**NOTES & CORRECTIONS** - Around 9:50, it's supposed to say "Phaethon is the SON of the Greek solar deity Helios" and I accidentally cut a couple of words out when I was cutting out an awkward pause and missed it in the review. Sorry about that!
It's also good to note that Phaeton's little stroll with the chariot resulted in the Earth having unhabitable areas (deserts and frozen wastelands) just like what Hollows are.
Correction: the public security weren’t after the cunning hares but the red fang gang. It was actually the cunning hares that lead public security to the red fang gang.
Little correction. The Cunning Hares didn't call public security and the press, the called Belobog industries who jumped at the chance to utterly screw up Vision (and do the right thing, Koleda is nice like that, but schadenfreude was definitely the strongest motivator). Nicole herself doesn't have the pull to get such a response by herself.
Nicole refusing to hand Phaethon over to the authorities to save herself was the first moment the story really started to move me. From then on I was 100% invested in the characters and the story as a whole.
@@enixraghunath703 In one of the interaction you can have with her is like she ask you to buy ramen for you and her togo. When you talk to General Chop he talk about how Nicole like would come back repeatedly for coupons that were meant for 1 per person. Each time she come back she change her look slightly like wearing sun glasses or let her hair down. Which obviously General Chop knows its her lol. But he also say he has no problem with it because he would often like buy ramen for a bunch of orphan kids. So ya she really does have heart of gold and as part of the Cunning Hares pepega af XD
Same. I mostly picked ZZZ up with the expectation that I would play it alongside a friend who was excited about it for a month or two and then drop it once I got bored of it. I had already realized that I would definitely be playing the game longer than I had anticipated (the gameplay is really fun) but once I saw that I was just like “dammit, now I’m invested”. So I’m most likely in this for the long run now.
One thing to note from the "world building basics" part of the video, the term Proxy is specifically for the illegal guides. Licensed "Proxies" are along with combat agents also called 'Investigators' if they're attached to HAND, PUBSEC or the HIA. This can be noted when you are become a civilian contractor in the explorations and investigation of Hollow Zero. Not once are you refered to as proxy.
@@tysej4 yes that also made me raise my brow in confusion. I mean I still don't completely understand what MC does with the hollow investigation people as the civilian contractor, what is expected of them and all that. The way proxies usually operate also leaves me confused, but it seems fair that they are the middle men that provide carrots to agents, which they hire to complete the missions. And Phaethon just happen to also be in the hollow through their bangboo to directly chat with the agents, which made possible by HDD and gives them a competitive advantage... Though that interpretation is somewhat at odds with solider 11 quest, where we are merely pretending to be Phaethon, but still use our full functionality?
@@Fabelaz In that job you are hired as a proxy, you were hired through interknot if I recall. That said the fact that you use the HDD instead of entering yourself as other proxies do is a bit of a continuity error. That said I doubt S11 knows much about how proxies operate.
i got interested after the introduction of the Victoria Household. I skipped everything before, the dialogue is terribly pace( despite the very cool cutscenes).
I got into this game because of the Cunning Hares crew. I just really love the bunch of dummies with a heart of gold. I really like the story so far too. It comes across as a Saturday Morning Cartoon or a Sitcom with its chill comedic vibes, but you can tell there is deeper lore at play that will eventually come out and hit us like a freight train.
So far ZZZ has had, in my opinion, the best told story in terms of characterization and importance of information. The dialogue isn't beyond bloated like Genshin and HSR, except for some slogs in the TV mode. However, the relationships the characters have with you, as Phaethon, and the relationships they have with each other feel fluid and really do feel like it matters that we're meeting all of these people.
Probably because unlike Genshin and HSR where we are always moving on to a new Region or Planet, ZZZ will largely take place in a fixed place (New Eridu) with a recurring cast of characters. Genshin also has this as everyone lives on the same continent but outside of Events you usually won't see characters outside their regions.
One thing to note about illegally entering hollows is that in koledas story, she mentions how her company noticed a new hollow springing up in a nearby school while they were doing renovations on it. It was apparently small enough and in a remote enough part of the city that the HIA didnt actually notice it. The principal took notice of this and decided to allow an illegal mining operation for ether crystals(given theyre a power source, imagine if you tried doing a fracking operation in a residental district for a little extra cash). The issue with doing this is apparently it raises ether activity and increases its chances of growing. You can reverse and even completely remove a hollow, but small enough hollows seem to have a problem of growing if too much noise or combat happens, which is probably why the HIA is so intent on ensuring everyone who goes into a hollow has a licence, because a few thugs trying to make a little cash can be responsible for dosens of deaths before the HIA even notices a hollow exists.
While this is true for the extremely small ones, for the bigger ones most activity inside of it seems to help weaken it (as of a quite early inter-knot post), with the primary reason for it being illegal to enter being that TOPS wishes to control the resources that can be gained from hollows.
This is the first gacha game where I’m reading everything and not skipping anything. I really vibe with ZZZ’s aesthetics, style, music and the story so far. Also love the combat and characters.
@@CrossShade8144 slight clarification, that's 18 not Eous, Eous has either a 01 or 00 on their scarf, 18 is the bangboo at the counter of the video store
Yippee, a nice summary that was easy to digest and covered all important plot points without making it overwhelming. Thank you Ashikai! (Oh and here is my obligtory "hi!" as a budding scholar! 😂❤)
I've been enjoying the story a lot more than I thought I would. Yes, the game starts out slow as it eases you into its story and gameplay, but I'm in Chapter 2 now and it feels like I'm getting the pay off. Love your insights into the story so far, especially the little details I missed.
About the siblings' ages, I noticed if you check the ice cream container at the convince store, Belle says "All I had to do was sulk when we were little, and Wise used to buy me one". Obviously little isn't the most exact and it might say something different when you pick play as Wise, but I'd say it's still something worth mentioning about Wise and Belle being very young when the old capital fell.
The recent negativity against ZZZ has really been confusing me, so thanks for this summary. A lot of people keep saying that the story isn't well written or is too boring, but frankly I think they're confusing "not well-written" with "not as captivating upfront as Genshin or Star Rail" Hoyo's already said ZZZ's supposed to be more of a laid back game, and this summary has pointed out that there's still gonna be some deep lore, so I think all the negativity is pretty unjustified.
6:36 THANK YOU FOR THE EXPLANATION!!! Ive genuinely been so confused what was different about hollow exploration once Fairy joined aside from her sometimes commenting instead of the support sibling, from the in-game explanation it seemed like there shoukd have been something new but it seemed like it all was in the off-screen calculating data that the siblings must have been doing, so no functional change in what we experienced and we were just told Fairy was incredible. The Carrot not being on a time limit makes sense for why it seemed exactly the same gameplay but still has a massive narrative impact, theres actual instances where not having her would have left everyone with much much more limited options That said, Im still a bit lost on why there needs to be a human in between Fairy and the people in need of a Proxy if shes this capable and can talk to them and adapt on the fly and everything, but there wouldnt be a story if the siblings werent involved so if there IS no explanation i can suspend my disbelief.
I'm a big Star Rail player but ZZZ quickly supplanted it as my number one game. Love the character designs and the story has me hooked so far. Victoria Housekeeping for life!
Two minor corrections: Firstly, Investigator and Proxy seem to be titles for the same job. The way the narrative and dialogue has treated things thus far suggests that Proxy is the term for an illegal Investigator. Secondly, Anby mentions more than once that the Hollow from the prologue is a Companion Hollow. Companion Hollows are like buds off of existing Hollows, in this one's case it's a bud from the Cretan Hollow (one of the major Hollows). If I remember right, the news broadcast at the start of the game mentions that Public Security's operation on Fourteenth Street (the manhunt for the Red Fang Gang after their theft of the strongbox from the White Star Institute) had been disrupted by the recent appearance of a Hollow. That's my evidence for the Hollow from the prologue not being the Cretan Hollow itself.
Perfect. Found myself skipping early story due to a bit of rerolling, then skipping bits of the story due to kind of just wanting to unlock things. And now I'm finally at a place where the town and the characters are kind of charming and the vibe is great and I'm loving it a lot but I wish I knew how I got here. This video is exactly what I needed
I'm glad for all the detail, because this game definitely isn't my kind of thing, so I won't be playing it myself. But I'm still really intrigued by the story of it.
tbh i never really wanted to play zzz, but seeing ashikai so excited about it made me download it. now its like one of my favorite games so thanks ashikai!!
Thanks for breaking down the story. Not sure if I'm stupid or if I was just too distracted while playing, but I had no f*cking clue about what was going on plot-wise
I sincerely appreciate these recaps because I have a hard time keeping up with the unvoiced content and like super secret stuff. So I get to enjoy the parts that draw me in then have a reason to listen and learn more about a world I enjoy while doing dailies and stuff.. 🎉
I was going to do a lore recap as well but your video was so informative and top notch! I shall direct my viewers to this video! Super easy to understand~ Hope to see more as the the story progresses!
Phaethon is Helios' son, who bites off more than he can chew in taking the solar chariot out for a spin, and does so much damage to the earth that Zeus blasts him.
another thing i love about this game's story is that, the ordeal in chapter 1 is still continuing as we deal with chapter 2 and 3, which is the vision corp lawsuit. and if we pay attention, chapter 2 also has something to do with vision! so even if it seems like we're jumping to different ordeals, turns out it's still a linear plot!! isn't that amazing?!
@ashikai I just wanted to say thank you for the high quality recap and analysis. I’m a huge Hoyoverse fan so it’s nice to be able to stay up to date regarding lore and content.
as much as ive been having with the combat and tv mode... it's the lore and stories thats kept me playing. It's so good imo, and this is coming from someone who normally doesn't pay attention to game stories or just skips them entirely.
Great recap! I cant wait to see what happens with the story and if in the future, Hollow Zero eats up New Eridu! That'll be so insane! Or maybe the professor was in Hollow Zero for so long, he literally becomes the biggest Ethereal on the planet and is treated like some super boss fight!
Thank you for covering it ❤ I am in love with the game, and it’s disheartening to see how negative the reception is among the larger CCs. I hope people warm up to it over time
Hopefully ashikai sticks with Zzz despite peoples criticism I think it's a decent and comfy game both gameplay and story wise. Would love to see future lore content.
I’m so happy you are covering this game I haven’t been able to watch you for like a year because I got burnt out of genshin and haven’t started Fontaine quest line yet
I’m still waiting on the part where Nero gets the Devil Bringer and Dante gets impaled but I’m sure that’s coming in 2.0 Keep up the great work y’all, love your content
After getting this summary, the game is like this manhuas about hunters and dungeons, and mining of the materials, a guild (HIA), and the ranking of mobs (in this case, ethereals c/o the White Star Institute). Got me more excited when I looked at it in that perspective. Waiting for the Kiana to be released haha!
Ashikai: I'm going to assume you've already played through the events Me: I wasn't even planning to play but I watched one video with a brief summary of the story and am now curious, so, another perspective seems cool
![[1.0 ZZZ] Prologue and Chapter 001 Story Breakdown - Zenless Zone Zero Lore](/img/logo.svg){kind=logo}
