@aran thinking again about some of my adventures in fan translation
there's a bit in Breath of Fire 2 where the game tries to clue you towards finding a guy so you can take his place in a tournament
i gave my WIP to a friend to test, and he got stuck at that part, because the hint was too broad - you're told about the guy, but you're not given enough context to intuit why that information is important
i fixed it with a simple addition to the tune of "if you're not him, you're not getting in!"
@aran there is an element of abstract thought this puzzle demands that i don't think the game clues quite well enough; it hints that there is some connection between the two passcodes and the antagonist's thoughts/motivations, but not to the alphanumeric cipher
i don't know what the finished translation patch goes with but i do remember offering some suggestions hinting a bit more explicitly at the passcode being a cipher