#guess we can’t give this a gameplay tag anymore whoops

[aheathen-conceivably]

Miss Ostara,

As previously discussed, your grandmother’s will stated very explicitly that the home was to remain in the family. We have attempted to contact other relatives as you requested, but to no avail; and due to the aforementioned parameters our hands are tied in regard to your inquiries about selling the property. We apologize for this difficulty.

Unfortunately, if you do not agree to take over the property, it will be surrendered to the state. As you know, it has been abandoned for quite some time, and its condition has deteriorated accordingly. This most likely means that it will be condemned, and set for demolition in the months that follow.

Your response is needed ASAP.

[angelic-guardienne]

I just realized that I, a lifetime resident of Ignis Hell, never made a post on my thoughts on Episode Ignis!! So I’ll do that now I guess while everyone is asleep and not tag anyone because... yeah.

Spoilers galore bc I don’t know if I can write a coherent review w/o spoiling some things. Just a head’s up, this isn’t really the most comprehensive review, it’s more just me rambling a bit, maybe I’ll do a deeper one later but for now it’s just a bit of a ramble. (this got progressively less comprehensive as the post goes on so just... process with caution)

Cut!!

Um where to start... okay, the gameplay. 

I’d actually played with Ignis a bit in the main game before heading to his DLC, meaning I had a brief familiarity with his controls (so I wasn’t panicking like “hoLY SHIT bells and wHISTLes”), I just hadn’t known what the specializations were for, so that was nice. I like the way he controls. He’s very smooth, sometimes he moves a bit too fast for my eyes (looking at that lightning magic) but other than that loved it. Loved him. Wonderful controls. Heard the blizzard power was OP and I concur. I used it a lot, mostly switched between blizzard and fire, was rarely seen hitting that lightning unless it was for a Total Clarity attack, and even then... the fire. the blizzard.

Ignis’ battle cries! Lovely. I don’t understand the “you’re mine!” trend that seems to appear in every game I play, but it sounded great coming from his lips, so yeah, seal of approval. 

I thank the lord every day for Adam Croasdell.

Ignis taking down those huge MT armors with the lance in two blows! (i’m talking before that segment with Ravus... which I’ll address later i’m sure) I’m a big fan of that. If I saw him do that irl i’d literally collapse. I almost collapsed just watching him do it in the game, but i was already sitting so i didn’t. 

(There were many moments during the dlc where i literally collapsed, but let’s get into that later)

But going back to the voice acting. I heard that some people thought it was rather poor but I found it really great? Ignis sounded a little bit whiny at times and completely done with everyone and everything at others and I loved it. He always conveyed the right emotions. 

There were those moments of course (you guys know the one. where he pushes off the MTs in the “resist” timeline. and just. keeps screaming. you know the one) but they just made me laugh a bit instead of driving me away. I look fondly on them.

There were actually a lot of moments that made me laugh in this dlc, serious as it was, i just. must have a very lowkey sadistic part of me. I always laughed at the sad parts of movies as a child. anyways. before i talk about those let’s get into these

these being ravus

ravus ravus ravus. my boy. i loved him before and i love him even more now. i’ve had a ravus/oc in the works for a while now and... and now i have a soulmate au in the works as well. help. this just came to mind. i’m sinking further and further into ravus hell on a daily

won’t even get into ardyn hell

back to ravus

love my boy. wanna hug my boy. i knew he was gonna take luna’s death very poorly but i thought we were gonna get a grief scene and be done with it but we got a grief boss battle (which... was hard. he’s so op like... help. the whole time he was on my team i was so happy i didn’t have to fight him and then...) and not one, but TWO grief heavy scenes so i was beyond satisfied. it was great. 

uhhhh ravy’s beard. 3/10 lol. it’s starting to grow on me though (in a metaphorical sense. i can’t grow a beard.) someone give him a candy cane and put him in red and call him kris

uhhh

(this is getting less and less coherent as we go and i’m sorry)

i’m sorry ravus’ beard is so hilarious. did he grow it because there wasn’t anyone around anymore to tell him not to? whoops made myself sad haha 

Oh! let’s talk about ardyn!

loved all the ardyn content. ardyn made me laugh and curse a lot, mostly laugh because... so theatric. the hat (you know the lil pat pat he gives that MT soldier he puts his hat on) and his little scandalized noises (the gasp he makes when ignis presents the ring in the alt ending) and that fucking scene where he’s revealed to be a grave robber and summons the armiger like it’s snowing outside

which it probably was

beside the point

Ardyn was good in this dlc. thank you Darin de Paul. lovely. his evil laughs... chills down my spine. but he evil laughs in a way that makes me both want to punch him and laugh with him. ardyn ignites emotions in me that i cannot name. not good ones, but ones all the same.

seriously though even if i wasn’t a fan of ardyn, ardyn was great in this. he’s slimy as hell and honestly... wow. he seemed like he was losing him mind a bit in this dlc and i love it. i’m 99% sure it was because of the ring. ardyn’s always a little bit crazier when it comes to the ring and this was allllll about the ring. so kudos for making it a trend

i... have a lot of thoughts about ardyn here. i just can’t express them correctly right now. ask me about them later and maybe i’ll be able to articulate. i’m sick and barely awake and all my brain is giving me is an “ardyn? cool bro” help.

there was more i said i’d come back around and talk about. um.

that mini stealth segment with ravus! wild. literally collapsed and almost missed the quicktime event in the second one. now i wanna replay the episode just to see what happens when i miss the quicktime events. i wanna do that with all of them actually. catch me doing that after i pick up my controller again. missing literally every. quicktime. event.

WAIT CAN WE TALK ABOUT THAT PART WHERE IGNIS FUCKING FLINGS HIS DAGGER INTO THE FACE OF AN MT

BECAUSE THAT WAS HOT AS ALL HELL

HE JUST CASUALLY THREW IT

ALSO IGNIS HOLDING HIS DAGGERS BACKHAND IS MY WEAKNESS

WILL NEVER GET OVER EITHER OF THOSE THINGS

ohhh let’s talk about the parts where i literally collapsed.

1) when the eastern bridge collapsed just as ignis was about to cross it and he looked so done

2) when ravus and ignis did their stealth takedowns

3) when ignis was all “i presume you weren’t born with a prosthetic” like igNIS

4) when ardyn summoned his entire armiger to fire at ignis in the alt end

5) every time ignis screamed in general

6) when ardyn’s sword hit igs in the face and knocked him out

7) “This world means nothing to me. Do with it as you wish.”

8) AND THE LAUGH THAT IGNIS LETS OUT AFTER THAT LINE

9) when i got the bad fucking end because time limits

10) when ravus found lunafreya’s dead body and immediately went into rage mode

11) when ragey ravus attacked ignis

12) when ardyn showed up as gladio

13) obvi. ignis taking down the huge mts

14) while screeching in frustration, whenever ignis fell off of the fucking rooftops

15) oh, when ignis ripped off his earpiece

now let’s talk about the moments that made me laugh bc there were... admittedly quite a few

1) “Don’t be asinine.”

2) the way ardyn fuckin gasped when he saw that ignis had the ring in the alt ending

3) ignis pushing those MTs off of him in the “resist” timeline

4) ignis sprinting?

5) caligo immediately (and... ineffectively) trying to drag Ravy’s edges as soon as the man was out of earshot

6) ignis talking in his little earpiece 

7) “Have you lost your marbles?”

8) “I wouldn’t do that if I were you” Ardyn says a solid number of seconds after Ignis puts on the ring

9) actually all of ardyn’s quote regarding ignis wearing the ring? the man was just like... “wow who is this kid”

10) ravus calling ignis “boy”

11) ardyn just fucking tossing noctis

12) and then tossing ravus as well

13) ignis going full halt next to pryna even though noct is right there, seems even he can’t escape the power of dogs

14) “Let your hair down!”

15) ardyn summoning his entire armiger to attack Ignis with

16) gladiolus “if you’re alive then pick up the damn phone” amicitia

17) the fact that the empire just carries around coeurls for no other reason than to drop down on ignis as cannon fodder

18) ignis sounding (cordially) ticked off with literally every altissian aside from weskham

19) fuckin. watching caligo control his mech in the boat chase

and moments that produced emotions i cannot explain

1) ignis always getting close to the altar/noctis and then getting knocked away by a freak accident

2) iggy getting healed by the crystal’s light (you know the scene. his hair is all down and that’s... the most beautiful i’ve seen him)

3) ardyn going to stab noctis and the dramatic irony bc we know he wouldn’t actually kill him and is just getting a reaction from ignis

4) ravus throwing the dagger at ardyn!!

5) quick recipeh

6) getting fucking. knocked off the edges of buildings. and taking fall damage

7) “I don’t want to die without him”

8) ignis seeing the claw of the fallen mt and immediately thinking “hookshot”

9) one-man army ignis

10) ignis being so very realistically tired after every single battle

11) ignis with his hair all the way down

12) fire eyes

13) fire body

14) generally ignis living up to his name

15) fuckin. father christmas over there

16) ignis asking noctis not to complete the journey and noctis turning it around so quickly jk that actually really really hurt

17) having to watch ignis feel around for everything

18) also i don’t know if anyone else caught this, maybe it’s just my game but i noticed in the ardyn v ignis fight in the alt ending, a lot of the recorded sounds of noct warping/fighting are mixed in the jumble of ardyn and ignis’ fighting sounds. i can’t tell who is making said sounds but i hear them all the time

so yeah

my general view of episode ignis? heartwrenching, 10/10, would recommend, would play again, will play again, all the best things, love it very much, will hold it near and dear to my hear. lovely lovely dlc.