#renault unicorn overlord | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

randomnameless · 1 day ago

Text

More artbook stuff -

Devnotes about the rest of the Elheim gang (Ithilion, Railanor, Eltrinde, Galadmir and Alcina!)

Ithilion!

Who apparently emphasises the "dark elf" and how different it is from the traditional "green" stuff the light elves wear?

"a bit of fetishism" uhh... Are we talking about the belts? It's on par with Yugi/Atem's Battle City outfit lol, but fwiw, I like the yellow/brown thing he wears, is it a cape, or just something for flair, idk.

Elven Fencers are really an... odd class, they can support and stun enemies, but tbh, I feel like I never really knew how to use them properly, save for them being a magic unit and slap them a fire/ice/whatever tome to give X conferal to an unit.

I found the "wind barrier" skill they had sort of cool though, it looks rad and while they aren't supposed to be dodge tanks, the skill is always a pain to deal with when you face some elven fencers lol.

Character wise, Ithilion has a scripted romance with a human NPC (Elina?) girl he saves in Elheim - for all the "we are isolationists and think humans are trash" Eltrinde and Rosalinde - who only became "leaders" recently - welcomed some refugees from Cornia in Elheim, but then Elheim was invaded...

Ithilion is rescued by a bunch of human NPC who refuse to sell him to Zenoiran forces, he tries to solo them/escape on his own with some edgy "I can't be with you because we are at war and I might die" stuff, but Rosalinde and Railanor tease him about it in their supports, and culminates in him taking a "break" from his duties as Rosalinde's guard (rather her kicking him out) for the next 100 years, so he can live his romance with Elina and watch over their kids - epilogue confirms they got half elves and he watches happily over them.

Cucumber point though, that I'll have to check later if it was a localisation stuff or not : in his supports with both Rosalinde and Railanor, it's implied he is younger than them - and listening to Rosalinde's stories about the outside world made him want to become a guard (even if he tried to be edgy and pretend not to be interested, Rosalinde remembers how his ears would betray his excitation!) - but then with the character ages revealed, he is actually older than her...

FWIW, Ithilion's character is a nice one, but I wasn't really fond of his class so I never used him a lot, save for adding a 5th unit in a slot...

Eltrinde!

Rosalinde's younger twin sister, who basically has a support with Lex, out of anyone lol, explaining how dark and light elves aren't on bad terms with each - other unlike other settings where both races are used - and she and her sister are the result of an interspecies romance, her dad was a light elf, and her mom was a dark elf and the previous Priestress, aka the leader of Elheim (it periodically changes, sometimes the light elf leader is the the leader of the country, some other time it's the dark elf leader).

Now...

Dev notes wise.... ugh.

Shrine maidens wearing leotards being a rule? Yeah, I don't believe it - this doesn't feel like the Cornian royal family being inspired by the previous Unicorn Knight design, but more like the devs wanted to draw ladies in leotards, and tried to give some coherence by making twins wear more or less the same clothes, but with some differences.

Pure'n'innocent figure... well yes, Eltrinde's basically, for a good part of the game, the "damsel in distress" Alain'n'Rosalinde have to save... and whose body was/would ultimately be used as a souljar by Alcina to gain a long-lived body, or access to Eltrinde's Priestress' powers.

When she's freed, there's not a lot left to do in Elheim - granted, we see her being worried and horrified when Gary wants to burn Elheim's sacred tree, and it was a welcomed surprise to see her storm and lash out at Baltro (and Alcina? I forgot) for desacrating her brethrens by basically reviving them to use them as zombies - I really liked this scene because if she had been the "demure'n'innocent'n'pure" archetype before, this scene was basically "Eltrinde is fucking pissed".

Of course we learn more about her in her rapport convos, how she loves to spend time with her sister, has a petty side (rip Scarlett's floromancy) and unorthodox passion for mushrooms which is weird for an elf - that gag is even played in the cover art for this artbook, where she basically carries a small mushroom basket :)

Too bad the way the game is structured, we couldn't have her talk more to other characters or engage with plot events from the other routes - her Alain's rapport convo, while playing again with the "romance" trope because much like her sister, she's designed to be a love interest, at least suggested that she knows humans and elves express their feelings differently and tries to adopt human customs when talking/dealing with Alain...

It's a shame it's only in this rapport conversation, because it's pointed out that Eltrinde and Rosalinde are less "insular" than, in general, the rest of the elven NPCs, but I would have liked to see more of that in her various convos.

Gameplay wise, she's more geared towards healing than attacking than her sister, but can also be deadly and with the right combination, Eltrinde can basically make sure that a random team thrown out for memetic purposes can survive at least one or two rounds and kill stuff.

(that was totally not me making a Mordon centric team and not having anyone being able to tank lol)

Galadmir's outfit is the "traditional design of the female elf archer" lol, so we can compare how different, color wise at least, Lydielle is to hers!

GG to VW to have managed to animate all the "floppy" parts when she draws her string, shoots, dodges etc etc because it sounds like a nightmare, but yep, those animations are cool.

Cucumber points for that "defeated" sprite, I mean gratuitous ass and broken spine is just... sigh. Linharagos' sprite is him being on his back, but somehow, for the female archer, she must give a view of her rear :(

Design wise though, it feels like her ears are longer than the other elves we meet, and I found it nice how the devs gave her some accessories (earrings and headdress).

As for Galadmir in herself, she's basically a mentor figure - who teaches and mentors Lydielle in her own training! - who blames herself for not being in the castle when it was overtaken by Zenoira, and when Eltrinde became possessed, but ultimately joins us, not before making sure, though, that Alain's group is trustworthy (even if Rosalinde and Eltrinde are with them...).

So she cooks some "earl grey" backstory asking the gang to help her, they do - while fighting together and when the paralogue is over, it's revealed her "earl grey" backstory was something she cooked on spot, to judge Alain's character (and Lex's lol).

Not a lot to say about her character, save that I liked how her playful side was illustrated in the cover of that artbook, with her teasing Virginia with a worm.

Ah.

Noma-san apparently loves bazongas, so the female elven fencers ended up like this.

Compared to the "cool" design the male elven fencers have this is... Well, okay, I understand dark elves and light elves are supposed to have different cultures and outfits and all, but if you put Linharagos next to Galadmir, it'd make sense to think that they're in the same class : their outfit has enough similarities to draw that link.

For elven fencers though?

It's even more ridiculous because the devs added a rapport convo (tfw Lex is basically the plot exposition guy) where it's explained that her lack of clothes is a choice, because faeries (the source of elven powers) don't like armor/clothes that's why she hangs out not wearing a lot of tissue... but then, Ithilion also uses the same fairies, and he wears pants so... Yeah :/

Even the watsonian explanation doesn't work.

As for Railanor's character, she's basically Colm but for Rosalinde (who still outwardly, at least, cares more about her than Melisandre does for her retainer!) and always dead serious when she has to deal with her liege's ideas (lampshaded in the rapport convo she has with Colm lol) - story wise she became enthralled by Zenoiran forces after creating a diversion to buy time for Rosalinde to escape, and Rosalinde herself felt so upset/horrible for what happened to her, in the map when we have to defeat possessed!Railanor, Rosalinde's seiyuu really managed to convey the feelings of desperation but also anger at the Zenoiran random who was hijacking her friend's body.

She was also the one who trained and mentored Ithilion, so character wise she's alright, but it's really her design that puts me off, or rather, I can't take her seriously lol

And we finish Elheim with a blast : Alcina!

"Strong, scary woman" okay, but the pose where she takes damages is anything but screaming "strong and scary".

"Obsessive feminity", are they talking about her hand gestures when she talks (like in her portraits?) or her animations - maybe it's me, but they're fluid (lel water magic) and it feels like she's dancing or something, instead of being static when casting.

Well, it's everything I have to say about Alcina!

Rather, everything positive I have to say lol, I wouldn't pull the sexism card with her writing (burning the world to reunite with her lost love) because Elheim basically gives us UO's version of Carlyle (I'll cover Gary later!), but I wonder if the devs' mention about "obsessive feminity"... well, betrays that, yep, Alcina's ultimate goal is due to her being an obsessed "woman"...

So yeah... Sexist writing :/

(rip Gary)

Character wise, bar the forced sad uwus, Alcina is still a major thorn in the side of the Zenoirans because she pursues her own goals - hell Baltro would have killed Alain and Eltrinde if not for her meddling, and she was the one who "didn't report" that Alain was hiding on Parevia Island for years, waiting for him to grow old enough to be suitable vessel for his grandpa!

Lore wise at least, she's a stupidly powerful mage and force to be reckoned with, so her betrayal hurt Cornia a lot (Yahna especially) and is the reason why Elheim fell, Elves trusted her with the secret formula to pass through their magic forest, and she used that trust to invade the country. We also learn that she and Gary led the campaign in Drakengard/Drakenhold, but due to the way this game was written, we can't have any Drakengardian confront her about that (was she the one who killed King Hugo? Does Aramis remember her?).

I'll maybe write something about her being a parallel to Reimann later on - in the prologue, when she was a blue unit and on Ilenia's side, she called him out for joining the rebellion due to his personal interests, but it's basically what she does after Ilenia's death. There's a mention of her siding with Ilenia because she was Gerard's daughter, and she knows using Alain as a souljar would make Gerard upset (was she aware Virginia was hiding in Drakengard when she led her campaign there? Would it have changed a thing?) but the idea that Gerard could return is worth every sacrifice so here she goes.

I wouldn't be so sour about Alcina if the game didn't... force fed us the "sad uwus" at her death, without giving any voice to Rosalinde, or hell even Eltrinde herself during her final cutscene.

Oh well.

Next : furries Reimann's kingdom!

#unicorn overlord stuff #artbook stuff #typing this about Alcina made me realise that there's a lot of stuff that could have went with the Cornian Traitors #like was she aware Renault and Hodrick were brainwashed? Gary wasn't at all #granted she learns about the brainwash/soul hijacking process later on so was she aware or not?#and about Ilenia being Galerius' host?#It's too bad that the elf leaders don't have any special cutscene with the boss of elf land #Yahna is all rest in peace master but damn #I can understand her having mixed feelings about this situation #but why not giving us any insight about how eltrinde and rosalinde feel for finally getting rid of the one who betrayed them #and ruined their country?#hopefully in Bastorias Morard will have some lines with Eligor #I wonder if the devs played or heard about Tellius when they designed Bastorias and came up with the plot lol

2 notes · View notes