Awesome / Live A Live

In death, you'll learn my true design!

A tale across time and space told within several eras of human history yields plenty of badass moments.

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Prehistory: The First

• The remake's Gameplay Tips reveals why there's a dinosaur skeleton in Pogo's tribe's backyard; The Elder managed to kill it singlehandedly when he was younger and left it there as a Battle Trophy.
• After invading the Kuu Tribe's base, one of the last areas is a Zerg Rush where you have to defeat several low-level tribesmen in order to press forward.^note The remake replaces this section with Gori's harem showing up to fight off the guards. After making it to the final room and gatecrashing Beru's sacrifice ceremony, Pogo proceeds to curbstomp and uppercut several tribesmen at once.
• When Gori (the ape) kicks a headdress at the final boss of the Prehistoric story. Double points are given because that was what the evil tribal leader was wearing five seconds before Pogo, Gori, and Beru saw him get eaten. Then the three heroes go and fight the dinosaur anyway in a Big Damn Heroes moment which is made bigger when Zaki comes to help.
• If you level Beru up to Level 7 (6 in the remake), she'll learn her ultimate attack Sing Hurt, which is powerful enough to nuke the T-Rex where it stands. That's right, she can ultimately end the monster that she was about to be sacrificed to through The Power of Love! The chapter's credits has both tribes celebrate on a giant slab of meat, implying that they carved-up Odo for a plentiful source of food.
• Pogo invents the very first human word at the end of his chapter. What is it? Love.^note In the remake, he shouts "AIIEEE!!!" instead, but "ai" in Japanese means "love", so it counts.

Imperial China: The Successor

• The Heavenly Peaks Descent is always a Moment of Awesome. Even when you get it as a normal technique, but especially the first time the student uses it. Bonus points in the PC/PlayStation versions when the game grants you the "Nothing Left to Teach" achievement right as Megalomania starts playing. By extension, anything epic the student does also counts as their former Shifu's moment.
• The entire assault sequence on the Indomitable Fist School. The Shifu and his disciple just tear their way through the entire fortress's defenses.
• When Yun is your chosen student: When you're facing a bunch of Ou Di's goons alone, he suddenly appears and starts ranting about how he sucks compared to Lei and Hong while effortlessly beating the crap out of the goons! What's even better is that Yun's stats reflect this aspect of his personality. He is the weakest of the three students at the beginning, but has pretty good stat growth; once he gets to around level 16, all his stats (except HP) are the best of the three or second best!
• Another is the end of the fight against Ou Di Wan Lee. The student fighting him performs the technique taught last minute by the Shifu (which you can also use once during the battle itself). And for the finishing blow that would fit perfectly in an epic kung-fu movie, the successor makes a slow motion spin kick that sends him flying off the table, breaking through his chair, and hitting his back against the gong. Killed on the spot.

Twilight of Edo Japan: The Infiltrator

• You don't necessarily have to rescue the hostage you are ordered to rescue, while going through the castle. What you're expected to do during a normal playthrough is to rescue him, then fight the Big Bad of the chapter — but you can skip directly to the Big Bad. If you do so, he rescues you instead! Furthermore, The Reveal of who the Prisoner is also counts; he is Sakamoto Ryōma, a national hero of Japan who helped lead the way for Japan to become more industrialized and democratic.
• The Watanabe father gets one before he dies by dodging sword strikes while in a small space. And said attacker was below him. In the remake, killing the Retainer who would kill Watanabe's father has them succeed in their mission and escape the castle, and choosing to abort the mission reveals they're fine and well.

Wild West: The Wanderer

• Mad Dog hunts Sundown mercilessly. But when they're about to have their supposedly-climactic duel at the beginning, both immediately call it off at the same time to gun down two Crazy Bunch members in hiding, then Mad Dog agrees to put his hunt on hold until Success has been defended. In one of the two endings of the chapter, when Sundown refuses the fight and waits for death, he refuses to shoot a defenseless person and lets him go.
  • The hunt starts again later, but Sundown's recovered his will to live and fights back.
  • And while Mad Dog has still lost his horse from before, he managed to catch and tame the O. Dio horse before attempting to catch Sundown again. Too bad he loses O. Dio just as quickly from Sundown's reins-shooting trick.
• If you so choose, you can forgo setting any of the traps. This means you fight a dozen fully armed, dangerous men or ghosts with only two guys, Spaghetti Western style — and WIN.

Present Day: The Strongest

• When Odie O'Bright tells Masaru how he killed all the fighters Masaru had defeated and learned from in cold blood, Masaru declares that Odie didn't know what a fight was and that he would use the masters' powers to end Odie for his crimes.
  Masaru: And with my own... righteous fury— ("Megalomania" starts blaring) I WILL END YOU!
  • Before this, Masaru's Shut Up, Hannibal! is worth mentioning in itself after Odie introduces himself as the "Greatest Warrior".
  Masaru: You... You son of a bitch. A warrior? Like HELL you are! You're nothing but a cold-blooded murderer!
• In the end, despite Odie's ominous warning that not following his method will lead to Masaru's position under threat, he welcomes his first ever challenger with a smile, knowing that he's attained his dream for now and will maintain it fairly.

Near Future: The Outsider

• The remake's opening song for this chapter ("Go! Go! Steel Titan!") is filled with all the 80s-90s anime cheese a player could hope for. The fact it can actually pass as an anime opening to some degree shows just how much potential the HD-2D aesthetic truly holds. What started with Bravely Default and conceptualized with Octopath Traveler is now really hitting its stride in terms of art style; SNES-style pixel art never went out of style, and has been refined into something truly wonderful in all its glory.
• Akira getting Steel Titan to move completely and then the theme song starts up. The player will then quite possibly go through a Theme Music Power-Up in real life, it's that good. And then you fight the entire friggin' Japanese army!
  Akira: (while a golden glow of psychic power covers him) But nothing's impossible...when you're too stubborn to surrender!
  • Then there's Akira's Screw Destiny towards becoming liquefied fuel for Odeo.
  Akira: That thing's no god of mine! And I'm not melding with these freaks or anything else. Still with me? (golden glow returns as "Megalomania" starts blaring) THEN LET'S FINISH THIS, MATSU!
• Before that, Matsu takes a drug that amplifies his spiritual power, barges into the Steel Titan's cockpit, and manages, through sheer grit and force of will, to get it moving. And then he kicks a lot of ass before the overdose kills him and Akira has to take over.
• Matsu's "I'm the taiyaki guy!" ("I'm a local businessman!" in the remake) is pretty damned good, too. Notable because this is his introduction as a character.

Distant Future: The Mechanical Heart

• The three survivors all get one:
  • Darthe faces the Behemoth, the Final Fantasy monster that can one-hit-kill Cube and killed Huey and Rachel, with nothing more than a blaster. And wins!
  • When Rachel tries to kill herself and almost kills Cube in the process, Kato saves them. Also a part of the main Character Development thread of Cube progressively behaving like and being considered as a human.
  • And of course, Cube themself by defeating the Big Bad of the chapter. Even more so considering they had no fighting ability, and hacked the virtual reality in which the fight happens to give themself some fighting abilities — that they keep once back in the real world!

Middle Ages: The Lord of Dark

• After Uranus sees the pitiful shell of a man Hasshe has become, he angrily declares that "the hero is dead" and who they see before them is just a spineless coward. This causes Hasshe to reconsider and join the party.
• The moment Oersted stops being a Heroic Mime and proclaims his undying hatred of the world and everyone in it (using Odio's font, no less!). After all the horrible things that happened to him, slowly destroying everything he believed in, he finally snaps, and it is awesome.
  • This scene becomes even better in the remake. The addition of voice acting benefits Oersted's monologue to an insane degree, and it is capped off with "Fugue for the Lord of Dark", a brand-new, grander arrangement of Odio's theme.
• It's probably the most emotional scene in the entire game because in theory you know that it's probably a bad idea, but you just want those asshole villagers to get their comeuppance so badly.

Final Chapter: The Dominion of Hate

• In the remake, this chapter gets its own unique character selection screen, a hellish red vortex on a dark background with each character swirling around it on blue pedestals (except for Oersted, who gets a red one to signify that his version of this chapter will be very different). When you select anyone besides Oersted, the confirmation screen has the other heroes line up behind them in a row like the Badass Crew they will become, making it clear they will not be alone.
• Upon choosing your protagonist and landing in what the player knows is the ruins of Lucrece, wandering around with no one until you see a familiar face: One of the other protagonists. That's when you know everything's going to be alright and they're going to kick ass.
• Pretty much the whole of Oersted's version of the Final Chapter. You get to be the villain for once as you wipe out the heroes. His monologues at the start of the chapter and before each battle gave more of a feel to his perspective. As horrible as it is, Odio sells the idea in his speech as he begins to possess the villains of the other seven chapters.
  Oersted/Odio: "Rewrite the tale. Just so! Your statues seven are my ink and quill. With magic potent, singular... Pure hate! I'll take up arms. Assume the guise we share. For we are Odio... and we will win!"
  • The fact that you can CHOOSE Armageddon as a battle command◊ is a highlight. The music as everything is blown away is as awe-inspiring as it is horrific, and the remake includes a final image of the world igniting in flame before it cuts to credits.
    Oersted/Odio: Let All Creation Yield to My Command: Let Blinding White Subsume and Cleanse the Slate
• Alethea’s atonement. After expressing utter shame and disgust over her past actions, she begs the heroes to stop what Oersted has become and revealed that she has the power to teleport everyone out of the Mind Dungeon. Truly an epic and powerful act of redemption.
  • Odio thought that trapping her and the rest of the souls there would leave them utterly helpless, but Alethea is the only one who has the power to fight back against him, even indirectly, and chooses to assist the heroes in stopping him in order to fix her mistakes. Also counts as a massive heartwarming moment, showing that Alethea does truly feel remorse and is no longer blaming Oersted for her choice to off herself, but rather she knows herself to be the only one responsible (rather than showing signs of denial like Streibough) and does the right thing for the heroes — she still cares about him!
• And what about seven people from different eras, that never met each other, and even fight between themselves at the beginning, defeating the God of Hatred!! Bonus points for the fact that at least four of them (Pogo, the Earthen Heart inheritor, Oboro, and the Sundown Kid) should logically have extreme difficulty meaningfully communicating due to their wildly disparate eras of origin (prehistory, ancient China, feudal Japan, and the American Wild West).
• The overall ending itself can count as an awesome ending, simply the thought of the seven heroes running together at sunrise as montages of their actions and the aftermath of their quests, accompanied by a medley of their personal themes, is just awesome.
• The Boss Rush that precedes the Golden Ending, especially if you've made sure to find all the characters and gone through their dungeons during the final chapter. Each character once again faces the Odio incarnation they battled in their own eras, except this time, they have all the experience and training they achieved during their journey through time, and the Villain Forgot to Level Grind! As such, what was once a terrifying enemy is now almost laughable. The Earthen Heart Inheritor and Masaru can fell Ou Di Wan Lee and Odie O'Bright with a single blow, Sundown can kill O. Dio with a single shot from his gun, and Pogo ends up turning Odo into dino-KFC again without the help of his best friend and soon-to-be wed wife, because as strong as they were, now they are NOTHING! Even better, instead of Megalomania, the characters' respective battle themes play in these fights. They aren't just overpowering Odio's many forms in terms of stats, they're overpowering him in the soundtrack as well! At the beginning of all this, your chosen main protagonist (unless you picked Pogo or Cube) says something to the effect of that no matter what happens, they and the other protagonists will be victorious and return home.
• Oersted's speech before the final battle and the true ending.
• In the remake, there's a True Final Boss in Odio himself as he forcibly takes control and unleashes his ultimate form, Sin of Odio. After you beat him, he unleashes an attack called Absolute Condemnation that strikes the four heroes you chose down. Everything looks bleak... until the three you didn't choose come in to save the day! This leads to all seven heroes helping to take down Odio, and all the while as you're battling him, you hear Oersted trying to break free of Odio's thrall... until finally, when all seven heroes are struck down once again, Oersted literally and figuratively breaks free from his hatred to land the final attack on Odio as a powerful act of redemption, finally becoming the hero he could've been in the end.
• Oersted's words as he frees himself are an awesome Call-Back to Hasshe's dying words, too; Hasshe had given up on humanity, but remained the hero of Lucrece to the end of his life because he knew that, when people asked for someone to help them, he'd faithfully answer 'I will.' All seven heroes hit Odio with everything they had, freeing Oersted, but needed just a little more damage to finish the creature off. And in their moment of need…
  Oersted: I am...I must...I will!
• The final sendoff for Oersted is great, with each character having their own unique spin on giving Oersted a final lesson before he dies redeemed.
  • A small, understated one for the current Earthen Heart Master is the stance they take before speaking to Oersted; it should look very familiar, because it was the patient, folded hands stance the Shifu always took with his students. Somewhere deep down, each of them finally realize they have truly become the successor to their martial art.
  • Masaru gets a great one, too, establishing he understands that there's more to being the best than being 'the strongest'; muscles will wither one day, but a spirit can stay passionate and driven until the very end. His speech also serves as one final 'screw you' to Odie; Odie was undeniably powerful, and proved as much beating down the same masters Masaru did, but his power wasn't going to take him anywhere. His only reason to exist was to kill and grow stronger, something that would have failed Odie when he became old and frail. For all of his proselytizing to Masaru about the meaning of strength, Masaru truly understood far more than Odie ever could. Additionally, he manages to prove Odie's claims that he would have to kill wrong. Oersted only dies because he went all out and burned himself down; as the protagonist, Masaru can absolutely say nuts to finishing Oersted off — and doing so is what allows Masaru to get back home in the end. When Masaru was faced with the choice to definitively end Odio's scourge for good at the cost of a man's life or give that man a chance at redemption, he chose redemption.
  • While the rest of the cast is mostly calm as they speak with Oersted, Akira is furious. Grabbing Oersted by the collar, Akira lays into him for what he's done, pointing out that even if what happened to him was unfair, it was Oersted's own choice to become the Lord of Dark.
    Akira: Know what your problem is? You blamed everyone else. Said it was them or gods or fate that made you what you are. But it was you! Just you! Yeah, people can suck. We can be selfish — look out only for ourselves. But if you focus only on the bad — judge them at their worst, well... You've already made up your mind, haven't you? Everything else is just an excuse!
    Oersted: ...Aye... Maybe so. I sought out nothing good. Expecting guilt... And just cause to condemn...

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