An Unexpected Caller - Endgame 2: Imprisoner of Magic
I’ve made no secret of my enjoyment of AUC, and a large part of that is how brilliantly the game conveys its tone and feel through relatively minimal storytelling. Its final three maps are the apex of this storytelling, and since I know Thangs plans to cover Endgame 1, I’ll cover Endgame 2 (as for Endgame 3, it’s peak enough that you should stop whatever you’re doing and play AUC right now).
E-2’s base map of choice is FE7’s Sands of Time, a rather infamous slog of a map thanks to it being cursed with the forced survive objective. AUC’s spin on the map instead makes it a kill boss map: specifically, the target is Kishuna, the magic seal unit in the middle of the map. However, Kishuna’s functionally immortal until you seize the throne, which starts occupied by Nergal. Kishuna’s iconic magic seal is in full effect, which both makes skipping around the map with staves harder and notably impacts a lot of combat (including the main lord Puzon’s, since much of his toolkit revolves around powerful magic swords).
What makes this map so strong is that it feels like both the culmination of AUC’s unique design and a celebration of GBA FE in general. Many of the map’s enemies are reprisals of prior bosses armed with tools evocative of their earlier appearances (incidentally a design choice used by a lot of endgame maps, both official and fanmade), and it’s always an enjoyable experience to refight familiar faces in a new context. The generics are also great to fight. Most of them sport many of AUC’s extremely unique weapons, such as the two berserkers with the Axe o’ the Titan and the The Iron Axe, or everyone’s favorite Kraken Hunter Sake Sake Sake archer, who is simultaneously the most and least threatening enemy on the map (and the reason AUC fans think 6/7 is the funniest thing ever). I won’t spoil this map’s recruits for those who haven’t played, but their inventories have some great deep cut vanilla references, like the FE7 MKDD Wind sword or the 60 use vulnerary that goes unused in base FE8 (I believe it was intended to be some manner of event distribution).
The music’s also worth special attention (though that can be said of most AUC maps). Most of ArcherBias’s remixed vanilla GBA boss themes get another chance to shine through the boss refights here, and the two new remixes, Dragon’s Gate II and Everything Into the Dark, are among his absolute best. Sullied Grace (from 3DS era Kirby) kicking in once Kishuna’s left defenseless adds a lot of hype and energy to what’s effectively walking up and slapping a joke boss, and the use of Fearless Adversary (one of Markyjoe’s original compositions) as the generic battle theme gives even nameless enemies a lot of weight, especially since the entire game prior doesn’t feature traditional player phase combat themes (also sullied grace and fearless adversary being used are both nods to iconic track usage from my hacks so i may be biased but shush).
AUC’s biggest strength is being able to breathe new life into what I once thought were unremarkable GBAFE maps, mechanics, and characters, and E-2 is one of the best reflections of that life. There’s many other maps I could’ve easily talked about as instant romhack classics (Ch. 2, 5, 8, and almost every map from Ch.11 onwards really could’ve been subjects of my effortpost), and if you take anything away from this, it’s that you should PLAY AUC RIGHT NOW GIVE UP YOUR RESPONSIBILITIES TAKE THE PUZONPILL TAKE THE TEODORPILL LIVE THE 6/7 LIFE