Now that I’ve gotten the game so that it works and looks decent, it’s time to ask the big question: How do I get Deneb in my battalion?
Hey, that screenshot isn’t from Ogre Battle 64! It’s from Ogre Battle: March of the Black Queen for the Super Nintendo, and as far as I know, it’s the only other real time strategy game in the Ogre Battle/Tactics Ogre family.
She’s recruitable in that game (although doing so tanks your reputation with certain factions), and she’s recruitable in Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together, and I just assumed she’d be recruitable in Person of Lordly Caliber as well… but she’s not. Apparently you can use the Game Shark to bring her as a playable character… I wonder if there’s a box downstairs with one…
All the Ogre Battle/Tactics Ogre games are just littered with secret characters who can have a huge influence on your game and the specific ending you get.
In this chapter, our army captures the leader of the rebels we’ve been pursuing for the entire game thus far. The hero (Magnus, but I’ve named him Corwin after my grandson) has been becoming increasingly disenchanted with both his superiors, who are bloodthirsty tyrants, and increasingly impressed with the people of the rebellion, who want to tear down the class barriers and bring freedom and equality to the land.
It’s here that Magnus has to decide if he’s going to turn and fight his own country on the side of the rebellion. He does — that’s part of the plot. But there’s more going on.
Since the very start of the game, he’s been plagued by a rival who really doesn’t understand why everyone seems to treat Magnus with such kid gloves and allusions to something dramatic in the past. His rival, Dio, even went so far as to challenge him to a duel.
Now, if you accept the duel and if you here don’t protest against killing the rebel leader when ordered, Dio will leave. And that’s pretty sad, as he is an extremely good unit.
But if you do protest, or refused to fight him in the prologue, then he will enthusiastically (along with everyone else in your army) switch sides to join you in your fight against the empire.
We also learn here that Magnus’ dad is a traitor and a murderer, and that Magnus was a childhood friend of the Prince up until the betrayal.
Chaos Frame
Like the SNES version, Ogre Battle 64 keeps track of an invisible value that determines generally if you are seen as a good or a bad person, called a Chaos Frame. This entirely determines which ending you get — either a great hero, or a forgotten villain.
Liberating strongholds raises this value. You liberate a stronghold if it is owned by the enemy, AND your alignment is either MORE lawful than the stronghold (for strongholds with high morale) OR more chaotic than the stronghold (for strongholds with low morale). (Right now, all my units are neutral, with some tending toward the chaotic).
In the SNES game, I was very careful with my chaos frames and ensured the best ending. By choosing to accept Dio’s duel at the beginning of the game, I may be locked out of the best ending.
Still worth playing?
Everything is so much slower than on the SNES version. The SNES version was a constant shuffling of units and priorities, whereas in the N64 version, I spend a lot of time waiting for units to get where I need them. One particular battle took me two hours last night — though that was more me dividing my forces too much, and the enemy retaking some of the strongholds I’d taken, which lowered my chaos frame.
I also had a choice of avatars in the first game, I could be male or female. No such choice in this game — you’re going to be Magnus, son of the accused murderer, and that’s it. I also haven’t found any good way to recruit new characters to make dedicated units. I’ve met and recruited random wanderers, and the opportunity will come to recruit named characters, but if I just need a cleric to fill out a unit, no such luck.
But, I’m having fun, and it is definitely very cool to be using my N64 again 🙂
