Let's Play Digimon Story: Cyber Sleuth! (screenshot LP)

I forgot about the parts on this page > . <
Though I kinda chuckled. *pat pat* we all make errors like that.
But the comatose people and the syndrome just made me go "cue the .hack// theme music".

I'm gonna agree with IT, Rie is likely a digimon. Orrr the first victim of Eden Syndrome and managed to survive like Mercury. I like her malevolence and her attitude. "You should be scared of me but I don't want to feel like a jerk all the time" or maybe "This is how non-threatening humans act, correct?" *holds a knife in her hand*

So far the best way I can think of to describe Rie is a bit like Umbridge from Harry Potter - she acts sickeningly saccharine sweet, but that's just the attitude she puts on. In terms of her words and actions she comes off as frighteningly psychopathic.

For our first real villain so far, I quite like her.

What?! Another update already?! ...well, I did say I wanted to catch up so I could let y'all vote which'd let me play again, so... yeah.

Part 10: We Should Have Listened About the Coffee

Last time we learned some more about EDEN Syndrome and found out we're now our own twin, found out that mystery girl Yuko may well be on our side, and narrowly avoided the increasingly unsettling Rie Kishibe. Let's get out of this hospital already!



Popping out the side of the network line we entered from cuts off the minidungeon. Don't worry too much about it - there were no items, and if we wanted the scan data from Digimon who resided there, the area is now available in the Mirror Dungeon over in the DigiLab.



As promised, Kyoko meets us back in the lobby, and congratulates us on a completed mission. It's time to go back and discuss what we learned.



Back at the agency, Kyoko comments on how difficult it was to comprehend seeing our own body lying there, and hypothesizes that the other victims likely suffered a fate not unlike ours - though they weren't as lucky. Although we didn't learn too much in all, she advises us not to get too hasty.



Kyoko reminds us of the agency's motto ("From Beginning to End"), a phrase that was passed down to her from her father, who was also a detective, as a way of... well, honestly, I actually had trouble translating this. The white-on-white messed with my translation app, and "father" is the only word it could accurately and consistently get. I tried entering the characters into Google Translate manually, but that took ages and Japanese is very complicated to actually write out.

So let's pretend this is an inspirational reference to her dad, and we're being told this to keep up our spirits about figuring out what's going on. Yay!



Of course, there is still the question of what we do next.

Fortunately, Kyoko comes to our rescue again, and reiterates her offer to let us work as her assistant. Besides being intrigued by our case, she thinks we have talent, and will provide us with food, clothing, and a place to stay for as long as we're working with her. That's quite handy considering our body is in the hospital and it might raise questions if we tried to take care of all that ourselves...



Mercury quickly agrees, and Kyoko happily announces that our contract is established.
if this game was a couple years earlier I'd make a Madoka joke

And with that, she gives us our official title, dennou tantei, or in English... "Cyber Sleuth."

TITLE DROP GOOOOOOOOO
that's a Youtube link by the way, kids, prepare for noise



Anyway, to celebrate our official partnership, she tells us to wait on the couch and she'll brew some of her famous coffee to make a toast!

...wait, wasn't there... something about the coffee? Something important?



Oh god, that doesn't look right. That doesn't smell right.



Kyoko proudly announces this as one of her special recipes... sea grape and fermented bean paste.



I think this may be the only possible response to such a concoction. Oblivious to Mercury's reaction, Kyoko goes on about the merits of the specific ingredients. And then we get this:



I don't know what any of these mean. I think the first one, which is apparently "chibitsu," is a way of saying "cheers" or something similar. The second one is "gubitsu" but I don't know what that means. The last is just "gugugugugugubitsu" and that's hilarious.

In any case, we gotta drink the coffee. Bottoms up, guys.



For that ordeal we get 1000 CSP! ...what's a CSP? Well, there's bound to be a tutorial.



For our next task as an official Cyber Sleuth, Kyoko suggests we look around Nakano Broadway and familiarize ourselves with the shops and shopkeepers. This is going to be our base of operations from now on, after all, and it's best to know your own home turf.

In fact, she directs us to the whiteboard next to her desk, where we can check out requests from anyone who comes in needing help, and posts up our task as a request there.


yes that whiteboard



Even better, we're officially in Chapter 2! What's the chapter title mean? Ahh, I have to leave some surprises...



It's the first time we've been able to walk around the office! Nice. As before we earn a trophy for reaching the next chapter, and here we can walk over to that whiteboard and check out the requests.



See? Told you there'd be a tutorial. This first screen explains that, any time we come back to the office, we can check the whiteboard and see if any requests are up. We can take them one at a time and the currently active one is marked with the blue symbol. If we decide to take a different one we have to put the current request on hold, but why not just finish them one at a time? Conveniently, we can also check our digivice in the player menu if we forget the parameters of the current request.

(Even more convenient is the online guide I'm using to avoid running around aimlessly!)



The color of the magnet pinning the request up also denotes what kind of quest it is. Red quests are important ones - you know, story quests. Blue and yellow are normal requests. Green are requests that came from Digimon on our farm island. Purple requests are accessed through downloadable content.

Oho? DLC, hmm? Well, I wonder if we'll see any other content of that sort. *cough*specialDigimonfrompreorderDLC*cough*



Here's the one available request. Each one has a title referring to the goal of the request, and a difficulty. One star, as you can surmise, is rather easy. Now this quest happens to be called "High-Quality Coffee Beans" -

Oh. OH GOD NO. I CAN'T DRINK THAT AGAIN.



The quest tells us the client and their location (in this case, that'd be Kyoko and she's right here in the office).

There's a briefing as well. Here's what Kyoko's telling us to do:
"I'd like some coffee beans bought from the shop K-Cafe. It's located at... no, I'll let you find it yourself. Don't forget to introduce yourself around either."

Last is our reward - 300 yen, 500 CSP, and five healing items. The tutorial didn't tell us, but CSP are "Cyber Sleuth Points" and they accumulate over time to increase our rank. It's experience to level up as a detective! I'm not sure what the purpose is, though. I'll try and find that out at some point.

After accepting the quest, Kyoko reminds us to check the whiteboard every once in a while. It's the only way to progress the game, in any case, so we'll be stopping back here often. If there's any particularly interesting or amusing sidequests I'll show them, but for the most part I'll skip over them (or skim the relevant bits) when I can for the sake of moving the run along.

Now we can explore Nakano Broadway! Our first destination is, conveniently outside Kyoko's office. There we see a familiar face.



Hiya, Mirei! She greets us as a cyber sleuth (that's dennou tantei again for you who don't remember) and talks about how fate once again has brought us together. Mercury eloquently expresses his surprise at seeing Mirei in the real world, and suggests that her philosophical tangents are somewhat distracting from the main point.



Like so.

Mirei decides to get to the point and tells us to hold out our hand and close our eyes.
fun fact: I mistyped that as "hold out our eyes and close our hand" and almost didnt' catch it



Silly Mirei, I already had that glove. You can't fool me. I do look stylin', though, thanks for noticing.

In actuality, Mirei installed a program into the glove on our right hand. Our being is a cyber-body right now, remember, which means we're essentially a physical program. What Mirei just gave us is the ability to reconfigure any items we obtain in the real world to data and bring them with us to the digital world!



Mirei goes on another spiel about destiny and says that, while she can't tell us the future (or implies we might not want to know) despite being at a fortune-teller's spot right now, the boundaries between the physical and digital worlds are blurring, and that the powers we now hold might well be the light of hope for this world.

So, you know, no pressure.

More helpful is that we can access the DigiLab from this spot at any time! We don't even have to jump into EDEN, all we have to do is step outside the office and pop straight into the lab.



Or, well... we'll be able to once we finish the request we're on right now. I have some Digimon at max level and we could do some evolving... if we could get in! Ah well, best get to exploring our new home...


Next Time: Nakano Broadway or the Highway

"Updates three days in a row," you say, "that's impossible!" BUT NO! It is possible, and it is here! How far can this streak go? As long as I can keep it!

Part 11: Nakano Broadway or the Highway

Last time we took a new career path, stomached what might be a human rights violation, and got a mission to explore our new center of operations. So let's get on that, shall we?



Oh wait, who's this here? She just appeared outside Kyoko's office after I finished speaking to Mirei. Let's see what she has to say, shall we?


she has quite a few text boxes so pardon me in advance for only posting the first here

DLC Delivery Clerk: "Thank you for downloading our content! Here, please cherish this downloadable content we're distributing. ...oh my goodness, you don't have enough internal memory for this. To get the downloadable (spoiler) you'll need to free up 5 blocks of memory. When you have space in the party memory, please talk to me!"

Well, dang.



We do have plenty of room for free items, though! Our spoils include several status effect healers, three each of the A-rank HP and SP restoring items, and some farm food that increases stats other than friendship.

Sadly, we don't get a free party memory expansion, which would've been useful right about now. We'll just have to wait til we finish up Kyoko's task and grab the Digimon this lady's holding for us!



Okay, now it's time for a proper tour of the place. This is the outside of Nakano Broadway and will lead us to the world map once that's available. You may recall that I mentioned Nakano Broadway is a real-world location. Here's a picture of it in real life. Not a bad likeness, eh?

Nakano Broadway's considered to be "Tokyo's other otaku heaven," right after the district of Akihabara. I'd love to visit Japan someday, and this game has put Nakano right near the top of the list of places I'd like to see.



The game's super generous with where you stand in relation to NPCs. The guy talking here is the fellow on the far right. He tells us there's a CD store on the second floor and a cafe on the fourth.



This is the first of the shopkeepers we need to introduce ourselves to. The place isn't open just yet, but when she learns we work with Kyoko she becomes quite friendly and says we're welcome anytime. That's pretty good, because this woman happens to keep the first item shop of the game. It's pretty convenient that the agency, the portal to the DigiLab, and a store are all so close.



This is a gachapon machine that dispenses Digimon medals. You'll recall we've been picking up some of those already, and while I don't think I've shown it they can also appear as loot from battle.



Why, there's a familiar face! Considering what we went through, it's good to see Nokia made it out safe and sound. Let's go talk to her, she'll probably want to know what's going on.



She's glad to see us safe and sound, though she's also worried about Agumon and Gabumon. She also somehow manages to mangle the word "Digimon" into "Hakudzuyomon."

Yeah, I dunno either. She says that there's something that bothers her about the situation, like a memory from childhood she can't quite recall. Hmm, that sounds a bit odd but we can't do much with it now...



Also, she thinks our new job is super cool.



...or at least, she thinks the sound of it is, because she has no idea what the heck "cyber detective" means. Oh, Nokia.

To sum up the rest of the rather one-sided conversation (motormouths love a good silent protagonist), she has no idea where Arata is and asks us to keep an eye out for him, and also mentions that she's listening to a new album by some guy called "Jimmy KEN." That is... quite possibly the worst name for a rock star I've ever heard.



Talking to her again after our conversation has her sing some of Jimmy KEN's lyrics, which, even with the translation barrier, sound positively horrible. She thinks the music's addictive, though, so... to each their own, I guess.



Poking around near the second-floor card shop nets us an Agumon Hakase medal. Yes, that is a real Digimon. No, we can't obtain him. I only wish. The card shop isn't open, either. I think this is where we turn medals in but I'm not sure yet.



Here's some more stuff on the second floor, which this part which is apparently outdoors. Nothing of interest here, just showing off some scenery.



Not so much with the fourth floor! Here's a terminal which will let us into EDEN - handy, since Mirei's place only gets us to the lab and back.



This is also the site of the offline coliseum, where we can take on some ingame challenges. The... maid in cat ears... named Oruru, lets us sign up for the Bronze Cup, which requires us to win five fights in a row. Let's get some Digimon fighting in!



...we may be overqualified for this tournament. The first opponent, aptly named "Boy," just has a Punimon and Botamon.



Our second opponent, "Girl," has a Poyomon and Tokomon. Just barely stronger.



Ah, now here's something interesting! "Salaryman," who is apparently a bigger success at Digimon battling than he is at his career (his words, not mine), has two Digimon we haven't seen yet - two Baby-level Kuramon, and its In-Training evolution Tsumemon.

Oddly, Kuramon is the only Baby who can't be easily obtained before this point. You could make use of evolution charts to grind up a Digimon to a level that could then be degenerated to a member of this line, but that'd take forever and be kind of boring. We'll be able to see new Digimon related to these guys soon enough.

Also, a minor fun fact - Digimon Capture works during all these battles, too! We get scan data from every Digimon we face, and some people intentionally throw this fight to repeat the battles and get enough scan data for Kuramon.

That's lame and I'm not gonna do it. And I say this as someone who fully intends to use a Digimon that evolves from Kuramon.



Our fourth opponent, an office lady, has three Digimon. We've already seen Nyaromon and Pabumon, but we haven't seen Wanyamon... and might still have trouble seeing him because he's partially hidden behind her dialogue box. Whoops!



The final opponent between us and the crown is this masked man, noted as a "Demons Hacker." I think that means there's a hacker group called "Demons," which sounds like they're trying far too hard to be edgy. I'll bet he's 13 years old, 15 at most.

His Guilmon is a mild challenge, but our team still wipes him out in a single turn.



For victory we get a... "Brave Point"? I'll have to look up what that is later.



For now, this is our destination, K-Cafe. It's where Kyoko sent us to grab some coffee beans, so let's do that!





Inside the cafe, the waitress and the manager have a little comedic spiel about... well, I think the joke, such as it is, is that the waitress is far more competent than the manager, and manages to strongarm him into giving her a raise after she finds the particular brand of coffee beans Kyoko wants.

For much more comedy value in far less time, look at Mercury's expression in that screenshot. He is so beyond putting up with them.
the funny thing is that's only the third dialogue box and he's already done



And we're done with the quest! All we have to do is turn it back in to Kyoko and get our reward.



There's actually a little bit more to deal with before that, though! Kyoko reveals that, besides the reasons she explicitly stated, our mission was one last test to make sure that our cyber-body would pass as normal in society. Success!

Also, we finally find out just what the heck is up with Mercury's non-present parents - they're on a longterm overseas business trip! How convenient is that? Apparently word got to them that Mercury - or rather, his body - is in the hospital, but Kyoko's set things up so that our hero can call his family and assure them that he's okay. This is, after all, technically true. She's also letting them know that Mercury is her assistant for the time being, which they're thankfully okay with.

In addition to that, Kyoko suggests that we return to the "scene of the crime," as it were - not in the digital world but in the physical world. If we go back to Shinjuku, where we materialized after narrowly escaping, we might find some useful clues!

Before that, though, I have something far more important to take care of...



OW OW OW OW

No, it's okay! I'm fine! Let's just do some Digimon management and forget about the horrific experience we just endured...




d to


First off, the evolutions. Guilmon evolves into Growlmon and Renamon into Kyubimon. These are pretty logical enough, but where'd Frigimon come from? Why, that was Salamon! Yup, one of her evolution options in this game is Frigimon.

All three of these are their "canon" evolutions, so to speak - as in, these are the next step in the evolutionary lines I've planned out for them. Generally, as our Digimon evolve and degenerate I won't post every single change - just new forms and relevant highlights.





Guardromon returns to ToyAgumon, and we scan another Tanemon which shortly after evolves into Lalamon.





And oh hey, now we can make room in our party for those DLC Digimon we couldn't get at the start of the update! Now, I'm pretty excited, because let me tell you guys, these Digimon are really cool. First off, they -

Oh, would you look at that. I guess we're out of time for this update. Tune in next time when I reveal the identities of our new partners and inch ever closer to the next boss battle!
yes, I'm terrible, but I'm sure you guys could figure it out on your own if you really want to know before then


Next Time: Paint it Black, Arata's Back

You're incredibly mean, ending on a cliffhanger like that. By the by, is there somewhere we can see a list of what all digimon are actually in this game? Just curious since you do seem to know them all already. (Also no joke, I almost typed pokemon there)

Haha, I gotta keep people coming back somehow. Also, there's a full list over here, on the same site where all those Digimon profiles I link to are. There's also some Japanese sites I used before that to learn what all the Digimon in the game were and their evolutionary paths, which is how I figured out what my teams were going to be in advance. I even made a little guide for myself to keep track of all that.

Great, thanks so much, I'm gonna look through the list later and make my overall suggestions for final team and whatnot. I know it doesn't matter that much, but it'll be fun.

Hrm....

I'm believing you on the hacker group being named Demon but at the same time I just want to believe it's a reference to a number of SMT games

Hmm...I didn't even think of the SMT connection there, but you're right. I'm gonna cast my vote in with that as well.

(Also this game's list of included digimon is freaking huge, holy hell)

Well, not to spoil too much but I did a little research right after that last update and the hacker group really is called Demons, haha. We'll probably be seeing a bit more of them in the future.

There are quite a few Digimon in the game, numbering at 240 total. Of course, considering that there's around two thousand Digimon species at this point (give or take a bit) that's quite a small selection, and there's a few exceptions that I find particularly odd (I might do a side update about this later or just discuss it in a post). However, copies of the game came with a link to an online survey that asked about potential sequels, and asked what kind of Digimon people would like to start with in such a game, and what additional Digimon they'd like to see in general.

So rest assured that if there's ever a Cyber Sleuth 2 or whatever, and it's on a console that isn't region-locked, there will most likely be a playthrough of it here too.

As for this game, there'll probably be another update tonight. Was going to last night but didn't quite have the energy for it, and I'd rather be at the top of my game when doing these so rest assured you will be getting QUALITY CONTENT AW YEAH.

and also a resolution to that cliffhanger, which wasn't originally going to be a cliffhanger but it was getting late and the post was feeling long enough already

All right, I'm starting this post at 11 pm on the 14th. Let's see if I can finish this reasonably soon. (Post time was at 1:16 am. Not bad, not bad at all.)

Part 12: Paint it Black, Arata's Back

Last time we smoked some punks, evolved some Digimon, and obtained some coffee beans against our better judgment. Let's get moving before we're forced to try another of Kyoko's special blends.



All right, let's check in on the card shop! So talking to the guy who runs this place-

What?

The Digimon I got last update?

Weeellllll, I guess if you really want to see...





Welcome BlackAgumon and BlackGabumon to our team! These guys were available as a free preorder bonus (along with a number of Vita themes, a soundtrack download, and extra postgame quests). There's actually a couple other DLC-related Digimon - a handful of regular Agumon in cosplay, and one last Digimon who we can't get until one of those DLC postgame quests.

Despite being palette swaps of existing Digimon, these two have their own stats and potential evolutions. Before you ask, yes, the Champion, Ultimate, and Mega forms have palette swaps as well, and yes, they're also obtainable only with the DLC.

In any case, you can see these fellows start at level 5 with an impressive 20 potential. Keep an eye on these kids, they'll go far. Oh, they have an impressive destiny indeed...

...the card shop was closed, by the way.





You'll recall Kyoko instructed us to check out the location where we appeared in the real world. That's Shinjuku, which has now been added to the list of travel locations. We can also go back to Central Hospital, but there's nothing there for us right now.



We end up hereabouts, on a pathway near many busy intersections. Kamishiro Enterprises is ubiquitous, even here - you'll spy another access terminal to the left of the map icon. And hey - isn't that someone we know? Long dark hair, annoyed expression, ridiculous jumpsuit... that's definitely our Arata!



Arata's glad to see us safe, and he shakes his head at "that stupid Nokia" for getting us into that situation to begin with. If we go after the bizarre monster who attacks us, he suggests we leave her at home.
I don't remember her being the one who split the party to begin with, bud

He also lets us know some things he's found out since we last met. He caught wind of rumors about a creature in the system that eats the data of users it comes across, but when he tried to contact Kamishiro directly they denied such a thing even exists.

Arata admits that he feels a little stupid saying it, but he's serious about getting to the bottom of the matter.



He does have the idea of searching for some hackers - not benevolent greenhorns like us, but people are who willing to get down and dirty and find out things in, shall we say, less than moral ways - perhaps "black hat" hackers, as it were - and try to get a lead from them.

How does he plan to find these hackers, who are presumably really good at hiding from people who might want to find them? He has no idea. Guess that job's on us, then.

You know, I wouldn't be calling Nokia useless when you haven't even met a Digimon of your own, pal!



Here's the area map, bizarrely tilted at an angle. Pink's where we can go, yellow arrows lead us back to the world map, the blue one points to a downtown area (where we don't need to go right now).



There's an Arkadimon medal here! Yes, there's an entire line of Digimon where every evolutionary level has the same name, and I have no idea which one this medal is for. V-Tamer 01's a hell of a manga, you should go read it. I wish Arkadimon was in this game...



These two high school students have exclamation points over their head, which means either they just spotted Solid Snake or we need to go talk to them. I'm gonna take a wild chance and assume it's the latter.



This rather hyperactive lad is surprised to see us. The game calls him... "Ryota." Wait, that's not an amusing description, that's a name! Do I know these people?!



As it turns out, I do! Ryota and this girl, Sakura, are classmates of Mercury's. Ryota heard something about me going overseas with my parents (another of Kyoko's cover stories, perhaps?) and bewildered at seeing our hero here, asks if Sakura knows what's up.



I'm gonna take this as meaning she doesn't.
her dialogue here is just "well" and "umm"



Ryota mentions that Sakura's been acting unusual and says that it started when she got obsessed with some new music she started listening to. She can't focus on or talk about anything else - it's just "Jimmy KEN" this and "Jimmy KEN" that.
hmm could this be BLATANT PLOT FORESHADOWING I think it is



After we briefly explain our current job situation, Ryota thinks being a digital detective is pretty darn cool. He tries to get Sakura to respond, but to no avail.







Whispering in her ear to get her to react... results in her smacking him upside the head. I don't even know what he said and don't particularly care. I'll be honest, these two are side characters who have little plot relevance besides being comic relief. We'll get some DigiLine messages from them once in a while, which I'll try to show because they have their own little sideplot, but I just summed up 25 or so screens of dialogue in a few brief paragraphs. They don't have anything interesting left to say here.



After Mercury decides there aren't any useful clues lying around, we get some messages. The two bottom ones are the new ones - Nokia's raving about a new song she's listening to, from that Jimmy KEN guy again. Jeez, he's prolific. The other's from... Yukino? Who the heck's Yukino? Whoever they are, they ask if we can hang out later. Yeah, I'll pencil that in at half past nope.



We should be heading back to Kyoko's office to report, but first I want to mess around with my Digimon a bit. Trust me, it's worth it. Something really cool happened!



YOU CAN TOTALLY NAME YOUR DIGIMON

So, when asked before, I answered that you couldn't. Now, you can see that this isn't true, but I honestly didn't know at the time. You can't name Digimon immediately after they're born, as far as I know, but you have to pick the right selection of options on the menu screen while they're in your party, choose an option that doesn't seem selectable on first glance, and then mess around with the clunky English/Japanese keyboard until you figure out how to actually get English letters to stick.

But still! Names! Now, I didn't name every Digimon at this point, as I hadn't decided on all of them yet and was on the go, meaning I didn't have the list of the ones I did have either. For convenience's sake, though, I'll be referring to them by their given names from here on out. Here's everyone's names for reference:

• Starmon was named Gentarou
  
• ToyAgumon was named Percy
  
• Goblimon was named Lorcan
  
• Numemon was named Dexter (after a brief period flirting with calling him Farkle, but I had to give him some dignity)
  
• Frigimon was named Helena
  
• Growlmon was named Rhys
  
• Gomamon was named Ambrose
  
• Kyubimon was named Mitsuki
  
• BlackAgumon was named Schwartz
  
• BlackGabumon was named Nero
  
• Lalamon was named Veronika
  

I think this'll work much better, yes?



I take the opportunity to revert Solarmon to Motimon, then after some leveling make him into another Hagurumon. This fellow remains unnamed, and he is also ineligible for boss-party voting for reasons I will explain later.



Meanwhile, the currently-named-but-not-yet-at-the-time (aren't tenses fun?) Lorcan is ready to evolve! Note that Growlmon is not blanked out on his chart, despite not having evolved into him. Because I have Rhys, Growlmon will always be visible on every Digimon's evolution chart (at least when he should be there) from now on. It's very nice.



This time he evolves into his true Champion, Ogremon. He's still Virus and Earth, but look at that attack! Ogremon's a hard hitter, and if we take him along with us, Digimon with low defenses will crumple like paper before him. Despite being a doof in his various anime incarnations, Ogremon is very good in the Story series RPGs. Yes, that attack is fantastic, but his potential evolved forms will only get stronger from here on out.

I had to forcibly restrain myself from complacent gaming syndrome and using the same line I always do for Ogremon. As good as that line is, Lorcan will become something just as good - if not better. Yeah, I like Ogremon. He's good Digipeople.

Okay, I got the gushing out of my system. That'll bring an end to this update. Join us next time as we do the work Arata can't because we're the protagonist but also because he's a lazy jerk!


Next Time: A Dame Walks in With a Case...

I'm getting excited because we're getting really close to the first real boss battle. I don't like to guess because I'm usually wrong about these things, but it's maybe just one update before we're there?

Part 13: A Dame Walks in With a Case...

Last time we got some cool new Digimon, met some people we know both old and new, and bestowed names. Let's get right back into the action, shall we?



We head back to the office due to our lack of leads, and Kyoko comments on how it's good our initial reappearance into the world didn't cause too terrible big of a commotion.

She also mentions that she's prepared a dummy account of sorts for us to use when we enter EDEN. Since Kamishiro Corp thinks we're unconscious in the hospital, usage of Mercury's account would be suspicious. Therefore, this secondary account will let us operate as before without raising any alarms.

I don't think I've commented on this before, but I love that the game does make a point of addressing little things like that. A lot of times in games like this there's questions of the "well, why don't they _____?" sort, and we just sort of take for granted that it's a video game and it's because of the plot. But here they do address minor issues that might raise questions, and I appreciate the effort.

Anyway, before the conversation can get much further along, there's a knock at the door.



A "modest-sounding female voice" is at the door, asking if this is the Kuremi Detective Agency. Kyoko replies that our mystery guest has found the right place, and bids them to come in.

Who might our guest be, you ask?



In retrospect, this really isn't surprising at all. Our player character is just overdramatic.



Yuko is just as surprised as we are.

Curious, Kyoko asks how we know one another, and Yuko simply says that we're just acquaintances, apparently not wanting to let Kyoko know that she works for Kamishiro just yet. Technically, this is true. I just awkwardly hit on her at a hospital out of nervousness and narrowly avoided getting caught by her crazy boss. I don't even know her last na-



Oh, now we do! The request she's brought in is printed with the name "Yuko Yamashina" on it.



"...yes. I'm... Yuko Yamashina."

Don't sound too sure of your own name there, kiddo. In any case, Kyoko directs her to the client couch and has her explain her story in more detail.



Yuko gets right to the point. Apparently, her father is missing. Makoto Yamashina entirely disappeared without a trace, and while he was using an EDEN account at the time he hasn't responded to any contact and Yuko has no idea where he is.

While she's still somewhat reticent and it's clear there's something she's hiding from us (or at least from Kyoko), it's also obvious she's genuinely worried about her missing father and the boss decides to take the case.



When Kyoko asks for some contact information to let her know if we make any progress, Yuko deflects the question by saying she won't be reachable for some time. She takes her leave. Afterward, Kyoko is quite suspicious, and rightly so.



Looking over Makoto Yamashina's account information, Kyoko points out some anomalies. Among other things, there seem to be multiple versions of Mr. Yamashina's account active at the same time, and taking all things into consideration, Kyoko believes there's some account hacking going on. Our task is to head into EDEN and find some information about account hacking.



Also, she calls us "Watson-kun" and that's adorable.



Keyword get! With the "account hacking" keyword, we'll be able to question people and maybe sniff out a lead that'll let us find whoever stole Yuko's dad's account - and possibly to the man himself.



We got some DigiLine messages while we were listening to Yuko's request. Ryota wants to hang out, and Mercury reminds him to do his homework. Sakura, meanwhile, is talking about... you guessed it, Jimmy KEN. Mercury is nonplussed.

Also, Kyoko lets us know that the shops are open for business! I'm practically swimming in items thanks to the grinding I did earlier, so I don't stop by for now. I might try to grab a pic of the items available later, though I don't recall there being anything special.



Back to the beginning. There's a good few people to talk to here, so let's get star- wait. WAIT.



He claims to just be a cute, helpful computer buddy, but I KNOW WHAT YOU ARE. I KNOW YOUR EVIL FIRSTHAND.
on the other hand I got a sweet job and superpowers out of this on top of meeting quite a few beautiful women so I can't complain about my life right now

Anyway, it's been a little while, so a quick refresher about keywords.



Let's talk to this "intelligent salaryman" as an example.



Talking to him brings up the keyword menu, where we can pick one to ask him about. In this case, we're asking him if he knows anything about account hacking. (On the right is a brief summary of what we got the keyword for and what it's about. Pretty straightforward.)



The lock opens, and he lets us in on some things he's been hearing about a group of teenagers that've been prying into people's accounts. That's a start. Let's go see what the others have to say.





Sadly, the lady doesn't have much to offer, but the young man is far more helpful. He tells us there's a group called "Zaxon" operating recently that seems suspicious, and that we might just find them hanging around the Coulomb. Hmmm, we've heard that name somewhere before, haven't we?
I mean you could just go back to like, update 3 and figure it out easily but humor me here man



And we get the "Zaxon" keyword. He said they'd be hanging around the Coulomb, so we should head there next.



This is also a shop, by the way. Nothing noteworthy or useful just yet, but I'll be coming back here later for a reason. I have lots of reasons. Some of them will probably make sense eventually.



Heading back to where we originally met Nokia leads us to a couple of new faces hanging around. They're both hackers, and while the first guy comments on our strong Digimon he doesn't have much to say.



His buddy, however, is kind enough to give us the URL to the "Zaxon forum" if we want to check the group out for ourselves.



And with the URL in hand, we totally can! While the game does actually call it a "forum," I'm gonna call it the Zaxon hideout because that sounds way cooler.





Cheerful-looking place, ain't it? And yeah, your Digimon have a tendency to surround you like that when you warp into a place. I like to think of it as a protective circle and therefore adorable.

Hmm... as much as I'd like to keep pushing forward, this is a pretty good place to stop for the update. We'll have to take care of talking to the Zaxon members and continuing the push toward the first boss battle... next update!


Next Time: The Grindy Update

I don't remember what the little robot did that has led you to claim it's so evil, any chance for a refresher?

You might recall that Nabitto-kun is the one who got us into this whole mess in the first place, threatening to hack our character and friends if they didn't go to EDEN, and then doing so anyway, thereby installing an apparently dangerous program.

And, you know, leading to the whole "getting attacked by a giant tentacle monster and losing our body" situation. I suppose you could debate evil, but he's definitely kind of a jerk.

On an unrelated note, I'm going to update the original post with links to each chapter for easy reading! And there'll probably be another update tonight, after which I can definitely promise voting for the first boss will go underway.

There will be a lot of new stuff happening this update. Mostly evos and stuff.

Oh...he was that guy...is it really the same robot, and not just one that looks the same?

I have no idea, but I'm keeping my eye on the little bugger in any case. (It's also much funnier to imagine it's the same guy.)

Also, the OP is now updated with a proper chapter index! Huzzah! Your scroll wheels will thank me. Also, here's a teaser of things to come in the next chapter:

This is it. We're gonna get to right outside the boss' front door even if this update has to be double length (it totally won't, though). LET'S GET DANGEROUS.

Part 14: The Grindy Update

Last time, we took a missing persons case from that quiet girl we met at the hospital, found the Zaxon hideout... and, uh, that was about it. Huh. That was a short one, now I think about it.



There's totally a guy here, by the way. He's just sitting on the ground. He tells us that random people have been developing the Digimon Capture ability since just before the time EDEN started up. Well, this confirms two things - Nokia, Arata, and Mercury aren't the only ones that got targeted, and that there's other people out there with our ability.

He also says something along the lines of "there's a bunch of rookie hackers with no experience messing the place up, so Zaxon is trying to do their best to keep things under control."

This portrays Zaxon as the good guys, at least from his perspective - then again, that boy in white, Yuugo, said he was part of Zaxon and he seemed like he was okay.



Ooh, a Mojyamon medal. Dunno who makes these, but that collector obsession in me is getting fired up.



This rather bossy fellow tells us we should join Zaxon, and also namedrops Yuugo. Several of the NPCs here do, in fact, so he was being honest when he told us we should come looking for the group.



This guy mentions that Zaxon's been monitoring what Nabitto-kun's been up to and keeping tabs on the people he bestows the Digimon Capture power on. (I knew he was suspicious!) When someone gets the Nabitto visit, Yuugo approaches them to try to get them to join Zaxon. Explains how he just so happened to find us right at the moment we got the power.



This guy says that, even with the best hackers in EDEN on their team, the Digimon Capture ability is still beyond Zaxon's full grasp. They don't have any way to convert or easily evolve Digimon. Probably shouldn't tell them about the lab, I have a feeling Mirei wouldn't appreciate the constant traffic...



There's three people here with padlocks over their heads, but we only need to speak with the right one.



Specifically, this guy. He tells us we need to head to the second level of the Coulomb, past the firewall that we were blocked from accessing previously. Behind there, we should find a hacker that might be able to tell us what we need to know.

Also, I think we get made an honorary member of Zaxon or something. We get an item emblazoned with the Zaxon logo to let anyone who gets in our way know that we're on official business.



NOT NOW ARATA I'M BUSY
he says nothing of import here, I just wanted to yell at him for making me do the work





This is the guy who was blocking us from heading further into the Coulomb waaaaaay back when. He was apparently blocking it on Yuugo's orders to keep anyone from going in somewhere too dangerous, but we have clearance now. Also, this is the point where I realize you can adjust the camera with the right stick during dialogue boxes.





Disabling the firewall clears the way to the elevator (the green square), and also to another medal! This one is for YukimiBotamon. My translation app insists it's supposed to be "YukimiPokemon." Translation app, you joker.



Welcome to Coulomb Level 2! It's... a lot like the first. Level 3 is being blocked by the fellow in the top left, and a link to the DigiLab is right in the front door.



There's some other hackers hanging out in this area. This guy's friendly enough, and advises us to keep a varied Digimon party. Way ahead of you, bud.



We'll start to see some new Digimon while we're down here... well, new-ish. We've already seen Wanyamon in the little tournament we entered back at Nakano Broadway, but these are the first "wild" Wanyamon we've encountered.



I just want to point out this was their first battle and already Schwartz and Nero are pulling their weight and operating in sync. Total bros.



While regular Gabumon has the traditional Blue Blaster as his special, BlackGabumon has this sweet horn attack.





BlackAgumon still totally does fire breath, though.

yes I know that second picture is from later on but I'd rather show the attack now than wait



STILL BUSY, ARATA



Another friendly hacker. She reminds us to keep type and attribute compatibility in mind when battling Digimon. You might've noticed, incidentally, that most of the other hackers we've met so far only have low-level Digimon. Makes sense, given they don't have most of the tools Mercury has available.



Yokomon joins the list of available Digimon here, as does Goblimon (not pictured. You've already seen him anyway).







After Veronika gets some experience, I put her on the front lines while Gentarou (that's Starmon, remember) takes a break and lets the Rookies show their stuff.



After making some progress into the dungeon we hit a roadblock. These guys show up every so often in this place, and to get past them we must pass an arduous test. To move forward, we must-



CHOOSE THE TOP OPTION EVERY TIME! Truly, this is a challenge which not but the worthiest of Digimon tamers may overcome.

for a more detailed explanation, the top option is just to show them the Zaxon emblem we got from the boss back in their hideout. If you choose the bottom option they just turn you away and you have to try again and pick the top one this time, dummy



Getting past those guys gets us to the second part of the dungeon. I haven't been showing the contents of chests so far, mostly because there's nothing interesting. I got some HP restoration disks, a revival item, and a topaz (which is just there to be sold).







Rookie Digimon are starting to become more common. We've seen Lalamon, Biyomon, and Otamamon already, but it's worth noting. If you've only been using one Digimon up to this point, here's probably where you'd start having trouble. Luckily, I already have a menagerie of strong and varied Digimon so we've got no worries.

We have another encounter with the guys blocking the path, and find some more loot including an escape disk and some SP restoration items.



Lovely, another roadblock. "Clever hacker" here, however, doesn't want to stand in our way - in fact, he wants to lend us a hand! He informs us about Digimon support skills. And you know what that means...



It's tutorial time! Every Digimon has a passive ability that has a various effect. The example here given is a Digimon whose ability raises the attack of allied Digimon by 15%. These abilities stack, so three Digimon with this skill would have their attack raised by 45%! There's some very useful abilities out there, though I won't draw attention to most of them just because that would take a lot of time. I'll point out some cool ones here and there, maybe.



We can also look up information on Digimon we've seen/obtained via the Digimon Encyclopedia. Digimon marked with a star are only obtainable via the DLC. There's actually a lot of useful information here, such as seeing a Digimon's evolutionary lines and the requirements for each form. It's kind of like the Pokedex if it actually had useful functions.



And, like a sign from heaven, it's the access point for the lab. This means we're at the end of the dungeon, and the next room contains the boss! This is, all in all, a really nice way to ensure that you can level up and stay healed going into a big battle. Say what you will about her, but Mirei's quite considerate doing all this.

Since we have the facilities right here and can now battle to our heart's content... oh yes. It's grinding time.



First order of business is getting Ambrose evolved. Actually, I could have evolved him at any point earlier, just not into the form I wanted. Said form requires a certain amount of SP and I was holding out for that.



The resulting Sorcerymon is totally worth it. Look at that SP and intelligence stat!



Helena reverts to Salamon, because I'd heard that another of her evolutions had a skill or two that might be worth picking up.



Dexter, uh...

Well, he. You know...

...MOVING ON



I can't tell if that's pride or shame. Maybe both.

Am I referring to Dexter's expression or my feelings toward him? Again, maybe both.
I actually think Numemon's pretty adorable so shush



Here's a Xros Heal Up combo. Not really useful right now, since we're fighting weak random encounters, but it's another mechanic to show off. It's just like the attacking ones, except our Digimon team up to give a big heal to someone.





Veronika learns a healing spell of her own, and earns her evolution to Sunflowmon.



Not one to be outdone so soon, Ambrose shows us his moves. His special attack is water-elemental and hits every opponent for a nice chunk of damage - fueled by his great intelligence, this easily sweeps enemy teams.



"Come at me, Bromon!"





Schwartz and Nero actually hit their level caps for their Rookie stage, so I evolve them into Tyrannomon and Vegimon temporarily. Don't worry, this isn't permanent.





This totally makes it worth it, though.



This, not so much.



Helena evolves into the (likely more familiar for longtime fans) Champion Gatomon. Minirant time, I don't like that her Japanese name is "Tailmon." It's dumb and nonindicative. At least "Gatomon" actually tells us what she is!

You'll notice throughout this run that I use a mishmash of English and Japanese names. It's entirely according to my preference on an individual basis, so... yeah. Purists beware, I guess?



Oh yeah, check this out. One of Helena's Ultimates (from Gatomon) has a slightly different requirement here. "Jogress NG." And the same stat at 100% twice? Well, isn't that - ahh, heck with it, I'll stop being coy and tell you here that this is for Jogress/DNA evolution. To get this particular Ultimate you'll need two Digimon, who fuse together to evolve into a new form. There's a few of these in the game, and I plan to show at least one of them.



Dawwww. What can I say? I'm a cat person.


Next Time: A Wild Boss Battle Appeared!

Whew! That actually finishes up all the pictures I had for grinding, and wipes out my buffer! Which means we can finally get to voting on the first boss. I promised we'd get there, and here we are. So, here's how it works: I'll list my Digimon and their current forms a little further down, and you pick a team that you want to see take on the boss. And of course, make sure it fits the memory limit. I've still only got 20 to work with, but that'll change soon.

So first, our candidates:

The usual suspects:

As for the boss, what can you expect? Well, there'll be a Virus Digimon, and things might get a little bit heated. Wink wink. Anyway, vote for a team that you want to see win! Or vote for a team that will make my life difficult! (Please try not to do that!) I'll give voting... until this Sunday, the 24th. Just reply to the thread with what Digimon you're voting for and I'll do the rest.

Wooo, we made it!

Nice! Exciting! Gatomon is sooooo cute! x3

...Why do I get the feeling that these "Zaxon" people are up to no good? Maybe because their name has a Z and an X in it... and that's never a good sign.

Anyway, my votes for the boss-battle team are Gentarou (Starmon), Ambrose (Sorcerymon) & Nero (BlackGabumon). I'd suggest Gatomon, but sadly you don't have enough memory for her! :[

I like Starmon, BlackAgumon, and Numemon.

There might not be a proper update today (honestly, I dunno yet, it depends), but let's talk about how the voting went down!

Mini-Update: Voting Statistics

I think this kind of stuff is fun, so bear with me here. Anyway, we got three votes for this first boss poll. Two were in the thread, and one I got via Skype from a friend of mine who plays Uranium and reads this thread (hi there!). The first thing I did was plug all the respective votes into my nifty little spreadsheet:



Sorry for the size, you can just view the full-size image here if that's too small. In any case, you can see that I made out the chart to show how many votes each Digimon got for each successive boss.

That's not even the full roster of bosses. This thread's gonna go on for a while.

Anyway, I spoilered out boss names and the names of certain Digimon because spoilers. Here's what the colors of certain boxes mean:

• Pink boxes are Digimon who were ineligible because they don't actually exist yet. We'll be scanning them soon enough, I hope.
  
• Orange boxes are Digimon who got votes and could have been eligible, but because of the way the voting worked out couldn't be included. Since Gentarou and Ambrose each got two votes they automatically got in. Helena would have been eligible for the third but since her memory would have exceeded the limit she couldn't be included.
  
• Green boxes are Digimon who went into the next phase of selection (see below) but didn't win.
  
• Blue boxes are the Digimon that won the vote.

So our two guys with two votes went into the party automatically, and the ones who each had one vote (and didn't exceed the memory limit) went into the pool for the next part. Easy enough.

I had to choose from Dexter, Percy, Schwartz, and Nero for the third slot, and I couldn't just pick one on my own. To be as impartial as possible... well, I left it up to chance. So I found a nifty little website that helps you solve decisions by putting choices on a game show wheel and spinning it out. And who ended up lucky this time?



Dexter did! Our party for the boss will consist of Starmon, Sorcerymon, and Numemon. That's... actually pretty good, and everyone who voted got at least one of their picks in. Next time, we'll find out just how well this team works together!

Yes! I'm so happy numemon got in, I can't freaking believe it!

Hey guys, it's been a while! I had some other stuff happen, so apologies about the lack of the boss update. Good news/bad news time:

The good news! There will be an update, and hopefully within the week. I'm not abandoning this, don't worry about that.

The bad news! ...it won't be here. Actually, this is the last post in this thread, because, as you all are probably aware, Pokemon Uranium is moving forums. What does that mean for this run? Well, it means I'll be reposting every chapter over there before I start posting new ones. Here is a link to this LP on the new forums.

It's an ongoing process of moving every post one by one, so it'll take a little time. However, you can look forward to larger screenshot sizes, more legible text, and of course that same old Digimon detective action that we've provided thus far.

Looking forward to seeing you all in the new thread!