56 - Submarine Route
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Last time, we saved Abdul some trouble by taking a bullet for him, setting us down a completely different story path. This time, we get to explore the closest 7SU has to a classic world map.
I couldn't tell you how true this was in 1988, but it's probably a bit more true these days simply due to the proliferation of private recreational subs. If we're talking submarine cables for telecommunications, Saudi Arabia is a major regional hub connecting Asia, the Middle-East, and Europe.
If you're with Gallahad and Miriam, you get fewer items and only half as much money.
First order of business, as always, is to check out the new party members.
Stroheim is also joining us in an overpowered state thanks to the Deus Ex Machina. Skills-wise he's basically Mega Gallahad, having access to powerful gun and explosive attacks including a re-usable Nuclear Explosion. Remember, the only reason I've been tossing the nukes around like candy is because I'm blatantly cheating; you're supposed to only get at most two per playthrough (not counting the Dev Room).
Alas, he's only got the SP to fire that shit off once. Might as well fix that.
There we go.
If you aren't rolling with Speedwagon and Stroheim, Steel says the same but refers to Gallahad and Miriam as, "those two Speedwagon Foundation members who've been tasked with your safety".
This hint refers to how the second Nuclear Warhead (technically first, since King Joey is over in Egypt) is somewhere in this leg of the game.
They drop all those curatives and weapons in your lap for a reason. While you can pick up some basic supplies at the base here, it's a long way between restaurants or inns during this leg of the game.
That hole only shows up on NG+. We'll check it out later.
Alright, so, I attempted some research and it seems like this game is pretending the run-up to the Gulf War happening in the Iraq-Saudi-Kuwait region in 1988 was also going on as far east as the Bengal region. India is really quite far away and was broadly unrelated to the Gulf War other than the mass evacuation of civilians from Kuwait in 1990. As far as I can tell, there were no major military conflicts going on in West Bengal at the time.
The closest contemporary-to-1988 equivalent to the game's generic "there be terrorists" situation I could find in West Bengal was in Murshidabad, where 35,000 Muslims marched in protest over not being allowed to pray at the Katra Masjid - a notable mosque in the area - and clashed with local law enforcement. Even then, there were at most a couple dozen casualties; it certainly wasn't a whole-ass war zone.
Anyway.
Sigh. Not this time.
I don't believe the West Bengal map is the largest one in the game if we're going by technical number of tiles, but it's the one time 7SU has a "world map" where you're walking from one town to the next. So it feels like the biggest map.
It's also one where the R Patch's removal of random encounters changes the experience considerably. My spotty memory says that there were still some vehicles roving the map, but I'm reasonably certain most of these soldiers were gone.
It's a big ol' mountain-and-desert maze. Despite the actual East Indian region being quite humid.
Funnily enough, the Submarine Route would have been great for Cascada because every vehicle enemy drops Scrap Iron, which is effectively useless unless you have Quicksilver.
Because they're up at level 50, Speedwagon and Stroheim pretty much always go first and obliterate the enemy with extreme prejudice. I actually stop restoring Stroheim's SP above 300 just so he doesn't waste it on Nuclear Explosions over and over.
Sections of the map with helicopters also have roving events that randomly cause you to get blown up.
The crossroads a couple screens ago is mostly fake. Only one path really moves forward, and it involves a big snaking loop around the top half of the map.
The completely fictitious "war-torn" nature of the region aside, there's some decent environmental storytelling. This bridge would have made traversal much easier, but it's been bombed.
Tanks would be the most dangerous encounter here if we did not have the Unlimited Nuke Cyborg with us. It's also worth noting that other than Scrap Iron, vehicles also drop Surgical Tools, a full HP curative.
Sigh.
If you're so inclined, this is actually a pretty solid grinding area.
This settlement is way off in the bottom right corner of the map.
There's a surprising spectrum of mutability for this specific event depending on your Holly Death Counter. This soldier slowly runs out of energy as the days pass until he dies on Day 25, unbarring the door. We're currently on Day 16.
If you elect to just waste this poor bastard, you're getting a minimum -2 FP to all party members (yeah, even though they aren't here) and +8 (!!!) negative karma, both of which increase the closer you are to Day 25.
So we're simply going to save first and load after exploring the tower. Duh.
The inside is a complete madhouse. Dudes are running around everywhere and will attack you on sight. There are a few chests scattered around with some pretty solid curatives, but you're likely to use them up just getting around.
Even inanimate objects start throwing themselves at you.
The second floor is no better.
I am cutting out so many battles.
Off in the craziest corner of the top floor is a radioactive green chest, which, of course, contains...
Now we just have to escape! Easy!
Here you can see the hit we took to FP; Joseph and Polnareff were both calling us Funky Party earlier. Abdul also gets a huge boost if you take the Submarine Route.
Last time we checked this, it was at 1...
You can either musou your way down the floors again or stand here and hit this rock over and over until it breaks. I mean literally like, 30-50 times.
A convenient shortcut!
As established, I have no need of a measly single nuclear warhead. No point in taking the penalty for us.
A quick reset and we're back outside without killing a guy in cold blood.
Much better.
We lose out on a pip of Surplus Fate Energy though.
Early helicopters in the 1920s and 30s basically looked like wingless planes because they were literally built off plane chassis. The "first practical helicopter" - the Focke-Wulf Fw 61 - was invented in Nazi Germany in 1936, three years before JoJo Part 2 takes place. By the time of Stroheim's death at Stalingrad in 1943, the Allies were fielding small numbers of the Sikorsky R-4 primarily for medevac purposes. I wonder how flabbergasting it was for injured soldiers to see some heretofore unheard of machine floating in to pick them up.
Anyway we ain't fighting all those.
As a concession for NG+, this tunnel connects points of interest on the West Bengal map. It's much more straightforward to traverse than the surface and the zombies pose even less of a threat than the tanks and soldiers.
Quick history lesson: West Bengal is India's easternmost state. Back in Update 20 I briefly touched on when British India split up into India and Pakistan. It actually split into West Pakistan, India, and East Pakistan; the last of which was the East Bengal region. After West Pakistan's declaration of martial law, ethnic cleansing of Bengalis, and loss in the subsequent war, East Pakistan became Bangladesh and remains so to this day.
Taking the tunnel took about 10% of the time as over land to cover the same distance. I head straight back in and go for a different exit.
That town's our final destination, but we still have a couple other things to check out.
It's a massacred town. There are some helicopters and soldiers running around, but otherwise there is absolutely no material gain in coming here.
I looked at the game files and I couldn't find anything else on this map. It's just here to illustrate the horrors of a fictional war in West Bengal in 1988 that did not occur in reality.
Funnily enough, Tanks are weak to multiple status effects.
Lastly, we have this refugee camp across the water.
As you might expect, if we had a Support-type Stand we'd be able to help out a bit.
There are also vendors here for basic curatives and weapons, but we're nice and full up on bazookas.
Eventually, we finally reach our destination. I'm sure getting to Saudi Arabia from here is going to be no problem at all. See you again!
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