It’s definitely one of the episodes you don’t want to ignore. Because that also sounds like Ignis.

Final Fantasy XV: Episode Ignis continues the trend of the DLC episodes for Final Fantasy XV, in that they’re improving with each one. With solid combat that adds a strong backbone for the whole adventure, Ignis engages in an emotional mission to try and save the boy who would be king, Noctis. While the gameplay may stutter and stumble, there is more than enough of a grand finale to leave you emotionally wrought and makes it one of the strongest installments to the Final Fantasy XV story so far.

During Final Fantasy XV, Noctis convinces the mayor of a city to allow the gang to perform an arcane ritual that summons a wrathful god, that has a penchant almost exclusively for destruction, who sleeps in the waters below the city. Needless to say, what with the heavy presence of Niflheim forces, the summoning of an angry god doesn’t quite go as the faux pop group intended and a large scale confrontation happens between the people of Altissia, Niflheim, the angry sea serpent and Noctis and his gang. You may remember that Noctis activates his hidden Saiyan blood, possibly from his mother’s side, and puts a stop to a god with, what can only be described as, surface to air missiles made of swords. I’ve gone into all this detail of setting the scene because our DLC episode takes place moments after Noctis passes out, leaving his retainers to try and retrieve his body.

Ignis ends up separated from Prompto and Gladio and finds himself alone as he has to race around the city searching for a means of reaching his king. For the most part, this DLC chunk primarily entails running around and beating up groups of Niflheim troops in the hopes of reclaiming districts of the city. That’s the city that was more or less almost entirely destroyed by what can only be described as a battle between actual gods taking place on it. The city of Altissia is a sprawling nightmare of small pathways and back alleys that will probably leave even a local confused and lost, but there’s little to fear as Ignis manages to get his hand on a grapple hook, allowing for you to take to the skies, or at least the rooftops, and never touch the dirty floor ever again.

The grapple hook helps make the whole procedure a lot smoother as you don’t have to worry too much about finding a map point and working out if you take the second right turn or the third, which isn’t entirely useful when you’re engaged in battles of liberation and also trying to save the life of your reason to live, being Noctis. If you ignore the fact that Ignis definitely has better things to do than run around a city at his own leisure, killing mechanised troops and trying to find letters between inhabitants of Altissia, then the combat and the whole area control aspect of the DLC is actually quite fun.

The combat in Episode Ignis is quite fast and involves swapping between different elemental attacks with Ignis’ daggers. Each element serving a different purpose with fire being geared towards intense one on one fights, ice involving large swinging attacks for area of effect damage that’s perfect for taking out large groups and finally lightning which is the most unruly and awkward to use as it’s exclusively a dash attack that will see you cutting through your foes with lightning speed. The only issue with the latter is that not only do you cut through your foe, you also travel a lot further than your foe and will often find yourself someways behind them, so it’s probably easier to just walk up to your foes and burn them alive.

All of this mixed with a variety of special finishing moves gives the combat a great feel that’ll have you darting between foes and maybe even using the grapple hook to engage in devastating takedowns that almost seems entirely out of character for Ignis, the cool, calm and collected member of the group which is one of the great things about a lot of the combat and extra activities that you can take part in, all while ignoring the plight of your would-be king.

The greatest part for Episode Ignis is the exploration of Ignis’ character and seeing him totally out of his element. Comparing it to the other episodes, Episode Gladiolus barely took the hunk of meat out of his comfort zone and most issues were solved by either flexing or shouting, Episode Prompto definitely played with the chocobo haired boy’s fears of abandonment that left a powerful image behind but these were elements previously seen in the main game itself, meanwhile with Episode Ignis you watch a man pushed well beyond his limits as Ignis, quite literally, lets his hair down and engages in tough and dirty fighting. He’s no longer the prim and proper, oddly British, King’s assistant.

He’s a man who frequently goes out of the frying pan and into an even bigger and hotter frying pan as obstacle after obstacle gets in his way and Ignis is left to face what feels like an entire army by himself, well not entirely by himself as sadly Ignis can’t stand the heat of the kitchen and ends up making one of the biggest mistakes ever made. To watch Ignis go so far as to team up with the worst character in Final Fantasy XV, Ravus, should show how haggard and how far this man will go to save those close to him, but instead just reminds everyone that Ravus exists.Regardless of grown man children ruining everyone’s party, Episode Ignis goes on with this constant feeling of being a high octane action film but with more emotions than grit. Grit isn’t a good cooking ingredient.

The revelations to Ignis’ story add the emotional bolt through the DLC that make the whole thing so impressive and possibly the best episode of DLC out of the three. By the end of it I was so emotionally ravaged by the whole thing as it had evoked similar feelings as the ending of the main Final Fantasy XV game itself. In fact, the plot of Episode Ignis unfolds in such a way that you’re called to relive some of the emotional scenes of the main game in a whole new light and, if you’re like me, you wont be prepared to go through that all over again.

Like most of Final Fantasy XV, the strongest part of Episode Ignis comes almost entirely from the characters themselves. The key part of Episode Ignis is the master chef himself as Ignis’ buttery biscuit base is stripped back for all to see a man pushed to the edge of reason. The game is definitely aware of how much of an emotional gut punch it’ll give you and doesn’t shy away from throwing one punch after the other into your bruised and battered torso. Where the heart is, in the gut. Much like Final Fantasy XV, Episode Ignis will sneak in the odd heart wrenching scene during it’s climax and credits at the exact moment where you feel like you may have finally recovered from the last one, not to mention the alternate endings that turn the whole story upside down.

Episode Ignis is the DLC episode that, so far, best represents the themes of Final Fantasy XV in their whole. With gameplay that’s strong enough to hold it up throughout the experience, but isn’t really anything to write home about, it battles Episode Prompto for being the best of the season pass content, with both lacking where the other is strong. Episode Ignis can feel a little disjointed with its direction as elements of gameplay are picked up and dropped with an overwhelming pace and the exploration of Altissia feels less like a part of the game and more like something for the player to keep themselves occupied in. Despite all this, the entire experience is an emotional spectacle that I’d highly recommend the episode if you loved the main game for the emotional appeal of its characters.