Augusta Tower



Augusta Tower is a location in Final Fantasy XIII-2, built by the Academy in 13 AF. In 300 AF, a timespace anomaly has thrown the tower into chaos and turned the interior into a maze.

Datalog
ACADEMY DATANET FILE

''Augusta Tower is the central information processing facility of the Academy. The entire edifice is occupied by the machinery of an artificial intelligence that possesses unprecedented processing power.''

The tower also houses the Proto fal'Cie Project, an ambitious plan to create a man-made fal'Cie.


 * Travel Guide: Augusta Tower

''Augusta Tower is the giant electronic brain of Academia. The AI mind that occupies the tower stores precious data and records from centuries ago that cannot be found anywhere else. Apparently, there are freelance data miners who do nothing but search the archives for new information discoveries.''
 * Area Information

''When the tower was first built, a number of galas and parties were held featuring the tower mascots, Augy and Towpy. When the tower was closed to the public the mascots were discarded, to the dismay of small children everywhere.''
 * From the Editor's Desk:

Story
After having discovered in Academia 400 AF that they were entombed in a tower at 200 AF for learning the "forbidden history", Serah, Mog, and Noel travel to that time to discover the truth. As they explore the tower, they find images of their time in Academia. They also discover various data logs about the Proto Fal'Cie project.

Serah, Noel, and Mog see Caius ascending the tower and are instantly suspicious. Serah and Noel both find the people within the tower seemingly lifeless and they encounter Alyssa Zaidelle near the main elevator. However, Alyssa then unveils that all of the people within the tower - including herself - are duplicates, holograms designed to look exactly like their original counterparts.

Presuming that Caius has business on the top floor, they ask the Alyssa duplicate to take them to the top floor. However, along the way, they are attacked by groups of enemies. As they fight, they see images of 13 AF which show that the AI in charge of the tower, as part of the Proto fal'Cie Project, rebelled against its creators and killed all of the staff in the tower - including the original Hope and Alyssa.

Afterwards, the AI created the fal'Cie Adam which in turn created the duplicates to cover up the incident and to kill any who found out the truth. After dispatching the monsters, they continue upward towards the top floor. When they reach the top, the two encounter the Yeul they countered in Oerba, who talks to Noel and Serah, revealing to them that Caius is immortal and retains memories of all of the timeline's events. As Noel and Serah step through the Time Gate to face the fal'Cie Adam, Yeul has a vision of a bright future before dying as Caius picks up her body and takes it away.

Noel and Serah end up in a junction between timelines, and there find Adam. They realize that the fal'Cie used the time junction to take control of the AI and instigate its own creation, making it a living paradox. After defeating it once, the fal'Cie regenerates itself by traveling back in time and negating its death. After fighting continuously, Serah yells at Hope about him making his machine. This outburst was recorded in an Oracle Drive in 13 AF and after seeing Noel and Serah fight it, Hope abandons the project, ending Adam's existence and stopping the fight. They then return to the Tower, then move on through the time gate to an alternate Academia in 4XX AF.

Areas
The Augusta Tower is a 52-floor high tower located presumably somewhere on Gran Pulse. It consists of the central lift which is used to move around various floors of the tower. Many rooms have rotary properties and computers.

{| width="100%"
 * width="50%"|

200 AF

 * width="50%"|

300 AF

 * 49th Floor
 * 50th Floor
 * 51st Floor
 * 52nd Floor
 * AI Nucleus
 * Top Floor
 * 12th Floor
 * 13th Floor
 * 14th Floor
 * 15th Floor
 * }
 * 14th Floor
 * 15th Floor
 * }

200 AF

 * Accessories


 * Monster Materials


 * Special

49th Floor

 * Zwerg Metrodroid
 * Luminous Puma
 * Flanitor
 * Thermadon

50th Floor

 * Orion, Vespid Soldier x2, Zwerg Metrodroid (Fixed)
 * Orion, Vespid Soldier x4 (Fixed)
 * Orion, Zwerg Metrodroid x4 (Fixed)

51st Floor

 * Orion
 * Flanitor
 * Vespid Soldier
 * Zwerg Metrodroid
 * Luminous Puma

52nd Floor

 * Orion
 * Dragoon
 * Flanitor
 * Greater Behemoth
 * Thermadon

Top Floor

 * Proto fal'Cie Adam, Left Manipulator, Right Manipulator (Boss)

12th Floor

 * Flanborg
 * Flanitor
 * Thexteron

13th Floor

 * Orion
 * Dragoon
 * Flanborg
 * Flanitor
 * Thexteron

14th Floor

 * Flanborg
 * Flanitor
 * Thexteron

15th Floor

 * Flanborg
 * Flanitor
 * Thexteron

Development
Motomu Toriyama, director of Final Fantasy XIII, has explained that the developers believe in adding a complex dungeon in the middle of the storyline to act both as a trial and a story turning point. Augusta Tower was designed for this purpose in Final Fantasy XIII-2, as a futuristic dungeon peppered with puzzles. The player has to search the whole Historia Crux to access the heart of the tower making it a challenge.

The Final Fantasy XIII-2 Ultimania Omega producer and director interview reveals scrapped plans for a Hope DLC scenario episode, involving a journey through the Augusta Tower. Players would have ventured through the tower, completing a number of Live Triggers as they did. The aim of the DLC was to stop Alyssa from killing Hope and based on player's Live Trigger choices, the player would have either continued the game or receive a Game Over. While this scenario was scrapped from the game, it was basis for a chapter in Final Fantasy XIII-2 Fragments After.

Music
"Augusta Tower" composed by Mitsuto Suzuki, plays as the location theme for the Tower. A remixed version of the song titled "Augusta Tower -Aggressive Mix-" plays whenever enemies are present. In Augusta Tower 200 AF, "Eclipse" also plays after a certain part in the game.

Etymology
Augusta is a feminine form of the name of the Roman Emperor Augustus, and is also part of the original Latin names of many ancient places named after him.

Trivia

 * If one chooses to do an optional side quest in the Bresha Ruins 5 AF to collect research notes for a scientist in the Academy, it is revealed that the notes contain detailed plans for both the Tower and the duplicates, which the scientist denies writing and is convinced the notes are from the future. This implies that the very existence of Augusta Tower may be either a paradox or a stable time loop.