Transcript

[00:00:01] Speaker A: Hello and welcome back to the Gaming Backlog Book club. We are here to chat about Prince of the Lost Crown up through breaching the seal after finding a few new abilities.

Reminder, we do go into spoilers, so if you want to avoid that, start at a previous episode, play along, and come back to this one once you’re caught up.

So, yes, I had fortunately. Just to cap off our conversation from last time, I had fortunately saved the Haven at the end of the last play session and was rather close to the spot you had mentioned with the grate in the floor for the chakram to open a path and the spinning blade rollers to get some ore treasure. I had indeed taken a screenshot of that spot the previous play session. So I now also have the Shield of Mythra. And I also can say that I love it. It’s so useful, and I’ve upgraded it at least once, if not twice.

[00:00:53] Speaker B: Yes, it is very useful. I will say just for now. Yeah, I have it and I have, I think fully upgraded is.

[00:01:01] Speaker A: Oh, you go. Yeah, you’re at full. Does it. Okay. Does the full one make the bubble bigger or make the time? I think it makes. It makes the bubble bigger.

[00:01:09] Speaker B: It makes the bubble quite a lot bigger.

[00:01:12] Speaker A: So I love the effect. I think my only issue with it is that instead of slowing the person down, it slows them in a bubble, and half the time, the parry knocks them immediately out of the bubble anyway.

Or the attacks do. Right. So I guess you have to launch them up most of the time. I’ve tried to start doing that anyway. It’s still great, that very minor kind of sticking point. But anyway, let me just say. Woof. That was a long section to play through.

[00:01:43] Speaker B: Yes, it was.

[00:01:44] Speaker A: We totally botched the size of this chunk of gameplay progress. But, hey, here we are on the other side, and all the better for it. And I guess kind of most of the time, it thematically made sense because we were going after very specific goal.

But anyway, so moving on from the Sacred Archives, we’re now in the Upper Citadel, which is definitely a lot more kind of visually vibrant being outside and truly looks like a place that would have been a palace beforehand.

And you got your classic harpy enemies that fly around. So it’s a good spot to use our newly acquired Athra surge attack that we snagged from our alter ego.

I don’t know how much you use that one. The kind of. The upward slice.

[00:02:31] Speaker B: Yeah, the upward, upward slice. I have not. I don’t think I haven’t used it yet.

[00:02:35] Speaker A: I I like it a lot. There’s. There’s a kind of annoying amount of floating above you enemies that somehow manage to dodge if you jump up at them.

So it’s come in handy especially for like some of the mages and the Djinn and things like that.

[00:02:52] Speaker B: Oh yeah, those jinn are.

[00:02:53] Speaker A: Yeah, at least. At least the birds are easy enough to parry and they one shot kill with a parry.

[00:03:00] Speaker B: Yeah, that’s true.

[00:03:05] Speaker A: And then once you get up top, through the platforming puzzle with the chakram and find the tree there, that there’s that tough new enemy who blocks you, parries you, and has multiple charge attacks that deal out a lot of damage. I didn’t die to him, but kept bailing out and coming back with full health to work out how to best take him on, since I assumed we’d see him a bunch more. And yeah, my strategy involved a lot of dodging through him and parrying the kind of regular bull rush without the eye glint.

[00:03:34] Speaker B: Yeah, I think same here.

[00:03:37] Speaker A: And you know, he was quite difficult. Now in hindsight, right there, we didn’t actually see him that often because I’ve seen him like occasionally throughout, but I figured it was going to be a very common enemy.

Who knows if it keeps growing in the future, though.

And then you meet the old man who’s clearly been waiting for you, considering he greets you with here you are at last.

And saying that he’s met Sargon many times in the past and the future. Not sure how that works, but obviously we’re dealing with some weird time issues here.

And then in the next area, even higher from there, after that short gondola ride, there are giant spiked pillars you can ride down to the next Walk Walk tree. And also a mysterious astrology room with a spot to what I presume is double jump and get out of it.

But we have now reached the pit and we still don’t have a double jump.

It’s almost a guarantee there will be one.

Maybe we’ll find it here.

But I have a feeling there’s some lore or something else to uncover in the place in general.

[00:04:48] Speaker B: Yeah, I would assume so, because there’s a few places I have like the marks on the map with the eyeballs where, like even there’s one like just outside of the haven where it’s like spikes on a wall and you have to jump up it. And I was like, I don’t have a high enough jump and I can’t jump and dash or whatever.

[00:05:06] Speaker A: So I was like, there has to

[00:05:07] Speaker B: be a double Jump or something that will teleport me up higher. I don’t know.

[00:05:10] Speaker A: But yeah, they taunt you with that or above Art of a haven since the very beginning and you still can’t get it.

[00:05:22] Speaker B: Still can’t get it.

[00:05:23] Speaker A: It’s going to be the most cathartic thing to pick that thing up finally.

[00:05:27] Speaker B: Yeah, it will be.

[00:05:29] Speaker A: But yes, you finally catch up to Anahita and Prince Ghassan, kick her in the face, and then create some space between them so you can protect Kasan. And then Varam shows up to take over in the recovery of the prince. Or so he says. And against all odds, frickin Varam stabs Ghassan all the way through.

Much to this dismay of both Sargon and Anahita. I guess it’s time to team back up.

[00:05:59] Speaker B: I guess so, yeah.

[00:06:01] Speaker A: Although we have not yet found her either, so it sounded like fun. Varam’s motivation was to go after the Crown and the throne.

But Varam, didn’t you hear the name of the title? You’re in the Crown is lost, buddy.

[00:06:16] Speaker B: Exactly.

[00:06:17] Speaker A: Nowhere to be found.

And probably deep inside of a pit too, considering.

Anyway. Of course you end up in a battle that you can’t win against him, since it’s one of those scripted events to get rid of you and kind of make you battle your way back.

[00:06:31] Speaker B: I was, I was, yeah, I was really hoping it was one of those because I was like, I’m getting my ass handed to me in this battle right now. And I was like, I don’t know if I’m going to be able to beat him. And then it finally did like that little scripted part and I was like, oh, thank God.

[00:06:48] Speaker A: You know, it’s one of those cases where I’m glad I didn’t.

Didn’t kind of quickly pause and reload to try again kind of thing and just start. Because some, you know, it’s not always so telegraphed that it’s a scripted thing in these games where, you know, you’ll just retry over and over again. Then finally you just put your controller down in agony and then. Oh, it was scripted all along, so I’m glad it wasn’t that.

[00:07:15] Speaker B: Same here.

[00:07:16] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, I guess even after Varum unleashed his kind of true power, I felt like I actually held my own reasonably well against him.

Especially dodging his crazy long range attacks like 60% of the time.

But you know, the inevitable of course happen. And down to the depths we go.

[00:07:32] Speaker B: Yep.

[00:07:35] Speaker A: He kind of does everything he can in that cutscene to not kill you. Though.

And also kind of like, you know, he smacks you with the hilt of his sword and doesn’t do much damage otherwise. And it sounds like he’d rather damage you with words, saying he’s going to erase your reputation completely.

I’m curious what the reputation is. Maybe it’s something from the future that he’s already seen.

[00:07:59] Speaker B: Maybe.

[00:08:00] Speaker A: Yeah, but. So you’re down. You get launched down to the depths. How you survive that fall, nobody knows.

And then the old man has to go ahead and steal your map.

[00:08:12] Speaker B: Yep.

[00:08:15] Speaker A: While exploring down here, did you find the scrapper in the depths?

[00:08:19] Speaker B: I did. Yes, I did find the scrapper.

[00:08:22] Speaker A: He’s like this weird humanoid spider dude and sells various amulets that have this really high risk reward ratio, but only accepts Xerxes coins, of which I had three.

And I used them all to buy the lost key to some secret part of the Citadel elevator.

[00:08:39] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, I did too.

[00:08:42] Speaker A: I figured in that moment it meant you had to have access to something cool and unique, you know, not just another amulet I don’t have enough empty nodes for anyway. Yes, but, you know, his character design reminded way too. And I know you haven’t seen this guy before, but it reminds me way too much of Patches from the Soulsborne games, who. I guess, you know, you’re probably far enough off from playing Soulsborne to not remember this when it happens.

He’s like a.

I think he’s a dude in the Dark Souls games and he’s a spider with the same head, same human head in Bloodborne, who will basically tell you, oh, go look over there. And then he’ll shove you off of a cliff or into a hole or something like that where there’s a bunch of enemies so that he can elite your corpse.

[00:09:32] Speaker B: So kind.

[00:09:33] Speaker A: So kind. I’m glad that the Scrapper is not that and actually just sells you stuff.

[00:09:37] Speaker B: Yes. Yeah, I would be too.

[00:09:42] Speaker A: Also, what the hell was that creepy giant mast thing crawling at you in a tunnel and stabbing the ground the whole time?

[00:09:48] Speaker B: Oh, my God. In the. In the catacombs? Yeah, there’s.

[00:09:53] Speaker A: Yeah, there’s some in the depths. In some of the catacombs.

[00:09:55] Speaker B: Yeah, I think. Yeah.

[00:09:56] Speaker A: Oh, I think it was actually just the depths, but in like the weird kind of reaches of the depths. So creepy.

[00:10:01] Speaker B: Yes.

[00:10:03] Speaker A: Yeah, it was so just not appealing at all. And obviously you can’t fight him because he’s got the mask and he stabs like crazy, so you just kind of run away and throw your hands up in the air until later.

Also, did you ever get caught by the floating ghost guy down here?

[00:10:22] Speaker B: Yes, I did.

[00:10:23] Speaker A: That possesses you and blocks off all but one piece of your health bar.

[00:10:27] Speaker B: Yeah. That’s unfortunate.

[00:10:29] Speaker A: The nice thing is that that one was close enough to a wak wak tree, so I just sprinted back there, um, and was like, all right, I guess I’ll just evade and go around you or something, because I’m not about to survive on a one health bar. There’s no chance.

[00:10:43] Speaker B: No.

[00:10:43] Speaker A: Like, I’m reasonably okay at parrying. I’m really good at dodging, but it’s just.

[00:10:48] Speaker B: What?

[00:10:48] Speaker A: Why?

[00:10:48] Speaker B: Why.

[00:10:53] Speaker A: Then?

Yeah, the second alternate Sargon fight was quite a bit easier for me after knowing what to expect from the first time around.

The Arrow Athra surge he gives you is kind of cool, but I’m not likely to ever use it, honestly.

[00:11:14] Speaker B: Yeah, same here.

[00:11:17] Speaker A: But Shadow of the Simurg, now, that is awesome.

Yes.

And unlocks a whole lot of new things.

It. Basically, it reminds me a lot of Tracer from Overwatch with the recall ability, which I always enjoy doing in that game.

[00:11:35] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, yeah, it does.

[00:11:38] Speaker A: And it’s, you know, it’s nice that you can cancel it or you can leave it just floating around wherever you want. And you can use it to. I don’t know if you went back to Artaban at any point, but you can use it to, you know, freeze yourself mid attack and then re. Like, do double attack.

Oh. Essentially, if you do the.

[00:11:58] Speaker B: That way.

[00:11:59] Speaker A: Don’t. Like, if you just. Not a combo, but hold square or. What’s the. What is it, a X on Xbox?

No, you hold. Hold the attack button, and then right as you’re about to unleash it, do the Shadow of Simmer.

You’ll do the lot. Like that kind of flying blades attack, and then hit. Hit the L1. And then you end up doing a second version of it.

[00:12:27] Speaker B: Oh, okay.

[00:12:28] Speaker A: Very useful.

But anyway, yeah. The old man we’ve been chasing is waiting for us atop the statue as we leave the room and cryptically asks if we’re courageous and clever enough to save our friend, implying Prince Cassan.

So it turns out maybe we can bring him back from the dead after all, but have to deal with someone with the darkest of souls.

And that’s a very specific word choice, wouldn’t you say?

[00:12:59] Speaker B: Yes.

[00:13:01] Speaker A: Like, could you be any more obvious on Dark Souls?

He gives us the eye thing, as he calls it back, and even places a map marker for us to find the Pit of Eternal Sands. And boy, oh, boy, is it far away.

[00:13:19] Speaker B: Yeah, it’s nowhere close to where I was. Yeah, I was like, oh, this is going to be a journey to get here.

[00:13:26] Speaker A: But, you know, hey, I guess exploration is the whole point, isn’t it? So off we go. Exactly.

And just as we had started to figure things out, Neith shows up claiming that we betrayed the immortals and killed Ghassan as the partner in crime to Anahita.

But fortunately knows Sargon well enough to know that he can’t lie when he’s angry. So she stands down, then explains that Varam said that’s what happened, so it’s his word against Sargon’s. And while Neith and Artaban met that news with skepticism, unfortunately Orod and Rajen.

And I forget the archer’s name. Menelaus.

[00:14:06] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:14:08] Speaker A: Believed Varam and Rajen seems like a bit of a suck up to saying he’s fit to lead.

So yeah. Fights incoming. Since they’re hunting us down, it sure would have been nice if Neith had brought us with her to escape the depths though, because she literally just flies out of there without even giving any directions. Just jumps diagonally through some walls and didn’t take us with her.

I thought we were friends.

So before moving on to the next section, did you go exploring the rest of the depths with the new recall ability?

[00:14:48] Speaker B: I did, yeah. I think I’ve explored the majority of the depths. There might be like one little section I haven’t got to, but I think the majority I’ve explored.

[00:14:57] Speaker A: Well, considering we can now get behind and kill the giant creepy masked knife crawler dudes that are stuck in crawling in tunnels.

I took me a second to realize

[00:15:10] Speaker B: I could do that.

[00:15:12] Speaker A: Yes. You have to like go put a teleport clone right in front of its face and then run away.

[00:15:20] Speaker B: Yeah. Have it chase you and then you.

[00:15:22] Speaker A: Yeah, and then it’s got that like kind of weird spew out. That’s no fun.

[00:15:26] Speaker B: Yeah, it also back kicks you if you’re not careful.

[00:15:31] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You know, the bat kick’s no fun, but it was useful to go back through the depths. Picked up a bunch of items. Did you do the motherly love side quest?

[00:15:44] Speaker B: I don’t recall doing the motherly love side quest.

[00:15:49] Speaker A: Okay, so you, I want to say it’s like up, diagonally up right. Somewhere sort of in the center of the depths map, there’s a room with an old lady that says that some beast killed all of her children and she wants you to go get revenge. Does it ring a bell?

[00:16:09] Speaker B: No.

[00:16:10] Speaker A: Okay.

[00:16:10] Speaker B: No, I do not recall doing this

[00:16:12] Speaker A: one she gives you a side quest called Motherly Love.

It sends you back sort of far left, past one of the crawling stabby dudes, and then you end up in this room and fight a dark version of the giant boar from the forest.

[00:16:33] Speaker B: Okay.

[00:16:37] Speaker A: And then it’s pretty much the same fight. Honestly, not all that difficult at this point. But you go see the mother’s children’s bones all over the room behind and collect a toy with a lullaby etched onto it.

Oh, great. Yep. And then as you’re leaving the room back to the boss room, the old lady mother shows up and you say, hey, give me what you promised with the more information about this place.

And it turns out she’s actually basically just a xenomorph from Alien that ambushes you.

[00:17:11] Speaker B: Oh, lovely.

[00:17:13] Speaker A: Which, yes, you end up seeing a lot of in the catacombs. It’s kind of one of those enemies, but in a form of a mini boss, so it’s fortunately just a mini boss and not terrible. Terribly difficult to kill, but it definitely caught me off guard.

So, you know, throw the robe off and then quick strike and you get hit. But as soon after, yeah, you learn it’s the same creature. So it was good to have a tiny bit of experience with it before getting to the catacombs.

[00:17:39] Speaker B: That’s probably.

[00:17:41] Speaker A: Okay.

[00:17:42] Speaker B: Yeah. It’s probably in the one section of

[00:17:44] Speaker A: the depths that you didn’t check out,

[00:17:47] Speaker B: like, grayed out from it. Yeah. Yes.

[00:17:48] Speaker A: Okay, that makes sense.

[00:17:50] Speaker B: So.

[00:17:55] Speaker A: And yeah, so you reach the catacombs, and then Kalux, the tree sprite that looks like a fireball, says you’re someone who knows the way but is forever led astray.

Almost like it knew exactly that I had just gone all over the place looking for goodies instead of following the main path.

[00:18:14] Speaker B: True.

[00:18:14] Speaker A: Yep.

Gotta love some subtle meta humor.

[00:18:18] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly.

[00:18:19] Speaker A: But even better is the fact that he comes along with you as your personal torch.

[00:18:25] Speaker B: Yes. Through the catacomb, which is nice.

[00:18:28] Speaker A: Like, what impeccable timing for this guy to show up. It’s almost like they designed it that way.

[00:18:34] Speaker B: Seems like it. I know. Now, it’s so nice to have that light. Otherwise. Yeah, that would have been a very difficult section.

Even more.

[00:18:45] Speaker A: And I guess here’s an interesting point. So the catacombs look like they’re ripped straight out of Silent Hill 2.

I could.

[00:18:56] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:18:58] Speaker A: Okay, let me make my case here. Like, if it’s not immediately jumping in your head, squelchy noises.

[00:19:04] Speaker B: Yes.

[00:19:05] Speaker A: Weird mouth walls with sharp teeth blocking doorways that both spit acid at you and become Tunnels.

[00:19:13] Speaker B: Yeah, those are annoying. Yeah.

[00:19:15] Speaker A: And just like, weird, like, fleshy walls and all this stuff. It not a pleasant place at all. Fortunately, it’s fairly a small part of the map, but kind of that subsection of the depths.

[00:19:28] Speaker B: Yeah, it is. Yeah. Did you. So, wait, did you go.

Okay, I think we took different ways to get to the pit. Originally, you went from the depths through the catacombs.

[00:19:41] Speaker A: First, I went from the depths through.

Yeah, I found a path from the depths to the catacombs.

[00:19:48] Speaker B: Yeah, so did I. And then I went backwards, and then I went through the forest, down through the sunken harbor to the pool, and then I went backwards through the catacombs.

[00:20:02] Speaker A: Interesting. So you had a nice little break then from.

From the dingy darkness to get the catacombs. Yeah, but.

[00:20:10] Speaker B: Yeah, so I get the light, like the Wac Wack tree that’s by the pit, like right before you enter the catacombs or where you came out of. If I go to that, then I get the.

The eyeball who gives me light, and

[00:20:21] Speaker A: then I go back through. Yeah. So I’ve realized now that any. Any entrance you. You arrive to from the. To the. To the catacombs is where he’ll show up. So. Yeah, a very handy teleporting tree sprite, but. Okay, that’s curious. So you climbed back up out of the depths and then went through the forest and then down to the.

[00:20:43] Speaker B: All right, because I unlocked the elevator after meeting the scrapper and went all

[00:20:49] Speaker A: the way back on the elevator. You go through that little. The room that the key you just bought unlocks and then get up there.

Interesting.

[00:20:57] Speaker B: I couldn’t go all the way up because obviously I think we need to double jump or something. But.

[00:21:01] Speaker A: Yeah, then I went back to the

[00:21:02] Speaker B: haven, did some upgrades, and then I went through the forest, because there’s, like, a little section of the forest that you can drop down into this sunken harbor.

[00:21:12] Speaker A: There you go.

Okay.

That’s the joy of a Metroidvania. You can take multiple routes, places.

[00:21:20] Speaker B: Exactly.

[00:21:23] Speaker A: Interesting.

Yeah.

I was kind of happy to bail out of the catacombs and then pop into the sunken harbor.

[00:21:32] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. It was the opposite way where I went into the catacombs. I was like, I don’t like this. I died quite a few times before I got to the next whack whack tree in the catacombs.

[00:21:44] Speaker A: Yes, because the whack whack trees on the other end.

[00:21:46] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:21:48] Speaker A: Interesting. Okay, well, then I guess my recounting of the path that I took is not going to sound super familiar. So just reverse recall what you got.

[00:21:59] Speaker B: Yeah, the.

[00:22:01] Speaker A: You did. Did you find. I think it’s an optional boss. Did you find a giant crab boss?

[00:22:06] Speaker B: Yes. With, like, a metal claw?

[00:22:09] Speaker A: Yeah, with a giant armored claw. Armored claw. Interesting fight.

Yes, mostly in that it was kind of random. Amongst all the fantastical enemies we’ve been fighting.

[00:22:21] Speaker B: Yes.

It took me a sec to figure out that you need to jump over him or dash over him to the other side to then do damage. Because I was, like, just parrying his and dodging his armored claw.

But once I figured it out, I was like, okay, this guy’s actually not too difficult.

[00:22:42] Speaker A: Yeah, it wasn’t all that tricky once you find out the kind of the one weakness.

I mean, yeah, it’s just the fact that it’s giant, I guess, makes it stand out, but it’s kind of just random that it was a crab, I guess Crabs are scavengers, though, so if it was going to appear in this game, it makes sense. It’s in the catacombs, where all the bones are.

Crabs are known for eating some really weird stuff, but they taste delicious, so that’s true.

But, yes, I guess now that we’ve reached the entrance to the Pit of Eternal Sands, the old man says that we’re not ready. So I guess I found, now that I think about it, yes, I did not go through the Sunken harbor because it’s after the pit’s entrance when you’re coming from the catacombs.

Because I came out of the catacombs and showed up right at the pit.

[00:23:35] Speaker B: Right, right at the pit.

[00:23:36] Speaker A: And then after that, got to the Sunken Harbor.

So you had a lot more exploration involved to get to the pit. I popped out of the catacombs and was right there.

[00:23:45] Speaker B: Yep.

[00:23:47] Speaker A: And reaching the entrance to the pit, the old man says, we’re not ready. Turns out we need more abilities to do so.

We did know that already because of that was at this point, I.

This is how we kind of laid out this. This episode. Right. But it was at this point that I definitely realized we had a lot more to do before calling it a wrap for the episode.

[00:24:07] Speaker B: Same. We got to the pit and he said that, and I was like, oh, my God.

[00:24:11] Speaker A: So, you know, in hindsight, last episode should have been up until this entrance, like, arrival to the pit. So we should have done the whole depths and catacombs because of the amount of time.

But hey, you know, we got through it.

And anyway, the old man couldn’t just be straight up with us, but I guess Speaking in riddles was a lot more common in ancient times, so a bit less direction than I would have liked, but it seemed like the forest and the sacred archives were the right places to look, based on what he said.

And yet, considering that the closest fast travel point in the Catacombs was fairly far backwards for me, I decided to push forward and head towards the forest. The old man also said he didn’t want to be around when all hell breaks loose, but I do want to watch and didn’t give any more context than that.

So, I mean, something is not so nice as waiting for us in this pit of eternal sands.

[00:25:10] Speaker B: Oh, yeah.

[00:25:13] Speaker A: Okay. So at this point, I moved on to the sunken harbor. And you’re coming from the other direction. So you had a very different experience with dealing with them. But what did you think of the pirates?

[00:25:24] Speaker B: They were annoying.

They were. I don’t know, they caught me off guard a few times, jumping out with the first attacks. Yeah, I died quite.

[00:25:33] Speaker A: Yeah, they definitely. They pull the sneak attacks a lot, like coming from the background.

[00:25:37] Speaker B: They’re a bit stronger than I thought too. I wasn’t.

[00:25:40] Speaker A: Yeah. So. And. And very agile. Yeah, Like, I. At first I was annoyed, but I. Overall, in the entire sunken harbor experience, I had a lot of fun fighting them. Yeah. But damn, like, they are good at baiting me into parrying and then attacking right after I’m not able to recover.

I. I could barely get that down because of all the fake outs, so I was just dodging like crazy most of the time unless it was the yellow glint thing. And half the time I was already in the middle of something and couldn’t get back to parry in time. So.

[00:26:12] Speaker B: Yeah, my.

Yeah, I did that. And then I kind of went into like. If I saw one, it was like I. I rushed them and then tried to pin them against the wall. Just kept hitting them and hitting them. So it didn’t give them much of a time to attack otherwise. Yeah, because.

Yeah, I got faked out a lot otherwise trying to time the parries.

Yeah.

[00:26:35] Speaker A: Didn’t expect the pirates to do that. I’d expected some, you know, muskets and whatnot, but. And a little saber here and there. But yeah, I guess so. Exploring through the sunken harbor was a. A little odd that a harbor’s so far below the earth. I mean, the sunken kind of pins it there. But like, how do you. What? I don’t know.

I don’t know where this whole underground caves of water come from.

Anyway. I was literally a single health bar away from dying with no potions left when I got through the rest of the sunken harbor and would have had a really long way to go from the respawn that I didn’t want to deal with. So I was so glad. I, like, I saw one bar of health and said, nope, you’re not killing me today. And just like ran around like a madman until I was able to kill the last pirate and get out.

I’m so glad I made it by the skin of my teeth because I did not want to repeat that again.

[00:27:33] Speaker B: No, no, it was difficult. There were a couple times. Yeah.

I came from the.

As I said. So I came through the forest way. So I actually found a Wak Wak tree and a homa statue.

[00:27:45] Speaker A: Yes. Which I found eventually.

I think that might have been the one actually, because I got back up towards the forest before going into the next section.

[00:27:53] Speaker B: Yeah. There are two in the depth in the sunken harbor. There are two homeless, which is so weird. There’s like two really close to each other in the sunken harbor, but yet there’s only like a couple in some places far away.

[00:28:05] Speaker A: Yeah, some of them are hidden pretty well too. Like you gotta take some odd shortcuts in other areas.

[00:28:14] Speaker B: Oh, yeah.

[00:28:15] Speaker A: What did you think of the soma tree?

[00:28:19] Speaker B: That was.

I enjoyed the area up to.

[00:28:23] Speaker A: Yeah, I think, you know, it’s an awesome looking biome, right?

[00:28:27] Speaker B: Yes.

[00:28:28] Speaker A: It reminded me a little bit of Kashyyyk in Jedi Fallen Order, which I loved.

[00:28:33] Speaker B: Okay. Yes.

[00:28:34] Speaker A: Like, such a lush, vibrant place is so rare in collapsed worlds in video games. So the forest and the Soma tree were kind of a breath of literal fresh air, especially after that nasty stench of the depths in the catacombs.

I do of course mean vibrant and lush eventually because at first it’s kind of dark and dingy with the corruption after all.

[00:28:58] Speaker B: Very true.

Yeah.

Did you fight the giant tree monsters?

[00:29:08] Speaker A: Yes, I sure did. I did.

[00:29:10] Speaker B: I dodged past. I was like, I don’t want to deal with you right now. I was like, I’m just going to

[00:29:15] Speaker A: explore frightening and remarkably good kickboxers too.

[00:29:20] Speaker B: Okay.

[00:29:21] Speaker A: I, I. You did. You did not fight one. I think there’s a handful. There’s like two or three that I came across.

[00:29:26] Speaker B: Yeah, I came across two or three and I was able to like sort

[00:29:29] Speaker A: of dodge past, like past them. So you may have, you must have seen at some point that. So basically the. They have a handful of attacks. They have like the kind of stick his arms into the ground and then launch spikes up from the ground attack.

There’s A giant, like, flying kick almost.

And then it can also jump up and slam the ground. And then there’s another thing where it summons. Oh, it spews out poison or venom sacks. I don’t remember which. And the most important, I suppose it can summon these, like, leaf dog things that if you don’t kill them fast enough, turn into the actual, like, forest warriors.

[00:30:14] Speaker B: Oh, okay.

[00:30:16] Speaker A: So, yeah, he’s got a lot of attacks and you just kind of gotta keep smacking and dodging and all that.

Not a lot of parry opportunities, but they’re not terribly difficult. They just look.

[00:30:28] Speaker B: Look more intimidating.

[00:30:29] Speaker A: Yeah, but. Yeah, like really good kickboxers. So here’s my question. When is a tree going to be a guest character in a 2D fighting game?

Yeah, I. I will main. I will main a giant ent tree as a fighting game character. So if somebody put that in there also, I mean, even before finding the trees so that, you know, the. The spiked beetles that crawl up on the vines and stuff, Those things are straight out of Metroid.

[00:30:59] Speaker B: Okay.

[00:31:00] Speaker A: They just climb around on loops around, go up and down and over platforms, but know they’re in our way, so they gotta die.

But they’re just. That’s classic. Super classic.

Doesn’t do anything except if you run into them, you got problems.

[00:31:17] Speaker B: Yes, very true.

[00:31:22] Speaker A: I will say also, like, throughout this section, it became a lot more apparent. But I do love how the lore items you pick up leading to the boss here all kind of lay the foundation for what type of enemy it is.

I feel like it makes so much. Makes the whole experience so much more immersive than just reaching a boss in some corner with no context other than what it looks like and the room that it’s in.

So you don’t know anything about it, about it at all, or about his motivations. Like, I really liked hearing this. You know, came from the sky. This forest queen came from the sky and corrupted everything.

It doesn’t really explain much beyond that, but it’s still something to go off of instead of just an appearance.

[00:32:08] Speaker B: Yeah, it definitely does.

[00:32:10] Speaker A: I do also really like, and we were kind of chatting about this, that in so many games, if I had to go into some weird corner and find a secret path to.

Just because I like exploring the nooks and crannies, you end up finding some item or some currency or whatever. And in most games, if it was just a literal text item with no benefit, I would typically be annoyed by that. But I like how much it deepens the lore here.

[00:32:40] Speaker B: Yeah, it does. It Definitely, yeah. Deepens the lore more of everything.

[00:32:46] Speaker A: Especially like the scrolls and the Secret Archives and those kinds of things, like the notes and all of that.

Yeah. It’s obviously games have gotten really far into that direction of voice notes and all those things and they can be a little tedious, but I think that it’s just the right amount here.

[00:33:03] Speaker B: Yeah, it is.

[00:33:08] Speaker A: And so, okay, after the first trees, you find a walk, walk tree at the base of the soma tree. And it’s just so sad to come across.

There’s no gold light, just the wind chimes and the purple corruption and there’s the Somatri spirit floating up above that can’t say anything.

Like it kind of like brings you down. It’s a little depressing, but fortunately you’re able to kind of climb back out of it and save the area completely. Did you run into adolescent Varum?

[00:33:43] Speaker B: I did, yes.

[00:33:46] Speaker A: He, in that first encounter there, he calls you a friend.

If only he knew his own betrayal in the future. Yeah, maybe, just maybe we can befriend this kid version of Varam enough for current Varum to not be an A hole.

[00:34:08] Speaker B: Hopefully that would be nice.

[00:34:10] Speaker A: Yeah.

[00:34:11] Speaker B: Maybe that’s how we can change the events of the future.

[00:34:14] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, clearly there’s what we already fought three, two other Sargons and I think two more after this.

So there are clearly many, many versions of the same people all over the place.

[00:34:28] Speaker B: Oh yeah, there definitely are.

[00:34:34] Speaker A: On to the forest Queen.

[00:34:36] Speaker B: Yes.

[00:34:38] Speaker A: Wow.

You know, first off, just from the world building perspective, her corruption was so powerful, it literally tamed a God, the wolf God Shamrosh, and turned it into a rideable pet.

You know, a winged wolf on its own is scary enough, but this Forest Queen with her spinning blade attacks makes it all the more tricky.

And also just for the cherry on top, it looks like, kind of looks like a Valkyrie out of God of War. Although more spider like with the weird eyes.

[00:35:12] Speaker B: Yeah, she does. Yes. I agree with the armor and everything. Does kind of look like a Valkyrie.

[00:35:17] Speaker A: Very, very cool.

Very cool kind of character design, boss design visually, you know, as well as the gameplay.

And now before even getting to the fight itself, you know, it’s just this.

This right here is making full use of the 2.5D graphical style. This boss fight, and I loved every minute of that element to it. You know, the full animation in the background and using it to attack you was fantastic and is now how I will judge every future game in the 2.5D style that I’ll eventually play.

[00:35:55] Speaker B: Yeah, it was really good.

[00:35:57] Speaker A: Like, especially. I mean, just the, like red eyes light up in the background and you gotta dodge really quick. Super cool.

[00:36:06] Speaker B: Coming up from the ground. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[00:36:09] Speaker A: Loved it.

As far as the fight itself, how did he go about taking out the queen?

[00:36:19] Speaker B: Okay, I’ll say this one I didn’t love as much.

[00:36:22] Speaker A: Oh, this is my favorite one so far, but go for it.

[00:36:25] Speaker B: Well, no. Okay.

It was a good fight. It was hard. It took me. I will say this took me.

I don’t know, probably close to 10 tries.

[00:36:35] Speaker A: It is a tricky one.

[00:36:36] Speaker B: It is tricky.

Got her close a few times and then.

Oh, those little purple mushrooms that explode were. Oh, I hate those things.

[00:36:47] Speaker A: Yeah, they’re annoying. Okay, let me ask you this. How many arrows do you have in your quiver currently?

[00:36:52] Speaker B: 20. I had 20.

[00:36:54] Speaker A: Same with me.

You had 20. And they don’t. They don’t. There aren’t enough arrows dropped during this fight in particular to make it work super well. Especially if you miss occasionally.

[00:37:06] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:37:07] Speaker A: I guess the other question. How.

What was your amulet build to start the fight and then to end it? Actually, did you rejigger your amulet build at some point? Okay, so you, like, didn’t do the retry and went back to the walkway tree to do that?

[00:37:22] Speaker B: No. So after about three tries.

[00:37:26] Speaker A: Well, what were you using at first?

[00:37:28] Speaker B: I think I was using just whatever

[00:37:31] Speaker A: you walked into the room with.

[00:37:32] Speaker B: I’m trying to think what I had. Yeah, whatever I walked in the room with. How many of amulet slots do I did I have at that point?

Because I have.

I have eight amulet slots, like now. And I think I had six in that battle.

So I had the Shield of Mithra. I had. Yeah, okay. I would have had the Shield of Mithra, the Ruksana’s gift, which does the health after parry.

That would have been five. And then I would have had.

Oh, and then I would have had blessing.

So that was one. So that’s what I had.

[00:38:04] Speaker A: Yeah.

[00:38:05] Speaker B: After three tries, I realized the Shield of Mithra is not useful in this fight.

Not. Not helpful because I tried to use it on a spinning blade. But I was like, it really doesn’t do much at all because you can’t close the distance.

[00:38:20] Speaker A: And it’s not get. It doesn’t get caught in the bubble. Yeah.

[00:38:23] Speaker B: So I took that off and I threw on Aslan’s glory, which gave me an increase melee attack power while full health. And what was the other one I did?

It might have also been the will.

Was it the will of Rostam, I think, which increases the Power of the standard sword attacks.

Okay, one of those.

[00:38:48] Speaker A: Okay.

[00:38:49] Speaker B: I think it was. Yeah, I believe it was one of those to just give me some more attack power. Yeah.

And then I was able to. Yeah, I was able to just kind of.

There wasn’t much to parry in that fight. There was really, really. I mean, I.

[00:39:08] Speaker A: The spinning blades and one yellow eye lunge thing.

[00:39:12] Speaker B: Yeah. And that was about it.

[00:39:14] Speaker A: Otherwise. Hold on.

Okay. When. When I talk about it, we can see if we did it, too, but go. Go for it. Keep going.

[00:39:22] Speaker B: Oh, no. I was just saying, then it took me a few tries. I mean, it took me a few tries after. Even after I switched. There were a few times where I got her close. There was one time. One time that almost broke me because I got her to a sliver. Like, I had to just do one hit. One hit, and she was dead.

And I got knocked by the wolf into frigging, like, a whole, like, mushroom

[00:39:45] Speaker A: that went boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And I was like.

[00:39:47] Speaker B: And I’m dead. I was like, no,

[00:39:51] Speaker A: don’t go throwing controllers now.

[00:39:53] Speaker B: No, I did not. I just.

I, like, gave myself, like, a couple minutes, and then I beat her on the next try because. So.

[00:40:00] Speaker A: Good, good, good. Yeah. But regained composure.

[00:40:04] Speaker B: No. Yeah, it was. It was good. It was.

Once I kind of figured out,

[00:40:11] Speaker A: like,

[00:40:11] Speaker B: some of the movement attacks, I was also, for the first bit of it, the one move she does that you can’t parry. Her red attack, where she’s spinning and the wolf is running at you.

I had no idea. Like, how do I get past that without getting hit? And then it hit me that you use the shadow close and then you move behind it.

[00:40:29] Speaker A: So once again, after knowing that, it’s kind of hard to execute still, because you have to recognize that it’s that one and not the other.

Charge attack.

So you have to sprint up close enough so that you can. Because the wolf is so long, you have to get close enough, quickly enough to put the shadow down and then sprint and teleport pretty quickly, too.

Yeah. Even after I knew that it was the thing to do, I still got hit by that a handful of times.

[00:40:52] Speaker B: Yeah, same here. And I even.

And then the part where the wolf jumps up and howls and it goes into whatever, like a darker. The red background.

Yeah. Red dimension. I even, like, I’ve done it so many times. I knew, like, it was so hard to parry some of those, like, her duplicates that were coming in. I was more afraid of, like, trying to just dodge that. Her attack when she stabs down at you because that does more damage. So I was just mainly focusing on that.

[00:41:25] Speaker A: And that’s unblockable.

[00:41:26] Speaker B: Yeah. So that’s unblockable. So.

[00:41:28] Speaker A: Okay, that. That’s what I was going to ask about. So. Yeah. So the.

The first I did this fight about. I think I won it on my fourth or fifth try. The first couple in that red realm, I was just dodging everything or trying to dodge everything, and you get caught up once and you’re effed.

And so once I realized about the parrying, I didn’t get the timing down because they come really quickly.

[00:41:58] Speaker B: They come quickly.

[00:41:59] Speaker A: I started. You know, I do parry, parry. Then you have to watch out for the upper one. That unblockables get to dodge and parry combined.

But. Yeah.

Anyway, what else do you. Do you think about.

[00:42:13] Speaker B: No, it was a. It was a good fight once I could get that. The yellow parry to the yellow attack that you can parry, and it does quite a lot of damage, which is cool because then they, like, run into each other trying to get you. You dodge.

[00:42:25] Speaker A: Yeah. It’s a sweet kind of little mini testing period.

[00:42:28] Speaker B: Yeah. But I mean, going into this fight, I think I also had. It was either two or three potion refills, and I had like six or seven total health bars. Yeah.

But still, like, I. By the end of it, I was used up. I think all of them close to it.

[00:42:42] Speaker A: So what you’re saying is you’re ready for the. Don’t pick up any Soma petals run.

That’s not happening. Just go in with like, the.

Like playing Zelda with three hearts.

[00:42:54] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:42:54] Speaker A: All the way through.

[00:42:55] Speaker B: It was just. It was. It was a good fight. It just. It took me. This was a difficult fight, but I was like. I knew when I got her down to that one little sliver, after I made some adjustments, I was like, I know I can. I. I’m gonna beat this.

And then. Yeah. Next try. I did.

[00:43:12] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. As long as you’re making some progress each time you try.

[00:43:15] Speaker B: Yep.

[00:43:16] Speaker A: Or learning something out of it. Yeah, it’s.

I. At least the first couple times that I lost fairly quickly.

Same. I. I walked into the room, of course, with Shield of Mithra because it’s always on there and a couple other amulets that I like doing when I’m roaming around, but realized it wasn’t cutting. It turned, you know, went and turned off Field of Mithra. And then I loaded up on parry boosting amulets, even though there aren’t that many parry options.

So, yeah, I removed. Moved. Removed Shield of Mithra because it didn’t help at all.

But I did put on the amulet that lets you heal when you parry and then the amulet that builds up Athra surge when you parry.

And then I kind of wrote out the rest of my couple attempts that way. I loved the build, honestly, with just parrying non stop whenever you could.

[00:44:13] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:44:15] Speaker A: And because it’s she. I mean just by sheer luck, almost like she was using the spinning yellow blade attack enough. And then in the next phase, the sham rush also throws it back towards her so you get two parries right there.

So I was building up surge and health while I was doing it till like either top myself off or survive.

And super useful. So I quite enjoyed that. And then, yeah, those two phases in the Red Realm with the many clones of the Queen felt a lot like the Mantis Lords in Hollow Knight in all the best ways. Because once you nail those parries and dodges in that phase, it feels like this choreographed dance and super fun.

[00:45:02] Speaker B: Okay, yeah, that was. Yeah, not my favorite phase of that battle.

[00:45:09] Speaker A: Honestly. I think that was my favorite part of the battle. Except for the sweet parry animation where they run into each other.

[00:45:15] Speaker B: Yeah, that was a. That’s a. Just dodge as much. All the up like the herd down spear attacks that are on parry, bowl

[00:45:26] Speaker A: and tank through the yellows.

[00:45:28] Speaker B: Try and like. Yeah, take some of the yellows out or parry as much as like just get a couple because they didn’t do too much damage.

[00:45:35] Speaker A: But yeah, it wasn’t as bad.

Well, anyway, saving Chermash was great and just a little bummed out that we couldn’t pet the wolf. Yeah, I suppose he is a God though, so I guess I can forgive him.

And from there you pick up the Dimensional Claw, which is a great power up.

[00:45:57] Speaker B: Yes, you do. That’s right. Yeah.

[00:46:01] Speaker A: I in particular love summoning and charming builds in games that have them, so. So it’s so cool to be able to possess an enemy to fight against its allies temporarily. Or pick up, you know, the essentially Molotov cocktails or the purple sacks and use them as grenades.

It’s of course also useful for traversal and exploration.

Did you continue exploring the Soma Tree after the boss fight now with that new claw ability?

[00:46:30] Speaker B: I did, yeah, I did.

[00:46:33] Speaker A: Did you find the Double Sargons that are arguing with each other?

[00:46:37] Speaker B: Yes.

[00:46:38] Speaker A: One trying to join forces with you and the other one saying he’s full of crap.

[00:46:42] Speaker B: Yep.

[00:46:43] Speaker A: Yeah. How’d you go about that fight? Did you enjoy that one a bit

[00:46:49] Speaker B: more because it was so at this point Also I had gone back and I put back on like Shield of Mithra and kind of changed, rechanged my amulets. And I’m glad I did because for this I was able to just parry the crap out of these guys.

[00:47:04] Speaker A: Parry them into oblivion.

[00:47:06] Speaker B: Yeah, parry them into oblivion. Which then with the. The other one, the other amulet that. Yeah. Gives me health when I parry, which I had upgraded to I think giving me moderately a moderate amount of health at this point.

[00:47:19] Speaker A: What was your Shield of Mithra upgraded to?

[00:47:22] Speaker B: I think it was medium.

[00:47:25] Speaker A: Okay.

Yeah, I have not fully upgraded it yet, but I. It sounds like you have.

[00:47:32] Speaker B: I have now. Yes, I have now. At this point it was at medium, but it is now fully upgraded. So is the parry to get health. So I get. Great.

It says greatly get a lot of health increases. Yeah, it does. It gives a good amount.

[00:47:46] Speaker A: I gotta upgrade that one again.

[00:47:47] Speaker B: That one’s helpful. I will say.

So. Yes, I fought both the Sargons and somehow amazingly I beat it on my first try. I don’t know how I came close to dying a couple times. But what was also nice is they used the same after abilities. So they were trying to do the hit heal one. So I just like knocked them out of their circle and then I’d stand in it. Oh, you heal with their nice heal myself. And then if they tried to come close, I’d parry so that I could still stand.

[00:48:16] Speaker A: So nice.

[00:48:17] Speaker B: Yeah. But I got through the fight. It was a good fight.

There was at one point I was basically hitting them down equal at the same amount and then one of them I just started to take down more and I was like, I’m just going to kill one off and then same.

[00:48:30] Speaker A: And in this fight, yeah, I. I also beat them in one try and I was really glad because it was far enough from the tree that I didn’t want to have to come back here.

But the.

I had the Athra surge. That does like a spin attack.

[00:48:43] Speaker B: I had that one too. I did use that and I also

[00:48:45] Speaker A: had the one, the very first one that you get that stabs through armor that I hit one of them with but not the other or hit one of them more with than the other. So yeah, they were. I had whittled them down to both like 30% and then one of them got killed a lot faster at the end. But that spinning blade after surge, I think I used it almost immediately when I realized I was surrounded.

[00:49:06] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:49:08] Speaker A: And after you kill them, the teleport up and then ground pound atherosurge. You get from them is awesome. I’ve been using that a lot.

[00:49:17] Speaker B: Oh, I have not used that yet.

[00:49:20] Speaker A: It’s solid. I think between that and the area, like the vertical arc slice is both really kind of my favorites right now.

[00:49:30] Speaker B: Okay.

[00:49:35] Speaker A: But, yeah, I guess I also wandered around some more after this fight and found mostly just more time crystals and an amulet or two.

You can go. Did you go back to Shamrosh at all at that first.

That first Walk Walk Tree that was all depressing.

[00:49:52] Speaker B: I don’t actually know if I went back to it.

[00:49:55] Speaker A: So it has. That one has a Homa statue near it. So I went back there, and Shamrosh will give you another amulet which is called Water something. And I quite like using it.

[00:50:07] Speaker B: Yes. Is it Elusive Water?

[00:50:11] Speaker A: I believe so. There’s one there. And there’s one other kind of hidden one in the chest somewhere. I don’t remember which one is which, but.

[00:50:17] Speaker B: Okay, maybe I did go back then.

[00:50:19] Speaker A: There’s some useful things to go back.

[00:50:20] Speaker B: I got one called Elusive Water. That dodging does damage by moving behind the enemy.

[00:50:26] Speaker A: Yes. There’s one of them. There’s another one that lets you, like, step dodge in place, which I haven’t tried yet because it takes up too many slots, but might get it soon.

But yeah. And then you can also actually talk to the spirit of the Walk Walk Tree. So.

Okay. Doesn’t give you anything major, but kind of gives you a little. Thanks.

[00:50:47] Speaker B: A little. Thanks. Okay. I might have to check that out. I’m pretty sure I went back to that.

[00:50:52] Speaker A: Yeah.

[00:50:54] Speaker B: Also, which Homer statue? Because there are two in the Soma Tree.

[00:50:57] Speaker A: It’s the one that’s farther down. The one that’s down near the entrance to the Soma Tree area.

[00:51:03] Speaker B: Got it. That’s good. That’s what I thought. Yep.

[00:51:08] Speaker A: And then the Sacred Archives. So it sounds like you and I both did the Soma Tree first, but technically we had a choice. But from where we were in the Sunken harbor, it just made sense to do the Soma Tree first.

[00:51:18] Speaker B: It just made sense. And for me, because I came in Sunken harbor first, I had actually gone all the way to the left there and found that entrance to the Soma Tree.

[00:51:26] Speaker A: Sure.

[00:51:27] Speaker B: Before I made it to the pit. So when I read that and I was like, oh, okay, I know where that entrance is. I’ll go that way first. So.

[00:51:33] Speaker A: Yeah. Smart. Okay.

And then. Yeah. There’s the Sacred Archives. Right.

How did you feel about all those portal puzzles in the Temple of Knowledge?

[00:51:47] Speaker B: The. They were cool. They were. They were fun.

[00:51:50] Speaker A: They’re very cool designs and cool platforming challenges. Right. I think at the top of the, at the top of the list of notes about this.

[00:51:57] Speaker B: Yes. The first couple, I figured out myself because there’s four total, right? Yeah, four total. There’s.

[00:52:02] Speaker A: Yeah, there’s four doors there yet.

[00:52:04] Speaker B: Yeah. The first couple I was able to figure out myself. The last two that were, like, so large, I was like, I’m not gonna. I had to read like, a bit of a walkthrough and be like, figure out, Figure out exactly how to finish it. Because I could get it to a certain point, both of them, but I couldn’t figure out how to get to. With enough time to get to the scroll or whatever to pick up. But, yeah, I had to. Yes, I’ll say. I had to use a little bit of a walkthrough to just get me through those. The last two puzzles.

[00:52:34] Speaker A: Yeah, I think I used a walkthrough just in the third one. It might have been, but was very much. I mean, yeah, at this point, I was trying to get through this and this whole massive section of game and finished at 1am last night. So, yeah, you know, my, my desire to go explore off, off the beaten path, I still extended it for me, but that’s kind of what I love this genre for in the first place.

But, yes, at that point, it was, you know, 12:30, and I wanted to just finish it off.

[00:53:04] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:53:06] Speaker A: So I, I, I looked it up too. But it. They’re very creative, unique. That does require some finesse and some multiple attempts and all that, but very cool to be in a place that’s primarily puzzles more than fighting every once in a while. So it felt kind of like a Zelda dungeon or something else along those lines.

But, yes, your reward is the clairvoyance ability.

[00:53:34] Speaker B: Yeah.

[00:53:35] Speaker A: And hell yeah with that. If you saw the note on a scroll or what’s it called, a steli earlier, that’s how you can take down that damn jailer.

[00:53:45] Speaker B: Yes.

[00:53:46] Speaker A: Did you go and find a jailer?

[00:53:48] Speaker B: I did after this. So I know the jailer was like. It’s like an optional mini boss fight because I could have just gone straight back to the pit, but I went and found the jailer and fought and did that little mini boss battle.

And with clairvoyance, yeah, it wasn’t too difficult. I think he.

I died. It took me. I think it was two tries, but the first time, it’s because the Djinn caught me.

[00:54:15] Speaker A: I died. I think I died twice and won on my third try. And Yes.

I got caught out by the friggin poison rats.

And then later by the pirates. Actually, not by the pirates, by the jailer, but trying to avoid the pirates who are so fast.

[00:54:31] Speaker B: When the pirates came up, yeah, at the end there, I just went straight for them. And one of them I was able to just. I kept hitting over and over. I was able to just hit him. And then.

[00:54:39] Speaker A: Yeah, I think the time that I won is when I had. When he finally used the parryable attack. The like one shot kill. Like that helped me a lot.

And yeah, I mean, I guess also

[00:54:51] Speaker B: with Clairvoyance, with the Djinn, you can turn it on and then the gin

[00:54:54] Speaker A: never can find him. Same deal with, you know, you have to turn. You have to turn on Clairvoyance so that the jailer doesn’t heal himself. Yep, exactly. It does. It. I mean, it’s the weirdest thing because it’s just like a small graphical touch of when you’re in the alternate dimension. Right. It’s.

It kind of blur. Like not blurs. Well, I guess it blurs and covers the border of the screen with this purple aura.

And for some reason I feel like I’m. Like it’s harder to see or something or focus on.

[00:55:20] Speaker B: I feel like I’m more cramped. I feel like I’m more cramped on this screen.

[00:55:22] Speaker A: Yeah, it feels more cramped and uncomfortable to do, but you know, you have to power through.

[00:55:28] Speaker B: So.

[00:55:28] Speaker A: I was glad when I got through that phase, was able to turn it off, but I. So, okay. I was excited to hunt down this jailer who was very annoying and sending me to the prison and all that, but I’m never a fan of boss fights that rely so heavily on minions.

You know, it could have been an op catharsis moment where you finally turn the tables on this guy and can just end him.

But. Oh well, I guess if people would be complaining if a boss was too easy though, I mean, it would. I guess that would make more sense if you had a forced fight with them that you survive by the skin of your teeth and then you come back and just wipe them out, which I think I’ve seen once or twice in some games before. But anyway, you finally win. And the key unlock was pretty nice.

[00:56:23] Speaker B: Yes. Yeah, it was.

[00:56:24] Speaker A: Because there’s obviously many, many doors with eyes in this area or at least in the prison.

And I know you had not been to the prison beforehand because he didn’t catch you. When we were in the Sacred Archives last time, did you go back to the prison?

[00:56:38] Speaker B: I did. I Went back to the prison.

[00:56:40] Speaker A: I have not.

[00:56:41] Speaker B: I went back to the prison. I think I completed it. I went through and killed.

[00:56:49] Speaker A: Based on the time crunch that I was dealing with, I decided I’ll just. I’ll just go back to the prison to explore those locked jail cells later. Whether that’s after the Pit of Eternal Sands or in the final section right before the ending.

I’ll just go do a sweep through the prison to finish that off before finishing the game. But I was not quite going to jump into it in this moment. So what did you find down there? If you want to give me some hints?

[00:57:15] Speaker B: Sure. I mean, I don’t know if you have a side quest of the lost warriors.

[00:57:21] Speaker A: I do. Yes. Huh. Yeah. I think I fought at least two already.

[00:57:25] Speaker B: Oh. So I fought two. One I found at the beginning of

[00:57:28] Speaker A: the game and then the second one

[00:57:29] Speaker B: I just found here in the prison. In one of the sections of the prison. He was tough. I died a few times.

There is a Wak Wak tree in the prison, which is nice though, so makes it not too difficult to get back.

There’s quite a few time crystals. I mean, he drops, I think when you kill him. Was it his.

Yeah, I think he drops a coin or drops something.

Yeah, there’s some collectible. I think there was a couple collectibles also. But I got through.

Yeah, I just kind of went through the prison and then. And then I was able to go down to the lower city or I think is what it’s called again, or whatever. No, the. Yeah, Lower city area. You can go a different way through the. Through the prison.

Were using the key. It opens the door. And I fought this giant bird, which wasn’t a boss, it was a giant. It was just.

[00:58:21] Speaker A: It was talking about here. It wasn’t the simmer getting revenge, was it?

[00:58:27] Speaker B: No, no, no, no. It was just a big. It was a good sized bird that I was able to kind of take. It wasn’t too difficult. I mean, you can kind of figure out its attacks and then just kind of aerially attack it.

But then I was just looking through the lower city and I didn’t find much. And then I got stuck in a part where I think I needed something new.

[00:58:49] Speaker A: Got it.

[00:58:50] Speaker B: Oh, I need.

I need to break a wall. Actually, I can now. I need to break a wall by getting something that’s explosive and throwing it with the dimensional claw.

But yeah, there wasn’t. There was a few things in the prison. It was a good little.

I think at that point I had done all that Stuff. And I was just on, like, on a roll of. I’m just gonna get through this and do what I can and then go to the pit.

[00:59:17] Speaker A: Right. And so at this point, like, it’s. It’s usually around this point in a game where I. If I were to wager. And I mean, I guess based on how we’ve broken up these episodes, we’re a little. Either at or a little past halfway through the game, and you get more and more abilities. And I’ve taken, obviously, screenshots and put pins in places where I know that an ability will unlock the way to go through there.

[00:59:40] Speaker B: Yep.

[00:59:41] Speaker A: At this point, I’m not necessarily going to, because I don’t. I enjoy the backtracking in Metroidvanias. It’s a very big part of the existence of them. So I really like doing it, but I don’t like doing it 20 times.

So I. But basically my plan is to.

I’ll usually explore the rest of the area I was just in for things that I just saw. But I’ll wait until nearing the end to go and do a full sweep through most of the gray areas of the map I haven’t seen with the new abilities and just get everything at once. So, like, use the bombs and use the dash and use the teleport instead of, like, every time I get a new ability, run through the whole map. Because that’s just tedious, in my opinion.

[01:00:26] Speaker B: Yeah.

[01:00:30] Speaker A: But yeah, I, I.

Anyway, you go and move on. Right. It sounds like, yeah, I’ll be doing the prison at some point because it sounds like there’s some nice rewards. Did. How do you feel about the Xerxes coins? Like, you can use them, obviously, for that final step upgrade of the Amulets, but collecting them is kind of. It took me a number of coins specifically for me for me to realize that it doesn’t actually, like, log it in your inventory until you land on solid ground.

It’s like. Like I had seen them floating around.

[01:01:05] Speaker B: Yeah, this is similar.

Yeah.

[01:01:07] Speaker A: Yeah, similar.

[01:01:08] Speaker B: Go ahead. Similar to Celeste.

[01:01:11] Speaker A: I was about to say, yeah, strawberries

[01:01:14] Speaker B: or something you could get. And I did not try and get all of them in Celeste because that was like my. Yeah. And it was also, like, my first time really playing, like, one of those types of games where you have to be accurate with jumps.

[01:01:24] Speaker A: Precision.

[01:01:25] Speaker B: Platform. Yeah, precision. So I got a couple of them. But yes, it’s like, you have to. Once you get back on flat ground and you’re safe, that’s when it goes into your. You officially get it right.

I collected a couple of them. I’ve collected a few of them.

[01:01:41] Speaker A: Yeah. I mean, whenever I see them, I just keep going, keep trying until I get it basically there.

And I have. I mean, I almost. I want to say I almost have like 10 now because I haven’t upgraded a whole lot yet, which I probably should go back and do.

[01:01:55] Speaker B: Oh, I have.

[01:01:56] Speaker A: But just the.

[01:01:56] Speaker B: I have used them and upgraded. Yeah, I still have a couple of used.

[01:02:01] Speaker A: The fact that they. They had to land on ground threw me for a loop for a while because I was like, I. I got it. I clearly have it. Like, why?

[01:02:09] Speaker B: Yeah.

[01:02:09] Speaker A: And then I would die, you know, or fall or whatever, and it didn’t register.

But anyway, yeah, good times.

[01:02:20] Speaker B: Yeah.

[01:02:21] Speaker A: Obviously you move on to. It’s to the Pit of Eternal Sands and unlock the seal basically just turns into a giant whirlpool hole.

I don’t know what I was expecting really. I guess it is a pit.

So jump into the pit and then you land and then you find a walk, walk tree very soon. And I saved. And that was it.

[01:02:45] Speaker B: Yep.

That was basically the same for me.

Actually, you know, before that though, I did.

I’ve done quite a few upgrades to make myself quite a bit stronger.

So for say, like amulets wise, what I have now, like the.

I have eight amulet slots right now.

So I have the Shield of Mithra that takes up three.

The Rakshana’s Gift, which takes up two.

The Blessing, which is one.

Yeah. The Wolf Bride, which takes up one. And then the Aslan’s Glory, which also takes a one. But I have the Shield of Mithra fully upgraded, so it’s Shield of Mithra plus 2.

[01:03:32] Speaker A: I’ll probably be doing that soon.

[01:03:34] Speaker B: Yeah. I have Rakshana’s gift plus two, so that’s why it greatly restores health.

I have Blessing plus two. So I now have. I get three extra bars out of Whack Whack Tree. Yeah, Yeah.

[01:03:46] Speaker A: I don’t know.

[01:03:47] Speaker B: And I have the other two at plus one.

[01:03:49] Speaker A: I might have one amulet that’s at plus two already, but I spent a lot of my stuff in upgrading the Kaze and Layla. Um, so I have those at plus two.

[01:04:00] Speaker B: Oh, I have those at plus three.

I got those.

[01:04:02] Speaker A: Oh, okay. No, I don’t know if I’m at plus two or plus three now that you mentioned it. I have not upgraded the bow because I don’t care enough.

[01:04:09] Speaker B: Neither have I, but I have the.

[01:04:11] Speaker A: I have more arrows available. Right.

And I want to say no. Yeah, I still don’t care Enough about the bow, because most of the things you just shoot at will die with a single regular arrow the way it is now. Maybe eventually we’ll need to upgrade it, but I’m. I’m going to just keep storing my cash for amulets. And the swords.

[01:04:31] Speaker B: Yes. So I use it. Yeah. For that. So. Yeah, I think I. Yeah, I have the swords plus three. I don’t know if that’s the biggest or if there’s one more. There might be one more. I then have three healing potions. So I have healing potion plus two. So I get three total healing potions.

[01:04:48] Speaker A: And then

[01:04:50] Speaker B: I think I did maybe one upgrade to the. How much a healing potion gives you when you use it.

[01:04:57] Speaker A: Yes. I think I’ve only done the. I think I have that at two or three.

Yeah, I think I have that at three. And I have the other one at two.

The quantity of potions. No, I have three potions, and I have a good amount of healing from them.

[01:05:15] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, it gives me a good amount of healing. And then also. But with me, also with the parry now, that greatly increases healing. It’s. Yeah, it helps a lot.

[01:05:22] Speaker A: I’ve got a lot of ways to heal at this point.

[01:05:24] Speaker B: I think in total, with the three bars I get from blessing, I have 10 total health bars, which is nice.

[01:05:31] Speaker A: That’s good.

[01:05:33] Speaker B: Yeah.

I’ve done a lot of exploring and finding things and then time crystals and spending money.

Also, I’m not gonna lie. I bought some treasure maps from Fariba.

[01:05:45] Speaker A: Oh, no, I. Oh, treasure maps. Oh, gotcha. Yeah, I have money on those. Oh, I did seen those.

[01:05:53] Speaker B: Some of them I can’t get to still.

[01:05:56] Speaker A: Right. I’ll just wait until I’ve upgraded things enough and then buy those at the end.

[01:06:00] Speaker B: Yeah.

[01:06:03] Speaker A: The only other thing, I guess so after you. After Neith finds you and you have your conversation in the depths of the first time I was at the Haven after that, she’s just hanging out by the walk walk tree, and you talk to her, and she says, hey, so and so’s over at the lower city, and she puts a point on your map and starts a side quest.

And so I was like, all right, cool, I can do a side quest. This is before I realized how long this segment was.

It’s like, all right, I teleported over to the homa statue and walked over to Neith, and she says, hey, yeah, I found, you know, this person was here.

You know, come along with me. We’ll. We’ll take them out together.

And then it. I said, yeah, sure. And then it gave a pop up notification that basically said, you’re about to embark on a long journey that takes you away from what you’re doing.

Would you like to do this? Yes or no? And so I was kind of curious because that’s usually what a game will say when you’re like in that last stretch before the credits of a game. And so I was like, I don’t think we haven’t gone to the Pit or anything, so I don’t think this is the ending. So I look it up and that’s actually how you start the dlc. So if you talk to Neith, don’t do that yet because that’s going to be our last section of season if you want to go for it. But we’ll be doing it later.

[01:07:31] Speaker B: Yeah, we will be.

[01:07:34] Speaker A: So anyway, for next time, play along until you have gathered all the guardians and open the path to the upper reaches of the palace. Then save and quit and hang on for next time.

[01:07:46] Speaker B: Yeah, and thank you everyone for joining us on this one.

Yes, it was a very long section. Hopefully you guys enjoyed it as much as we did.

It was definitely fun. It was difficult, but yeah, it was a good time.

[01:07:59] Speaker A: So if, if my light research has any indication, this may be another long section as well, but hopefully not quite so long.

[01:08:07] Speaker B: Yeah, we’ll say hopefully not. Yeah. But again, thank you everyone for listening and have a good one.

If you want to follow along and discuss our playthrough of native 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 account under the same name. Thanks.