Transcript

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Hello and welcome back to the Gaming Backlog Book Club. We are here to chat about Prince of the Lost Crown. Up until we finished the Sacred Archives biome or section of the game, I suppose it’s finished everything we could do up until this point because it looks like at least looking at the map, there are some pieces that were still grayed out on my end.

And reminder, we do go into spoilers here and there. So to avoid that, start another episode, play along and come back to this one once you’re caught up.

Well, after our previous segment there, getting the bow in the forest and coming back to the haven, you know, on the way to the next area, now that we had access to that bow and could reconstruct the goddess statue, there’s a tablet talking about Jahandar or Jahandar, and apologies if I’m mispronouncing that. I tend to approach words in languages I don’t know with pronunciation from Spanish, which I do speak whenever the word structure looks like it could very much fit into the Spanish language.

Anyway, I saw the tablet and thought, sweet, another piece of mythology and lord of this world.

And honestly, I was really loving how much we’ve already gotten out of relatively little time we’ve spent with this game in terms of both mythology and lore.

[00:01:22] Speaker B: Yeah, we’ve gotten a good amount and

[00:01:25] Speaker A: so we’ve reached this one and like those sort of the tablets of information. So you read this description of Jahandar, which right away mentions that he has the body of a lion, the face of a human, and the tail of a scorpion. And I realized this is the body, the. Sorry, the boss that is very prominently featured in most of the trailers and reviews I had seen when the game was coming up on release and then was available.

[00:01:48] Speaker B: Yep, same here.

[00:01:49] Speaker A: You recall that too.

[00:01:51] Speaker B: Yeah, I definitely recall that.

[00:01:53] Speaker A: And so I was waiting. Like I read this thing, I realized what that was and I was waiting and wondering in anticipation for when I would come across it.

And of course it’s an early game boss, so I didn’t expect a major, major challenge that I would spend hours and hours on. But it’s always fun to come across something you recognize. And it didn’t disappoint.

But more on that in a sec. So what else was funny is that it was very soon after.

But the Lore tablet also mentioned Kaheva, the royal sword, which sounds like it would be a fun weapon to wield as a pickup later and also attach the sacred fire, which would be sweet to throw us fireballs or something if we Gain access to magic abilities. No guarantees there. I haven’t heard anything about that, but I also haven’t looked up anything really. So it would be cool to throw fire around.

[00:02:44] Speaker B: That’d be a cool perk. That would be. Yeah.

[00:02:47] Speaker A: And you know, I was also surprised that this legend said the young king Darius locked up Jahandar instead of kicking it out or killing it, even though it killed 500 warriors.

Big mistake if you ask me. But I guess it explains why we have to fight him.

[00:03:03] Speaker B: Yep, exactly.

[00:03:06] Speaker A: And because of this, the fact that he, you know, was able to tame it and lock it up, Darius was named the king of kings.

And yeah, I haven’t had the chance to research and dig into this, but I look forward to finding out more about this king soon, hopefully.

[00:03:21] Speaker B: Well, I’m sure we’ll learn more.

[00:03:24] Speaker A: And I did see actually a number of other Darius related lore tablets around as well. But yeah, I was expecting this to be like the intro to this section. This tablet talking about Jahandar, like building up anticipation around this boss that we’re going to fight. And we had like 20 to 40 minutes to maybe an hour of exploration to do until we get there. And then I looked at the map and saw this giant room right above us and didn’t have to wait long, huh?

[00:03:51] Speaker B: No, we did not.

What, the first five, ten minutes, if that.

[00:03:56] Speaker A: Oh, I think it was honestly like two. You just go around kind of a looping corridor and there you are into a coliseum. And there weren’t any other routes available because, yeah, I had already explored everywhere I could go up to this point. So straight to the boss it was.

[00:04:10] Speaker B: Yep.

[00:04:11] Speaker A: And I love this fight.

I, you know, it’s a nice kind of beastly, but varied moveset. You know, it has kind of the wild strikes with the paws and then the tail, but, you know, some interesting tells to figure out as well. And he’s kind of fast, honestly.

[00:04:28] Speaker B: Yeah, he is.

[00:04:30] Speaker A: And I think this is where I finally forced myself to figure out the parry timing. Okay, I know, I know you had done it a bit beforehand, but I died a number of times to the yellow eye. Kind of slow. Bull rush, charge attack most mostly because I would see the yellow eye glint and then panic and try to parry way too early and I would get one shot killed.

So, yeah, you know, after you go and fight through him, it was good to pick up the soma flower with the health bar boost because I was nice to have an extra piece of health going forward.

[00:05:06] Speaker B: It was definitely, yeah, it’s definitely a close to Him.

[00:05:10] Speaker A: Have you been using the amulet that gives an extra bar of health as well?

[00:05:15] Speaker B: I have, yeah.

[00:05:16] Speaker A: Same here.

Which doesn’t restore with potion. It’s only after your. No, but it’s still valuable to kind of keep your survivability up. And then you’ve also find soma flower petals, like individual pieces around the world as well. And I finally, during this play session, picked up a fourth one and got an extra bar. So I want to say I’m hovering around six or seven maybe. I can’t remember exactly.

[00:05:38] Speaker B: I think it’s six with the. Included.

[00:05:42] Speaker A: With the included extra. With the amulet one.

[00:05:44] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, I believe so.

[00:05:46] Speaker A: I will say too. And I probably go into more detail around which one specifically later. But the. I see so many of these amulets have really cool kind of perks to them and I want to equip them all, but so many have two or three slots required. So I’ve been unequipping ones that. Like the one that lets you heal a little bit when you parry is great, but I had to take it off because something else was slightly better or slightly more useful to me, I guess, in the moment.

[00:06:14] Speaker B: Well, I have. I have that one on with the parry that did a little bit.

[00:06:18] Speaker A: I had it and replaced it just recently with something, but I don’t recall what exactly.

[00:06:23] Speaker B: I think I have six amulet slots.

[00:06:28] Speaker A: Six? Yeah, I think I have six as well. Probably maybe seven. But I think. You know what? I think I just had seven out of six. So, like the. Whatever I was hovering over was.

[00:06:39] Speaker B: Yeah, I think you. Because I was gonna say if you have seven. I was like, I feel like I’ve looked every way to find.

[00:06:45] Speaker A: Because I. I think that’s. Yeah, I’ve pretty.

Pretty exhaustively explored things.

[00:06:50] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:06:51] Speaker A: But there’s like a couple puzzles that get you some stuff too, which I. We can chat in a sec, but how did you feel about Jahandar as a boss? I thought it was also kind of cool that he talks to you and kind of taunts you a bit.

[00:07:01] Speaker B: Yeah, it was. It was a good. It was a good boss fight, as you say. It was pretty quick. I somehow. And I’m not even lying on this, I beat him first time, but I beat. I beat him first time with. When I say it, I had a sliver of health left and I just had to. I hit him. I was very lucky on just being able to dodge. I was able to parry like some of the. The claw attacks, which helped, which got me. Let me get some extra hits in.

And then I Would kind of jump back from the.

From the glowing. The yellow eyes. I was never able to parry one of those. I didn’t even really try. I kind of just timed claw attacks and the. And the tail attack.

The tail whip. Um, yeah, I got through and like, I used the.

Yeah. The ather ability to. I gave myself some heal once I had run out of P Potions.

[00:07:55] Speaker A: Oh, sure.

[00:07:56] Speaker B: To like heal myself up a bit. And then I saw he was like, close to the end, so I used the.

Yeah. The other.

[00:08:04] Speaker A: The first F. Yeah, the kind of armor piercing strike.

[00:08:08] Speaker B: Yeah. When you go just straight through with the swords. And I got him down to like, nothingness.

[00:08:13] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[00:08:14] Speaker B: And I was like, oh, my God, I just need like one or two hits on him and he’s dead. And I was so close. I was like, I just gotta time this. And I got it right.

[00:08:21] Speaker A: I really like that armor piercing one. So I haven’t taken that off either. And yeah, you know, I had the healing one for like just a couple minutes on or like, well, maybe it was an hour. But in that last one and I replaced it with the one I mentioned last time, which is you kind of do this swipe that sends three beams of wall.

[00:08:38] Speaker B: I got that. I have that one.

[00:08:40] Speaker A: I really like that one still.

Yeah, I’m a huge fan of that. But yeah, I was. What I did find, though, is that multiple times in this Jahandar fight, I used either of those abilities right when the red light, like the unblockable attacks starts up and it actually, it gives you invincibility and like interrupts it so he doesn’t do the attack at all.

[00:09:05] Speaker B: Oh, okay.

[00:09:06] Speaker A: So those. Those types of author abilities can come in handy if you.

[00:09:10] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:09:10] Speaker A: Later on aren’t super confident yet in your ability to dodge some of those attacks. Most of the time I was just dodging through.

But yes, that internalize this moment of killing the boss with a sliver of health left. Because that will be happening much more frequently when we get to our season on Lords of the Fallen.

[00:09:32] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, I’m sure it will.

Yeah.

I will say, before the whole Jahandar fight, I did. Because you talked about it last episode. I did all the trainings.

[00:09:42] Speaker A: Oh, yep, yep. I mean, it’s helpful to just buy some extra stuff. And then of course, once you buy all of the amulets and the extra health potion and the extra. What was it? Another bottle?

[00:09:51] Speaker B: That was what I did is I used it on the extra health potion, which.

[00:09:54] Speaker A: Those are the first two things that I bought. What are The. The two health upgrades, then the.

The other I. All the amulets. But now she’s all out of stock. So I gotta. I guess we gotta keep waiting. Cause it says not restocked yet.

[00:10:07] Speaker B: So in restocking in progress, which I find interesting. So I’m curious on.

[00:10:10] Speaker A: So we’re gonna be able to buy another health potion and another.

Yeah, another health bar from the mage at some point. But.

[00:10:17] Speaker B: Yep.

[00:10:19] Speaker A: I don’t know what triggers that. Probably some story event.

[00:10:22] Speaker B: I would assume so.

[00:10:22] Speaker A: Yeah.

But okay. I’m glad you picked up the kind of the master sword swipe attack.

[00:10:28] Speaker B: I did that and I also as well changed to Persian.

[00:10:33] Speaker A: Oh, you did voice acting.

[00:10:34] Speaker B: I did. And I’m actually really. I’m still obviously reading all this. I’m fine. I like reading the subtitles. But yes, I agree.

It fits really well.

[00:10:43] Speaker A: Yeah, it. Honestly, it. It definitely helps with the immersion side of it.

[00:10:48] Speaker B: It does.

[00:10:51] Speaker A: Which you don’t kind of.

I don’t know. I mean, especially because the. It’s nice also that a lot of the talking that happens is when the. There’s not action. Like you’re not fighting through conversations, which makes it a lot. Obviously in a fast paced action game like in Astral Chain, we. You miss a bit of the conversations if you’re playing in, you know, another language than your own with subtitles because all that text is popping up while you’re trying to survive.

But a lot of these kind of. I suppose you could call it a cutscene, but it’s really like text with slightly moving animation and no fighting going on. Makes it really a lot more immersive. I really like the Persian dub.

[00:11:37] Speaker B: Yeah, so do I.

Yeah.

[00:11:41] Speaker A: So yeah, I’m glad you’re doing it too. It’s a fun way to play it. And yeah, as we heard on Discord, not really something that’s very common. And this is actually, I think the first one ever official in all of gaming. So none of the other Prince of Persia games had it either. Which, you know, maybe if that Sands of Time remake ever comes back to life. I kind of doubt it at this point, but if it does, maybe they’ll include it there.

[00:12:07] Speaker B: I doubt it. Yeah, they’ll include it. That’d be nice.

[00:12:13] Speaker A: So, yeah, very fun boss fight. It was way through the one that you see in the reviews and the trailers, but now that we’ve done that, that’s the one I was waiting for. I figured it was going to be one of the first boss fights, if not the first one. I’m very curious to See who else we’re fighting in the future and how much more weird and unusual. The kind of character designs. Enemy designs. Start looking.

[00:12:36] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:12:39] Speaker A: Anyway, you. Right after this fight, you go into this gorgeously painted purple time wind tunnel thing and grab one of the Simurgh feathers.

With the Simurgh itself looming in the background.

You see like the giant beak and eyes looking at you. And even better than the art, it unlocks the rush of the Simurgh, which is the Lost Crown’s version of a mid Air dash move.

[00:13:06] Speaker B: Yep.

[00:13:06] Speaker A: Which, Alex, since you haven’t played super far into any Metroidvania previously, the midair dash is a fairly common movement ability you can unlock in most Metroidvanias. But not every last one.

[00:13:19] Speaker B: No, but it is useful.

[00:13:22] Speaker A: But yeah, it’s very useful. And especially in combat as well as your sort of platforming. And again, loving how they’re baking in the mythology into why you can do the things you can do and encounter at least some of what you encounter.

Right. Like sometimes they just do it because you need a way to get around. But this is attaching it to this mythology.

Can’t get better than that.

[00:13:46] Speaker B: No.

[00:13:48] Speaker A: And then they right away they put you to the test to master it as soon as they possibly can. With some platforming in a room full of spikes and retracting platforms and walls.

How are you finding the planned. I say planned because you can see what you need to do, but how are you finding the twitch reaction platforming so far?

[00:14:07] Speaker B: Not bad. I mean, I’ve never been too terrible, I think, because obviously from childhood when you play games like Cranston, of course,

[00:14:13] Speaker A: things like that, at least people from our generation have put in plenty of hours into.

[00:14:20] Speaker B: Yeah, I’ve played like Celeste too, which is a lot of that. You gotta jump time your jump, but

[00:14:25] Speaker A: there and then do something else. Midair.

[00:14:27] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. And there are time zone this where it’s been a little tricky where I feel like I jump onto a wall and I feel that I can jump either straight back up the wall or I’m jumping to a different angle, but it jumps lower than it should and I go into the spike and then it just goes.

[00:14:42] Speaker A: Yeah, sure.

Yeah. I mean there’s. There are some of the. Some of the. A lot of it’s like trial and error in practice, right?

[00:14:48] Speaker B: Oh, yeah.

[00:14:48] Speaker A: Because I think there are many, many cases where you’ll.

You’ll.

From whatever platform you’re standing on, solid ground, you’ll see where you need to jump to maybe take a second action and then Maybe do something to trigger a switch and then everything else is out of view so you don’t know what the next step is and it becomes a lot more twitch reaction. So you get past that first section and then you still don’t get any solid ground and then you hit the spikes and. But at least you know, like okay, after I’ve done this part I in midair need to shoot the bell over there so that I create the platform here and I can keep going.

And then sometimes they add a third segment to it or something like that too. But that’s just all part of the fun.

[00:15:30] Speaker B: It definitely is.

[00:15:32] Speaker A: But yeah, I, I really like. Once you get it down, it’s so much fun to kind of traverse everything and I really like, you know, compared to some Metroidvanias that are a bit more rigid in terms of how you can move around. Like obviously Prince of Persia is known for acrobatics and maneuverability and they really kind of mix it in here with a backflips and ability to kind of get around a lot more quickly, honestly, which is so fun.

[00:15:58] Speaker B: Yeah, it is, it is. I’ve definitely gotten used to the. Well, I’m starting to get more used to the jumping and shooting with the bow in midair to time on the blocks and hitting the bells and.

[00:16:09] Speaker A: Yeah, and I mean I think we’ve mentioned it on some other season but I typically only use my dual sense edge controller for really fast paced games, usually Souls likes or whatever because I don’t want to take fingers off the triggers or shooting games but.

But it might actually make sense to use it here and bind triangle to a back button because.

Because combining jump and shooting is a little bit more tricky.

[00:16:40] Speaker B: So yeah, so I’ve always had. Because I use the. Yeah, the dual sense edge as well and I’ve always had the. I’ve had the two back buttons and they’re always mapped to the left trigger and right trigger.

I actually really like it.

I can dodge really quick backwards and forwards and I can parry really fast because I’m not pulling the trigger all the way down. I’m just doing a quick click on the back button.

[00:17:06] Speaker A: But okay. I mean you’re used to that. So that’s your method obviously if it’s working with you.

[00:17:11] Speaker B: But don’t forget it for all game.

[00:17:12] Speaker A: A lot of games you use it a lot more than I do. But don’t forget that the dualsense Edge has the little clicks on the near the triggers that you can shorten the trigger.

[00:17:23] Speaker B: That is true.

[00:17:24] Speaker A: You can yes, but you have a system that works, so keep doing it. Right, obviously.

[00:17:28] Speaker B: No, I do. Yeah.

[00:17:29] Speaker A: But now that you mentioned that, I might consider doing that too. I might switch to the edge for this, but for me, I like also that with the edge you can swap to.

You have four different options of like, save preset button. So I might do that. Triangle on, triangle on, one trigger, one back button.

[00:17:48] Speaker B: Yeah, I get it. Because it is a little awkward when you’re trying to jump, jump, and then you’re moving your finger up to triangle,

[00:17:53] Speaker A: jump, jump, and then you gotta. While aiming. Yeah. So it seems like a type of thing that could help.

[00:17:59] Speaker B: We’ll see. Yeah.

And.

[00:18:03] Speaker A: Yeah, so I guess as soon after I was doing my.

After acquiring this rush of the Simurgh dash, I was doing my obligatory post ability unlock exploration and came across an amulet called Rukhsana’s Gift, which restores the health. Right. This is the one that restores the health when you successfully parry. So that gave me even more motivation to just parry constantly.

[00:18:29] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:18:30] Speaker A: After kind of doing the practice against Jahandar.

So, yeah, more. More motivation, more reasons to keep doing it. But then I. I took that amulet off and then I kind of get myself into trouble a little bit.

I. You also find. I’m assuming you also found the fast travel system system here through the homa statues.

[00:18:53] Speaker B: Yes, I did. Yep. Got that. Which is nice.

[00:18:56] Speaker A: Did you also pop over to the Haven to see what else the mage had to sell?

[00:19:01] Speaker B: Yeah, I did. I’ve been back there a few times. I’m trying to think, what did she have? I don’t know. I’ve bought a few things.

[00:19:09] Speaker A: Yeah. I think I had purchased almost everything, so there was nothing new at this point.

But Artaban taught me a combo and gave me some currency for the rush of the Simurg training. So it wasn’t worth it. It was worth it to go back. Sometimes I go back to the Haven and I just realized I shouldn’t have wasted the time.

[00:19:28] Speaker B: Yeah, I get that.

[00:19:31] Speaker A: Yeah.

[00:19:32] Speaker B: I also did some exploring. Like, I went to the. Back to the Lower City.

[00:19:37] Speaker A: Okay, I was gonna say, now that we have the dash ability, did you backtrack and explore anywhere else again?

[00:19:41] Speaker B: Yeah, I backtracked and explored. So I went through part of the section of the Lower City, and I ended up in a room that locked me in.

And then you get locked in and these. The like, rolling spikes come towards you and there’s a pattern and you have to jump over them and jump and dash and you have to get through like Six rounds of it, and they come round like the wall, like in the room, and there’s a chest in the room. And once you get through it, you get the chest and the door opens. So the chest was like a raw ore, is what it was.

[00:20:19] Speaker A: Oh, I do not think I’ve done this.

[00:20:21] Speaker B: No.

[00:20:21] Speaker A: Where is. That’s in the lower city somewhere.

[00:20:23] Speaker B: Yeah, it’s in the lower city. Okay, so you take the Ra. Or to.

I want to say it’s like the armorer. What’s her name?

Kethera. No.

Oh, I forgot her name. The giant lady in the.

[00:20:38] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, sure, sure.

Your blacksmith. Surtur style Blacksmith.

[00:20:42] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. You take it to her, and she.

[00:20:45] Speaker A: Oh, that’s the material for that. Okay. And she can do what?

[00:20:48] Speaker B: She gives you a very powerful amulet, which came in very handy later, and it’s called the Shield of Mithra.

[00:20:55] Speaker A: Okay.

[00:20:56] Speaker B: And basically what this amulet does is if you do a successful parry, it creates a time bubble, slowing all enemies within it.

[00:21:04] Speaker A: Oh.

[00:21:04] Speaker B: So if you’re fighting close to somebody and you parry a close attack, they get sucked into this time bubble and they slow down, and you can just hit them with attacks and knock them out.

[00:21:12] Speaker A: That sounds wonderful. How many slots does that take?

[00:21:15] Speaker B: 3.

[00:21:16] Speaker A: Of course it does.

[00:21:17] Speaker B: Which is. Which is why I have that. On the one that parries.

[00:21:20] Speaker A: That does health.

You’re going deep into the parry build.

[00:21:25] Speaker B: Yeah. And then I have another one that gives me. Actually, you know what? I lied. I took the. No, I took the parry. One that gives health off. Because I add. I got another one that’s two. That’s does more damage with your swords,

[00:21:38] Speaker A: because I thought that would just be more useful. Is that the one that has the four, the additional part of the combo, like the fourth attack in the combo.

[00:21:46] Speaker B: It might be that one, or there might be a different one.

[00:21:47] Speaker A: I can’t remember.

[00:21:48] Speaker B: But yeah, so. Because that’s a two. So then I have the three. The two, and then I have a one, which was. I think is.

It’s the health. It might be the health one if that was a one. Yeah, yeah. So as of right now.

[00:22:03] Speaker A: Okay. Okay, well, I’m gonna go find.

Where was the shield useful?

[00:22:09] Speaker B: The Shield of Mithra is it’s just what you get when you give her the raw ore.

[00:22:14] Speaker A: Right. Oh, yeah. But the.

[00:22:15] Speaker B: And she creates raw.

[00:22:16] Speaker A: Or was from somewhere in the lower city.

[00:22:18] Speaker B: Yeah, it’s in the lower city. I think it’s over. I mean, yeah, you probably have it mapped, like, marked, because I’m pretty sure the way to get there was yeah. Was to dash. You couldn’t get there unless you had the dash basically. And then you can go through the rest of the thing.

[00:22:33] Speaker A: I didn’t go. I looked at all my screenshot or memento shard photos and didn’t. Maybe I just didn’t look closely enough. But I didn’t see like a lot of dash opportunities. But I did go to one like near the very first walk. Walk tre.

And then you kind of jump off the staircase and dash to the wall and then jump and dash again and you get a chest with a skin in it. Like a costume.

Oh, I got.

[00:22:57] Speaker B: Yeah, I got one that was short and it swaps.

[00:23:01] Speaker A: So I put it on for just for now just to see what it was like. And it’s basically like. Well, I guess the alternate Sargon almost.

Which we’ll chat about in a sec.

But okay. So I have to go and find this ore. That sounds like close.

[00:23:18] Speaker B: It’s close to literally the beginning where we come in when you first start in the lower city. So it’s one of those areas where you first come in and then you go down a little bit and you’re gonna have to dash it around. And if I remember rightly there’s.

[00:23:31] Speaker A: All right, that’s where I’m gonna go.

[00:23:33] Speaker B: Yeah. Like you just have to avoid. There’s a few like spike traps. Spikes on walls. It’s a lot. Yeah. Of like the platforming just getting around to get there.

[00:23:42] Speaker A: So I will definitely go find it before I continue on because yeah it is useful.

[00:23:48] Speaker B: I also found. As I said, I found shorts behind a broken wall. I was able. I just was like I was hitting an enemy.

[00:23:55] Speaker A: Yeah. Whenever I see it.

Yeah. Oh, okay. You found it by accident. Whenever. This is another good thing to do. This comes from Metroid where you had to. In the first Metroid you had to blow up every single like bomb. Try to bomb every single wall in the entire game just to see. Find secrets then pass forward.

So. Yeah. So basically anywhere.

Anywhere that I don’t see a dead end wall that’s not an obvious like jump off the wall to get up higher situation. I start smacking the wall to see if it’ll break.

[00:24:29] Speaker B: That’s a good idea.

[00:24:31] Speaker A: But also actually do you have the. It’s one that doesn’t take a slot. Are you using the. I guess it’s a parrot or some kind of bird.

[00:24:39] Speaker B: I don’t have that.

[00:24:41] Speaker A: Okay. I don’t know where I found that then. That was last time. I’ve had it like very. Since very early I think it’s even in the screenshot from our last episode’s cover. Maybe.

Oh, maybe, maybe not. Maybe not. But it’s like this golden bird that follows you around everywhere and it will make a noise and fly over and kind of flap near any secrets that you can.

[00:25:07] Speaker B: What?

[00:25:08] Speaker A: So it’ll go. It’ll go over to a wall occasionally.

It. It kind of alerted me to a couple puzzles that it would. You would just kind of gloss over and not expect to happen.

So I don’t. Is it an amulet? I found that it just doesn’t cost. It’s not an amulet. Yeah, it’s like in the amulet screen you have amulets and there’s this other thing that you can attach to your necklace, but it’s not. It’s not an amulet that takes slots. It’s just a thing you can place.

Pretty sure.

[00:25:35] Speaker B: Okay, I’m going to have to.

[00:25:38] Speaker A: I’ll see if I can find out what it’s called and I’ll let you know. But it’s found me some secrets. So, Value, did you head anywhere else before the Sacred Archives?

[00:25:52] Speaker B: I don’t think so. I think I saved. Because there’s a white work. Yeah, right.

[00:25:55] Speaker A: You didn’t head back into the depths or anything?

[00:25:58] Speaker B: Oh, no. Yes, sorry. Yes, I did head back into the depths.

So I bought.

So I swapped out whatever the one amulet was, I think. Yeah. And put on this horn. Viper Amulet, which says it decreases the amount of poison damage you take. It does not decrease that much, I can tell you that. Or like, doesn’t. I was. The second I got hit with any bit of poison, like I was watching my health go down quick and I was like, okay, this is not great.

So I went through all the depths because I felt like, oh, maybe there’s something. Now I can do this. Is there something here I missed? And I don’t. There wasn’t really there.

[00:26:32] Speaker A: You, like. There wasn’t a boss or anything that you could do down there?

[00:26:35] Speaker B: No, no. There was some hard. There was like these rat ninja creature things.

[00:26:42] Speaker A: Rat people. Okay.

[00:26:44] Speaker B: I don’t know. They were like messing me up.

[00:26:48] Speaker A: Did you find a walkbox tree down there?

[00:26:50] Speaker B: No, that was. That’s the annoying thing. There is no wok fox tree down there. So you go through the whole thing.

[00:26:56] Speaker A: Poison. Poison.

A poison area is probably not the best place for a lush golden tree to be spreading.

[00:27:02] Speaker B: You go through the. Well, actually, it’s not the whole thing. I lied because I think actually there was a point I got to where

[00:27:08] Speaker A: I couldn’t find faraba to give you another map.

[00:27:12] Speaker B: Okay. Actually, yeah. I got to a point where I can’t go through anymore, so there’s definitely more to the depths.

But I was able to create a shortcut because when you enter the depths, there’s, like, a grate that bounces.

[00:27:24] Speaker A: Yep. So there’s a lot of those.

[00:27:26] Speaker B: Open that grate. So then I can create a shortcut to get to.

Which helps because it makes me miss quite a few enemies.

[00:27:33] Speaker A: Okay.

[00:27:34] Speaker B: And some platforming and other things, but I don’t recall finding, honestly finding, like, anything of insane use down there that helped me. So.

[00:27:45] Speaker A: Okay.

[00:27:46] Speaker B: Yeah, I just did that, and then I went back and to the Haven, and then fast traveled to the first one.

Sure.

[00:27:56] Speaker A: Yeah. All right. So what you’re saying is I should just hold on to the depths until I have a reason to go back later?

[00:28:00] Speaker B: Yeah, I would. Wait. I don’t recall.

[00:28:03] Speaker A: All right. All right.

[00:28:04] Speaker B: Getting anything.

[00:28:07] Speaker A: Cool. Well, so we push forward and arrive at the Sacred Archives, and it’s full of these madmen that are all delirious, and.

And you can talk to some of them. Like, some of them just kind of spout delirious shenanigans.

And then there’s one room where you talk to the third one, and it starts attacking you. So we found a new, kind of unique type of enemy, like this weird dude that throws poison vials or fire, like, basically Molotov cocktails at you.

[00:28:42] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:28:43] Speaker A: In that. I don’t know if you know which room specifically I’m talking about. There’s, like, a statue, and there’s four panels that they’re standing on.

And if you.

This. The bird helped here. Didn’t quite. I kind of just ran past it the first time. But if you crouch on the panel that doesn’t have anyone on it, it gives you a chest with. What’s it called? One of the soma flowers or flower petals? Yeah, I think it was.

[00:29:07] Speaker B: Yeah, I did this, but I’m not gonna lie. I did this because I found it by looking at a walkthrough quiz. I wasn’t sure if I was going

[00:29:14] Speaker A: the right direction, 100% the right way.

[00:29:16] Speaker B: Yeah. And I saw. I just saw that quickly. So. Yes. But I did get it, which I think either increased my health or got me close. Yeah.

[00:29:24] Speaker A: Getting.

Getting lost is part of it.

[00:29:27] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:29:29] Speaker A: But, so, yes, you’re.

[00:29:30] Speaker B: You’re.

[00:29:31] Speaker A: There’s a lot more. There are many more Lore tablets here than any other section so far, which makes sense because it’s an archive library full of knowledge, which was Cool.

But, you know, right, you go past. Past that one room where there’s the soma flower and there’s a tall, lanky dude with a hook that teleport kidnaps people to who knows where.

I saw that little mini cutscene and noped out of that room right away.

And then I’m really glad that I did too, because I went the other direction and found the areas first Walk Walk Tree in the room that I didn’t visit yet.

So if I didn’t even want to know where that teleport would take me in that moment and force these gigantic run backs.

Because, yeah, if I hadn’t found that Walk walk tree, I would have been moved further away and not had a chance to save it.

I also know. I know I’ve referenced Bloodborne a few too many times in this podcast already, and we’re only, what, 51 episodes in, but I do that game. This kidnapper dude in.

In the Sacred Archives reminds me of an enemy in Bloodborne that literally captures you in a giant bag, basically like a potato sack, and then tosses you in a jail cell. Funny stuff.

And it, you know, it brings you to an entirely different area that you have to wait a lot longer to get access to otherwise.

But did you end up getting caught by this guy?

[00:31:06] Speaker B: I did not. I was able to because it shows the bubble around him of what he can hear, so I was able to sneak around. There were a couple times that I got caught in, like, the bubble caught me.

[00:31:19] Speaker A: Yeah.

[00:31:19] Speaker B: But I would then just sprint and just. I would just dash and slide as much as I could, and I just, like, would slide through a door into the next room and get away.

[00:31:26] Speaker A: Okay, okay, You’re a bit more careful than I am. I did the same and was able to sneak by him a bunch of times, but also got caught a bunch of times.

[00:31:35] Speaker B: Yeah, I didn’t want to fight him.

[00:31:37] Speaker A: And yeah, I mean, to what I can understand, you can’t really fight or defeat him in this moment because he, you know, you can like, kind of knock him down, but. Okay, but he. He. He hooked me twice. And he gets sent to prison.

[00:31:52] Speaker B: Oh, okay.

[00:31:55] Speaker A: And.

But didn’t take our. Our weapons away, so that’s a choice. But this jailer character definitely seems to base everything on instinct rather than logic. Right. He can’t see and sniffs around and is just overall a weird dude.

But, you know, silver lining. Escaping from the prison was quite fun, actually. And I had been wondering how to get to that section of the Sacred Archives map anyway, which is Sort of this large eye room south of where we were.

[00:32:26] Speaker B: Is that what that is?

[00:32:28] Speaker A: That’s what that is. So there’s a. There’s. And there’s three offshoots that require a key that you can’t get through.

So I suppose it was kind of inevitable to get caught by this guy. I kind of expect this creepy jailer person to be a boss. If we go back there, though.

[00:32:44] Speaker B: Yeah.

Wait, do you get a key to get out?

[00:32:49] Speaker A: I think we will get a key in the future. No, you do not get a key. You just. It’s. It’s like. It’s like the other areas where you can unlock a door after you’ve seen it somewhere else. You can unlock it from the other side.

[00:32:59] Speaker B: Yeah. Okay.

[00:33:00] Speaker A: All right, so you can. You can do that and get out. But actually it has. I mean, it’s a fairly decent security prison because the insides have, like. I had marked on my. With screenshots on my map multiple times from each direction. Because there’s two ways to get into the jail. Well, I think the one way is actually to get in is to get teleported there by this guy. And then the other, the way to get out has a pressure plate unlocked. So you can’t really go in intentionally from the outside. Okay.

[00:33:30] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:33:34] Speaker A: But. Yes. So there’s. There, there, obviously. This Sacred Archives is full of gated doors that require a retina scan to find a key that you have. Which we don’t have yet.

[00:33:47] Speaker B: No, we do not.

Speaking of the whatsits, I’ve been using that. Speaking of the, like, marking points. I’ve been using that. More of definitely marking points of if I can’t get to it.

[00:33:59] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. And then in the Sacred Archives here, I ran out of screenshot very quickly.

[00:34:05] Speaker B: I have 15 of them.

[00:34:06] Speaker A: What?

[00:34:08] Speaker B: Yeah, I have 15.

[00:34:09] Speaker A: Oh, maybe it’s a total for some reason. I guess I’ll have to confirm this.

[00:34:14] Speaker B: I know I bought an upgrade somewhere that gives me. Give me a couple extra.

[00:34:18] Speaker A: I thought you had to.

[00:34:21] Speaker B: No, I think it’s 15 total.

[00:34:23] Speaker A: I thought it was. Oh, it’s 50. Yeah. See, I thought it was five per area, but it might be 15 total, and I just didn’t.

I guess I can confirm it later, but that’s curious. Yeah, I’ve used them all up because I’ve got screenshots all over my map.

[00:34:37] Speaker B: Okay.

[00:34:38] Speaker A: And then I started using the pins and just kind of like.

They’re like fairly detailed pins. Right. There’s a set of teeth, I think, and a bullseye and a question Mark and a star and like a spikes. So I’ve been using it to somewhat understand what I need to do.

[00:34:54] Speaker B: Oh, okay. I should. Yeah, I need to use those markers more too.

[00:35:00] Speaker A: Well, anyway, going through the Sacred Archives, did you find and fight Shadow Link? I mean, Alternate Sargon.

[00:35:09] Speaker B: Yes, I did.

Yep.

[00:35:12] Speaker A: Yeah, it’s a fun, somewhat unusual fight.

[00:35:16] Speaker B: Yeah, it was.

[00:35:18] Speaker A: And it, it gives you the.

Well, I guess talking about the fight itself, it’s always entertaining to fight someone that has a similar skill set to you.

[00:35:28] Speaker B: Yep.

[00:35:29] Speaker A: In this case it is you. But he’s got an extra ability on top of it.

So the first time I got him down to like a third of his health left and he killed me because I was just kind of being careless. He caught me in that, whatever it’s called, above him twice.

And then the second time I just completely destroyed him and got him stun locked basically in this, in one of the combos that Artaban taught me.

[00:35:55] Speaker B: Oh, okay, very nice.

[00:35:58] Speaker A: So I took down like 75% of his health just using that over and over and then just dodging and parrying actually.

So it was a really fun, kind of like almost like a dance type battle and really enjoyed it.

[00:36:11] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:36:12] Speaker A: But yeah, that, that slice above you after ability is definitely cool, but it’s kind of limited so far.

You know, it’s. Obviously this is kind of where we saved and quit for next time, but I just tried it out on a couple enemies and yeah, it’s all right. Like you can, you can launch someone up and then, and then use it on them or I guess, I suppose in the future there’s going to be more flying enemies too, probably.

[00:36:38] Speaker B: Yeah, I, I haven’t, I didn’t use that.

Yeah, my fight, I died a few times. I think he beat me the first three times pretty, not pretty quickly. I think the first time I went in and I didn’t realize what the fight was. He destroyed me.

I was like, oh.

I was like, okay, now I know like his moves. Like, he’s fast. And I was like, okay, he’s quite getting slightly.

Then I got him about like down halfway on health for the second try. And then the third try I was close. And then after that try I realized I was like, you know what?

And I went back to the Black Tree and I put on the Shield of Mithra at that point. It’s where I then switched out some of my amulets to give me the more strength, I think, for swords. The Shield of Mithra. And yeah, and then I think also the other.

Either the parry or another. Yeah, another one.

[00:37:34] Speaker A: Okay. Yeah, you’re adapting on the fly. That’s a smart, smart.

[00:37:38] Speaker B: So then I went back in to fight him with the Shield of Mithra, and when he’d come close and I’d hit him and he gets stuck in the time bubble, I could destroy him. And then it knocks him out of the time bubble, but I was still in a combo, so I kept hitting him, and so I just caught him in that three or four times and I, I destroyed him. I beat him. I, I.

[00:37:58] Speaker A: Look at that. Yeah. If one build of amulets doesn’t work, try another build.

[00:38:02] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly. So I was like, after that, I was like, okay, this thing is useful.

[00:38:08] Speaker A: Yeah. Okay.

[00:38:09] Speaker B: Especially for close up enemies.

[00:38:11] Speaker A: The second I turn on the game, I’m going to go hunt that shield down and then. Or the ore down and make the shield.

[00:38:18] Speaker B: Yeah. The second you pick up the ore, it gives you the side quest to go talk to.

[00:38:21] Speaker A: To go back to the.

[00:38:23] Speaker B: To go back to the Haven and talk. So, yeah.

[00:38:26] Speaker A: The other thing about this particular boss fight and what’s interesting to me is that from what I can tell, it’s actually optional maybe since I kind of went right as you’re going in that direction, I went the opposite. I have this, you know, whatever. I have every game that gives you kind of explicit instructions or directions of where to go, I go the opposite direction as far as I can first.

[00:38:54] Speaker B: Because there’s always something behind you.

[00:38:55] Speaker A: Usually. There’s almost something. Almost always in a good game, at least for exploration purposes, there’s almost always something available or some treasure you can find, or at least something you can mark down. Not just in Metroidvanias, but in most genres, especially in Bioshock. Go away from that arrow until you can’t find a single thing left.

So because I went in the opposite direction of this golden windstream path to find. Find alternate Sargon, you know, I. The first time I fought him, I.

The, the walk walk tree I saved at was like the first one in the Sacred Archives because I didn’t go to that direction and save at that walk walk tree. That’s right past where you fight him.

[00:39:39] Speaker B: Okay. Yeah.

[00:39:41] Speaker A: So I died and had to do the whole run back. And then I was like, okay, what’s the other direction? Just to check. And I, oh, there’s a tree here. I could have been like two feet away.

But it is curious that, I mean, obviously we set this without knowing who it was actually, because we did this spoiler free. We didn’t know which Boss was we were going to come up on for the Sacred Archives.

Technically we could have missed it.

So I suppose it’s lucky that we both found them. Yeah, easily. I mean, hopefully all you listeners found him without getting too far past either.

[00:40:14] Speaker B: Yeah, because. Yeah, because you could go to that walk, walk tree and, and then continue. Right. And it takes you right into what is it, the Upper Citadel or Upper City or whatever it’s called.

[00:40:25] Speaker A: Upper City, yeah.

[00:40:26] Speaker B: Yeah. And I don’t know, I like I walked in there and saw the name change and I was like, I don’t think this is where we’re supposed to continue. I think it’s. We’re supposed to stop somewhere around here. So I went back and then. Yeah, that’s when I found him originally.

Wow.

[00:40:41] Speaker A: Yeah. Well, optional boss, but still a boss and a fun one at that.

So. Something that I noticed peripherally last time but didn’t put much thought into then.

When you die to a boss in this game, you don’t have to do a run back. The menu gives you the option to retry, which is so helpful. Great quality of life option there. I do actually enjoy the run backs in some Metroidvanias and Souls games. It kind of gives you a chance to clear your head and mentally prep for the next attempt. Attempt. But if you die 10, 20, 30 times to the same boss, it can become tedious and frustrating. So it’s a nice feature to have that retry option.

[00:41:19] Speaker B: There is.

I didn’t know that I just would die. I’d go back to the wak wak tree that I saved at and run back.

[00:41:26] Speaker A: So what do you just, when you

[00:41:28] Speaker B: die, do you just hit retry? Where’s the retry?

[00:41:30] Speaker A: Well, when I die, it pops up a menu that says option A. Like the top option is retry.

It’s on the you died screen. It says retry and then it says go back to Wakwak Tree.

[00:41:44] Speaker B: Oh, maybe I must hit retry. But it takes me.

[00:41:50] Speaker A: And on top of that it doesn’t, you know, it even refills your potions fully.

And if you, even if you had used some before the boss fight. So like before that checkpoint of the boss fight, it still refills them for you. So it’s almost like having a walk walk tree right there.

The one exception is that alternate Sargon was not, did not have the retry option. So yeah, as I explained, I did that run back. But so if you haven’t seen it. Okay, well maybe, maybe you’ve done it and don’t recall or you’ve died to a boss.

[00:42:30] Speaker B: Except for the first one.

[00:42:32] Speaker A: The very first one. So there you go. So there’s that. That might be the reason why.

Because I had died a couple times to both Jahandar and the wild boar thing.

[00:42:43] Speaker B: Yeah, I didn’t. Yeah.

[00:42:44] Speaker A: But didn’t die to the very first one, so maybe that’s why.

[00:42:49] Speaker B: Oh, okay.

[00:42:50] Speaker A: This.

Yeah. Alternate self did not have a retry option.

[00:42:55] Speaker B: Okay. That’s why.

[00:42:56] Speaker A: And if we’re both wrong, then maybe it’s a setting, like part of the difficulty settings, but I don’t recall that being a thing.

[00:43:04] Speaker B: I don’t recall seeing that on the settings when I was looking through.

[00:43:07] Speaker A: Well, okay. It’s a kind of a fickle system. Then we’ll see whether it’s available in the next boss if we. If we end up dying to it. You want to die on purpose just to confirm?

[00:43:16] Speaker B: No, but I’m sure I will die to some other bosses at some point in this game.

[00:43:20] Speaker A: Yeah.

Cool. Good section. Definitely a bit shorter than I had anticipated.

Obviously, there’s more to explore in the Sacred Archives in the future with all those key doors, so we’ll be back, no doubt about that. And this next upcoming section might be a little bit longer, but hey, spoiler free is better than knowing what’s coming up, so.

[00:43:44] Speaker B: Definitely.

[00:43:46] Speaker A: So for next time, please play until you open the seal after finding all three new abilities.

Then save and quit and hang on till next time.

[00:43:58] Speaker B: Yep.

Thank you everyone for listening and hope you’re enjoying your time in Prince of Persia as we are, and we will talk to you next time. Thanks.

If you want to follow along and discuss our playthrough of naive games on the Gaming Backlog Book Club Podcast, please give us a follow on your podcast platform of choice. Spotify, Apple Podcasts, iHeartRadio, Pandora, Amazon Music, or Pocketcasts, as well as our Discord and Instagram under the same name. Thanks.