Final Fantasy VIII Disc 3

Lunar Gate

Back to Esthar

When you regain consciousness, you will be accosted by the welcome committee. Eventually, Rinoa will be left in capable hands. I’m still not convinced I know what the doc is capable of, but that’s a whole different issue. You are now free to roam about the country. Talk to the Presidential Aide here and he’ll tell you to head to the Lunar Gate. It turns out Ellone is in space. You would not believe how long it took me to figure that out the first time I played. I didn’t talk to him the first time around. You can also play cards against Odine to get the Ward Card. Leave the room and look at the painting over the doorway to the room you were just in. Doesn’t that look ? :)

To get to the Lunar Gate, you’re going to need to rent a car, but we really want to explore the city in the meantime. Head to the car rental place, but be sure to stop off in the Shopping Mall first:

From the presidential hallway outside the room where you left Rinoa, head right. Remember this screen as it’s where the Queen of Cards will end up if she ever says she’s heading to Esthar. Sit on the elevator seat, select yes when asked to leave palace, and watch the cool CG. (Oh, hey - they have a protective bubble now!) Once outside the palace, head down go right.

There’s another one of those floating seat things. This is a tube junction. When you get to the tube junction, take the “City Entrance via Shopping Mall” route. When you get to the mall, get off the lift - I promise you won’t regret it. Touch the screen to visit each store. Some of the stores will give you a gift the first time you visit, so go back to them a second time.

Optional: Unlock Johnny’s Shop

If Johnny’s Shop is closed, keep trying and it will eventually be open. Once unlocked, you can get back here any time from the menu. If you’ve got the , , , and abilities learned, you can essentially farm Gil now:

Buy 100 and
Recovery-Med Refine those into Mega-Potions
Sell back to the shop
Repeat as desired.

Optional: Chery’s Shop

You can get a free here. Just try to enter the shop a bunch of times. If you missed a while playing cards in the Galbadia Prison, you NEED this one. The Guardian Force Overview page ends with an optimal Grouping that you can refer to at any time. As discussed during the escape from Galbadia Prison, put your first on , your second on (after erasing with an Amnesia Green), and your third on (again, erase first).

When you are ready to continue, just get back on the transport seat and select To City Entrance. When you get off the tube, follow the big yellow triangle that points down, not the small flashing one pointing up, and examine the panel to the left of the rent-a-car access ramp. Select Rent Car. Trust me, it’s worth it.

Once you are outside the city, drive forward until that road ends, then turn right. Take the second left and you should be pointed directly toward the lab where Lunatic Pandora was. Head south from there to go to the Lunar Gate. If you get lost, press Select and pull up your map.

Area Enemies: Esthar Continent Travel

Enemy	Location	Card / Rare Card	Useful Draws
Malboro	Esthar continent travel	Malboro Card / Tonberry King Card	Lv 1-19: Bio; Lv 20-29: Bio, Demi; Lv 30+: Bio, Demi, Quake

The area around here is crawling with Malboro enemies, and they’re not a lot of fun to fight. If you have to go on foot, consider unless you’re having Edea help level up your . If you can’t use , make sure one character has and junction Pain, Confuse, Berserk, and Sleep. Junction as well, if possible, to prevent Slow.

Doomtrain Side Quest Note

This is a good chance to obtain the . After leaving the city, head east by southeast until you arrive at Lunatic Pandora. Turn south and you should see the half U-shaped structure of the Lunar Gate. Head south by southwest and you’ll come to Tear’s Point. Enter Tear’s Point, go forward two screens and pick up Solomon’s Ring on the ground. If you have at least 6 , at least 6 , and at least 6 items, you can use it and call .

His / skills are great, and his comes in handy. Also, lets you refine Attribute-Up items from the cool stuff you can . In other words, if you have him, and like playing the , you can get seriously good characters at fairly low levels. Really cool stuff! starts out with status attack/defense junctions, so I usually junction him to whoever has the Shiva-Diablos-Pandemona combination. Since and also have Status Def junctions, this allows all three characters to defend against various status conditions, like Confuse, instant death, etc.

Optimizing GF Distribution with Doomtrain

Group 1: Siren, Carbuncle, Leviathan, Ifrit

Group 2: Quetz, Brothers, Alexander, Tonberry, Cerberus

Group 3: Shiva, Diablos, Pandemona, Doomtrain

Strategy: Adds the big status and elemental defense package to the group that already has the Shiva-Diablos-Pandemona shell.

Ability Priority: Forbid Med-RF, ST-Def-Jx4, Elem-Defx4, Auto-Shell, Boost, Darkside. Full list.

Lunar Gate

Hit select and check your map, which should now contain the location of all structures in Esthar. When you arrive at the Lunar Gate, enter the building, follow the lady and enter the tube. Choose “I’ll do whatever it takes.” You have the choice to trust Zell or not, but the outcome will be the same regardless of what you choose, so you might as well be nice. I mean, that was my choice. You can choose to be a jerk to Zell if you want. It’s probably not that far out of character for Squall, I suppose.

You’re going to have to choose a party here. I like the Zell-Edea-Irvine group. This group should get all junctions, not the Squall-Rinoa-X group. I like to send Selphie along with Squall, FWIW. Once you’ve chosen the party, have Squall follow the third wheel through the elevator door. Watch the cool CG and then move the remaining characters outside.

Low-Level Route

This is the stronger version of the Edea AP trick from the last page. Because Edea is temporary, she can eat the EXP while your permanent party stays low. KO the other two characters, let Edea do the work, and use the AP to push and toward the high-value abilities you actually care about. If you have Edea level up and up to level 100, that unlocks:

ability to refine 100x into 1x ,
ability to refine 100x into 1x Trial,

When you’re ready to advance the story, return to your car at the Lunar Gate (you have to be on the world map to get in your car), and drive back to the city center of Esthar city (not just onto a part of the map.)

Back to the City

From the City Entrance where the big yellow triangle is, head left two screens, and down one. Draw Quake if you want, then talk to the research assistant and tell him yes, you want to talk to the doctor. Follow him, and sit on the elevator seat. When it stops go through the door in front of you and talk to the doctor.

The short version is this: you want to try and jump onto Lunatic Pandora as it is crossing over the city. There are three places where you can do that. You have 20 minutes to complete the mission, or it’s game over. See below for directions to get to the first point within the 5 minutes allotted. When you have your instructions you can leave. Feel free to talk to him if you like lots of background information.

Junction before leaving. Since this is a timed event, is really a must here. Leave the laboratory and head for the first contact point:

Timed route to Lunatic Pandora
Step	Action
1	On the screen where you exit from the lab, head right to the main drag. Meaning, get on the main drag; don’t go right one screen.
2	Go left.
3	Go straight to the upper-left corner of the screen.
4	Go straight, not left, at the next fork.
5	Go right, not straight, at the next fork.
6	Follow the road to the right.
7	Follow the road to the right. You appear at the top-left corner of the screen here; it’s kinda hard to see your guys, though.
8	When you see two Esthar soldiers looking at a blue car, stop and wait at the upper edge of the screen. I got here at 18:40 on the clock.
9	Wait for Lunatic Pandora to show up. It will show up when the timer hits exactly 15:00.

Lunatic Pandora

When Lunatic Pandora shows up, defeat the soldiers at the door, and you will automatically jump in. You should enter Lunatic Pandora toward the base. There are a lot of dead ends and other annoyances here, so just stick to the path described below to get through with the least headache.

Area Enemies: Lunatic Pandora First Visit

Enemy	Location	Card / Rare Card	Useful Draws
Elite Soldier	Lunatic Pandora: first visit	- / -	Lv 1-19: Fire, Thunder, Blizzard, Scan; Lv 20-29: Fira, Thundara, Blizzara, Scan; Lv 30+: Firaga, Thundaga, Blizzaga, Dispel
G-Soldier	Lunatic Pandora: first visit	- / -	Lv 1-19: Fire, Thunder, Blizzard, Cure; Lv 20-29: Fira, Thundara, Blizzara, Cura; Lv 30+: Firaga, Thundaga, Blizzaga, Curaga
GIM52A	Lunatic Pandora: first visit	- / -	Lv 1-19: Haste, Slow; Lv 20-29: Haste, Slow, Dispel; Lv 30+: Haste, Slow, Esuna, Dispel
SAM08G	Lunatic Pandora: first visit	SAM08G Card / X-ATM092 Card	Lv 1-19: Shell, Protect; Lv 20-29: Shell, Protect, Life; Lv 30+: Shell, Protect, Reflect, Life

Lunatic Pandora first visit route
Step	Action
1	Draw Meteor if you want, and head up the stairs.
2	At the top of the stairs are three elevators, conveniently labeled Elevator I, II, and III. Draw Curaga if you want or need to, then take number 3, on the far right.
3	When the elevator stops, head down the stairs at the right and bottom of the screen, then take the ladder. You should end up at a Confuse draw point.
4	To the right is a LuvLuvG, if you did the whole Laguna-picks-up-and-loses-the-key thing earlier.
5	From there, head left past the boulder and check each of the rooms.
6	Get the cool stuff. My rooms had a in the far right, a Silence draw point in the middle, and a in the far left.
7	Continue left. On your way, be sure to pick up .
8	When you get to the little room, draw Ultima unless you have all your guys full of it.
9	Head back right a few screens, up the ladder, and back down the elevator. Because I had been fighting some battles for a while and had gotten paid by Garden, I was able to head straight down from Elevator 2 and get another hit at the Meteor draw point.
10	Go to elevator number 1 this time, and draw Holy if you need to, then head left around the corridor. You can draw Holy across from the elevator. As you go around the corridor, look for a small cave on the right. There will be a inside.
11	At the fork in the road, head straight, and then you will be accosted by something you could probably beat, but you aren’t given the chance to figure it out.
12	After Zell orders the retreat, watch some CG and eventually you will be Squall again.