Fate/stay night [Archive]

Talon87

07-28-2010, 08:02 PM

Having relived the fight between Archer and Berserker so many times on my computer and iPhone, and having not relived the moments from the second half of Fate, I had forgotten why I disliked the anime's second half so much until just now upon completing the fight against Berserker. That was the cheapest, most deus ex machina defeat ever. :roll: I remembered Caliburn's involvement in his death and was hoping for something awesome, but instead all I get is:

Despite Excalibur being the more famous sword by name, Caliburn is blessed with the ability to lop off Berserker's arms whereas Excalibur can't. And this makes sense how? :? WHY? :? I'm pretty sure that Logic dictates, "If a stronger Noble Phantasm can't do it, then a weaker one certainly can't." Blah blah Caliburn is Saber's preferred sword blah blah blah, it's just a bunch of bull. :|
One use of Caliburn on Berserker's person is said to "have killed him 5 times in a row." WTF, that doesn't even begun to make sense. When Archer killed Berserker six times, it was because he delivered six different fatal blows to six different parts of the body using six different projected Noble Phantasms inside of his Reality Marble. That makes sense. When Saber slashed at Berserker only once and dealt a fatal blow to his chest, it was said that she killed him five times at once. That doesn't make sense. -______-; No, no! Don't explain it! Pleeeeeeeease don't explain it! -_-; I don't want to hear the bullshit defense that Type-Moon and/or the fans have come up with for this. Please, just ... leave me alone, and let me hate this scene for what it is: poor writing. :|
Ilya commands Berserker to dodge Saber's attack but, according to Shirou, he couldn't. Caliburn was faster. Well guess what? Ilya still had her Command Crest. And (unbeknownst to Shirou & Co. but knownst to us!) Ilya is born from the Holy Grail itself, a being of pure magic. There is absolutely no reason for us to believe that she would not have ordered Berserker to dodge this attack and, had she been ordering him to do the impossible as so many Masters before her have done of their servants, that she too would have used up a Command Spell (whether she wished to or not!) and that, by the magic of the Holy Grail itself, Berserker would have been able to perform a miracle and dodge Saber's blow.

I mean, for God's sake, man! :evil: Saber can teleport to school 10 minutes' walk away and catch Shirou falling from the third story of a building but Berserker can't teleport two feet to the left to dodge an incoming sword? :roll: COME ON!

What a disappointing fight. The only part of it which was remotely satisfying was Rin's failure to leave a mark on Berserker, only for her to then say "SURPRISE!" and unleash four more jewel-spells all at once, only for BERSERKER to then say "Surprise back, bitch. =P" when we see that his head, blown off by Rin, has regenerated in no time at all.

And I'm supposed to believe that he couldn't dodge Caliburn and that one slice from it killed him five times over? Puhlease. :roll:

Doppleganger

07-28-2010, 08:58 PM

Despite Excalibur being the more famous sword by name, Caliburn is blessed with the ability to lop off Berserker's arms whereas Excalibur can't. And this makes sense how? :? WHY? :? I'm pretty sure that Logic dictates, "If a stronger Noble Phantasm can't do it, then a weaker one certainly can't." Blah blah Caliburn is Saber's preferred sword blah blah blah, it's just a bunch of bull. :|

This is what bothered me most when I saw that scene, but it seems to be because Excalibur is actually a weaker Noble Phantasm in its base form (Invisible Air - C Rank) than Caliburn (A Rank). Excalibur's A++ ability is the nuke, and Ilya admitted if Saber used that, Berserker would have lost all of his live at once.

Berserker can't be harmed by anything less than a B Rank Noble Phantasm, which is why Saber did no damage battling him.

No, no! Don't explain it!

I'm going to anyway, lol. I'm not defending that the scene is poorly written, because I raged fairly hard at it too. But there's *some* semblance of logic to it, albeit errant (these are largely my own ideas):

Berserker's ability is apparently based on the Dungeons & Dragons spell "Stoneskin". Stoneskin creates a magical layer of "stone" around the user that absorbs a single damage-inflicting attack. After that, the layer is discarded. The number of layers is determined by the level of the mage casting it, but certain weapons can bypass the protection entirely and hurt the mage protected by them.

Berserker's lives are conceptually similar, except the next life (skin) only triggers after he receives a mortal wound. On top of that, Berserker gains immunity to an attack used against him once, and the lives regenerate after a time.

This is why Archer was fairly deadly against Berserker, and the damage to Berserker so varied and extensive. It's also why Ilya gave Berserker more lives than he had the night before.

Excalibur killing Berserker makes sense because he'd be completely obliterated, and there's no way he could regenerate if there was no body left. But why Caliburn's single stab could be so deadly, I'm still at a loss. Especially when one learns the limitations of Shirou's ability.

Ilya commands Berserker to dodge Saber's attack but, according to Shirou, he couldn't. Caliburn was faster. Well guess what? Ilya still had her Command Crest. And (unbeknownst to Shirou & Co. but knownst to us!) Ilya is born from the Holy Grail itself, a being of pure magic. There is absolutely no reason for us to believe that she would not have ordered Berserker to dodge this attack and, had she been ordering him to do the impossible as so many Masters before her have done of their servants, that she too would have used up a Command Spell (whether she wished to or not!) and that, by the magic of the Holy Grail itself, Berserker would have been able to perform a miracle and dodge Saber's blow.

Can't talk about this yet. :X

And I'm supposed to believe that he couldn't dodge Caliburn and that one slice from it killed him five times over? Puhlease. :roll:

It was awful and cheesy.

Talon87

07-28-2010, 09:40 PM

God, I love Ilya. :3 (In a non-lolikon way, of course! =P) She is just so adorable. I totally sympathize with Shirou, and laugh heartily and approvingly at all the comics which joke that Ilya is the girl best able to steal Shirou away from the competition. (See picture.)

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/th_1162421705247.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/1162421705247.jpg)

(click here for lazily-translated version) (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/1162421705247-edit.jpg)

If the game was a sexless harem game that allowed you the full gamut of characters to pick from, I think I'd totally pick Ilya on the first run-through, not to mention probably half the runthroughs I played. She's just too gosh durn adorable. Especially -- through creepily! -- when she gets into those icily-cold death modes of hers. "If you don't summon one soon, you'll die, Onii-chan." Adorable, in its own Angel of Death way. lol

Talon87

07-28-2010, 11:29 PM

Awwwwwwwwww. :( At 21 hours 38 minutes, I got my first ever Dead End. :( It happened when Caster attacked the Emiya residence with her golems, and I had two choices.

1. Send Saber after Caster, while I protect Rin and Ilya
2. Go with Saber

Between two choices like these, normally I'd pick #2; but I felt like picking #1 just to see what would happen, and this was the result. :( Aw man. And I was hoping to beat the game with zero Dead End encounters, too. :| :oops:

==============================

Anyway, something else I wanted to say. Earlier, I wanted to point out a plot hole in the franchise, but it looks like I was wrong after all, so let me tell you about the perceived hole plus the Type-Moon answer I just saw mere moments ago in-game:

Assassin's identity in the 5th Holy Grail War is Sasaki Kojirou. The game makes it pretty clear that Kojirou is not the same entity as the Sasaki Kojirou who really lived. Rather, he is the legendary spirit known as Sasaki Kojirou, the legend whom men, women, and children today think of and speak of when they say his name. As such, Assassin is capable of performing superhuman -- or even superphysical -- feats, like when he uses his tsubame gaeshi to generate two (and what he says should have been three!) simultaneous slashes.

Well, running off of this law of FSN physics, I began to wonder, "Hey wait a second: how come Saber's a girl, then? :?" After all, even if the argument is that King Arthur's true identity in life was a girl named Arturia, that shouldn't have mattered. We know King Arthur today as King Arthur. Everyone thinks of him as a man. Every story in the written record speaks of him as a man. And so his heroic spirit ought to have been male, not female! This inconsistency irked me, and I was going to post about it ...

... until I got to the scene where Shirou asks Saber about her wish, and he discovers the truth behind Saber's inability to turn back into a spirit. (As a reminder moreso to myself in the future reading this than to anyone else, I write the following!) It turns out that Saber was like a living example of Lancer's Gae Bolg: the cause and effect of her contract with the Holy Grail Wars is inverted. Most heroes find themselves summoned into the war against their wishes but are promised as a reward the Holy Grail. In Saber's case, she made a wish on her deathbed: "grant me the Grail and I shall become a heroic spirit [i.e. a slave in spirit form for all eternity to the protection of humankind]." Since the Grail took her up on her offer, the way her entry into the Grail war works like this:

(a) she's still alive, but about to die
(b) she goes into the 4th Grail War
(c) she loses
(d) she returns to the battlefield in England
(e) she goes into the 5th Grail War

Basically, Saber is still alive -- and the Saber who Shirou sees before him isn't the heroic spirit King Arthur, but rather is the about-to-be-heroic-spirit as she really existed. In her own words, Arturia almost dead: [i]that is who Shirou and the others are seeing before them. This is why she can't turn into a ghost, and this is also why she's a girl and not a guy.

Doppleganger

07-29-2010, 12:02 AM

Between two choices like these, normally I'd pick #2; but I felt like picking #1 just to see what would happen, and this was the result. :( Aw man. And I was hoping to beat the game with zero Dead End encounters, too. :| :oops:

Actually, Tiger Stamps are a good thing. The meta universe of the Tiger Dojo actually adds some insight into what's going on in the novel which isn't apparent even when all three routes have been played. It's also great for building up experience with Taiga (who's only a minor character otherwise) and Ilya herself. Also that bizarre SD Rin who appears from time to time.

Basically, Saber is still alive -- and the Saber who Shirou sees before him isn't the heroic spirit King Arthur, but rather is the about-to-be-heroic-spirit as she really existed. In her own words, Arturia almost dead: that is who Shirou and the others are seeing before them. This is why she can't turn into a ghost, and this is also why she's a girl and not a guy.

Two small corrections. What Saber contracted was not to become a Heroic Spirit, but a "counter guardian". There's three types of beings enshrined in the "Throne of Heroes" as you'll find out in UBW, had Saber died normally she would have gone on to be a regular Heroic Spirit. Counter Guardians are a bit different, and the third category will also be discussed.

Second, although I hate to chip away at your (very correct) conclusion, it's entirely possible even if Saber were a Heroic Spirit, she still might not be male. Servants gain a "legend bonus" that enhances their abilities in the era they're summoned and the region they're summoned. Cu Chulainn, for example, is close to how powerful he was in life as a Servant. This is because he's virtually unknown in Japan, and Irish mythology isn't as well known as Norse or Greek mythology. However, if the Holy Grail War took place in Ireland, he'd be much more powerful. But, while these "legend bonuses" can enhance a Servant's parameters (Strength, Agility), or the Noble Phantasms they're believed to possess, they can't directly contradict historical fact.

Let's say Jesus Christ had Rank A in Divinity. Even if Jesus was summoned as a Servant in an Islamic nation, where the majority of people believe he was merely a holy prophet and not a God incarnate, he wouldn't suddenly lose that divine attribute.

Another way of framing it is that Servants can be considered a "role" and Heroic Spirits the "actors/actresses" who play that role. Even if an audience expects a certain type of person playing that role, the actual person can be very different from the expectation. Although within the context of the "play", the actors/actresses abilities will scale to what is expected of the role. For most of the cases in the Grail War, the actresses/actors are sometimes portraying a caricature of themselves.

Talon87

07-29-2010, 04:53 AM

One thing I vaguely remember from the original series, one thing I absolutely despised, is happily missing from the video game's version of events. That is in the anime, Shirou had the potential to become the greatest wizard the world had ever known but he gave that up by transferring his Magic Circuit (or something like it) into Saber in order to keep her alive; but in the original video game story, he does no such auto-castration and is repeatedly hinted at being an under-the-radar sorcerer (due to his remarkable regenerative abilities, his ability to project Noble Phantasms, etc). It really pisses me off when somebody has C-level talent but A-level potential only to say, "Well, it's not like I'm going to miss it since I've never even had or known it, so I guess I'll go ahead and part with my chance for A-level talent after all by selling it to you." it happened with Toya in Cardcaptor Sakura, too, and it really pissed me off then, as well. I'm so, so glad to see it missing from FSN the video game, i.e. the most canonical of the canon sources.

On a different note, man, Caster sure does get hosed in Fate. 8O Gilgamesh (still unidentified) just shows up and it's Game Over for Medea.

I made it through Shirou's late night chat with Kotomine about Saber and the rogue Servant from the last war, and saved there and shut down for the night.

Btw, I don't have any Tiger Stamps. Should I have? Are they supposed to spawn in response to dead ends being reached?

Doppleganger

07-29-2010, 05:53 AM

That was censorship, the anime had Shirou transfer a whole mana circuit (which makes no sense, mana circuits = blood vessels, even Servants have them) into Saber because they couldn't say semen had mana in it.

Tiger Stamps are collected once you get a Bad End, although I think you can only see which you've collected when you finish the route. Collecting them all unlocks some omake content at the end of the game.

Talon87

07-29-2010, 04:01 PM

Okay, Fate path just continues to piss me off. Eager to wrap it up so I can get to the GOOD paths. =P

I just got through Shirou's fight with Gilgamesh (whose identity is now revealed). I got to see Gilgamesh reveal his personality, then reveal his identity, then reveal "Gate of Babylon," then pull Ea from it, and finally perform Enuma Elish. All of that was okay (although Gilgamesh is hardly tolerable, being the only character in the game more chauvinistic than Shirou) ...

... but then I got to the bit where Shirou tries to block Gilgamesh with Caliburn, and Gilgamesh cuts Shirou (and I paraquote!) "from the left shoulder down to the waist," effectively cutting him in two, with the use of Gram, the sword whose legend predates Caliburn's and upon which Caliburn's is likely based. And what happens? Shirou himself says, "If I stand right now, my guts will spill out onto the ground and I'll die instantly." And then what happens? I'm given a choice: Stand or Don't Stand. I know where this is going and, groaning, I pick Stand. And then what happens? Shirou survives. For the fourth goddamn time (fifth if you count Vs. Rider at school!), Shirou survives wounds that should have ended him right there.

1. Lancer blows away Shirou's heart. He's about to die but Tohsaka arrives and repairs his heart with her 10 years' worth of stored-up magic in her pendant.

1½. Lancer returns to finish the job and almost succeeds but Saber appears.

2. Shirou jumps in front of Saber to block a blow from Berserker. He is cut in half. Everyone assumes he will die. But he doesn't.

3. Shirou blocks Rider's lacerative assaults with his arms. She mercilessly slices apart his arms and torso. As he falls to his death from the 3rd story at school, he is miraculously caught by Saber and even more miraculously manages to heal off his wounds.

3½. Shirou manages to survive the fight against Berserker. That alone is WTF-worthy, but technically Berserker never lands many blows on Shirou in this fight, so meh. (See 1½ for another example of a technically non-death but still as-good-as-death scene.)

4. Shirou is stabbed by Caster's knife. Tohsaka later says that Shirou's spinal cord was severed. She begins to think that Shirou has the regenerative capabilities of a vampire. Shirou thinks to himself that he wouldn't put it past Tohsaka to experimentally decapitate Shirou in an effort to kill him.

5. Shirou is blown away by Gilgamesh. He cannot move. He literally cannot move. Every bone in his body is broken. He is in immense pain. Even with the magic of regeneration, he can only barely move his right fingers, and then right arm, as the fight wears on between Saber and Gilgamesh. Then, he activates his Magic Circuit and decides to use magic to propel his body into battle against Gilgamesh. At which point, he is cleaved into two, right down the middle (well, from the left shoulder to the waist -- so while his head is spared, his heart should still be toast, as should his stomach, spleen, and bowels. :roll: ).

It's getting old. REALLY fucking old. It takes away all suspense when Shirou has "the body that refuses to die." It also really cheapens Archer's death (since, when you think about it, he should have all the inherit qualities of regeneration which Shirou has, and he should have a connection to his Master which allows for the siphoning of magic energy to be channeled into healing).

I mean, I just don't care anymore at this point about Shirou almost dying. Type-Moon has truly taken away any and all suspense from these moments for me. If they were to show me in the next scene that Shirou was sliced into four different meat chunks, I would not expect him to die from it at this point. I would yawn and say, "He'll heal." And he would. Because it's getting to be this dumb and this predictable. :roll:

Doppleganger

07-29-2010, 06:57 PM

If you hate Gilgamesh now...

Also I can't comment on your rant, because there is an explanation for it, in Fate at least. ^^;

Talon87

07-29-2010, 08:01 PM

I don't necessarily hate Gilgamesh -- yet? ^^; You've got me nervous, Doppel! -- but I just hate how he's chauvinistic to the point of being Caveman Bubba. You know the type: "you me wife, BAM BAM," a swing of the club, a KO'd cavewoman, and subsequently a knocked up cavewoman. I mean, hell, in his conversation with Saber he even went so far as to delight in the fact that she told him "No" and said he'd have pleasure raping her into submission. I mean, that is some serious Caveman Bubba talk.

Shirou gets 2nd place. He's a classic example of a young man who is chivalric to the point of becoming chauvinistic. Instead of admiring Saber's fighting skills, he keeps raging over the fact that she's a slender-bodied girl and would be better suited to leading a girly life instead of being the king. I mean, that's chauvinism. That is textbook chauvinism. "Girls can't be leaders." I know he thinks he's being all superhero chivalric, but he's not. He doesn't realize it but he's not. And that's what's irksome to me about him.

=================================

Anyway, right now I'm at the part where:
* Shirou went to the church to talk about Gilgamesh for the second time
* no Kotomine
* "Go downstairs?" Y/N --> I picked Y. Obviously IRL I'd not have picked it when the game told me I was thinking "If I go down there, I know I will die", but this is FSN :roll: , the game where you're always supposed to pick the most suicidal option, it seems.
* Shirou discovers what happened to all those other kids from 10 years ago. :(
Hand-in-hand with that, naturally, he also discovers what's been keeping Gilgamesh alive all these years.
* Lance to the chest! That's the sixth time Shirou's been given a mortal wound. Or is it? 'Cause yet again -- *GROAN* -- we have an injury that just barely missed his heart.
* Shirou claims his eyes were open but he could not see. That he could not feel his limbs. Given what he just saw, this made me think "holy fucking shit, Kotomine amputated his limbs and gouged out his eyes 8O". You would think that by now I would be used to Type-Moon's gross exaggeration of the protagonist's injuries, but ... alas, no. I am still not used to it. Because I fell for it hook, line, and sinker. Meaning ...
* ... that when I then see Shirou is fine, and pretty much only in pain because of a lance to the chest, I decide to take a break from playing.

Gyad the second half of this story is frustrating! :lol: Now I remember why I hated it so much! It's so illogical and un-epic! All the cool epic shit takes place in the first half! Sigh, sigh, siiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiigh! :lol:

Doppleganger

07-29-2010, 09:27 PM

big bad birtha

07-29-2010, 09:54 PM

I still hate Gilgamesh for what he did in UBW.

As for the whole surviving a blow that should've killed you thing, Type-Moon overuses the hell out of it. By the time I played Tsukihime, I was kinda tired of it.

I also still think there should've been an Illiya path. I mean, as far as interests go, the other three are kinda dull. Illiya's also kinda like a child Arcueid.

Talon87

07-29-2010, 09:56 PM

Okay, it was officially revealed just now that Shirou has Saber's Excalibur's sheath inside his body. (Bizarre.) But this makes sense as to:

(a) how he summoned Saber -- specifically Saber -- in the first place, and
(b) he can't die.

Still, it's sort of lame. I will be only too glad if this plot device is conveniently absent from the other routes. Or, at the very least, if it is not as heavily leaned upon.

Doppleganger

07-29-2010, 10:36 PM

I also still think there should've been an Illiya path. I mean, as far as interests go, the other three are kinda dull. Illiya's also kinda like a child Arcueid.

Supposedly, HF is a combo Sakura/Ilya Route because Nasu was too time pressed and/or lazy to flesh out a route specifically for her.

UBW-HF, not for Talon yet:

Canon states that among all the women in the 5th Holy Grail War, Archer only has a particularly history with Ilya. He has that beginning history with Saber, and knows her identity (implying he stuck with her for a while) but anything further isn't clear.

It is hinted that in Archer's universe, everyone died except Shirou and Ilya, and that Ilya's presence was a major factor in preventing Shirou from becoming Archer, but her death had the opposite effect. Because Ilya strained her body beyond its limits by controlling Berserker, even if she survives the war she dies within a year of the 5th Holy Grail War ending (Fate/hollow ataraxia takes place half a year later).

My own idea is that Archer failed to stop the Grail's evil in his time-line, which had world-affecting consequences. This would set the stage for him to evolve into the Archer we know today.

Talon87

07-30-2010, 01:38 AM

I just beat Fate. :D It ended better than I was beginning to fear. I had completely forgotten about (or did the anime not even use this plot device?) how Saber uses Avalon to defeat Gilgamesh and how Shirou simultaneously uses a projection of Avalon to defeat Kotomine. That was cool.

I liked the epilogue. I'm happy to see that Ilya is alive because I remember from way back when Doppel (or somebody!) said to me after I finished the anime, "You know, Ilya dies after a little bit because she's a magical being created by the Grail, and so without it she ceases to exist." Maybe that was just for the anime, I dunno. But regardless, it was great to see that Ilya was still very much alive two months (April 7, it said!) after the 5th Holy Grail War ended.

But ... she didn't get to live with Shirou? :3 ^^; Aww man! I was hoping he'd have adopted her! Taiga adopting Ilya is just ... I dunno, kinda weird. Taiga doesn't seem like Mommy material. (And seeing how Ilya reacted with Taiga in the epilogue, I guess I'm proven right! :lol: )

But I wonder ... why would Ilya not want to go back to being with the Einzberns? And why wouldn't they demand her back? I mean, whether Ilya is Kiritsugu's and Irisviel's daughter or not, I have no idea (still haven't read Fate / Zero!), but assuming that Irisviel is Ilya's mother, then even if Irisviel is deceased by the time of the events in FSN, wouldn't that still mean that Ilya's got a maternal grandfather or grandmother back in Germany who misses her?

Maybe this will be addressed in Unlimited Blade Works or Heaven's Feel.

DOPPEL! :( I unlocked all of the artwork for the Fate path except for one random piece of art! What happened!? :( What did I do wrong? ;_; (If you load up the game and go to the in-game gallery, it's the very first picture on Page 2. The one to the left of Rider slitting her own neck.)

Also ... without spoilering too much, what is the best way to get onto the UBW path? How does it work? Does it ...

1. Let me pick when I start a new file? I doubt it, because of the "Try again from the night of the 3rd day" message.

2. Offer me new selections on Tohsaka's Prologue route when we reach the night of the third day, February 2nd?

3. Offer me old selections on (ditto) but which now have new consequences?

4. Offer me new selections on Shirou's Main Story route when we reach the night of the third day, February 2nd?

5. Offer me old selections on (ditto) but which now have new consequences?

Doppleganger

07-30-2010, 02:08 AM

But ... she didn't get to live with Shirou? :3 ^^; Aww man! I was hoping he'd have adopted her! Taiga adopting Ilya is just ... I dunno, kinda weird. Taiga doesn't seem like Mommy material. (And seeing how Ilya reacted with Taiga in the epilogue, I guess I'm proven right! :lol: )

She basically does, since Taiga freeloads at Shirou's house and Ilya comes with her.

Maybe this will be addressed in Unlimited Blade Works or Heaven's Feel.

It will.

DOPPEL! :( I unlocked all of the artwork for the Fate path except for one random piece of art! What happened!? :( What did I do wrong? ;_; (If you load up the game and go to the in-game gallery, it's the very first picture on Page 2. The one to the left of Rider slitting her own neck.)

You likely picked an option following that battle that skipped that CG, but the end result was the same.

Also ... without spoilering too much, what is the best way to get onto the UBW path? How does it work? Does it ...

It works like how you dock onto Coco's Route in Ever17, new options appear that weren't available in your first play. There's only a single option to enter UBW, while several to get into HF. And you can't get to HF without going through UBW first.

Talon87

07-30-2010, 02:40 AM

Okay, well I'm not going to look it up. I'm just going to try my best and see if I can get it. I'll answer every question that pits Rin against Saber with "Rin", and likewise Rin against Sakura with "Rin," and I figure that'll get me there. If that's not the trick? Then I'll just have to hope I'll know it when I see it.

Doppleganger

07-30-2010, 06:41 AM

Random plugging and not caring about Bad Ends would work too...and earn you Tiger Stamps. :V Although not being "pro-Saber" just means when Kotomine asks Saber to betray Shirou, she very well might.

I think the CG you're missing is Saber scaling a skyscraper with Rider, but I'm not 100% sure. If you take a screen of the first and second page I could easily identify which one you're probably missing.

It's been a while since I played the game, but I remember a specific event in the tower after Rider was defeated that, upon my play-through, didn't yield what I expected. After Saber defeated Rider, Shinji ran away...and was killed. Supposedly, following after Shinji would result in Shirou coming face-to-face with Berserker, who would smash him into goo. In my game, Shirou found nothing, then returned to the roof to find Saber. I might have built up too many Saber points for that to have resulted in a Bad End though, I don't know the full details of how that works.

big bad birtha

07-30-2010, 06:47 AM

Umm, I decided to take a look into what CG you were missing, and it seems to be one from Saber's past. Did you ever get a choice to give Saber a stuffed doll, or something asking about a pet? It's been a while, but I think giving her a stuffed doll unlocks it.

Talon87

07-30-2010, 01:44 PM

Doppel: I never got any Tiger Stamps, despite two Dead Ends reached. I think it's because the Tiger Dojo asks me, "Do you want a Hint?" and every time I have willingly said "No" because I genuinely do not want spoilers. I think that maybe because I click "No," it doesn't register. If this logic is wrong, then I don't know what the problem is. Regardless, I have no Tiger Stamps despite clearing Fate and along the way having reached two Dead Ends.

BBB: We went to the plushie store on our date, but that was way, way past the Rider incident. At that time, I (Shirou) asked Saber what she likes, and she commented "lions and panthers." I assume we got her one but I never got to see it.

Doppleganger

07-30-2010, 05:35 PM

The hints are pretty non-descript, they tell you exactly what you didn't do. Something like, "Shirou, you should be more manly! Don't leave Saber behind even if you're concerned about me!".

The only exception would be Saber turning on Shirou due to a lack of Saber points, where they'd tell you to replay the game and be nicer to Saber. But that's only marginally worse.

Talon87

07-30-2010, 10:07 PM

Wow, that was pretty obvious. "Oh look: it's actually giving me a choice this time about whether to halt Saber's advance against Archer or not." Talk about majorly changing history! And so far it sure has. 8O With Shirou down one Command Spell and Tohsaka up one; with Archer actually able to participate in fights; and with Team Tohsaka considerably less indebted to Team Shirou, this is shaping up to be a very different Holy Grail War. And I haven't even finished their first fight with Berserker yet.

For the record, I picked "Don't stop her" the first time, thinking that -- since that was the crueler, darker option -- it would lead me to the crueler, darker Shirou of UBW (and subsequently HF). When I noticed that NOTHING HAPPENED, I was like, "Wuh oh :oops: , let's back up and try that again. ^^;"

Talon87

07-30-2010, 10:11 PM

So, I hear there's a movie going to be made! Looks like HECK FROZE OVER after-all and we're getting Unlimited Blade Works!!!

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/anime.php?id=10981

Doppel, I looked into this a bit more last night. Seems like the UBW movie is in the exact same position as the Haruhi movie:

* it has aired
* but it hasn't yet come out on DVD
* nor has it yet been English subtitled

Hopefully both films will come out on DVD soon. :(

Doppleganger

07-31-2010, 02:05 AM

For the record, I picked "Don't stop her" the first time, thinking that -- since that was the crueler, darker option -- it would lead me to the crueler, darker Shirou of UBW (and subsequently HF). When I noticed that NOTHING HAPPENED, I was like, "Wuh oh :oops: , let's back up and try that again. ^^;"

Actually, I made the same mistake.

Talon87

08-01-2010, 01:08 AM

Rider's dead. :( Archer has attempted to kill me at the Ryudou Temple. :( Tohsaka very clearly has feelings towards me which she has difficulty accepting. :lol:

Caster is much more badass / gets to do much more in this story path. But if memory serves, isn't she at her best in Heaven's Feel?

Some of the differences between Fate and UBW I am able to accept and really enjoy. For instance, I'm able to accept and enjoy all the added conversations between Shirou and Archer, things which naturally wouldn't have gotten to take place in the Fate timeline where Archer spent most of his time at Tohsaka's, healing. But the fact that Shirou isn't sharing dreams with Saber anymore, for instance, is something which makes me go, "Huh? :? But wait a second ... shouldn't that be happening regardless of the timeline?" It's moments like these where I think Ever17 does a much better job at exploring alternate timelines. Nothing that happens in the You path contradicts information in the Sora path. Nothing in the Tsugumi path contradicts information in the Sara path. They're just different paths with different sights to see. And then they all come together for the Coco path which, while having new twists and turns, still doesn't do anything to shake the very fabric of our characters' personalities. It seems like Type-Moon's struggling with this same feat in Fate / Stay Night since we are seeing historic deviances like Shirou having UBW dreams instead of Fate dreams and having a mana-line fed from the Ryudou Temple to his bedroom in UBW but not in Fate.

Talon87

08-01-2010, 03:13 AM

Okay, so, I absolutely love Chibi Ilya in the Tiger Dojo, and I was most disappointed to discover that neither she nor any of the other characters are in my download of "Fate Stay Night CG set". (As an aside: anyone have a folder with a true, full rip of all the in-game art, including characters in all their various emotional states? :oops: )

So anyway, here I am, trying to find pictures of Chibi Ilya since I want to print them off and use them for drawing practice, and what do I discover but ...

The most awesome FSN pun ever!!! :D

Okay, so get this: Ilya and Fujimura-sensei have their own single, okay? And guess what the name of this song is? "We are Tora Buru"! Why this is awesome:

* toraburu is how you would sound out the English word "trouble" in Japanese
* tora is referencing Taiga (tora meaning "tiger")
* buru is referencing Ilya, since she is referred to as "Buruma-chan" ("Bloomers-chan") in the Tiger Dojo, and sometimes as "Loli Buru", due to the fact that she's wearing a gym t-shirt and gym bloomers.

So the duo really are Tora Buru ... but they're also toraburu (trouble). I love it. This is so, so awesome. :D God, I love Japanese. ^_^

Doppleganger

08-01-2010, 05:07 AM

There are more puns like that in store as long as you read he omake material, I believe. Stuff in F/ha as well.

But if memory serves, isn't she at her best in Heaven's Feel?

No, she gets the most screen-time in UBW. She's alive for less time than in the other two routes, but appears longer than she did in Fate, yet less than UBW.

But the fact that Shirou isn't sharing dreams with Saber anymore, for instance, is something which makes me go, "Huh? :? But wait a second ... shouldn't that be happening regardless of the timeline?" It's moments like these where I think Ever17 does a much better job at exploring alternate timelines. Nothing that happens in the You path contradicts information in the Sora path. Nothing in the Tsugumi path contradicts information in the Sara path. They're just different paths with different sights to see. And then they all come together for the Coco path which, while having new twists and turns, still doesn't do anything to shake the very fabric of our characters' personalities. It seems like Type-Moon's struggling with this same feat in Fate / Stay Night since we are seeing historic deviances like Shirou having UBW dreams instead of Fate dreams and having a mana-line fed from the Ryudou Temple to his bedroom in UBW but not in Fate.

Supposedly, Shirou being less impressed at a woman entering his life has something to do with it. It's most explainable away in HF.

Avalon's influence at least is still prevalent, although that won't be the case forever.

Talon87

08-01-2010, 06:38 PM

Souichirou ripped off half of Saber's neck, it told me. Whether this was just the author of the games grossly exaggerating once again or not, I was still worried. Saber is about to die. Furthermore, I have not once picked Saber when given the choice between her and anyone else. And so for both of these reasons, when the game asked me, "Will you let Tohsaka handle Kuzuki-sensei while you rescue Saber? or will you leave Saber to be devoured by Caster while you back Tohsaka up?", I opted to defend Saber. "For once," I thought, "we'll place priority on Saber."

And then ...

Tohsaka had her head punched off. 8O D:

Tiger Stamp #19, earned. -.-;

Doppleganger

08-01-2010, 07:40 PM

It's not just FSN that was like this, Ever17 (for my run at least) in Takeshi's Route usually meant being cold to either Sora OR Tsugumi, because being nice to both (as Takeshi would, and was during Coco's Path) would land the player into the horrific Sora-Tsugumi Bad End.

UBW bothers me a bit in that you have to be rather cold to Saber, but...

(don't read this until after you actually see UBW itself)

Saber isn't completely cold to her Master. She still has lingering attachment to Shirou even as Rin's Servant because her strongest character is loyalty. It's not on the level of understanding they arrived at in Fate because there's tons of development that was skipped, but the feelings aren't reciprocated by Shirou in UBW.

I won't say anything about HF yet.

I really, really like Rin and Ilya as heroines, but I think Saber as the main heroine and Archer as the main antagonist work better than the combinations TYPE-MOON gave us in FSN.

Talon87

08-01-2010, 07:44 PM

I still haven't gotten to UBW the moment. The last thing I just saw was Shinji talking to Gilgamesh ("Archer") in the underground area of the Matou estate where the bugs are. (And I only know the bugs' role with Sakura because of hentai doujinshi. ^^; Otherwise, as far as I would have known as a gamer, these bugs have nothing to do with Sakura and they're just gross bugs. Nothing's been mentioned yet about implantation.)

Edit-Update: Right now I'm in the middle of the part where Caster's busted into our home and taken Fuji-nee hostage.

Talon87

08-01-2010, 11:37 PM

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/fate_staynight_unlimited_blade_works-poster.jpg

I wanted a higher-res version of the promotional poster than I'd been finding and I finally found it.

Talon87

08-02-2010, 01:17 AM

In the words of Alfalfa from The Little Rascals ... (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15Z7Mi3gRe4#t=6m25s) (click!)

"YOU BENEDICT ARNOLD! YOU JUDAS PRIEST! THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT!"

Well, I guess I can't say the outcome is Archer's fault, per se, outside of the fact that it was his decision to make and he made it. But the first two lines still count.

Oh man. I really didn't see that coming. I expected he would betray Rin's orders, and only insofar as I expected that he would attempt to kill Shirou. But I had no idea that he would ... that he would ... wow, man. This was big. And bad. Poor Rin. And poor me: 'cause how am I ever going to look at Archer the same way again!? :cry:

Doppleganger

08-02-2010, 02:46 AM

What's even more telling is in Fate and HF, he was always that desperate. But Shirou's actions in both routes stayed his hand.

In UBW, where Shirou is blindly pursuing his ideal, Archer loses it.

I'm not even sure where you are exactly -

Archer using Rule Breaker?

Talon87

08-02-2010, 03:13 AM

Right now, Shirou and Rin are off to join forces with Ilya. (Yay Ilya! :D) Meanwhile, Caster's identity as Medea was finally revealed, as well as the nature of her meeting Kuzuki and forming a contract with him.

I don't remember Archer ever being prepared to do in Fate what he did in UBW. And besides: you mention Shirou's blind pursuit of his ideal, but I feel like he was absolutely no different in that respect in Fate. Both the Fate Shirou and the UBW Shirou have tried to save all of the people all of the time. Both the Fate Shirou and the UBW Shirou have had difficulty, in the opinions of others, with valuing their own lives / with prioritizing their own safety before the safety of others.

Honestly, I feel like it isn't Shirou who has acted differently between the two routes and has thereby generated two different histories of events. No, it isn't Shirou who has acted differently: it's Caster. In Fate, she is less aggressive and as a consequence Shirou & company feel like all hope is not lost. They only have to deal with one enemy at a time, each of whom fails to form an allegiance with the other Masters and Servants. In UBW, Caster is much more aggressive and pro-active, and as such, Kuzuki Souichirou now controls four of the five surviving Servants (not counting Gilgamesh). It's very much a Lord of the Rings "we have a 0.00000001% chance of winning" hopeless scenario. This is why Archer acted differently: not because Shirou or Rin were any worse from how they were in Fate, but because Caster was so much better in this second timeline.

Doppleganger

08-02-2010, 05:48 AM

I don't remember Archer ever being prepared to do in Fate what he did in UBW. And besides: you mention Shirou's blind pursuit of his ideal, but I feel like he was absolutely no different in that respect in Fate. Both the Fate Shirou and the UBW Shirou have tried to save all of the people all of the time. Both the Fate Shirou and the UBW Shirou have had difficulty, in the opinions of others, with valuing their own lives / with prioritizing their own safety before the safety of others.

Whenever Shirou approached Archer in Fate, he'd always get an "aura of hostility" and Archer would casually provide insight in an irritating or insulting way to Shirou. He was too weak to do anything about it that time around - by the time he was fully healed, he had to battle Berserker. His pejorative insight was about as bad as he could muster, and perhaps he felt that such interaction might have changed Shirou. Certainly, Archer took interest in Shirou's obsession with Saber, which is what's severely lacking in UBW.

Honestly, I feel like it isn't Shirou who has acted differently between the two routes and has thereby generated two different histories of events. No, it isn't Shirou who has acted differently: it's Caster. In Fate, she is less aggressive and as a consequence Shirou & company feel like all hope is not lost. They only have to deal with one enemy at a time, each of whom fails to form an allegiance with the other Masters and Servants. In UBW, Caster is much more aggressive and pro-active, and as such, Kuzuki Souichirou now controls four of the five surviving Servants (not counting Gilgamesh). It's very much a Lord of the Rings "we have a 0.00000001% chance of winning" hopeless scenario. This is why Archer acted differently: not because Shirou or Rin were any worse from how they were in Fate, but because Caster was so much better in this second timeline.

This is actually due to behind the scenes stuff.

In Fate, Berserker attacked Ryuudoji after Saber was summoned and was driven off by Assassin (which is an incredible, incredible feat) but the infiltration weakens Caster, allowing Rider to infiltrate a few days later. Kuzuki retreats to the temple as defense, allowing Rider to get into her skirmish with Shirou at school.

As Shirou battles Rider, which Berserker/Ilya oversee, Gilgamesh attacks Ryuudoji. Kuzuki is killed by Gilgamesh and Assassin dies, while Caster flees. Her attack at Shirou's house was out of desperation as she was already being pursued by Gilgamesh.

In UBW, Berserker is weakened by his battle with Archer and so the assault on Ryuudoji doesn't happen. Kuzuki manages to kill Rider while she's snooping around the school, which causes Shinji to seek asylum with Kotomine, who then "gives" him Gilgamesh. Rider and Gilgamesh not attacking Ryuudoji allow Caster to be more aggressive with her attacks.

Talon87

08-03-2010, 12:41 AM

Wow, I just saw the fight between Archer and Shirou a couple minutes ago. 8O That was ... well, it was "wow. 8O"

Now it's time to see how the hell Shirou plans to defeat Gilgamesh this time around. And I thought things looked bad in Fate! I don't see how he can survive this one, short of some supremely inane bullshit copout. But I hope to be pleasantly surprised.

Talon87

08-03-2010, 06:05 PM

I just beat Unlimited Blade Works. I was pleased with the ending except for two major grievances. Does that mean I can still claim to have been pleased with it? ^^;; I don't know, 'cause these grievances are pretty big. :|

1. The explanation for how Shirou can beat Gilgamesh. I really didn't like this. It boils down to "Yes, the swords inside of Shirou's Reality Marble are one rank lower than the authentic weapons; but since Shirou can pull them out of the ground faster than Gilgamesh can pull his over his shoulders, it lends Shirou the advantage. Also, Gilgamesh is not skilled at close-range combat." What the fuck is this bullshit? XD First of all, pulling a sword out from the ground is significantly faster than pulling it out of a void behind one's self, now is it? That's a new one on me! How many seconds you shave off there, Shirou? One? A half? A tenth? :roll: Second of all, Gilgamesh is said to not be skilled at hand-to-hand combat ... for a Servant in the Archer-class! He's still a Servant, for Christ's sake. And he's still Gilgamesh. The Gilgamesh. The king of heroes. The two-thirds deity one-third mortal who almost achieved immortality. The one who has been on more adventures in his lifetime than Shirou has been on in three Fifth Holy Grail War paths combined ;-) . I'm supposed to believe that Shirou outranks Gilgamesh in swordsmanship? Give me a fucking break, man! :roll:

This whole time, I was thinking the explanation might have been something different. But nope. In the end, it was "UBW Reality Marble trumps Gilgamesh's Noble Phantasm." To me, that's bullshit. I was way happier with his defeat at Saber's hands in the Fate route where she used Avalon to defeat him. That at least was acceptable, if still a little wishy-washy. :roll:

2. The surprise return of Archer! What the fuck is this bullshit? :evil: Come on, guys! What the fuck? :evil: This is just dumb! Archer himself said that he only had one-tenth of his magical energy left pre-fight with Shirou eighteen or so hours ago. He then spent a significant portion of that energy fighting Shirou. He was subsequently skewered by Shirou. And if that wasn't mortal enough for a wound, he was then multi-skewered by Gilgamesh. WTF. :evil: You're telling me he survived this? You're telling me no one -- not Gilgamesh, not Tohsaka, not Saber -- no one noticed that he was still alive? They just left him to burn inside Castle Einzbern? And he didn't even do that!? That he magically rose from the ground and escaped the burning castle? Gimme a fucking break, man. :roll: Archer died in Castle Einzbern as far as I'm concerned. There is no excuse for the deus ex machina bullshit that Type-Moon pulled at the end of the UBW route by having Archer come back and save the day on both fronts! I mean, fuck: saving Shirou is bad, and destroying the Grail before Saber can destroy it is bad, too; but you're telling me he did BOTH!? With virtually no magical energy left, he made his way back to the Ryudou Temple, threw a sword at Gilgamesh's head, and showered the Holy Grail with a rain of arrow-blades? COME ON! :roll:

But seriously: aside from these two complaints, I really enjoyed the route. :oops:

On to Heaven's Feel! :D Meeeeeeeeeeow, Sakura! :3

Doppleganger

08-03-2010, 08:43 PM

There are two endings to UBW. One is the True, which you likely got (I think) and the other is "good" which is the one I personally feel to be the best TYPE-MOON ending of any of their works, as well as the most satisfying for most of the characters involved.

Also, as you've finished the route here's a little supplement from Realta Nua. In UBW, I think (?) Archer explained about the book system for how his master copy in the Throne of Heroes gets information. Archer doesn't experience things first hand, he instead reads a sort of summary about the events his astral projections are experiencing. Sort of like Naruto's Kage Bushins gaining experience for him.

This summary (which was in my signature for a long time, until I added the Gurren-Lagann stuff) is what lonely miserable Archer reads up in the Throne. It comes from the epilogue of Realta Nua's UBW Good End:

Archer, fighting Shirō
People he couldn't save, himself he couldn't save.
What he believes in, what he believed in.
What did I become, what was I before?
This boy won't be stopped by himself.
Always raising his sword for what he believes in.
Even if he knows he can't win.
Even if there is no meaning in it.
Even if he is not strong enough.
He laughs it off.
That ideal was beautiful.
That heart was faked, but what it believed in was beautiful.
Archer lowers his blade.
"EMIYA" was cursed...
But I wasn't wrong.

First of all, pulling a sword out from the ground is significantly faster than pulling it out of a void behind one's self, now is it? That's a new one on me! How many seconds you shave off there, Shirou? One? A half? A tenth? :roll:

The theme of that battle was while Gilgamesh's GOB was more powerful than Shirou's UBW, Shirou's UBW had unlimited firepower, and his lower grade weapons were powerful enough to destroy Gilgamesh's. So rather than explain it as a matter of draw speed, is more like "for every weapon Gilgamesh pulls out, Shirou's already chucked two at him".

Second of all, Gilgamesh is said to not be skilled at hand-to-hand combat ... for a Servant in the Archer-class! He's still a Servant, for Christ's sake. And he's still Gilgamesh. The Gilgamesh. The king of heroes. The two-thirds deity one-third mortal who almost achieved immortality. The one who has been on more adventures in his lifetime than Shirou has been on in three Fifth Holy Grail War paths combined ;-) . I'm supposed to believe that Shirou outranks Gilgamesh in swordsmanship? Give me a fucking break, man! :roll:

He really doesn't know how to use a sword on a swordsman's level. Sure, he can slash away like you and me, but it's like pitting an Kiai master versus an MMA fighter (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gEDaCIDvj6I). A case of someone extremely overconfident underestimating a powerful opponent in a spectacularly graphic way.

Gilgamesh's overconfidence is always how TYPE-MOON explains away how he could ever lose, even in Fate. Ea's power for example is never used to full capacity outside of Fate/hollow ataraxia. Nasu's numerical comparison was something like, Saber's Excalibur at the end of Fate had a power output of 800, while the upper limit for Ea is 4000. For Ea to tie against Excalibur even in Saber's first bout with him, Gil was barely using 20% of Ea's maximum. This seems like retcon (imv) but it seems consistent with Gil's personality.

Interestingly, while Gilgamesh is arrogant in Fate/Zero he's not ridiculously overconfident like how he is in FSN. So it's likely the Holy Grail's influence that addled his brains a bit, even if his ego was too strong to be completely consumed by it.

This whole time, I was thinking the explanation might have been something different. But nope. In the end, it was "UBW Reality Marble trumps Gilgamesh's Noble Phantasm." To me, that's bullshit. I was way happier with his defeat at Saber's hands in the Fate route where she used Avalon to defeat him. That at least was acceptable, if still a little wishy-washy. :roll:

I think the intended take home wasn't that Shirou could outpace Gilgamesh, but that for every blade Gilgamesh could take out of his vault, Shirou took out two. Shirou's weapons are weaker than Gilgamesh's, but they were powerful enough to destroy his authentics.

There is no excuse for the deus ex machina bullshit that Type-Moon pulled at the end of the UBW route by having Archer come back and save the day on both fronts! I mean, fuck: saving Shirou is bad, and destroying the Grail before Saber can destroy it is bad, too; but you're telling me he did BOTH!? With virtually no magical energy left, he made his way back to the Ryudou Temple, threw a sword at Gilgamesh's head, and showered the Holy Grail with a rain of arrow-blades? COME ON! :roll:

I was annoyed that it wasn't Shirou who dealt the killing blow, and I agree it was cheap to have Archer steal everyone's thunder at the end there. However, I don't agree that Archer surviving his battle with Shirou was all that far-fetched (except for the part where he's skewered by Gilgamesh!), or that he shouldn't have a decent amount of power at the end of it.

Even regular Servants without an Independent Action attribute can survive with bare minimum mana once they've been disconnected from their Master. However, unlike with IA, they're not supposed to be able to fight, it would be "survive long enough until the Servant can find another Master". Assassin, who isn't even a full Servant and should have rightfully dissipated immediately once Caster died, mysteriously survived long enough not only to greet Saber, but fight her at full strength.

Independent Action is like a battery skill, the Servants only rely on it once they're disconnected from their Masters, but they're capable of fighting even in the absence of one. Heavy fighting can deplete it quickly, but resting can recharge it a little after a while.

Archer spent almost no energy fighting Shirou. I distinctly remember Shirou saying something like "it feels like I'm fighting Berserker!" but that could only be because Shirou can't tell the difference between the force of extremely powerful blows. Archer was definitely throwing everything he had into those strikes, but even regular people won't pass out from punching as hard as they can over and over again. As long as he wasn't charging a Broken Phantasm or tracing something really powerful, he could still be fielded following that fight.

Even Shirou's stab is fairly superficial considering Saber survived what should have been an insta-kill with Gae Bolg, and Archer survived Saber slicing him up with Invisible Air back in Fate.

Now, Gilgamesh skewering Archer was what shocked me the most, if there's any part of his reappearance that was implausible, it was surviving that. I hadn't seen that scene until going through the novel - I knew about Archer coming back for the finale, but I didn't know he came back after going through that. Berserker, freaking Berserker, was skewered to death twelve times by Gilgamesh earlier in the route. Each of Gilgamesh's weapons is a Noble Phantasm, and while Gil isn't exactly using their real abilities, he's still throwing them with the strength of an average Servant. As tough as Archer is, I found it bizarre he could survive that when Caster was torn to pieces in both Fate and UBW by the same kind of barrage.

The scene added some redundancy, with Archer saving Shirou again in the finale. I don't think that scene was necessary, it accomplished nothing in the grand scheme of things except to shock the reader.

Talon87

08-03-2010, 09:53 PM

I make a big deal about it because it was stated verbatim in the game, Doppel, that Shirou could draw them faster than Gilgamesh could draw his and that this was what spelled out the difference between them. I understand your argument (from the Unlimited Blade Works name itself), but it bothers me to think that Shirou could supposedly "summon an infinite number of blades" without running out of mana first. To me, the moment he runs out of mana, (a) the Reality Marble should crumble and (b) he shouldn't be able to project any more swords. And to me, the Reality Marble should crumble after a time. The game even said so: that right when the Grail shows up to interrupt his and Gilgamesh's fight and swallows up Gilgamesh whole, his Reality Marble was already beginning to show signs of fading/weakening anyway with the outside world beginning to be visible through the ghost-like imagery of the UBW world.

So I mean, suppose the Grail hadn't come along and swallowed up Gilgamesh. Then I feel that Gilgamesh should have won that fight. Shirou's Reality Marble was disintegrating (b/c he was out of mana, b/c Tohsaka was out of mana, as she realizes during her own ordeal), and Gilgamesh still had plenty of swords left.

Another problem I have with Shirou being supposedly able to beat Gilgamesh is this insolvable power triangle:

Point A: Shirou/Archer (put them together)
Point B: Berserker
Point C: Gilgamesh

C beat B in Einzbern Castle in UBW, B beat A in Einzbern Castle in Fate, and A beat C in the Ryudou Temple in UBW

It's a very bothersome paper-rock-scissors. ^^;

The only to solve it is to say, "Well, Archer at his full strength wouldn't have lost to Gilgamesh. Gilgamesh was just taking advantage of Archer's weakened state." But that pisses me off even more. XD I may hate his personality, but Gilgamesh is the Gilgamesh ffs. He has the single greatest Noble Phantasm (until UBW came along and said, "No, we're going to crap all over it with Unlimited Blade Works, even though we told you already that the rank of the UBW swords is always one rank below what they would have been in real life." Whatever. :roll: )

Another thing that bothers me about is that Berserker is defeated by Gilgamesh yet is able to defeat Archer -- and his Reality Marble! I mean, seriously now: wtf, Doppel. :lol: :) COME ON! There's just no way that Archer should have lost to Berserker given what we saw Shirou -- li'l Shirou!! -- do to Gilgamesh in UBW. Vice versa, given that Archer was only able to kill Berserker six times and given that Archer had "mugen no ken" (the infinite sword) as his Noble Phantasm, there's no way that Gilgamesh should have been able to defeat Berserker, either.

It's a logical inconsistency. :| If the Gate of Babylon isn't enough to beat Archer's/Shirou's Reality Marble, and if that Reality Marble isn't enough to beat Berserker, then the Gate of Babylon should also not be enough to beat Berserker. But if the GoB is enough to beat Berserker, and if UBW is not enough to beat Berserker, then the GoB should be better than UBW. :|

Doppleganger

08-04-2010, 12:17 AM

I make a big deal about it because it was stated verbatim in the game, Doppel, that Shirou could draw them faster than Gilgamesh could draw his and that this was what spelled out the difference between them.

Ah, I think I see the confusion (?). We'll only get a definite answer when the movie comes out and visually shows it, but my interpretation -

Shirou says that the blades automatically came to his hand, a la how the Jedi remotely grab lightsabers using the Force. Archer also has the ability to telekinetically command the swords in his UBW, as we see with his rain of swords technique. But this is faster, since Shirou doesn't even have to concentrate to get a fully materialized sword. If Shirou's not insta-tracing the weapons as Gilgamesh pulls them out, they're responding to his grip flying into his hand as soon as he desires their use.

I understand your argument (from the Unlimited Blade Works name itself), but it bothers me to think that Shirou could supposedly "summon an infinite number of blades" without running out of mana first. To me, the moment he runs out of mana, (a) the Reality Marble should crumble and (b) he shouldn't be able to project any more swords. And to me, the Reality Marble should crumble after a time. The game even said so: that right when the Grail shows up to interrupt his and Gilgamesh's fight and swallows up Gilgamesh whole, his Reality Marble was already beginning to show signs of fading/weakening anyway with the outside world beginning to be visible through the ghost-like imagery of the UBW world.

This one's easy.

There's a discrepancy between the universe seen from inside UBW and that from outside. From the outside, UBW's barrier is visible (separated by a wall of fire) and finite, like say maybe 800 metres in diameter. But inside UBW, the barren landscape of swords literally goes on forever, so there really are an unlimited number of weapons in them.

When Shirou regularly traces a weapon, he's recreating the weapon from scratch based on the version stored in his memory/UBW. This takes less mana in absolute terms, but it's not as efficient as taking the fight to UBW itself, where he doesn't have to make the weapon all over again. When Shirou casts UBW, he's not actually tracing all the weapons at once, he's taking the combatants to a world where all the blades are pre-traced for him.

So I mean, suppose the Grail hadn't come along and swallowed up Gilgamesh. Then I feel that Gilgamesh should have won that fight. Shirou's Reality Marble was disintegrating (b/c he was out of mana, b/c Tohsaka was out of mana, as she realizes during her own ordeal), and Gilgamesh still had plenty of swords left.

Debatable.

I'd say if Shirou hadn't sliced off Gil's arm, Gilgamesh could have won. Gil is technically skilled with only two weapons - Enkidu and Enuma Elish. Enkidu is going to be less effective against Shirou than Berserker because Shirou has no divnity, and against a regular person it's not much stronger than a regular chain. Even Kashou and Bakuya could easily slice through it. Gil was going to use Ea against Shirou (which is useless aside from its ability, and is also complete overkill, showing just how desperate he was!) but he lost that chance when his arm got chopped off.

Gilgamesh literally had the strength and speed to punch out Shirou, but whether that is enough to defeat a Kanshou + Bakuya wielding Shirou I don't know, especially when he lost an arm. If Shirou used the boomerang ability Archer uses, Gil wouldn't have been able to escape, no would he have been able to if Shirou used the sword rain ability.

Another problem I have with Shirou being supposedly able to beat Gilgamesh is this insolvable power triangle:

Point A: Shirou/Archer (put them together)
Point B: Berserker
Point C: Gilgamesh

C beat B in Einzbern Castle in UBW, B beat A in Einzbern Castle in Fate, and A beat C in the Ryudou Temple in UBW

It's a very bothersome paper-rock-scissors. ^^;

The only to solve it is to say, "Well, Archer at his full strength wouldn't have lost to Gilgamesh. Gilgamesh was just taking advantage of Archer's weakened state." But that pisses me off even more. XD I may hate his personality, but Gilgamesh is the Gilgamesh ffs. He has the single greatest Noble Phantasm (until UBW came along and said, "No, we're going to crap all over it with Unlimited Blade Works, even though we told you already that the rank of the UBW swords is always one rank below what they would have been in real life." Whatever. :roll: )

Another thing that bothers me about is that Berserker is defeated by Gilgamesh yet is able to defeat Archer -- and his Reality Marble! I mean, seriously now: wtf, Doppel. :lol: :) COME ON! There's just no way that Archer should have lost to Berserker given what we saw Shirou -- li'l Shirou!! -- do to Gilgamesh in UBW. Vice versa, given that Archer was only able to kill Berserker six times and given that Archer had "mugen no ken" (the infinite sword) as his Noble Phantasm, there's no way that Gilgamesh should have been able to defeat Berserker, either.

It's a logical inconsistency. :| If the Gate of Babylon isn't enough to beat Archer's/Shirou's Reality Marble, and if that Reality Marble isn't enough to beat Berserker, then the Gate of Babylon should also not be enough to beat Berserker. But if the GoB is enough to beat Berserker, and if UBW is not enough to beat Berserker, then the GoB should be better than UBW. :|

Gilgamesh took advantage of the narrow Einzbern Castle battleground by aiming for Ilya, forcing Berserker to stand in the way of his Gate of Babylon when Berserker would otherwise have dodged the attacks. Gilgamesh took something like eight of Berserker's lives like this, but even with all that Berserker could have still crushed Gilgamesh were it not for a single Noble Phantasm.

That Noble Phantasm is Enkidu. Enkidu is the only real weapon in the Epic of Gilgamesh FSN's Gilgamesh also has, it's the chain that bound the Bull of Heaven, which allowed Gilgamesh and his best friend Enkidu (who the chain was eventually named after) to kill the rampaging bull.

Enkidu seems like just a regular chain, but it's real ability is its strength is inversely proportional to the divinity of whatever it's restraining. In the FSN anime, Gilgamesh used Enkidu to restrain the faster Lancer so he could be stabbed with Caladbolg. Even Heracles, the strongest hero in all of the world's mythology, combined with Mad Enhancement as a Servant which doubled his strength, was unable to break the chain (except for at the end, where his desire to protect Ilya was so immense he overcame it) because of his high divinity.

In the FSN anime, Archer used UBW against Berseker, but in the novel Berserker didn't have tons of swords sticking out of him as is typical whenever Archer uses the sword rain ability of UBW. Archer fought Berserker in the same place Gilgamesh did, he could have easily employed that tactic if he wanted to. For this reason, most people seem to think he didn't use it against Berserker, for what reasons nobody really knows.

Although...the reasons are pretty obvious if you ask me. ^^;

Archer wouldn't use the same tactic Gilgamesh did because he loves Ilya and would never even dream of harming her, even in UBW. In F/ha it was suggested that during Archer's "route" Ilya was the only girl to survive the war, everyone else including Fuji-nee died (he also failed to 'save' Saber, whatever that means). I won't go into it now, since HF is very much the "Ilya route that wasn't meant to be" but more will be revealed.

Talon87

08-04-2010, 01:02 AM

That reminds me ...

ILYA! ;___;

I was so excited when I learned that we were headed out to Castle Einzbern to forge an alliance with Ilya. And I was so, so distraught when the poor thing had her eyes slashed by Gilgamesh. I about cried when she found Berserker's corpse and started speaking to it before she, too, expired.

Doppleganger

08-07-2010, 09:47 AM

So Talon, I'm assuming you've already gotten past the...

Archer Arm Shirou bit. So I ask of you - what if Archer survived but lost his memory again, and found himself in feudal Japan (http://img824.imageshack.us/img824/7301/gekkou.jpg)?

Talon87

08-07-2010, 02:01 PM

I haven't started Heaven's Feel yet, actually. Don't worry, I didn't click your spoiler box. I'm taking a break from the game so I don't feel burnt out on the plot. I want to enjoy Heaven's Feel at Max Power.

YUKI.N

01-08-2011, 11:01 PM

I just finished sitting through the second awkward H-scene in Fate. Didn't think the first one was so bad, though killing her emotions or not, Rin's actions definitely went overboard. Saber taking the initiative without her presence was even more ridiculous though. The whole scene read like a hilariously OOC fanfic. I certainly don't remember the animé even referencing this part.

*ahem* Anyway, on the topic of sex, I have a hypothesis in answer to Talon's question as to why Saber and Shirou don't share dreams in the other timelines. I'm fairly positive the dream-sharing began only after the first time they made love, so I assume it also formed some sort of spiritual connection. Unless they do it in the other timelines too, in which case I have no explanation.

Oh, and didn't the animé also pull some justification for not having their bodies touch afterward due to the possibility of mana or memories jumping between them? Or was that just Saber/the studio making up excuses for censorship? Or am I thinking of something else entirely? It's been a long time since I watched the show.

(...Why must my mother always come downstairs right when I enter these scenes? I swear parents must be psychic... x.X)

Raptor Jesus

01-08-2011, 11:33 PM

Lilblu's Mom, "My mother sense is tingling!" *shoots webs and swings to where Lilblu is*

YUKI.N

01-09-2011, 12:23 AM

Aw. Got my first bad end when I faced Kotomine. I wanted to see what Shirou would say to Kiritsugu since I don't know much about his character. Guess I have to take Tora Buru's advice and actually come up with a battle plan beforehand.

In addition to Talon's advice to always "pick the suicidal option", I've been mostly relying on my memory of the animé course of events, which is severely waning at this point. On that note, I didn't recall the victims in the church as the other children who survived the fire 10 years ago. Is my memory just faulty?

Talon87

01-09-2011, 12:33 AM

Nope, that was new to me too. That, or we're comrades in faulty memories. ;-)

YUKI.N

01-09-2011, 01:40 AM

All right, cleared Fate. Now I can finally start exploring new material. UBW, here I come!

...Unless I can't resist the urge to go back and unlock all the Tiger Stamps. So. Tempting. Gah.

By the way, Talon, did you ever find that CG you were missing? If not, you can obtain it on the 8th day by asking Fuji-nee to give you a gift before dinner.

Doppleganger

01-09-2011, 06:11 AM

I just finished sitting through the second awkward H-scene in Fate. Didn't think the first one was so bad, though killing her emotions or not, Rin's actions definitely went overboard. Saber taking the initiative without her presence was even more ridiculous though. The whole scene read like a hilariously OOC fanfic. I certainly don't remember the animé even referencing this part.

That's Nasu's writing for you. Actually, I think it's pretty common for male H-writers to put out really bad stuff like that. The scenes in Muv-Luv weren't the best quality, but they were better than mollusk scenes at least.

Now, Sengoku Rance's main scenario and H-scene writer is a woman. Her scenes were great. I don't really understand why, though. o_o

*ahem* Anyway, on the topic of sex, I have a hypothesis in answer to Talon's question as to why Saber and Shirou don't share dreams in the other timelines. I'm fairly positive the dream-sharing began only after the first time they made love, so I assume it also formed some sort of spiritual connection. Unless they do it in the other timelines too, in which case I have no explanation.

It was strengthened after that, but it had been happening for a while before. Truth be told though, had Shirou and Saber stayed connected for the full two weeks, there would have been no secrets between them.

Talon87

01-17-2011, 06:02 PM

May start later today (is this the seventh time I've said this?), but anyway ...

Here's an AWESOME F/HA fan video! (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uD3YmkBgRU4) As I said on Youtube, "I never really felt that I was missing out on Fate/Hollow Ataraxia until I saw this video. Now I really wish that there was an English patch out for it!"

Coolest CG in the video seems to be the one at 0:47, but the cutest/coolest bit in the whole thing is definitely 0:51 when Berserker is giving Ilya a high-speed ride on his shoulders. Awwwwwwww. :oops: Just look at that smile! :D Ilya's so cute. :)

Talon87

01-20-2011, 09:35 PM

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/FateZero_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/FateZero.jpg)

Oh wow: shit just got real (http://www.fate-zero.jp/). :D

Ootsuka Akio (http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/people.php?id=832) will be providing the voice for Rider. Oohara Sayaka (http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/people.php?id=1376) will be providing the voice for Irisviel von Einzbern. Kawasumi Ayako (Saber), Nakata George (Kotomine Kirei), and Tomokazu Seki (4th War Archer) all reprise their roles for this latest television installment in the Fate universe.

The animation will be provided by ufotable (http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/company.php?id=4362), the same group who provided the animation for the Kara no Kyoukai OAVs.

The February issue of Newtype magazine, for which Fate/Zero was the cover story, reported that the Fate/Zero anime will air on television this year.

Lady and gentlemen: brace yourselves. 8)

For more information on Fate/Zero, click here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fate/zero).

Doppleganger

01-20-2011, 10:26 PM

It's a movie, right?

Talon87

01-20-2011, 10:45 PM

I don't think so. The website says TVアニメ化決定 (TV Anime-ka Kettei, or "Making of the TV Anime Decided") on the front page, and television isn't a likely place to debut a film. You'd think they would debut a film either in theaters or else straight-to-DVD. Elsewhere on the site (in one of the posts on the newsfeed), it says 2011年放送開始予定です, or "Plans for a 2011 broadcast have begun." The word 放送 housou, "broadcast," again suggests that this is going to air on television and not in theaters. Now sure, it could be a film that airs on TV. Lord knows we do that tons of times in the West. But I don't think that's the case here. I'm pretty sure that this is going to be a television anime. And that makes sense. Fans were disappointed by how choppy and spastic the plot progression was in the UBW film, so I doubt that ufotable would want to repeat history all over again.

Here's hoping for a 24'er. At roughly six episodes (3 hours) per novel, that should be just about right, both allowing the plot to be fully fleshed out and allowing for some spectacular fight scenes.

Talon87

02-07-2011, 09:19 PM

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/fate_sig.png

Made this Fate/Zero banner for us. Took a good picture of Nitro+'s that pretty much sums up the 4th Holy Grail War in a nutshell, slapped on the official logo, and voilà. :D It's also doubling as my new signature (albeit two-thirds the original size). Turned off my sig for this post to avoid the disorienting effect of seeing it doubly. ^^;

Oh, and by the way? Click here. (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/guess_whos_docked_01.png)

That's right. 8) Guess who's coming to dinner ... :twisted: ;-)

Talon87

02-07-2011, 10:37 PM

Sorry for the double-post, but I just saw this in-game and I had to say something:

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/awwww_th.png (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/awwww.png)

Number one, awwww. :oops:
Number two, why oh why didn't you write up an asexual Ilya path, Nasu? ;_; I've been looking forward to the Sakura path for ages, but an asexual fourth path dedicated towards Ilya would have been supreme.
Number three, I can't wait to see Shirou team up with Ilya in this route if he does so. Speculation follows:

You guys promised me he'd team up with Ilya in UBW, but then as he went to go and try and do that she got murdered! :cry: So I'm hoping against hope that I misinterpreted what you guys said, or you misremembered, or something, and he teams up with her this third time around. I'll be crushed if he doesn't. Shirou and Ilya for the win! :lol:

Talon87

02-08-2011, 12:14 AM

Triple post. :oops: But there's so much to talk about! :D

Shirou just went to talk to Kotomine as per Saber's advice in order to learn more about his father and the 4th Holy Grail War, something which never happened in previous routes. And hoooooooooooooo man! Is the shit getting real or what!? :D (See non-spoiler picture.) (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/kiritsugu_ten_years_ago.jpg)

So stoked for Fate/Zero this fall. Will be bummed out if they delay it to Spring 2012, but either way this is going to be awesome. :D In the Heaven's Feel path, there have already been so many vague references to events that took place in the 4th Holy Grail War that I just know it's going to be an absolute delight to see them fully-explained and fully-animated.

Here's a spoiler example from the conversation with Kotomine:
According to Kotomine, Kiritsugu at one point in the war destroyed a rival Master's Servant. The defeated Master was then grovelling on the ground on all fours, crying. Kiritsugu allowed this to go on for a little while before aiming a gun at the defeated Master's head and pulling the trigger.
We don't know who the Master was nor the Servant. We don't even know the nature behind Kiritsugu's actions. (Kotomine claims they were callous, cold, emotionless. But were they really?) We know to anticipate this amazingly emotional scene, but aside from that we know nothing of the specific details. Everything is brand-new, never-before-seen. (Well, not if you've read the books already :lol: , but ...!)

This is going to be so awesome. :)

Speculation about the aforemention scene, btw:
I wonder if it'll be Velvet Waver. That'd be really emotional. To see Rider fall in combat. To then see Waver, just this teenage boy who was too full of himself at the war's beginning and had no idea what he was getting into, now grovelling on the floor, begging for his life, crying like the boy that he is. To see Kiritsugu with an emotionless, blank stare on his face. Raising the gun. Pointing it at Waver's head. And pulling the trigger.
Obviously I could be wrong. I have, after all, only a one in five chance of being right.

Doppleganger

02-08-2011, 04:42 PM

/Fate%20Stay%20Night/awwww_th.png[/img][/url][/center]

Number one, awwww. :oops:
Number two, why oh why didn't you write up an asexual Ilya path, Nasu? ;_; I've been looking forward to the Sakura path for ages, but an asexual fourth path dedicated towards Ilya would have been supreme.

Laziness on his part. He half-arsed Tsukihime too, since Satsuki was supposed to have a path and he didn't write that either.

Consider that the ideas for Tsukihime and FSN were both conceived when Nasu was in high school, he hasn't actually made a VN in his adult life and nothing really significant since 2004. TYPE-MOON gets so much cash from its spin-off projects he can just sit back and play Nitro+ all day. =3=

Also, you're basically getting the Ilya path now because it was combined with Sakura. It made HF kind of wonky because Shirou has this devotion to Ilya, yet he's supposedly sworn to protect only Sakura.

Number three, I can't wait to see Shirou team up with Ilya in this route if he does so. Speculation follows:

You guys promised me he'd team up with Ilya in UBW, but then as he went to go and try and do that she got murdered! :cry: So I'm hoping against hope that I misinterpreted what you guys said, or you misremembered, or something, and he teams up with her this third time around. I'll be crushed if he doesn't. Shirou and Ilya for the win! :lol:

Compared to how he was in Fate, it was a team-up. Though, HF is pretty much the real deal.

I wonder if it'll be Velvet Waver. That'd be really emotional. To see Rider fall in combat. To then see Waver, just this teenage boy who was too full of himself at the war's beginning and had no idea what he was getting into, now grovelling on the floor, begging for his life, crying like the boy that he is. To see Kiritsugu with an emotionless, blank stare on his face. Raising the gun. Pointing it at Waver's head. And pulling the trigger.
Obviously I could be wrong. I have, after all, only a one in five chance of being right.

I'm not going to say who it is (though I have an idea) but it's not.

Waver Velvet becomes Rin's instructor in London post-FSN, and he goes back after the 5th Holy Grail War and cleans up whatever mess was leftover in Fate and UBW.

One cool thing about the 4th Holy Grail War is one got more material to pair Servants with. For example, I think 5th HGW Archer and 4th HGW Rider would have been unbeatable if they ever teamed up. Their abilities complimented each other so well, and I can't imagine they wouldn't have gotten along well together.

Talon87

02-08-2011, 06:11 PM

Yeah, I'd heard before about Heavens Feel being the merged Sakura/Ilya path, and I'm already seeing the earliest signs of it. It's pretty clear so far that Ilya is just the adorable add-on to what is otherwise meant to be a Sakura-devoted path. I was saying earlier, "Oh Nasu! Why didn't you make four paths? ;_;"

About Waver Velvet: really? That directly contradicts claims made by Kotomine in earnest about the 4th War:
I thought he told Shirou that he and Kiritsugu were the only two to survive the war. He might have said that he was the only person to ever confront Kiritsugu and live to tell the tale, which would be different, but I'll have to check that out if I can.

I'm posting via cell phone right now, so expect more later.

Doppleganger

02-08-2011, 07:06 PM

About Waver Velvet: really? That directly contradicts claims made by Kotomine in earnest about the 4th War:
I thought he told Shirou that he and Kiritsugu were the only two to survive the war. He might have said that he was the only person to ever confront Kiritsugu and live to tell the tale, which would be different, but I'll have to check that out if I can.

That's almost certainly a lie, even without the F/Z material. Since you don't seem to know Kotomine's secret, that tells me he'll reveal it HF. I'd thought it was revealed in Fate, but I've forgotten a lot of things.

Talon87

02-08-2011, 08:29 PM

Kotomine's secret? Probably not. What do I know about him?

I know he was the son of the last war's supervisor.

I know he was the first Master to exit the last war.

I know he's a former member of the Church who switched sides to the Magic Association but without telling the Church that he had done so.

I know he considers himself to be on a somewhat smarter or better path than either the Church or the Magic Association. (Like, he makes it sound like the Church has one goal, the Magic Association has another, and he has a third that takes the best bits from both of them and combines them into one.) In this sense, he's really a traitor to both groups.

I know (as of HF) that he knows healing magic. I know (as of HF) that he learned the healing magic because there was somebody he could not save in the last war. (Presumably his father? L-O-L + W-O-W if I'm thrown for a loop and they reveal that Kotomine had feelings for Irisviel! 8O)

I know he somehow managed to get his hands on Archer (Gilgamesh), considering that was not the Servant he summoned. (Which Servant he did summon, I do not know.)

I know (as of HF) that his dream is the opposite of Emiya Kiritsugu's goal. What exactly this means, though, I have no idea, since a lot of things could potentially be "the opposite" of the goal of becoming a superhero. (That is to say, I wouldn't necessarily assume that he wishes to become a supervillain. It's more likely that where Kiritsugu wished for a peaceful world without conflict, Kotomine wishes for a world filled with fascinating conflict. He has mentioned in HF how nothing excites him.)

I know that he's explained his goal to me before with the Grail in the ends of both the Fate and UBW paths, but for the life of me I can't remember what he said. The corrosive black tentacles left a larger impression on me than Kotomine's ramblings. :oops: And in each case, five minutes later he's dead and forgotten, so ...

I know (as of Fate) that he's been doing horrible things to the bodies of the war orphans who were sent to the Church's "orphanage." How they're all limbless, blinded amputees and such, kept barely alive in the basement of the church. Though I confess I don't remember why he's doing it other than for the possible fact of needing magical energy to supply to Gilgamesh in order to keep him in our world.
That's sort of it. So I imagine you're right that I don't know whatever secret it is you're talking about. The last one comes the closest, but it's not so much a secret as it is a terrible thing he's been doing in secret. Two different things, of course.

Doppleganger

02-08-2011, 10:01 PM

None of what you listed is what I'm thinking of, so I'm fairly sure it hasn't been revealed yet.

The secret, for later-

Kotomine was killed by Kiritsugu during the final battle of the 4th Holy Grail War. However, Saber wasn't able to completely destroy the grail (for some reason) and its corruptive presence, in the form of a black liquid, basically spilled out and covered Kotomine. It granted his final thoughts as a wish, which ended up causing him to come back to life, and the grail created that enormus fire that killed Shirou's real parents.

Gilgamesh has been said to have been tainted by the grail, but he was actually corrupted through Kotomine, since the two had a Prana link.

Talon87

02-12-2011, 04:07 PM

Making slow progress into Heavens Feel, I think I'm fast approaching (if I haven't already passed) the Point of No Return between whether I'll get the one HF ending or the other. I have no idea what either ending entails. I just know that there are two possible endings to unlock.

Decisions, Decisions:
Most recent choices have included ...
Do I not lie to Sakura about my sex dream with Tohsaka? Or do I evade the question?
I chose to not lie. I figured Shirou would give a held-back response. And he did. But my alarms were definitely set off when the moment Shirou dropped Tohsaka's name, I saw a face on Sakura I'd never seen before: half-crestfallen, half-sinister, her long hair hiding her eyes from view. Wuh oh!
Do I go shopping? Do I have a snack? Or do I watch TV?
This is from when Shirou has stayed home with a fever. Option 1 hints at an interaction with Ilya. Option 2 hints at one with Sakura. Option 3 hints at doing nothing. I chose Option 1. Again, I don't want to piss Sakura off, but like hell I'm going to miss out on Ilya scenes!
Do I punch Shinji? Or do I restrain myself?
This was the choice from the surprising scene (discussed later) where Shinji came to pick Sakura up. I didn't even have to think twice: I chose to punch him.
Do I patrol Miyama City? Shinto City? Or do I stay home to watch over Sakura?
Sakura's eyes changed and she had another attack, so I opted to stay home. I got a nice Sakura discussion scene out of it, but I don't think it'll be enough to offset the damage dealt by her discovering I had a dream about Tohsaka.
So we'll see how I fare, given these choices. Will I get Ending A or will I get Ending B? Only time will tell. The good news (?), at any rate, is that I have yet to get a single Game Over so far, so there've been absolutely zero Tiger Stamps for me on this route.

Tohsaka sex scene:
This came completely by surprise. I have snubbed Tohsaka at every single opportunity except the one life-or-death scenario where I chose to surprise her by asking to talk (rather than fleeing for my life) when she sinisterly approached me at school that one time. But I wouldn't think that this would be enough for Shirou to be having sex dreams about Tohsaka of all people!

The other thing which was really surprising about this scene for me was that it was the first sex scene which I would say was at least kinda erotic. On a scale of -10 to 10, mind you, this only ranks a 2. It wasn't very erotic. It still suffered heavily from Nasu's terrible sex scene narrative. But a clothed Tohsaka hides her flat chest pretty well. She looks better with her hair done up. In fact, with nearly all of her clothes on, she doesn't look nearly as anorexic and gangly-looking as she does in her proper sex scenes in UBW: this in my book is a major plus. But I suppose the best thing about this sex scene was that there was no awkwardness on the part of either party. Whether because it was a dream or what, I don't know, Shirou didn't seem the least bit embarrassed or (even worse) Harry Potter 6 "Harry let the lion in his chest roar with delight" ridiculously giddy. He just seemed like a normal dude who was enjoying the moment. On the flipside we had Tohsaka who, for her part, was a standard bitch-in-heat character: which was a really appreciated erotic step-up from the "ow, Shirou, it hurts! But I'll bear it because it still feels good" masochism from other sex scenes in the game. No pain. No humiliation. No tsundere moments. Just she wanted him, he wanted her. It worked, if weakly. (Like I said: only a 2 on the -10 to 10 scale.)

Shinji's Visit to the Emiya Household:
Wow. :|

Well, let's start off with the biggest bombshell: Shinji has been having sex with Sakura. This is something I've seen in tons of FSN doujins, so I guess I should have expected it to be canon, but still ... there's a difference between imagining (or filling in the gaps for myself) that Shinji has this sort of relationship with Sakura and actually being told it canonically in the game.

But second: that punch to the poor girl's face. What the fuck. Even if he'd slapped her, he'd be way out of line, a bully, a horrible person, etc. But to actually punch her and knock her to the floor ... on MY doorstep ...! :evil:

Shinji is a terrible, terrible person. He deserved to die in Path 1 (and did!). He deserved to die even moreso in Path 2 (but didn't! :evil: ). And he most deserves to die in Path 3. I know it isn't nice to call for people's execution, but seriously, what a depraved individual. He's pretty much ruined Sakura's life. Now, even if she tries to have a consummate relationship with her Emiya-senpai, she's not going to be able to have sex with him without thinking about the times she was raped by Shinji. Those memories are burned into her mind. She will forever associate sex with Shinji. In that sense, sex is ruined for her. What a fucking prick. :evil:

Rendezvous with Ilya, Part II:
That scene was really cute. It was also pretty awesome to finally get to see Ilya's servants Sella and Leysritt, although as expected they're not likely to become friends of Shirou's. I appreciated the nod (intentional or not) to Kanon's Ayu in having Shirou gift Ilya a bag full of taiyaki. Maybe taiyaki just conjure up an image of cute girls in heavy winter clothes in the minds of most Japanese men :lol: , I dunno. I would have LOVED to have had a CG of Ilya preparing to take, and subsequently taking, a big bite out of a taiyaki. That would have been awesome. Oh well. :oops:

Last scene I saw:
Lancer just bit the dust courtesy of True Assassin.

Doppleganger

02-12-2011, 04:47 PM

Rin doesn't have a flat chest!

Tohsaka sex scene:
This came completely by surprise. I have snubbed Tohsaka at every single opportunity except the one life-or-death scenario where I chose to surprise her by asking to talk (rather than fleeing for my life) when she sinisterly approached me at school that one time. But I wouldn't think that this would be enough for Shirou to be having sex dreams about Tohsaka of all people!

The other thing which was really surprising about this scene for me was that it was the first sex scene which I would say was at least kinda erotic. On a scale of -10 to 10, mind you, this only ranks a 2. It wasn't very erotic. It still suffered heavily from Nasu's terrible sex scene narrative. But a clothed Tohsaka hides her flat chest pretty well. She looks better with her hair done up. In fact, with nearly all of her clothes on, she doesn't look nearly as anorexic and gangly-looking as she does in her proper sex scenes in UBW: this in my book is a major plus. But I suppose the best thing about this sex scene was that there was no awkwardness on the part of either party. Whether because it was a dream or what, I don't know, Shirou didn't seem the least bit embarrassed or (even worse) Harry Potter 6 "Harry let the lion in his chest roar with delight" ridiculously giddy. He just seemed like a normal dude who was enjoying the moment. On the flipside we had Tohsaka who, for her part, was a standard bitch-in-heat character: which was a really appreciated erotic step-up from the "ow, Shirou, it hurts! But I'll bear it because it still feels good" masochism from other sex scenes in the game. No pain. No humiliation. No tsundere moments. Just she wanted him, he wanted her. It worked, if weakly. (Like I said: only a 2 on the -10 to 10 scale.)

Might want to replay that scene later in the route. You'll see something you didn't know the significance of until you're knee-deep in the Heaven's Feel stuff.

Shinji's Visit to the Emiya Household:
Wow. :|

Well, let's start off with the biggest bombshell: Shinji has been having sex with Sakura. This is something I've seen in tons of FSN doujins, so I guess I should have expected it to be canon, but still ... there's a difference between imagining (or filling in the gaps for myself) that Shinji has this sort of relationship with Sakura and actually being told it canonically in the game.

But second: that punch to the poor girl's face. What the fuck. Even if he'd slapped her, he'd be way out of line, a bully, a horrible person, etc. But to actually punch her and knock her to the floor ... on MY doorstep ...! :evil:

Shinji is a terrible, terrible person. He deserved to die in Path 1 (and did!). He deserved to die even moreso in Path 2 (but didn't! :evil: ). And he most deserves to die in Path 3. I know it isn't nice to call for people's execution, but seriously, what a depraved individual. He's pretty much ruined Sakura's life. Now, even if she tries to have a consummate relationship with her Emiya-senpai, she's not going to be able to have sex with him without thinking about the times she was raped by Shinji. Those memories are burned into her mind. She will forever associate sex with Shinji. In that sense, sex is ruined for her. What a fucking prick. :evil:

He could have been a good guy, but a certain someone steered him down that path. Shinji completely reformed in UBW, for what it's worth (very little). I should note that the Matou family is pretty screwed up, though his Dad is probably the worst. His uncle was awesome, but wasn't without his closet skeletons.

Rendezvous with Ilya, Part II:
That scene was really cute. It was also pretty awesome to finally get to see Ilya's servants Sella and Leysritt, although as expected they're not likely to become friends of Shirou's. I appreciated the nod (intentional or not) to Kanon's Ayu in having Shirou gift Ilya a bag full of taiyaki. Maybe taiyaki just conjure up an image of cute girls in heavy winter clothes in the minds of most Japanese men :lol: , I dunno. I would have LOVED to have had a CG of Ilya preparing to take, and subsequently taking, a big bite out of a taiyaki. That would have been awesome. Oh well. :oops:

It might be becoming a trend, Shana popularized the image of "lolis" eating melon pan. Though I haven't seen many little girls in snow eating taiayki since FSN (haven't seen many little girls in snow period).

Talon87

02-12-2011, 05:20 PM

What? The fact that Rin's eyes turned a hypnotic red? I assumed it meant ...
A) Shirou was dreaming of sex with a hypnotized Rin
B) Shirou was having sex with Dark Sakura in his dreams, and she took on the visage of Rin
C) Shirou was having sex with Ilya in his dreams, and she took on the visage of Rin

But all three were pretty outlandish so I didn't even bring it up last post.

Talon87

02-13-2011, 05:22 PM

Ilya Glomps Me, I Nosebleed:
So Ilya came out of nowhere and attacked me one day. (pic) (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/ilya_glomp.jpg) And by "attacked me," I mean she jumped out of hiding and glomped me with a pouty face. What do I to turn her frown upside-down? Why, I invite her to my house (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/ilya_wai.jpg), of course! Needless to say, Saber was not amused. But this was a very cool scene. Without actually coming out and saying it, Nasu more or less tells the player with this scene, "Ilya is looking around the house she would have grown up in had she been raised by Kiritsugu and not the Einzberns." It was awkwardly cute when she looked sad at the end and said that she was upset she hadn't been able to find the man her mission was to kill (i.e. Kiritsugu). She said it like that, but you know what she really meant was that she was sad that Daddy is really gone. :cry: Oh, Ilya, you poor thing ...

A Surprise Meeting in a New Location:
Rin tells me to meet her at 4pm after school at the Chinese restaurant in the business district. This was unexpected. New scenes this late in the game? Wow! I wonder what it looks like inside. I wonder if-- AUGH! What are you doing here!? (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/kotomine_spicy_chinese.jpg) This was a really cool scene. I really enjoyed it.

One thing that bothers me about Kotomine's role in FSN is, every time, every path, I feel like the guy's a nice guy until we get to the end of the path and realize that he's a sick fucker and also the mastermind pulling the strings behind all this. Like, in both Fate and UBW, the Kotomine-Gilgamesh duo are the final bad guys you face off against. They are the enemies above all enemies. Even if that slightly changes in Heavens Feel, it still doesn't change the fact that Kotomine's not a nice man. And yet: every time I play the game, I think "This guy's pretty neat. Why does Shirou have such a problem with him? :?"

This was especially true in the Chinese restaurant scene. Kotomine laid it out on the line that he was Lancer's master but that he was now out of the war since his Servant had died. (Whether he's lying or not, since obviously he's still got Gilgamesh in cahoots with him, I dunno. But taking him at his word, this is +1 point for Kotomine.) Then he goes on to have this funny scene where he's devouring bowl after bowl of really spicy food. I dunno, I just found it amusing. It's hard to hate somebody the more human they become. And I found it funny that Shirou used Kotomine's love of spicy food to justify his hatred of this man. LOL What fucked-up logic. lol

Dickworms:
So, yeah: the Makiri lustworms. (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/makiri_dickworms.jpg) I had not remembered from my doujinshi purveys just how phallic these creatures were until I saw them in-game. They look like a bizarre fusion of a silverfish (http://www.extension.umn.edu/distribution/housingandclothing/images/DK1018_1.jpg), a penis, and the LOLWUT pear (http://www.reece-eu.net/gallery/var/albums/funny/lol-wut.jpg?m=1272645430). They just ... look so weird. >_>

But it was pretty cool to learn all about Matou Zouken's usage of them in the scene where ...
... he kills that one young woman in Shinto in order to secure a new body.

Sakura in Heat:
So, I've reached my first teaser (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/sakura_delirious_estrus.jpg) for the route's promise of Shirou x Sakura action. But nothing more than this yet. Sakura has a number of times gotten red in the face and panty, but so far Shirou's still identifying it as "the flu" :roll: and Sakura is writing it off as "being tired" :roll:.

To give you a feel for where I am ...

Sakura made lunch for Shirou and proposed they eat it together in the archery club dojo.
But Shirou spaced and went to the rooftop to discuss strategy with Rin. She ate half his lunch ...
... and then realized "OH FUCK" when Shirou offhandedly mentioned that Sakura had made this for him but she had made so much it would be plenty for two.
So we go back down the stairs and run into Sakura who begins to go into her Dark Sakura mode, except Rin quickly defuses the situation by telling Sakura that this was all her fault and that it wasn't what Sakura thought it was.
Shirou and Saber go out on patrol that night. They run into Rin and Archer facing off against Matou Zouken.
Zouken got cut in half by Archer.
His upper torso fled when "the Shadow" (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/theshadow.jpg) appeared near the bridge.
The Shadow attacked Rin but Shirou pushed her out of the way and took the brunt of its attack. He seemed to become contaminated by it, but nothing more's been said on this matter.
Zouken's bugs devoured a woman fleeing for her life in Shinto.
True Assassin appeared and addressed what he recognized to be his master. So now we know that Matou Zouken is the master of True Assassin.
Though I am still confused as to whether he summoned True Assassin at the start of the war or whether he summoned True Assassin only after the war had started and we saw True Assassin punch its way out of Assassin's body. I'm also confused how/why the Grail would have allowed for an eighth servant to be summoned (whether you want to label Assassin or True Assassin as the eighth being entirely up to you).
Given the Shadow's colorings, I'm pretty sure that it either is Sakura already or else that it will join up with Sakura at some point. (Since I know what Dark Sakura looks like already.) It'd make sense if it's already Sakura since the Shadow seemed to want to hurt Rin, and that'd make sense since Sakura is jealous of Rin, believing Shirou to be in love with her (due to the combination of [1] the sex dream and [2] the boxed lunch fiasco).

Doppleganger

02-13-2011, 06:26 PM

True Assassin is Servant #7. He replaced Kojirou as the proper Assassin of the 5th HGW.

And a big reason Shirou hates Kotomine is because they're really alike. Kotomine even looks (http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Kirei_Kotomine_7661.jpg) like Shirou in F/Z, though the similarities don't seem to have much bearing on what Archer thinks. Funnily enough, Kotomine also seems to have similar harem/seduction powers to Shirou, given his antics prior to the 4th HGW.

Talon87

02-13-2011, 06:31 PM

I thought so, too! Glad to hear I'm not crazy or imagining things. I thought the two were very similar as well.

You say True Assassin is servant #7. And I can see that being true, given that I've now seen his fight against Saber at the Ryudou Temple. But ... what does that make Sasaki Kojirou? Was he an imposter, summoned by Caster but never really a Servant recognized by the Grail? Or was he authentically Servant #7 and some sort of switcheroo took place between him and True Assassin?

One thing is clear: where Sasaki Kojirou seemed more swordsman than assassin, True Assassin is totally what you think of when you think "assassin." The throwing daggers, the trickery, the crawling-like-a-shadow up temple rafters and along the grassy ground ...

I just don't like how he is some identity-less Middle Easterner. I'd much rather he be a Heroic Spirit. But I even read the text in-game which confirmed that the Assassin Class is not compatible with Heroic Spirits, i.e. there really aren't any famous heroes in the history of Man who have been assassins. Wizards like Merlin, swordsmen like the Three Musketeers, lancers like Cu Chulainn, sure: but no assassins.

Doppleganger

02-13-2011, 06:55 PM

Kojirou could be created because there was a vacancy open for a Servant, but he's more of a "substitute" Servant #7. The amount of mana that went into his creation was far less than a regular Servant, so he's literally only a fraction of the soul power of average Servants like Lancer or Archer. But, even though he's a substitute Servant, the fact that he was summoned means all the vacancies were filled, since only seven Servants can be summoned in any one war (more than seven occured in the 5th because they were hold-overs from prior wars). To summon True Assassin, Zouken needed to replace an existing Servant, and so he basically appropriated Kojirou as a start up cost for TA. So I guess it's like Yu-Gi-Oh!'s concept of tributing monsters to summon stronger ones.

I just don't like how he is some identity-less Middle Easterner. I'd much rather he be a Heroic Spirit. But I even read the text in-game which confirmed that the Assassin Class is not compatible with Heroic Spirits, i.e. there really aren't any famous heroes in the history of Man who have been assassins. Wizards like Merlin, swordsmen like the Three Musketeers, lancers like Cu Chulainn, sure: but no assassins.

Hattori Hanzou?

Talon87

02-13-2011, 07:08 PM

Wait, is this always the case for summoning True Assassin? Because I thought ...

True Assassin was the one who filled the Assassin slot right from the get-go in War 4?

Doppleganger

02-13-2011, 08:28 PM

It only happened like it did in the 5th because Caster, a Servant herself, summoned an incomplete Servant with insufficient mana. Hassan is supposed to be the only being who can be summoned as Assassin, Kojirou is "bugged" as it were.

Talon87

02-13-2011, 11:47 PM

Of Superheroes and Sakuras:
Okay, well, now once again I feel like I've gotten to a crossroads, but who's to say in hindsight whether the choice I was presented with will really have any bearing on the unfolding plot or not?

After talking with Archer outside of the church and later Ilya in the park, I was presented with a choice: continue towards my goal of being a superhero or prioritizing Sakura's life. These choices are only mutually exclusive if Rin is correct about the danger Sakura poses to others being something which cannot be avoided. If Rin is wrong, then we can have our cake and eat it too. But anyway, for the sake of the romantic story -- and a gut feeling that this choice will unlock the True End ;-) -- I went with "I'll save Sakura no matter what." In real life, I wouldn't have had such a choice to make, so it's pointless to criticize me for not picking what I would have done in real life. Neither of the two options accurately fit what I'd do in real life. (In real life, I'd try to protect Sakura but I'd also try to guard the townspeople from Dark Sakura.)

So anyway, we'll see how things play out as a result of this choice. Maybe it was just an artificial choice, I dunno, but it seemed pretty heavy-duty. I mean, it got the Archer treatment, the Ilya treatment, and the song "This Illusion (Piano Arrangement)" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6GbctgywNBg) playing during it. So yeah: if that isn't over-the-top obvious that the scene was important, I don't know what is. :)

Sakura, you're creepin' me out, girl!:
There's this scene in the game where Sakura says:
"I see. I just have to keep [Senpai] from going outside."

She reaches a simple answer with a calm voice. Delighted by her sudden insight, she smiles and ...

"Right. You won't get in any more danger if you're hurt so badly that you can't walk."
When I saw this, I was like, "Hooooooooooooo shit! 8O" But nothing came of it. Sakura never attempted to bust Shirou's kneecaps or anything.

RIDER! :D :
Backtracking a bit to the scene at Ryudou Temple (Saber vs. True Assassin) ...

It was pretty awesome to see Rider return. God damn, she is sexy! :D So cool to see her defending Shirou.

It was also really cool to finally, finally officially have her identity revealed. And her Mystic Eyes! Talk about great timing on my part to watch Kara no Kyoukai before picking FSN back up! I wouldn't have even remembered what the term "mystic eyes" meant from Tsukihime were it not for Kara no Kyoukai. So the whole explanation about Rider's particular flavor of Mystic Eyes and how they are of a legendary status not seen in the times of mortals was both well-understood and well-received. :D

I didn't like the handwavey bullshit Nasu pulled, though, at the end of that fight scene.

It looks like Rider has got the heroes backed into a corner courtesy of her eyes and then Shirou conveniently blacks out and when he wakes up everyone's alive and well. What the fuck. >_> I know, I know: it was all because Sakura went nuts and tried to kill herself and so the Andromeda Blood Fort spell weakened and Rider called off her attack to prioritize her Master's survival, etc etc, but come on. :| Talk about your obvious cases of writers not being able to figure out how their heroes can get out of particularly sticky situations. :roll:

Current Progress:
The sex scene with Sakura at Maison d'Emiya. Leave it to Nasu to take a touching sex scene and muck it up with ridiculously corny dialogue. "Senpai ... is my body dirty?" :roll:

Doppleganger

02-14-2011, 12:11 AM

You chose wisely. Trying to protect the town would've lead to a Bad End, I think. Also,

It was also really cool to finally, finally officially have her identity revealed. And her Mystic Eyes! Talk about great timing on my part to watch Kara no Kyoukai before picking FSN back up! I wouldn't have even remembered what the term "mystic eyes" meant from Tsukihime were it not for Kara no Kyoukai. So the whole explanation about Rider's particular flavor of Mystic Eyes and how they are of a legendary status not seen in the times of mortals was both well-understood and well-received. :D

Might want to replay that scene later in the route. You'll see something you didn't know the significance of until you're knee-deep in the Heaven's Feel stuff.

...

Current Progress:
The sex scene with Sakura at Maison d'Emiya. Leave it to Nasu to take a touching sex scene and muck it up with ridiculously corny dialogue. "Senpai ... is my body dirty?" :roll:

Yeah, what a dumb question. Of course it is, Sakura. =P

I should chime in that most of the H-scenes I've seen in VNs tend to be rather bad, yet Nasu's personal charm seems to amplify the abberance. But the awkward ones are the worst.

big bad birtha

02-14-2011, 07:09 PM

I just remembered something mentioned in BMW and I'm wondering if it's canon or just something Wark made up. Archer was talking to Sakura while she was being held captive, and he said that he was so driven by his morals, that he killed her. I mean, it would make sense if he did, but it was never mentioned in FSN (atleast as far as I remember.) Anyway, I'm basically asking whether he did or not.

Also, I wonder if Shirou catches worms in Heaven's Feel?

Doppleganger

02-14-2011, 07:21 PM

I just remembered something mentioned in BMW and I'm wondering if it's canon or just something Wark made up. Archer was talking to Sakura while she was being held captive, and he said that he was so driven by his morals, that he killed her. I mean, it would make sense if he did, but it was never mentioned in FSN (atleast as far as I remember.) Anyway, I'm basically asking whether he did or not.

He did. It was mentioned in F/ha I think.

Also, I wonder if Shirou catches worms in Heaven's Feel?

That didn't happen.

Talon87

02-20-2011, 03:19 PM

Disclaimer: this post contains major spoilers, but nothing that hasn't already been spoiled earlier in the thread back when our community was smaller and so we all just assumed that everyone knew certain major details. Lil' Blue, you're safe to read all of this.

First off, I am officially GAR for Lancer. Don't ask me how that works.

That being said... CURSE YOU KOTOMINE. How dare you force my favorite character - let alone Servant - so far to suffer such a lame death as impalement by his own spear?! Gr... At least he got back up and stopped the priest from killing Rin (not to mention Shinji from raping her!). So at least his death wasn't in vain. It was still cheap though. T-T

The Archer vs. Shirou fight was cool, though I was hoping for Shirou to learn how to summon his own Reality Marble at this point so a scene like in the 2nd animé OP (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-XTUJprs7ZE&t=1m08s) could take place. Archer particularly annoys me now since I have my own vision of becoming a superhero, so every time I feel like his words are testing me as much as they are his younger self.
Lancer is amazing in Unlimited Blade Works. I didn't care for the guy at all in the anime. I weakly cared for him after playing through Fate. But in playing Unlimited Blade Works, wherein he takes a major role in the plot alongside our heroes, I came to love the guy immensely. I was especially psyched to discover in the UBW path that Cu Chulainn could just as easily be summoned as a Caster as a Lancer since he was (apparently?) just as famous if not more famous for his runes than he was for his spear Gae Bolg. That's just crazy. It's so hard for me to imagine him as a Caster-class Servant having only come to know him through FSN, but on the flipside it is so, so cool to know that he's such a badass that he transcends classes. (I don't think the same thing can be said for many of the Servants, especially Arturia. To not summon King Arthur for his/her sword Excalibur is to pretty much botch the summons completely. I hesitate to say that Arthur is worthless as a non-Saber, but it's undeniable that he/she is at his/her best in the Saber class.)

The Archer vs. Shirou fight is probably the climax of the path, if for no other reasons than:
(1) should one enter it unspoilered, it is the point where one once and for all learns Archer's true identity, and
(2) the bad-ass theme song "EMIYA" plays during the fight and is just so, so perfect

But of course the scene offers more than these two things alone. As you mentioned, the scene is important because the future self chastises the younger self for his self-destructive dream -- a dream which we all admire. It is the ultimate tragedy that Archer, in successfully becoming a superhero, necessarily sacrificed some lives (cough cough) in order to save others. And that, afterwards, the people would reject him for his actions, despite the fact that he saved them, and he would become the pariah of his era.

The thing which bugs me most about the fight is temporal logic. If Archer is the future Shirou, and if (as in the UBW path) the events of UBW are what is playing out, then it follows that Archer must have himself, as a young man, experienced the UBW path personally. This means two things for the plot:

First, it means that we know that Shirou can't possibly lose the fight. For Shirou to die would be to introduce a paradox: for how could a boy who dies grow up to become the man who kills the boy later in the time-loop? It doesn't work. The boy has to survive such that he can grow up to become Archer. So if you think about it, this takes a lot of suspense out of the fight.

Second, it calls into question why Archer would even attempt to kill his former self in the first place. Yes, I understand his motivations, but what I'm saying is that he should know full well that the past cannot be changed: that even if you are summoned into the past, everything you do there will all lead towards the future you just came from.

I suppose the answer to the temporal paradox is the supposition that Nasu does not share in my theories of time travel -- namely, that he subscribes to the belief that multiple timelines originate from any one action-point in time and that he also believes that his creation, the Throne of Heroes, transcends all timelines -- and thus you can theoretically have Archer be the end-result of Shirou from Path 4 (Heavens Feel Unwritten End?), and you can have that same Archer be summoned into the Fate, UBW, or HF paths without any problems. In other words, perhaps Nasu believes that you can change the past with time travel. But I say bah to that. :\ This is where we have creative differences ... although I guess that's not the right term for it since I'm not on the creation staff for this game. ^^; :lol:

Doppleganger

02-20-2011, 05:17 PM

Lancer is really awesome in UBW but F/ha is really where his character grows. If the Master-Servant dynamic is a major selling point to FSN's plot, you can imagine Lancer had such an interesting relationship with his original master.

We also get the TYPE-MOON version of his past, which is surprisingly accurate to the original legend (as opposed to Rider's...or Saber's).

Second, it calls into question why Archer would even attempt to kill his former self in the first place. Yes, I understand his motivations, but what I'm saying is that he should know full well that the past cannot be changed: that even if you are summoned into the past, everything you do there will all lead towards the future you just came from.

Two reasons for that.

1. It was for his own personal satisfaction to kill Shirou, as if reaffirming his pessemism was correct.
2. A temporal paradox.

What Archer was gambling on in killing Shirou was the hope that UBW Shirou was going to become an Eirei. Records in the Throne of Heroes are composites of information from all time-lines, and they're constantly being drawn from the time-lines, it's not a one-time copy/paste, it's more along the lines of a computer running on vital resources in a system32 file. Archer wanted to delete a vital file in system32, which he hoped (he wasn't sure, and had a lot of doubts given he existed) would sublime reality and free him of his torment. If it wouldn't, he'd settle for #1.

I suppose the answer to the temporal paradox is the supposition that Nasu does not share in my theories of time travel -- namely, that he subscribes to the belief that multiple timelines originate from any one action-point in time and that he also believes that his creation, the Throne of Heroes, transcends all timelines -- and thus you can theoretically have Archer be the end-result of Shirou from Path 4 (Heavens Feel Unwritten End?), and you can have that same Archer be summoned into the Fate, UBW, or HF paths without any problems. In other words, perhaps Nasu believes that you can change the past with time travel. But I say bah to that. :\ This is where we have creative differences ... although I guess that's not the right term for it since I'm not on the creation staff for this game. ^^; :lol:

The Throne of Heroes is part of Akasha, and does transcend the parallel universes of our world. However, the record of Eirei in the Throne is based on a composite of all incarnations of the original hero who would become an Eirei.

Talon87

02-20-2011, 06:15 PM

Yeah, see, I think that's dumb. :lol: But whatever. I'm still enjoying the ride, so I can handle a few bumps in the road ...

YUKI.N

02-20-2011, 07:16 PM

I was especially psyched to discover in the UBW path that Cu Chulainn could just as easily be summoned as a Caster as a Lancer since he was (apparently?) just as famous if not more famous for his runes than he was for his spear Gae Bolg.

That was a really nifty fact to learn. I would definitely like to have such a guy on my side, or at least see him paired with a Master who would recognize and make the most of his hidden abilities. Given that most of us probably never heard of Cú Chulainn before FSN, he'd be practically unknown in Japan and therefore hold the greatest element of surprise (as Dopple mentioned in the suggestion thread). An unluckier Servant than Saber would probably fall right for his Gae Bolg trap the first time he used it. It was just unfortunate timing and circumstances that forced him to leak his identity.

Anyway, finished UBW. I pretty much agree with Talon's complaints about the ending, but otherwise I very much enjoyed it.

Question: I'm missing one final CG after the one of Rin sitting on a desk with the sunset coming through the window. Is this from the "Good" ending Dopple mentioned? Is so, how do I achieve this ending?

Also, how does one go about docking onto Heaven's Feel? Should I just pay attention to Sakura from the beginning?

Talon87

02-20-2011, 07:23 PM

About how to dock onto Heavens Feel ...

Yeah, you won't get any official confirmation for the longest time -- the first "Heavens Feel"-labeled Interlude is like on Day 3 or something. But you'll know you're doing it right if you meet a character you've never seen before. Don't want to spoil the surprise for you, though I can here if you must know:
Matou Zouken, Shinji's grandfather
This character was totally missing (or at the very least was operating behind the scenes? :?) in Fate and UBW, but he's a major character in Heavens Feel so you'll know him when you see him.

Every time I played the games prior, I always lavished attention on Sakura anyway. When I played Fate, I was dedicated towards Sakura all the way until Saber was summoned. And when I played UBW, I did the same except for those rare instances where I was forced to pick between doting on Rin or on Sakura. So docking onto the Heavens Feel path for me didn't feel like I was doing anything special at all.

But to answer your question, yes: it seems from my own recent experience that all you'll have to do in order to dock onto the HF path is to dote on Sakura, to always pick the Sakura-related option, etc. When you do, now that you've cleared UBW, you'll occasionally notice some new screens' worth of dialogue following old and familiar choices you made. But really, the big clues that you're doing things right will be the appearance of the new challenger and, eventually, your first Heavens Feel interlude scene.

I was disappointed to discover that there was no Heavens Feel opening movie file. I was so certain there would be one. :( Oh well. Letting you know this so that you don't do what I did: panic that you may not have docked properly since you never saw the movie. (I quit panicking once I was already on, like, Day 6 or Day 7 and was clearly playing Heavens Feel but still had not seen a trace of any movie ... :lol: )

Doppleganger

02-20-2011, 07:25 PM

Yeah, the CG you're missing comes from the Good End.

Yeah, see, I think that's dumb. :lol: But whatever. I'm still enjoying the ride, so I can handle a few bumps in the road ...

I can't say I don't agree. It's needlessly complex, and the complexity only seems to arise because it has to tie into the TYPE-MOON world mechanics.

YUKI.N

02-20-2011, 07:51 PM

There's really no opening movie for HF? Darn, I was wondering why I couldn't find one when I searched YT.

I haven't particularly paid much attention to Sakura since I prefer Saber and Rin. I still support ShirouxSaber mainly due to the fact Shirou has you-know-what inside of him, so it makes symbolic sense. Rin's cool so I admire her, but I don't quite see her as a match for Shirou. Though UBW's ending did make me more partial to the idea of ArcherxRin, if that makes any sense. It's just that in my opinion I don't think any girl should settle for Shirou until he fixes that old-school "chivalric bordering on chauvanistic" view of his, which Archer thankfully seems to lack. Saber gets a pass since she has zero experience as a woman and therefore doesn't know any better, not to mention she lived during the age of chivalry anyway.

That being said, I guess Sakura would be the best choice since she seems weak and in need of protection anyway. I just don't personally feel anything special towards her. We'll see if this path changes my mind.

And Dopple, could you give me some advice on how to achieve the "good" UBW ending? I'm also curious to see how it turns out.

YUKI.N

02-20-2011, 11:10 PM

I just saw the dream sex scene with Rin. All I have to say is that those HYPNOTIC RED EYES ARE GONNA GIVE ME NIGHTMARES AHHH!!!

...

Anyway, my theory is that the dream Rin is somehow related to the "True Assassin" that was just summoned. As "it" consumed the corpses at Ryuudouji and kept repeating "It is not enough", Rin's sexual advances towards Shirou in the dream seemed to echo those sentiments.

I've been relatively unspoiled on the Heaven's Feel path aside from the knowledge of what Sakura eventually becomes (and only in name), so I'm pretty much playing blind from now on. All of these events and characters are new to me. o.o;;;

Doppleganger

02-20-2011, 11:37 PM

Rin and Shirou really work optimally as best friends/partners, not as lovers, though I like Rin a lot as a heroine. I agree that Saber x Shirou is best, and Archer seems to feel that way too (the memories of his life are rather vague, but the one scene he distinctly remembers is his first meeting with Saber). I wish Nasu had given a more satisfying resolution to the Shirou x Saber, Fate doesn't cut it.

And Dopple, could you give me some advice on how to achieve the "good" UBW ending? I'm also curious to see how it turns out.

Throughout the route make a lot of pro-Saber decisions.

Talon87

02-20-2011, 11:39 PM

Not a bad guess, but like Doppel said: it's all about the eyes.

YUKI.N

02-21-2011, 02:43 AM

Talon87

02-21-2011, 02:12 PM

I'm about to form a contract with Rin, and she's asking me whether I will obey her or not. I tested out both answers. Seems refusing actually nets a positive response, whereas accepting the condition places a geas of coercion on me. Talon, which option did you choose? I'm curious how this will affect the story later on.
I know the conversation you're talking about though I forget what all the questions were. I remember there were at least two, possibly three. Supposing there were two, I answered the first one saying I'd do as she asked but the second one I told her no. It was something along the lines of "Will you do what I tell you to, no matter what it is?" and I answered "No" because in real life my thinking would be, "No, I'm not going to do whatever you tell me" and as a gamer my thinking was "Oh shit, if I say 'yes,' then later on she'll ask me 'Please die :3' and it'll be a Bad End! 8O" So I said No either way. And then she was all, "Good, I'm glad to hear it. I'd have worried you were a bad partner if you'd said Yes. I need you to be able to stand up and tell me 'No!' when you think I'm wrong, otherwise what good are you to me?" Something like that.

I didn't explore the other options -- to me, that's sort of like cheating in a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure book where you look at the outcome for both options before sticking with one =P -- so I can't weigh in on the ramifications for what having told her "Yes" would mean. Which brings us to ...

Btw, Talon, you may want to go back to the Ilya glomping scene and choose the second method of apologizing to her. ^~
Maybe on a second playthrough I will. What was the second option? I remember there being three, and I save at all question-points so it'll be very easy for me to explore it later should I want to. I just remember that option #1 was to invite her over to my house, which is the one I picked. And I'm very pleased with that outcome. She was adorably pleased to see where Kiritsugu lived and I got some good (if sadly limited) additional insight into her backstory.

Holy crap Saber died. o.o;;; Totally did not expect this development.
Wow, you really haven't been HF spoilered. While I didn't know that she ____, per se, I did know that something like it would have to happen given the existence of D___ _____. I'm surprised you've never heard nor seen of D___ _____ before. Or maybe you have but the fact that Saber ____ still surprised you. Where and how it happened surprised me too, I'll confess. I was expecting ...

(do not click unless you can fill in the blanks I wrote up above all on your own already) (see comments below for more about this)
... Dark Sakura to bust out something like Rule Breaker and steal Saber from Shirou. So I, too, was surprised to see Saber get defeated by True Assassin prior to the evolution of Dark Sakura.

There's a very, very famous wallpaper that spoiled some HF stuff for me ages ago. But it was also one of those things which had me interested in HF from the beginning. However, it's a big spoiler, especially if you say you've managed to avoid HF spoilers, so only click this if you're wanting to verify that you already know what I'm talking about (http://images2.fanpop.com/images/photos/3300000/DarkSakura-DarkSaber-fate-stay-night-3313851-1024-768.jpg), yet do so at your own risk. If you have successfully avoided HF spoilers, then this will be pretty devastating. :|

YUKI.N

02-21-2011, 03:03 PM

I know the conversation you're talking about though I forget what all the questions were. I remember there were at least two, possibly three. Supposing there were two, I answered the first one saying I'd do as she asked but the second one I told her no. It was something along the lines of "Will you do what I tell you to, no matter what it is?" and I answered "No" because in real life my thinking would be, "No, I'm not going to do whatever you tell me" and as a gamer my thinking was "Oh shit, if I say 'yes,' then later on she'll ask me 'Please die :3' and it'll be a Bad End! 8O" So I said No either way. And then she was all, "Good, I'm glad to hear it. I'd have worried you were a bad partner if you'd said Yes. I need you to be able to stand up and tell me 'No!' when you think I'm wrong, otherwise what good are you to me?" Something like that.

I didn't explore the other options -- to me, that's sort of like cheating in a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure book where you look at the outcome for both options before sticking with one =P -- so I can't weigh in on the ramifications for what having told her "Yes" would mean.

I panicked when Rin placed a geas on me, so I went back and tested all options. Answering "yes" or "no" to her first two questions doesn't have any bearing, but whether you ultimately accept her conditions or not determines whether the curse takes effect.

The reason I decided to try agreeing to it first is because I thought Shirou just might be stupid and desperate enough to do so. In this scenario, he's lost Saber and Rin seems to be the only one he can rely on. Maybe I just can't forgive him for being so easily trusting of his enemies in previous paths (*cough*Ilya*cough*). Certainly in real life I personally wouldn't agree to such terms, but then I also wouldn't go stupidly running into danger all the time like Shirou does. =x

Having seen the animé first, I'm more familiar with animé Shirou's personality and view him as a seperate entity. Thus unlike the previous VNs I've played, I've discontinued the gamer thought process entirely and instead try to emulate the protagonist's. In that vein, I decided to lie to Sakura about the sex dream, since I see him as the type of guy who'd avoid the truth in order to protect somebody, as well as be too embarrassed to admit such a thing - especially to a girl he likes. We'll see how our paths may differ due to this decision.

Maybe on a second playthrough I will. What was the second option? I remember there being three, and I save at all question-points so it'll be very easy for me to explore it later should I want to. I just remember that option #1 was to invite her over to my house, which is the one I picked. And I'm very pleased with that outcome. She was adorably pleased to see where Kiritsugu lived and I got some good (if sadly limited) additional insight into her backstory.

The second option was to obey a command from Ilya like a Servant. The result is that while you don't take her home, you do spend some quality time together. The bonus is an extra CG, and while it's no taiyaki, it's pretty cute. You also get to hear Ilya briefly mention her mum.

(This is another reason why I'm exploring more options now in search of hidden gems. As a warning, option three produces a scary response.)

Wow, you really haven't been HF spoilered. While I didn't know that she ____, per se, I did know that something like it would have to happen given the existence of D___ _____. I'm surprised you've never heard nor seen of D___ _____ before. Or maybe you have but the fact that Saber ____ still surprised you. Where and how it happened surprised me too, I'll confess.

I mentioned I have heard of the name D___ _____, but that's it. I don't know exactly what that entails or how D___ _____ comes into being. I didn't click your spoiler, though I did peek at the wallpaper. I think I recognize one of the characters as Saber, but I have no idea who the other is (although the URL just gave me a clue). Still don't know how it all relates to the plot.

YUKI.N

02-22-2011, 07:20 PM

I just came across the initial concept art (http://www.projectsaber.com/2010/03/31/initial-fatestay-night-concept-art/) for FSN's protagonist and Saber. The original designs were surprising, to say the least. It would've been rather interesting to play as a female in an action-oriented VN - so long as she's less dense than Shirou and still takes an active role. The concept kinda reminds me of Alucard's Master Integra (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integra_Hellsing) from Hellsing (though I've not seen the show). Perhaps the prologue was told from Rin's perspective as an homage to the scrapped idea.

Anyway, putting HF on hold for two weeks like I mentioned in the suggestion thread.

*suppresses urge to imagine an alternate genderbent universe for FSN*

Doppleganger

02-22-2011, 08:29 PM

Saver was supposed to have Shirou's personality from what I heard a long time ago, and his major enemy remained Gilgamesh. Archer wasn't even concieved of at this point, I think Gilgamesh might have ended up as Rin's Archer.

Talon87

02-22-2011, 09:47 PM

I like the fact that Arthur is Arturia if for no other reason than it really drives home (or should I say, it really makes easy to follow?) the lesson that Saber is not like the other Servants because she has been summoned prior to death rather than after death and, as such, she is summoned as she really existed and not necessarily as we know her today through legends. What better way to drive this point home than to summon the totally masculine King Arthur but have him be a woman instead?

And it fits in pretty well with the time period, too: before the invasions by the Romans and the Scandinavians, English society was matriarchical according to some (see: The Mists of Avalon (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mists_of_Avalon), see also: NBC's television movie Merlin). And even if it wasn't, the evidence is clear that pre-Roman or early-Roman Britain was a world where women were just as likely to become leaders of men as were men. For example, Boudica (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boudica) was a Welsh queen who led an uprising against the Romans occupying the land of her ancestors. And her contemporary Cartimandua (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cartimandua) was a queen in northern England who allied with Rome rather than putting up resistance. These historical facts [?] suggest that a female Arthur could have been possible, and Type-MOON delightfully plays with that idea.

Now, I'm not saying I'm a big fan of Saber being a girl. Tonight (2/22/2011) I don't particularly care much one way or the other. And I'm having trouble remembering what I initially felt back in 2006, 2007 when I first found out about FSN and Saber's role in it. All I'm saying is, changing the Servant's gender has got to be one of the most solid ways to drive home the point that a Servant summoned before death will be summoned as he/she truly was and not as we remember him/her.

YUKI.N

02-22-2011, 11:49 PM

When I first saw the animé, I totally thought the story was intentionally built around the central idea that Saber was a girl. Like the thought just randomly occurred to Nasu one day: "Hey, what if King Arthur was actually female? Wouldn't that be some crazy shit?" And then he simply went from there. The Holy Grail War and the Master-Servant relationship were just afterthoughts to provide a proper setting and explanation.

(...Maybe I'm the only one who jumps to weird conclusions like that. >>; )

Of course, in the back of my mind I always figured the main reason was to simply add more moe to the harem. =x Which is fine with me, since Saber is adorable. In all of the paths I still found her the cutest character. Never got to see her pouty face in the animé, tee hee~

*ahem* Basically, I admire cute/beautiful girls who can kick ass and/or fend for themselves. So I personally appreciate the decision to make the strongest fighter - not to mention leader of a country - a woman who's completely unconcerned about her gender. Historically accurate or not, it's the innovation that counts in my book.

On a random-ish but related topic, I thought it might be interesting if we propose ideas for which heroic spirits might have been summoned to each class had all their genders been reversed (disregarding potential crossdressing situations like Saber's). I've been trying to think of historical female figures who might fit the roles but can't name any off the top of my head, save perhaps Artemis as an Archer. Though I guess that's to be expected, given the relative shortage of famous female heroes, real or mythological. x_X

Do you guys know any more? Suggestions for a male Caster and Rider are also welcome.

Oh, and I think it goes without saying that any Fourth War Servants are out as candidates. No spoilers please.

YUKI.N

03-05-2011, 04:29 PM

I'm home for spring break, so I'll be picking up with Heaven's Feel again and charging full-speed ahead. Better watch out, Talon.

Edit- Just encountered D___ _____ for the first time. I want to clarify that I originally thought Talon was previously referring to D___ ______, whose name I'd heard before. Never heard of nor seen D___ _____ until now (or rather until I saw the wallpaper).

...The Sakura sex scene was the worst yet. So many things wrong with it, in so many ways. XD There's one that I feel I have to point out:

The varying movements are like those of an educated prostitute.

Shirou would know this... How? I thought UBW confirmed he was a virgin. *insert roll-eyes emoticon*

Doppleganger

03-06-2011, 07:56 PM

Supposedly, when Japanese kids bang each other, the women is supposed to be completely submissive (unresponsive) and the guy assertive. An assertive girl is apparently the hallmark of someone with experience.

I once read a woman talk about her Japanese boyfriend "feeling gay" when they banged each other, because of how aggressive she was in bed. Normally, that's the guy's role. It's the whole seme-uke thing, the girl apparently turned her BF into an uke.

...why do I know this? >.>

YUKI.N

03-06-2011, 09:57 PM

Just cleared HF (both Normal and True endings). I'll wait for Talon to catch up before discussing it in-depth, as he's bound to catch more issues/feel more strongly about them than I, whether they're positive or negative. Couple things I want to remark on though:

What's up with Shirou pulling Rule Breaker all of a sudden out his ass? Yeah, he saw Caster holding it for a split-second very early on, and somehow deduced its properties just from one glance. Back then I was even more confused: How in the world did he gain that instinctive foreknowledge? I might've let it slide like summoning Archer's Rho Aias against Dark Saber if there were some logical explanation for information from previous paths leaking into Shirou's brain, but there were none. It feels like the writer just conveniently threw it in there in order to pull a deus ex at the end.

Disappointment over not being able to save Saber is a given. Moving on.

Both possible endings leave a bad taste in my mouth since they basically go against the principles Fate and UBW enforced. In the end, it's exactly as Shirou predetermined: He gave up his ideal of helping others to protect just one person. He was willing to sacrifice everyone in order to save Sakura, and many did die as a result of that.

I certainly don't mean to deny Sakura the human right to live or find happiness. What gets me is that Shirou told her she should live so she can "take responsibility" for all those people's deaths. And what does she do in the Normal end (which I first saw)? Weep and grow flowers. Uh, way to honor Shirou's dying wish and contribute to society, girl.

The True End is all right, since Sakura's cheerful with Shirou there and all and claims she'll "do her best". Vague promises don't mean much to me after seeing how she dealt with the remorse in the Normal End though. Give us some substance to back up those words please - at the very least a hint of what she plans to do in the future to atone for her sins.

Maybe I'm too harsh and demanding of a perfect ideal like the one Shirou followed in Fate and UBW. Can't say I enjoyed HF as much as the other two paths for that reason. My feelings towards Sakura haven't changed significantly. I still see her as a weak person - in fact more so for not growing stronger and learning to overcome obstacles on her own after all she's been through. It's just...

The prince and princess lived Happily Ever After, huh? *sigh*

Talon87

03-06-2011, 10:21 PM

Awwww, I'm feeling awfully Ben Kenobi right about now. :( ;-) But I got distracted this weekend, playtesting the Pokemon Black game (EU rom) on Saturday and then watching some more of the BW anime on Sunday, catching up to where the sub group I'm following has left off. I've got some exams this week, but my spring break begins next week, so maybe then I'll beat it, who knows.

Sorry to hear you didn't like it as much as Fate or UBW. That seems to be somewhat common, with HF fans being a vocal minority. I'd heard ages ago that it was one of those cases where one would either love Heavens Feel or hate it. I'd also heard ages ago that it was very dark. If that's true, and if it's the dark or cynical spin which you disliked the most, then that may bode poorly for your Fate/Zero prospects this fall -- since I've also heard that Fate/Zero is incredibly dark, pessimistic, cynical, etc. Basically, all the masters are assholes to varying extents is what I've heard. Though I have a hard time accepting that for Waver Velvet: he seems like a cool kid who just got in over his head from what little I know about him.

Doppleganger

03-06-2011, 11:10 PM

HF is only dark in the sense of the main characters being in an absolutely hopeless situation. Even in Fate, against Berserker, there was never a single instance of Shirou/Saber ever thinking they didn't have a snowball's chance of winning. But in HF, the main characters are fudged over, and over, and the reader shocked at the brutality and ruthlessness of Sakura.

Just cleared HF (both Normal and True endings). I'll wait for Talon to catch up before discussing it in-depth, as he's bound to catch more issues/feel more strongly about them than I, whether they're positive or negative. Couple things I want to remark on though:

What's up with Shirou pulling Rule Breaker all of a sudden out his ass? Yeah, he saw Caster holding it for a split-second very early on, and somehow deduced its properties just from one glance. Back then I was even more confused: How in the world did he gain that instinctive foreknowledge? I might've let it slide like summoning Archer's Rho Aias against Dark Saber if there were some logical explanation for information from previous paths leaking into Shirou's brain, but there were none. It feels like the writer just conveniently threw it in there in order to pull a deus ex at the end.

Shirou has the ability to "Google" Archer's arm for weapons he could use in a situation. He basically searched for a weapon that could destroy talismans and came up with Rule Breaker, which Archer properly encountered in his scenario.

YUKI.N

03-06-2011, 11:35 PM

It's not the darkness that I mind so much. I love me some angst and drama. It's the fact that Shirou - champion of truth and justice and whatnot - turned his back on all of that to fulfill his own selfish desire. I understand you should treasure yourself and the people you love first and foremost. But like what you said, I want to have my cake and eat it too. I would desire to protect Sakura as well as the townspeople. I'm not mad that Shirou threw away the cake for a cherry (potential for an awful pun? *shot*), but I am disappointed he purposefully forgot the recipe and never tried to bake a new one. Or at least build a shrine and pay tribute to the cake (...even if it's a lie *shot repeatedly*). I dunno which analogy makes more sense, if at all. ^^;;;

...Darn. Now I crave cake. x.X

Shirou has the ability to "Google" Archer's arm for weapons he could use in a situation. He basically searched for a weapon that could destroy talismans and came up with Rule Breaker, which Archer properly encountered in his scenario.

By "his scenario", are you referring to UBW? How does that work? Or do I not want to know?

Oh, yeah. I had another question for Dopple:

The Rin sex scene. What was the significance of this? From your hint, I feel it has something to do with Rider. Sakura's freakout over Rider's veil also suggests to me that Rider's eyes also possess some power of seduction. But I don't recall Shirou ever getting exposed to her gaze before the dream. Even if Rider was the one influencing Shirou's mind, I don't see what bearing it would have on the plot, if at all.

Also, I'm missing one CG from the "Another" Gallery. It's the only one on the last page, so I'm guessing it's either special or from a hidden H-scene. Any tips on how to get it?

Doppleganger

03-07-2011, 12:26 AM

I'm not mad that Shirou threw away the cake for a cherry (potential for an awful pun? *shot*)

Ooh, I like the way you think. Well done, well done!

*claps*

...Darn. Now I crave cake. x.X

I'm pretty sugar-doped myself, so I'll pass.

But to answer your analogy, Nasu sees the two objectives as mutually exclusive. Shirou inherently understands that Sakura's mind is so screwed up that if he wasn't willing to burn all of Fuyuki to save her, she didn't have a chance of being saved. Most heroes in Shirou's position would try to save everyone, but Nasu wanted to make this route be distinct from UBW and Fate, which sort of overlap with that ideal.

HF annoyed me because it stripped away one of Shirou's personality definitions that made him unique - his idealism. Most idealists in his situation have the power to change the world (like Kururugi Suzaku) so they're never faced with their ideals being questioned/doubted, they overpower everything and enforce their will on the world. Those who don't have the power die. Here, Shirou is a guy without the power, but managed to survive yet still clinged to the ideal. Taking away that ideal pretty much reduces him to a Rambo caricature. HF Shirou is without a doubt the most hardcore and impressive of the Shirous in FSN (save Archer), but he's also on a self-destructive path and it's an extraordinary devotion toward an ordinary objective.

By "his scenario", are you referring to UBW? How does that work? Or do I not want to know?

Basically Archer's route.

What we know of Archer's route is he saw Gate of Babylon and recorded all the swords in it for his UBW, and went around the world after that to get other weapons like Rho Aias and Gungnir. HF Shirou can't record stuff properly in UBW because he lacks the mentality that gave rise to UBW.

The Rin sex scene. What was the significance of this? From your hint, I feel it has something to do with Rider. Sakura's freakout over Rider's veil also suggests to me that Rider's eyes also possess some power of seduction. But I don't recall Shirou ever getting exposed to her gaze before the dream. Even if Rider was the one influencing Shirou's mind, I don't see what bearing it would have on the plot, if at all.

Rider was having sex with Shirou, and was using her eyes to hypnotize him into thinking it was Rin. I believe Sakura sent Rider to him with the purpose of servicing him and getting a mana recharge, but Rider actually likes Shirou a lot (just not as much as Ayako).

Also, I'm missing one CG from the "Another" Gallery. It's the only one on the last page, so I'm guessing it's either special or from a hidden H-scene. Any tips on how to get it?

Might be one of the Bad Ends. Is it an HF scene?

Talon87

03-07-2011, 01:45 AM

On the topic of fangirl-speculating about possible Heroic Spirits, did you guys know that the face cards in a 52-deck of cards are all based on legendary characters according to French tradition? I didn't know this. I learned it just now while Wikipedia'ing "Jack (cards)" because, while eating my dinner in front of the computer, I was wondering just where on earth the name "jack" came from for playing cards and what the Jack really was. (I'd always thought he was the Prince. Turns out he's just some knave in the service of the Royal Court!)

So. Anyway. Relevancy to FSN: have you ever heard the story of Ogier the Dane (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ogier_the_Dane)? It sounds pretty cool, and I'd like to submit him to the list of interesting Heroic Spirits I would love to see in other Grail Wars.

Name: Ogier the Dane
Servant Class: Saber, Berserker
Noble Phantasm: Cortana (sword) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curtana)
History: Ogier is the son of Geoffrey, king of Denmark. In La Chevalerie Ogier de Danemarche, he had a son who was slain by Charlot, son of Charlemagne. Seeking revenge, Ogier sought out and slew Charlot, and was only barely prevented from killing Charlemagne. He resisted Charlemagne for seven years but made peace with him to fight at Charlemagne's side against the Saracens, in which battle he slew the giant Brehus.
Other Names: Ogier le Danois (modern French), Ogier de Danemarche (archaic French), Holger Danske (Danish)
Iconography: you can see a statue of Ogier here (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/de/Holger_danske.jpg)

Ogier's story has all the right ingredients. He seeks paternal revenge against the son, Charlot, of the founding monarch of France, Charlemagne, for having killed his own boy. After exacting that revenge, so blinded is he by grief and anger that he almost takes the life of Charlemagne as well. For seven years the two were bitter enemies until one day they had to unite against a common foe. Charlemagne led his troops into battle and Ogier proved to be one of the greatest men in all the land, slaying a mythic beast -- a giant! :D -- and fending off the invaders. He became one of Charlemagne's knights. This in spite of the fact that he had killed Charlemagne's son years earlier! What fate! That yesteryear's villain would be tomorrow's brother-in-arms?

He's not exactly famous to us, but in France he was at one time so famous, apparently, that -- you've already guessed it -- he was immortalized as the Jack of Spades. Kinda neat, huh? :) He may not be all too famous, but Doppel's always saying that that's what a Master would desire in a Servant in a Grail War anyway: an identity that's tough to decipher.

Only problem I can see in Ogier's legend is that, from the little I've read, he didn't meet his end in any particular way which opens itself up to a weakness. No Achilles heel, no Kryptonite. This might not mesh well with the FSN universe Nasu has crafted seeing as all of the previous Servants have all had something which served as their weak point. Something might have to be invented for an FSN Ogier were he to be summoned to serve as his personal vice or weakpoint à la the Grail-contaminated Gilgamesh.

Doppleganger

03-07-2011, 02:00 AM

That is seriously exciting, I had no freaking idea the playing card reliefs were modeled after legendary figures! I can't believe an important detail like that's sitting in plain sight...

And look, apparently Charlemagne's sword still exists today, in the Lourve. What a sight to see! My sister's going to Belgium this summer, maybe she can take a picture of it if she goes back to Paris...

Talon87

03-07-2011, 02:10 AM

I was just looking at that same picture of Joyeuse on Wikipedia before refreshing this page for your reply. :D What a coincidence.

Be careful, though! I was reading on the Joyeuse wiki page that there have been multiple different swords to surface up over the ages all of which have been said to be the real Joyeuse. So the one in the Louvre (which goes with one of the oldest claims) may or may not be the real deal.

It is alleged to have been interred with Charlemagne's body or contrarily to be held by the Saint Denis Basilica, where it was later retired into the Louvre after being carried at the front of Coronation processionals for French kings. Another supposed Joyeuse is held at the Imperial Treasury in Vienna.

Personally, I'd be more inclined to believe that Charlemagne was buried with it, but who knows. (Wouldn't it be easy these days to confirm the buried-with-it theory by peering into his grave with X-rays and stuff and looking for a sword? :?)

The "Durandal", on the other hand, leaves much to be desired. =\ Rust or no rust, it very clearly looks like some shabby meh-grade sword (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Rocam_durandal_082005.jpg) that someone shoved into a crevice of rock just to sell a story to tourists. :|

YUKI.N

03-07-2011, 02:12 AM

Ooh, I like the way you think. Well done, well done!

*claps*

Thank you, I try.

HF annoyed me because it stripped away one of Shirou's personality definitions that made him unique - his idealism. Most idealists in his situation have the power to change the world (like Kururugi Suzaku) so they're never faced with their ideals being questioned/doubted, they overpower everything and enforce their will on the world. Those who don't have the power die. Here, Shirou is a guy without the power, but managed to survive yet still clinged to the ideal. Taking away that ideal pretty much reduces him to a Rambo caricature. HF Shirou is without a doubt the most hardcore and impressive of the Shirous in FSN (save Archer), but he's also on a self-destructive path and it's an extraordinary devotion toward an ordinary objective.

It's funny. Back when I first watched the FSN animé, I could care less about Shirou's idealism. I was a cynic and a pessimist who didn't believe in the good of society or people who'd want to save it in the first place. A couple years ago when I played The Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time, my view changed completely. I now admire that ideal to the very end. I will admit that in any situation where I'm unsure, I try to spur myself on by thinking: "What would Link do?"

As a result, I also unconsciously compare any protagonist to Link. I know it's unfair to hold anyone to such high standards, and that the real world is not as pure and forgiving as the beautiful Hyrule. In a sense, HF sort of reminds me of Majora's Mask, which shared a similar dark tone and themes. The difference is as you said: Link pursued in his ideal until the very end, and was able to succeed because he did have the power to change the world.

So now that I'm faced with Shirou's decisions in HF (and Archer's in UBW), it feels like a cruel, wake-up-to-reality slap in the face. As if I'm personally under attack - undermining the hopes and courage I've finally managed to build up in these past two years. Which is why I'm irrationally angry. I'm angry at FSN for making me question my beliefs, and at myself for not having the self-confidence to rise above the challenge.

Basically Archer's route.

What we know of Archer's route is he saw Gate of Babylon and recorded all the swords in it for his UBW, and went around the world after that to get other weapons like Rho Aias and Gungnir. HF Shirou can't record stuff properly in UBW because he lacks the mentality that gave rise to UBW.

So basically, you're referring to Archer's route as separate from any of the three paths we've seen? I guess I figured the FSN universe revolves around parallel worlds (especially thanks to the ___ _____ of Z_______) - I just don't like to think about complicated timelines if I can help it.

Rider was having sex with Shirou, and was using her eyes to hypnotize him into thinking it was Rin. I believe Sakura sent Rider to him with the purpose of servicing him and getting a mana recharge, but Rider actually likes Shirou a lot (just not as much as Ayako).

Who's Ayako? Or should I not know yet?

Might be one of the Bad Ends. Is it an HF scene?

It's from the "Another" category at the bottom of the screen, which contains some miscellaneous images and scenery.

Talon87

03-07-2011, 02:19 AM

That is seriously exciting, I had no freaking idea the playing card reliefs were modeled after legendary figures! I can't believe an important detail like that's sitting in plain sight...

Continuing with this exciting train of thought, here are the identities for you to chew on:

Source for the following: http://www.woodenhorsebooks.com/Playing-Card-Names.html
King of Hearts: Charlemagne
Queen of Hearts: Judith (of the Book of Judith, an Apocryphal Book of the Bible)
Jack of Hearts: "La Hire," a famous French warrior a.k.a. Etienne de Vignoles
King of Spades: King David
Queen of Spades: Pallas, a.k.a. Minerva
Jack of Spades: Hogier the Dane, one of Charlemagne's paladins
King of Diamonds: Julius Caesar
Queen of Diamonds: Rachel (of the Bible)
Jack of Diamonds: Hector of Troy; alternatively, Roland of France
King of Clubs: Alexander the Great
Queen of Clubs: Argine (an anagram of Regina)
Jack of Clubs: Lancelot

Source for the following: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Playing_cards#French
There are theories about whom the court cards represent. For example, the Queen of Hearts is believed by some to be a representation of Elizabeth of York—the Queen consort of King Henry VII of England, or it is sometimes believed to be a representation of Anne Boleyn, the second wife of Henry VIII. The United States Playing Card Company suggests that, in the past, the King of Hearts was Charlemagne, the King of Diamonds was Julius Caesar, the King of Clubs was Alexander the Great, and the King of Spades was the Biblical King David (see King (playing card)). However, the Kings, Queens, and Jacks of standard Anglo-American cards today do not represent anyone in particular. They stem from designs produced in Rouen before 1516, and, by 1540–67, these Rouen designs show well executed pictures in the court cards with the typical court costumes of the time. In these early cards, the Jack of Spades, Jack of Hearts, and King of Diamonds are shown from the rear, with their heads turned back over the shoulder so that they are seen in profile; however, the Rouen cards were so badly copied in England that the current designs are gross distortions of the originals.

What I find fascinating about the identities is how seemingly random and unrelated they are. I expected husbands to pair off with wives, or at the very least for the King and Queen identities to belong to the same faction. I certainly didn't expect Julius Caesar to be paired off with the Biblical Rachael and Hector of Troy from Homer's Iliad. :lol: What a crazy grouping! But yeah, those are the identities. And ...

Fate/Zero stuff
Notice some familiar friends in the list? ;-)

Doppleganger

03-07-2011, 02:57 AM

Who is "Regina"?

So now that I'm faced with Shirou's decisions in HF (and Archer's in UBW), it feels like a cruel, wake-up-to-reality slap in the face. As if I'm personally under attack - undermining the hopes and courage I've finally managed to build up in these past two years. Which is why I'm irrationally angry. I'm angry at FSN for making me question my beliefs, and at myself for not having the self-confidence to rise above the challenge.

You'll love Muv-Luv Alternative.

So basically, you're referring to Archer's route as separate from any of the three paths we've seen? I guess I figured the FSN universe revolves around parallel worlds (especially thanks to the ___ _____ of Z_______) - I just don't like to think about complicated timelines if I can help it.

Parallel Worlds not only exist, they are the core concept of the Third Magic, which

Rin used in her Jeweled Sword of Zelretch. She pulled mana from infinite parallel worlds to make her jeweled beam.

All three FSN routes are canon, in a sense, to the TYPE-MOON multiverse. Archer's Route is believed to be different from the three seen in Fate, but actual details of Archer's two weeks during the war are sparse. The only detail known for certain is how he met Saber, and how Rin resurrected him.

Who's Ayako? Or should I not know yet?

She's the leader of the Archery Club. Rider seems to have an affinity for her, and it really shows in FHA. Some seem to think Shinji raped her in one of the routes after Rider drained her, I'm not sure which. It was the route where she was found unconscious near trash cans.

It's from the "Another" category at the bottom of the screen, which contains some miscellaneous images and scenery.

Mmm, I'm sorry to say I have no idea. If you took a snapshot of where in the category it is Talon or I might be able to locate an answer. I don't have FSN installed anymore on my PC, so I can't confirm anything.

Actually, BBB mentioned something about never deleting VNs, so maybe he could help out with that as well.

YUKI.N

03-07-2011, 03:19 AM

You'll love Muv-Luv Alternative.

I'd like to play it at some point. Space constraints are a major concern now though, so I need to polish off FSN first and send it packing before looking at any new VNs.

She's the leader of the Archery Club. Rider seems to have an affinity for her, and it really shows in FHA.

Huh, interesting. Is there a canon explanation as to why Rider's attracted to her?

Mmm, I'm sorry to say I have no idea. If you took a snapshot of where in the category it is Talon or I might be able to locate an answer. I don't have FSN installed anymore on my PC, so I can't confirm anything.

Actually, BBB mentioned something about never deleting VNs, so maybe he could help out with that as well.

I think the category was unlocked after beating the game. It's the only available picture on the last page - where the sex scenes usually go. Hence my puzzlement.

(I really hope it's not the scrapped ShirouxIlya CG referred to in one of the Tiger Dojos. x_X Did not need to know about that, thanks.)

Doppleganger

03-12-2011, 07:24 PM

Going to be in offline mode for a bit, so before it's too late -

Beast's Lair appears to have been shut down by ProBoards for copyright infringement. Statute 25(a) is basically "we can shut down your board for any reason" but it's almost undoubtedly due to the high amount of copyrighted material, not to mention incomplete MangaGamer material, held there. No telling how long it'll be gone, but assume it's permanent since I don't think the forum can be redeemed given how much illegal material is floating in its archives. Quite a pity, it had TONS of TM information since freakin' 2002 or so that'll simply be lost to time. :/

I'd like to play it at some point. Space constraints are a major concern now though, so I need to polish off FSN first and send it packing before looking at any new VNs.

I'll be writing my topic in-between study and Pokemon this weekend, hopefull it'll be posted on Monday. I highly recommend this title...

Huh, interesting. Is there a canon explanation as to why Rider's attracted to her?

There doesn't seem to be any particular reason, she just likes Ayako. Rider's attitude in FHA may be simply an expansion on Ayako getting victimized circumstantially in FSN.

I think the category was unlocked after beating the game. It's the only available picture on the last page - where the sex scenes usually go. Hence my puzzlement.

(I really hope it's not the scrapped ShirouxIlya CG referred to in one of the Tiger Dojos. x_X Did not need to know about that, thanks.)

Apparently there's a bugged CG somewhere. Does this (http://i52.tinypic.com/2110ab7.jpg) look like your library?

Talon87

03-13-2011, 01:46 AM

Well, I've been distracted by the B/W rom a bit, I have to confess, but with Spring Vacation having started, I should find time to pick FSN back up. Listening to mega-epic music (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BTy77FMwO6o) certainly helps the cause. :)

Doppel, do you think what you told us about will have any impact on an F/HA translation getting finished? It'd be a shame if that project were pulled when (afaik) it's over 50% complete right now.

Doppleganger

03-13-2011, 03:51 AM

I picked a poor time to get into B/W since I have a major exam coming this Monday, and haven't had the resolute to devote proper study to it.

As for FHA I have no idea. I don't know how much organisation was specific to Beast's Lair's topic, though I doubt the staff would be stupid enough to only preserve their translated scripts in post form. Granted, I wouldn't hold it against them, BL has been around undisturbed at that address for nearly a decade, but it's still dangerously irresponsible.

YUKI.N

03-13-2011, 10:32 PM

Apparently there's a bugged CG somewhere. Does this (http://i52.tinypic.com/2110ab7.jpg) look like your library?

My HF gallery looks a bit different. I have only four pages, and the images you showed me start on page two. I've also never seen the third-to-last CG of Shirou. I don't recall if I've seen the fifth-to-last image of Rin either, but I can't find it in my library.

The gallery I was referring to is called "Another (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/starswift/AnotherFSN-1.png)", which contains "other event graphics (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v254/starswift/AnotherFSN.png)". Anyway, I actually did find the missing image. It was unlocked by collecting all the Tiger Stamps.

So if there's nothing more, I'll probably delete FSN off my comp soon.

Although I'm still confused about your interpretation of the Rin sex scene...

If Sakura sent Rider to Shirou, wouldn't she have been aware of the "dream" without Shirou telling her about it? Plus wasn't Rider still under Shinji's control at this time?

Talon87

04-16-2011, 08:57 PM

マチ★アソビ Vol.6にて、Fate/Zero 第1弾PV公開決定！

5月3日（火）～5日（木）に開催される「マチ★アソビ Vol.6」にて

■TVアニメ「Fate/Zero」第1弾PV

の公開が決定いたしました！！

動くゼロキャラクター達を始めて見られるこの機会、お見逃しなく！

【マチ★アソビ公式HP】

http://www.machiasobi.com
On a whim, I decided to check the Fate/Zero anime webpage today to see what news had come out since I last checked it in February. It seems like there's an event called Machi Asobi and they're holding their "sixth volume" (sixth event, I presume?) from May 3 to May 5. There, ufotable will be showing the attendees their preview video (PV) for the Fate/Zero anime. So hopefully in about three weeks, we should be able to find this preview on Youtube and enjoy! :) And then agonize for many months whilst we wait for Fate/Zero to air. ^^;

Talon87

05-17-2011, 05:51 PM

The PV I talked about was finally uploaded to the Fate/Zero official homepage a few days after Machi Asobi wrapped up. You can watch it by clicking here (http://www.fate-zero.jp/movies/index.html). You can also opt to watch it on Youtube by clicking here (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fkGaGBrS7_k). (Be careful of spoilers from Youtube commenters, though!)

Enjoy!

Doppleganger

05-18-2011, 12:56 AM

Saber looks great in that last scene! I was backing away at that questionable Irisviel, but that last shot was lovely. It reminds me of the Realta Nua OP work by Madhouse.

Thank the Crimson Moon for no DEEN.

Talon87

07-13-2011, 05:19 PM

So after many months of saying I would pick it up again and not doing so, I finally picked FSN up again last night. No idea why. And so far it has been glorious. :)

But things were majorly rough at first. I had forgotten so much, and knowing that I had forgotten so much was driving me so crazy, that I had to find out what I was forgetting. So I went back through the thread yesterday evening and re-read all of my Heavens Feel posts to try and catch back up. Did a pretty good job of this but then I had no more time to play. I resumed playing today and I'm currently at the part right after Shirou gets an unusual gift from Kotomine and Archer.

Shirou and Sakura Sex Scene #1:
So you might recall that this is where I got hung up back in February. It's kind of funny, isn't it? :lol: But if ever there was proof that Kinoko Nasu sucks at writing erotica, it's that the board's biggest hentai afficionado put down the game and didn't pick it back up for months because he'd gotten to yet another Nasu sex scene.

As far as FSN sex scenes go, this wasn't too bad. Kind of weirded out by the parts where Shirou was thinking "I want to destroy her" (uhh, what? :?) and as usual Nasu's writing is distractingly and embarrassingly bad, but what can you do?

Shirou's tête-à-tête with Rider:
Not bad. I originally picked the most neutral option ("Say Rider? Aren't you hungry?") but felt I was copping out, went back, and decided to say "Look, Rider, I like you." As expected, Sakura took this to mean I like liked Rider and went ballistic. Fun scene ... but will it have dire consequences? 8O Probably not, but it's fun to imagine. :)

Shirou's Journey into the Einzbern Forest:
"FUCK YEAH! :D Team Shirou x Ilya, here I come! :) It's about time!" This is what I pretty much thought when they announced this. I didn't expect what actually happened to happen.
As the scene quickly gives way to its first interlude, revealing Ilya is on the run with Berserker from Castle Einzbern and the dark phantom in pursuit of them, I thought, "Oh no, not again, :cry:" worried that this was going to turn out to be exactly like Unlimited Blade Works' Castle Einzbern scene.

The next thing I didn't expect was that a serious, plot-important fight was about to take place. I'm referring, of course, to the True Assassin + Dark Saber + mysterious phantom Vs. Berserker fight. The fight was kinda lackluster?, given the overwhelming odds for defeat Berserker was up against?, but I really enjoyed the allusion to Greek mythology when they had Berserker rip off his skin in order to free himself from the dark slime and to make one last-ditch attempt on Dark Saber's life. A, the ripping off the skin part. B, the fact that he did so to combat a poison. Nice reference to the legend of Hercules and how he died.

This scene was also Dark Saber's debut which was both unexpected and really nice. Would have been way more epic, of course, if I had not been spoilered on Dark Saber's existence ages ago: but that really can't be helped. I'd seen pictures of Dark Saber perhaps since before I'd even started watching the FSN anime, and certainly by the time soon after I'd watched it, and honestly the knowledge of there even being a path where there was a "Dark Saber" and a "Dark Sakura" was what really had me looking forward to playing the game some day in the first place.
The Mysterious Phantom:
I think I've mentioned it in older posts, but I'll go ahead and say again: the identity of the phantom still has not been officially revealed, but I've long suspected who it was due to the phantom's coloration and due to the knowledge of what the suspect looks like thanks to all the fan art I've seen of that person over the years. But anyway:
The game strongly, strongly hinted at the phantom being Sakura after the fight in the Einzbern Forest wrapped up. They showed Sakura, back at Shirou's house, having a vision of what the phantom was doing. They claimed it was because she was watching the scene unfold through Rider's eyes, but it was awfully convenient that she exited the reverie the moment the phantom vanished from the crime scene. Then they had her vomit and something came up out of her mouth. She then ambiguously says "Senpai's arm ...". Is it because she's vomiting because of the image of Shirou losing his arm? Or is it because, as I first read it XD, she actually puked up Shirou's arm? Obviously that doesn't seem plausible, but ... that was how I first read it (before continuing with the scene), and regardless, the dialogue here seems to hint at Sakura being the phantom. Whether she exists in two places at once or whether she teleports in between the Emiya household and the battle sites remains to be seen.
Servant Statuses:
Saber - captured and corrupted either by True Assassin's blackness or else by the phantom's. It's still sort of vague who/what is sucking the Servants away and who/what is corrupting them.

Lancer - dead, cause of death unknown (or at least I don't remember it)

Archer - dead (blown away by the phantom, gave left arm up to help Shirou)

Caster - dead, consumed by True Assassin

Berserker - dead, absorbed by the black slime (whether it was True Assassin's or the phantom's is unclear)

Rider - still alive, and pretty much the heroes' only remaining hope for victory

Assassin - dead, consumed by True Assassin

True Assassin - still alive and kicking.
Tohsaka's Compelling Interest in Saving Sakura:
I had completely forgotten that this epic cat was already out of the bag. But apparently it was because, after no mention of it during the previous scenes, it was then casually addressed by Shirou in his conversation with Rin at Kotomine's church. So apparently this was revealed during the time I played in February. Whoops for not noting it back then. ^^;

Adorable:
So then I get to one of the cutest Ilya glomp scenes since I put the game down in February. Had to screencap this, had to share. :D

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/ilya_claims_me_001_th.png (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/ilya_claims_me_001.png) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/ilya_claims_me_002_th.png (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/ilya_claims_me_002.png) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/ilya_claims_me_003_th.png (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/ilya_claims_me_003.png) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/ilya_claims_me_004_th.png (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/ilya_claims_me_004.png) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/ilya_claims_me_005_th.png (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/ilya_claims_me_005.png)
Adorable. ^___^

Talon87

07-14-2011, 03:23 PM

The Implications of Archer's Emergence from the HF Path:
It's interesting how one tweak to the story can completely change how Archer comes into being. In Fate and Unlimited Blade Works, it's presented pretty clearly that Shirou will one day become Archer as he practices his craft and develops his natural talent. But in HF, it's presented as though Shirou became Archer because of receiving Archer's arm. For instance, Rin has made comments in the HF path like "Normally you'd never have been able to learn how to do this, but now that you have this arm, you can." And it's funny because we've seen not once but twice before (Fate, UBW) that he totally can learn projection magic in a very short span of time, capably enough to take on the King of Kings, Gilgamesh, and emerge from the 5th Holy Grail War a survivor.

Speaking of the King of Kings ...
Gilgamesh has made only one off-screen appearance since I've resumed playing. He had a short conversation with Kotomine about whether Kotomine really doesn't have a wish or not. This conversation prompted Kotomine to have a flashback sequence which went into greater details than we'd had before about Kotomine's childhood, his relationship with his father, his beliefs, etc. Kotomine comes back out of the reverie and Gilgamesh asks him again about whether he has a wish or not that he wants granted. And Kotomine peculiarly answers that the Grail cannot grant his wish but it can allow him to wish into existence something else which can. Which, uh, is sort of admitting that you do have a wish and you do want the Grail. :lol: So why you gotta be so confusing about it, dude? =P

Sakura Sex Scene #2:
Not as good as the first one and I've pretty much run out of patience for Nasu's crappy sex scenes. So I rapid-fired the mouse quite a bit on this and I also read each of the screens blazingly fast -- it was more "scanning" than "reading" -- slowing down only to read parts that looked like they might have mattered to the greater plot.

Ilya knows! 8O:
So I got to the first round of Shirou's training with Rin and Ilya in the dojo. Rin steps outside (to have an Interlude conversation with Sakura) but before we cut to that it's just Shirou and Ilya in the dojo. And then Ilya says something very strange: she tells Shirou that while Rin might not appreciate the gravity of the situation of Shirou having received Archer's arm, she does ... and she knows Shirou's relationship with Archer. A, that's all she says -- that she knows their relationship. She doesn't say what that relationship is. So B, this leaves Shirou puzzled as (in the Heavens Feel path) he's never learned the truth about him and Archer, much like in Fate. Interesting! How does Ilya know? Is it because she realizes, as a very magical being and as an Einzbern, that there should have been no way for the surgical operation to have been a success unless Shirou was {spoiler}? Interesting. Makes you wonder if Kotomine also knows. Makes you wonder if it's going to come up again after all.

Shirou offers to project Rin's sword but ...:
I had to laugh at the part where, after Rin has explained hers and Ilya's plan to have Shirou project a copy of the Tohsaka's heirloom sword, Shirou offered to project it just by looking at it. Rin then chastized him, saying, "No! :evil: We don't want another of your crappy hollow projections! If you don't have the raw materials, then we'll never stand a chance!" Had to laugh, of course, because even though Shirou's projections in the other paths were hollow and consequently were one-hit wonders that shattered as soon as he used them, he was still able to win in those paths doing the very thing he proposed and Rin rejected. But it will certainly be interesting to see Shirou create a sword from raw materials this time instead of doing his usual (from the other paths) and creating them out of thin air. Maybe it'll last for more than 3 hits this time? :lol:

The Shadow's Identity:
Still hasn't been officially revealed. But given that you-know-who woke up from a nightmare where you-know-who was the Shadow, it's seeming increasingly likely that the culprit's identity's been nailed since before I started to play (oh spoiler art =P).

Talon87

07-15-2011, 03:13 PM

Ilya, Please Stay!
Shirou and Ilya go shopping for three days' worth of food. On the way home, Ilya starts to sing Die Lorelei (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1BdRJzc3Dk):
Die Luft ist kühl und es dunkelt,
Und ruhig fließt der Rhein;
Der Gipfel des Berges funkelt
Im Abendsonnenschein.

Die schönste Jungfrau sitzet
Dort oben wunderbar;
Ihr goldnes Geschmeide blitzet,
Sie kämmt ihr goldenes Haar.

Den Schiffer im kleinen Schiffe
Ergreift es mit wildem Weh;
Er schaut nicht die Felsenriffe,
Er schaut nur hinauf in die Höh.

Ich glaube, die Wellen verschlingen
Am Ende Schiffer und Kahn;
Und das hat mit ihrem Singen
Die Lore-Ley getan.
Translation (from this source (http://ingeb.org/Lieder/ichweiss.html)):
The air is cool in the gloaming
And gently flows the Rhine.
The crest of the mountain is gleaming
In fading rays of sunshine.

The loveliest maiden is sitting
Up there, so wondrously fair;
Her golden jewelry is glist'ning;
She combs her golden hair.

The boatman aboard his small skiff, -
Enraptured with a wild ache,
Has no eye for the jagged cliff, -
His thoughts on the heights fear forsake.

I think that the waves will devour
Both boat and man, by and by,
And that, with her dulcet-voiced power
Was done by the Loreley.
It's interesting because Ilya totally had this song in the other two routes as well (it played when we saw the flashbacks of her in the forest with Berserker and the slain wolves) but not until the Heavens Feel path has she actually sung aloud any of the lyrics, and here we see that they perfectly fit this path in describing Shirou's relationship with Sakura. Kind of weird, then, that they describe a girl other than the girl who is characterized by this song ^^;, but neato all the same that it ominously describes Shirou's willingness to lose everything, even his own life, if it means rescuing Sakura.

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/yatta_ilya_scene_th.png (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/yatta_ilya_scene.png)

But perhaps the highlight of this scene for me was when Shirou finally popped the question "Will you be my sister?" Close enough! "Will you come and live with me after the war?" Awesome. Heartbreaking to hear Ilya's realistic response of (paraphrased) "I would love to, but it's impossible. If I'm alive at the end of the war, then that means you're dead."

Third Sakura Sex Scene:
I actually hollered "NOOOOOOoooooooo! :lol: :cry:" when this one started up. Was so, so glad it lasted like one-fifth the regular length of one of these Nasu sex scenes. But was very disappointed to discover that it fleshed out the remainder of Sakura's sex scenes in the Gallery. Because I was TOTALLY hoping for Shirou x _ _ _ _ . _ _ _ _ _ _. :oops: Totally up my alley. Oh well. There's always erodoujinshi.

The Shadow Revealed
It's official. Saw the scene where poor Sakura feels like she's following the Shadow ... except that she's feeling every emotion it feels ... and then she runs into Gilgamesh in a dark alley ... and he dismembers her. If I had thought that Nasu wrote ridiculous shit for Shirou, HERE was a truly ridiculous bit of writing. Holy shit: he graphically describes disembowelment, being cut in half below the waist, and having one of her arms lopped off at the elbow. And she STILL survives! And not only does she survive, she ...

... kills ... Gil? 8O WHOA! What the hell just happened? Did she just eat Gilgamesh!?
So yeah. That was an interesting scene. If I'm not mistaken, it also shows that ...

we never get to see Gilgamesh in the Heavens Feel path while wearing his gold armor. Also, we never really get to see him do anything super-evil with lasting consequences. Poor Ilya he blinded and then ripped her heart out, which I would personally say was worse than Sakura's fate even had Sakura died. But the fact that Ilya perished whereas Sakura survived and then devoured Gilgamesh, for me, makes Gilgamesh's role in UBW his most evil one.
Rin Steals Sakura's One Precious Memory:
The scene where Rin talks to Shirou about how she, too, was spying on him on the track field four years ago. Not really important to me except that the scene serves as a catalyst for Sakura's further development into {spoiler}.

Ilya discusses Containers with Sakura:
The scene where Ilya reveals ...
that Sakura has the other four servants (Lancer, Caster, Saber, Berserker) but that she (Ilya) has Archer. The reason why Ilya knows so much about Shirou = Archer, perhaps? Probably. It would seem that after absorbing Archer, Ilya came to know about him. And this necessarily meant that she discovered the truth of his relationship with Shirou. It would also mean, if Archer's memories had returned by the time of his demise, that she knows how the War will turn out -- or at least how it turned out in Archer's timeline.
Zouken's tête-à-tête with Shirou:
This was a very interesting scene. Lots of important development.
This is the scene where Zouken asks Shirou to consider killing Sakura in order to save the townspeople. He comments that he can no longer go anywhere near her, nor can Tohsaka Rin. Only Shirou can because Shirou is the only remaining person in this world whom Sakura loves/trusts and thus whom the Shadow will not automatically destroy should that person try to do something to Sakura.

It's also the scene where we learn about what the Shadow actually is. Zouken explains that it's some sort of spiritual energy given form in Sakura that crossed the border between the realm where the True Holy Grail exists (i.e. the realm all the fake Holy Grails communicate back to) and our realm. Zouken seems to indicate that a proper Holy Grail construct, like the Einzbern's, is able to close the gate between that world and ours but that Sakura, as an imperfect experiment on Zouken's part, was not only unable to close the gate fully but that she allowed this creature/energy-being through. It's not really clear to me whether the Shadow represents the corrupted Holy Grail Doppel has spoken of to me before (War 3, you said this happened in?) or whether it's some other entity. It's also not really clear to me to what extent Dark Sakura is actually Sakura and to which extent it's this external force. Zouken makes it sound like Sakura has merely become a container for this being (i.e. the Sakura we know is long gone) but at the same time he makes it sound as though this being as adopted not only Sakura's form but also her emotions and memories. And that this is why Shirou's the only person, until now, the Shadow won't touch. (Even though it toally did lop off his arm that one time in the forest -- because Sakura willed that Shirou be grievously injured such that he could no longer partake in the war.)
The White and the Black Grails:
Ilya confirms what Zouken told Shirou. Tells him about her being a H_______s.

Shirou resolves to ... what!?:
So I saved here before quitting yesterday and this is where I'm set to resume now. Looks like it's the decision I made outside the church Part 2. Only this time I get the feeling that the situation is even more grave.
Outside the Church, I made the decision to save Sakura rather than to kill Sakura. Same decision as I'm making now. But the idea inside my own head at the time, and probably that within Shirou's as well, was that I wanted to have both Sakura -and- the townspeople. Shirou simply wasn't willing to condemn Sakura at that point. But now, it feels like Shirou is making a slightly different choice: one between certainly sparing Sakura but allowing her to become Dark Sakura and kill everybody, or else killing Sakura in order to avert disaster and to release Sakura from her pain. I don't know what I'd do in real life in this situation, but I think I'd probably have the attitude, even if it's ridiculously self-destructive, of "I won't try to kill you while you're you. I'll set to work if and when you do become irreparably evil." I.e. I'd probably cling to the hope that she isn't going to transform. In other words, I'd repeat my same decision outside the church and pick Sakura over the world. We'll see what the ramifications of that choice are!

Doppleganger

07-15-2011, 06:44 PM

As far as FSN sex scenes go, this wasn't too bad. Kind of weirded out by the parts where Shirou was thinking "I want to destroy her" (uhh, what? :?) and as usual Nasu's writing is distractingly and embarrassingly bad, but what can you do?

I've noticed this a lot in eroges. The guys are perfectly normal, but when they're riding the high wave they're always thinking degradation/destruction. "She's so proud normally, the thought of her depravity makes my member harder than diamond" or something.

It seems so uncharacteristic, but its ubiquity suggests a common repressed attitude among H-game protags?

Talon87

07-15-2011, 07:35 PM

Make Your Choice!
So like I said, I chose the same option as I did before at the church. Thing is, I'm once again wondering if I'm jumped the gun in thinking I've identified the decision you all talked about as being the fork in the road between the True End and the other end. Because it looks like the choice I made wasn't just a viable choice but the only viable choice: Rider explains to Sakura after Shirou leaves that had I attempted the other choice she would have killed me/him. Dunno if that's just a path-specific bit of dramatic commentary or if I yet again avoided a Tiger Stamp moment. :lol: I've still got zero Tiger Stamps on this path.

Shirou's Conversation with Kotomine:
So the next morning Shirou runs off to confront Kotomine after he realizes that, given what Zouken said about the fragments of the last Holy Grail being {spoiler}, Kotomine should have definitely noticed. This conversation was useful since it spelled out, with no more bullshit vagueness, what Kotomine's and Kiritsugu's mentalities were like.
Kotomine explains that he was, as we had learned from his reverie a few posts back, born evil / born without the capacity to be good and to enjoy goodness. Thus he always sought good as a boy but realized it just wasn't him. And then his life goal changed and he vowed to protect the emergence of any and all life forms, no matter how wicked since he viewed his own life the same way: an abomination who should have been aborted and yet was brought into this world anyway. Kiritsugu, on the other hand, Kotomine explains, "loved humans" so dearly that he more or less committed himself to "evil" because that was the only way he could become a superhero. I.e. he said "Fuck the people I care about, I'mma go protect the many." So given my (Shirou's) choice to protect Sakura rather than the people of Fuyuki City, Kotomine commented that I am more like him than I am like Kiritsugu. This makes me all the more excited for Fate/Zero this fall. Really looking forward to seeing how things play out between Kiritsugu and Irisviel. Also looking forward to seeing how things play out between him and Kotomine.
Ran back home and noticed something was amiss. Saved, decided to post this small update, and will resume in a bit.

Talon87

07-16-2011, 08:30 PM

Currently am at Castle Einzbern, fleeing from D___ B_______. Well, I dunno if he's D___ or not. Haven't actually seen him yet.

Chose to team up with Kotomine. Even if he has the 180º opposite goal as me in the long term regarding Ilya, for now he and I are on the same page for saving her. So I welcomed his help.

Getting confused by all the NasuVerse terminology. What's the difference between these three:
* Holy Grail (like Ilya)
* Holy Grail (like the one in the other realm)
* True Holy Grail (which apparently is hidden somewhere in this "land of Tohsaka")

I figured the True Holy Grail would be that second bullet point, i.e. the Grail and its contents that exist in the other realm which we are accessing via a man-made Grail (e.g. Ilya) in our own realm. Kind of like how we have Servants but we don't have the pure-form Heroic Spirit blueprints that exist in the Throne of Heroes. But now Shirou and Kotomine are referring to some third Grail that apparently is somewhere here in the land and which Shirou hopes to destroy the magic circle of. (What? Now I'm even more confused! Why would a Grail that was made 200 years ago still have a Magic Circle in place? and why would destroying the Magic Circle at this point destroy the grail? WHO THE HECK IS POWERING THE CIRCLE!?!?!?!?!? Is there some Immortal who's trapped down there keeping the spell running!? O_o)

Some reference was made to how the Grail in the other realm got poisoned, although I can't remember if the game specified that it happened at the end of War 3 or if I just projected that factoid onto the dialogue courtesy of memories of UPN conversations.

LOL @ Shirou's eight-story jump. (Well, three castle stories. But he said this equaled roughly seven or eight normal stories.) Goddamn Nasu and his "oh yeah Shirou can survive ANYTHING" stuff. :lol:

Speculation: given that Rider's contract with Sakura doesn't appear to necessarily be broken off (even though Sakura did use the last of her Command Crest spells to order Rider to protect Shirou no matter the circumstances), and given that Sakura is now über-powerful, does that make Rider über-powerful? We haven't really seen any indication of this yet. But I'm curious if Rider will be able to hold her own against a four-way onslaught between D___ S____, D___ B_______, D___ S_____, and True Assassin.

Speculation: Kotomine made an offhand comment to Shirou about how Rin's ancestors have got some vampire ties. I'm guessing that this is going to be what ties into Old Man Zelretch, eh? We'll see. :)

Talon87

07-18-2011, 02:17 AM

So, I'm about to beat the game (the Shiny Sword vs. Shadow Giants fight has already taken place completely, self-sacrificial hug and all) but I haven't posted in a bit because I've been logging all my progress to a Notepad file and it's written more for my own bookkeeping than for you guys and I've been lazy about converting it from one to the other. I've decided I'll break the notepad file's contents into segments and will post them bit by bit. Here comes the first of them. Then I'll go back and resume playing ... Just remember! I'm actually much farther along than where this post ends.

==================================================

Escape Through the Einzbern Forest:
When Kotomine took hold of Ilya and broke into an inhuman run, I thought, "Oh shit! He's got the girl! @_@ And I can't catch up!" Thankfully Shirou did catch up ... but then he noticed something was very wrong about this entire situation. And the first piece of Kotomine's peculiar history was revealed. 8O

I Know That Sword! :D:
When Kotomine handed Shirou the Black Key, I didn't recognize the name nor the description at first. But when I read the Status screen, a distant memory began to stir. And when I reached the final line, the one about how some Executors are known to carry hundreds beneath their clothing, it all came back to me. "CIEL! :D I bet these are the swords Ciel always had in Tsukihime!" A quick trip to the Internet confirmed it. A smile was had. :)

"And now you die ... HUH!?":
The part with Kotomine vs. True Assassin started off normal enough ... and then everything got "HOLY SHIT 8O WHAT'S GOING ON 8O OH MY GOD THIS IS AWESOME" when the unexpected happened.
Recall: True Assassin wears Kotomine down and eventually delivers the killing blow. Only there's two problems. First, he believes that Kotomine's swords will pass through his body as if he were a shadow. They don't: they instead pin True Assassin to a tree. He can't even budge. Second, he believes that his arm will connect, rip out Kotomine's heart, and kill him. But instead, he's horrified at something which has gone horribly wrong ... and you we see that Kotomine LIVES. :O

Such an unexpected twist. At this point, I was seriously entertaining such wild theories as "He's a Homonculus made in the image of the original Kotomine! :O" and "Oh my God what if he's Undead, like, a Vampire or something? What if he's even a True Ancestor? O_O" The reality ended up being a leeeeettle bit less crazy ^^; but it was still unexpected! :)
Kotomine the Badass:
Kotomine frees himself from True Assassin and leaps TEN FEET INTO THE AIR (WTF), grabs Matou Zouken, brings him back down to the ground, and -literally- beats him to a pulp. As in, his body is -literally- decimated into a pulp. Nasu graphically describes how half of Zouken's head remains, mushy brains sticking out. Zouken's half-head laughs at Kotomine as Kotomine delivers the final blow to it. All this while, he's chanting a mysterious chant of the Church's. Zouken meanwhile is spitting vitriol at Kotomine, saying such things as:
(1) that Kotomine is still searching for happiness and that he won't be able to find it
(2) that Kotomine was an abomination the day he was born

Such an epic scene. Even if it was disappointing to later learn that Zouken had not really been destroyed after all. :|
The Angel of Death!? :O Awwww man! False alarm. :(:
Some time earlier, Kotomine internally think-labels True Assassin as Malak al-Maut. So I looked this up and it's the Quranic name for the Angel of Death, Azrael! While Azrael is his name in Arabic, the Quran never mentions his name in this way, instead calling him Malak al-Maut, "the Angel of Death."

"Is it possible," I thought to myself, "that Doppel was wrong about True Assassin's identity? It doesn't seem that way: there aren't too many positive hits for 'Malak al-Maut True Assassin' on Google, suggesting he is Hassan after all." Later on I would discover that Doppel was of course completely right. But at the time, I was entertaining the possibility that True Assassin was, true to his name, the Assassin, the bringer of death to end all bringers of death, the Archangel himself, Azrael. I mean, both Azrael and Hassan have ties to the Middle East (as Azrael is a popular fixture in Islam and is also believed in by the Jews, who originate from the Middle East) and both certainly could be rightly considered "the king of assassins"!

The Birth of the Heroic Spirit Emiya:
The part where ...
Shirou tries to engage Dark Berserker in combat. This to me was just insane. A, Berserker is the strongest Servant. B, this Berserker isn't just any Berserker: he's fucking Hercules. C, this Hercules-Berserker isn't just any Hercules-Berserker: he's Hercules-Berserker powered by the colossal power of the tainted True Holy Grail itself. He ought to be a b-e-a-s-t. 8O How on Earth is Shirou going to stand up to this monster?

And that, friends, is the first step the boy would take towards becoming the Heroic Spirit known simply as Emiya. Because it is GODDAMN AMAZING (even if it's kind of "lol Nasu :roll:" anti-climactic to see Shirou pulling this shit off over and over again :lol:) for a mortal boy to defeat Grail-powered Hercules-Berserker.

The one thing I'm not sure of yet, even where I am in the game right now, is to what extent Shirou is becoming Archer and to what extent he is simply dying. The game is deliberately ambiguous about this and I can't stand it. I want some evidence, any evidence, that he's turning into Archer. Bronzed skin? White hair? Something. Anything. But at the end of this scene, all we get is a tantalizing hint: Shirou, his back turned to Ilya, is the spitting back-image of Archer. Well, duh, he SHOULD be, they're the same goddamned person after all. :lol: But the artwork takes it one tantalizing step further with the Shroud of Martin: it is the same crimson color as Archer's battle armor, of course, and the way it billows behind Shirou evokes the mental image of Archer's red cape.
Hey look, it's Deus Ex!:
Dark Saber arrives but lets Shirou go because Sakura is calling for her. And besides, she says, he's earned it anyway since he managed to defeat Dark Berserker. OH, COME ON! WHAT A LAME BIT OF DEUS EX MACHINA! =P :lol: There is no pity in war! This is dog-eat-dog! You see an opportunity and you TAKE it! She should have KILLED him right then and there! ESPECIALLY if those were her orders from Sakura. And hell! Even if Sakura was telling her "No! Come back, and DON'T harm Shirou!", she could have STILL apprehended the redhead and dragged his scrawny ass back to where Sakura was. Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh well. :lol:
That's it for this post. Check in next time for Part 2 of my end-game commentary! And now, back to what looks to be the epic final chapter of the route ...

Talon87

07-18-2011, 09:52 PM

Small little blurb out of sequence: I BEAT IT. ^_^

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/beat_the_game_001_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/beat_the_game_001.png) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/beat_the_game_002_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/beat_the_game_002.png)

But I'll keep posting the play-by-play notes, continuing with Part 2 later tonight. I'll offer some short comments right now and will save most stuff for the final part of this post series later.

Fan of Rin becoming Zelretch's apprentice.

Not a fan of Shirou becoming one of Touko's puppets. Was not a fan even in Kara no Kyoukai of the idea that (KnK OVA 5 spoiler): the real Touko might be dead and that the Touko we see before us is a puppet.
Jury's out on whether fan or not fan of Rider still being around. I love Rider, for the record, but still ...

Does Kotomine's connection with the Grail (at the end of the 4th War) explain why he was able to keep Gilgamesh around? They made it sound like the same was true for Sakura's relationship with Rider; but Kotomine never became as entangled with the Grail as did Sakura, did he?

Awww @ scene between Makiri Zouken and Justica von Einzbern in Ilya's body. I know it's awfully cliché to pull this sort of stunt, but I've said it once, I've said it a thousand times: I'm a sucker for tragic villains. Matou Zouken did some truly heinous things in life, but awww at this scene.

ILYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! ;_;
So ... if I were wanting to unlock the non-True endings for either path, what would I need to do differently? No hints were offered at the end of completing the True End path so I don't feel too bad about asking. (There was a hint offered some time during Shirou's moments in the cavern where he recalled "nothing that just happened would have happened had I not scolded Sakura back then like I did", so I suppose that could be the hint, but I don't remember scolding her even being an option. Was it? If it was, I guess I just naturally picked it and it led to the True End.) Are the outcomes of the other endings lesser? (like, more people die, ending is overall crappier?) Or are they just different? 'Cause I gotta say, I'm kind ehhhhhhhhhh about the canon ending for Heavens Feel. ^^; NOT A FAN OF PUPPETS! ^^;

Talon87

07-18-2011, 10:59 PM

Just finished reading back through everyone's posts (and I mean everyone's from Page 2 on forward), expanding all the spoiler boxes, etc.

I'm impressed Little Blue unlocked both HF endings so quickly. Is that because you can access them by making a choice very near the end of the game (i.e. once you're already inside the cavern?) and she just found it by guess-and-checking? Or what? Guess I should ask the actual person herself rather than speaking about her in the third person ... :lol:

Doppel, lol at your Rance thing. Is that supposed to be Oda Nobunaga? WHY IS HE MISSING AN ARM!? XD But now that I've played HF, I see what you were trying to go for there. ;-)

Doppel, there is so much we disagree on aesthetically when it comes to this game. But I'll wrap Little Blue into this as well by throwing it out there: of the three main FSN heroines, I liked Sakura best.
Hers was the most believable romance if you come at it from a real world perspective, Rin's was the most believable romance if you come at it from a cinema perspective, and Saber's was just flat-out not very convincing. What I mean is, Sakura was a girl Shirou fell in love with bit by bit over the course of two years, and Shirou a man Sakura fell in love with bit by bit over the course of four years. Believable. Rin, on the other hand, Shirou had only gotten to know intimately for about a week or two. It's a fast-paced romance that screams Hollywood action-romance summer blockbuster.
Then you have personalities: Saber's the kind of masculine, straight-laced girl. Not my thing at ALL. Rin was the bitchy tsundere. Can be my thing, hit or miss (for classic hits, see Love Hina's Naru and Ever17's Tsugumi), but as a rule I don't much care for bitchy tsunderes. Sakura was the shy beauty (cha-ching), the childhood sweetheart (not my thing but not against it), -and- as the story progressed the corrupted femme fatale (cha-ching). Absolutely wanted to H-U-G..H-E-R..T-I-G-H-T when she started petulantly shouting at Rin during their mana fight.
Body-wise, it's got to be Sakura once again. Saber has a flat chest (STRIKE), blonde hair with green eyes (STRIKE for that particular combo), and SHORT HAIR (STRIIIIIIIIKE). Rin's kinda flat-chested too (I know Doppel adamantly disagrees, but did you SEE those sex scene CGs? :lol:), has brown hair with blue eyes (STRIKE for that combo), and has curly-ish hair (STRIKE). Sakura is as near pure perfection as this game comes for the main heroines: purple eyes with longish straight purple hair (cha-ching!), nice bust (cha-ching!), and totally seductive when she goes dark (cha-ching!).
I think it goes without saying that unless you're a lolikon it's obvious that Rider is the game's most smoking-hot character: gorgeously luxuriant long hair, generous bust, and one hell of an outfit to show off those breasts, ass, and legs. Then if you are a lolikon, Ilya is the clear winner, no questions asked. She steals the heart of even the blackest-hearted non-lolikons. But of the main three heroines, if I had to pick a Mai Waifu, I'd go for Sakura. So I don't fault Shirou for doing this at all. Doppel, you wrote in one post that Shirou undertook extraordinary pains for an ordinary goal (i.e. Sakura). Clearly, you're not a romantic. :lol: Or at least you weren't playing FSN with the mentality of one. I saw Heavens Feel as one big path where Nasu crafted his personal magnum opus of what a man will do for the woman he loves. You don't really get that in the other paths -- Shirou falls in love with Saber and is already fighting for a different cause; likewise, he falls in love with Rin and is fighting for something other than that love -- but in Heavens Feel, you have a man who basically says "Fuck the world. Fuck me. Fuck EVERYTHING -- I'm going to save the woman I love." It's almost cheesy in how cliché it is. But I love it. I sap that shit up. :D

Other stuff to respond to will probably come up in my own posts. (I'll try and post #2 here in a bit.) But I also did not get all of the CGs.
Fate: missing one (the one from last summer)
UBW: missing one (probably has to do with the non-True End)
HF: missing two (probably have to do with the non-True End)
Another: missing one (the same one Li'l Blue was missing, so I guess I can't get this without getting all of the Tiger Stamps. Forget that: can you just upload it so I can see it? :oops: :lol:)

Doppleganger

07-19-2011, 12:59 AM

Getting confused by all the NasuVerse terminology. What's the difference between these three:
* Holy Grail (like Ilya)
* Holy Grail (like the one in the other realm)
* True Holy Grail (which apparently is hidden somewhere in this "land of Tohsaka")

Holy Grail refers to any Einzbern homunculus who can manifest a portion of the Third Magic, but serve as a krater to pool Mana gained from the deaths of Heroic Spirits (since their bodies are comprised entirely of Mana).

In Heaven's Feel, there are three functioning grails - the original (Justica von Einzbern), Ilya von Einzbern and Matou Sakura. Sakura isn't a homunculus and is a "fake" grail, but she still consumes the Mana of Heroic Spirits in the same way that Justica and Ilya would. But she isn't capable of granting wishes or manipulating the Third Magic.

In most FSN scenarios, dead spirits are sucked in by Justica. In HF, Archer is assimilated by Ilya, which is why she knows his identity after he dies. Sakura eats most of the rest except Caster and Lancer, I think.

The True Holy Grail is like a portal, connected to Akasha, the Nasuverse God, and is the mechanism that allows the wishmaking. The mana collected from the lesser grails becomes fuel for the wish. The problem is, the "taint" summoned in the Third Holy Grail War usually perverts/distorts how the wish is enacted.

The Birth of the Heroic Spirit Emiya:
The part where ...
Shirou tries to engage Dark Berserker in combat. This to me was just insane. A, Berserker is the strongest Servant. B, this Berserker isn't just any Berserker: he's fucking Hercules. C, this Hercules-Berserker isn't just any Hercules-Berserker: he's Hercules-Berserker powered by the colossal power of the tainted True Holy Grail itself. He ought to be a b-e-a-s-t. 8O How on Earth is Shirou going to stand up to this monster?

And that, friends, is the first step the boy would take towards becoming the Heroic Spirit known simply as Emiya. Because it is GODDAMN AMAZING (even if it's kind of "lol Nasu :roll:" anti-climactic to see Shirou pulling this shit off over and over again :lol:) for a mortal boy to defeat Grail-powered Hercules-Berserker.

The one thing I'm not sure of yet, even where I am in the game right now, is to what extent Shirou is becoming Archer and to what extent he is simply dying. The game is deliberately ambiguous about this and I can't stand it. I want some evidence, any evidence, that he's turning into Archer. Bronzed skin? White hair? Something. Anything. But at the end of this scene, all we get is a tantalizing hint: Shirou, his back turned to Ilya, is the spitting back-image of Archer. Well, duh, he SHOULD be, they're the same goddamned person after all. :lol: But the artwork takes it one tantalizing step further with the Shroud of Martin: it is the same crimson color as Archer's battle armor, of course, and the way it billows behind Shirou evokes the mental image of Archer's red cape.

HF Shirou will not become Archer because Archer's self-sacrificing ideal is what gives Unlimited Blade Works its shape, and HF Shirou rejected that to pursue Sakura.

Also, Berserker in HF was much much much much weaker than Berserker in Fate and UBW. This is because he has high divinity supresses the effects of the corruption, making him less agile and strong overall. It's still impressive Shirou beat him, but I felt defeating Dark Saber was a bigger accomplishment given his history with Saber and how Dark Saber was stronger, if slower post-corruption.

Really though, speed and durability are Shirou's major problems when fighting the Servants. And in HF he wore himself down pretty quickly.

Does Kotomine's connection with the Grail (at the end of the 4th War) explain why he was able to keep Gilgamesh around? They made it sound like the same was true for Sakura's relationship with Rider; but Kotomine never became as entangled with the Grail as did Sakura, did he?

Gilgamesh's corruption gave him a physical body, but since he has a dead soul, he can't produce Mana on his own and had to consume children (the kids in the basement of Kotomine's church) to stay in the world. He's not dependant on Kotomine at all.

Kotomine was merely resuscitated by the grail, so he can still produce his own Mana.

So ... if I were wanting to unlock the non-True endings for either path, what would I need to do differently? No hints were offered at the end of completing the True End path so I don't feel too bad about asking. (There was a hint offered some time during Shirou's moments in the cavern where he recalled "nothing that just happened would have happened had I not scolded Sakura back then like I did", so I suppose that could be the hint, but I don't remember scolding her even being an option. Was it? If it was, I guess I just naturally picked it and it led to the True End.) Are the outcomes of the other endings lesser? (like, more people die, ending is overall crappier?) Or are they just different? 'Cause I gotta say, I'm kind ehhhhhhhhhh about the canon ending for Heavens Feel. ^^; NOT A FAN OF PUPPETS! ^^;

Don't be nice to Ilya.

Frankly, I feel you would like the Normal End far more. The True End is sort of harem-y in comparison.

YUKI.N

07-19-2011, 01:42 AM

I'm impressed Little Blue unlocked both HF endings so quickly. Is that because you can access them by making a choice very near the end of the game (i.e. once you're already inside the cavern?) and she just found it by guess-and-checking? Or what? Guess I should ask the actual person herself rather than speaking about her in the third person ... :lol:

I don't recall exactly what the choice was, but it was towards the very end of the game. According to walkthroughs, if you pick "Do it" as the last option, you get the Normal End. Funny, they say you can't achieve it on your first runthrough. Wonder how I saw it first then?

I'm really not one to comment on the romance aspect, but to each their own in terms of visual appeal. I personally think Sakura's design is the plainest of the three. >>;

Another: missing one (the same one Li'l Blue was missing, so I guess I can't get this without getting all of the Tiger Stamps. Forget that: can you just upload it so I can see it? :oops: :lol:)

I don't have the game installed anymore, but here you go:

http://fsn.seorinwastaken.com/archive/397.html

Talon87

07-19-2011, 01:47 AM

Man, you sure did reply to a lot of old stuff I already found the answers to as I continued to play to respond to, Doppel. :lol: Respond to some of the newer stuff! Oh yeah ... I haven't posted much. Well, I posted some! You could respond to those points for now. =P :oops:

Also, are you sure about your claim that Justica absorbs the souls in other paths? :?: I feel that this is incorrect. Ilya specifically indicates in HF that it was her duty to absorb the defeated Heroic Spirits but that unexpectedly (and, we as players recognize, for the first time) she had competition in the form of Matou Sakura; and that the only reason she even managed to absorb Archer was because she was so much closer to him at the time of his death than Sakura was. But Ilya, Zouken, and everyone else seemed convinced that Ilya's the one who's supposed to be receiving the spirits. This would also make the most sense in terms of using the girl as a key in the other paths. (In Fate, Kotomine abducts her in her entirety; in UBW, Gilgamesh gruesomely settles for her heart.) Also ...
Justica is already long-gone, so I don't see how she could be there to absorb spirits. She sacrificed herself to complete the activation circle for the True Holy Grail. It's kind of ambiguous in HF whether she was the one authentically having the conversation with Zouken or whether, in his dying moments, the old magus merely saw the woman he had loved in the eyes of her great-great granddaughter.
But as our resident Type-Moon expert, I trust to your expert knowledge of the back story. If you could cite something for me -- an in-game line, some supplementary material, Nasu interviews, anything -- I'd appreciate it.

Talon87

07-19-2011, 02:55 AM

Kotomine's Past:
Awesome. :) Sad. :( Weird. :?
We discover that Kotomine, in his desperate attempt to be a normal man who finds happiness in good rather than happiness in evil, sought out and wed a terminally-ill woman. This woman, he recalls, was a saint, and she loved Kotomine very much. But Kotomine was unable to love her or their child. He was happiest when they were most miserable, and when they sought to please him they only made him unhappy. In the end, he stonefacedly tells his wife that the experiment was a failure. Bittersweet, she kills herself but not before telling him how much she still loves him. Kotomine then remarks -- and this is pretty fucked up -- that he was sad NOT because she had died but because HE had wanted to be the one to kill her. He had wanted to know the pleasure (WTF) of killing the woman one loves. Well, w/e.

Apparently sometime during the Fourth Holy Grail War, Kiritsugu shot Kotomine through the heart, killing (?) him, but when the contaminated grail's contents spilled forth onto Gilgamesh, the dark magical energy, not being able to completely corrupt the Servant, flowed onward -- towards the Servant's Master, towards Kotomine. Insodoing, it (quote) "resurrected" Kotomine and gave him a new (fake) heart to continue living on. THIS is why True Assassin's Noble Phantasm failed. You can't produce a fake to kill the real when the real is already long gone.
I really feel bad for the guy. He's not trying to blame it on how he was born. He's desperately tried fighting against his nature. But he's realize it's futile: he simply is the way he is. To me, he's an unrealistic entity -- I don't believe men like him are born -- but as characters in fiction go he's a tragic and fascinating one.

So now I'll just dust myself off and ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhh SHIT. :|:
The part when Dark S_____ discussed Avenger and Angra Manyu [sic] with Kotomine was interesting if confusing at times. But by the end of the game, I think I got the gist of it.

Shirou's Losing His Mind:
It was MAJOR plot point time when we returned from the forest to the Emiya household. The original way I interpreted what was going on was:
that when Shirou was not conscious, Emiya was; and that slowly but surely, his body was being taken over by Emiya.
Doppel has explained already why this idea is inconsistent with what little we know of Archer's past from UBW (specifically how Archer felt betrayed by society when they turned their backs on him and transformed him into their pariah of sorts after he had already sacrificed what he held dearest in order to try and be a superhero and save them).

Still: this was the part in the game where Shirou, Ilya, and Rin have a serious talk about the truth behind the Holy Grail War system. And hot damn was it enlightening. Some reminder notes to catch you up to speed are provided below courtesy of yours truly:

Ilya explains the true purpose of the grail wars. She explains that the Einzberns and Makiri both desired immortality and, specifically, the Third Sorcery. They believed this could be granted by Heavens Feel and that Heavens Feel, in turn, would be given form via the Grail ritual.

Ilya explains that it was during the third war that the True Holy Grail (i.e. the magic circle in the land) became tainted. Einzbern cheated: they summoned an eighth class, "Avenger", and into that class they used a Zoroastrian scripture as a catalyst to summon Angra Manyu [sic]. But who they got was -THE- historic Angra Manyu, i.e. a boy in a Persian village who became a sacrificial scapegoat for all the evils of the world, and he lost in the 3rd war pretty quickly. But when his Heroic Spirit soul entered the Holy Grail, everything changed: because of (confusing long explanation Ilya provides), he corrupted the grail and it in turn transformed him into -THE- Angra Manyu, i.e. an über-Devil.
Then Ilya said some stuff that I wanted to look up and/or confirm with you guys:
Ilya seems to further explain that because Angra Manyu activated the Grail's wish-giving capabilities, the Fourth Holy Grail war was really a sham. She says she doesn't think Kiritsugu realized it until it had already begun, though she isn't certain. But the implication seems to be that THE GRAIL CANNOT/DOES NOT GRANT A WISH ONCE EVERY WAR, BUT RATHER THAT IT CAN ONLY EVER GRANT ONE WISH, PERIOD; or else that, after being corrupted by Angra Manyu, it was no longer in the business of handing out free wishes anyway.
The way Doppel has explained this in some earlier posts is that the Grail, in its corrupted state, will still provide wishes but that it will do so as perversely as possible. Bound to the words of the mage making the wish, it will give them what they requested but will give them the most horrible thing possible which still adheres to the wish's terms. Doppel seems to be implying, for example, that this is what caused the fire in Shinto (where Li'l Shirou lived) ten years ago. And maybe he's right, I dunno, they never really said it verbatim like that in FSN so we'll have to wait and see how things play out in Fate/Zero, I guess. But the way Ilya made it sound (see spoiler box above), it almost sounded like it wasn't even going to grant a bad wish, let alone good wishes. *shrug*

Ilya's explanation of how the Third Sorcery works was a little confusing, so I've decided to look into this more. The way she made it sound, I would say that words like "resurrection" and "immortality" are both incompletely synonymous with what is described by the Third Sorcery. They're partial synonyms: they almost describe what Nasu means, but not quite. To use the NasuVerse terminology Ilya does, the Third Sorcery "elevates" the soul to "the next level." I have no idea what this means, but the implication is that our souls are at Level x where they're not capable of being immortal/resurrected/some such and that, by going to Level x, Ilya explains that the soul can sort of rain back down into existence multiple times/ways. I dunno, will have to read more about it.

Ilya also explains that in the Third Holy Grail War ...
it wasn't that the True Holy Grail summoned a Heroic Spirit using the Third Sorcery but rather that it summoned a Heroic Spirit who on his own was -already- capable of using the Third Sorcery. This is interesting and warrants further research. Because the boy named Angra Manyu would have been a bonafide sorceror if he were capable of performing this magic -- and were he so capable, it would beg the question of why he was the villagers' captive in the first place. Also, I thought that according to Sakura there are five sorceries, that each has only been discovered once, and that the five were discovered by four individuals (meaning one guy, presumably Zelretch, discovered two while the other three each discovered one). Considering that Angra Manyu the boy dates back several thousand years, one would think that if he learned the Third Sorcery in life, he would have been its inventor.

And if it wasn't him? If the boy wasn't capable of sorcery, let alone magic? Then why did Ilya say what she said about how the True Holy Grail had summoned a Heroic Spirit who knew the trick? Does this tie back in to the whole Throne of Heroes concept? If so, is Angra Manyu's position on the Throne of Heroes one which is picking up information from all his existences? And if so ... how come he's not having an adverse effect on the Throne of Heroes? Wouldn't it be, I dunno, bad to have Satan in that group? Wouldn't he kinda sorta TOTALLY corrupt the dimension?
It's sooooo shiny ...! :O~~~ The Gem Sword Zelretch:
Some refresher notes:
Shirou and Ilya go to reproduce the Tohsaka heirloom sword. Rin isn't allowed to join us because she doesn't know that we've already removed the Shroud of Martin once before and plan to use Archer's arm once again in order to ensure as flawless a projection as possible.

Ilya links with Shirou's mind like the one time she did in the shopping district, only this time instead of showing him the path to Einzbern Castle, she instead shows him a memory built within her: of the day the True Holy Grail was created. In the center of the magic circle is Lizleihi Justica von Einzbern, and Shirou is so captivated by her that he spends/wastes most of the precious little time he has inside Ilya's memory gazing upon her.
I totally would have too, dude. :) ..... OW! :| *Talon rubs sore ribs elbowed by Yuki*

However, as his vision begins to crack, he realizes he's goofed and hastily searches for Tohsaka's ancestor such that he can identify the gem sword and burn its image into his mind. He finds Kischur Zelretch Schweinorg, sees the sword at his side, and immediately concludes that there is NO way he can possibly hope to project an accurate replica of the sword. He can copy its form, sure, but he can tell that it not only has great magic within but that IT IS CONSTRUCTED USING KNOWLEDGE FROM THE FUTURE WHICH WE DON'T EVEN HAVE HERE ON EARTH YET. And thus, given this, it's impossible for Shirou to make that which he can't even fathom. However, as he emerges from the mindmeld feeling defeated, Ilya congratulates him and points out that he managed to replicate the sword smashingly well.
Oh Nasu: once again you let the boy wonder do the impossible. I swear, if there's one thing which pissed me off to no end, it was that Fate/Stay Night wrapped up without confirming that Shirou is a
sorceror!
Other than that, though, this scene was pretty cool. What followed was eerie, from Shirou's time lapse issues to Rider's stony threat on Shirou's life after Rin and Ilya took their leave, but overall this was a great bit of backstory and probably the richest development we've yet seen of Meeting of the Minds between FSN's hierarchy (see: Justica, Zouken) and Tsukihime's (see: Zelretch). I'm not a big Tsukihime fan, though I liked it well enough, but even I can appreciate how cool this The Flintstones Meet the Jetsons moment was. :D

Oh, I should point out ...
Shirou stabs himself in the palm once again with Rin's amulet -- he had been using it to try and remain in this world, remember? by paining himself so he won't fall asleep? -- but his hand starts to bleed and Rin discovers the amulet. At this point, just as in the UBW path, she freaks out and demands to know where Shirou got this amulet, pulling out the SAME amulet from her own pocket. And, as in UBW, it is strongly hinted at (though not revealed here 100% officially as it was in UBW) that Rin pieces together the truth about Shirou's relationship with Archer. She demands to speak with Ilya and orders Shirou to rest. That's when Rider then shows up ...
Plot Hole!:
So yeah. Nasu kind of wrote himself a plot hole that I didn't notice until yesterday when I was reading something about Rider on the Type-Moon Wiki:
As the girls leave, Rider shows up. She reveals that she's been in hiding because, so long as it is Matou Sakura HERSELF who is trying to kill Shirou, she cannot/will not interfere.

The thing is, this goes against what Sakura told her to do. "No matter the circumstances, protect Senpai." Now, you could say that Rider is simply choosing between one of two contradictions and that she opts to prioritize her Master's life over her Master's command. I could be kind of okay with that. (It'd still be a plot hole though, but only a baby one.) But there's just one problem ...

THAT ISN'T WHAT HAPPENED THE PREVIOUS DAY! When Dark Sakura invaded the Emiya household and sought to abduct Ilya, remember what happened? Rider showed up and protected Shirou from Dark Sakura's black tendrils! (Remember how hurt and stony-cold-hateful Sakura was towards Rider when she felt this perceived betrayal? And how Rider was all "Master, please understand, I am merely following out YOUR orders"?) So yeah. For the sake of convenience, Nasu makes use of Rider when he needs her (like at the Emiya household scene) and then discards her when she'd be inconvenient (like with the Einzbern Forest scene with Shirou vs. Dark Berserker). TYPICAL. =P Typical Nasu. I swear, dude comes up with some great ideas but goddamn is his writing a little rough around the edges! ^^;

This ends Part 2. Look forward to Part 3 of the endgame posts tomorrow! :)

Doppleganger

07-19-2011, 06:42 AM

I'm really not one to comment on the romance aspect, but to each their own in terms of visual appeal. I personally think Sakura's design is the plainest of the three. >>;

Think of it this way.

1. Talon went in wanting to love Sakura.
2. I went in wanting to hate her.
3. You and BBB went in with open minds.

Man, you sure did reply to a lot of old stuff I already found the answers to as I continued to play to respond to, Doppel. :lol: Respond to some of the newer stuff! Oh yeah ... I haven't posted much. Well, I posted some! You could respond to those points for now. =P :oops:

Yeah, the nature of your questions pretty much requested direct spoilers, so there wasn't much room to edge around with hints and suggestion.

I'll give you a straight up spoiler, though - the source of the taint in the Holy Grail:

The identity of the taint is Angra Mainyu, the Zoroastrian God of Destruction and Lord of all Evil - supposedly. In reality, "Angra Mainyu" was just this Persian kid who was sacrificed by an ad hoc mob in the same way Jesus Christ was sacrificed. In the same sense, all of the world's "sins" and evils were piled into this boy's soul, but as I mentioned earlier with Heracles, divinity allows one to resist that kind of evil influence. But this kid wasn't divine at all, and died cursed and full of hatred for the people who killed him. Yet the act of self-sacrifice, voluntary or not, qualified him as a Heroic Spirit.

I think the Einzberns tried to summon a "powerful Servant" during the 3rd Holy Grail War and aimed for Angra Mainyu, who as a God would be quite powerful. Since Angra Mainyu was a God though, this technically shouldn't have worked. But they ended up with this fake by accident, who turned into a worthless Servant with no Noble Phantasm that was easily killed, but his immensely evil presence perverted the Holy Grail's power.

In both the 4th and 5th Grail, Angra Mainyu causes incredibly havoc because of the immense Mana that goes into the Grail, and through people making wishes, he's able to exert his evil influence.

I'll look for other answers to plug in here, so sit tight. You've just written novels of stuff in the time it would take me to log in.

Talon87

07-19-2011, 03:55 PM

I'll give you a straight up spoiler, though
You "gave" me neither a spoiler nor anything I hadn't already posted about previously. :lol: I'll, uh, redirect you to the post wherein I discuss this very thing: http://forums.upnetwork.net/showpost.php?p=246925&postcount=138 .

You know: the one right before yours. ^^;

YUKI.N

07-19-2011, 06:29 PM

Think of it this way.

1. Talon went in wanting to love Sakura.
2. I went in wanting to hate her.
3. You and BBB went in with open minds.

Curious: Why did you want to hate Sakura?

Since the animé, I was never too partial to Sakura. I'm usually not a fan of clingy, dependent girls. I thought HF might change my opinion by explaining her reasons, and it did. However, I still see her as weak. I don't mind that Shirou supports her, and I'm glad that she has him. Yet I was also hoping that with his help, she would grow to finally love herself and prove she's still capable of surviving without him. Which the Normal End revealed the opposite.

Talon87

07-19-2011, 06:48 PM

I still don't know how to dock onto that. You said there's an option called "Do it," but I didn't see anything like that at all. (I always save at every choice and looked back at the last 20 or so choices before the end of the game.) The closest thing I saw to it was:
the scene where Shirou has the kitchen knife and is contemplating whether to go through with killing Sakura or not
Doppel seemed to suggest that it has to do with neglecting Ilya. If that's true, (a) I can see why I most definitely didn't dock onto that :lol: since I'd say maybe 85% of the time when even forced to pick between Sakura and Ilya I would still go with Ilya, but (b) I don't see what that has anything to do with the choice in the spoiler box. If you could either tell me more details, or if you could link me to whatever site/walkthrough it is that you may be using to figure out your own response, that'd be great. Originally, I wasn't planning on obtaining the non-True End for UBW, but going back through the old posts I see that Doppel seems to think that it's the best ending of the entire game. Interesting. Then there's HF whose alternate ending I wouldn't mind seeing since (a) Doppel says he thinks I'd like it more (we'll see!) and (b) I don't do puppets. ^^;

I'm throwin' it out there right now: if there are vampires in Fate/Zero, I'll roll my eyes but expect nothing less; yet if there are puppet users in Fate/Zero, I'mma wince. >_< Touko was probably the neatest character in Kara no Kyoukai, but I hate, hate, hate the idea of "puppet users" in my shounen action stories. Hated it in Naruto and I hate it here in the NasuVerse too. :lol: What I hate most about it in the NasuVerse is how badly Nasu seems to insist that ...
Shirou's perfectly normal in his new body. NO! :lol: I reject this! If he's a clone down to the genetic level, then guess what is: he's not a "puppet", he's a clone! But too bad Nasu specifically wrote in the end game text that Shirou's new body ISN'T a clone! So then I say "Okay, so if he's not a clone and you keep insisting he's a puppet, then that must mean that he's made of meat and sinew but that, at the genetic level, he's hollow. In which case, I DON'T LIKE IT! :( It's as much a Bad End as if you'd had his spirit inhabit a sword or a seagull!"

YUKI.N

07-19-2011, 06:58 PM

I still don't know how to dock onto that. You said there's an option called "Do it," but I didn't see anything like that at all. (I always save at every choice and looked back at the last 20 or so choices before the end of the game.)[/spoiler]

It might be available now since you cleared the True End:

http://www.gamefaqs.com/pc/921327-fate-stay-night/faqs/53220

I honestly don't remember how I achieved the Normal End first. I guess according to Dopple I didn't rack up enough Ilya points. Yet I don't recall going so far back to rectify my relationship with her.

The Normal End for UBW is cute, and I'd agree it's probably the "happiest". Although it's harem-y like HF's True End.

The idea of puppets also kind of unsettled me.

Doppleganger

07-19-2011, 07:15 PM

Wow, that was in /stay night? My memory/soul's crumbling, I could have sworn that was only FHA material. o_O

The way Doppel has explained this in some earlier posts is that the Grail, in its corrupted state, will still provide wishes but that it will do so as perversely as possible. Bound to the words of the mage making the wish, it will give them what they requested but will give them the most horrible thing possible which still adheres to the wish's terms. Doppel seems to be implying, for example, that this is what caused the fire in Shinto (where Li'l Shirou lived) ten years ago. And maybe he's right, I dunno, they never really said it verbatim like that in FSN so we'll have to wait and see how things play out in Fate/Zero, I guess. But the way Ilya made it sound (see spoiler box above), it almost sounded like it wasn't even going to grant a bad wish, let alone good wishes. *shrug*

The Fourth Grail's wish lead to the immense fire. That was Kotomine's wicked desires made real. The Fifth Grail also granted a wish, and it was severely less sinister, but that depends on your POV. I think the Muv-Luv cast would find it worse.

Ilya's explanation of how the Third Sorcery works was a little confusing, so I've decided to look into this more. The way she made it sound, I would say that words like "resurrection" and "immortality" are both incompletely synonymous with what is described by the Third Sorcery. They're partial synonyms: they almost describe what Nasu means, but not quite. To use the NasuVerse terminology Ilya does, the Third Sorcery "elevates" the soul to "the next level." I have no idea what this means, but the implication is that our souls are at Level x where they're not capable of being immortal/resurrected/some such and that, by going to Level x, Ilya explains that the soul can sort of rain back down into existence multiple times/ways. I dunno, will have to read more about it.

TYPE-MOON assumes a non-immortal soul (as opposed to Christianity) that like the human body decays over time, and the decay happens even if the soul is put into a new body. The soul also suffers from a form of Graft vs. Host diseases in that the soul will try to destroy a body that isn't its original, it is very resistant to storage in other forms. Ways to avoid this while maintaining immortality are to make the original body undead, like with Zouken and Nero, but the soul decay still occurs. Nero in particular lost his sense of individuality, and Roa believes he's a new being carrying on the will of the original Roa. This is because Nasu seeems to think memories are storied in the soul after being recorded by the brain.

I guess the scenario is analagous to how telomeres shorten over several rounds of cell division. Even if the soul (chromosome) finds its way into a new body (cell), information is lost until the lineage will eventually die out from decay.

The Third Magic basically grants immortality to the soul, also giving it pliability to "reincarnate" into a new form, whether it be a spiritual body, or a puppet, without information loss.

All of the "magics" are capable of reversing the dead somehow - Second Magic allows taking someone out of a parallel world, Third Magic allows them to perfectly reincarnate, while the First Magic allows reversal of time, undoing death.

Ilya also explains that in the Third Holy Grail War ...
it wasn't that the True Holy Grail summoned a Heroic Spirit using the Third Sorcery but rather that it summoned a Heroic Spirit who on his own was -already- capable of using the Third Sorcery. This is interesting and warrants further research. Because the boy named Angra Manyu would have been a bonafide sorceror if he were capable of performing this magic -- and were he so capable, it would beg the question of why he was the villagers' captive in the first place. Also, I thought that according to Sakura there are five sorceries, that each has only been discovered once, and that the five were discovered by four individuals (meaning one guy, presumably Zelretch, discovered two while the other three each discovered one). Considering that Angra Manyu the boy dates back several thousand years, one would think that if he learned the Third Sorcery in life, he would have been its inventor.

And if it wasn't him? If the boy wasn't capable of sorcery, let alone magic? Then why did Ilya say what she said about how the True Holy Grail had summoned a Heroic Spirit who knew the trick? Does this tie back in to the whole Throne of Heroes concept? If so, is Angra Manyu's position on the Throne of Heroes one which is picking up information from all his existences? And if so ... how come he's not having an adverse effect on the Throne of Heroes? Wouldn't it be, I dunno, bad to have Satan in that group? Wouldn't he kinda sorta TOTALLY corrupt the dimension?

I don't think that's what Ilya meant. I don't want to say something based on what you've digested that could be wrong, but I think she only meant he had the potential for using the Third Magic, not that he could actually use it. Zelretch hasn't found a single apprentice in all of his years of un-death who could inherit the Second Magic, except for potentially Rin. And there's no guarantee Rin will be fully capable of weilding the Second Magic.

Also, all of the "magics" date back from the dawn of time, and have been passsed down since then. No magic was invented in the modern era (only "sorcery"), not even in the Age of the Gods that the Greek mythological figures came from.

Curious: Why did you want to hate Sakura?

Since the animé, I was never too partial to Sakura. I'm usually not a fan of clingy, dependent girls. I thought HF might change my opinion by explaining her reasons, and it did. However, I still see her as weak. I don't mind that Shirou supports her, and I'm glad that she has him. Yet I was also hoping that with his help, she would grow to finally love herself and prove she's still capable of surviving without him. Which the Normal End revealed the opposite.

To clarify, both Talon and I had knowledge of HF's content going in, but I'd already disseminated the entire Fate body of work, and knew everything going in. So my memory of novel details are pretty bad because playing the VN was more a formality for me - I was frequently bored by the stuff I already knew. I had hoped that HF would have changed my opinion by presenting new stuff and not just reinforce my opinion, but it didn't happen.

Sakura is morally depraved. Voluntarily so. She's weak, but also desired wickness, because if she really wanted to she could have dominated Angra Mainyu's corruption (which she did in FHA, herp). Both Gilgamesh and Kotomine did, so I really had no sympathy or tolerance for Sakura at all.

While she certainly had the most relatably tragic past to a high school guy (Rin's isn't sad at all, while Saber's is something only a leader could truly empathize with) it didn't really justify her wanton, bloody rampage. Shirou's devotion to her likewise seemed to be an almost over-reaction given their level of interaction. Talon paints a story of gradual attraction, but given how Shirou just as easily fell for Rin (who he was already consciously attracted to) and Saber (over a two week period of intimacy) I just don't buy that he was really all that in to Sakura. And this with the same base childhood, I'm hard pressed to believe those early scenes with Sakura sold HF Shirou as a Sakura man.

Talon87

07-19-2011, 08:23 PM

Wow, that was in /stay night? My memory/soul's crumbling, I could have sworn that was only FHA material. o_O
Having not read much about nor touched F/HA, I can assure you that anything you read me saying about Angra Manyu [sic] the NasuVerse character definitely comes from this game.

TYPE-MOON assumes a non-immortal soul (as opposed to Christianity) that like the human body decays over time, and the decay happens even if the soul is put into a new body.
Yeah, I noticed that, but thank you for putting it into the words you did. It's clearer now. I don't like this, but then again, I don't believe in a soul anyway so I'm already having to play Mental Hopscotch to keep along with Nasu's universe's laws of biology. =P

Also, all of the "magics" date back from the dawn of time, and have been passsed down since then. No magic was invented in the modern era (only "sorcery"), not even in the Age of the Gods that the Greek mythological figures came from.
I've noticed something in your own posts and have been quiet about it until now because I didn't want to sound pedantic ... you keep calling the Sorceries "Magics." Like, you've called the Third Sorcery "the Third Magic" numerous times. Likewise with the Second Sorcery. I didn't say anything because I chalked it up to "Okay, he's not using Mirror-Moon's specific English terms. I'm not going to criticize that. He's probably using the term the fanbase popularized before Mirror-Moon translated the games," but now I have to say something because in your very last sentence when you say that "no magic was invented in the modern era, only sorcery," you show me that you do differentiate between the two terms. So I went off to the Type-Moon Wiki to figure things out.

Matter became more complicated, however, when I discovered that the Type-Moon Wiki seems to use your nomenclature yet directly contradicts your claim:
Article: "Third Magic" (http://typemoon.wikia.com/wiki/Third_Magic)
"The Third Magic was originally achieved by the Einzbern family, but its secret was lost one thousand years ago."
"There is no information on the original practitioners of the Third Magic."
Granted, wikis are user-constructed and smaller ones like this Type-Moon Wiki are prone to errors. But if we're to go off of this, it would seem that the Einzbern family did invent the Third Sorcery/Magic, rather than that it's been around forever. Maybe a better way to say it, just like people do for things like "Faraday discovered electromagnetism," would be to say that the Einzberns were the first humans to discover this technique but that the technique has existed since time eternal. I could go for that. It's just, let's be clear: the claim is on the table that no one knew how to do the Third Magic before the Einzberns did ... and yet Ilya's story seems to directly contradict that (given what she says about Angra Manyu).

Back to the matter of terminologies. To use a :,:: format analogy, it seems that
Mirror-Moon "Magic" : Type-Moon Wiki "Magecraft, Thaumaturgy, or Sorcery" ::
Mirror-Moon "Sorcery" : Type-Moon Wiki "Magic"
Very confusing. :| Especially since it plays a crucial role in the story. We're told time and again how important it is to recognize that quote unquote anyone can do magic like Tohsaka's but that only a very rare individual can perform true acts of magic, or (to use the Mirror-Moon term) sorcery. We're told again and again that the first category of magicks follow the rules laid out by the world whereas the second category of magicks bend or contravert the rules laid out by the world. Almost as though the first category is simply a magician knowing the magic password and whispering it in just the right way to achieve the desired effect whereas the second category isn't like this at all but is instead something much more, something miraculous, something which ought to be impossible being made real.

I really wanted ... (spoilers up thru HF True End)
Shirou to be that sorceror all game long (since they kept making a big deal about how he was insanely re-inventing the wheel every time he activated his Magic Circuit; or since how Shirou was made out to be only good at one thing but to be very very good at it and to actually be good not at what they thought he was good at but to be good at the other side of the coin, the harder side, and to be able to pull off an amazing feat no other magician could pull off). Was very disappointed that they never confirmed or denied that Shirou might have been sorceror material. Was very disappointed that in one ending (UBW True) he's just Tohsaka's manservant whereas in other ending (HF True) he's just Sakura's hubby and a puppet to boot. >_>;
Anyway, sorry that this post sounds incredibly pedantic. But it's important that we discuss the right terms. I can adopt yours if you want, especially since that's what it seems the fan community is using anyway if the Type-Moon Wiki is any indication. Knowing me, though, I'll probably start using the Japanese terms since those are true canon and leave no room for doubt. (They use mahou 魔法 "the way of magic" for the miraculous kind of magic and they use majutsu 魔術 "magic techniques" for the more ordinary kind.) So to use those terms :) ...
I wanted Shirou to be the next mahoutsukai, not a meager majutsushi.
Sakura is morally depraved. Voluntarily so. She's weak, but also desired wickness, because if she really wanted to she could have dominated Angra Mainyu's corruption (which she did in FHA, herp). Both Gilgamesh and Kotomine did, so I really had no sympathy or tolerance for Sakura at all.
The thing is, Sakura feels very real. She is the most human, the most real villain in the story. She is a parallel existence to the True Holy Grail itself. To paraquote Kotomine, the True Holy Grail was neither holy nor evil at first: it was pure. Pure energy. Even the faintest taint in a pure body of water would "infinitely" darken that ocean, because even a 0.000000000001% darkening of a previously immaculate lake is, in terms of mathematics, an infinite or beyond-infinite darkening of the lake multiplicatively. If I ask you, "how many times larger than 100 is 1,000?" you answer "10", but if I ask you "how many times larger than 0 is 1,000", how do you answer? It isn't a thousand times bigger. It isn't a million times bigger. It is an incomprehensibly larger "times" bigger: because it went from no pollution to some pollution. Anyway, digression. ^^; The point is, a small taint taints the Grail. And Angra Manyu wasn't even a small taint: he was a colossally large taint which gave rise to an even more colossally large and evil entity. Sakura is much the same way. Every child is born into this world pure, not meaning "good" but merely meaning "devoid of record." They are a clean slate. I think it's undeniable that a child subjected to the life poor Sakura underwent would come out the way she did. And that's why she's such an endearing tragic character. The poor thing was ...
given up for adoption by her biological parents
beaten by her new family
violated by her grandfather (if not sexually, then at the very least with the bugs being implanted into her)
sexually violated by her brother
beaten by her brother (kicked, punched)
the small pleasures she had in life were constantly being either taken away from her or being in threat of taken away from her
her perfect sister was going to steal her crush
her brother was going to tell her crush how she was damaged goods
So on and so forth. While other children slept in warm beds and opened Christmas presents, Sakura was bitten and invaded by slimy, phallic worms. The few pleasures she knew in life were only given to her by her calculating grandfather so as to further accentuate the despair necessary for her transformation. (Why else would he allow her to go to school, be in the archery club, etc but for the fact that without the light the dark is meaningless?) She's a much richer, more sympathizable character than either Saber or Rin are. She's so selfless and yet at the same time so selfish that she is a completely relatable human being. Purely selfless and she'd be unrealistic, but purely selfish and she'd be a bitch. Sakura is this girl who is so nice on the surface but who underneath is an ugly, raw, real person. When I say ugly, I don't mean that she's hideous. If she were hideous, who would like her? I mean that she is not Pygmalion's statue. She is not an impossibly perfect woman, a Yamato Nadeshiko. She's real. She's petty. She's possessive. She's got low confidence and yet paradoxically also has a very high opinion of herself. This is just so real. I love it.

While she certainly had the most relatably tragic past to a high school guy (Rin's isn't sad at all, while Saber's is something only a leader could truly empathize with) it didn't really justify her wanton, bloody rampage. Shirou's devotion to her likewise seemed to be an almost over-reaction given their level of interaction. Talon paints a story of gradual attraction, but given how Shirou just as easily fell for Rin (who he was already consciously attracted to) and Saber (over a two week period of intimacy) I just don't buy that he was really all that in to Sakura. And this with the same base childhood, I'm hard pressed to believe those early scenes with Sakura sold HF Shirou as a Sakura man.
Fan interpretation, I'll admit. We played the same game and took it different ways. You placed a heavier focus on "time in, time out." I placed a heavier focus on "okay, Nasu is telling me that Shirou and Sakura have been slowly but surely building up to becoming an item over this past year and a half. I will in my own mind reinvent all those scenes." I guess it's like if we were to argue about Star Wars prequels and you said "Anakin x Padme is so shallow" and I was to say "No wai man :O George told us they like totally dig each other so BELIEVE IT!" I don't with Star Wars :lol:, of course, but I did here. Maybe it's because I wanted to, maybe you're right about that, but I was able to take Nasu's claims seriously. When he said, "Sakura x Shirou has been in the works from Shirou's perspective for a year and a half and from Sakura's perspective for four years," I believed it. I imagined the times she made him soup when he was sick, the times she vacuumed or prepped dinner when he was working overtime, the times he walked her to archery, etc. And so in Heavens Feel, it feels like the Holy Grail War just so happens to coincide with the blast-off of the Shirou x Sakura love rocket that was going to lift off ANYWAY right around this time. (Maybe a littttle later since the War nudged Shirou to act a bit sooner than he otherwise would have.) Whereas for the other two girls, they weren't in Shirou's life at all until the war. And he only got to know them over the course of two weeks.

Talon87

07-19-2011, 09:35 PM

Confused. I just did the Heavens Feel non-True End as per Li'l Blue's walkthru's advice. And I got it. But ...

First of all, I was really underwhelmed by it. ^^; It wasn't nearly as thought out or developed as the UBW or HF True Ends have been. And I don't see why Shirou's decision should have been what made the routes different. In both routes he tried to "do it." So I don't see why they now make it that I have to choose and that now if I choose "Do it" I get a completely different ending whereas before there had been no choice, Shirou tried to do it, and failed on his own. Whatever.

Second of all, I'm not sure why Doppel thought I'd really like this ending. Maybe because it had no puppets? ^^; Maybe because it was tragic-romantic? But I'm actually a really big not-fan of:
women who get widowed very early in life and then stay widows forever
It's too tragic for me. EDIT: Well, it's too tragic for me to watch them live like that. I absolutely love these stories from the other side (i.e. ghost stories).

Third of all, I didn't unlock any new CGs. And I would have thought I'd have unlocked one of the ones I don't have because it's the one where ...
You see Shirou with Dark Sakura's Command Crest all over his face.
I would have sworn that that one would have come about from beating the game a different way. Surprised it didn't. So, uh, is it attached to a Bad End or something?

Separate question now: looking at Li'l Blue's walkthrough, it seems like it's a whole different adventure to dock onto UBW non-True End versus UBW True End. So here's my question: if I make the different choices, does the story play out different (we're talking way before the end of the game here) and I should take it slow and enjoy it over the course of several days of playthrough? Or is nothing different at all until the very very end and I should just bam bam bam knock off the different choices and reach the new ending? If it's an entirely new adventure, I might put it off for now. But if it's just an alternate ending, as was the case for Heavens Feel, then I'll probably go do it right now.

YUKI.N

07-19-2011, 10:00 PM

Third of all, I didn't unlock any new CGs. And I would have thought I'd have unlocked one of the ones I don't have because it's the one where ...
You see Shirou with Dark Sakura's Command Crest all over his face.
I would have sworn that that one would have come about from beating the game a different way. Surprised it didn't. So, uh, is it attached to a Bad End or something?

Are you referring to one of the CGs in the gallery (http://i52.tinypic.com/2110ab7.jpg) Dopple posted (first in bottom row)? I never saw that one either. Might've been HA-exclusive, if that's where the screencap's from.

Separate question now: looking at Li'l Blue's walkthrough, it seems like it's a whole different adventure to dock onto UBW non-True End versus UBW True End. So here's my question: if I make the different choices, does the story play out different (we're talking way before the end of the game here) and I should take it slow and enjoy it over the course of several days of playthrough? Or is nothing different at all until the very very end and I should just bam bam bam knock off the different choices and reach the new ending? If it's an entirely new adventure, I might put it off for now. But if it's just an alternate ending, as was the case for Heavens Feel, then I'll probably go do it right now.

UBW's story plays out pretty much identical for both endings, IIRC. You just have to give priority to Saber.

Talon87

07-19-2011, 10:03 PM

CG:
Yeah, that's the one. But no, I do believe it belongs to this game, Yuki. I have it in my Fate / Stay Night CG pack. The pack is incomplete (for instance, it's missing all of the character models) but it has all of the event CGs, I believe, and that was among them. Looked at it just last night after having beaten the game. Wanted to see what I was missing out on from other ends. (Didn't discern much. lol)

UBW End Stuff:
So you think I should blast through the choices then? Just follow the walkthru's advice and BAM, BAM, BAM blow through 'em and make haste for the Ryudou Temple? I'll do that if you say so. I see Doppel's here in the thread, so I'll give him a chance to tell me "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! DON'T DO THAT! O_O" before I head off. :lol:

Doppleganger

07-20-2011, 02:08 AM

Gonna watch baseball soon, so don't wait for me on breezing through stuff. I'd leave it to your discretion...if Shirou annoys you, just skip through things.

I'd stick around for the bad HF end where

Sakura tentacle rapes Rin

...though...

YUKI.N

07-20-2011, 02:10 AM

CG:
Yeah, that's the one. But no, I do believe it belongs to this game, Yuki. I have it in my Fate / Stay Night CG pack. The pack is incomplete (for instance, it's missing all of the character models) but it has all of the event CGs, I believe, and that was among them. Looked at it just last night after having beaten the game. Wanted to see what I was missing out on from other ends. (Didn't discern much. lol)

Just realized I meant to say Réalta Nua, not Hollow Ataraxia. Darn the series' need for "cool-sounding" foreign language titles.

Doppleganger

07-20-2011, 10:21 PM

I've noticed something in your own posts and have been quiet about it until now because I didn't want to sound pedantic ... you keep calling the Sorceries "Magics." Like, you've called the Third Sorcery "the Third Magic" numerous times. Likewise with the Second Sorcery. I didn't say anything because I chalked it up to "Okay, he's not using Mirror-Moon's specific English terms. I'm not going to criticize that. He's probably using the term the fanbase popularized before Mirror-Moon translated the games," but now I have to say something because in your very last sentence when you say that "no magic was invented in the modern era, only sorcery," you show me that you do differentiate between the two terms. So I went off to the Type-Moon Wiki to figure things out.

Just to clarify,

"mahou" = magic, sorcery (Mirror Moon)
"majutsu" = sorcery (Eclipse), magecraft (Mirror Moon)

Granted, wikis are user-constructed and smaller ones like this Type-Moon Wiki are prone to errors. But if we're to go off of this, it would seem that the Einzbern family did invent the Third Sorcery/Magic, rather than that it's been around forever. Maybe a better way to say it, just like people do for things like "Faraday discovered electromagnetism," would be to say that the Einzberns were the first humans to discover this technique but that the technique has existed since time eternal. I could go for that. It's just, let's be clear: the claim is on the table that no one knew how to do the Third Magic before the Einzberns did ... and yet Ilya's story seems to directly contradict that (given what she says about Angra Manyu).

I'll go with that. TYPE-MOON suggests that all of the magics had practitioners back when "magic" was common, before the age of sorcery and science. But the Einzberns are the only ones with a recorded history, recognized by the Mage's Association, of being capable of The Third Magic.

Very confusing. :| Especially since it plays a crucial role in the story. We're told time and again how important it is to recognize that quote unquote anyone can do magic like Tohsaka's but that only a very rare individual can perform true acts of magic, or (to use the Mirror-Moon term) sorcery. We're told again and again that the first category of magicks follow the rules laid out by the world whereas the second category of magicks bend or contravert the rules laid out by the world. Almost as though the first category is simply a magician knowing the magic password and whispering it in just the right way to achieve the desired effect whereas the second category isn't like this at all but is instead something much more, something miraculous, something which ought to be impossible being made real.

The strictest definition of "mahou" is that it's something currently impossible to achieve with "majutstu" or "kagaku". The effects can be imitated by lesser means, but until they can be perfectly replicated, the only way to achieve it is termed "mahou".

Time travel, for example, is hypothetically possible by science. The First Magic is the domain of time travel - once a time machine becomes a reality, the The First Magic won't be considered a magic anymore.

Ultimately, the Mage's Association considers magic any secret technique of an individual that can do something beyond science/sorcery, that others could never hope to learn or replicate. Basically...a signature move.

Interesting trivia tip - Sasaki Koujirou's Tsubame Gaeshi is an application of The Second Magic. :D

Also, a lot of the wikia material is either my own writing or proof-read versions of what I've written, since I penned the entire FSN TYPE-MOON article back in 2006 and only incorrect details have been fixed. Nasu's long-winded, philosophical way of explaining things rather than using analogy is pretty tough to chew on.

I really wanted ... (spoilers up thru HF True End)
Shirou to be that sorceror all game long (since they kept making a big deal about how he was insanely re-inventing the wheel every time he activated his Magic Circuit; or since how Shirou was made out to be only good at one thing but to be very very good at it and to actually be good not at what they thought he was good at but to be good at the other side of the coin, the harder side, and to be able to pull off an amazing feat no other magician could pull off). Was very disappointed that they never confirmed or denied that Shirou might have been sorceror material. Was very disappointed that in one ending (UBW True) he's just Tohsaka's manservant whereas in other ending (HF True) he's just Sakura's hubby and a puppet to boot. >_>;

He's more like her apprentice in UBW, but it's not like she could teach him how to use his magic, just teach him how to avoid killing himself. And while he's not a sorcerer, he's a hero, which is a much bigger deal from a wider perspective.

Talon87

07-20-2011, 10:30 PM

The Underground Lair:
This was pretty cool. I'd seen it in the TV show ages ago and was wondering when we were going to come here since it obviously hadn't happened in UBW.
http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/C21_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/C21.jpg)
The part where Sakura removes Zouken from her body wasn't just shocking for its gruesomeness factor but for what it revealed about Matou Zouken. I had had no idea until then that Zouken had been hiding within his very own adopted granddaughter. That he was hiding within the very same Crest Worm which was causing Sakura to need to consume a lot of mana or else, to be really horny, etc. So basically ... Zouken has always been with Sakura. He was there when she played with herself in the privacy of her bedroom, he was there when she made love to Shirou, he was there for it all. A-W-K-W-A-R-D! :lol: 8O
Dark Saber vs. Rider:
I didn't like that this one started off with a bit of deus ex: "Rin can pass because my Master has business with her. The rest of you must defeat me should you wish to continue onward." I guess it makes sense since Sakura was so drunk with power and so jealous of Rin at this point that she would have wanted very badly to humiliate her sister in a fight one-on-one, but still: it seemed awfully convenient. Then again, it was a handicap for our heroes, not for Dark Saber, so I guess I can't complain too much.

I really didn't care for how Nasu kept playing Dark Saber up as "the strongest Servant conceivable" in this route, nor did I particularly care for how he kept playing up Excalibur as "the strongest Noble Phantasm." But I did appreciate
the shield Rho Aias's unexpected return for one final scene. What a surprise. I loved that shield from the moment Nasu first revealed. For as long as I can remember, I have always been fascinated by defense over offense. I've always admired the martial arts that are more about "you cannot move me" than about "nothing can withstand my onslaught," I've always admired a good defense over a good offense in most sports, and in fighters and RPGs I'm always a big fan of the concept of somebody who may hit kinda weakly but who can take one hell of a beating before they fall. So it was great to see Nasu lend a shield, Rho Aias, a shield I had never even heard of before playing FSN, such an important role in two of the game's three paths. And I was so happy to see that it was such a truly beautiful Noble Phantasm to behold.
As for how this fight ends:
I think I touched on it in an earlier post, but ...

I was kind of underwhelmed by the logic ("we'll block Excalibur with Rho Aias whilst riding Bellerophon into Saber, crashing our way to victory") but it made for one hell of a CG:
http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/rho_aiasbellerophon_versus_dark_excalibur_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Stay%20Night/rho_aiasbellerophon_versus_dark_excalibur.jpg)
Gorgeous. :D

P.S. Part of why I didn't like why Nasu built Dark Saber up so much was that he brought her down comparatively easily. Thought I should mention that before moving on. I originally wrote in my notepad file:

Shirou and Rider's fight against Dark Saber. Pretty cool, if a -liiiiiiittle- bit contrived after they made Dark Saber out to be such an unstoppable force. I might have been more able to buy it had they left it at Regular Saber vs. Rider plus this plan. But anyway, here's how it went, as a reminder: Rider summoned Bellerophon but at the exact same moment Shirou used Archer's projection magic to summon a perfect replica of the shield Rho Aias, the epic shield Archer was seen to favor and summoned on several occasions in the Unlimited Blade Works path. Together, using the combined forces of Bellerophon (as a projectile) and the shield (to block and even to repel Dark Saber's EXCALIBUR! blast), they were able to turn what Shirou described as a 100-to-90 ratio favoring Dark Saber's victory into a surprise victory for them. I kind of question that if Dark Saber ranks a 100 that Rider's Bellerophon would rank a 90. :\ How could that be the case given that REGULAR Saber's Excaliber was able to defeat Bellerophon? I guess you could chalk it up to Rider having Shinji for a master in the Fate path, but then again, Saber had mana-impotent Shirou in the Fate path! So ... yeah! :\ (Note: "odo impotent," I should say. Nasu reminds us later on during the fight between Sakura and Rin that odo is the magical energy within a mage, mana the magical energy outside a mage.)
You Can't Save Everyone:
I thought we'd already learned this lesson earlier. But I guess Nasu doesn't give two shits about hundreds of villagers' lives. Only the characters we came to know and like personally matter. Snarky as I'm being there, I'm also being very Devil's Advocate-y and tongue-in-cheeky: because I think he raises a very good point. It's human nature to not feel the sting of thousands of strangers' deaths versus the loss of one loved one. So this scene (you know the one I mean), even if it felt a little melodramatic, was appropriate in the end. I especially liked the Bad End that resulted from making the other choice. The bit about "the look of contempt in {spoiler}'s eyes" was really quite good and hearkened back to a lesson first taught to us in the Fate path.

Choosing this bad end gave me first and only Tiger Stamp for the entire route since picking it back up. :lol: (I think you saw that proof in an earlier screencap I provided where I showed you how I'd gotten all three True Ends.)

I'm going to take a break here. I'll be back later with Part 4!

Serin

07-22-2011, 08:27 PM

Well, first off, nice to meet you all, just wondering if I can join this little discussion.

I guess it makes sense since Sakura was so drunk with power and so jealous of Rin at this point that she would have wanted very badly to humiliate her sister in a fight one-on-one

Well yeah, it was most definitely a Dungeon Bypass for Rin. Although it wasn't completely because of her being jealous. For all that Rin cared, she kinda taunted, teased, and berated the girl for the entire route. Look at the scene before they decided to project the jewel sword, and Sakura sent one of her shadows as an emissary. Rin basically told her to screw off when Sakura told her to take Shirou and run, and that she was coming to kill her.

No Rin, you do NOT antagonize the super powerful emotionally crippled and possessed girl!
She was honestly very lucky the fight in the cave ended how it did.

You Can't Save Everyone:
I thought we'd already learned this lesson earlier. But I guess Nasu doesn't give two shits about hundreds of villagers' lives. Only the characters we came to know and like personally matter. Snarky as I'm being there, I'm also being very Devil's Advocate-y and tongue-in-cheeky: because I think he raises a very good point. It's human nature to not feel the sting of thousands of strangers' deaths versus the loss of one loved one. So this scene (you know the one I mean), even if it felt a little melodramatic, was appropriate in the end. I especially liked the Bad End that resulted from making the other choice. The bit about "the look of contempt in {spoiler}'s eyes" was really quite good and hearkened back to a lesson first taught to us in the Fate path.

Choosing this bad end gave me first and only Tiger Stamp for the entire route since picking it back up. (I think you saw that proof in an earlier screencap I provided where I showed you how I'd gotten all three True Ends.)

Femme Fatale only really happened because Rin said one thing too many, to be honest. The ending basically showed that the difference was that Rin got to go up to her and tell her how she felt, for realz this time, and hug her, which was what was needed.

Anyway:

Actually, I don't think he is quite that cynical. Shirou was shown to shed tears, and he even is broken up with the fact that he has to decide on the decision to choose at all. Certainly Sakura felt the weight of what had happened (even if largely it was not of her doing consciously) in both HF Normal and True. In Normal, she tells Rin, even when Rin offered to have Sakura stay with her, that she would rather live alone, so that she can be more independent (it wasn't just because she missed Shirou that she decded to live there, and you can't really blame her for not wanting to live at her place anymore).

As for the townspeople, the flowers were in hopes Shirou would come backi, and the hopes that one day she could be absolved. It's a stick situation, Hf is, because Zouken, the Mastermind that set all this to motion, is dead, and cannot take the blame. Most would cry out that someone pays for the crime, but then, where would it end? I say that it is useless to use the victim of said circumstance, in order to satiate some twisted form of justice. But anyway, I do not think Sakura will ever forget the people lost, but she was not totally dead in that ending. It is said that she personally tutored Rin's granddaughter. So the sisters stayed close. She had a fun life, even if it was at times a melancholic one. The thing is, as a victim of abuse, she unfortunately didn't have anyone to fall back on, so her isolation is understandable. After all, what therapist is going to understand magical worms and the like? At the very least, she died at peace, dreaming she met Shirou again. Even if Nasu gut punched the reader, knowing that souls get recycled after death, it was nice.

As for HF True, Sakura pretty much took off and did her best to help Shirou in his time of need, getting the new body to put his soul into. She also tried her best to fix the town's abnormalities according to what went on with the Shadow, as Fuyuki's Supervisor, even trying to re-learn magic(Rin even gave her an invitation to the Association, which she declined for the moment, as she wanted to stay and take care of Fuyuki). Rin said the town felt as it had before thanks to her efforts. And when Rin asked how she was holding up, she said "I can't let these guilty feelings crush me" which I interpret as her knowing and understanding the weight of the War and lives lost, but at the same time living her life.

All this to say, I think neither of them are at a "screw the world" mindset at all. HF was the route where team cohesion really didn't happen until the end, where things were at their worst(and even then...), and the villains trolled the hardest.

I also am very excited for Fate/zero in the Fall. I wonder how people who think Kiritsugu is all hard-edged badass will take a certain scene at the Einzbern castle. I can't wait!:D

Talon87

07-22-2011, 09:45 PM

Well, first off, nice to meet you all, just wondering if I can join this little discussion.
Well, of course you can! Welcome to the UPNetwork! :D

Actually, I don't think he is quite that cynical.
Did I say that? :?: Can you point out where you saw someone calling Shirou cynical? I wouldn't be surprised if one of us did, but I'd like to know what scene whoever it was that said it (me? Doppel? somebody else?) was talking about when they said it. Would affect how I'd reply to your counter-assertion.

I was biased into seeing the game in these shades by Doppelganger years ago (2007) when I was watching the anime and asking him about the different routes in the game, but now that I've completed all three paths I think it was a very smart observation and it bears repeating here since we're talking about Shirou's cynicism or lack thereof.

Fate: Shirou is completely committed to his childhood ideals. They are not challenged or are weakly challenged. He happily resolves to become a superhero like Kiritsugu. If we were to pick an ethical color for this route, it would be white.

Unlimited Blade Works: Shirou's childhood ideals are seriously challenged for the first time by Archer. Shirou basically learns that, according to Archer, pursuit of his ideal will only result in his own ruin. In the end, he still decides to pursue his ideal rather than to abandon it, but concerns are introduced and he must confront them. If we were to pick an ethical color for this route, it would be gray.

Heavens Feel: Shirou is forced to choose between his childhood ideals and the woman he loves when he is placed into a situation which mutually excludes the two. In the end, he abandons his childhood ideals and pursues a "selfish" happiness for the woman he loves. This is basically the "screw the world" path and if we were to pick an ethical color for it it would be black.

That was the analogy I heard from Doppelganger four years ago. (So if you want to critique it, by all means take it up with him and/or the people who fed him the idea first! :lol: :oops:) But I think it's got a lot of merit to it. While it certainly is a selective interpretation to some extent, it doesn't take too much effort to see Fate as the vanilla path, UBW as the kinda rocky path, and HF as the dark path.

In that sense, I think you could say that Shirou is "cynical" in HF ... although like I said, if you could find who said that and in reference to what scene I'd appreciate it since that'd guide the discussion. Perhaps "cynical" isn't the right word to describe him since he never really gets moody-pessimistic about the war, about the information he's been fed by Kotomine or Rin or Ilya, etc. He abandons his childhood ideals, sure, but he's not particularly cynical about it. He doesn't ever say anything which makes us think that his opinion of the world is that it's a crappy place. But if ever there were a route for him to become mistrustful, HF is certainly it as it's really the only route in which he learns any of the backstory for Grail Wars 1 thru 3 or even the founding of the Grail War itself.

If we were to compare Fate with Heavens Feel, I think it would be fair to say that:
Fate is the path where Shirou values ideals over lives. (He will be a superhero even at the cost of his own life.)
HF is the path where he values lives over ideals. (He'll do what it takes to get Sakura back and give her happiness.)

It's kind of like the age-old question, "If you're put into a life-or-death situation where you can survive at the cost of your honor or else you can die but die honorably, which do you pick?" Even though Shirou is a generally nice guy in all the paths and he doesn't ever have to kill any of his allies or do anything extremely evil in any of the paths, Fate is the one where he says "I'd rather die than live in dishonor" whereas HF is the path where he says "I'll do anything if it means saving Sakura, even if the living and the dead will condemn me for it." Both are romantic, but they're opposite answers to the same dilemma.

Serin

07-22-2011, 10:51 PM

Sorry, I meant to say I was talking about that Nasu isn't particularly cynical. But you didn't say that either. And thanks for the welcome, btw.

It's good to talk about HF from a more neutral standpoint. Most people are very passionate on both sides and fail to see some of the goodies hidden in this route, and indepth character analysis.

It's kind of like the age-old question, "If you're put into a life-or-death situation where you can survive at the cost of your honor or else you can die but die honorably, which do you pick?" Even though Shirou is a generally nice guy in all the paths and he doesn't ever have to kill any of his allies or do anything extremely evil in any of the paths, Fate is the one where he says "I'd rather die than live in dishonor" whereas HF is the path where he says "I'll do anything if it means saving Sakura, even if the living and the dead will condemn me for it." Both are romantic, but they're opposite answers to the same dilemma.

Well, that is very complicated. And I don't quite think Shirou is at the "I'll do anything to save Sakura." If it was just about ensuring Sakura's 'safety', then he would kill Rin with no hesitation if she threatened that. But Shirou doesn't, and saves Ilya and Rin when it could kill him and jeopardize his mission to save Sakura. Shirou is more "I'll do anything to ensure the safety of the ones closest to me." in this route, and even then, he is tortured and would rather have everyone be safe. Shirou, as we are shown in UBW, has the inherent lack of 'me' in his relationships. Whatever would make his loved one(s) happy, he strives toward it.

Talon87

08-16-2011, 09:02 PM

Rewatching this addictive fan vid for F/HA (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2vRuXYEHW4), I saw the part with Shirou and Ilya snuggling and out of nowhere it dawned on me that ...

Heavens Feel True End spoiler
the whole idea of Shirou being brought back as a doll, as much as I didn't like it, perfectly fits in with Shirou x Ilya and is probably where/how Nasu first conceived of such a plot point. Remember: Heavens Feel is like two-thirds Sakura path to one-third Ilya path, right? And the two got oddly merged together to produce an epic path which at times feels kind schizoid since Shirou cares about both Sakura and Ilya much more than he does in any other path. Well, logically, it stands to reason that most of the stuff that happens in Heavens Feel probably came from the prototype for Sakura's path and that only some of it came from the prototype for Ilya's path. But if you think about it, the idea of having Shirou's spirit brought back and placed inside of a puppet-replicate of his body fits perfectly with the idea of a homonculus Good End. Why? Because: two dolls wind up happily ever after like peas in a pod. Now I realize that Shirou isn't a homonculus per se ... but he kinda is. :lol: If Ilya is a living automaton without a soul, then Shirou's body was likewise a puppet/robot/body made from flesh capable of being given life by a sorceror (i.e. becoming a homonculus) had they so chosen, but instead they placed Shirou's soul inside of it. It still isn't his natural body. It's a body which will never age, etc etc. In a lot of ways, it's just like a homonculus.
I dunno. That idea just occurred to me. Feel free to disagree. I just had a "wow 8O" eureka moment with it though as I saw Shirou x Ilya in the fan vid @ 0:48.

Talon87

08-21-2011, 06:22 PM

It looks like they're releasing short, fifteen-second commercials over the next few weeks which showcase a different master-servant pair. The first commercial was already released last week and is currently available for viewing on the official website (http://www.fate-zero.jp/movies/spot01.html). It shows the Saber-Kiritsugu pair. The next commercial has been announced to air on select stations starting August 20 (so, it's already begun) and showcases the Rider-Waver pair. Will Yuki watch it? Or will she wait until October before witnessing the Servant we're all so excited to see? ;-)

Here's the schedule (translated from the official site) for the seven commercials' broadcast schedules:
Commercial 1
Team: Emiya Kiritsugu-Saber
Airs: From Saturday, August 13 to Friday, August 19

Commercial 2
Team: Waver-Rider
Airs: From Saturday, August 20 to Friday, August 26

Commercial 3
Team: TBA
Airs: From Saturday, August 27 to Friday, September 2

Commercial 4
Team: TBA
Airs: From Saturday, September 3 to Friday, September 9

Commercial 5
Team: TBA
Airs: From Saturday, September 10 to Friday, September 16

Commercial 6
Team: TBA
Airs: From Saturday, September 17 to Friday, September 23

Commercial 7
Team: TBA
Airs: From Saturday, September 24 to Friday, September 30

I just watched the second CM courtesy of an upload to Nico Nico Douga (link; requires Nico Nico account to see) (http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm15366939) and HMMMMM. :) :? :) Mixed emotions. Click the spoiler boxes to read on.

About Waver's voice:
He sounds like the chronic dork character. The young male protagonist who is clumsy, not lucky in love, etc. I suppose that might be perfect for Waver Velvet, I don't know, having avoided much of the spoilers for Fate/Zero. This is one that will probably have to grow on me but I think already has. First time I watched the CM, I borderline hated it. Now I've listened to the CM like 20 times and I really think it could work. It'll all depend on what kind of person Waver is.
About Rider's voice:
I like it. :) Deep but not too deep, testosteroney but not too testosteroney, buddy-buddy but not too buddy-buddy, it works. That laugh was kind of weird-sounding though. ^^;
About what was shown in the commercial:
WARNING! Servant's identity is revealed in this commercial! (Because he proudly declares his name to his Master. XD) Expand this at your own discretion!
この僕に持って来いの部隊じゃないか？
我が名は征服王イスカンダル！
MWAHAHAHAHAHA!
馬鹿にしやがって！馬鹿にしやがって！馬鹿にしやがって！

Without context, first line could go a lot of ways. One possible reading is "This is the (military) force that I, Waver Velvet, have summoned, is it not?" Another would be "You're the (military) force that I, Waver Velvet, have summoned, are you not?" Another still would be "These are the forces you have brought to me, the great Waver Velvet, aren't they?" Etc. Hard to say whether he's referring to Rider as the 部隊 military force or whether it's something which Rider summons in the story but which isn't shown visually in this commercial. この[name], literally "this [name]", is the Japanese way of saying how we say in English, "I, [name]" as in the examples "I, the great and powerful wizard of Oz" or "I can't believe that I, Gilgamesh, would fall to one such as this!" More than anything, this line is meant to clue you in subconsciously to Waver's personality: the young voice and the smug sense of self-importance and capability tell you all you need to know about Waver for the time being.

Second line is Rider introducing himself saying "My name is Iskander, the Conqueror King!" Iskander is the {spoiler} name for {spoiler} and is the name that Type-Moon has decided to use for this character, much to my delight. 征服王 Seifukuou is a title that Rider has given himself. XD To discuss it, further spoilering by flat-out revealing his identity!
We call him Alexander the Great. They call him アレクサンドロス3世 or Alexander the Third. But his Type-Moon name is 征服王イスカンダル or Iskander the Conqueror King or (more to the point) Iskander the Conqueror. The name appears to be a portmanteau from the Persian name for Alexander (Iskander Magdunee, "Alexander of Macedon") and the Japanese name for William the Conqueror (primarily ウィリアム1世 William the 1st but secondarily 征服王ウィリアム William the Conqueror King). Why do I keep saying "Conqueror King" instead of just "conqueror"? Because I'm being too literal :oops: =P and that's how the Japanese appear to do it for these conqueror-rulers. The regular word for a conqueror in Japanese is 征服者 seifukusha. The 者 at the end just means "person"; and so replacing that with 王 king is like establishing the difference between some measly conqueror and the King of Conquerors! The conqueror! The one! The only! William ALEXANDER! :lol:

So yeah. We call him "Alexander the Great," the Japanese call him "Alexander the 3rd", the Persians call him "Iskander of Macedon", but in FSN we'll be calling him "Iskander the Conqueror." Or at least that's how he introduces himself to Waver Velvet. :lol: I guess we'll probably be calling him Rider most of the time, haha. :)
The laughter requires no translation. ;-)

Finally, the last line is just Waver saying "Making fun of me! Making fun of me! Making fun of me! :evil:" Synonymous with "making a fool out of me!" Obviously included as it's meant to show a sneak peek of the relationship between easy-going, ridiculously powerful Rider and uptight, puny Waver.[/i]
So I guess it'll be fun to get a commercial each week, even though it's torture that they're only 15 seconds long and so insubstantial. ^^; I wonder who we'll see next week? I wonder who they'll decide to save for last? (You think it'll be Berserker, Doppel? My money's on Berserker. I think we'll see Gilgamesh either next week or the week after that.)

Doppleganger

08-22-2011, 04:58 AM

Berserker will probably be last.

On Waver and Rider's voices -

Waver seems perfect. I imagined someone similar to Kaiji's Ichijou, myself. He's a bit nerdy, but is accomplished, brash and potentially overconfident. We'll look at Waver and Rider and think they have little in common, but gradually see they have a lot more in common than is initially apparent.

Rider was more or less how I pictured him. I'd pegged Yanada Kiyoyuki as Rider's voice, and the guy they did get isn't far off. I can't identify the CVs, so they're fairly unknown, or don't have a ton of famous roles unlike Saber, Gilgamesh, Kiritsugu, etc.

Talon87

08-31-2011, 02:14 AM

The third commercial is out. It's of Kotomine Kirei and his servant. It doesn't seem to be available on the official site yet, but if you have a Nico Nico Douga account, you can watch it here (http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm15443569).

Be warned! If you didn't already know that Kotomine Kirei's summoned servant in the 4th Grail War was not Archer, you do now. ^^; (This is mostly directed towards Yuki, the only person currently here who I think may not know this fact already, but applies to anybody in the future as well.) Both the Servant's class and identity are revealed in the discussion that follows!

Absolutely love Hassan's voice ... but TOTALLY didn't expect that to be his voice. 8O It sounds way too noble. I expected a "ke ke ke" kind of raspy, possibly even semi-deranged voice. I realize Hassan may not be like that, but the Assassin class I thought would be.

There is a weird thing which is shown though :? : they show someone looking through a sniper rifle at someone, might be Saber in her 4th War civilian garb, and it just ... irks me. ^^; All through the 5th Holy Grail War, Hassan was proficient in his use of throwing daggers. In fact, the Dark seemed to be his only weapon other than his Noble Phantasm with his crazy arm manipulation thing. But now we're being shown that he may be operating in a more conventional, 21st Century sense of assassination techniques. It just ... I dunno. ^^; If he's supposed to be a Heroic Spirit from the Middle Ages Middle East, I don't think it's appropriate to show him using Sam Fisher night vision sniper rifle scopes and stuff. ^^;

But I'll roll with it! Because the voice is pretty sweet. :)
They've also gone and surprised us with this delightful second 1m30s trailer (http://www.fate-zero.jp/movies/pv02.html)! (Nico Nico Douga link here (http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm15457040).) It could have been better, but it's still pretty good and a welcome surprise. :D The video begins by showing us each of the seven Masters' Command Spell insignia. I suspect that this segment of the trailer is meant to teaser-showcase the voice actors behind the four remaining Masters who we've not yet heard in the weekly 15-second commercials. It then cuts to some rehashed footage from CMs 1, 2, and 3 before showing us some new footage. (Footage some of which I imagine we're going to see once again in the four remaining CMs. ^^; ) The trailer shows all seven Servants at one point or another, though some (notably Berserker) are only shown for a brief moment. If you don't want to see what Berserker or Caster even look like, then I would avoid watching this trailer. If you're excited to see what they look like and are merely concerned with being spoilered about Heroic Spirit identities, this video's pretty safe. I didn't catch a single name drop and I was listening for them.

Spoiler discussion follows. All seven masters' names are provided, a few master-servant pairings not yet revealed via the commercials are mentioned, some possibly spoiler events are alluded to. If you just want to see names to put to each of the Command Spells, expand to see the list as it's at the very top and then read no further.

The Masters, by Command Spell, are shown in the following order:
1. Emiya Kiritsugu
2. Kotomine Kirei
3. Uryuu Ryuunosuke
4. Waver Velvet
5. Matou Kariya
6. Kayneth Archibald El-Melloi
7. Tohsaka Tokiomi

The person talking during Matou Kariya's segment appears to be little Matou Sakura. She asks him, "Uncle Kariya, are you going somewhere far away?" I honestly had no idea who Kariya was, only ever having seen fanart of him with (a) Berserker and (b) the phallic crest-worms of Matou Zouken's, so I always assumed this was Zouken and he just happened to look a hell of a lot younger. Now I'm left wondering if he might not instead be Shinji's biological uncle. He could even be Shinji's biological father for all I know. Guess I'll find out with the show! :D

Going back to Kiritsugu, he has some pretty heavy-duty stuff to prophecy to us 8O: "Airi [his apparent nickname for Irisviel], I've ... gotten into a mess where I'm now going to have to kill you." ;_________; Talk about opening your trailer with heavy-duty stuff!

Kirei follows after him, merely asking, "Then, are you saying that all of the Masters have a reason for wanting the Holy Grail?" Nice line which elicits a "HRNNNNGH OMG :D" response from the fandom who have completed the Heavens Feel path in the original game.

Uryuu sounds deranged, fitting his character, as he says "DUDE, YOU'RE SO COOL!", presumably to his Servant.

Waver says, "They were implanted in me too, the Reiju [Command Spell] were." Or more loosely "I've got them too! Command Spells." They really chose great lines that subtly clue the listener in to each master's personality. Waver's line here really shows his "Me too! I'm good enough to compete too!" mentality with regards to this whole affair. He's so in over his head, the poor thing. :lol: Though he does have Rider :lol: 8O ...

Sakura is next, but we already covered her, so moving right along ...

El Melloi says "Dying and knowing your place , I guess." Without more context, I can't offer a better translation into English for this line. Seems kind of weird to me.

Tokiomi says, "[It may seem to you that I am] suddenly [telling you] a story that's difficult to believe, but ... the resurrection of heroic spirits from every era and every nation ... killing one another in a bid for hegemony ... that is the Holy Grail War." Sounds like he's explaining it to little Rin, but obviously it makes for a dramatic finish to the opening portion of the trailer. :)

Saber then asks her usual "I shall ask: are you my Master?" Music kicks in and ...

Irisviel (?) comments, "8 more years ... then your battle will be over." She follows this up with "You and I will accomplish our ideal."

It looks like they brought back Tohsaka Rin's voice actress to cover little Rin, and she does a [i]great job sounding like one might expect little Rin to sound like. Her one line in this trailer, "Kirei ... is it okay if I trust you?", is an emotionally jam-packed setup for what ultimately goes down between Kirei and her father. No idea what the compass is that she's holding.

Sakura has a line right after this where she's shown being sucked away by the crestworms. She says, in a really sad really loli voice, "Bye-bye ... Uncle Kariya." SAKURA! NEUUUUUUUUU! ;_______;

Then to brighten the mood it's everyone's favorite 4th War Servant, Rider :D, saying "YOSH! :D" and getting us pumped. He follows this "As expected from my Master!" Awesome. (EDIT: reading back through the post, this line doesn't sound that impressive in English. ^^; One of those things which is sadly lost in translation. The original is very ... "I'm proud of you, m'boy!" mixed with "As expected of the master who could summon I, the great {spoiler}!" It's a "Like Master, like Servant! MWA HA HA HA HA! :twisted:" kind of comment from Rider. And it's awesome. :D)

Caster's line I don't really follow at all, I'll admit, so I'm not even going to try. First line is something like "Before you [as in "in front of you"], only God is overshadowed!" (Uhh, what? :? So ... nobody else is overshadowed? Just God? Why don't you say "even God is overshadowed" or something? I don't get this line at all.) Second line is even more confusing. Something about his love and uncleanliness (possibly unholiness given the previous bit about God). No idea what on Earth he's trying to say.

But Uryuu seems impressed as he launches in with a psychotic-eyed "OKAY! :D"

Gil gets the next line in (lit.) "You [kisama] are unable to look at me" or (more loosely) he's suggesting he's too glorious for lesser beings to gaze upon. Think of it like the old Christian idea that God is so brilliant that to gaze upon his being would blind you. This is that sort of line, I suspect. Again: Japanese is a context-driven language and without context in which to place this line it's sort of hard to give you a definitive answer as to what Gil's saying. It's not even clear if he's addressing Tokiomi or another Servant.

Lancer gets the second-to-last line with "I'll have you allow me to go on the hunt" / "I'll have you grant me this kill," presumably spoken to his master. Despite the grammatical nature of the line, he could also be saying this to Saber in their fight (which would fit very well with the next line), in which case the English translation would be "I'll take this kill." But given the 行かせて ("allow me to go"), I doubt it.

And finally Saber gets the last line with "Interesting. I accept your challenge!"
Just saw El Melloi's fiancée (http://typemoon.wikia.com/wiki/Sola-Ui_Nuada-Re_Sophia-Ri). She is hot. One certainly hopes she survives this Grail War. :oops: :) She also looks really familiar. But I don't want to read any details on her Wikia page so I'll just have to wait until the season's over before I go trying to find out if we've seen her before somewhere or if I just recognize her from Fate/Zero art.

Doppleganger

08-31-2011, 02:44 AM

You didn't use the voice patch for FSN, right? That might explain your surprise at Kirei's Servant, though he's always acted as a sort of "old butler". He refers to [anonymous] in FSN as "[anonymous]-dono" if I recall correctly.

Just saw El Melloi's fiancée (http://typemoon.wikia.com/wiki/Sola-Ui_Nuada-Re_Sophia-Ri). She is hot. One certainly hopes she survives this Grail War. :oops: :) She also looks really familiar. But I don't want to read any details on her Wikia page so I'll just have to wait until the season's over before I go trying to find out if we've seen her before somewhere or if I just recognize her from Fate/Zero art.

Her design is similar to Bazett but they're not related.

Her fate?

She dies brutally.

Talon87

08-31-2011, 06:16 PM

DAMMIT. I didn't want to read your spoiler, but I decided to quote-reply to you (see quoted text below) and ... FUCK. :| RIGHT THERE. Well, at least I don't know the details. Did you really have to write that, though, when I specifically said I didn't want to find out and no one else had solicited that information from you? ¬_¬ Oh well. :lol: *shakes head, sighs, smiles* Worse things to be spoilered on, to be sure.

Speaking of spoilers ...

You didn't use the voice patch for FSN, right? That might explain your surprise at Kirei's Servant, though he's always acted as a sort of "old butler". He refers to {Talon edits this name out} in FSN as "{Talon edits this name out}-dono" if I recall correctly.
You've pretty much given away who Kirei's servant is with the way you've written your reply. :lol: Doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure that one out, given the name you wrote and the honorific you attached to it. Again: there are worse things to be spoilered on, certainly, things like Berserker's identity, who exits the war when, which Masters survive and which do not, et cetera, but c'mon.

As for my response,
No, I did not play it with the Realta Nua voice patch. I had a variety of reasons for this:
I wanted to experience the game the way it was originally experienced by so many.
I did not want to deal with the hassle of either re-downloading the game or else downloading a voices-only patch and having to try to get it to merge with my existing install.
Most importantly, I like to advance through text at my own pace, sometimes very fast and sometimes very slow. And there's nothing I hate more than in a visual novel with audio than to have the audio constantly either (i) clipping because I'm going too fast through the scene (e.g. "So-- Kurt-- Cheese-- Brenna-- I-- Hahahaha!") or (ii) playing and then having a long silent pause because I'm wanting to read and re-read what was just displayed because it's very important (e.g. "You don't understand! You meant EVERYTHING to me! ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... *crickets chirp* ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... *protagonist taps foot impatiently* ... ... ... ... ... ... ...").
For all these reasons, I chose not to pursue FSN with voices.
I can see the heroic spirit talking like that, but I just don't see it fitting in with the Servant class. His hunched-over back, his thin frame, that smiling skull mask ... these all made me picture the classic "ke ke ke" semi-deranged killer. Granted, Hassan never seemed deranged other than during his "birth" scene where he couldn't even talk, but I still can't shake the perception that True Assassin would have sounded ... I dunno, a lot less like 5th War Archer. 'Cause he sounds a lot like 5th War Archer. Manly. Calm. Wise. Noble. It's that last one -- the nobility in the voice -- which just throws me. That's it. That's what's bugging me most. Assassins don't really seem noble ordinarily. So it's very weird to hear this guy who sounds like he fits in with 4th War Rider or 5th War Archer yet he's a friggin' Assassin.
I dunno. It just surprises me, that's all. It's also very interesting to me that (on Kirei's summonings) ...
Kirei didn't summon a Servant his second time around. Given that he can summon a Servant, given that he did summon a Servant, you'd think he'd have participated in the 5th Grail War and summoned Assassin yet again (and if not Assassin, then somebody else) and would have used his hold-over from the 4th War, Archer (Gilgamesh), to go and kill Bazzett and take Lancer from her, giving him not two but three Servants right from the very get-go. You wanna talk an advantage? That's an advantage. I suppose the Magic Association wouldn't approve him as a Master for the 5th War or something? :? But in that case, what's Shirou's explanation? Why is he allowed to bumble his way into the fight if Kirei's not? Why deny the priest but allow the boy who didn't even intend to join the fight? Maybe it's really just a matter of trying to be sneaky and not having enough magical ability to support two and a half servants at once. (Calling Gilgamesh a "half" since he's largely self-supporting courtesy of Kirei's human sacrifices in the basement of the church. Even including the half might not be correct. Still: at two servants to support, the stolen Lancer and the proposed summon, it's difficult to see Kirei managing when by his own admission he was magically weaker than, say, the Tohsaka or Matou lineages of old.)

Doppleganger

08-31-2011, 06:32 PM

Think of him as a variant on the Bruce Timm-era Joker. Deranged yet dapper, refined yet revolting. He's a slick professional at what he does and happens wear a smile when doing it.

I also have no idea why Kirei didn't pump himself up during the offseason either, sure he was raising Rin, fathering faith, fathering kids and stuff, but it is a bit questionable that he wouldn't be a player again. Perhaps to make himself less obvious? I don't know how the Greater Grail selects Masters either, Rin petitioned entry with her ritual, but Shirou clearly didn't have such luck.

IIRC, wasn't it an old summoning circle in Kiritsugu's basement that allowed Shirou to bring forth Saber?

Talon87

08-31-2011, 07:05 PM

I completely agree, but we neither know why that summoning circle would have worked at the time it did in the manner it did for Shirou (I mean, seriously: he had been in that shed a thousand times before, so it was not merely his presence nor Avalon's that triggered the circle. And why would Kiritsugu produce a summoning circle in the backyard shed if its activation premise were something as specific as "If Shirou's life is ever in danger and he happens to enter into this circle with Avalon, summon Servant Saber!" :lol: I mean, seriously, c'mon! That's crazy. The boy already died at school earlier in the evening, proving that even were such a strategy what Kiritsugu had really concocted that it's a terribly poor one with a high chance for failure given a high chance for the boy not friggin' being there at the time of greatest need) nor do we know why the Magic Association (with Kirei as the immediate proxy) would have accepted Shirou's candidacy.

Part of me wonders if perhaps they wouldn't have accepted his candidacy. After all, Kirei did operate as a proxy for both the Association and the Church, the latter too busy in Rome, the former too busy in London to be bothered to come out to Japan and oversee things themselves. Perhaps Kirei gave Shirou the green light full well knowing he oughtn't to have done so but also believing that:
(a) in this manner he would be able to exact some sick revenge against Kiritsugu and
(b) he was either going to die anyway or else accomplish his goal of helping Angra Mainyu come into this world -- in either case, what need would he have for the concerns of some old farts in London or Rome?

But that's just me speculating. There's no canon dialogue to back that up as far as I know. And besides: given Shirou's amazing demonstration of magical prowess during the 5th War (not as a traditional well-rounded mage but instead as a master of a very specific art and I do mean master, holy fuck 8O), in particular during the Unlimited Blade Works path (though Heavens Feel works pretty well too, given the sword of Ze____'s he made a damn good copy of), it's not like the Magic Association was going to turn the boy away anyway. They were probably very interested in him ... well, in the UBW True Path, anyway. For various reasons, they were probably less interested in the boy in other paths.

I do think it's a combination of the (1) limited magic capabilities he had and (2) his desire to be all sneaky-like which explain Kirei's choice. Even though HF reveals that the whole affair is something of a charade, there may even be something to the Fate path-taught idea that Servants make contracts with their Masters under the express understanding that both are working towards attaining the Grail together; and that the more Servants a Master has, the less satisfied any one Servant under him is. They may even infight or off one another, given the opportunity, in order to ensure that they are ultimately the one to obtain the Grail, not the others. Perhaps this even helps to partly explain Kirei's unique circumstances: he was able to have Lancer and Archer precisely because Archer (Gil) was out of the contest anyway (purportedly) and so Kirei could assure Lancer that it would just be the two of them fighting to get the Grail. And of course Lancer would have a tough time buying this, but a deal's better than no deal at all when your Master's just been killed and you're on limited time before fading from this world and missing your opportunity to get the Grail.

Talon87

09-02-2011, 11:11 PM

So, I was taking a break from reading neuro papers and doodling kanji when I decided to pull out my phone and read about anything random on Fate/Zero that Google turned up that didn't look like it'd be spoilery.

And I found some random page where someone translated the first chapter of Fate/Zero Vol 1 into slightly broken but pretty close to really solid English. (link) (http://byakko.freeservers.com/FSN/Zero-Prologue.html)

And I read it all. :oops:

It's a prologue chapter, set 8 years before the war. And it's pretty damn good. And makes the tragic romance addict that I am go "HNGGGGGGGGH! >_< :D" at the prospects for how strongly Fate/Zero may stroke the Epic Chord inside my heart.

(Below, I talk about what's in it, and how that pertains to two lines I translated from the second 90-second trailer a few days ago.)
The chapter is set 8 years before the 4th Holy Grail War. In it, Irisviel has just recently given birth to Illyasviel and Kiritsugu is holding his daughter for what appears to be his very first time. The first third/half of the chapter is the narrator explaining what sort of person Kiritsugu is, heavily referencing things we heard secondhand about the man from Shirou (about how he tried to become a "Hero of Justice" but felt that he had failed in his mission) and then strongly alluding to the Heavens Feel path of Fate/stay night and suggesting that Kiritsugu makes the opposite decision with respect to Irisviel that Shirou makes with respect to Sakura, i.e. Kiritsugu decides, as is heavily suggested throughout the prologue, that "all lives are equal" and therefore the only conclusion one can reach in such a Utilitarian world is that it is better to sacrifice one for many, even if the one you must sacrifice means the world to you.

This is again brought up, this time in conversation, by Kiritsugu as he talks with Irisviel. Remember that opening line to the second trailer? The way I translated it originally, I went with one of the English meanings of the word, "mess" (las in "getting into a mess"), but the better choice would have been (in going from Japanese to English) to have omitted a literal translation of 羽目 altogether and have simply written it as, "Airi ... I'm going to have to kill you someday." It's not quite literally what he says in Japanese, but it would give you the correct understanding in English. (Sadly our guy in the page I just linked seems to have translated it as "I will be the plight that kills you." Uhh, 羽目 does mean "plight," but last time I checked, plights don't kill and neither do people become plights. ^^; I can't decide whether he confused 羽目 hame for 破滅 hametsu [ruin, destruction] or whether he confused plight for blight.) In any event, Kiritsugu's quote from the PV now has context: this from the prologue, and he's referring to the fact that in the next Grail War, Kiritsugu (as the selected champion-magus of Einzbern) is going to be forced to destroy Irisviel (as she is the Grail, much like Ilya was in War 5, and he will have to "activate" her into order to win the war for Einzbern and achieve the True Holy Grail and make a wish upon it). So basically, from the very outset, Fate/Zero as the story of Emiya Kiritsugu is a tragic romance. I'm lovin' it already. :D

The second quote from the second PV comes a little later when Irisviel, while trying to console Kiritsugu about the task which awaits him several years in the future, tells him:
忘れないで。誰もそんな風に泣かなくていい世界、それが、あなたの夢見た理想でしょう?あと八年。。。それであなたの戦いは終わる。あなたと私は理想を遂げるの。きっと聖杯があなたを救う.
"Don't forget. A world in which no one need cry like that, isn't that the ideal born from the dream you saw? Eight more years ... and after that, your battle will be over. You and I, we will achieve our ideal. Certainly the Grail will save you." (my translation)

So yeah. Now what Irisviel was saying in the PV makes sense. I was thinking she was saying it now, and she was prophetically referring to Kiritsugu's death and the passing of the torch to Shirou (since IIRC War 5 takes place ten years after War 4 and two years after Kiritsugu dies, making it eight years exactly between when War 4 ends and Kiritsugu dies). But now I see that she was actually talking eight years in the past (relative to when War 4 starts) and it was that very war, War 4, to which Irisviel was referring.

So wow. This is pretty cool. It sounds like Kiritsugu met Iri (pronounced "EYE-ree", アイリ Airi in Japanese) six years before the start of the war, and another eight years were spent together before Hell unleashed itself upon the Earth's surface once again and robbed Kiritsugu of almost everything. That's fourteen years he was in love with Irisviel. :D Awesome. That's also EIGHTEEN YEARS he spent preparing for the Fourth Holy Grail War. 8O Dayum. The Einzberns weren't fucking around this time. After the abysmal performances they had in the previous war, it looks like they went all fucking out to make sure they won this one.
I really look forward to learning how the Einzberns discovered Kiritsugu, who exactly he is, etc. We learned in FSN (the game) that Kiritsugu was pretty much always off the grid, deliberately so, and that the Magic Association never authorized his entry into the land of Tohsaka. It'll be very interesting to see what sort of magus Kiritsugu is. (I'll use the Japanese terms here so there's no confusion like last time. :) 魔法 mahou being the magic that it takes a very rare soul to pull off, 魔術 majutsu being the magic Rin and the others pull off, I'll call the rare soul a 魔法使い mahoutsukai and I'll call the common magic users 魔術師 majutsushi.) It was strongly hinted at, though never confirmed, that Kiritsugu was either one of the greatest majutsushi of the last 100 years or else that he was a very rare talent indeed, a bonafide mahoutsukai. If a mahoutsukai, I wanna see it. :D I wanna see it so bad. If only a majutsushi, I still wanna see how kickass of a magic wielder he is. FSN was mostly Shirou's strengthening magic (two-thirds of Shirou's screentime) or his projection magic and Reality Marble (one-third of Shirou's screentime) and Rin's jewel magic (which just seemed like magical bursts of energy, really). Sure, there were the occasional exceptions (see: Ze_____'s sword in Heavens Feel) but I'm really looking forward to what kind of stuff Kiritsugu's got in store for us. Fire? Temporal magic? Healing magic? Body enhancements? Summons? Teleportation? The list goes on and on.

Do you think we should make a new thread for Fate/Zero? Or are you guys okay with continuing the FSN Universe-centric discussion all in one thread? It's your guys' call as I'm equally okay with either. It was just something I've been thinking about. I lean towards keeping it here, barely, but am pretty cool with either option. I probably lean here because we already have so much here anyway.

Doppleganger

09-03-2011, 12:20 AM

I'd keep it in this thread, it's all related media anyway.

Kiritsugu's ability is majutsu, but it approaches mahou. It's a pretty darn impressive ability, I think, and he makes better use of it than Shirou did with Unlimited Blade Works (comparable to how Archer uses his UBW).

Talon87

09-03-2011, 01:27 AM

So you know it, then. Tell us, Doppel: how many surprises are left in store for you with Fate/Zero? Do you already know everything? I certainly hope not, for your sake. :( I mean, it'll still be great fun for you even if you did to get to see Fate/Zero in beautiful animated form with all the colors and motion and voices and whatnot. But I sure do hope that you've got numerous treats left, be they who exits when, who loses to who, in what manner so-and-so is defeated, and so on. I feel pretty spoilered as is but the extent to which I am spoilered is:
anything implicit from FSN (e.g. we already know that Kiritsugu and Kirei have to be the last two warring mages standing because we already know that their final battle was how the 4th Holy Grail War came to an end)
Servant and Master visual appearances
Servant identities (all seven)
And then I have partial spoilers, meaning things I'm not 100% sure are correct but which I feel I've heard or seen at one point or another. Things like ...
4) Saber vs. Lancer is one of the earliest fights in this war, and afaik/iirc Lancer is the first Servant to exit the war

5) Saber vs. Caster is another very early fight, although I confess I don't know the specific details (e.g. does Caster die outright? does he live to swear his allegiance to another Master?)

6) Uryuu is a serial killer, whether in practice or merely in predisposition I don't know

7) Pretty sure Doppel told me a long time ago about Waver Velvet's fate (BIG SPOILERS!)
Namely that Waver survives the war, much to my surprise. I was thinking it'd be much more tragic/epic if Kiritsugu killed Waver in his bid for the Grail, but I guess it turns out that Waver not only survives, he does some crazy temporal stuff that involves him being an adult at the time of War 4. At least, this is what I think I remember Doppel explaining way back when. Don't want to refresh on the FSN Wikia since I'd rather be as ignorant as possible until seeing it happen in the show.
But regarding questions like the ones that follow, I honestly have no clue. And I feel bad for you, Doppel, if you do know all these answers. It leaves so little for you to discover. :(

(No real spoilers, but I do refer to some things referred to earlier in the week with Kotomine Kirei's CM. Would not be wise to click this if you did not expand even the first of the spoiler boxes in that post.)

Who kills Tokiomi? Is it Kiritsugu? Kirei? A third party?
Is it in battle or is it a more subtle assassination?
How does Kirei come to possess Archer?
What befalls Kirei's original 4th War Servant?
Does Rider die? (I would presume so.)
If he dies, who kills Rider? (I would presume Gil.) How does he die?
When does Irisviel die? (Presumably she most certainly dies.)
How does she die? (i.e. is she killed? or does she successfully transform into the Grail? Well, I think we can answer that last one since we know that both Archer and Saber were still fighting by the time the Grail had already been activated ... but maybe not! Heavens Feel definitely threw some wrenches into the works regarding the whole mechanics of the Grail system.)
What happens to Rin's mother?
Who is the accomplice that one sometimes sees with Saber and Iri? (She [?] seems to be a gun-wielder. Not sure if an Einzbern homonculus or not.)
What are each of the seven Masters' respective wishes? (We know Kirei's. We kind of know Kiritsugu's [the whole "Hero of Justice" thing], but I suspect his wartime wish could be different. But I don't know any of the others'. Not even Waver's.)
How long does this war last? (War five lasted like two weeks. Does this one last much shorter? Much longer?)
What are the battle sites in this war? (Ryuudou Temple again? If so, who would be based there? Of the seven Masters, I can't peg a single one holing up there. Uryuu would be my desperate guess if I was forced to pick one. Shirou's high school? No reason for there to be anyone there: everyone but Waver's an adult and Waver's a foreigner anyway.) We know of at least one epic battle site to look forward to that wasn't in FSN: and that's the riverfront near the bridge that connects Miyama and Shinto. The place where we know Saber unleashes Excaliber and does such great damage that it's reported on the local news the next day. :lol:
In what specific order do the Masters exit?
How many Servants change Masters throughout the course of the war? (We know of at least one, Archer, but as for any others, I have no clue.)
What are the teams, if any? It's hard to picture Kiritsugu teaming up with anybody. Much like Ilya was in War 5, Kiritsugu seems like he'd be Einzbern's lone wolf in War 4. Can't see Tokiomi partnering up with anybody either. From what very little I have seen of him, he looks like a smug son of a bitch. Kirei would probably benefit most from an alliance but it isn't in his nature, unfortunately, to honor such partnerships nor would anyone be willing to team up with the lowly son of the local priest, a young man who isn't even a proper magus. Waver's another who I'd think would benefit from an alliance but who I can't see managing to team up with anybody. Uryuu is psycho. El Melloi seems like the type who wouldn't partner up. And that leaves us with ... is that everybody? Feels like it. Oh wait, no: Matou's entry, I almost forgot. I .......... can't say I see him teaming up with anybody either. :lol: Maybe with Tokiomi for a little while. Maybe. After all, the pride of Matou and the pride of Tohsaka teaming up in this war would be an interesting throwback to the original three-family project between Makiri, Tohsaka, and Einzbern. But other than that ... I can't say I see Kariya teaming up with people.
But I'll repeat once more :lol:: provided there are any teams, what are they?
And is Kariya even "the pride of Matou"? Or does Matou Zouken completely look down on Kariya as a worthless P.O.S. with zero potential as a magus?
In fact, how does Kariya stack against Shinji? Against Shinji's father? Against Zouken?
What artifacts were used to summon each of the six servants other than Saber? We know Einzbern procured Avalon and lent it to Kiritsugu for the purposes of summoning Arthur as Servant Saber, but that's about it. What did Kirei use to summon his servant? Actually, I'm most interested to learn what Tokiomi did to summon his Servant. That one's been something I've wanted to know for years. :) Another really big one I'd love to know about is Berserker. It would be very, very interesting to discover what it is that the Makiri (or was it even the later Matou?) got their hands on that enabled them to summon that particular Heroic Spirit.
How does Kariya control Berserker? We know how Ilya controlled her Berserker: she's the goddamn Holy Grail :lol: and is a mega-magical being incarnate. But how on earth does Kariya manage to control his? Is it with the help of the dickcrestworms? Really? :lol:
How much of Taiga's dad will we get to see in this? How much of Taiga?
What is Taiga's relationship with Kiritsugu anyway? I feel like this was hinted at somewhere in FSN but I'm not sure how much of what I'm thinking right now is memory recall and how much of it is manufactured recall.
Does something happen to Kiritsugu during the course of this war that pretty much predetermines he will die eight years later? Or did he die of natural causes on that day when Shirou lost his stepfather?
And this time, Doppel, don't answer any of these questions. =P They're strictly presented as examples of things I don't yet know. And would like to keep not knowing until I see them in the show. :lol: If you want to run through the list and identify which ones you can and can't answer, be my guest.

Doppleganger

09-03-2011, 02:39 AM

Tell us, Doppel: how many surprises are left in store for you with Fate/Zero?

Fate/Zero.

Do you already know everything? I certainly hope not, for your sake. :( I mean, it'll still be great fun for you even if you did to get to see Fate/Zero in beautiful animated form with all the colors and motion and voices and whatnot.

I'm going to watch it because I used it as a contest anime for my village in BVS, so I'm more or less obligated to follow it. What I most look forward to are the voices, which is pretty much the only thing I haven't been treated to yet.

Talon87

09-03-2011, 06:55 PM

That's disappointing. I was looking forward to speculating with you while we watched this together.

The 4th CM is up. You can check it out on Nico Nico Douga (http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm15502532), but it is not yet available on the main Fate/Zero TV website. Neither is CM #3, still, which I think is pretty odd. Anyway, comments!

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/4thwar_caster_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/4thwar_caster.jpg)

Caster is so ugly, I never get over it. My least favorite Servant design of the 4th War Servants. I don't like his eyes, I don't like his costume, I just think he looks blah. I was really disappointed when I first learned what he looked like, as I had heard who he was prior to seeing him, and I really didn't feel that his design fit his heroic spirit identity. I still don't feel it does, but oh well. lol

I look forward to hearing Lil' Blue's guesses about Caster's identity. I uploaded this sample picture because I think it exemplifies the fact that he looks like other candidate spirits and not like who he really is. For instance, when I saw him in the CM, it made me think specifically of:
Vlad the Impaler, i.e. Count Dracula
And while that's an interesting guess, one that fits not only this guy's bizarre costume but also his Servant class (Caster) and the "are you really a famous fictional or historical figure?" litmus test, it's also dead wrong. :lol:

I don't know much about Uryuu and Caster, but I look forward to seeing them in the show and hopefully being pleasantly surprised.

Okay, I just saw this picture of Caster's identity on Wikipedia (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/84/Barbebleue.jpg) (don't click it or hover over it if you don't want to be spoiled) and I have to admit, if this is where Type-Moon took their inspiration from in his character design, then I can definitely give them a pass on the creepy bulging eyes. :lol: Because wow. I had also completely forgotten about his historical identity (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gilles_de_Rais) (again, don't click if you don't want to know!) and am now anticipating some amusing interactions between him and Saber. :lol: 'Cause I know I for one ...
always mistook Saber for Joan of Arc when I first saw her -- she's blonde, she's a girl, she's a knight, she's gotta be Joan of Arc! -- and so it wouldn't surprise me if Caster would be all like "Joan, my queen!" and Saber's all "WTF, get away from me. ¬_¬ You have the wrong girl." :lol: Though that really shouldn't happen since she shouldn't look exactly like Joan -- why would she? -- and he ought to remember what Joan looked like in life. Anyway. =P

Doppleganger

09-10-2011, 06:58 AM

This is only tangentially related to FZ, but in AliceSoft's new Rance Quest, a new character named Alexander (http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20110901094538/alicesoft/images/5/57/%E3%82%A2%E3%83%AC%E3%82%AD%E3%82%B5%E3%83%B3%E3%8 3%80%E3%83%BC.jpg) was introduced.

If you can guess what Noble Phantasmsattacks he has, I'd say you're mildly psychic.

Talon87

09-10-2011, 01:41 PM

You're spoilering Yuki. Even if it's gonna be revealed in like Episode 1.

EDIT: I realize I'm being extremely whiny with this, but ... ffs, Servant identities? You can keep it in your pants for the next three weeks out of respect for the girl who won't even watch the CM, can't you? Besides: even if I make the connection between his Fate/Zero name and his common English name (upbringing) and even if you do too (learned it in school), it doesn't necessarily mean that she will. She may end up very surprised that he is who he is. Or she may figure it out the moment his Fate/Zero name is dropped, as we would have. Regardless: all will be revealed in just three weeks. Try to hold it in until then.

In other news, CM 5 still hasn't been uploaded to Nico Nico or Youtube. No idea who it's about. The official website has finally been updated and is now showing CMs 3 and 4, so you can check them out if you like by clicking here (http://www.fate-zero.jp/movies/).

YUKI.N

09-10-2011, 02:04 PM

Sorry, couldn't help it and scrolled up to see Dopple's post. My initial guess:

Alexander the Great

FYI, I've only watched the trailers and the first CM so far.

Talon87

09-10-2011, 03:16 PM

Well, I can answer you one way or the other. Your choice to read it.

Are you absolutely certain you want to click? The answer is ...Yes. -_-; ^.^;

But it's okay. He reveals it in the CM. And thus presumably reveals it the moment Waver summons him. Which is why Doppel's probably going to groan at me for being so protective of you when it came to this spoiler. lol 'Cause it isn't much of a spoiler if it's revealed in Episode frickin' 1. :lol:

Should you have opened this, feel free to go back and read through a lot of the stuff I spoiler-boxed having to do with Rider. I know no more than you do about him other than his identity and a rough idea of his personality, so you should be able to have fun with those posts. :) You can also expand every last thing I wrote below should you have expanded this spoiler box.

I was editing my last post to respond to Doppel's original question, so here follows what I was going to edit in:

As for guessing what his Noble Phantasm is, I have no idea. I would guess that it would be something like ...
Gordian Knot (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gordian_Knot), since he famously cut it.
Something to do with his mentor, Aristotle (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aristotle).
Something to do with his top generals, the Diadochi (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diadochi) (had to look up the name). Of these, the one I remember from high school history is Ptolemy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ptolemy_I_Soter). The others I had to look up with the help of Wikipedia. Guys like Perdiccas (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perdiccas), Craterus (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craterus), and Antipater (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antipater).
But seeing as he is Rider, after all, I would suspect that his Noble Phantasm be nothing other than the name of his horse ...
Bucephalas (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bucephalas), his loyal steed from boyhood until the horse died of old age thirty years later (WOW).
So yeah. My #1 guess would be the name of his steed. Having seen the CM (with the four oxen), my thoughts would have initially gravitated away from this theory; but having since looked up the horse's name and discovered what it means, well, the theory's all but confirmed. :lol: We'll just have to wait and see though. But yeah, this was my guess going into the series (pre-CM 2) because of the fact that (a) he's friggin' Rider, (b) 5th War Rider's Noble Phantasm also had to do with her steed (although in her case the name was not the name of the creature itself but rather its first master), and (c) perhaps the single most famous piece of art of this hero is of him with his steed:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/ac/BattleofIssus333BC-mosaic-detail1.jpg
Seeing the oxen threw me for a loop, but learning that his steed's name has to do with oxen has brought me right back to where I started. So yeah: à la Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?, "B_____las, final answer." :)

Anyway, this is something I never knew before (and sounds typically Persian :lol:) but it's something I thought I'd share with you:
From Wikipedia's article on Artaxerxes III, the ruler of the Persian Empire just before Alexander. (Artaxerxes IV, his son, ruled for only two short years. Artaxerxes IV's cousin, Darius III, was the king whom Alexander defeated. Both Artaxerxes III and his son Artaxerxes IV were killed by the court vizier, Bagoas (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bagoas).)
An uncommonly known theory about Artaxerxes is that he is mistaken for Darius II, the son of Artaxerxes I, due to the fact that they share the same name, Ochus. The same theory also suggests that Persia's meddling in Greece was in fact a war against the Macedonians, and that Artaxerxes drove the Macedonians to extremes and so they had to pay forty thousand pieces of gold and offer the hand of the King of Macedon's daughter to Artaxerxes. But Artaxerxes sent her back to her father because of her offensive breath. The theory further suggests that the daughter was pregnant with Artaxerxes' son, who is thought to be Alexander the Great. This could be another explanation why Alexander adopted the Persian royal title of Shahanshah.
Shahanshah means "King of Kings." We've already seen how Iskander stylizes himself in Fate/Zero ("the Conqueror-King") but the title of Shahanshah is certainly one which, should he lay claim to it in Fate/Zero, will cause him to butt heads with Gilgamesh. :D :lol: This theory would also sort of fit with some of the Type-Moon depictions I have seen of Rider during his life: many of his commanders and aides are all quite dark-skinned, suggesting Persian rather than Macedonian lineage. But who knows. Could just be an artistic decision.

Oh: I said it sounds "typically Persian" because leave it to Persian historians to take the guy who kicked their asses and to come up with a conspiracy theory that he's actually part-Persian himself. Persians are naturally very proud of their lineage, history, culture, everything, and it does not surprise me in the slightest to learn that there are theories that Alexander was part-Persian, even though this is the first I've heard of them. Traditionally, Persians spit upon the name of Darius III, seeing him as weak and cowardly. Persians also celebrate the fact that (whether true or not) Alexander took for his wife a Persian princess and made her his primary wife from that day until the day he died. The More You Know™, unless you already learned all this from history courses in which case The More You're Reminded™. XD ;-)

YUKI.N

09-10-2011, 04:07 PM

Okay, I gave in and read the (related) spoiler(s). ^^; Then I watched the CM. I must say I think I'm going to enjoy this comedic duo. I like their voices, sounds to me they suit their personalities well. Waver's hair reminds me of Ken from Digimon, so that may also play a factor. ^~

(*plays ending over and over, and LOLs each time*)

The preview pic for the third CM intrigues me. Kotomine's servant looks an awful lot like True Assassin. o.O; I thought his first partner was Gilgamesh. Is it safe for me to watch?

Doppleganger

09-10-2011, 04:16 PM

I wasn't aware that Servant's name wasn't common knowledge. I'll tip-toe around the broken glass in the future, I promise.

Talon87

09-12-2011, 01:00 AM

CM 5 is finally out. Youtube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0uR7_hlTnO0) and Nico Nico Douga (http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm15572964) links provided. The official site (http://www.fate-zero.jp/movies/index.html) still hasn't updated to include it, but considering the delay with CMs 3 and 4, it might be a while before they upload CM 5 to the site.

This commercial features Lancer, much as I expected, meaning they've saved Archer and Berserker for last. Makes sense. Archer is a big deal but his commercial will mostly be about revealing who his master is. Berserker is one of the biggest deals in the story given who the Heroic Spirit summoned into the class is and his master is probably the master I'm most intrigued to learn more about.

I really like Lancer's voice. I suspect ...
(spoiler about Lancer)
... we're not going to get to hear too much of it, though, considering he's the first person Saber fights. At least, that's the impression I've gotten. Could be totally wrong about this. But I think Lancer's one of this war's earliest Servant casualties, if not the earliest. So yeah. Too bad. :| Because I really like that voice.
Lancer's master seems positively detestable. Reminds me of ...
Alba from Kara no Kyoukai Volume 5. Seems a little insane, seems very self-important and oh-so-sure he's the very best mage there is. When he's totally not. >_>; If Kiritsugu doesn't take him out, certainly Tokiomi or Kariya will. That's just my two cents. L-O-L if he's defeated by the "mere child" Waver Velvet and his epic partner, Rider.
The (first?) OP for the anime seems to have been teasered in this CM. Song name is "oath sign," band name is LiSA. It sounds pretty good. On the whole, though, I'm a little disappointed in the OP and ED for Fate/Zero. ^^; Both sound way too J-poppy and not epic enough. Oh well. We'll see what happens.

Doppleganger

09-12-2011, 03:10 AM

Oh hey, Lancer's Master is being voiced by Hikaru Midorikawa. :D Probably one of my most hated CVs as a villain (not because he sucks, but his voice really riles me up) alongside Tomokazu Seki, who voices Gilgamesh.

Talon87

09-17-2011, 01:15 PM

Official website (http://www.fate-zero.jp/movies/) updated to have CM 5. Still no sign of CM 6 on the site, on Nico Nico Douga, or on Youtube. Should be coming any moment though. Final bets, place them! :lol: My bet remains CM 6 for Archer, CM 7 for Berserker. And I would place the odds at 2 for : 1 against. But we'll just have to wait and see.

Two more weeks until Episode 1! :) Well, two-and-a-half, I guess, before we can expect to see the subs. ^^; (Airs on Sundays, starting on October 2, so it'll probably be Tuesdays or Wednesdays when we see subs. Maybe Mondays or even Sundays if we're lucky.) Anyone know of any groups who have already announced that they're planning to pick this one up? I won't be watching it with gg regardless of whether they pick it up or not (tired of their shit) ... Doki are a typically lolimoe / Key / softer fare group who I can't see picking this one up (though they did pick up Blood-C) ... so that leaves me with Underwater, Mazui, and UTW for groups I've been following recently who might be interested in this. Of those, UTW seems like a shoe-in since their group's very existence came about in order to make sure that the Unlimited Blade Works film would be subbed. So I'll probably start off with them and, depending on the quality of their translation and on the quality of others', either stay put or else abandon ship for better shores. But really: I'm surprised no one's been talking about picking this one up. o.o

This just in! Saw a thread on MyAnimeList (http://myanimelist.net/forum/?topicid=324183) by random chance. According to them, the first episode of Fate/Zero is going to be an hour long. :D If true, this is awesome. Wish more animes did this. :D We are in good hands, lady and gentlemen. We are in very good hands with ufotable, it seems. :) (The line in the first attachment that he's using to corroborate this claim starts off 第一話は初回一時間[can't make out]大ＳＰ, or "Episode 1 will be a one-hour introductory special.") This is awesome. It should facilitate showing a hell of a lot of the summons.

Talon87

09-17-2011, 06:52 PM

CM 6 is out on Youtube now. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rVZEoF9i-OE) Didn't see it on Nico Nico uploaded by the guy who's uploaded all the other PVs and CMs so far, but someone else has uploaded it to Nico Nico, too (http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm15633604), so you can check it out there if you prefer. And the Servant/Master pairing in this CM is ...

The Berserker/Kariya pair!

Kariya's dialogue is HRNGHHHHHHHH tragic&epic-sounding.

あぁ、きっと会える。それは叔父さんが約束してあげる。
Aa, kitto aeru. Sore wa Oji-san ga yakusoku shite ageru.
More lit: Mm, we'll definitely be able to meet [again]. Uncle promises you that.
More Eng: Yeah, we'll definitely see each other again. I promise you that.

待ってろよ、桜。
Matteroyo, Sakura.
More lit: Be waiting, Sakura.
More Eng: Wait for me, Sakura.

Oh man. :cry: I have a feeling this arc is going to be powerful stuff. I already have been spoilered about the Servant's identity -- which I won't mention here -- but that Servant's story alone is going to be huge in the plot, particularly as it relates to certain other Servants. But Kariya's story! Oh man! I know, like, nothing about this! But it is shaping up to be so so good! A, it looks like he had a loving relationship with Sakura. One can only wonder how she took his defeat in this war. It's a shame, though, that we never really heard about him in FSN since that means her relationship can't have been that prominent with Kariya unless her memories are erased or she suppresses them or some such. But B, it looks like she was who he was fighting for. NO idea why yet. NO idea why she was his candle in the water. But these PVs and CMs have really made it seem to be the case that she was. So I'm really looking forward to finding out more about that.

At 0:04 in the CM, Kariya looks like he's sleeping on stone pavement outside with a suitcase beside him. Is he homeless? o_o; Why on Earth should he be? WTH, Zouken, what's your problem? XD Maybe I'm just seeing it wrong and that's really the stone basement in the Matou household or something. What is that next to him though? Guess I'll find out. (Not asking for actual answer if spoiler. ¬_¬)

I really like Kariya's voice. Not sure if this is me reading into the character the way I want him to be -- which is a dangerous thing when you know next to nothing about him -- but the voice sounds like the sort that belongs to the very kind-hearted characters in anime. He sounds like a really nice guy who's just been placed in a position where he must do terrible things. The whole Sakura subplot that he's got going on seems to suggest that he sees himself as the agent who gets his hands bloody in order to keep Sakura's clean, i.e. if he can get the grail, then Zouken can have his stupid wish and no harm need come to the girl. It's only if he fails that Zouken intends to use Sakura as a back-up plan (which we know all about from Heavens Feel). So yeah: seems like the story of the nice man who becomes a monster in order to spare someone he cares about from having to become a monster. And since we know how his mission plays out in the end ... that makes this all the more tragic. :cry:
So yeah: looks like I lost the bet despite those 2:1 odds I talked about last post. :lol: I guess that means next week is Archer! ^^;

Man, the fact that these CMs are only 15 seconds long though really kills me. I want to hear more! I want to see more! Why can't the series start tomorrow? XD Oh well. Two weeks, one day, and a couple more for subbing. It's not too much longer!

Talon87

09-19-2011, 01:12 AM

The characters page (http://www.fate-zero.jp/characters/index.html) on the TV site was updated some time ago, it seems, and it has links to crude (but not too crude) drawings of all of the major characters along with their names (though no Heroic Spirit identities for any of the Servants) and a little bit of information about them. There's no benefit in clicking on that first link, really -- Doppel already knows everything and Yuki doesn't want to see which Master pairs with which Servant until it's revealed in the anime -- but I did want to at least show you guys this. (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/fate-zero_ilya.png) Awwwwwww. :oops: It says, "The daughter born between Kiritsugu and Iri. She has an innocent and friendly personality. In Fate/Stay Night, she becomes the Master of Berserker." She looks so adorable. It's so sad that she doesn't get to have a daddy or a mommy. ;_; Stupid Grail War.

Talon87

09-24-2011, 01:07 PM

CM 7 is still missing, but the official website has updated to now include last week's CM 6. Just one more week to go! :D

And to celebrate that fact, the Japanese are pulling out all the stops. In a throw-back to our childhoods, the Fate/Zero team have organized an event in Tokyo for fans to participate in. It's a stamp rally (http://www.machiasobi.com/events/stamp_rally.html), and here's the basic idea of how it works: you get a stamp book from the event organizers and then you make your way through each of seven stops along the way. There's Cinema Sunshine Kitajima, Tokushima Station, and ufotable cafe to name a few of the stops. I'm assuming that each stop along the way, you get to do an activity in addition to obtaining that location's stamp. For fans, it's a fun get-together. For the television production staff, it's a way to reward Fate/Zero fans for their enthusiasm. A silly but fun event that brings a smile to my face. I wish we had things like that over here more often. If Fate/Zero were a family-friendly program, I'd even say that this event seems like "fun for the whole family!" :lol:

EDIT UPDATE:

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/gil_fatezero_cm_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/gil_fatezero_cm.jpg)

"8 minutes ago," according to the video when I clicked on it at 9:13am local time :lol:, someone uploaded CM 7 to Youtube: click here (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xdiFGaWUaSY) to watch it.

It's not a bad CM, but it's much weaker than CM 6 was for me. ^^;
Even if I had come into Fate/Zero not knowing which Servants paired up with which Masters, I still would have figured out who gets Archer given knowledge of who the seven masters were and applying process of elimination courtesy of having seen the previous six CMs. Since Yuki hasn't done that, this goes inside spoilers. (Though I'm pretty sure she glimpsed and/or knows already that Kirei isn't the master of Archer at the start of the Fourth Grail War.) But to anyone else who had seen the full list of the seven Masters and who had watched every weekly commercial, the outcome was clear. So that kind of robs this CM of what little oomph it might have been wanting to pack. Oomph it could have retained had this CM been the sixth to come out, as Doppel and I had originally predicted it would be, and not the seventh.

The CM isn't helped by the fact that Tokiomi barely features in it at all. The focus is predominantly on Gilgamesh. And while the CM does give us a sneak peek at what will undoubtedly become many a fan's wallpaper once the HD episodes are out and we can get better screen captures of the image :), it's not like we're exactly going crazy seeing Gilgamesh here. We've already seen him twice (anime) or three times twice :lol: (visual novel), and he isn't really doing anything here in the CM to assuage fears that pre-contamination Gilgamesh is going to be just as arrogant and foul as post-contamination Gilgamesh was. I'm all for his being arrogant. It totally fits the Epic of Gilgamesh's main character. But it would have been nice if it were a little tempered. In the CM, at least, his voice is just dripping with that smug villainy tone we've come to expect from his character. So I'm a little concerned, but I'm still optimistic going into the series that we will see a more likeable Gil during the early phases of the Fourth War.

Speaking of arrogance, though: I told Yuki in Skype, and we see it here once again in this CM, that Urobuchi Gen really played to the idea introduced but poorly implemented in FSN that the summoned Servants' personalities greatly resemble those of the Masters who summoned them. In FSN, we really only see it with Sakura/Rider and Shirou/Saber. We never really got to know Caster's summoner, nor Lancer's (FSN only), Assassin (not True Assassin) has got nothing in common with Caster whatsoever, Berserker is kind of without his true personality due to his Servant Class and even his original Heroic Spirit identity doesn't quite mirror Illyasviel. (Yes, they're both insanely powerful. That's kind of where the correlations end. ^^; :lol:) And then there's Rin and Archer, and they're not exactly mirrors of one another either. Rin summoned Emiya because they had a very special connection, not necessarily because she was summoning a Heroic Spirit which greatly resembled herself. But in Fate/Zero, we see the original concept that Servants mirror their Masters really being applied and I love it because it lends the story that added ounce of epic awesomeness. We see it ...
- in Uryuu/Caster
- in Kiritsugu/Saber
- in Waver/Rider
- and now in Tokiomi/Archer
I can't speak for Assassin resembling Kirei or not. It remains to be seen, and from what we saw in the game (FSN) I didn't really feel that Assassin fit either Zouken or Kirei. I also can't speak for Lancer and El Melloi since I know next to nothing about either one of them. And finally there's Berserker and Kariya. Berserker I know plenty about given who the Heroic Spirit of Berserker is, but Kariya's still an unknown to me. Is he like his Servant? Maybe. That'd kind of make some sort of (weird) sense out of the whole Sakura being his driving force. Berserker's relationship with {spoiler} could also be mirrored in Kariya's relationship with his brother, I dunno. I'll have to wait and see. But for these four, I know enough -- even if only a little -- to already begin to appreciate how Urobuchi Gen + Kinoko Nasu did a better job this go-around having the Servants really be mirror reflections of the Masters who summoned them. And so, having said all that, we move on to what we saw in this CM. As brief as it was, it ends with Tokiomi declaring 「この戦い、我々の勝利だ！」 or (lit.) "This battle, it's our victory!" or (for English meaning, omitting the "in this battle" bit) "Victory is ours!" It's not much. It's just a tiny little line in the final script for this series which will consist of thousands upon thousands of lines. But it's enough. Because it's arrogant and confident. From his use of 我々 ware ware, a form of "we" which automatically connotes that the speaker sees himself as (socially) superior to the addressee, to the tone in his voice, he seems delightedly confident that there's no way he or Archer could possibly lose whatever fight it is that he's talking about. This attitude seems to perfectly fit if he's the Master who summoned Gilgamesh, the most arrogant Heroic Spirit we saw last war.

Talon87

09-28-2011, 05:40 PM

Well, after nearly eight solid months of "Urobuchi Gen," "Urobuchi Gen," "Urobuchi Gen" in this thread, today Gen decides to drop this bomb mere days before the television series' premiere, probably (1) because he didn't want to tell us or ufotable didn't want him telling us any sooner than this else it would lessen fan optimism for the series' magnificence and yet (2) because he knew we'd find out one way or the other come Sunday's episode: "Urobuchi Gen clarifies writing role on Fate/Zero anime." (http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/interest/2011-09-26/gen-urobuchi-clarifies-writing-role-on-fate/zero-anime)
Gen Urobuchi (Puella Magi Madoka Magica, Phantom - The Animation, Blassreiter) stated on his Twitter account on Sunday that he is not writing the scripts for the upcoming Fate/Zero television anime series. Although Urobuchi wrote the prequel novel to Type-Moon's Fate/stay night visual novel software, he is supervising the script rather than writing for the anime adaptation. Urobuchi noted he approves the final manuscript for every episode of the fantasy series as well as offering input at recording sessions.

Urobuchi previously wrote the script for every episode of Puella Magi Madoka Magica and some episodes of Phantom ~Requiem for the Phantom~. He has written many Nitroplus studio releases and penned the novel adaptation of Rei Hiroe's Black Lagoon action manga in 2008.
I dunno. This could be great news and it could be terrible news. Not having read much at all of the books, I couldn't tell you how great of a writer Gen is. And while the writing of Madoka's episodes would certainly deserve a "fine" or a "good," what really sold Madoka was its (1) premise, (2) art, (3) music, and (4) direction + execution. Little to none of which concerned its episode-by-episode writing. Not to mention that the writing (and the plot itself) wasn't always the greatest. Sayaka arc, anyone? Series finale, anyone? ^^;

So back to Fate/Zero. They'd have to be stupid to have the anime veer away from the books' established canon. So I'm not too worried about them doing that because I doubt they will. The only thing I'd be worried about is, "What if the writers they've brought on for this project are worse than Urobuchi Gen? :|" But I somewhat doubt that too. A, the fact that ufotable allowed Gen to have such a long directorial arm, so to speak, in this writing process yet didn't have him write the scripts almost makes it sound to me like script writing is more of a menial task in anime companies (is it?) that you pass on to the lackeys (do you?) and that courtesy of Madoka's ridiculous success and so much of that credit going to Gen himself, Gen has graduated from the ranks of a "mere writer" and is now a writing overseer who still has final say on what passes and what doesn't but all without having to actually type out a manuscript himself. B, if ufotable's in-house writers were that inferior to Gen, you'd think that they would happily ask Gen to pick up the pen, take a seat, and join the writing team for just this one project. Or that Gen himself would tell one of the writers, "Get up," would take his chair, and would sit down to write out a script if he (Gen) thought that ufotable's in-house writers were going to butcher the Fate/Zero narrative he had crafted over four original manuscripts (now reissued as six volumes).

Still: this comes as something of a shock. It's the sort of thing I would have expected them to have told us sooner if they weren't trying to hide it. The fact that they waited this long, but that they still went ahead and told us rather than letting us find out on our own when we saw the credit roll at the end of the episode, makes it feel all that much more like they were trying to hide it. Not a good sign. :| But maybe it's just for the reasons we already mentioned -- that they worried fans would lose confidence in the project the moment they learned Gen wasn't actually penning it -- and maybe those reasons are baseless come Sunday when we find that the show is well-written and sticks just fine close to the original books.

Doppleganger

09-28-2011, 10:12 PM

I dunno. This could be great news and it could be terrible news. Not having read much at all of the books, I couldn't tell you how great of a writer Gen is. And while the writing of Madoka's episodes would certainly deserve a "fine" or a "good," what really sold Madoka was its (1) premise, (2) art, (3) music, and (4) direction + execution. Little to none of which concerned its episode-by-episode writing. Not to mention that the writing (and the plot itself) wasn't always the greatest. Sayaka arc, anyone? Series finale, anyone? ^^;

It's neither great nor terrible news.

Gen's dialogue and how he explains things are more similar to Kinoko Nasu than normal anime writers, befitting the descriptive style of writing a visual novel. I didn't notice this in Madoka, and it's probably testament to Akiyuki Shinbo and his magical girl experience, + Gen imitating how magical girl works.

His strength is in constructing the fictional setting, its internal logic and organizing the plot. By extension, he can effectively address thematic questions, but isn't particularly good at characters or dialogue. Saya no Uta had weak characters and a paper-thin plot; it was nothing but a premise and themes, but used what it had to hammer those themes well.

Since Gen penned the original work, barring major changes his influence will be felt x2 since he's also supervising the script. Someone else who can write convincing dialogue will probably take over. I have no idea if they'll be better or worse.

Talon87

10-01-2011, 03:24 PM

The first episode should have aired just moments ago. :)

Official site update:
With that said, the official site (http://www.fate-zero.jp/movies/index.html) has updated to include the seventh and final commercial. This one depicts Archer and his master. It's mostly just Archer though, with a moment that stands out where he says "mongrel" (zasshu), something which the fans went wild over on Nico Nico. :lol:

Scheduling:
According to a site linked by the official site in their latest news post (http://blog.livedoor.jp/geek/archives/51294176.html), Fate/Zero airs on Saturdays at midnight (the Saturday/Sunday interface) in half of Japan, airing on Sundays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Fridays at or past midnight for the other half. That's pretty convenient. It means that even if someone fails to obtain a good episode capture on Saturday nights (or Saturday mornings here in America) that there are still loads of other days to fall back on. I have no idea why TV Hokkaido, for example, doesn't get to air the show as early as Tokyo does. :| (Their airings are Tuesday nights.) If I were a fan living in Hokkaido, I'm pretty sure this means I'd be driven to obtain a Tokyo broadcast rip just so that I could join in with my fellow fans in Tokyo on discussing the latest episodes while the banter is still hot.

Images:
Some sample screenshots while we wait! :)
Rin looking pouty or unconvinced about something (http://services.img3.akibablog.net/11/oct/1/column_aniplex/104.jpg)
Kiritsugu in the Kotomine family church (http://services.img3.akibablog.net/11/oct/1/column_aniplex/105.jpg)
Waver looking like he's steeling himself for something serious (http://services.img3.akibablog.net/11/oct/1/column_aniplex/106.jpg)
Kirei looking disinterested (http://services.img3.akibablog.net/11/oct/1/column_aniplex/107.jpg)

Stamp Rally:
Some sample stamps from the stamp rally:
"Saver" (http://services.img3.akibablog.net/11/oct/1/column_aniplex/109.jpg) :lol:
Kiritsugu (http://services.img3.akibablog.net/11/oct/1/column_aniplex/110.jpg)

Fansub Scene:
So who will you be watching Fate/Zero with? Two teams have announced their plans to sub this series. One is the European-based Doki Fansubs. They will use British English spellings, not something I'm too terribly excited for, but they're a solid group and for the time being they also seem to intend to release the files in 8-bit, the bit rate your player should already be able to decode just fine if you've been watching anime in the last four years. The other is Unlimited Translation Works (UTW), the group that brought us the Unlimited Blade Works fansub. Their prior experience with UBW and huge fan interest in the Fate universe should be a boon in accurately translating the terminology inherent to the series. However, they have announced their plans to release subs only in 10-bit from now on.

More on that and how it affects me and indirectly may affect you too:
Many older computers cannot process 10-bit encoded files as they are too resource-intensive. Certain players, notably VLC, are also not yet compatible with 10-bit files. I had heard that VLC's nightly build for 1.2.0 was compatible but when I tried to load the sample 8-bit and 10-bit files Doki had released a while back, I found that the nightly crashed whenever I tried to open the 10-bit file in it. I don't know if that means that my computer is incapable of handling 10-bit files or if it's a specific mismatch between the VLC nightly build and Doki's sample file. In any event, if other people have been able to load 10-bit files just fine using VLC 1.2.0, then I guess it means that I am S.O.L. as anime increasingly moves towards a 10-bit encode across the board. :| Only reason I'm boring you with these personal details of mine is to inform you that I will be unable to compare UTW's translation with Doki's, as had been planned, unless UTW also releases in non-10-bit. I think they announced their intention to release 480 XViD which means I should be able to do the comparisons but also means that I'm going to go crazy if their translation ends up being the better of the two >_>: since I'm not going to archive 480s for this series but will be unable to even watch anything higher from them.
Not sure what Underwater plans to do but I do know that, like UTW, they are committed to 10-bit only releases for all of their future projects released in 720p or 1080i. No word from Mazui about anything other than Boku wa Tomodachi ga Sukunai. No idea about any of the lesser groups (Nutbladder, gg who have been demoted to this category =P, Coalgirls, etc).

Talon87

10-01-2011, 05:12 PM

Double-post. Found some adorable fanart on Pixiv by user-artist 伊東. Links below along with translations:

http://www.pixiv.net/member_illust.php?mode=medium&illust_id=19630483
Title: More Importantly, Let's Arm Wrestle! (Sonna koto yoir, udezumou shiyou ze!)

Illyasviel: Don't [you dare] lose, Kiritsugu!
Irisviel: Good luck/You can do it, Kiritsugu!
Kirei SFX: *stare*
Rin: What. (annoyed) I'm not helping you.

http://www.pixiv.net/member_illust.php?mode=medium&illust_id=21855153
Title: I love Papa! (Papa, Daisuki!)

Illyasviel: There's no way Kiritsugu can lose! >(
Rin: Haa? Otou-sama is decidedly much stronger! >(
Karen: Someone like my papa is the village tick.

I'm not quite sure what Karen means by that. ^^; But I thought it was really cute, funny, and spot-on how the artist had Little Ilya arguing with Little Rin about whose daddy is the better Master. :) I left Rin's "Haaaaaaa?" in Japanese just so you could hear it in your head as you read it. :) Didn't want to translate it to "Whaaaaaat?", figured you all know that's what it means contextually.

Cute, funny comics. Thought you guys would appreciate these. :)

big bad birtha

10-01-2011, 06:34 PM

I'll just watch the show under the group that releases consistently. I've updated my CCCP, and my computer is a higher end laptop that's only a year old, so I can play 10 bit files just fine. Whether it's 10 bit or not won't really decide who I choose though. I just want consistent releases. However, if all the sub groups generally release at the same time with consistency, of course I'll go for a 10 bit release.

Talon87

10-02-2011, 03:50 AM

Awesome.
Just finished Episode 1. It was fantastic. :D

Excellent music, excellent characters, excellent presentation, excellent animation ... this episode alone has Fate/Zero muscling the other Fall 2011 animes out of the way for the gold medal. It's wonderful when something you've been looking forward to for so long not only matches but even exceeds your expectations. If Fate/Stay Night the anime were a 7/10 and the game an 8/10 or a 9/10, Fate/Zero is already looking to be a 9/10.

Comments on the various scenes. I'd love it if people read it all, but it's such a big wall of text I'm afraid most won't. Doppel, maybe? ^^; Just pick and choose the pieces you want to reply to.

The scene with Kiritsugu and Tokiomi was my first taste of new information ... and what information it was! :D
(clickable once you know which Masters summon which Servants or when you've finished Episode 1)
Given that we know Kirei most likely betrays Tokiomi in order to obtain Archer, what a scene this was!
I had no idea that Tohsaka attempted to gain an edge in the war by having Kirei help him out. And I had already completely forgotten -- how stupid of me, I know! -- that Kirei was Tokiomi's pupil for a time according to FSN. A little disappointed that he's only his pupil for three years -- I would have preferred, say, seven or ten -- but it's still much better than Kariya's one-year-training situation. If I hadn't already played FSN and born witness to the ridiculousness that is Emiya Shirou winning the Grail War after only two weeks of "Masterhood" and even less than that of actual magical "training" under Rin's tutelage, I would be kinda >_> right now about that. But since I have played FSN, it's all good. :lol: Go Kariya-ojisan!

Zouken's voice actor ... is that Hyoudou I hear? 8O :D Just looked him up on ANN and, while there's no information yet about him voicing Zouken in Fate/Zero ... it does reveal that he provided the voice in Realta Nua! 8O

Matou Kariya is easily looking to be one of my favorite Masters between both wars. Though it's kind of curious that he would go so far for this little girl. It makes me wonder ... given what we saw in his debut scene alongside Tohsaka Aoi, might he and Aoi have had an affair? Might he suspect that Sakura is actually his daughter? Whether she is or she isn't, if Kariya suspects it, then that might explain why he's willing to go so far for this little girl.

The scene with Waver Velvet at the Magic Academy was sublime. It totally fit my expectations for what sort of character Waver is. And I'm totally onboard with Waver's paper! :) (XP @ El Melloi! =P) Though I had no idea that ...
do not click unless you know the identity of the servant summoned by Waver Velvet!
El Melloi was originally trying to summon Alexander the Great. Such a Heroic Spirit would have been wasted on El Melloi. =P I also don't think they would have fit very well together. :? Alexander perfectly fits Waver which is why, IRL, Urobuchi Gen and Type-Moon had them pair up. Waver's arrogance is a very different flavor from El Melloi's, and it's Waver's flavor which Alexander the Great the eirei would have given the stories that have been passed down of him.
I still can't get over the fact that Nakata George provides the voice for Kirei. XD When I first watched FSN years ago, I had not heard George's voice much before. And then when I played the game last summer, I did so without the voice patch, so even if there were times subconsciously where I read Kirei's words in George's voice, for the most part I read them voicelessly. So hearing George's voice here after having watched over 130 episodes of Keroro Gunsou (sample here, listen to the red frog Giroro (www.youtube.com/watch?v=D52zzoXA3EY#t=2m09s)), I can't help but to smile every time Kirei speaks. :) I love Nakata George! :D It's such a shame that he plays the villain in this series! XD

Right around the 22-mintue mark, Kirei's Servant makes his debut. :) I was actually surprised to see that the Servant had already been summoned. I was even more surprised by what was revealed earlier in the episode:
that the Command Crests began to appear on Masters' hands as many as eight years before the War began. I always imagined, given the bias of Fate/Stay Night where we saw most everything through Shirou's eyes, that the reiju didn't appear on somebody until the moment of summoning the Servant. I always thought that, until the seventh Servant had been summoned and all the available slots had been filled, just about anyone could become a Master provided they knew what to do and how to do it. But Fate/Zero seems to be establishing what we were told going all the way back to the Fate path of FSN: and that is that the Grail selects the Masters. So I guess if the Grail wanted to, it could wait until the very last minute (as it did with Shirou) or it could select a Master years in advance (as it did with Kiritsugu and Kirei).
Surprised that Hassan revealed his identity to Tokiomi. Perhaps Kirei instructed him to do so in order to gain Tokiomi's trust and/or in order to fool Tokiomi into believing that Kirei is incompetent. Either way, I guess it works out for Kirei in the end since Hassan doesn't exactly have a fabled weakness, being the sort of lesser Heroic Spirit that he is.
The revelation about Kiritsugu's past was amazing. I had had no idea that he ...
... was a famous assassin, let alone known as "the Magus Killer." That is so epic :D, but also such a surprise. 8O So basically not only was Kiritsugu a huge threat in War 4 because he summoned one of the very best Servants (Arthur/Arturia) into one of the better Servant classes (Saber), he himself was also a huge threat to the other Masters. Crazy. :D
I'm really glad that they released this as a two-parter. Because you can tell that "Episode 01" would have ended right around here under ordinary circumstances, and while Episode 01 still would have been quite good ... it would have left one dying for more.

I absolutely loved the part where Kiritsugu and Kirei are each thinking about the other. Was such an awesome, awesome scene. Having played FSN's third path, we all know what Kiritsugu is talking about regarding Kirei but we're also then able to be impressed with Kiritsugu for figuring this out from the available information. Not knowing much about Kiritsugu, on the other hand, it's impressive to see Kirei piecing things together -- the same sorts of things we as fans experiencing the story for our first times are trying to piece together, too. It's pretty clear that if Kiritsugu was once upon a time this {spoiler} but that he put all of that behind him after meeting and falling in love with Iri that, along with what Iri told us about Kiritsugu in the opening scene and along with what we know of Kiritsugu's ideal from Shirou in FSN, that Kiritsugu is fighting for a world in which everyone can be happy. This despite his notorious past -- and the very deeds he may have to commit in this war in order to make that reality possible. In that sense, Kiritsugu is a very interesting Master for Saber but he's also a very appropriate foil for Kirei. I know that FSN kept insisting to us that the two men were foils, but never has it been more clear than here after watching the first episode of Fate/Zero.

Where did Waver go to summon Rider? :lol: At first I thought he had caught a plane to Japan, but then we see that the people he's staying with are his grandmother and grandfather and that they have European names (Martha and I forget), only to find out that ...
... they're not really Waver's grandparents :lol: and that he's just freeloading off of them for a time while he prepares to summon Rider. So where is he, exactly? :? :lol: Is he in Japan and there's this random European grandma and grandpa who own a farm there? lol Or is he is in Europe somewhere -- and if so, why? If he's going to hypnotize people anyway and if he's going to have to go to Japan anyway to participate in this war, why not have caught a plane to Japan and have hypnotized a grandma and a grandpa there? Well, whatever. It's still neat. =P
The part with Avalon was very neat. I absolutely love Iri's voice by this point :oops: and hearing her explain what Avalon is was just so cool, even if it's nothing more than a reminder for us who've played the game. But there was some added information, like the fact that they found the scabbard in Cornwall. This is just so cool (see comment on Uther Pendragon below). It's clear that Type-Moon really does their homework when it comes to these sorts of things. From calling Rider by the name the people who today inhabit the land of the kingdom he conquered call him by to having Avalon be located in Cornwall, they really do their lore research. :D

Interesting to see how Kiritsugu is so night-and-day different from Shirou though in many respects. One of these is how Kiritsugu coldly but pragmatically views the summoned Servants as mere tools whereas Shirou treated them as living people.

I absolutely love how neither Kiritsugu nor Irisviel are aware that Arthur is actually Arturia, a girl. They both refer to him as a male numerous times and Kiritsugu even uses the name we all know from Arthurian legend, Arthur Pendragon (son of Uther Pendragon, Duke of Cornwall).

The part with Kirei and Rin was interesting. I thought that Kirei gave her a very appropriate, mature, and honest answer. So it was interesting to me to see that Rin detected in it the fact that Kirei was ...
(speculation)
excusing himself from future betrayal of her father should he in fact do so.
I loved discovering what was used as the catalyst to summon Gilgamesh. SO APPROPRIATE. See: the story of Utnapishtim and the serpent (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epic_of_Gilgamesh#Tablet_eleven). So, so cool. God, I love this aspect of the FSN universe! :D This is like the most fun part of the whole experience: seeing who was summoned, with what they were summoned, what their personalities are like and how that matches up with the historical record or with legends, etc.

The part with Kariya and Sakura on the upper floor of the Matou mansion was really sad. :( Even more sad is that ...
Kariya only has one month left to live. :( And that the Crest-Worms have completely destroyed his body, disfiguring his face and paralyzing his leg. So sad. And to think that for all we know FSN Sakura doesn't even remember Kariya, given that she never talked about him. (Yes, I realize he was invented after the fact, but still!) He did all this for a girl ... who may not even remember him now. :(
Nonetheless, like I said before, if Rider looks to be my favorite Servant this war, Kariya is fast looking to be my favorite Master. And that's damn impressive given that I am also fangasming over Kiritsugu, Kirei, and Waver.

Interesting that the Matous aimed for Berserker precisely because Kariya is so weak. Further interesting that Tohsaka didn't have Kotomine do the very same. There's an obvious con to summoning Berserker ordinarily -- and that's that it takes great magical power to restrain him in all his madness. But the Matous have something the Tohsakas lack, and that's Zouken's worms. With them, they should be able to keep Berserker under wraps most of the time, unleashing him -- and sapping Kariya of his limited magical power -- only as necessary. So I guess because Kirei didn't have that option, he had to settle for a lesser class.

The end of the episode with the four different summons was just amazing. :D On the one hand, I'm a little disappointed that they had the four overlap like this. On the other hand, it made for one hell of an epic combined scene.

Neat that Kiritsugu summoned Saber inside the Einzbern church (presumably in Germany). That all but confirms at this point that the Summoning Circle in the Emiya shed was put there by Kiritsugu for Shirou: and not that it was a hold-over of Kiritsugu's from the previous war and that Shirou accidentally happened to reactivate it, as I and I'm sure many other fans assumed when watching/playing FSN. Given this, and given the seemingly contradictory instructions from Kiritsugu to Shirou that he mustn't become a magus, it'll be fascinating to see what Kiritsugu's plan was.

Can't wait to see next episode ...
- how El Melloi reacts when he discovers that not only was it Waver who intercepted his catalyst but that Waver successfully summoned Iskander
- how Kiritsugu reacts to Saber upon seeing that she's a girl

Also: how fast the plot thickens! :D 8O Can't believe that in the sneak peek for Episode 2 we've already heard Kirei's plans to betray Tokiomi! "Your first mission," he tells Assassin, "is to slay Tohsaka Tokiomi." Holy cow! I very seriously doubt that Tokiomi dies that early on in the story, so my question is: does Assassin? Is that what this means? Is Assassin one of the very first Servants to exit the war? And does he do so as early as episode 02? O_O I mean, dayum, I thought Rider died early in the anime but that wasn't until around episode 9 or 10 at least. Well, maybe he tells Assassin to do this but Assassin suggests they hold off for now or something? ^^; Guess we'll find out next week. But wow: the war hasn't even begun yet, with Uryuu having yet to summon Caster, and already Kirei's showing his true colors. A Master worthy of Assassin, indeed! 8O

Talon87

10-02-2011, 06:13 PM

Here's a preliminary rundown of the various subbing groups' efforts for Episode 1.

Commie:
Pros:
- fastest release (three hours after the show aired! 8O)
- fairly accurate translation
- got pretty much all of the FSN terminology right, maybe one or two hiccups tops
- tiny file (320 MB for a 55-minute 720p file? Amazing!)
Cons:
- typographical errors ("Kireo", "sudent", et al)
- inaccurate translations in a few places

UTW:
Pros:
- most accurate translation
- got all of the FSN terminology right
- boasts better video quality than Commie (though personally I think it's very hard to tell)
Cons:
- a few awkwardly-translated or inaccurately translated places, though far less than Commie
- rather large file size (500 MB for 55-minute 720p file is not a bad size, but when Commie can pull of 320 MB for the same thing with minimal drop in video quality ...)
- slower release (didn't come out until Sunday morning our time, so 12+ hours after the episode aired. Still very fast, but not Commie fast)

Doki:
appear to have dropped the project

From the available releases, my vote right now would go to UTW. Basically it boils down to one thing: translation, translation, translation. Commie's translation was pretty good. I already said yesterday I'd give it like an 8/10 or 9/10. But UTW's was simply better. More accurate. They didn't cut words or phrases out like Commie did (e.g. "Look, Kiritsugu"). And they disagreed with Commie in some places where, when I looked the words up -- because I didn't know them either :oops: -- it turned out that UTW was correct. (One memorable example was in the Torino scene with Kirei and Tokiomi. UTW has Tokiomi talk about a "Plan B." I thought that that was very strange since it begged the question, "Well then what's your Plan A? :? Isn't this Plan A?" But sure enough, Tokiomi does say jizen no saku, and WWWJDIC confirms that jizen (no) saku means Plan B or alternate plan. It even says "Plan B" right there in the dictionary. :lol: Another example later in the same scene was when Tokiomi asked Kirei what was the matter. In the Commie release, they had Tokiomi conclude that Kirei was "upset." But in the UTW release, it was "baffled." Looked up the word and sure enough: "baffling," right there in my dictionary.)

But I'll say that if you do decide to go with Commie for their speed and smaller file sizes, you really shouldn't be missing out. This is not a "Nutbladder vs. Underwater" scenario like with Kaiji S2. I'd say Commie's translation and UTW's are within arm's reach of one another. Neither one is perfect yet both are very good. I'll probably tune in to one more episode from each fansub group before picking, but if Episode 1's any indication, I'm probably going to select UTW for this one.

===========================================

I've watched the first episode three times now. :oops: (Twice with Commie's, once with UTW's.) That's three hours, or six anime episodes' worth. If that doesn't tell you how awesome this first episode was, I don't know what will. What are you guys waiting for? Grab it and let's discuss! :)

One thing I realized on subsequent viewings of Episode 1 was just how perfect Kariya's Servant's Heroic Spirit suits him. While I won't spoil the Servant's identity inside the spoiler box, even mentioning what is that the two have in common is a potentially HUGE spoiler, so please don't click on it unless you already know who Berserker is.
Remember how I speculated that, given that Kariya seems to have feelings for Aoi, he may have had an affair with her and suspects that Sakura his daughter? Well, never minding Sakura, let's focus on the Kariya x Aoi side of things. Aoi is a married woman. Specifically, she is married to the land's overseer, Tohsaka Tokiomi. So consider this ...
Kariya = his Servant's identity
Aoi = the woman who his Servant had an extramarital affair with
Tokiomi = a weak parallel with the man who was the husband of the wife who Kariya's Servant had the affair with

Even if we don't want to include Aoi and Tokiomi in the equation, what we can accurately say of both Kariya and his Servant is that each lusted after a married woman.

So when Zouken told his son that he had found "a relic most suitable" for him, I didn't fully appreciate what he might have meant by that until subsequent viewings. Only then did it click that Kariya, much like Uryuu, Waver, Kiritsugu, and Kirei, is a Master who bears striking resemblance to his Servant.

Another thing which I just now realized, right as I'm writing this post, is that Kariya also shares in common with his Servant the idea that he's terribly hideous. Well, this is specific to one particular interpretation of the legend surrounding Kariya's Servant, and that is:
(clicking this would very probably spoil the Servant's identity for you)
T. H. White's
But regardless, there's that connection too: that Kariya (now) has a hideous face and so too did his Servant in at least one of the legends concerning him.
The song that plays at the end of the episode when the four summon their Servants (www.youtube.com/watch?v=dL5KaKEcRsA#t=2m19s) is so amazing. :D Can't wait for the OST. When it picks up around 2:39 in that link, you know things are getting epic ... and then the part at 4:16 (www.youtube.com/watch?v=dL5KaKEcRsA#t=4m16s) is just shiver-inducing how beautiful and epic it sounds. LOVE IT. Love it, love it, love it.

big bad birtha

10-03-2011, 04:17 AM

I watched this last night, but I just got home from work and didn't feel like talking about it. Anyway, thoughts on the episode itself.

First thing, holy fuck does this spoil a bunch of stuff for FSN. Actually, this spoiled some things that even I didn't know about (about what Illiya actually is).

I like how this alternated between masters and went over all of their stories behind getting into the grail war, which is something FSN didn't do. Though, I was tired when I watched this, so not many of their stories fully sank in. I generally like the teams better as well. A bunch of men is way more GAR than several underage girls and an annoying hippie.

Visualwise, this is ufotable, so of course it's glorious eyecandy. The fact that they kept really close to Type/Moon's usual art style was really nice as well.

Otherwise, I don't really have much to comment on. I remember enjoying watching it, but I don't remember much else. I'll probably watch this again when I'm less tired, so the information can sink in better.

Talon87

10-03-2011, 04:41 AM

I learned about Ilya ages ago, I want to say in conversations with Doppel back in '07, when discussing the fandom's joke about Shirou's imouto complex and it being pointed out to me that:
she's actually his older sister, not his younger one, as when he meets her she's roughly 18 years old.
That, and also the fact that one of the earliest pieces of fanart of Irisviel (and that also explained who she was):
had Ilya right there with her, and the two totally looked like a mom and daughter pair.
But yeah. Surprised you didn't know until now. Even more surprised given that I don't think I've even bothered being subtle about it in this or other threads since I thought everyone knew, particularly every one of us here.

As for spoiling stuff for FSN, that really can't be helped. ^^; The whole point of even doing Fate/Zero was as glorified fanservice for the fans. It's basically a "Hey guys? You know all those characters we alluded to in the game? What if we were to tell you their story? :D" deal. So of course they're going to have to spoil Heaven's Feel as they justify how Kariya entered the war, from Zouken to the Crest Worms to Sakura. Though to be honest, that's sort of the only thing I think it spoiled. Everything else is "OMG! :D" stuff for fans of the game but which wouldn't mean anything to a newcomer. Things like seeing Tokiomi summon who he summons, seeing Kiritsugu summon Saber and being all "You're not King Arthur!", etc. Which reminds me: yeah, they spoil Saber's identity, and I guess that's a spoiler from, what? Halfway through the Fate path? But again: can't be helped. Whereas Shirou summoned Saber by accident and therefore had no idea who she might be, it'd be pretty implausible for Kiritsugu to not know who he summoned given that he knew what relic he was using as a catalyst to summon her.

Glad to hear someone else has watched it. Even more glad to hear you enjoyed it so much you think you'll rewatch it. I know I sure did! :lol: Looking forward to hearing more of your thoughts after you give it a second go-around.

YUKI.N

10-03-2011, 03:27 PM

Talon87

10-03-2011, 04:29 PM

So much information dump, wah. Can't be bothered to sort all the pieces out now. But everything looks epic. =3

So I was right that Kirei's orginal Servant was the same True Assassin from the fifth War?

Rin's mom is pretty. The "Kariya-ojisan" character is totally new to me, but I like him a lot already. Poor Sakura... And poor him. Especially because I read a little bit of the spoiler about Berserker. ^^; Sorry, I wasn't looking carefully and thought that post contained your review. I only glanced over the first paragraph + comparisons.

Hey, I was kinda close to guessing Gil's Summoning Relic? Both an eagle's feather and a snake's skin are properties cast off from animals. XD

The rest of the plot I'll hopefully sort out as I go along. In the meantime, I'll just admire the gorgeous animation. Love how they even bothered to animate the dust particles in the library. Not sure I care for the OP's vocals, but the visuals are absolutely stunning and leave me wanting more.

Favorite part is where Rider grabs Waver's hand and hauls him up onto the carriage. D'aw. <3

Oh, yeah- Is there any reason why fourth War Lancer so closely resembles fith War Lancer? Even their weapons' colors are the same.
Alright. ^-^ More people watching. Good, good! Now we're just waiting on Doppel and -- do I dare to dream? :D -- other UPNers who may be interested in joining us in watching this series this season.

Kinda bummed you read the paragraph about the Kariya/Berserker comparisons =\, but hey: if you decide to find out who Berserker is (don't! =P), then three of us (you, me, and Doppel) can start talking about it more. Would still need to spoiler tag it as it's arguably one of the biggest deals of the entire franchise. (Not quite 5th War Archer's identity big, but I'd say it ranks pretty close to it.) Even though you've been pointed in the right direction by what I said so your sleuthing would be kinda called into question =P, it'd still be pretty neat if you can figure out who the Servant is before it's made all but completely obvious. I'm interested to see what the relic was that was used to summon the Servant. I can't even imagine what it would be. Well, I can imagine a few things, but I dare not place them in a spoiler tag. =P ;-)

I like that part with Waver and Rider in the OP too. :) I especially like the part with them in Waver's borrowed bedroom, Waver trying to do his studies and Rider being all "I'm bored. :( Let's go do stuff. :D" lol I just love how huge he is! XD

As for 5th and 4th War Lancers, to answer your question as succinctly as possible:
(you can click on it if you want since you're the one soliciting the answer to the question anyway :lol:)
yes, but it is not because they are the same person as they are not.
What did you think of the summonings? What did you think of Ilya's birth scene? There's so much to discuss, people. You can reply to things I've said, but I can't reply to you unless you say some more! Don't be scared off by the walls of text. :oops:

YUKI.N

10-03-2011, 05:16 PM

Kinda bummed you read the paragraph about the Kariya/Berserker comparisons =\, but hey: if you decide to find out who Berserker is (don't! =P), then three of us (you, me, and Doppel) can start talking about it more. Would still need to spoiler tag it as it's arguably one of the biggest deals of the entire franchise. (Not quite 5th War Archer's identity big, but I'd say it ranks pretty close to it.) Even though you've been pointed in the right direction by what I said so your sleuthing would be kinda called into question =P, it'd still be pretty neat if you can figure out who the Servant is before it's made all but completely obvious. I'm interested to see what the relic was that was used to summon the Servant. I can't even imagine what it would be. Well, I can imagine a few things, but I dare not place them in a spoiler tag. =P ;-)

Okay, I was mulling over the information I gleaned plus what I already know, and I have a guess as to Berserker's identity:

Sir Lancelot.

Right in the first paragraph of his Wiki entry:

"He is the most trusted of King Arthur's knights and plays a part in many of Arthur's victories. He is perhaps most famous for being intimate with Arthur's wife Guinevere and the role he plays in the search for the Holy Grail."

As you clarified for me earlier, Berserker is wearing armor. Hence I'm fairly confident he's a knight. And who is the most famous knight after King Arthur? The most trusted knight serving under him, Lancelot of the Round Table.

This means his background would definitely play a part in establishing a past relationship with one of the most major characters: Saber. I'm still confused as to the specifics surrounding Arturia's marriage and how or why Type-Moon would explain an extramarital affair. The scene in FSN where Arthur faced off against "his" son still puzzles me to this day.

Summonings were cool. Didn't mind that they overlapped, as at least we get to see more than we did in FSN. And from the sound of the preview, we'll still get to hear the invidual introductions.

Ilya's birth scene was cute. Liked the cameo of the one of her nurses. (On a related note, I was able to recognize the Matou mansion right away. Yay for playing the game first.)

Raptor Jesus

10-03-2011, 05:26 PM

big bad birtha

10-03-2011, 06:06 PM

Illiya thingy Illiya's birth did one of those "8 years ago" things when her scene hit, so her being 18 years old is actually correct.

Also, as for why I didn't know about Illiya, I barely paid any attention to FSN discussion in fear of being spoiled for Fate/Hollow on the off chance its translated within the next 5 years. I also never bothered questioning it because, well, why bother? If they say she's a homunculus, then I'll buy it. When I saw Iris, I just thought her genes were used to make her.

Talon87

10-03-2011, 07:13 PM

Ilya:
birtha explained it, Loki. The opening chapter to Fate/Zero Volume 1 is a prologue chapter which takes place eight years before the 4th Holy Grail War (and thus 8+10 or 18 years before the 5th Holy Grail War). So yeah ...
FSN spoiler
Ilya's relationship with Shirou evolves through several layers.
Level 1: she calls him Onii-chan, but there's not necessarily any special meaning in this. A little girl in Japan might call a stranger onii-chan if he's an older male but who she can tell isn't an adult. Just like you call a stranger who's a man oji-san (lit. uncle) or a woman oba-san (lit. aunt).

Level 2: it's then revealed, either in the Unlimited Blade Works path or else not until you get all the way to the Heaven's Feel path, I forget, that Ilya's father was actually Emiya Kiritsugu. This explains some things observed in the Fate path, such as Ilya's desire to live with Shirou in Shirou's home after the loss of Berserker. It also lends an added dimension to the fact that Ilya calls Shirou "Onii-chan": it turns out he really is her onii-chan!

Level 3: You then find out somewhere (I don't remember whether it's at the end of Heaven's Feel or whether it's in Fate/Hollow Ataraxia or perhaps not until all the way in the very scene you just saw in Fate/Zero, but somewhere along the way you find out) that Ilya is actually Shirou's senior, and that despite her very small frame, it's revealed that she isn't really 10 or 11 years old but is in fact 18 years old. This lends the Onii-chan label its third and final layer of complexity. While Shirou is not Ilya's onii-chan, he is still her brother -- it's just that he's the otouto in the relationship, the younger brother, and Ilya's actually Shirou's Onee-san.
The Four-Way Summoning Scene
Yuki, my only complaint with the combined summonings is that so little time was spent on each Master+Servant. That stated, of course the combination of four summonings all interlaced like that made for the best singular summoning scene you could possibly have asked for. I guess to explain it in a mathy way,
if the value of a single summoning is 1.0,
then I'm feeling that the interlaced four summonings were a 2.5, which is 1.5 greater than any one single summoning ...
... but still 1.5 smaller than the sum of four individual summonings would have been, or 4.0
Make sense? ^^; So yeah. Don't get me wrong. I absolutely loved it. :) What it sacrificed in more fleshed-out individual summonings, it made up for by being a singularly better product than any one summoning scene would have been alone.

More about the summoning scene and how much I enjoyed it (not a spoiler if you've seen Episode 1)
The best thing the combination summonings scene had going for it was that it cycled between each of the four Masters at their most epic moments. So like, we got to hear Kiritsugu, who seems to be a very private man, declare his life's mission to herald in the good and vanquish all evil (a very Arthurian trait indeed :)), we got to see Waver being all frickin' epic for a little kid :), totally evoking mental images of his Servant's Heroic Spirit when he was Waver's age and set forth from Macedonia to prove his worth, we got to see Kariya invoking the Berserker aspect of his summons and we got to see how the summoning wracked his body (I didn't notice until the second viewing that Kariya actually starts to bleed out of his right eye as he summons Berserker 8O :(), and we got to see Tokiomi, so confident/proud as the descendant of Schweinorg (http://typemoon.wikia.com/wiki/Kischur_Zelretch_Schweinorg). It was just so, so perfect. :) The music, the animation, the words spoken, the camera angles, all of it, it was just so bloody brilliant. The best scene in an action anime or in an epic anime of the last x years where, quite honestly, I'm wondering if X may not be greater than 10. :lol: Every time the music has hit its fever pitch and Tokiomi says to Kirei, "We've won, Kirei. In this battle ... victory is ours!" And the camera just cuts to Gilgamesh, who's all ... all ... godlike. It's like they basically just summoned a god! And they pretty much did! :D (Well, as close as you're going to get in the NasuVerse, anyway. A spectral image of a man who in life/legend was two-thirds god one-third mortal man.) And he looks so ... cold! Cruel! "Who the fuck are you guys and what am I doing here?" :lol: It's just so amazing.
Tokiomi parallels his Servant:
I've said it before, I'll say it probably a thousand times before the series wraps up: I really love how the Masters and the Servants are reflections of one another in Fate/Zero.
(repeating myself here from previous posts ^^; )
The argument was advanced in FSN that this was the case, with 5th War Rider supposedly being a reflection of Sakura and with Shirou (particularly the Fate path Shirou) being a reflection of Saber. And I can see those two very clearly. But for everybody else, it just didn't really work. We never got to meet Bazzett and of course Lancer is nothing at all like Kotomine; neither is Gilgamesh; Assassin (Kojirou) is not at all like Caster; we never got to really know Caster's master; and Ilya and her Berserker didn't so much share in common personality or stature but rather the common element of raw power, Ilya being the most magically powerful Master in the entire contest given who/what she is -- a living Magic Circuit -- and Berserker being the most powerful Servant in terms of raw power and the fact that holy shit it's fucking you-know-who. But in Fate/Zero, the argument that the summoned Servants are reflections of the Masters who summoned them could not possibly ring truer. We see it already in Kiritsugu and Saber, in Kariya and Berserker, in Waver and Rider ... but this time I want to talk about Tokiomi and Archer.
Tokiomi is someone I don't know much about. He's hard to figure out, certainly much harder to figure out than say Kariya or Waver. He barely appeared in FSN and did so only though flashbacks of Rin's. But there was one thing which the four-way summoning scene revealed to us: Tokiomi suits Archer. Maybe not completely. But one way in which he does is ... both Tokiomi and Gilgamesh take pride in their ancestry. Gilgamesh was two-thirds god, one-third mortal. Clearly he's out of Tokiomi's league. But a parallel still exists: Tokiomi sees himself as "the descendant of Schweinorg," the great Zelretch, Master of the Second Magic (amongst other things), a true sorceror. If we liken Zelretch to a god amongst men, then what is Tokiomi in Tokiomi's own eyes but half a god himself? In this sense, he is like Gilgamesh, who sees himself as almost-a-god and who tried to gain immortality for himself. While Tokiomi seems very civil thus far, very gentlemanly, one can't help but wonder if under that veneer lies a man who looks down upon the other magi as "mongrels," much like Gilgamesh does when he looks upon almost anyone beside himself. (Do we know of anyone else besides Saber and Enkidu whom FSN Gilgamesh has respected?)

It'll be interesting to see how the trend continues next episode. I kind of doubt that we'll see it with Kayneth and Lancer, but we may. We'll definitely see it with Uryuu and Caster and, even if in its extremeness it almost feels a little shallow, I still think it's a great application of the idea that the Grail selects for each Master a Servant who resembles them in some fashion.

Raptor Jesus

10-04-2011, 02:32 AM

H-games have weird excuses for making it okay to sex a loli.

YUKI.N

10-04-2011, 02:38 AM

H-games have weird excuses for making it okay to sex a loli.

There actually aren't any Ilya H-scenes.

Although apparently they were considering "putting it in". *shot*

Talon87

10-04-2011, 11:55 PM

Apparently October 3 is Waver Velvet's birthday, and so several fan artists made some celebratory birthday fanart of him. This one (http://www.pixiv.net/member_illust.php?mode=medium&illust_id=22149734) by Pixiv user 968 (http://www.pixiv.net/member.php?id=8256) was one of my favorites. :lol:

(click to expand to see images)
http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/22149734_p0.jpg
"Happy birthday to me ... happy birthday to me ... happy birthday, dear me ... happy birthday to me!"

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/22149734_p1.jpg

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/22149734_p2.jpg
"What are you doing!? You're always doing unnecessary things like this!"
Waver Emote Text: Jeez!!
Rider Emote Text: Whaaa...?
Arrow pointing at Waver: but [really] he's happy
Apparently it's also Kaname Madoka (http://www.pixiv.net/member_illust.php?mode=medium&illust_id=22155337)'s birthday today. Damn, Gen: is October 3 your birthday or something? :lol: (Looks like it's actually December 20.)

YUKI.N

10-05-2011, 12:34 AM

Apparently it's also Kaname Madoka (http://www.pixiv.net/member_illust.php?mode=medium&illust_id=22155337)'s birthday today.

Waver x Madoka crackshipping = D'aw. <3

Talon87

10-07-2011, 09:24 PM

Sneak peek snapshots (http://www.fate-zero.jp/story/index.html) are out for tomorrow's episode. As you might expect, three of the things we'll be seeing in tomorrow's episode are:
Waver doing stuff with his newly-summoned Servant, 8-year old Ilyasviel's debut, and Uryuu summoning (or at least doing stuff with) Caster.

Judging from the screenshots alone, tomorrow's episode will have a very heavy focus on Kiritsugu at Castle Einzbern. I guess that makes sense, though, if this is to be Ilya's last appearance for a while. Just like Rin, it's unlikely that we're going to see Ilya again once this war gets underweigh. Maybe one or two chance pop-ins, but that'd be it. I mean, she'll probably be staying behind in Germany during the war: even if Irisviel is her biological "mother" and Kiritsugu her "father," she's still a homonculus and daughter of the Einzbern clan. I'mma thinking Acht and the other elders will be taking care of her. Besides: if everything goes according to plan for the Einzberns, Iri won't survive this war anyway -- and that's the last thing they'd want her daughter to have to witness firsthand.
I'm a liiiiiiittle pessimistic about the screenshots' bias towards one particular character ^^;, but here's hoping that they are not representative of the actual distribution of screentime for various parties. I want to see more Waver & Rider! :lol: And I'd like some Kariya & Berserker and Tokiomi & Archer, too!

unownmew

10-08-2011, 06:06 PM

Talon87

10-08-2011, 06:25 PM

YUKI.N

10-08-2011, 06:32 PM

You could also supplement the animé with the UBW movie. It's very fast-paced compared to the game though. Plus HF is where the most major relevant spoilers to F/Z are at.

Talon87

10-08-2011, 06:33 PM

Started watching Fate/Stay Night a couple days ago. Was planning on watching Fate/Zero, but forgot the title, and realized this one was released before it. ^^;

Currently just finished 14, and enjoying it a lot. (though Shirou's naivety in the beginning irked the heck out of me.)
Double post, but I didn't want to pad the other one with the actual Fate Stay Night discussion reply.

If you just finished 14, then it means you just saw one of the best moments in anime history. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZBAEk_Ugmk) It also means (sorry! ^^; ) that the anime's about to jump the shark. Or at least, that's when things in the anime started going downhill for me. It gets very confusing and silly in places as they struggle to combine events from the Fate path with those from the Heaven's Feel path, not to mention changing the very nature of how Shirou gets mana. (I'm all for taking the sex scenes out of a game which is terribly weakened by them, but don't make up some bullshit explanation about Shirou putting his magic circuits into Saber or something. That's even worse.)

Since you had no idea about Saber's identity, I guess that means you've remained surprisingly unspoilered about just about everything this story has to offer. So here are some questions for you. (Place your answers in a spoiler tag.)
Who do you think __ is?
Saber (you know)
Archer
Lancer
Rider
Berserker (you know)
Caster
Assassin
Who is your favorite Master so far and why?

Who is your favorite Servant so far and why?

unownmew

10-08-2011, 09:20 PM

Surprise. :lol:

Also, it's great that you're watching the anime, but you're not really in any position to watch Fate/Zero without going down one of these two paths:

Path A: you need to play the PC game for FSN first. And you need to complete all three paths: Fate, Unlimited Blade Works, and Heaven's Feel. You're looking at (gameplay-wise) 72 to 96 hours before you'll reach the end.

Path B: you press on to Fate/Zero after only having watched the anime version of FSN. You then get confused and/or spoilered about various characters or events.

Path B's fine if you're okay with that, but I've read a lot of whiny bitch comments from people on both Commie's and UTW's weblogs saying "EPISODE 1 SPOILED ME FOR HEAVEN'S FEEL! ;_;" And it's like, "Guys, you had four years following the end of the anime to go and play the game. And even if you just discovered it now, you still could have learned some self-control, kept your fucking dicks in your pants, and played the game first. So don't bitch to me or to anyone else saying 'OMG, it spoilered Heaven's Feel. ;_;' Zero sympathy." So so long as you're not going to join them and be a whiny bitch too :lol:, then I would say Path B is acceptable. It isn't preferable to Path A, but if you're not willing or able to invest the time into the game, then it's a perfectly acceptable Plan B. Better than not seeing the show period. :?

I would say you're not in any rush. If you finish the FSN anime in the next week, go and get the game, and complete that before December 1, you'd still only be eight episodes or so behind the rest of us when you made the plunge into Fate/Zero. Not a big deal. So I would really encourage you to pursue Plan A. If the anime is a 7/10, the game's an 8/10 or even (generously) a 9/10. But ultimately, the choice is yours.
Erk. Good thing I started with this one first then. ^^;
Unfortunately, school's really getting in my way of getting things done, even now, I ought to be doing homework instead of watching anime >_>

I don't think I'll be able to get the PC game finished before Fate/Zero's done broadcasting, add to it, H-games aren't something I can spend all day playing in my current living conditions. But I would like to go with Path A. Where would I find a translated copy to play?

Double post, but I didn't want to pad the other one with the actual Fate Stay Night discussion reply.

If you just finished 14, then it means you just saw one of the best moments in anime history. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZBAEk_Ugmk) It also means (sorry! ^^; ) that the anime's about to jump the shark. Or at least, that's when things in the anime started going downhill for me. It gets very confusing and silly in places as they struggle to combine events from the Fate path with those from the Heaven's Feel path, not to mention changing the very nature of how Shirou gets mana. (I'm all for taking the sex scenes out of a game which is terribly weakened by them, but don't make up some bullshit explanation about Shirou putting his magic circuits into Saber or something. That's even worse.)
I did, and I thought it was awesome.
Also, gears in the background, Steampunk+ :lol:

Hmm, I did noticed it seemed to speed up, but I'm on 18 now. I guess I'll see where it goes.

I did figure sex would be a reasonably logical way for sharing mana, though, I guess it matters a lot how it's presented. Are you saying Shirou needs it regularly to replenish his mana though? :?

Since you had no idea about Saber's identity, I guess that means you've remained surprisingly unspoilered about just about everything this story has to offer. So here are some questions for you. (Place your answers in a spoiler tag.)
Who do you think __ is?
I wasn't sure, but I had my suspicions once I saw the first fragmented memory/dream, I was surprised it wasn't discussed afterwards though.

Saber- I thought she was Joan of Ark for the majority of the time, up untill she unleashed Excaliber, I couldn't think of any other female Hero's that she could have been. Now I'm going to have to look up the possibility of King 'Artur' being a girl.
Lancer- Saber identified him quickly, but I didn't pay much attention to him. I don't remember who he is.
Rider - No idea, none whatsoever, but Peracles (sp) of Greek mythos, is the only one I know of who has tamed a pegasus. I actually liked Rider though, kusari-fundo is pretty nifty.
Berserker (you know)
Caster - Medea, as was revealed by Illiya recently
Assassin- I'm unaware of many Japanese Heros, so, I don't know him yet.
Archer- I was wondering if he was Robin Hood, though, had doubts due to the color of his dress. Episode 14 gave me a very big suspicion, but if it's true, it would be quite the mega spoiler itself..

Archer = Shirou?!!!

Who is your favorite Master so far and why?

Who is your favorite Servant so far and why?
Favorite Master, would probably be Rin, Illiya's rather adorable, but a tad too bratty, while Rin has more history, and is capable. Shirou's rather vexing at times, and the others are relatively to evil for me to like.

Servant is more difficult.
Archer and Assassin are pretty cool. Rider was quite cool, and had an alluring outfit, though I do like Saber. Saber's personality is nice, and it helps that she's a girl. ^^;

You could also supplement the animé with the UBW movie. It's very fast-paced compared to the game though. Plus HF is where the most major relevant spoilers to F/Z are at.
There's a movie? What's it called exactly? UBW? I may check that out.

Talon87

10-08-2011, 09:50 PM

Oh lord. :roll: "Gears" does not equal steampunk. If it did, then you'll find that X/1999 and Rozen Maiden are "steampunk" too. :lol: But I'm glad you enjoyed Archer's Reality Marble all the same. :)

The Unlimited Blade Works movie is worthless unless you've played the game.

Everyone who's played the game first: "That was great eyecandy! :D But it was a bit condensed. :? I hope my friends who haven't played the game won't find it too confusing ..."

Everyone who hasn't played the game first: "That was awful. >_< I didn't think anything could be worse than the Studio Deen anime but ... ugh. The Studio Deen movie takes the cake. I couldn't even follow what was going on! So confusing!"

It's why I didn't even mention it. Honestly, if you're going to do Path B, I think you should do yourself the favor and still not watch the UBW movie until you've some day played the game first. Fate/Zero is going to spoil you on Heaven's Feel, not Unlimited Blade Works, so there's no point in watching the Unlimited Blade Works movie if:
(1) it's not going to inform you of anything you'd need to know for Fate/Zero and
(2) it's just going to be a disastrously confusing experience for you.

Tell me this: what would possibly even make you think that Archer would be Shirou? :lol:

unownmew

10-08-2011, 10:23 PM

Oh lord. :roll: "Gears" does not equal steampunk. If it did, then you'll find that X/1999 and Rozen Maiden are "steampunk" too. :lol: But I'm glad you enjoyed Archer's Reality Marble all the same. :)
While it's true, Gears =/= Steampunk, Steampunk does love it's gears. :)

The Unlimited Blade Works movie is worthless unless you've played the game.

Everyone who's played the game first: "That was great eyecandy! :D But it was a bit condensed. :? I hope my friends who haven't played the game won't find it too confusing ..."

Everyone who hasn't played the game first: "That was awful. >_< I didn't think anything could be worse than the Studio Deen anime but ... ugh. The Studio Deen movie takes the cake. I couldn't even follow what was going on! So confusing!"

It's why I didn't even mention it. Honestly, if you're going to do Path B, I think you should do yourself the favor and still not watch the UBW movie until you've some day played the game first. Fate/Zero is going to spoil you on Heaven's Feel, not Unlimited Blade Works, so there's no point in watching the Unlimited Blade Works movie if:
(1) it's not going to inform you of anything you'd need to know for Fate/Zero and
(2) it's just going to be a disastrously confusing experience for you.
Ah, I see. Well, then I shan't be watching it until I've played the game.

Tell me this: what would possibly even make you think that Archer would be Shirou? :lol:
I take it from the lack of spoilers there, that that's not the case?
(Or are you trying to mislead me? )
just in case..
I thought it was, because Archer had "flashbacks" relating to Shirou and Rin, with a particularly strong one of Shirou, as well, they both can forge weapons out of "nothing." Also, similar hair style, and the fact that both he and Shirou say they can make weapons, but can still not use them.

And, further evidence, in the new opener, there's shown a scene of Shirou and Archer fighting each other in Unlimited Blade Works (but Archer is dead), and he recreates Archer's Swords for his own use later. Archer's lack of Recollection of himself would also be explained as, his identity had not be forged yet.

I also wouldn't be surprised if Shirou would sacrifice himself for someone else, causing himself to become a Servant. Or chooses to become a servant so he can be with Saber.

Anyway..

An 8th Servant!?!

Talon87

10-08-2011, 10:43 PM

Well, with an answer like that :), I don't feel bad saying whether you're right or wrong. Just so you know, though: Unlimited Blade Works is basically "the Archer's backstory path," so if you think you're going to play that, then do that before you go looking up who Archer might be. In any event ...

Archer's Identity
Is indeed Shirou. :clap: :clap: :clap: GOOD JOB. Seriously. I think you're the first person I have ever met who got that right without spoilers and on their first try. I was certainly not one of them. I was one of the many people who was convinced that each Servant would be a hero from legend or history. I finished the entire anime and still didn't know who Archer was. Looked it up on wikis + discussed it with Doppel back in the day. Was very surprised.

unownmew

10-09-2011, 12:13 AM

Darn, with an answer like that, I don't want to look just yet.

You said it was a PC game, you mean visual novel? Where could I get a copy to play it? Or is it a simple google search away?

Talon87

10-09-2011, 12:43 AM

It's probably both a simple Google search away and yet still better to ask in this specific case since there are multiple versions of the game and I'm not sure which ones work with the Mirror Moon English language patch and which ones do not. I am not the person to ask though. IIRC I just grabbed whatever copy I could find that I cross-referenced with Doppelganger and away I went. Doppelganger is probably your best bet. But what you're going to need to do is:

(1) Install the game. It'll be in raw Japanese. (Is this your first visual novel? You may need to ask for help installing it, getting it to run, configuring your computer to run one, etc if it's your first.)

(2) Obtain the Mirror Moon translation patch.

If you have trouble installing the game, here is some advice I found online and my own comments beneath that:
Ok so i was reading comments on how peoples games didnt work, and mine didnt either, after searching around allitle i got my game to work, heres how:
1. I used Daemon tools light
2. Mount Cd 1 to device:0
3. A popup comes up then mount cd2 to the same device and press ok
4. Another popup comes up and then mount CD3.CCD!!!!! not Cd3
5. The game should install just fine
6. When trying to load the game i got a tm.exe error
7. Go to http://www.typemoon.com/dl/dl_fate.html and go to the bottom of the page and find FateNoCDv2.zip and download it
8. Extract FateNoCDv2.zip and paste the files in your fate folder..... C>programfiles>Fate
9. Go to http://mirrormoon.org/news/2008/11/fatestay_night_english_v3_2 and download the english patch
10. Run the english patch and the game should work just fine (it did for me)

Talon's note: some guy wrote the above, and we copied and pasted it here.
As for us, well, CD3.ccd kept freezing the computer, and CD3.cue was not accessible. So we just dragged the BIN over to Daemon Tools Lite and it worked from there. We never encountered any tm.exe error, either.
So you can try to do what I said worked for me (bottom half), or you can try doing what he said worked for him (top half), if you have trouble getting the game to install.

unownmew

10-09-2011, 01:01 AM

Hmm, useful advice, thank you. I didn't know there was a separate patch I needed to download.

I asked mostly because I didn't remember seeing it listed in the website I usually use for VNs, and no, it's not my first, I've played Clannad (not finished), and a few others as well. I'm aware of how to install them (for the most part anyway).

Thanks again.

YUKI.N

10-09-2011, 01:12 AM

Just watched episode 2 of F/Z. HOLY CRAP.

This is a lot darker than FSN, all right. At first when Uryuu was goofing around, I thought: "This guy seems like fun. I think I'll like him." And then he turns to the TV and says that, which makes me >.<. Then he turns to the kid and I become o.o;. Finally he summons Caster and tells him to x, and while Caster seems nice at first I know it's a trap, and then... It happens. ;.; And I'm like YOU SICK EVIL BASTARD(S). D8

...On a lighter note, loved Rider's introduction. His prideful pilfering was just awesome. "A cowardly thief sneaks away in the night. If you leave, bursting with song, then you a conquering king!" BAHAHA. *applauds*

Also enjoyed how he was more concerned with catcing up on what happened to his kingdom and further world conquest than the Holy Grail War itself. Good that he knocked Waver down a peg as well, and reprimanded him for setting such a small, useless goal. I look forward to seeing how these two are actually similar. I expect they may have a lot to learn from each other over the course of the series.

Judging by the ending, it looks like Kirei may be sacrificing Assassin this early in order to gain Gilgamesh? =O That was fast.

Talon87

10-09-2011, 01:58 AM

Fate/Zero Episode 02 Discussion w/ Pictures:
A good episode! :) Not as great as Episode 01, by any means, but still very good.

Rider and Waver:

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_001_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_001.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_002_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_002.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_003_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_003.jpg)

This was probably my favorite scene of the entire episode. Rider is just awesome. Or should we say ... Eskandar Maghdooni? :lol: :D I absolutely loved how Iskander's first order of business was to catch up on everything. Aristotle taught him well! :D 8O I had forgotten that Doppel spoilered me on this ages ago, but the moment I saw the books (see the first picture above), I knew what we were in for and remembered what Doppel had told me had impressed him so thoroughly about Iskander. Indeed, he is impressive.

But he's not perfect. :lol: Most Servants seem to realize that they're only going to be around for the duration of the war -- if they're lucky enough to last that long! -- and that after they get their wish they're going to go back to the Throne of Heroes, unless their wish was for something which would keep them in this world. But Iskander is like, "Look, guys: not only do I know I'm going to conquer the world once and for all, but I know it so truly that I'm going to start making plans naow." :lol: Waver had to try his best to remind the giant, "Look: we're here to obtain the Grail, not to conquer the Orient, then the former Persian Empire, and finally return to your homeland in style."

I agree with Yuki that it was good to see Iskander try and knock some sense into Waver -- even if he was a bit too physical :lol: :oops: -- and that it'll be good to see how Rider helps Waver become a man.

Ilya and Kiritsugu:

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_004_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_004.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_005_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_005.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_006_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_006.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_007_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_007.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_008_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_008.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_009_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_009.jpg)

My second favorite scene, to be sure. Ilya was adorable in FSN, but here she's 10x more so. Just ... awwwwwwwww. :oops: I'll let the pictures speak for the scene themselves.

Uryuu and Caster:

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_010_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_010.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_011_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_011.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_012_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_012.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_013_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_013.jpg)

So we finally meet Uryuu Ryuunosuke and his servant, Caster. These two are yet again a shining example of how Fate/Zero takes a Master and pairs him with a Heroic Spirit who is most similar to himself. And unlike many of the other scenes, where one has had to speculate about such connections (Kariya/Berserker, Tokiomi/Archer, Kotomine/Assassin, Waver/Rider), this was the first which came out and said, "Look, guys -- these two are like peas in a pod." Just when you thought Uryuu was sick, Caster comes along and is like "Let me show you how I'm 10x the sick fuck you are. >3" And he is.

One thing which has always bothered me about Caster, ever since I first saw his picture years ago (2007 or '08 at the absolute latest), is his eyes. Oh, those eyes. D: In the pictures I'd seen, they made him look wretchedly ugly. And he is still wretchedly ugly. But the anime shows just how soulless those eyes are. They remind me so much of a Great White shark's eyes (http://www2.pictures.zimbio.com/gi/Cage+Diving+Great+White+Sharks+South+Africa+TWyujf tC0BBl.jpg). Look at the first picture. Aren't those eyes just dark, soulless, and like the Great White's big black eyes? So that's why I loved it -- though it made me so terribly uncomfortable :( -- that the animators then had the second picture you see for this section, where Caster is just taking Uryuu in and ...
1) don't those eyes look positively piscine!?
2) doesn't it seem like Caster is contemplating the murder of his Master right off the bat?
Uryuu seems like the psychopathic grunt who is hanging out with the Joker. He's in way over his head.

Anyway, I've avoided the elephant in the room which is how goddamn discomfiting this scene was. :( It was an incredibly appropriate scene to appreciating what kinds of characters Uryuu and Caster are, but god damn was it difficult to watch. ufotable has already shown that they can do a good job with stuff like this courtesy of the Kara no Kyoukai series, but that still doesn't make it any easier to watch. Uryuu making the summoning circle with his feet bathed in the blood of his victims ... the little boy, terrified and being told he's going to be gobbled up by a demon ... Caster, who's positively frightening ... and then of course Caster's tricking the boy only to devour him anyway. Just awful, awful stuff. :(

Kotomine's Betrayal:

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_014_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_014.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_015_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_015.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_016_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/ep02_016.jpg)

Wow! Kotomine sure didn't waste any time, did he? :lol: You have to wonder how well he thought this one through. Wouldn't it have been wiser to have, y'know, waited for Archer to have been engaged in battle with another Servant? Waited for Archer to strike down the third party Servant and Master and then order your Assassin to take out Tokiomi? Then again, Kotomine is the enigmatic character who finds beauty in little yet wants so desperately to know it, so maybe this chaotic command to his Servant was what his heart desired. Who knows. In any event, L-O-L at how Gilgamesh just pwns him. I felt bad for Hassan :(, but it totally brought back memories of how Gilgamesh pwns Caster in the game's Fate path. And I felt kinda bad for Caster there, too. ^^;

Credits:

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_rider_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_rider.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_archer_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_archer.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_lancer_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_lancer.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_caster_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_caster.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_assassin_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_assassin.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_berserker_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_berserker.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_saber_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_saber.jpg)

I really like the visuals for the end credits. Not too crazy about their pick for Gil -- lol, shirtless? :lol: LOL, LION? :lol: -- but I guess they were going for the whole "king of beasts = only the most suitable kitty to the King of Kings" angle on that one. :lol: But the others range from very appropriate (Rider's, Lancer's) to the very artistic (Assassin's, Berserker's) to the in-between the two (Caster). And then there's Saber's. I might like that one more if we knew who she was impaling, if she had Excaliber instead of a spear, and if she didn't have the face of an Amish doll. :lol: But on the whole, very nice, very artsy, I like it.

If you don't know who the Servants are, this ending will probably be one of the most useful early leads for you in trying to figure them out. ;-)
In response to Yuki:
Yeah, we hit on several of the same points. I liked that line of Rider's too. Though I felt like he was right! :oops: A thief hides, but someone who can just go in and take and not have to hide clearly is a force to be reckoned with! :lol:

Overall, this was a good episode. It introduced some new characters, it threw us some fanboy/fangirl scraps, and it was visually stunning as always. But I could have used more Waver/Rider -- just make it the Waver/Rider hour for the next seven weeks, will ya? :lol: -- and I could have used some more character development all around. Like what we got last week. I know, I know: not every week can be a 1-hour special. :cry: But if it could be ... ohhhhhhhhh man. :D

YUKI.N

10-09-2011, 02:26 AM

Credits:

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_rider_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_rider.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_archer_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_archer.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_lancer_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_lancer.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_caster_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_caster.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_assassin_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_assassin.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_berserker_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_berserker.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_saber_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/credits_saber.jpg)

I really like the visuals for the end credits. Not too crazy about their pick for Gil -- lol, shirtless? :lol: LOL, LION? :lol: -- but I guess they were going for the whole "king of beasts = only the most suitable kitty to the King of Kings" angle on that one. :lol: But the others range from very appropriate (Rider's, Lancer's) to the very artistic (Assassin's, Berserker's) to the in-between the two (Caster). And then there's Saber's. I might like that one more if we knew who she was impaling, if she had Excaliber instead of a spear, and if she didn't have the face of an Amish doll. :lol: But on the whole, very nice, very artsy, I like it.

If you don't know who the Servants are, this ending will probably be one of the most useful early leads for you in trying to figure them out. ;-)

I liked the shirtless scene, and the addition of the lion. ^^; Rawr smexy Gil.

Anyway, thoughts on Servants' idenities:

Lancer: Looks like Robin Hood to me. Though why wouldn't he be an Archer then? Hm.
Caster: He called himself Bluebeard. Is he really? I know the folktale of the nobleman who murders all his wives, which is gruesome enough to fit. Caster looks a little scrawny to be him though, and doesn't even have a beard. His dress and credits scene seem to suggest he's a witch doctor of some sort.
Berserker: I still say he must be Lancelot. The lake looks the same as in Arthurian legend, and the Lady of the Lake was the one who raised Lancelot from infancy.

Doppleganger

10-09-2011, 02:26 AM

Wow, I LOVE the ending screen-caps and wish we'd get full on back-stories for the Servants. Those caps are entirely new and I'd like to see "A brief history of time - as told by TYPE-MOON" with all Nasu's neurotic ideas on aliens and magic.

Especially mythical Ireland. WOW, anime where? :(

Also, Talon. Great White Sharks are cute, don't call them soulless.

Om nom nom (http://www.itsnature.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/great_white_attack_on_seal.jpg.jpeg).

YUKI.N

10-09-2011, 02:28 AM

Especially mythical Ireland. WOW, anime where? :(

Careful, Dopple. You just confirmed for me one of the Servants hails from Ireland. =x

Though Talon already admitted there is a relationship between the two Lancers.

Talon87

10-09-2011, 02:40 AM

Oh lord: if you type in Lancer's Heroic Spirit's name, Lancer's Type-Moon wikia page is the very first hit in Google. XD His Wikipedia page is third. Surprisingly, a baby names page beats out Wikipedia on this one. Weird! (No: the name is not a common name like "Sean.")

Seeing Lancer's episode is going to be ... interesting, now that I am re-reading about him on Wikipedia. Doppel spoilered something earlier in the year regarding a particular character on Team Lancer and I'm starting to see now why Doppel's spoiler is going to happen. :lol: :( Also ...

(meant for Doppel only; meant for anybody else once Team Lancer exits the war, whenever that may be)
Still writing this in partial tongues just in case Yuki can't control herself. XP XP XP

Lancer is the first obvious example of how my observation that Fate/Zero pairs Masters with themselves in Servant form does not hold true for El Melloi. If you know who Lancer is, El Melloi's role is that of someone very famous in Lancer's story. Someone very, very famous. Even more famous than who he managed to summon. It's too bad he didn't manage to summon that guy instead! LOL Guess he's just a shittier magus than he thinks he is! XP

Talon87

10-09-2011, 03:01 AM

Word from UTW's blog:
So what do you guys think of the studio’s plan to split Fate/ Zero into Fall 2011 and Spring 2012? >.>
What? :? Hopefully this guy is just being a douchey troll. That would be pretty disappointing news if Fate/Zero is going to be split up like that.

UPDATE: Oh no! :( This is terrible! :( ANN's reporting the same thing! (http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2011-10-06/fate/zero-bd-box-release-to-add-cut-scenes) Apparently it was announced in one of the latest issues of Newtype magazine. Aww man. This sucks. :( I'd rather have had it air from January to June than have it air like this. Breaking it up by 3 months sucks. :( Could be worse, I guess, but ... :| :| :| :| :| ... :|
Are there any videos of the Caster Summoning Scene non-censored?
Wait, it was censored? :? Just because it was in a darkly-lit home doesn't mean it was censored. I guess we'll find out when the BDs come out.

UPDATE: Forget censored: the same ANN article (http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/news/2011-10-06/fate/zero-bd-box-release-to-add-cut-scenes) reports that entire scenes are not even going to be aired but will be included on the BD releases. (WTF? :?) It seems like televised anime is increasingly resorting to bullshit tactics like this in order to force people to buy the expensive BDs.
I think most of this ep’s budget went to that Assassin dance.
LOL! So true! :lol:

Aww man. What should have been a good Fate/Zero night sure has been dampened by the news that we're only getting ten or eleven more episodes this season before the plug is pulled until April. If they were going to do that, hell, I'd rather they'd made Fate/Zero the same as they did Kara no Kyoukai: one two-hour film for each book. That would have been six films @ 2 hours a piece or (roughly) 24 episodes of anime. The same as they're doing now. Except that what they're really doing now (once you cut out the OPs and EDs and such) is only 22 minutes per episode, not 30, so they're really giving us less footage than an OAV approach would have done. :| Not to mention that as much as I think this anime is beautiful, it's not nearly as beautiful as Kara no Kyoukai was. (FUCK. Why is the worst Type-Moon property the best animated? D: )

Sigh.

Talon87

10-09-2011, 02:46 PM

Slept on it. Still not feeling any better about it. Splitting it up artificially into a first half and a second half, I worry, is going to make the first half too stretched out and the second half too rushed. :|

(speculation informed by images I've seen in Book 3 of the original 4)
Alive at the start of Book 3:
- Emiya Kiritsugu, Saber, Irisviel
- Kotomine Kirei
- Waver Velvet, Rider
- Matou Kariya, Berserker
- Uryuu Ryuunosuke, Caster
- Tohsaka Tokiomi, Archer

May be alive, may be dead at the start of Book 3:
- other Assassins
- Kayneth Archibald El Melloi, his fiancée, Lancer

Dead at the start of Book 3:
- Assassin

Explanations
Kiritsugu and Kirei are both still in, of course, because they'll be in until the very end. Likewise, Irisviel isn't going to die until the very end either. So you have Kiritsugu, Saber, Irisviel, Kotomine, and Archer accounted for this way.

Waver and Rider go to the library in this book at one point, so they obviously survive the halfway point. Whether they exit in this book or not I don't know, but that's not important right now.

Berserker's identity is revealed in this book -- or so I thought, but I can't seem to find the picture, so maybe that's Book 4, the final volume -- and so obviously Kariya and Berserker are still in it by the time the halfway point is reached between Books 2 and 3.

Uryuu and Caster are very much still alive. They have a picture together, and they also have a conversation early on in Book 3. (Didn't read it, didn't want to be spoilered more than that.) They probably exit this book, but still: alive by the halfway point.

Tokiomi is very much still alive by the time Book 3 starts. As is Archer.

The only person who's missing, and the one we know is one of the earliest ones to get into a fight with Saber, is Lancer. So I'm guessing that Lancer and Lancer's Master, Kayneth Archibald El Melloi, are the first to exit the war. Whether that happens in Book 1 or Book 2 I don't know, though if I had to guess it's probably not until Book 2. (Keep in mind that Rider didn't exit from the FSN anime until around or after the one-third point with Episode 9-ish, so it'd make sense for them to try and keep Masters and Servants alive for the sake of reader intrigue for as long as possible.) What's peculiar is that Lancer adorns the cover for Book 3 yet doesn't appear in any pictures inside the book. So even he may still be alive in Book 3 for all I know, only to die very early on. For now, though, let's chalk Lancer and his master up as pre-halfway point casualties.

Oh, and there are no pictures of Assassin, but whatever. ^^;

In other words, if this speculation holds, it means that 6 of the 7 Masters and 5 of the 7 Servants are still alive by the end of the original Volume 2 of 4.
Given what I wrote in the spoiler box, I am concerned that the first act of the anime is going to be very stretched out -- we're only two episodes in and yet we're already on page 128 of 257 of the original Volume 1 (of 4). In other words, we're already through one-eighth of the novels' combined text. Now, I guess you could fairly point out that we're also only one episode shy of that being perfectly on time, since if we were thru Ep03 of 24 right now that would be one-eighth exactly. And I guess you could also point out that the earlier episodes will cover ground faster than the later episodes will because, naturally, combat that is described in a few pages in the book will take entire 5+ minute scenes up in the anime, that's true. But still. A little concerned for the pacing. I guess we'll just have to see.

Talon87

10-10-2011, 04:05 AM

Looking at the fan translation for Book 1, there are some pros and cons. The most noticeable con is that whoever translated this speaks little more Japanese than I do and opted for a very literal translation in places. It produces very awkward dialogue. Like when Ilya pouts in episode 02 and Kiritsugu tells her 困る komaru, they translated this literally as "I am bothered by that" instead of translating it for the English equivalent contexually-informed meaning of "Aww, don't say that" or "Daddy doesn't want that," etc. "I am bothered by that ¯_¯" sounds so stone-faced, so robotic, it completely lacks the "aww, no, don't say that ^^;" emotion which the anime correctly put into place. There are loads of other examples, too, where the translation is ridiculously literal and causes problems for the English reader.

But one big pro for the book, and thus a huge con for the anime -- and one which makes me wonder, is that what the "BD-only scenes" talk is all about :? -- is that some of the scenes showing up in the anime are showing up in truncated forms. For example, the scene with Ilya and Kiritsugu ... in the book, it goes like this:
Ilya and Kiritsugu walnut hunt
Irisviel and Saber talk
Kiritsugu talks with Ilya about how Mommy won't be coming back but Kiritsugu will try his hardest to win so he can come back
In the anime, they did the first two bullets flawlessly. Nary a word or gesture was cut out from the walnut scene. Skimmed through the other one pretty fast so I can't vouch for it being 1:1, but it was probably close. But the third scene is completely absent. And it's arguably the most important one. Well, I'm sure many will say Scene #2 is most important, and that you can't have Scene #2 without having Scene #1 first, but ... c'mon! Kiritsugu's good-bye to Ilya? Talking about how Mommy won't be coming back? Talking about how Daddy will try his best to come back? Come on! :( Why was this cut? It may not have been cut -- it may be a BD-only feature >_< -- but for the time being, the book wins this round.

Another pro for the book is exposition which can't be (easily) done onscreen. In Episode 02's case, there was some exposition before the Uryuu scene in which we learned what kind of person Uryuu was, why he became a serial killer, etc. Maybe it'll be brought up later, but I kind of doubt it. It suffices that the viewer understand "Uryuu Ryuunosuke is a serial killer who kills because he enjoys it. The end." But sometimes the exposition is really very helpful. Maybe even too helpful. Like ... when Assassin is killed by Archer at the end of Episode 02, there's this bit which pretty much explains what happened. And I wouldn't have figured that out necessarily.

In his pledge to his Master, Assassin knew there was no contradiction in Kirei's words.
In front of such an overwhelming enemy, fear is— yes, there is no place for fear—
There can only be despair and abandon.
Slashing through the air in a howl, an infinity of shining blades started raining down on Assassin.
Assassin felt the eyes. The familiars observing from outside the place. The first Servant to fall in the fourth War of the Holy Grail meets an unsightly end without even a retort, witnessed by the other Masters.
And at the last moment, Assassin understood. The true intention of his Master, Kotomine Kirei, and... of the leader, Tōsaka Tokiomi.
(quoted from the fan-translated copy of the book, no idea what the original text said as I don't have it on this computer, so chalk any errors up purely to them, not me =P)

See what I mean? That very last paragraph reveals to us that this was all Tokiomi's plan. And that Kotomine did this not as a genuine act of betrayal (n'est-ce pas? ;3) but because he was playing along with his master's, Tokiomi's, plan. Kotomine made it seem like he and Tokiomi are not allies so that the other Masters would not perceive them as such. (Little does Tokiomi realize, Kotomine genuinely seeks to betray him! XD) So basically, Kotomine didn't send Assassin on a suicide run out of stupidity -- instead, he did it to make himself look stupid to the other Masters and to make it seem like he and Tokiomi are not allies. This knowledge converts what otherwise felt like a total "OMG! Kotomine's betraying Tokiomi already! 8O" scene into a "Oh. I get it. This is all a hoax :lol:" scene.

What I want to know, then, is why Kotomine gets to have multiple Assassins but why in Fate/Stay Night it seemed like Zouken only had the one True Assassin and that, once he died, that that was it, Game Over for Assassin. I expect this will be explained in episodes in the near future, so DO NOT EXPLAIN, DOPPEL. I repeat, DO NOT EXPLAIN. This is more a question for Yuki and I to mull over.

big bad birtha

10-11-2011, 02:42 AM

I've watched episode 2 (several days ago). It was an entertaining episode, even though I really could have done without some of the Caster summoning scene.

The Rider/wimpy boy team is entertaining. I honestly wouldn't mind if they were the main spotlight for the entire show.

Like always, this show is great eyecandy. Actually, I've made arrangements to make this show even better in the eyecandy department!

Talon87

10-11-2011, 06:05 AM

The Rider/wimpy boy team is entertaining. I honestly wouldn't mind if they were the main spotlight for the entire show.
Indeed. :)

The Caster scene makes one very uncomfortable, but it's also very real and appropriate to the characters. It really, viscerally drives home what sort of people they are. Caster is especially frightening, in a Ryuk (Death Note) sort of way, what with those awful, awful eyes. And what they do is even more terrible than how they look. Much more terrible. But Uryuu makes for an interesting, if unsettling, addition to the cast of the War 4 Masters, and his Servant suits him to a tee.

What "arrangements" have you made? Did you purchase an HDTV or an adaptor to connect your computer to your existing TV or something?

big bad birtha

10-11-2011, 06:58 AM

Yeah, basically. I bought a pretty nice TV a few months ago, but never use other than the few times I play videogames. So I figure, why not buy an adaptor for watching movies and anime with nice visuals? Fate/Zero would be perfect for using it.

Talon87

10-11-2011, 06:23 PM

I went and got the latest copies of the fan-translated works, and thumbing through them I landed on the afterwords. I thought I would share the ones from Volume 1 with you since they provide interesting insight into the whole affair and are non-spoilery. The English translation for these sections is very poor -- whoever translated this either doesn't speak English fluently or else (more likely) was translating far too literally from the source material -- but it's still legible and I think you'll enjoy reading it as much as I did. :)

How Urobuchi Gen came to be the lead author for Fate/Zero - Urobuchi Gen's version
Urobuchi Gen wants to write stories that can warm people's hearts.

Those who knew about my creative history would probably furrow their brows and think this is a cold joke. Actually, I couldn't completely believe it, either. Because when I start typing out words on the keyboard, the stories my brain comes up with are always full of madness and despair.

In fact, I wasn't like this before. I've often written pieces that didn't have a perfect ending, but by the last chapter the protagonist would still possess a belief that 'Although there will be many hardships to come, I still have to hold on'.

But from I don't know when, I can no longer write works like this.

I am full of hatred towards men's so-called happiness, and had to push the characters I poured my heart out to create into the abyss of tragedy.

For all things in the world, if we just leave them alone and pay them no attention, they are bond to advance in a negative direction.

Just like no matter what we do we can't stop the universe from getting colder. It is only a world that is created through a compilation of 'progresses of common sense'; it can never escape the bondage of its physical laws.

Therefore, in order to write a perfect ending for a story you have to twist the laws of cause and effect, reverse black and white, and even possess a power to move in the opposite direction from the rule of the universe. Only a heavenly and chaste soul that can sing carols of praise towards humanity can save the story. To write a story with a perfect ending is a double challenge to the author's body and soul.

Urobuchi Gen had lost that power. It still hasn't recovered. The 'tragedy syndrome' is still
continuing within me. Is this a terminal disease? Should I give up on the pure 'warrior of love' that I've longed for? Ascend a pallid battle steed and reincarnate into a dispenser of this virus... Could it be that I can only create pieces that give men courage and hope in my next life? (When I wrote this, I wrote 'courage' as 'lingering ghosts'. Could this be because of using 'ime' - Ah, I wrote 'ime' as 'hatred' -are there no chances of recovery for me?)

Honestly, I even wanted to break my pen. I remember watching Spidermen II. When I saw Peter wishing that he doesn't have the power to change his body, I also thought 'Perhaps, I wish to never write another script again!'

Therefore, I visited my friend Nasu Kinoko's house on the afternoon of the next day, and
wanted to tell him my true intention. But before I spoke with him about what I've been
thinking in my heart, Takashi Takeuchi got ahead of me and started talking. And as soon as he spoke he brought up an unthought-of proposal.

The parts afterwards are the same as Kinoko's notes. Although the initial plan was just a short piece describing the duel between Kiritsugu and Kirei, the wings of imagination can't be stopped once it is spread opened and finally all seven Masters and their Servants are gathered together. I found myself once again immersed in the joy of weaving together a story. It can be said that the launch of Fate/zero saved my writing career.

Right now, I've writing a piece that is saved and has a perfect ending. To be more accurate, writing a part of this piece.

Yes. This marvellous piece called Fate - its perfect united ending surrounding the protagonist Emiya Shirō is a set fact. No matter how cruel the end of Zero turns out to be, it wouldn't affect the perfect finish of this entire work.

Right now, I've finally got a chance to write a tragic ending according to my heart's desire. No matter how I display the darkness inside my heart, from an overall look I am nevertheless a partner of 'the warrior of love, Nasu Kinoko'.

Ohhh yeah.

Umm. Although it didn't completely solve my problem, however, to allow me to once again discover 'the self that has the joy of creation' is already a big improvement.

Right now, I'm moving forward step by step. No matter where I end up in the future, I am already very happy at the moment.

According to current projections, Fate/zero should end in four volumes.
How Urobuchi Gen came to be the lead author for Fate/Zero - Kinoko Nasu's version
Why would Zero be written by Urobuchi Gen? That is a long story.

The relationship between Urobuchi Gen and Fate can go back to 2002.

I was writing the Fate Saber route at the time, and was sent into the hospital near my house due to illnesses. TYPE-MOON was still doujin at the time, and Fate was yet a fledgling draft with four main routes including an Ilya route.

Takeuchi, who thought ‘if there’s only Nasu doing the work we’ll never finish it’, asked me: “Is there a writer you think as trustworthy who can write some stories to be inserted into plot?”

With such thoughts, I began to hook Urobuchi Gen with baits such as ‘wanna go see a movie together?”. Although I was quite happy with Urobuchi’s reply “I’ll definitely do things that interest me”, I still told him “Nah, I was just kidding!”. That was because I suddenly realised I always gave up on projects by being like this, and I must see this one through. Maybe Fate will be the last game that is solely written by me. Therefore I decided to do it myself, and gave up on the plan of seeking his help.

(Later, TYPE-MOON changed from doujin to commercial, therefore ordering Urobuchi’s scripts became harder. He was also busy doing other things he likes, so the matter of cooperation was put away.)

Then two years passed. It became the summer of 2004, when Hollow was being developed.

When we were developing Hollow, which had many assistant writers creating the plot together, Takeuchi once again surprised me with his words.

“For Eclipse, should we get Urobuchi Gen to write one?”

It was too surprising. But because my disposition as Urobuchi’s fan was too intense, it was too hard for me to speak such a request; it was like making a demand to a god. I gave the question to Takeuchi in a roundabout way “… Um, if it’s brought up by you, Takeuchi, he might find it pretty hard to refuse…”. Therefore, at one time when we were dining with Urobuchi, Takeuchi said straightforwardly “Urobuchi-san, I’ve got something I want to talk to you about”. That was such a strong direct attack!! As ferocious as a spiral upward hook.

Yes. Spiral upward hook. I think those knowledgeable readers should know about it. Faced with such an attack, this man who often surpassed the reader’s imagination only hummed and nodded slightly, and made a clever counter move.

“Ah. If so, what about getting me to write about the fourth Heaven’s Feel? Something like Fate/zero.”

So… impressive!!

Isn’t this just great? To be honest, I even think this is an idea more wonderful that developing the Hollow game.

Then, we began to discuss about it:

“Speaking of, what is the fourth war about?”

“Hum – Saber getting bullied by Gilgamesh and Alexander!”

I answered unceremoniously.

In my mind, there are two main points in the fourth Heaven’s Feel.

One is Saber’s setback.

King Arthur, who ruled her people as the model human. The selfless and devoted, just and uncorrupted Arturia.

The absolute commander who surpassed mortals, the majestic Gilgamesh.

And the extravert king whom some called a tyrant, but still held his belief that he’ll bring his people to happiness. The King of Conquerors, Alexander, who ruled the world as a man.

Using the intensive conflict between the three to unravel Saber’s story in Zero.

And the other point is Kiritsugu’s story. I contracted that to him according to his wishes as well. I don’t care about other things anymore.

“I understand. Then I’ll do it according to the way I like it to be. Ah, but I’ll do my best to get the style of the piece close to Fate.”

He is indeed Urobuchi Gen, able to think about TYPE-MOON’s clients.

Afterwards, we discussed it over and over. After a few continuous meet-ups, the draft of volume one was finally completed in the winter of 2004.

Some readers might be surprised that at the time, Hollow was obviously not finished, so why was volume one concluded!?

(Because we were too busy at that time. In 2005 we also began to do a lot of new commercialisation. Afterwards, as we sorted out all the personnel the company got back on track again.)

Because of that, Urobuchi-san thought ‘Zero is a story based on Fate. So it’s better if Zero doesn’t become available to the public before Fate is released.’ Therefore, after waiting for a year, it was finally released in the winter of 2006. That’s how things went.

The above is Urobuchi-san and Zero’s initial encounter.

Although only us creators thought it will be an interesting project at the time, today when the story is approaching its conclusion I have no doubt Zero will become a piece that everyone who likes Fate are eagerly expecting.

Volume one is the prologue. Then it is the beginning of the war in volume two and the pitched battle and its astonishments in volume three. Lastly, there is the utterly despairing volume four (currently being written). Please enjoy the joy of Fate that Urobuchi is bringing to us all.

Oh, no. Maybe Urobuchi’s Heaven’s Feel is indeed the true Hell.
I was also going to post the D&D-style character sheets but unfortunately they provide the identities of six of the seven Servants so I'm going to have to hold off on that for now. ^^; Could upload edited versions, I suppose, but I'm too lazy to upload the same thing twice. We'll just wait for now.

Doppleganger

10-12-2011, 06:48 AM

Sounds like Baiken translated this, and quickly.

It's sort of amusing, Urobuchi reminds me of BBB had he reached a Bad End earlier in the year. BBB's search for innocence and happiness lead to him watching magical girl anime. That same drive prompted Urobuchi to develop a magical girl anime. BBB was purified, Urobuchi remained defiled.

Nasu's recount is likely the more accurate of the two, but it really does go to show how the VN groups back then knew each other in the same way that the translation groups know each other, and things were very informal until legal stuff got involved. That start-up feel really is reflected in the ambitious style of VNs from that era, as opposed to the mass-market vomit of 5pb.. >=(

YUKI.N

10-12-2011, 01:51 PM

Just finished reading this. ...UROBUCHI GEN IS A TOTAL ANGST ADDICT AH HA HA HA!!! ...Teach me, master. 83

Talon87

10-12-2011, 10:32 PM

This blogger (http://yaraon.blog109.fc2.com/blog-entry-4499.html) made the connection between the artwork in Fate/Zero's ending sequence and the works of art which likely inspired them. In order of appearance ...

Rider (http://blog-imgs-43.fc2.com/y/a/r/yaraon/2_20111010044906.jpg) | Archer (http://blog-imgs-43.fc2.com/y/a/r/yaraon/5_20111010044904.jpg) | Lancer (http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3600/3397872329_6a692a3f78.jpg) | Caster (http://blog-imgs-43.fc2.com/y/a/r/yaraon/3_20111010044905.jpg) | Assassin (http://blog-imgs-43.fc2.com/y/a/r/yaraon/4.jpeg) | Berserker - no picture provided | Saber (http://blog-imgs-43.fc2.com/y/a/r/yaraon/1_20111010044906.jpg)

Notes:
I changed the picture on Lancer's because the filename of the original version on the weblog reveals Lancer's identity. It's the exact same statue though, and it's actually a better quality picture, just an inferior angle.

Assassin's picture is one you've probably already seen on Wikipedia when looking him up.

Comments:
Wow. 8O :D Some of these are uncannily spot on, some less so. Let's work our way from the ground up. Assassin's is a pretty loose adaptation of the original piece. Yes, he's on a horse. Yes, he's dark-skinned. It sort of ends there. Archer's is pretty good: and it shows where they got the inspiration for the kitty. :3 Lancer's is not bad. Not bad at all. The same two people, the same tree idea, even the same positioning. It's obvious they based it off of this statue. Caster's is lol no way spot on. I totally thought that that painting in the ending video sequence was made for the show. And while the artists did take some liberties -- for instance, Caster is much more aggrieved in the Fate/Zero version than in the original painting -- it's still remarkably evident that they based their work on this pre-existing painting. And now we get to the good stuff. :) First up is Saber's. Wow. I had no idea that that was based on an existing piece. It certainly explains why she has a lance and not a sword. :lol: Very well-played, ufotable! And now, the clear champion: Rider's. Holy crap, they basically took the original painting and turned the people in it into Takeuchi-drawing-style NasuVerse people. 8O :D I love it! Makes me wish that there had been paintings of that caliber for all seven Servants so that ufotable could have parodied all seven beautiful paintings! Well done, guys!

unownmew

10-13-2011, 01:22 AM

I finished Fate/Stay Night a few days ago, but hadn't posted yet. It was very well done, and I even teared up a little at the end. No progress on Archer's Identity beyond my own suspicions, so I'll have to play the VN for that. I miss Saber though.

Also, downloaded the VN completely, apparently it was available on the usual VN website, I was just not aware of it. But during extracting, part 1 of 11 has some bad files or something, I'm getting 4 error files, anyone else get this? Everything else extracted fine it seems.

Talon87

10-13-2011, 02:45 AM

I didn't have an 11-part download, so I can't help you there. :|

Glad you enjoyed it. Now if you play the game, fair warning, you may be a little bored at first with the first route since it is going to be 80% of what you just watched. There will be some differences though, and even still the game is a much better product imo than the anime was, so you should have fun with it. In any event, get through the Fate path and then you'll sail smoothly on to Unlimited Blade Works and Heaven's Feel.

As you play the game, you could probably go back through this thread and read older posts from people as they played through too. Just be sure not to read past where you are in the game at any given point! ^^;

Doppleganger

10-13-2011, 02:47 AM

11 part game sounds like it came from erogedownload. Download that file again, then extract everything together.

Talon87

10-15-2011, 11:07 PM

Fate Zero Episode 03 was quite good. :) It'll probably be the last of the introductory exposition (though I'm sure we've plenty exposition in store as we progress!), so if you were excited by Episode 01 then you'll surely enjoy this episode but if vice-versa you were bored by Episode 01 then this will probably disappoint you slightly and have you champing at the bit for Episode 04 next week.

I got most of my fanboy discussion out courtesy of Yuki and Skype, so you'll have to forgive me if I end this post here. ^^; But yeah. Really good episode imo. Would be happy to discuss it with others. And once again, look forward to next week's episode for what promises to be the first full confrontation between Servants. (As Episode 2's "confrontation" doesn't exactly count. ^^;;;; )

Talon87

10-16-2011, 11:55 PM

Some of the Fate/Zero fanart (or official art) I found this weekend ...

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/1317392694283_edit2.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/1317392694283_edit1.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/1318361776873_edit.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/1318361776873.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/22404867_p1_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/22404867_p1.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/1318715672216_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/1318715672216.jpg)

The first one is an adorable picture of Irisviel giving her daughter a kiss on the cheek. Official art.

The second one is a good picture of Waver and Rider sitting up against each other, back-to-back. I think it's fanart, but it is remarkably well-drawn and looks like it's been taken straight out of the anime.

The third one is a picture I saw someone comment made them a fan of the Waver x Taiga pairing. I looked and I looked and I looked online all weekend and couldn't find any evidence that the two ever meet -- in fact, I was reminded that in FSN Taiga suggests that she had a crush on Kiritsugu -- but I definitely have to admit that this fanart is very cute and endearing to me if in fact the girl in the picture is Taiga. Although I imagine her being a little less wild as a child, I still think that she and Waver are polar opposites in a lot of ways: but it'd be very cute if Taiga was attracted to Waver while Waver was like "Stay away from me! @_@" towards Taiga. lol

The fourth one is humorous fanart someone made making a funny observation about the fact that Gilgamesh's pet, depicted in the Fate/Zero ED, is a lion, and that it was this very same creature which all throughout the games Saber was likened to again and again and again. On the bottom of the picture, FSN Gilgamesh is saying to FSN Kiritsugu, "I want to keep that [as a pet]!" And Kiritsugu replies, "But we already have Lancer," the same way you'd say "But we already have a pet." :lol: It is definitely a funny observation. There is even a photoshop of the ED scene (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/1318714694540.jpg) that shops Saber in over the lion. :lol:

YUKI.N

10-17-2011, 12:19 AM

http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/22404867_p1_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/22404867_p1.jpg) http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/1318715672216_th.jpg (http://i54.photobucket.com/albums/g92/talon87/Fate%20Zero/1318715672216.jpg)

Now in addition to Waver x Madoka, I have a new crazy crackship to support: Gilgamesh x Taiga ftw. XD

Nice ED shop too. o.o;

unownmew

10-17-2011, 12:35 AM

11 part game sounds like it came from erogedownload. Download that file again, then extract everything together.
Yeah it was from erogedownload, I guess it got corrupt while downloading, but I didn't seem to have any problems during the download. I extracted everything together though the first time, that's when I got the errors. Extracting one at a time revealed errors from multiple paks... *sigh* I guess I'll have to re-download everything then.

Thanks for the help.

YUKI.N

10-22-2011, 07:15 PM

Watched Episode 04. Rider is a total baka. XD But we love him for it.

So we learn Lancer's name within the episode already, darn. Was hoping to try and figure him out on my own given extra clues. Though I doubt I would've been able to even with the information provided. My viewing history actually indicates I stumbled on his Wiki page during my fruitless research last week, but I still would have trouble making the association. Love mark = mole?

With Rider's entrance at the end, and given how Talon pointed out the OP scenes where Saber appears to be fighting Lancer, Berserker, and Assassin all at the same location, I wonder if this long first fight is already going to turn into an every-which-way battle royale? Bullying was right, everyone seems to be ganging up on poor Saber right from the get-go. XD

Talon87

10-24-2011, 12:47 AM

Just finished Episode 04 myself. It was a pretty good episode all things considered. :) The ending definitely makes one wish this had been even only ten minutes longer.

Lancer had some fascinating abilities. Though I still think Cu Chulainn's "reversing cause and effect" ability is far more lethal, Saber's magic resistance under Shirou, for Christ's sake, was enough to defeat it. The fact that a fully-powered Saber under Kiritsugu still fell under the influence of both the red lance and the yellow lance of Diarmuid's says a lot for his spears' potencies.

Gae Dearg (http://typemoon.wikia.com/wiki/Gae_Dearg) was pretty interesting. I can't imagine that the ability to penetrate any magic would have been as useful back in the Fenian Cycle as it is in the NasuVerse where 50% of everything is made by or strengthened by magic. :lol: Also, the TypeMoon Wikia says that Diarmuid received the lance from his father. These two bits of information make me suspect that its abilities in the anime are concoctions of Urobuchi's or Nasu's. But I could be wrong. Still, it's pretty neat, and it even begs the question as to whether Diarmuid could use the spear to free himself from an enveloping Reality Marble like Unlimited Blade Works.

Gae Buidhe (http://typemoon.wikia.com/wiki/Gae_Buidhe) is certainly the more interesting of the two. Injuries done by the lance do not heal, ever? 8O So Saber's already gimped for the remainder of this war?

(details about how long Saber's gonna be stuck like this)

Urobuchi Gen: Welllllllllllllll, we decided that that would be too powerful ...
Kinoko Nasu: ... so we went ahead and made it so that the curse wears off if you can manage to kill the spear's owner. ^^;
Talon: LAAAAAAAAAAAME. =P
Urobuchi & Nasu: ^^;
Still, the spear presents a very interesting and serious challenge. I like it. I like it a lot. I didn't think that they'd be able to summon a Lancer as impressive as Cu Chulainn but color me impressed. And color me very ignorant of Irish mythology. ^^; Looks like they had a fair number of damn powerful lances! XD :lol:

Now that Diarmuid's abilities are all out in the open, though, I have to say: I don't think he's in a very good position, nor is his Master, Kayneth. We don't know how good Rider's vision or hearing are, but it seems likely that if he doesn't already know how the two spears work, he'll soon find out. However, we do know that Assassin has probably overheard everything perfectly fine. Which means that both Team Kirei and Team Tokiomi know all about the Irish lancer. This leaves only Team Kariya and Team Uryuu out of the loop. Not a really good position if you're Kayneth.

That stated, I'm inclined to agree with Yuki about the likelihood of a protracted battle. It seems like this battle could easily stretch through Episode 06, never mind just Episode 05 next week. We could see it evolve into a full battle royale with the arrival of Rider (this episode) and the subsequent arrival of Berserker (as indicated by the OP video) in Episode 05. And then things get messy in Episode 06 and the surviving Masters call their Servants back and retreat.

I'm sort of surprised that Kiritsugu didn't take Kayneth out when he had the chance. He's the expert assassin, so I'll trust to him, but I kinda wonder to what extend he allowed himself to be influenced by noticing the presence of Assassin. It was kinda cute to see how Kiritsugu told Maiya off (about trying to take out Assassin) and was all, "We cannot match him. :oops:" He said it was because he's a Servant and they're mere magi, but one gets the impression it was more like hero worship from a "meager" 20th century assassin to a fellow assassin, this one so friggin' legendary he got summoned by the Grail.

I enjoyed the revelation of how Lancer's two Noble Phantasms worked best, but I have to say that Rider almost stole the show once again this week. He came very close! :lol: The schtick with Rider and Waver hasn't gotten old yet. (I fear it could if they keep up the So Petrified I'mma Piss My Pants stuff for Waver, but I have a pretty good feeling that he'll get his bearings again at some point. Maybe. Hopefully. :lol:) I definitely loved, though, how Rider's like, "Let them take each other out? And miss the opportunity to fight not one, not two, but six heroes from legend? Are you freakin' kidding me? HELL NO, BOY! WE GO TO WAR! :D" Rider's so awesome. XD Even if he's, uh, a little too gung-ho. ^^; Any other Servant would get themselves killed with that behavior. Rider only gets away with it because he's frickin' Alexander the Great and ranks right on up there with King Arthur and Gilgamesh in the pantheon of "the world's most legendary figures."

I'm surprised that we still haven't met Kayneth's fiancée yet. I expected that to come up long before the other Masters learned Lancer's identity. Perhaps she wasn't there for Lancer's summoning? Maybe if this fight does break up sooner (Episode 05) rather than later (Episode 06+), we'll meet her either next episode or in Episode 06. Kayneth'll get like one-quarter to one-third of the episode to himself. He's the only one so far to have not gotten much development. Even Kariya and Uryuu (5th and 6th place) have had more screentime than the master everyone cares the absolute least about. XD Ya gotta give him some screen time before you axe him!

Talon87

10-24-2011, 02:50 PM

Rewatched it for the third time. :oops: Something I noticed the second time around and something else I noticed the third time around, both to do with the sneak peek for next week's episode ...

The second time around, I noticed that the name of next week's episode itself, "Howl of a Mad Beast," suggests the arrival of Berserker on the scene.

The third time around, I noticed that the person speaking at 23m36s is likely Caster. If so, this suggests the unbelievable: a five-way battle in next week's episode. Well, it probably won't be much of a battle. More of a "Servants are all present on the scene" affair. In which case we then get to lump in one of Kirei's Assassins, making it six Servants on the field at once. 8O

If Caster is in fact due to show up next week, and if he is the one who excitedly talks about someone having been resurrected, it should not only be a good scene but it should lend you very good evidence for figuring out who Caster is. (I know you say you've already figured it out, Yuki, but this evidence will either disprove your theory or else support it even more strongly, is what I'm saying.)
Something else that clicked on the third viewing, something which hadn't quite registered earlier, is also something informed by knowledge from Book 3 of 4. So don't click if you don't want to be spoilered about how long a specific Servant is going to last:
I'm pretty confident that Lancer is one of the first to exit the war. Either him or Caster. (Not counting Assassin since the Assassins as a group are still very much alive, though I suppose they too might be one of the earlier exits from the war.) That stated, I don't think he dies until some time in Book 3 of 4, a.k.a. Season 2 for this now-split-into-two-halves anime. If that's the case, then Saber's stuck with this gimp arm of hers for a good long while. 8O Talk about how frightening Lancer's golden rose truly is! Last night, I was all, "Oh, it heals once Lancer dies? :roll: Pfft, so in other words it'll be healed in like no time at all? :lol:" But I wasn't thinking straight. Sure, it's less grim for Saber and Kiritsugu if a chance for her arm to heal exists at all versus doesn't exist, but the fact that that chance hangs on Lancer's death and the fact that Lancer isn't going to die for a good, long while seems to suggest that for a long time in this war -- perhaps even for the bulk of the war? 8O -- Saber is in fact going to have a gimpy left arm. Not only that, but ... if it doesn't heal, shouldn't that mean she'll constantly be bleeding out of that arm? 8O Yeah. Not really a small deal. More of a big one, really.
Man, something else I've been thinking about is ... we know from FSN that Kiritsugu and Kirei are the last two standing, and that the final fight'll be between Saber and Gilgamesh. That's cool and all, but it means that Rider's defeat is inevitable. Awww. :cry: I don't want Rider to go. ;_; Even if it's not until, like, the second to last chapter of the final book XD, I still don't want him to go. It'll be very, very fascinating to see how Waver is defeated. Is he killed? Does he escape to the Church? Who defeats him? And how? It'll all be very interesting stuff. I can only hope that, anime-wise, it'll live up to the epicness of 5th War Archer vs. 5th War Berserker at the midpoint of the FSN anime which, for me, was definitely the highlight scene of that series.

YUKI.N

10-24-2011, 03:28 PM

YUKI.N

10-29-2011, 08:16 PM

Finished watching already. ^^

First things first, I scrolled down too far on the site I was on and accidentally saw the first comment, which pretty much all but confirmed my theory on Berserker's identity. =x (I also kind of have an idea of what he looks like thanks to a fanart browsing spree. ^^; Speaking of which, I have some images I'd like to share with you when we get a chance, Talon.) But then, events within the episode were already pretty strong indicators.

More information revealed about a lot of the characters' personalities, some of which were rather surprising. Was not expecting Kariya to go practically mad himself, thought he'd be more emo and pessimistic. Even more depressing since in addition to bodily corruption, it seems like there's not even a chance of saving him mentally now.

4th War Lancer is quite similar to 5th War Lancer, stressing the importance of honor by devotedly following his Master yet reluctantly carrying out his disgraceful orders. What's-his-name doesn't seem too smart though, wasting a Command Spell in order to force Lancer to kill Saber. Sure, it's advantageous to take care of an opponent when she's weak and they even have reinforcements, but in the long run a Command Spell could have so many more potent uses. In my opinion it should only be resorted to in a desperate situation. Surprised Tokiomi squandered one of his so early as well, but it's understandable since he's handling Gilgamesh, after all. On the other hand, Lancer promised he would defeat Saber, but his Master demanding him to kill her dead now just proves the guy's a dick.

Like how Rider lectured him on being a coward though, and defended Waver as his Master by applauding his willingness to stand by him in battle (even if he coerced him into it XD). Lol at the exchange with Saber at the end too. "Got anything nice to say to the lady, boy?" *no response* *holds up fainted Waver* Kid's comatose expression was priceless. <3

The last big surprise was Caster at the end. ...WTF he's after Saber too? XD All that talk about virgins even makes him sound like 5th War Caster in UBW. Cre-epy...

Not sure how I feel about the CG animation for Berserker's armor. Looks kinda awkward when it's moving - which is pretty much all the time due to the dark fog surrounding it.

Talon87

10-30-2011, 11:18 PM

Just finished Episode 05 myself several hours ago. I enjoyed it as it was full of surprises -- I'm finally getting deeper and deeper into territory where I don't know how things'll play out in their specifics, only in their generalities -- but it ended far too quickly and left me wanting more. A lot more. I'll go ahead and reply to Yuki's points bit-by-bit as she's pretty much hit on the head most everything I wanted to discuss as well.

Regarding Berserker's identity:
This is why you mustn't ever read comments on Youtube, on weblogs, etc when you're watching something you don't want to be spoilered on. Well, in any event ...

(do not click if you're not certain that what you're thinking is correct. Click ONLY if you're 100% certain you've been accurately spoilered)
You hunt for spoilers too greedily, child. =P So when you came up to me and told me you thought that Berserker was Lancelot, what was I to do? Deny it and I'd be a liar. Say nothing and my silence would be all the answer you need. Confirm it and, well, then I'd confirm it, something I did not want to do. So I turned to Doppel and asked him for advice. The following is yours and my Skype chat, copied-and-pasted into a Notepad file that very day so that I could pull it back up later and you could see how I never technically lied to you. ^^;

Yuki: I will probably try and rewatch it again when I have fewer things on my mind. ^^;
Yuki: Was there anything specific you wanted to discuss?
Talon87: Well, I was just going to respond to your speculation and point out that it's an interesting theory, one a lot of people have had, but you have to remember: NasuVerse Arthur was a girl, she was way more concerned with her country than romance, ... I mean, when she met Shirou, she was a virgin for crying out loud, remember?
Yuki: So did they scrap the whole history with Guinevere then?
Yuki: In that case, what was that whole scene about Arthur fighting his son about?
Yuki: Although IIRC, that was only in the anime.
Talon87: Arthur fights Mordred in Arthurian literature over the crown of England.
Talon87: As for Guinevere, I dunno.
Talon87: Considering Saber didn't have romantic or sexual experience before Shirou, it would seem to suggest negatory on that front.
Talon87: I asked Doppel about Mordred, he said it has something to do with magic and Morgan Le Fay ("Morganna" in the NasuVerse, I guess) turning Arturia into a guy and getting his semen to make Mordred. Bizarre.
Yuki: Wha? XD
Talon87: Apparently Nasu came up with it, not Urobuchi. (Go figure.)
Talon87: Great concept ... terrible writing thereafter. Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, Nasu. Whatever shall we do with you.
Talon87: *Great initial concept

As you can see, I just gave you reasons why it would make sense that Berserker might not be Sir Lancelot. And I tried to get you away from talking about and swerved us into different territory (pre-occupying you on Nasu's rewritten Arthurian legend). Doppel's entire point to me was that Nasu's version of the events in Arturia's past is so different from Arthur's in many ways -- for starters, Arturia didn't love Guinevere according to Doppel :? -- that without 100% knowing it for a fact ahead of time you might even argue that Sir Lancelot may not even exist in the NasuVerse. Of course, we know now with Fate/Zero that he in fact does, complicating the NasuVerse Arthurian legend somewhat. Nasu's Lancelot is a man ... who was in love with the Lady Guinevere. Kind of odd considering how dedicated Lancelot was to Arthur (in the tales) and the fact that NasuArthur is now a girl, and an attractive one at that. Whatever.
Regarding Uncle Kariya:
Doppel slightly spoilered me on this in the lead-in to Fate/Zero. (Goddammit, Doppel. :roll:) So I knew to expect this. Seeing it is indeed sad but it lends itself to the tragedy of Matou Kariya nicely. It also fits with Matou Zouken's complete disregard for others' lives.

Regarding 4th War Lancer's similarities to 5th War Lancer:
It's true. It seems like the Fenian Cycle, like the Ulster Cycle before it, deals heavily with these concepts of loyalty in servility. Cu Chulainn, like Diarmuid, was another man's servant. He was not his own man, per se. I mean, his cognomen was "the Hound of Ulster." His name literally means "Culann's Hound" for Christ's sake. Likewise, Diarmuid served another man. Given his backstory (one you're encouraged to read about now if you haven't already), it's not surprising to see Urobuchi and Nasu craft something like this. I quite like it.

Regarding Kayneth's imbecility:
I completely agree. The guy may be booksmart, I don't know, but he's clearly a fool as far as this Grail war is concerned. Rider's jab at Kayneth's bravery (or lack thereof) was amusing, yes, but it doesn't necessarily follow through: after all, our supposed hero Emiya Kiritsugu was also hiding at the time, even going so far as to use a decoy (Irisviel) so that the other Masters might, might believe that she's the real Master of Saber and that he's just some guy the Einzbern family took interest in. The fact is, there's no honor in dying senselessly: and Kayneth is trying to avoid just such a senseless death by watching and ordering Lancer from the shadows. Cowardly, maybe, but not strategically unsound.

It's Kayneth's early use of his first Command Spell which really calls his intelligence into question for me. Not only does he waste it on something so petty -- like you pointed out, Lancer was offering to kill Saber anyway -- but through Rider's blackmail it's then rendered completely worthless. Kayneth has to call Lancer back right after wasting a Command Spell to boss Lancer around to kill Saber. Ridiculous. A ridiculous, ridiculous waste of a Command Spell. Contrast this with Waver Velvet. Waver, too, was tempted to use a Command Spell for something petty -- to make his Servant respect him, something Tohsaka Rin actually did do in FSN! -- but he catches himself, realizes what he was about to do would have been such a stupid waste of a Command Spell, and decides not to do it. Already Waver is 10x the Holy Grail combattant that Kayneth is. Maybe he wouldn't survive in a 1-on-1 fight against his teacher, true, but with the aid of their respective Servants and with Waver's sensibilities competing against Kayneth's, I think it's already clear that Waver has the upper hand.

Regarding Tokiomi's use of a Command Spell:
This was interesting. I actually expected him to do what his daughter did in War 5 -- to order his Servant to respect him more, especially since this is the arrogant Gilgamesh we're talking about here and he has the Independent Action ability to boot -- so seeing him hold off on that but then waste a Command Spell like this surprised me and bothered me a little bit. But only a little bit. It's understandable (sort of? :?) that Tokiomi wouldn't want the other Servants to realize who Gilgamesh is just yet. I think Tokiomi's fear is that the other five Masters and their Servants might all agree to gang up against Tokiomi and Gilgamesh if they figured out who Gilgamesh was. So Tokiomi is trying to prevent them from finding out while there are still as many of them left standing as there are right now. Maybe once the opponents' numbers dwindle down to four or even three or two Masters remaining besides himself and Kirei he would be more comfortable with revealing Gilgamesh's identity. Until then, though, he doesn't want to give them any incentive to 5-against-2 on him and Kirei. So in that sense, his use of the Command Spell was smart.

If nothing else, I loved that it gave us a chance to see Tokiomi bossing Gilgamesh around. Gil's response was great to see and just as I imagined something like this would be.

On the awesomeness that is Team Waver:
I was caught off guard by Iskander's proposal to the others to become generals in his army and to help him to conquer the world. I had figured from what he said in Episode 4 that he wanted to have fun beating these guys himself. And I guess he still does. But he actually offered them the chance to serve him and to help him conquer the world. That was ... pretty interesting. ^^; I don't think Rider's aware of his imminent disappearance at the end of the war. He keeps saying and doing things as though he thinks he's going to be around after the war ends and that he'll actually have the opportunity to become king of the world. And I guess maybe he could if the Grail hadn't become corrupted in War 3 and he could have actually made a wish to come back and have a second chance. Or something.

But things really picked up in the entertainment department for Team Waver as the episode progressed. First there was Rider's defense of Waver and how he called Kayneth a coward who didn't deserve to be the Master of the great Iskander. Then there was the tense convo between Rider (who conquered the known world) and Archer (who is the oldest amongst legends' most famous kings) as to whether or not Rider had any business calling himself a king. (I'd say he does! XD Sorry, Gil, but your ego is way too big if you can't see that!) But then finally there was the awesome, awesome bit at the end where, after Rider intercepts Berserker's and Lancer's attack on Saber, Waver passes out and Rider later realizes it. "Boy, you got any clever parting words?" *picks up Waver's limp body* *Waver's head lolls to the side* :lol: Priceless.

What I so love about his character, even if (like I mentioned last time) it runs the risk of wearing out its welcome and turning Waver into a one-trick pony, is how he's basically the only amateur this time and in a field of deadly professionals. Every Master in this war is a serious threat. Even the minor ones, like Kirei (who only studied magic for three years) or Kariya (who only studied for one and is almost dead now because of it), are still colossally huge threats as compared with the pathetic Masters in War 5. Shirou? Shinji (an imposter, I realize, but still)? Kuzuki-sensei? The self-taught Rin was one of the better Masters in War 5 and, I dare say, for all her years (10 of them) of self-teaching, she's probably not much better than Waver is in War 4. Waver who had the benefit of a normal upbringing in a magical family, something Rin did not. So anyway, you have this mere child, Waver Velvet, who finds himself caught in this insane bloodbath. And it's no longer the awesome game he thought it was going to be. He bit off way more than he was prepared to chew and now he's pissing his pants in terror. And who can blame him?

On how EVERYONE'S identity is being revealed so casually now:
Such a different setup from War 5! ^^; In that war, there were some identities we didn't discover until towards the end of the Heaven's Feel path! (5th War Rider) ^^; For where we are in Fate/Zero, if you transpose that over to FSN, we're like ... what? One third of the way through Fate at best? So we ought to know, like, two identities tops were this to be anything like War 5.

The funny thing is that it's not because the Masters or Servants are less competent this go-around than in War 5. Quite the contrary! It's the very fact that everyone was either participating in or else eavesdropping on this first fight that everyone knows everyone else's name now. Well, not every name (Caster, Berserker, Archer, and Assassin are still secrets to the other Masters), but for the audience, we pretty much know every name but one at this point, and that's Berserker's.

On Caster's comments at the end:
If you think you've figured out Caster's identity (as in, really really think you know it), then Caster's reaction at the end of the episode should make perfect sense to you. Without saying anything too specific, I'll put it to you this way ...
Caster has mistaken Saber for another hero. And the hero he has mistaken Saber for is the same hero so many others mistook her for when first they played or watched FSN. :lol: Basically Urobuchi Gen thought that was a great idea and ran with it. And I agree. It's pretty neat to have Caster (given who he is) fitting two different formulas perfectly: on the one hand, he's the perfect Heroic Spirit for a serial killer like Uryuu, but then on the other hand he's one of the very few people we would need to have summoned in order for his relationship with Saber to play out.
For what it's worth, I'm preeeeeeeetty certain you figured out who he is ages ago, Yuki. As did everyone else who looked up "Bluebeard" on Wikipedia and clicked on related article links. :lol: ;-)

On CG Berserker:
I really hate it. :| Really, really hate it. It's very distracting and it very awkwardly stands out when it's juxtaposed, as it so often is, with regular animation. Like if the smoke is animated but Berserker is CG. Or like if even the smoke is CG but then the floor that is being turned to rubble is animated. The stark contrast between anime and CG makes the CG that much more distracting. Either do the whole thing in CG or do none of it in CG. Personally I prefer animation to CG, so I'm thrilled that Fate/Zero went with the anime route instead of the CG route like Berserker seems to be telling us they might have been considering. I'm hopeful -- very hopeful -- that negative fan reaction to this will see ufotable going back to the drawing board either (a) mid-season or else (b) in between the two seasonal halves of this story and that they'll decide to animate him the regular way (computer-assisted animation in programs like PhotoShop and whatnot) instead of continuing to run with a wire-frame CG model.

That stated, I'm going to try to not focus on it or obsess over it because if I do it threatens to ruin the entire experience for me and I don't want that. I'm just ... *sigh* ... very puzzled and upset that enough people on ufotable's staff thought that this was a good idea for the idea to go through committee and make it into the finished product. It looks dreadful. :|
Wish I'd gotten this reply out sooner. Would have given you something to read while you were home this weekend. Sorry I didn't watch the episode until today. :(

YUKI.N

10-31-2011, 03:31 AM

Wish I'd gotten this reply out sooner. Would have given you something to read while you were home this weekend. Sorry I didn't watch the episode until today. :(

No problem. I actually didn't have power at home so I couldn't use the computer at all.

Regarding Berserker's identity:
This is why you mustn't ever read comments on Youtube, on weblogs, etc when you're watching something you don't want to be spoilered on. Well, in any event ...

(do not click if you're not certain that what you're thinking is correct. Click ONLY if you're 100% certain you've been accurately spoilered)
You hunt for spoilers too greedily, child. =P So when you came up to me and told me you thought that Berserker was Lancelot, what was I to do? Deny it and I'd be a liar. Say nothing and my silence would be all the answer you need. Confirm it and, well, then I'd confirm it, something I did not want to do. So I turned to Doppel and asked him for advice. The following is yours and my Skype chat, copied-and-pasted into a Notepad file that very day so that I could pull it back up later and you could see how I never technically lied to you. ^^;

Yuki: I will probably try and rewatch it again when I have fewer things on my mind. ^^;
Yuki: Was there anything specific you wanted to discuss?
Talon87: Well, I was just going to respond to your speculation and point out that it's an interesting theory, one a lot of people have had, but you have to remember: NasuVerse Arthur was a girl, she was way more concerned with her country than romance, ... I mean, when she met Shirou, she was a virgin for crying out loud, remember?
Yuki: So did they scrap the whole history with Guinevere then?
Yuki: In that case, what was that whole scene about Arthur fighting his son about?
Yuki: Although IIRC, that was only in the anime.
Talon87: Arthur fights Mordred in Arthurian literature over the crown of England.
Talon87: As for Guinevere, I dunno.
Talon87: Considering Saber didn't have romantic or sexual experience before Shirou, it would seem to suggest negatory on that front.
Talon87: I asked Doppel about Mordred, he said it has something to do with magic and Morgan Le Fay ("Morganna" in the NasuVerse, I guess) turning Arturia into a guy and getting his semen to make Mordred. Bizarre.
Yuki: Wha? XD
Talon87: Apparently Nasu came up with it, not Urobuchi. (Go figure.)
Talon87: Great concept ... terrible writing thereafter. Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, Nasu. Whatever shall we do with you.
Talon87: *Great initial concept

As you can see, I just gave you reasons why it would make sense that Berserker might not be Sir Lancelot. And I tried to get you away from talking about and swerved us into different territory (pre-occupying you on Nasu's rewritten Arthurian legend). Doppel's entire point to me was that Nasu's version of the events in Arturia's past is so different from Arthur's in many ways -- for starters, Arturia didn't love Guinevere according to Doppel :? -- that without 100% knowing it for a fact ahead of time you might even argue that Sir Lancelot may not even exist in the NasuVerse. Of course, we know now with Fate/Zero that he in fact does, complicating the NasuVerse Arthurian legend somewhat. Nasu's Lancelot is a man ... who was in love with the Lady Guinevere. Kind of odd considering how dedicated Lancelot was to Arthur (in the tales) and the fact that NasuArthur is now a girl, and an attractive one at that. Whatever.

I sensed you were holding back and choosing your words carefully, so I didn't press further even after the ED pic made me confident in my theory. Still would've liked to piece together more clues so I could be all "WHY'D YOU LIE TO ME", and then you could counter with the evidence. ^~

So will they ever explain the details surrounding Saber's, Berserker's, and Guinevere's relationships with each other? I'm curious to see how Nasu/Gen handles their "love triangle" given the changes made to the legend. Was Lancelot even aware Arthur was a girl at the time? (Maybe the reason he attacked is because he saw her and was all "WHY'D YOU LIE TO ME". XD)

Regarding Kayneth's imbecility:
It's Kayneth's early use of his first Command Spell which really calls his intelligence into question for me. Not only does he waste it on something so petty -- like you pointed out, Lancer was offering to kill Saber anyway -- but through Rider's blackmail it's then rendered completely worthless. Kayneth has to call Lancer back right after wasting a Command Spell to boss Lancer around to kill Saber. Ridiculous. A ridiculous, ridiculous waste of a Command Spell. Contrast this with Waver Velvet. Waver, too, was tempted to use a Command Spell for something petty -- to make his Servant respect him, something Tohsaka Rin actually did do in FSN! -- but he catches himself, realizes what he was about to do would have been such a stupid waste of a Command Spell, and decides not to do it. Already Waver is 10x the Holy Grail combattant that Kayneth is. Maybe he wouldn't survive in a 1-on-1 fight against his teacher, true, but with the aid of their respective Servants and with Waver's sensibilities competing against Kayneth's, I think it's already clear that Waver has the upper hand.

I was planning to make a long rant on this myself as soon as I got back. One thing that really impressed me about Waver was his ability to recognize rashness and properly analyze overall situations. We've seen Rin, who prepared 10 years in advance for the Grail War, foolishly waste one of her Command Spells right off the bat. Compared to Waver, who after only a short time of study seems to have a full understanding of how the War works; thus he not only deserves points for keeping his emotions in check but for knowing why it would be such a huge mistake to use up one of his lifelines.

Another aspect that stuck out was Waver's realization that the distinction between a "split weapon" and "multiple weapons" was what made Gilgamesh's Noble Phantasm significant. Noticing details like this may be a byproduct of OCD or something similar, but in this case overattentiveness is beneficial. He really should have corrected Rider so they could discuss the implications together. I think once he grows the balls to take charge and offer his own opinions, these two could make an excellent team. Rider brings the brawn and true battle experience, Waver (mostly) provides the brains of the operation and info on their opponents and surroundings - an optimal Servant-Master pair. Rider sent Waver out himself on scouting missions after all, and turned to him for a report on Berserker's stats. This shows he does at least find Waver's observation skills reliable.

I bet each could come up with some great battle strategies on their own, and combining them would produce even better results. Waver's responses to dangerous situations may be cowardly, but they are sensible compared to Rider's "CHARGE" tactics. If they could both successfully achieve a happy medium they'd make a real force to be reckoned with.

Also, another reason that Kayneth's decision was monumentally stupid was that there were far too many unknown variables on the field. Berserker could have just as well turned on Lancer rather than seeing him as an ally, or might even view him as an obstacle. Rider too had declared hostility against him, and while there's a chance he may not have gotten involved his intentions to adress everyone were made pretty clear. Why run the risk of incurring the Great Conqueror's wrath by ignoring his presence? Rider even declared there were surely other Masters and Servants lurking on the field. With all the unexpected developments that had cropped up to that point, who's to say others might not suddenly join the fray or interfere for their own purposes? Too many chaotic factors lead me to think the wisest decision would be to withdraw in the first place and face Saber again one-on-one, who obviously would seek Lancer out to to undo the curse (and which she'd still be suffering from anyway).

Regarding Tokiomi's use of a Command Spell:
This was interesting. I actually expected him to do what his daughter did in War 5 -- to order his Servant to respect him more, especially since this is the arrogant Gilgamesh we're talking about here and he has the Independent Action ability to boot -- so seeing him hold off on that but then waste a Command Spell like this surprised me and bothered me a little bit.

I would not have expected Tokiomi to order Gilgamesh to obey him like his daughter did. Rin only did that out of frustration, and Tokiomi should know far better than her that a long-term spell like that usually fails - especially when dealing with someone so arrogant and moreover legendary. Unlike Rin and her unknown Archer, Tokiomi is well aware he's dealing with dynamite. Probably the most realistic option was to let the King of Kings do as he pleases, and only reel him in if he got too out of hand - lest Gil decides to bite the hand that feeds him.

On the awesomeness that is Team Waver:
I was caught off guard by Iskander's proposal to the others to become generals in his army and to help him to conquer the world. I had figured from what he said in Episode 4 that he wanted to have fun beating these guys himself. And I guess he still does. But he actually offered them the chance to serve him and to help him conquer the world. That was ... pretty interesting. ^^; I don't think Rider's aware of his imminent disappearance at the end of the war. He keeps saying and doing things as though he thinks he's going to be around after the war ends and that he'll actually have the opportunity to become king of the world. And I guess maybe he could if the Grail hadn't become corrupted in War 3 and he could have actually made a wish to come back and have a second chance. Or something.

I think Saber and Lancer were just as shocked by Iskander's obliviousness to his transience as they were by his obliviousness to the dangers of revealing his name. I wonder if they pity him, almost, and if anyone's going to have the heart to break it to the big guy that "no, you're not here to play and take over the world, we're just puppets who have to return home to limbo once this is over". ^^;

On Caster's comments at the end:
If you think you've figured out Caster's identity (as in, really really think you know it), then Caster's reaction at the end of the episode should make perfect sense to you. Without saying anything too specific, I'll put it to you this way ...
Caster has mistaken Saber for another hero. And the hero he has mistaken Saber for is the same hero so many others mistook her for when first they played or watched FSN. :lol: Basically Urobuchi Gen thought that was a great idea and ran with it. And I agree. It's pretty neat to have Caster (given who he is) fitting two different formulas perfectly: on the one hand, he's the perfect Heroic Spirit for a serial killer like Uryuu, but then on the other hand he's one of the very few people we would need to have summoned in order for his relationship with Saber to play out.
For what it's worth, I'm preeeeeeeetty certain you figured out who he is ages ago, Yuki. As did everyone else who looked up "Bluebeard" on Wikipedia and clicked on related article links. :lol: ;-)

Ooh, I see where this is heading. Very clever, Gen. Looking forward to seeing how this plays out.

Talon87

10-31-2011, 07:45 PM

I would not have expected Tokiomi to order Gilgamesh to obey him like his daughter did. Rin only did that out of frustration, and Tokiomi should know far better than her that a long-term spell like that usually fails - especially when dealing with someone so arrogant and moreover legendary. Unlike Rin and her unknown Archer, Tokiomi is well aware he's dealing with dynamite. Probably the most realistic option was to let the King of Kings do as he pleases, and only reel him in if he got too out of hand - lest Gil decides to bite the hand that feeds him.
Well, like I said before: I think he did what he did because he didn't want it to become a 5-against-2 fight.
The fact that Kirei has a hundred Assassins is remarkable, but Assassin is still "just" Assassin. Even with a hundred of them, it's not too different from having one Gilgamesh with one fully-powered Gate of Babylon. So if you then consider that Emiya Shirou ¬_¬ was able to defeat 5th War Gil (oh, Gil), then it stands to reason that even with Tokiomi fully charging him and even with Gilgamesh not being contaminated by the Grail's contents just yet, he might not be able to take on Berserker (who was rather effectively nullifying the Gate of Babylon 8O) and Saber and Lancer and Rider all at the same time. I think this is what Tokiomi was considering, and I think he was right to do so. It sucks for Tokiomi that he had to waste a Command Spell like that, it really does, but I think it was the right thing to do iff he's so afraid of everyone finding out who Gilgamesh is and going, "Whoa. 8O We need to take this guy out now."
I think Saber and Lancer were just as shocked by Iskander's obliviousness to his transience as they were by his obliviousness to the dangers of revealing his name. I wonder if they pity him, almost, and if anyone's going to have the heart to break it to the big guy that "no, you're not here to play and take over the world, we're just puppets who have to return home to limbo once this is over". ^^;
Poor Rider. ^^;

Ooh, I see where this is heading. Very clever, Gen. Looking forward to seeing how this plays out.
Yeah. I don't really know the details on this one myself, so your guess is as good as mine.
____________________

I went and re-watched Episode 05 some time after midnight, this time with UTW. It was good, but ... UTW actually made several glaring translational "corrections" that, though I might be wrong about this, I think Aniplex/Commie had gotten right in the first place. Like the adage says, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it!" I wish UTW would listen to this advice. Raze seems to be forcing too many unnecessary changes upon the script. Most are cosmetic but a few just feel flat-out wrong. If I watch it a third time (:lol:) I'll be sure to let you know what specific words or lines I felt were wrong. As it is, I have no memory of what they were specifically, only that they cropped up and I was like, "Huh? :?"

There were so many "best" parts to this episode, but for me the best part definitely remains that unconscious head loll. :lol: Priceless.

YUKI.N

10-31-2011, 08:24 PM

Well, like I said before: I think he did what he did because he didn't want it to become a 5-against-2 fight.
The fact that Kirei has a hundred Assassins is remarkable, but Assassin is still "just" Assassin. Even with a hundred of them, it's not too different from having one Gilgamesh with one fully-powered Gate of Babylon. So if you then consider that Emiya Shirou ¬_¬ was able to defeat 5th War Gil (oh, Gil), then it stands to reason that even with Tokiomi fully charging him and even with Gilgamesh not being contaminated by the Grail's contents just yet, he might not be able to take on Berserker (who was rather effectively nullifying the Gate of Babylon 8O) and Saber and Lancer and Rider all at the same time. I think this is what Tokiomi was considering, and I think he was right to do so. It sucks for Tokiomi that he had to waste a Command Spell like that, it really does, but I think it was the right thing to do iff he's so afraid of everyone finding out who Gilgamesh is and going, "Whoa. 8O We need to take this guy out now."

That makes sense too.

It's pretty much like what I was saying about Kayneth's fool decision to continue battling Saber - even though there were so many other potentially hostile opponents on the field. Why risk it?

Yeah. I don't really know the details on this one myself, so your guess is as good as mine.

Heh heh. I can picture poor Saber now: "Uh, I'm flattered, good sir, but you seem to be mistaken... Plus you really aren't my type." ^^;

Talon87

11-01-2011, 01:47 AM

Yuki, now that you're spoilered on Berserker, I feel like we can speculate on stuff a bit more. One thing you should do (so I say selfishly =P :lol:) is go back and read some of my older posts, now clicking on the spoiler boxes which have to do with Kariya that you skipped before. Though ... I'm pretty sure you clicked on nearly all of them. :lol: =P ;-) But I think one where I talked at length about Berserker was in his commercial week's post, so that'd be one to look into if you hadn't already.

Another thing to try out -- something I just did by accident in my desire to re-listen to that motherfrickin' epic song at the end of Episode 1 :lol: 8O -- is to watch again the scene with Kariya and Sakura the night of the summoning. Now that you know who Berserker is, the idea of parallels between Masters and Servants should be all the more obvious, and it really lends itself nicely to the tragedy of Matou Kariya.

But speaking of that tragedy -- mad speculation time. 8O This is 100% speculation, I promise, but I have a strong feeling I've hit the jackpot with this theory so click at your own risk!
One thing that's been bothering me ever since the summer when Fate/Zero fever began to bubble in my blood is the question, "What ever became of Tohsaka Aoi?" In Fate/Stay Night, we know that neither Rin nor Sakura were raised by their mother. It's strongly implied that Tohsaka was an orphan who was loosely monitored by Kirei but who otherwise had to raise herself and get help from extended family or from friends of the family. For whatever reason, this seems much more commonplace in Japan than in North America where it's all but unheard of for a child to live on their own. (The Minamis in Minami-ke likewise were three orphans who lived on their own, parented themselves, cooked, cleaned, did everything on their own, and who received only small financial contributions from friends or family. There are other similar examples in other anime or manga as well.) All the same, Rin never introduces us to her family, and we can only assume that they are all dead or gone. Thus we assume that Rin's mother was dead before we even had the chance to meet her. Like her older sister, Sakura was not raised by her biological parents and therefore never knew her mother growing up.

So given that Aoi exists -- and not only is she a real, living, breathing person in Fate/Zero but she's even there, in Fuyuki City during the Fourth Grail War -- what do we make of it? What conclusion do we reach? Perhaps the most obvious one of all is that Tohsaka Aoi died during the 4th Holy Grail War[/i]. But if so, why? How?

I think I may have just figured that out. Doppel pointed out to me several weeks back that Kariya himself becomes the berserker as the series progresses. That Sakura's comment in Episode 1 to Kariya about how he seems different and how he seems to be going somewhere far away is more prophetic than he could have possibly realized at the time. Well, let's think about it: what did Sir Lancelot famously do in Arthurian legend?

He drove Elaine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elaine_of_Corbenic) to commit suicide.

Do I expect that Aoi will commit suicide? No. But I do expect that she will die -- by Kariya's hand. Not directly, perhaps. Perhaps it will be his Berserker who snuffs out poor Aoi's candle. But I suspect that Kariya will be the one who, be it directly or indirectly, brings about the death of Tohsaka Aoi. Not only is it epically tragic, which seems to be what the entire character of Matou Kariya is all about, but it fits with Arthurian legend in a very interesting way: it combines Guinevere and Elaine into one woman. In Arthurian legend, Lancelot had two women he loved: his wife, Elaine, by whom he had Sir Galahad; and his lover, Guinevere. But what if Urobuchi Gen has combined the two together? What if that is the basis for NasuVerse Lancelot being an appropriate heroic spirit for the Berserker class? (And not merely that the Berserker class was pushed upon him by Kariya's summoning pact?) What if NasuVerse Lancelot killed Guinevere/Elaine? Whether it be in a fit of rage, whether it be in a fit of madness, whether it be a calm, calculated move that later drove him to madness? What if he did it? What if he killed the woman he loved? Then, oh then, would he be a ridiculously appropriate summon for Kariya. 8O

But I digress. Let us return to my speculation with Kariya. I'm thinking that Kariya kills Aoi. Not intentionally while sane, but either while mad or else not even him himself (e.g. it's Berserker who does it and who does so while Kariya is powerless to control him, on the very brink of death that he is himself). What do you think of this? Bull's eye? Hot? Warm? Neutral? Cool? Cold? Ice freezing cold? :lol: What do you think? I think I'm pretty spot on. A, it's so wonderfully tragic, and Kariya seems to be all about that, possibly even rivaling Kiritsugu for the title of most tragic character in the entire story. B, it lends a repercussion to the evolution we're already seeing in Kariya's character: that he's beginning to lose himself and become the berserker himself.

---------------------------------------

I linked you to Elaine's Wikipedia article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elaine_of_Corbenic) above. I have to confess I'm a bit rusty in my Arthurian knowledge myself, and that article refreshed my memory somewhat. Apparently Guinevere drove Lancelot "mad" because he was so passionately in love with her. She was all he could ever think of. She consumed his every waking minute. She's why he abandoned his wife of 10 years, Elaine, and child, Galahad, to return to King Arthur's court: not for Arthur, not for the Grail, not for Camelot, but for her. For Guinevere.

There's a lot to be said for the parallels, then, with Kariya. He abandoned a life of normalcy and pretty much brought about his own demise at his father's hands for what? For a woman. And not just any woman: Tohsaka Aoi. This is like Lancelot abandoning Elaine and Galahad for Guinevere. Like Lancelot, who was driven mad by his desire for Guinevere, so too is Kariya descending into madness. Now, his seems to be a lot more Sakura-centric than Aoi-centric on the surface -- after all, it's Sakura's name he keeps invoking in all of his scenes -- but like I brought up in the very first episode, why should he care so much about this one little girl? Why throw away [b]everything just to secure this one girl's happiness? It still isn't clear whether Kariya suspects that Sakura is his child or not -- for that theory to even hold any water, there'll need to be evidence of Aoi having slept with Kariya, and who knows if we're ever going to get that kind of evidence -- but I do think it's the case that Kariya sees Sakura as Aoi's child and so he wants to protect Sakura because protecting her is, by proxy, protecting Aoi.

Back to the idea of a combined Guinevere/Elaine character. Given what I'm re-discovering on Wiki, this would not surprise me. It seems that my beloved T. H. White combined Elaine of Corbenic (i.e. Lancelot's wife) with Elaine of Astalot (a maiden who killed herself for unrequited love of Sir Lancelot and was seen floating down the river in a boat towards Camelot) into one character. I'm fairly certain I remember reading in the book, The Once and Future King, that Lancelot discovered that Elaine of Corbenic had killed herself when the farmers outside Camelot discovered her body floating down the river inside a small wooden boat. I'm also fairly certain I remember NBC/Hollywood combining these two women into one with their television miniseries Merlin starring Sam Neill. Given this precedent for combining the women in Lancelot's life into one, it would not surprise me if Urobuchi Gen and/or Kinoko Nasu had the bold idea to combine Guinevere and Elaine. To on the one hand have the "Guinevere" part of her be the woman who was the passion of Lancelot's life and who drove him mad, but then on the other hand to have the "Elaine" part of her be the woman who either (a) killed herself or else (b) was killed by Lancelot, the details of which will have to be explained since (obviously) the non-NasuVerse Lancelot obviously never laid a murderous finger on any of the women who loved him.

YUKI.N

11-02-2011, 03:07 AM

That's an interesting theory, one which I could see coming to life based on your reasoning.

I'm not sure Kariya would go so far as to willingly kill Aoi, even in a fit of madnes/rage. I can imagine Aoi might place herself in the way of danger to try and talk Kariya down, and he winds up killing her by accident.

Sorry to disappoint you on my guesses for Caster btw. ^^;

Without the Bluebeard connection, I thought he was some sort of witch doctor just based on his appearance. Combined with the ED pic, I would've guessed he was hanged as part of the Salem Witch Trials.

Seeing Dracula in the Holy Grail War would be pretty interesting. Funny since I just watched the original film with my friend last night.

Also, nice call on the Joan of Arc development.

Talon87

11-06-2011, 01:39 PM

Just finished Episode 06. A good, solid, character-developing and character-introducing episode, but overall not one of the season's better episodes. No need to rush this one if you're busy this weekend.

Irisviel is adorable. :oops: :) The opening scene was very cute and funny. But it soon gives way to the tragic and the bizarre when Gilles not only reveals his true identity to "Jeanne" but also remains convinced, despite Saber's protests, that God has played a cruel trick and essentially reincarnated Jeanne d'Arc as this so-called "Arturia" who has no memories of her "previous" life. (Even though an historic Arthur would have predated the historic Jeanne d'Arc. :lol: :oops:) Like Irisviel pointed out, someone who isn't willing to listen to you pretty much can't be reasoned with: and so it is with the insane Caster, who seems convinced that Saber is Jeanne. Really, it's very tragic: because the poor bastard thinks he's gotten his wish when really he hasn't. And if we were to imagine alternate timelines where the Fourth Holy Grail War were to play out differently, one could easily imagine the frightful scenario where Caster wins the war (against all odds) and basically wishes upon the Grail to have Saber re-written as Jeanne, thereby "releasing" her from God's spell. Kinda creepy. ^^;

We then switch gears to El-Melloi's hideout. Very interesting developments here. We finally meet Kayneth's fiancée and it's (thankfully!) revealed that she has indeed fallen for Lancer, as hinted at by how coldly she acts towards her own fiancé yet how feminine and apologetic she acts when Lancer chastises her. Not to mention that annoyed look on Kayneth's face as he looks at Lancer's mole. Still, it's kind of interesting to see a battle relationship which kinda-sorta resembles what Shirou and Rin did in FSN, with Rin donating some of her mana to Shirou in order to power him up. So basically Sora provides the mana to Lancer while Kayneth, as the formal contract holder, is the one with the Command Spells and is free to spend his mana as a completely separate unit with no concern for his Servant's mana needs. Interesting. But we'll see how long it lasts/plays out.

Kiritsugu's attack on the building was interesting. But with a demolition like that, I'm surprised the whole thing didn't come tumbling down. Even weirder was that Kotomine and Maiya seemed unscathed. WTH? What were they doing there in the first place (Maiya especially!) and how on earth did they survive that sort of detonation!? (And given that they did, it seems unlikely that Kayneth or his fiancée would have been taken out so easily.) It was a good, character-building scene when Kiritsugu was shown out on the street watching the kids cry. The fact that he deliberately started a fire -- rather than just detonating the building without giving El-Melloi any clues whatsoever -- is very telling that he's gone soft and he isn't the cold, heartless assassin he once was, the assassin Einzbern had hoped to employ in this war. The fact that he was distressed by the children's tears, yet at the same time comforted by the fact that there were tears to cry, that the children were alive, is again very, very telling about Kiritsugu. Kotomine is almost certainly going to use this against him down the road. Likewise, it was unfortunate (in a sense) that Kiritsugu came to Maiya's rescue -- because it basically told Kotomine "jackpot >3" and informed him that he can take Maiya hostage or endanger her life and know that it will have an effect on Kiritsugu's actions.

But Kotomine wasn't the only one who gained useful information from this scene. Team Saber, too, was able to discover that Kotomine Kirei, allegedly withdrawn from the Grail War and holed up inside the Church basement, was not only out and about on the town but, against all odds, right there at the demolition site. This all but proves that he's still involved in the war. The other Masters may not know it yet, and who knows whether Kiritsugu will make it publicly known or not, but he knows. Kiritsugu knows. So I'd say they each gained some useful information from this event.

The scene between Kotomine and Archer was interesting. If I were Kirei, though, I would not have been so trusting of Gilgamesh. Who's to say that Tokiomi doesn't suspect treason, or that he isn't paranoid and is testing for treason, and that he's assigned Gil to feign dissatisfaction and an intention to defect to a new Master? But anyway, we at home know the score, and so it was interesting to see that Gilgamesh's reasons for betraying Tokiomi may be as simple as "You're too dull. =P" I doubt any of these magi would have ever dreamed that they might lose the war because of having a boring personality! :lol:

The sneak peek looks interesting. On the one hand, the episode suggested that Risei was going to meddle in the war by encouraging the Masters to band together to take out Uryuu and Caster because of their rogue actions. But on the other hand, the sneak peek for next week's episode, between Irisviel's line and Kiritsugu's, almost makes it sound as though Risei has directed all of the other masters against Kiritsugu or something. Even more interesting is when Caster rudely says, "Don't get any ideas, bitch!" 8O Who is that directed to, one wonders!? Could it possibly have been Saber? Is Caster in his madness lashing out at Saber who he sees as a hypnotized/brainwashed/reincarnated-and-unaware-of-her-past-self Jeanne and that this incarnation of Jeanne makes him angry as much as the true Jeanne is his goddess? Or what? If he's directing that at someone else, then who? Irisviel, perhaps? That'd be the second most likely. Maybe we're going to see Saber vs. Lancer again and then Sora is going to try something underhanded and Caster is going to show up to save the day for Team Saber? Less likely, but still possible. All the same, I'm intrigued by that line. Looking forward, as always, to next week's episode.

YUKI.N

11-07-2011, 03:03 PM

This was the first episode that I honestly felt was kind of boring. =| IThe opening scene was cute, but beyond that I often ended up zoning out during the conversation bits (and wished they would hurry up so I could get back to my Book of Friends XP).

Talon pretty much said everything that needed to be said, though one thing I'll remark on that others have made fun of (but we conveniently ignored in the first episode) is how sad it is they have nothing better to animate during long talking scenes than the people walking around the room in circles. ^^;

Talon87

11-07-2011, 03:40 PM

Talon pretty much said everything that needed to be said, though one thing I'll remark on that others have made fun of (but we conveniently ignored in the first episode) is how sad it is they have nothing better to animate during long talking scenes than the people walking around the room in circles. ^^;
I don't really notice this in anime when I'm watching it subbed, because it feels like the "motion" of the words (as we go from sentence chunk to sentence chunk) keeps things fluid. But when I watch programs raw, it becomes readily apparent. Gintama is actually a pretty bad offender of this, so much so that they often break the fourth wall and joke about how limited their budget is and how, since they used it all on the awesome fight scenes at the end of the previous arc, this new arc is going to start off with (literally) a still shot of the Yorozuya HQ as seen from the street outside while the three VAs (Kyon, Sunohara, and Shana ;-)) each talk. It's basically like listening to a radio drama while looking at a motionless drawing. Unbelievable that they do that sort of thing, but they do it.

So, that's pretty much what is happening in Fate/Zero as well. The animation is still retardedly pretty, even during these still scenes, which means -- you guessed it -- that they're shooting for "prettiness over motion." That seems to be the perpetual trade-off. Pokémon remains a rather unimpressive anime animation quality-wise, though 2011 Pokémon is certainly light years ahead of 1998 Pokémon, but it doesn't suffer from this problem nearly so bad as Gintama or Fate/Zero do. I've watched over 200 episodes of it raw, so I can tell you this: what Pokémon lacks in sparklies, it makes up for in dedication to giving viewers constant motion. To be perfectly honest, I think that it has to: and that it boils down to who their target audience is. Adults grow impatient with no motion in Fate/Zero or Gintama but they roll with it because they understand that if they're not getting good stuff now then epic goods await them later. But children grow impatient with no motion immediately and will become very frustrated and even change the channel rather than waiting for the motion to return. So Pokémon's hands are sort of tied and they have to devote gobs of money to ensuring that stuff is always happening onscreen, consequently condemning that stuff, because of budgetary constraints, to not looking as pretty as it otherwise might.

So let me rewind to the Fate/Zero vs. Gintama comparison. I want to point out to you that ufotable's budget for Fate/Zero appears to be so generous that even during these still scenes, we still get some motion and, more importantly, everything still looks like a work of art. It's a still work of art, devoid of motion, but it's a work of art nonetheless. Whereas in Gintama, a still like this would look very, very crude. Or non-mega battle sequences which are given motion would look very crude. Something is always looking crude in Gintama except for the mid-season or the season finale action sequences which look spectacular. That Fate/Zero gets to look spectacular even when it isn't trying is a testimony to (1) ufotable's budget and (2) ufotable's passion for the project.

All of this stated, yes, you still get to point it out and be moody about it. =P :) I'm just trying to show you how the grass is quite greener on Fate/Zero's side of the fence than elsewhere in the industry.

Talon87

11-13-2011, 04:50 PM

Just watched Episode 07. Marvelous. :D What it lacked in any one single scene being epic, it more than made up for with numerous micro-epic moments sprinkled throughout. Despite a few gripes here or there, this was a remarkably strong episode and will be a delight to fans who felt bored or otherwise disappointed by the relative lack of action in Episode 06 last week.

My only two complaints with this episode are (1) not enough Team Rider :lol: and (2) the plot reveal with Risei's arm. Let's not dwell on the former, so let's dive right into the latter and then after I finish that I can start gushing about what a great episode this was. :)

I really don't like the idea that Command Crests can be "passed on" from war to war. First of all, there was no precedent for this in War 5, perhaps most likely because the crests have to be passed along from living host to living host and the chain was broken with Risei's presumed death in War 4. One reason I don't like this is that it's too powerful of a plot device. It completely neuters any and all tension that we had regarding how Tokiomi squandered one of his Command Spells so early in the war. He knows Risei has a (for all practical purposes) unlimited supply of these spells. He and Risei are in cahoots, so obviously Risei is going to give Tokiomi as many of these Command Spells as he likes if it comes down to it, whether or not doing so would be obvious to the other Masters ("Hey, haven't we seen Tokiomi used five Command Spells already, Master? :? What's the big idea?"). Another reason that I don't like it is that it implies that the Command Spells on the former Masters do not disappear when they die, which seems rather stupid to me. I say this because, it seems pretty clear that if you manage to survive a Grail War, the Church isn't going to (easily) be able to lay a finger on you, and that you're going to live the rest of your life having whatever Command Spells you had leftover at the end of the war. So does this mean, then, that the Church desecrates the tombs of the magi once they die? and that they, I dunno, cut off their arms and "surgically" remove the Command Crests from them and implant them into Risei? Whatever the case, it seems rather silly. This is especially true given just how many spells or crests Risei appeared to have on his arm. Even if you divide the number of markings by three (one for each spell), that's still, like, 5+ Command Crests he would have had to have extracted from five different masters from Wars 1 through 3. Seems unlikely to me. We know Acht (War 3) is still alive and kicking. So too is Matou Zouken (War 1; Wars 2 and 3?). So like, just who on earth did Risei's crests come from, anyway? :?

That stated, the episode was otherwise fantastic. Even with the Risei plot device, I'd still probably give this episode an 8/10. Pretty high praise! So what made the episode rock? :D

First up we have Team Rider. :) It was great to learn how Rider got his t-shirt. I absolutely loved every second of his conversation with Waver and was only too sorry to see, come episode's end, that it was all we were to get of Team Rider this episode. I swear, they have got to be my most favorite team ever between any of the wars. :lol: :)

Second up we have the first major sign of friction between Team Saber's duo, Kiritsugu and Saber. I had completely forgotten until reading about in Urobuchi Gen's afterword to Volume 1 (or was it Nasu's?), but he's absolutely right: in FSN, they canon-stated that Kiritsugu only ever talked to Saber three times, and that this would naturally have to define their relationship. So it's very interesting to see how the proud Saber butts heads with the "cowardly" Kiritsugu. I mean, their relationship is fundamentally fascinating because it's as though Assassin summoned Saber. Imagine being a Saber who has to serve under an Assassin? Saber was able to serve under an Archer just fine in War 5, because they're fellow knights, and hell, Shirou's very core idea is the sword, so you can't get much better than that. But with Kiritsugu, she finds a Master who is willing to cowardly (?) pick off the other Masters as they heed the Church's call to hunt down Caster. Irisviel does an excellent job of playing the mediator here, ultimately ordering Saber to go and fight Caster (which reflects, then, that this is something Kiritsugu himself in his heart of hearts wants, i.e. he doesn't like seeing innocent children suffer) but at the same time getting her out of Kiritsugu's hair so that he can go ahead and plan how to assassinate some of the other masters along with his sidekick Maiya. It was a neat scene and I enjoyed it. Looking forward to seeing more on this front.

Third, we have a KiriIri romance scene! :D :oops: :D Hooray! This was really good, I really enjoyed it. Even if Kiritsugu came across as a leeettle bit of a pansy ;-) =P, it was great to see him desperately ask Irisviel about escaping together, just the three of them, and how she's like, "I know that you know that we can't do that. I'm going to die, and if you don't want my death to be in vain, if you don't want our daughter to suffer, you're going to have to win this thing. :(" But ... wow. What a romance scene. And H-O-O-R-A-Y that after what we saw in Episode 02, everything's been cleared up and it's clear that Maiya isn't so much "the other woman" as she is somebody who loves Kiritsugu one-sidedly. (I mean, I guess he loves her too, in a way, but like ... at least Episode 07 has shown where his heart truly lies. Go Iri! No offense, Maiya! ^^; )

Fourth, we have Caster's arrival on the Castle Einzbern grounds. Holy crap, this was tense. I don't know if I can even handle watching this scene uncensored once they release the BDs. :| (Digression follows.)
One thing I like about the TV censorship here in FSN is that they do it very tastefully and artistically. They'll have the horrifying sounds while just having the camera focus on a tree. Or something. They won't actually show Caster punching his hand through a child (last week) or crushing a child or a snapping its neck (this week). They just let the sounds inform the audience and have the video elsewhere. No clouds, no censor bars, no red blood turned into black goo, nothing: just very artistic censorship. Even when they do black things out (like in Uryuu's lair), it works really really well. It feels like an actual sewer lair, with very litle light that comes from the few kerosene lamps he's got set up around the place. Even if it obscures our vision of what's down there, it works for me.
But back to Caster's scene. This was like a "Pied Piper of Hamlin" scene from Hell. :( ^^; Caster has really shown just how wicked of a "heroic" spirit he is, and he's also shown just how mad he is. Because it baffles me that he would think that by doing all of these things he could somehow snap Jeanne out of it and bring her back to him. Even if Jeanne were to remember who she is (as per Caster's deluded POV), does he really think she'd be all "Gilles! Mon cheri! :D" and would run up and hug him dearly after what she's seen him do? :? He's killed countless children. No woman is going to run up to such a man and hug him and whisper sweet nothings in his ear unless she's a demon. So I like that there's this lack of logic in Caster's actions precisely because it demonstrates for the audience just how insane he really is, just how badly Jeanne d'Arc's murder at the hands of the English rattled his brain.

Fifth, we have the fight itself between Saber and Caster. Interesting! They've revealed Caster's Noble Phantasm -- some grimoire that gives him unlimited mana? -- and they've also revealed his tendency to summon tentacle demon/beast things. But that scene with the child running up to Saber for safety ... that was just ... wow. 8O :| I knew to expect some sort of repeat of what we saw in Episode 02, given how Caster told Uryuu he relishes in the delight of watching the moment when relief gives way to surprise-terror. But I expected the kid to die long before he made it into Saber's arms. Once he reached her, I was surprised. "Oh! 8O" I thought. "I guess he's really letting this one go this time. Maybe he'll kill it afterwards when Saber--" and before I could even finish my thought, I was interrupted by the tentacle monster going Alien on this kid and exploding out of his back, blowing his body apart into fleshy bits. :| Uhh ... wow. Not only is this dark, but this is pretty fucked up. Difficult stuff to watch. But it makes for a hell of a more convincing "Evil" spirit than the purportedly "evil" Hassan or Medea in War 5. Yeah, Medea killed innocent people too -- and by the hundreds -- but at least she put them to sleep and did it. Or at least she syphoned off their energy slowly but surely and they just felt like they were going into a stupor. 4th War Caster is a whole other beast completely.

Sixth, Diarmuid's arrival was awesome. :D It was really neat to see how Kayneth sent his Servant to fight alongside Saber in order to take down Caster -- and win Kayneth back a Command Spell -- but how in the meantime he ... well, next point. :lol:

Seventh, Kayneth's invasion of Castle Einzbern was pretty neat. We get to see how Kayneth, even if he's an incompetent bozo in many ways, is still a very proficient magus. That defensive shield of his is pretty badass. Shock waves, debris, bullets: it blocks pretty much anything and everything. But as I'm sure we can all surmise from how the episode ends, Kiritsugu's trump card appears to be that one revolver of his. I'm guessing that it has a magic-cancelling effect, meaning that while ordinary shields like cars or buildings might block it, magical shields will not. Obviously I doubt that Kayneth is about to die right here -- though he could! -- but it'll be interesting to see how he dodges the bullet fired by the experienced assassin, Emiya Kiritsugu.

Eighth, we see Kiritsugu's Reality Marble. Doppel had alluded to this in the past, nebulously saying that Kiritsugu is a pretty good magus but that what really makes him special is his Reality Marble. Now that we know what it is -- the ability to slow the flow of time!? -- I can sort of see why. I'm not sure it's as good as 5th War Archer's Reality Marble, but those are two very different things. One says "I bring you to my playground with infinitely many swords, at least until I run out of mana," while the other says "I get drained of energy very quickly, but the trade-off is, I can slow down time." If he could pause time, that'd be pretty epic ... but it'd also be pretty broken, so I'm glad that they didn't go that route. It would have also kinda rendered Kiritsugu's impressive reputation as "the Magus Killer" kinda moot since, like, anybody can shoot a sitting duck. :lol: So I'm glad that it's not quite that powerful. Still ... I'm not sure why Doppel made it sound like it was the #1 magic of the war. I guess we'll just have to wait and see.
See? This episode was just bam, bam, bam: one good thing after another. :) When so many mini-epic things happen in one episode, then even if the episode is devoid of a singularly grand-epic scene, it still comes across as a great episode. And so Episode 07 did.

I just popped open the books again to see where we are. Episode 05 brought us to the very end of Volume 1 of 4. Episode 07 sees us reaching page 112 of 249 in Volume 2 of 4, mere pages before the end of Act 06. At such a rate, then, it's conceivable that one of two things will happen:
(A) when the first half of the anime ends, we'll have just finished Volume 2 of 4
(B) when the first half of the anime ends, we'll have dipped into the beginning of Volume 3 of 4
I'd like it to be B, but it's probably going to be A, meaning we probably have some epic fights ahead of us in Acts 7 and 8. Indeed, I just checked, and Act 8 is the final act in Volume 2 ... yet it begins on page 156 of 249. In other words, it's positively huge. (By comparison, Act 7 begins on page 116 and only lasts through 157, so ... 41 or 42 pages for Act 7 versus 80 to 90 pages for Act 8. :lol:)

YUKI.N

11-13-2011, 07:14 PM

This was indeed better than last week's. Favorite moment was the "pants" scene. XP

I didn't dwell much on the implications of preserving Command Spells, so it didn't bother me too much. It was a bit of a surprise though, and I can see how it would be considered a broken plot device.

In response to your comment on how Kiritsugu seems affected by crying children: I thought of bringing this up when we were discussing Kariya, but is it true Kiritsugu used to kidnap and threaten Magi's families to achieve his ends? I read some game-players speculating on whether we'd see that in F/Z. Though most of the Masters this time either have no family to speak of (Waver) or are prudent enough to send them away to avoid danger (Tokiomi). Of course there's Sakura, though it's doubtful Kiritsugu is even aware of her existence or relation to Kariya, and the chances of him attempting to breach the Matou household just to get to her are slim. Besides, (pre-corrupted) Kariya might just be thankful someone managed to take her away from that awful place, which is why I considered talking of the possibility earlier. ^^;

There is Kayneth's fiance though. While she's obviously not a child, I wonder if, in the heat of battle, Kiritsugu might aim his gun at her and/or take her hostage to force Kayneth to withdraw. I could see a tradeoff between her and Iri taking place.

For the Caster-killing scene... It was terrible to watch, obviously, but less surprising that it would've been had it not already been established he was a heartless bastard. I mean, the death of the first boy made for a (literal) killer introduction to his character, but because of that it feels like any gore or horror scenes lose a bit of impact since we're now constantly expecting them, and they can no longer live up to the initial shock.

FSN game spoilers:

All three of FSN's paths averted this by introducing scaling levels of villainry. In Fate/UBW, Rider and Caster proved paltry beside the infamous Archer. Plus as you were saying, Caster was at least subtle in her actions. The final reveal that Kotomine himself was the true monster draining energy from children by keeping them in a half-dead, half-alive state turned out to be the most horrifying scene since it was completely unexpected.

Then in UBW, we got another nasty shock by witnessing Gilgamesh actually rip the beating heart out of a little girl. Things can't get worse than that, right? Wrong. Gilgamesh gets his ass handed to him in HF, and things just go more downhill from there what with the carnivorous worms, the Shadow, and the birth of the Grail itself.

I feel FSN was really effective in this department by pacing its darkness development, thus keeping the observant players in suspense and yet still managing to catch them occasionally by surprise. Even someone who had already seen the animé such as myself and thought she had a notion of how far the game would go was completely unprepared for some of the cringe-inducing events to come. While the ploy of introducing strong villains only to prove how strong another is when they're taken out can feel a bit tacky, overall I think it worked in FSN's case. A fourth path might've killed the chain, so perhaps it's a good thing they stopped when they did before the tactic got old.

On the other hand, here we're immediately given a creature so vile, it doesn't seem like anyone else can compare. (Though it remains to be seen what will become of wild card Kariya, and while those of us know how Kotomine ends up, I have my doubts those secrets will surface anytime soon.) With Caster's elimination inevitably nigh, I expect the major source of chaos to be put to rest and the War to return to its relatively "peaceful" fighting stage. While this is certainly a good thing, it's a bit disappointing in terms of story development if this was simply a "door-in-the-face" technique rather than "foot-in-the-door". I'd rather be gradually kept on my toes than quickly grow desensitized to the whole ordeal. ...But who knows. Maybe I'm calling things too soon just like with FSN, and there are still terrible surprises for us in store to, *ahem* "look forward to".

I'm still really hoping Jeanne herself will make an appearance. I'd love it if, beyond all odds, she got resurrected just so she could kick Caster's ass back into yesteryear - if not gear, though that's probably too much to hope for. I'd settle for Caster seeing a vision of her in Saber during his final moments, channeling her voice as she delivers a righteous speech before plunging her sword into his wicked heart.

This episode and the show's current pacing did make me wonder how much material we have to get through, so the book references are appreciated, Talon.