Category: RPG

Gothic [3] – Questing and the New Camp

April 10, 2013 by Nikola·0 Comments

Last time in Gothic, I learned a lot of new skills, got a hunting teacher, practiced sword fighting and then finally visited the Sect camp at the Swamp or, how they call themselves, the Brotherhood.

Thorus and Diego

Now I was back in the Old Camp and I finally had a conversation with, I guess, the highest ranking guard in the outer ring – Thorus. He made the requirements for joining the new camp official. I need to impress several people buy doing favors, getting strong, learning skills, etc. I already impressed a few, but I still have more than enough to do.

Thorus can also be bribed to let me into the inner ring, but it’s not worth the 1000 ore and the missed experience.

Thorus sent me back to Diego, who asked me to go fetch something from the mine, which will give me his recommendation. He was also now willing to increase my Strength and Dexterity, provided I have the skill points. I used the opportunity to increase my Strength by eleven points, all the way up to 21, because this directly increases my damage.

I got some extra are and decided to invest it in my first armor – a pair of digger’s trousers. This increases defense from weapons by 10 (or 15?) and defense from fire by 5, so I can now survive better to.

With these two things, I am now able to dispatch scavengers and mole rats without any issues. I can also kill a wolf if I’m careful and I can get rid of blood flies easily, though they can still kill me if I get swarmed.

Modrag and the New Camp

Thorus also had a favor for me. He wanted me to somehow get rid of Mordrag, who is a member of the new camp. Apparently, he steals their stuff and then sells it back to them, so they can’t have any of that. I went to talk to Mordrag and told him what’s up. He gave me an option. I can try killing him, which won’t end well for me, or I can follow him to the New Camp, to keep my options open.

Mordrag uses a bow, like a lot of members of the New Camp.

Either choice accomplishes my goal, so I chose the latter. The way to the New Camp was much easier than the road to the Brotherhood, with mostly scavengers and goblins along the way. I took note of some landmarks I’ll pay a visit to later, but I didn’t go far from the main road for the most part, because I didn’t have a lot of play time left and I wanted to get there before I’m done.

The New Camp is sitting on top of a dam, next to a lake. They have a mine of their own and a group of mages of their own – the Water Mages. I actually told one of the Water Mages about the letter I have for the leader of the Fire Mages, interested to see if there’s some rivalry, but he simply told me I have the option of joining the New Camp and then getting in contact with the Fire Mages via a regular communication route they have. I guess mages don’t plot against each other in Gothic.

I bought a book of spells, but it only contains descriptions, nothing else.

I explored most of the camp, got some quests, gained a level and learned acrobatics. I even went to their mine to check it out and gave water to the rice farmers. I learned two things. Firstly, their plan is to gather as much ore as they can and then detonate it to destroy the barrier. Secondly, other than the mages, almost everyone else in the new camp is an asshole, especially if they’re in a position of power.

I decided to join the Old Camp

It was night time again, so naturally, I decided now would be a good time to try and find my way back to the Old Camp. This time, I strayed away from the path quite a lot, which got me some experience and loot, but also got me some reloads. The first one happened soon after I left the New Camp. To the left of the primary entrance to the New Camp, there’s a cave with a laboratory and a bunch of people in there. As soon as I got in, I was attacked by one of them. I’m guessing I stumbled into someone’s meth lab or something.

It was morning by the time I got back to the Old Camp.

I moved on along the road to the Old Camp, getting lost several times and even stumbling into the forest I was told not to get in because it was too dangerous. Eventually, I saw the outlines of the Old Camp, albeit from a whole different direction than the one I was supposed to come back from. The net result is the same, so it doesn’t matter. I’m back at the Old Camp, I have a bunch of quests and now I’m free to roam and kill monsters.

Gothic [2] – Hunting, Smithing and the Swamp Camp

April 9, 2013 by Nikola·1 Comment

First Big Game Crash

My second session of Gothic was relatively short and it was made even shorter by a crash. On my first try, I decided to make a full circle around the old camp, killing scavengers along the way. I was hoping this would get me some experience and, more importantly, meat I can cook and sell. This is exactly what I got, but as I got back to the city and started trading with Dexter, the game crashed, so I lost about 20 minutes of my time.

Scavenging Skills and Sword Fighting

On my next try, I started saving often. This time, I checked my inventory and realized I have quite a bit to sell already. I traded everything I could for ore and then went out of the Old Camp’s front gate to pay Drax for some training. I repeated this cycle of hunting, trading and training several times, until I eventually learned all four of the scavenging skills. I can now extract teeth and claws, skin animals and gather other parts I can sell. I figured this would be the best way to spend early money – to make further accumulation of money easier.

I’m a bad-ass with a sword now, holding it in one hand and all.

I also spent 50 ore to learn the first level of sword fighting. As I said before, the character system of Gothic seems simple, but the way the mechanics work makes it extremely complex and interesting. For instance, learning the first level of sword fighting allows the hero to swing much faster and hold the weapon in one hand. It makes the game easier, but it also creates room for more skillful play. Basically, it synergizes both with the mechanics and the player.

Smithing

I also spent some time trying out smithing. You can buy metal rods from the smith and, through several steps, turn them into crude swords. These can then be sold at a profit of 10 ore per sword, so it’s a valid method of getting money, but overall, I think it’s mostly available in the game for flavor.

This is probably the worst smithing screenshot I could have taken.

To the Sect Camp (The Brotherhood)

Once I did all I could in the Old Camp, at least for the time being, I talked to a Cultist and asked him to take me to his camp in the swamp. This is basically an escort quest, but instead of me trying to keep my escort alive, it’s the other way around. The cultist was much stronger than me, so I basically abused this and used him to kill a bunch of enemies along the way to the Swamp Camp, mostly lizards, but also a wolf and some insects. This, with the added reward of completing the escort, got me close to the next level and placed me in a brand new location I needed to explore.

Baal Something earned about half a level of experience.

The Swamp Camp was definitely a religious place, if you consider smoking weed all day a religious thing. The cultist specialize in picking various smoke-able grasses they then sell to the other people at the prison colony, or even export outside. Each cultist also gets their daily dosage, which got me to a quest where one of them asked me for mine.

A swamp and some religious freaks. Not my cup of tea, but there’s experience and ore in it.

There are also teachers, called gurus, that I can’t talk to, but have to impress in order to join them. As I said, I don’t intend to join this camp, but there’s no reason not to do the quests for the experience and other rewards.

Back to the Old Camp

Once I explored most of the camp, I decided to go back to the old camp. I had to do this by myself this time, so it was a scary trip, especially because it was night time and there was rain. I took a bunch of wrong turns and nearly got killed by a pack of wolves, but eventually, I saw the outlines f the Old Camp on the horizon. I got in, found the shack assigned to me and used the bed to rest until morning.

Home, sweet home…

In my next session, I’ll work on getting my strength and dexterity up, so I can tackle stronger enemies. I also intend to buy an armor, or get it some other way. My only protection right now is an amulet I got off a corpse (+5 protection from weapons).

Gothic [1] – Intro and the Old Camp

April 8, 2013 by Nikola·0 Comments

For those not familiar, the basic plot of Gothic goes like this:

There’s a prison under a magical barrier with prisoners pretty much free to govern over themselves while in there, but unable to ever get out alive and with an arrangement to mine some special ore in exchange for stuff from the outside. The player is a fresh prisoner, just sent into the prison. Before he got sent inside, he was slipped a letter for the leader of the Fire Mages within the prison and that’s it. No name, not much further plot.

I didn’t get a chance to fix my Windows 8 issue here yet, so you get a crappy screenshot.

I actually like games with an anonymous protagonist, so this works for me, especially if there’s a prophecy to be fulfilled or something like that, the way it is with the Elder Scrolls series.

Meeting Diego

There’s a lot of characters in Gothic and, so I probably won’t remember most of them, but I managed to remember Diego. Diego is a denizen of the Old Camp and his job is to greet fresh prisoners. He basically introduces me to the prison and the inner politics.

The deal is, the prisoners split into three camps. The Old Camp still does the mining and gets most of the sought after outside stuff in exchange for the ore. They are probably the best equipped in there, but they aren’t really interested in changing the status quo. The New Camp has separated from the Old Camp and they’re actively trying to find a way to escape from the prison.

Sorry, still not fixed.

The Swamp Cultists are religious freaks. They found some entity they consider a god and they believe this thing will give them a way out of the prison and also grant them powers or something. I’m not completely sure yet, but I think I’ll either go with the Old or the New Camp when I finally join a faction. Religious freaks really aren’t my cup of tea.

Diego is part of the Old Camp, so his description was obviously biased. He told me who I need to talk to when I get there, pointed me in the direction of some discarded gear and sent me on my way.

I did some exploring around the landing area and found a pickaxe. This is not a very good weapon, even for the first one, but I don’t have a choice, really. From what I understand, the way weapons work in Gothic is that they have a strength requirement, and the more you surpass that requirement, the faster you can swing that weapon, up to a certain point. I might be completely wrong here, but if that’s true, then it’s probably in my best interest to pick a faster weapon instead of always going for the strongest one.

I fixed my issue here, so I could finally enjoy the nice view.

With the pickaxe, I did some more exploring and climbed a nearby cliff. On the top, I found two juvenile scavengers, a couple of mole rats and a goblin. The rats and the scavengers are beginner monsters, so they were easy to kill. The goblins, however, I remember from one of my earlier attempts at this game, so I was pretty scared when I attacked it. Somehow, I managed to kill it with a bit of health remaining, though, so I could freely enjoy the great view from the top of the cliff.

I went back down to the other side of the canyon, picked up a rusty sword, which is a weaker, but a faster weapon, and killed the last mole rat there. On the way to the Old Camp, I also killed a couple of meat bugs and got their meat for later.

First Time at the Old Camp

The Old Camp is arranged into several (two or three, I’m not sure) levels, with only the outer level accessible to me right now. I explored it in a circular fashion, talked to everyone and got all the quests I could.

The Barrier looks great in the night sky. It provides a lot of atmosphere.

One of the people there wanted to buy an ornamental sword from a merchant, but the merchant wouldn’t sell it to him, so I played mediator. Several guards wanted protection money from me, so I picked one and gave him the 10 ore he wanted. I think I need to pay all three to be protected everywhere, though.

There was an arena there to, as well as several people from the Cultist and the New Camp, trading and looking for recruits. The head guy at the arena wanted me to win a match in exchange for his good word with Diego. Several other people also wanted favors in exchange for their recommendation. Getting enough recommendations would make me an official member of the Old Camp, but even though I’m still not sure which side I’ll pick, I’ll do most of the quests anyway, for the experience and the rewards.

Frying scavenger meat over a fire. More atmosphere!

I found a frying pan over a fire and fried all of the meat I picked up from the scavengers and rats I killed. I remember this being very impressive back when Gothic was first released and it still holds its own now. I mean, sure, there’s alchemy in other games, but there’s an actual animation of frying the meat in this one. It’s a nice touch.

With all the exploration and quest solving, I finally got my fist level, so I traded most of my good away for ore and then gave the ore to some New Camp hunters outside, in exchange for them to teach me how to scavenge dead monster parts. I can now extract claws and skin animals. I still have two more to learn, so as soon as I get the money, I’ll come back.

It took me several attempts to clear these guys without dying, bit it made it all the more satisfying.

I also explored the area outside the Old Camp and climbed some cliffs. In one of the caves, I found a dead guard and reported it to another guard inside the camp. This secured me another recommendation. In another cave, on top of a cliff, I found basically a hermit. He used to live at the Old Camp, but then just decided to get away from it all.

I also spent far too much time trying to get down from that cliff. The controls in Gothic really have room for improvement. I kept taking from steps and falling to my death on my way down. I need to say something outright, though. Unlike many, I’m fine with the way Gothic handles combat. I’m OK with those controls. I just think the movement and jumping needs work.

The character screen looks simple, but there’s a lot of complexity hidden in there.

I actually spent a couple of hours doing all of this, so I decided to take a break at this point. There’s a lot to explore in the world of Gothic and I’m looking forward to it. It’s a great game that just happens to be rough around the edges.

Link’s Awakening [1] – Tail Cave

April 7, 2013 by Nikola·0 Comments

Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening - Cover, Box Art

I’m bad with names. I’m really bad with names. When I meet someone for the first time, I don’t think their name even enters my memory. I have to make a conscious decision to remember and repeat the name in my head just so It doesn’t go away immediately. The same goes with any other name.

Because of that, I couldn’t remember the name of the first dungeon of Link’s Awakening, nor the name of most of the characters in the game, other than Link, of course. Luckily, some quick googling helped with that, so I can now say I cleared the first dungeon – Tail Cave.

Zelda Wiki – List of All the Dungeons in Link’s Awakening

Koholint Island

Link’s Awakening is something of an off-shot of the main story arc of the Legend of Zelda series, the way I understand it. According to the story, After the previous games, Link is now a hero. He travels on his ship, ends up in a storm and crashes on the shores of the Koholint Island. To get off the island, he needs to wake up the Wind Fish.

This is how the game begins. Marin finds Link on the beach.

I can’t really understand how they do it, but the Zelda series manages to have a very minimal story in each game, but it all adds up to a complex and extremely interesting overall story arc. What I wrote above is pretty much everything the player needs to know about Link’s Awakening. There’s the backstory and the motivation and that’s it. Of course, stuff is added to it throughout the game, but no more than needed, which is very little.

Getting the Sword and the Shield

Link wakes up at the home of Marin, who he mistakes for Zelda for a moment, and her father Tarin. Taring gives him the shield and points him towards the beach where Marin found him, hinting something important might be there.

Zelda - Link's Awakening DX - The Shield

Tarin gives Link his shield, saying his name is written on it.

Before I went to the beach, I explored the village, checked out the shops and talked to everyone. I decided to do this playthrough completely walkthrough free, so instead, I’ll be taking notes (thank you, OneNote).

Talking to the NPCs made me realize the game is self-referencing a lot. The kids in the village give me tips about the gameplay and then finish with “I don’t know what that means, I’m just a kid”, there’s a Yoshi doll I can get at a game store, and there’s a lot of tips I can read up on on various signs and in the Village Library. There’s also a building with a phone in it. On the other side of the phone line is a person named Ulrira, who seems to be telling me what my next objective is. Overall, Link’s Awakening is the most approachable Legend of Zelda game yet.

I’m behind in postings, of course. My writing sessions are about as long as my playing sessions.

It also seems to control much more easily and fluently. The movement and the actions are less rigid, so I can dodge more easily. I still get hit, but it feels more like my fault when it happens and not that I’m not used to the controls, liked it felt in the past.

Anyway, I talked to everyone, took some notes and finally got to the beach, where I found my sword. I have two items now. Here are the notes I took:

Papahl’s wife wants the Yoshi doll for their kid.
Papahl will be lost in the hills later on in the game (this is more self-referencing).
Sale at the Sale’s House O’ Bananas is interested in any canned food.
One of madam Meow Meow’s dogs is interested in jewelry and accessories.
There’s a monkey on a tree near Sale who throws coconuts at me.
There’s a bomb-able wall on the beach near where the sword was.
There’s a book on the top shelf in the village library that I can’t reach
There’s another book in the library that apparently needs a magnifying glass.

After getting the sword, I immediately went back to the village to deal with some of the requests. I got the Yoshi doll and got a ribbon as a reward for that. I gave the ribbon to the dog and got a can of dog food. I then gave the dog food to Sale, who gave me bananas. I tried somehow giving those to the monkey, but they aren’t a select-able item and I don’t know how to talk to it.

Getting the sword plays the famous Zelda tune. It’s also definitely Link’s sword because his name is written on it.

I also got a heart piece from the well above the library. Getting four heart pieces in a Zelda game gives Link an extra heart container, so those are always great to pick up.

An owl (yes, we finally have the annoying owl) told me to go to the Mysterious Woods next, so that’s exactly what I did.

The Mysterious Woods

The screen went darker when I got to the Mysterious Woods. I don’t this happens on the original GameBoy, so it’s a nice touch on the color version. I had to fight a lot of Moblins while there, and I also find an item or two I wont be able to get until later, so I took some notes, or a note:

There’s a heart piece in a cave that I can’t get to. I need to be able to lift giant skulls

I found a toadstool and a witch’s hut, so I gave her the mushroom. I got a bag of magical powder. I used this magical powder on a raccoon who turned out to be Tarin, transformed by a toadstool he ate (the circle of life). I’m not sure what the importance of this is, but I did it. The witch told me to bring her more toadstools if I need more powder, so I’ll probably be doing that later. I also tried using the powder on other stuff. It lights up braziers and temporarily stuns that invulnerable enemy that electrifies me when I attack it, but I didn’t discover anything else.

Zelda - Link's Awakening DX - Tarin the Raccoon

Mushrooms are bad, kids. This is Tarin on mushrooms.

I was supposed to find the key for the first dungeon in the Mysterious Woods, so that’s what I eventually did, but it took me a while to find it. The place is pretty much a maze, so I got lost once or twice.

Link’s Awakening Dungeon #1 – The Tail Cave

The Tail Cave was located to the south of the village, north of the beach. I actually stumbled into it before I ever got to the Mysterious Woods, but I had to get the key to enter it.

I wonder why it’s called the Tail Cave…

The dungeon itself was easy, as I expected, since it’s the first dungeon. I found the compass and the map within the first few rooms and I beat the mini-boss a few rooms after that. The compass got a bit of an upgrade since A Link to the Past, or at least I think it did. It now creates a sound every time I enter a room where I can get a key. This can be useful with rooms where there’s a trick to get it. I don’t think the compass did this in A Link to the Past, but I might be wrong.

The item of the dungeon was the Roc Feather, which allows link to jump. It can even be used in the short side scrolling sections within the dungeons, which turns this part of the game into a full-fledged platformer. While we’re on the subject of the side scrolling sections, there are goomba and piranha plant enemies from the Super Mario series in those, which is a great touch.

Real goombas! Awesome!

Defeating the mini-boss involved jumping over things he sends at me, so I immediately got an opportunity to practice the jumping. The final boss of Tail Cave was more familiar and straight forward, but also far more annoying. It was the snake/worm boss with a vulnerable tail from the previous games. As before, if he hit me the wrong way, he would send me to the floor bellow, though this didn’t take away my health this time, and I had a much easier time getting back to the boss than in A Link to the Past. Still, it’s a very annoying boss.

Zelda - Link's Awakening DX - First Boss

I will always hate this boss, always!

Killing it got me my first heart container and the first of the 8 instruments needed to awaken the Wind Fish, which by the way, apparently is neither wind or a fish. The first instrument was a cello.

The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening [0] – A Story

April 6, 2013 by Nikola·0 Comments

My plan was to take my Gothic save with me over the weekend, so I could play it on my laptop. I copied it to my flash drive, but I left my flash drive plugged into my primary PC in Varaždin, so that plan is out of the picture. I thought about my options and then realized I have a challenge that’s sort of in progress, but I haven’t touched it in months – my Legend of Zelda challenge. Because of this, I got a Link’s Awakening rom and loaded up VisualBoyAdvance. Before I get to that, though, let me tell you a story or two.

Challenge Part 3, Link’s Awakening

Link’s Awakening is a Legend of Zelda game I actually played as a kid. As I already wrote on this blog, early gaming in Croatia was nowhere near the level of the West. We were always a generation or more behind the modern world when it comes to consoles and games and even then, we mostly bought pirated software and hardware due to a multitude of reasons.

Related Link: Gaming in the Balkans

So with all that in mind, how did I get my hands on an actual GameBoy and an actual game? I didn’t. I had a cousin who did.

Cousin #1, Waterworld and Link’s Awakening

Somehow, my cousin got his hands on an actual GameBoy and owned two games with it – Waterworld and Link’s Awakening. Both were in German and both were a bit advanced for us. At that time, Tetris and simple LED games were about the only thing we experienced as gamers, so an actual adventure game with puzzles, dialogue, equipment and a save option. All of those things confused the hell out of us.

I decided to go with the DX Color version. It’s a straight graphical upgrade with nothing lost.

Because of that, I’m embarrassed to say, I considered Waterworld to be the better game. I considered it, but I still ended up itching to play Link’s Awakening more often. I guess good games are good no matter what you think. In hindsight, I probably annoyed the hell out of my cousin because I kept hanging out at his place. I was the annoying kid obsessed with games, and he was the cool kid who only plays to waste some time every now and then. I guess gaming was my hobby before I even owned a proper console of my own.

I remember an instance where we somehow managed to delete a saved game and then couldn’t understand why Link didn’t have a sword anymore. We actually looked at the manual, not understanding any of it and then tried to create two new save files, named Ganon and Zelda, because we thought that’s what we saw on the screenshots in the booklet, hoping that would somehow give as the sword. Yes, we actually though Zelda was the name of the character we controlled.

I remember how proud I was when I finally figured out where to get the sword on a fresh save. Even then, neither of us understood the concept of saving the game and continuing later. The game we played before that just didn’t have that feature.

Cousin #2 and just Link’s Awakening

I also remember my cousin’s GameBoy somehow just disappeared one day. I never found out where it went, but that was it for Link’s Awakening for a while. My cousin then got an actual Nintendo Entertainment System, with Super Mario, Wild Gunman, Duck Hunt and a few more games, but The Legend of Zelda was gone and we went back to regular, simple games, without dialogue or saved progress.

The game actually looks really nice, even on the big screen, thanks to a great style and VBA’s smoothing.

About a year later, another cousin, this one some 20 years older than me, also got his hands on a GameBoy and a copy of Link’s Awakening. This time, I managed to figure out you can save your game and continue later and I figured out the concept of equipment. I remember getting to the point where I could jump, lift rocks and even swim, so from what I know now, it’s might be that I was about half done with the game, but I never managed to complete it. My cousin only lent me the GameBoy for a few days and once the third set of batteries was dry, so was my battery fund, so that was it.

In any case, Link’s Awakening was the only Zelda game that I played when it was current and probably the only video game before the PlayStation was out that I played when it was current. Sure, I talked about owning a Genesis, but even that, as ahead of this region as it was, was still nearly a generation behind. It’s a nice memory to have.

Related Link: Me owning a Sega Genesis

Gothic [0] – Making the Game Work on Windows 8

April 3, 2013 by Nikola·15 Comments

Surprise, surprise, GOG.com made me buy another game. This time, it was Gothic. Last time I played it, I just discovered the possibilities the internet offered me, and so I managed to download a RIP of this game on a 56k dial-up connection. It weighed about 100 MB, so it took me about two nights (and a big Internet bill) to download it. It hindsight, this probably wasn’t very smart, but that’s why we have hindsight.

This is what I got when I started the game. Unacceptable!

In any case, pretty much everything was ripped from the game, including voices, videos and higher level textures. Even with that in mind, I had a lot of fun with the game. I never completed it, though, so I decided to get it the proper way this time. The problem? Windows 8 has issues with Gothic.

Gothic Full Screen Problem on Windows 8 and How to Fix It

For some reason, on my Windows 8 machine (might also be on Windows 7), the game refuses to stay in full screen. Instead, it keeps resetting to a 640×480 windowed resolution. Even worse, the windowed mode doesn’t work properly so the game keeps crashing.

Thanks to pcgamingwiki.com (which is an amazing site), I managed to fix this issue. I actually had to download the Application Compatibility Toolkit and install a fix in order to get around this full screen/ window issue. These days, the fix has been updated, so all you need to do is to download and run the batch (.bat) file from the wiki.

Gothic should now work correctly in full screen. If you have Gothic 2, an added bonus is that the sequel should now be fixed as well.

Now for me, while the full screen mode was now working, the game still refused to remember the resolution settings, so I had to fix that to.

How to Force Any Resolution in Gothic on Startup

This part is simpler. What you need to do is to create a shortcut to Gothic.exe and put it in any place you like. Once you have it, right click it and go to Properties. You should have something like [code]X:\InstallPath\Gothic\system\Gothic.exe[/code] in the target field. Turn it into [code]X:\InstallPath\Gothic\system\Gothic.exe –zRes:1920,1080,32[/code] to make the game run in 1920×1080 resolution at 32-bit color. Of course, you can put any other resolution in there. Most of the standard resolutions should work.

You need to add something to the “Target” field, not “Start in”.

There’s also a possibility that your install path has spaces in it. In that case, your path will probably look something like

[code]”X:\Install Path\Gothic\system\Gothic.exe”[/code] What you do in this case is to add the extra stuff at the very end of the string, so it looks like [code]”X:\Install Path\Gothic\system\Gothic.exe” –zRes:1920,1080,32[/code] If you put it inside, it won’t work.

Links

Grandia [9] – Castle of Dreams, Zil Padon and Laine

April 2, 2013 by Nikola·0 Comments

I haven’t been riding the train for a while now and on those rare occasions where I do get some quiet time, I’m usually to sleepy to play. The train rides started making me extremely tired for some reason, so I keep nodding off while I’m on my PSP. Because of that, I usually just resort to listening to music instead of playing Grandia. That being said, I did manage to make some progress over the last two weeks.

Castle of Dreams

Firs up, the Zil Desert contained another optional dungeon – the Castle of Dreams. This one was, thankfully, much shorter than Soldier’s Graveyard, so I managed to complete it in one 40 minute train ride.

Rapp is definitely falling behind the most right now.

It was no less satisfying to get through, though, mostly thanks to some nice loot I got in there and a much more fun boss battle, compared to Soldier’s Graveyard. Among others, I got some really high-stat armor pieces, an even stronger sword for Justin than the one from Soldier’s Graveyard, a very nice dagger, a whip and most importantly, one more mana egg. Now I’m only missing one to teach Rapp his final element.

Once I spread my party around, the Lord’s Ghost was no problem.

As for the boss, it was called the Lord’s Ghost and it was difficult at first, but then I used the “Defend > Evade” action to spread out my party. After that, the monster’s area attacks were easy to heal through and I didn’t have any trouble killing it, as long as I didn’t use any melee moves on more than one character.

Zil Padon

With Castle of Dreams done, I went through the rest of the Zil Desert and finally got to the city of Zil Padon. For now, there was nothing for me to do there. I spent the night at the inn, found out there’s a lot of tension in the city due to three different races living in tight quarters and that was about it.

Everyone in Zil Padon is annoyed with each other, which I think will be important later.

I was tight with time, so I decided to just rush through the next two areas, which are Savanna Wilderness and Brinan Plateau. There’s something really important I’ve noticed, though – I started getting decent experience again.

Laine Village

The two areas finally led me to Laine Village, where Milda is from. Soon after I got in, I got the chance to meet the love of Milda’s life, Darlin. As it turns out, Darlin’s a giant, chubby, talking bull, and so are the other two wise men of Laine. I guess Grandia really doesn’t care about real world expectations, though Rapp and Justin seemed to be just as surprised as I was the first time I played through the game.

“Bulging muscles” would not be my first choice of words.

The three wise men told me a lot about Icarians, Alent and everything else I can expect. I was told I need to find out how to get to Alent, in order to fulfill some sort of prophecy. I was also told that Gaia, the petrifying monster I fought at the Tower of Doom, was somehow the ruin of the Icarian civilization, so it obviously need to be stopped.

Dorlin lost his marbles. Well, he lost his horn, which is sort off the same thing.

I was actually told this by Darlin and Derling, but the third wise man, Dorlin, had the key information I needed. The problem was, Dorlin went a bit cuckoo some time ago, after leaving his horn at the abandoned Lower Laine Village.

I guess that’s where I’ll be going next.

RPG Stats!

I know, I know. The purists will say that stats and leveling isn’t what RPGs are supposed to be about, but that’s all they’re about for me, especially JRGs, so this gets an extra subtitle.

Feena is probably the second strongest right now.

As I said, I started getting decent experience again, somewhere around Brinan Plateau. To be more precise, Justin started getting decent experience. The rest of my party doesn’t even get a chance to act, because Justin usually acts first and ends the battle with a single move. I decided to stop trying so hard to level everyone equally, mostly due to the way the game works.

Milda is supposed to be the new Gadwin – extremely powerful. She’s not.

If anyone gets to far ahead in levels, the experience that character gets is severely reduced. If anyone get’s to far behind, they get a huge boost in experience. I figured the worst case scenario would be that Justin gets ahead and stops getting experience, but still acts first and kills everything before anyone else can act. In that case, I’m sure I’ll eventually reach a point where Justin can’t kill everything in one move and someone else is bound to get their chance. If that doesn’t happen before the game ends, then there aren’t any problems, since I’m obviously strong enough anyway.

The consequence of that decision is that there’s quite a gap between Justin and everyone else in the party.

On a side note, there’s this site called the Let’s Play Archive, which does basically the same thing I’m doing here, except better, so I wholeheartedly recommend it. Here’s a link to a Grandia Let’s Play I started reading today:

~~Let’s Play Archive – Grandia by Azure_Horizon~~

Sadly, the link is gone now, but be sure to visit the site and look for other let’s plays. There’s some awesome reading material there.

Warlords Battlecry 3 [4] – Gorgon Locked and Buried [COMPLETED]

March 31, 2013 by Nikola·0 Comments

It didn’t take long for me to go back to Warlords Battlecry 3 after waking up this morning, especially considering how the Daylight Saving switch messed up my sleep pattern. The game dragged me in and doesn’t intend to let me go until one of us is done fur. Luckily, It turns out the game would fall sooner than I would.

Humans and Dwarves

Last night, I got to the human lands with not much to do. This morning, I ended up in the area of Enmouth, where I had to fight four battles on the same map, against Barbarians, the Undead, Wood Elves and Knights, all in defense of the Empire. The fifth battle was again on the same map but against all four enemies at once. The fights stopped being challenging by now, though, since my hero could easily clear the entire map on his own. I still stuck to my old strategy of using him almost exclusively, while building up to fire priests at my home base, but slowly, the Fire Priests were getting used less and less often.

I’ve spent a lot of time here and I don’t think it was worth it.

Beating the five battles provided me with an alliance with the Empire, but that was about it, so it didn’t feel worth it. I moved on and got to the dwarven lands, where my intention was to somehow make them like me again. For some reason, I made them and the Dark Elves my enemy. I can understand the Dark Elves, but I don’t remember fighting Dwarves that often. The problem was, I couldn’t find any missions, regular or repeatable, which would help me with that goal.

The Heart of Zhur

I wandered onto an Undead island, where I got one more artifact during a chain of three missions. The Heart of Zhur now makes my hero completely immune to poison. After that, I moved on further south to the Orc lands, where I mostly fought goblins, but not before going through White Mountains, where I got one more artifact – The Gryphon Eggs. This give 30 Exp to every Gryphon I train, so they’re basically worthless.

Cureall Stone

I then finally got to the area with a mix of Plague, Orc and Dark Elf presence, where I got the Cureall Stone with my first Archmage hero. I did the same here and suddenly, I was only two actual artifacts (and two fortress keys) short of a full set of bonuses. One of the artifacts was found soon after, at Khaz-Barak. This place, according to the in-game description, used to belong to the Dwarves, so I was hoping the replayable missions here would help me get back on their good side, but even after several repetitions, it just wasn’t happening. I did get the Mythril Vein, though, which gives 10 extra armor to my hero.

Champion of Bartonia

I had one more look at my list of bonuses and realized the last one was called “Champion of Bartonia”. Bartonia was an in-game location, part of the human areas, but for some reason, I skipped it. I went back and realized that one of the replayable missions wasn’t actually replayable. I played through the chain of arena battles and soon, the final bonus and the champion title was mine. The final duel was a bit difficult, since like me, the enemy hero had an item that has a chance to heal the user, but eventually, my superior stats won. “Champion of Bartonia” also increases my attack speed by 50%, just like the Winds of the Desert do, so now I was attacking at an insane rate.

Arena duels take place on this map.

This thing basically made me invincible. I’m now attacking several times per second, with a chance to heal myself or do 500 extra damage to an enemy with every hit. Basically, almost nothing in the game can do enough damage to me fast enough to kill me.

The Second Fortress Key

I was close to the area of the Plague Horseman, so I took the chance to get one more fortress key. Just as it was with Bane, I had to fight with the Plague as my ally against Demons and a bunch of neutral floating skull enemies. This was easy to do, and again, just like with Bane, I got the key and a chance to ally myself with the Plague. I refused, because i would lose even more favor with the Dwarves. In hindsight, I should have accepted, since I didn’t get on the Dwarves’ good side before the game was over.

The Third Fortress Key

Now I was missing just one more key, so I took the long trip to the plains of Famine, where one more horseman was besieged by Gorgon’s forces. The game is certainly predictable, so again, I fought with an ally (the Swarm) against Demons and floating skulls and got the final key. I forgot to ask for the alliance this time, instead just rushing to the Wastes to get to the final two battles. By this point, other than my assassination chance and a high attack speed, I also had a high running speed, thanks to investing into the Running ability for the past few levels, so clearing missions was even faster.

I caught them all! Not all of them are extra useful, but some are quite nice.

The Final Two Missions

The first of the final two missions was basically a repetition of my first “Search the Wastes” mission. It took place on the same map, with the same enemies and again, when I got to the fortress gate, I nearly lost my hero. I finally realized why to. Apparently, there are two types of those floating skull enemies. The first use melee attacks, and they’re harmless. The second type uses ranged electrical attacks and hits for 50 points of damage. These are the guys that can easily kill me if I’m not careful.

Warlords Battlecry 3 - Gorgon's Fortress

You don’t really see Gorgon, just it’s fortress.

This brings us to the second of the two final levels. Again, it was the same map, but this time, I started out at the fortress and had to survive for 20 minutes against waves of those ranged skull enemies. Suffice to say, I would not have survived for long just defending. Instead, I rushed towards the two small tower bases on the map and destroyed both of them. This triggered the victory screen and that was it – game won!

The End

I got one of those “comic book” cut scenes, the game told me the main objective was completed and that was it. Admittedly it’s a bit underwhelming, but I can now proudly claim I’ve completed one of the games I played far too much of as a kid, but for some reason, never completed it back then.

Congratulations, I won!?

The thing is, this game isn’t really about completing the story. It’s about trying new hero builds and getting more and more powerful. There’s definitely still a huge chunk of the game I could explore. I’m just not sure I’m going to actually do it, since sadly, I have other games I also want to play. That’s the “problem” with gaming today – too many great games, too little time.

Maybe in a few weeks, I’ll try out that mode I’ve stumbled into – the Fifth Horseman. Maybe I’ll go back to one of the previous games in the installment, or maybe even turn towards the turn based games of the series. You see, the world of Etheria is primarily tied to Warlords, a turn based strategy RPG. The Walords Battlecry series is actually a spin off. There’s one more, more recent spin off to – Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords. The entire series is actually quite fun, but most games, just like Warlords Battlecry 3, suffer from lack of polish.

Warlords Battlecry 3 [3] – Gorgon and the Three Keys

March 30, 2013 by Nikola·0 Comments

Dux, the Ssrathi Assassin

Another weekend is here, which means I’ve spent another day on and off Warlords Battlecry 3. Switching my hero to an assassin was definitely the right move and the game is a lot of fun for me now, especially since I can complete missions a lot faster, so I can advance the game a bit every time I can squeeze in another fifteen minutes or so.

I don’t think I’ll ever max out some of those titles and ranks.

Dux is now level 29 and I think I won’t put any more points into Assassination. I have a 30% chance to outright kill my target with every swing and I swing about twice per second. Odds are, if I tackle an enemy here, they will be dead five seconds within the encounter at worst. Now, I need raw damage, so I can start taking down buildings just as fast.

Well, after doing some research, I found out Assassination doesn’t actually outright kill anything. Instead it adds 500 extra damage to an attack, so I guess I might have some trouble at higher levels. Still, I’d prefer to keep my hero more interesting and not just invest into a single ability.

Etheria Wikia – Warlords Battlecry 3 – Assassin

Since I don’t have many useful abilities other than Assassination, I decided to now focus on Wealth, which increases my gold income by 15 per minute for each point invested, as well as Running, which increases speed by 1 with each point invested.

The Retinue

I haven’t been paying as much attention to my retinue as I did last week, mostly because all I need my generals for now is mine conversion, since my low Charisma gives me a horrible command radius. For those unfamiliar with the game, this probably needs explanation.

How to Get Resources in Warlords Battlecry?

There are several ways to earn income in Warlords Battlecry. You can learn a skill which increases your income with one of the four resources. You can build unites which provide income in a resource. The primary way to do it, though is to convert neutral or enemy mines on the map. You do this by standing next to a mine and using the “Convert” command. This command converts any building within range, including enemy bases and unit training facilities. It doesn’t convert towers, walls, quest buildings or shops.

You can see the command radius and a couple of converted mines here.

What is the Command Radius in Warlords Battlecry?

The conversion range is tiny for most units able to use the command. For the hero, the range is bigger and it’s determined by the command radius. The command radius is a stat represented by a circle around your hero. Friendly units within that circle gain a morale, speed and combat bonus and the hero’s conversion command works on buildings within that radius. Items and the Charisma attribute are what increases this radius. The speed of conversion, on the other hand, is affected by Dexterity.

My Basic Strategy in Warlords Battlecry 3

In any case, my hero’s Charisma is low, so my radius is terrible. Because of this, I usually take a general or two into battle with me, to help me convert mines faster. Once I convert a couple of mines for each resource, I start hunting down enemy heroes. If I think I need protection, I command my generals to guard my hero, so they follow him, but I don’t control them as a group, to make use of my hero’s fast walking speed. You see, when you control a group of units in Warlords Battlecry, they move at the speed of the slowest unit.

Once I hunt down enemy heroes, I either take down their bases myself or I build up a large group of Fire Priests and use them to destroy everything. This works on most levels.

The Campaign

Last time, I failed hard at the Wastes, looking for Gorgon, the fifth horseman. This time, I wasn’t a complete idiot, so I cleared the mission and found Gorgon’s iron fortress. The game then sent me back to Khazdul, where I head to fight some Dark Dwarves to gain audience with their Runelord. He finally told me what I needed to do. I need to find the three keys of Gorgon’s fortress, defeat Gorgon and lock it inside the fortress. Then, the Runelord will use a spell to bury the fortress underneath the wastes. I wasn’t told where the keys are, but at least now I sort of know what’s going on in the game’s story.

Whenever I get to an important part of the story, I get stuff like this.

After that, I did some business with the High Elves and allied myself with them in the area of Lunarion and Ehlariel. They have a problem with the Dark Elves, so allying myself with one side meant going to war with the other.

The Garb of Tyatis

Next up was the island where the Dark and the Wood Elves lived. There are three areas here where I can find pieces of an item set – The Garb of Tyatis. One of them meant fighting and angering the Wood Elves, so I skipped that one, mostly because I got that item already from a random Dark Elf ambush. Another piece had me fight the Dark Elves again, so I was fine with that. What I wasn’t fine with was that the item was meant for magic users, so it was useless for me. Since the third piece of the set was guarded by Knights, I decided to just drop it, since I probably won’t be using the set anyway.

More Barbarians and the First Fortress Key

I got through the islands of the central sea, so I decided to circle back North to see if I missed something. I got ambushed by Barbarians along the way, but I didn’t find much, especially at the Plains of Ar which turned out to be completely empty. At Ylarie, I helped the High Elves defend against Orcs and got another artifact as a reward – a Frostwyrm Pelt. This gives me an extra 15 frost resistance.

My artifact collection is getting bigger.

Next up, I got to the Lands of Death, where I helped Lord Bane defend against a siege by Gorgon’s forces. The reward for this battle was the first of the three fortress keys, as well as a chance to ally myself with Bane. I didn’t accept this, though, since I was told the Knights wouldn’t like it and I’m trying to be the good guy here, sort of.

After getting the key, I went back to the Barbarian area, around the Plains of Ar. At the Gap of Ar, over the course of two missions in which I fought the Minotaur, I recovered two of the five fingers of the Hand of Sartek. I then found two more at the Plains of War and the last one upon returning to the Plains of Ar. This gave me one more artifact – the Hand of Sartek, which gives my hero 8 extra Combat.

The Humans and the Dwarves

The last thing I did was to go the Knight lands, but I didn’t find much there yet. I did get into an extremely annoying mission – Troll Hunting. This one takes place on a map full of “neutral” trolls and, pause for effect, sheep. The joke of this game is that trolls, which usually hurl boulders at you, can pick up sheep and hurl them instead. Basically, on a map with sheep, they can get limited, but extremely powerful ammo. I’m not sure if sheep bypass armor or something, but Dux was getting hit hard on this map, so I had to take it extremely slowly. Since the goal of the map was to kill all 40 “neutral” trolls, it took me a while to get through.

Trolls also ambushed me after the mission. On a bridge!

After that, I scouted through several areas of the human and dwarven lands, but found almost no missions, other than replayable ones. As for the Dwarves, they hate me now, so I’ll have to find a way to get back on their good side, if that’s even possible. The irony is, the Dark Dwarves actually kind of like me. Well, not really irony, just fact.

Anyone Else Playing This Game?

I’ve done some googling to see if anyone else is blogging about this game. I always thought it had a lot of fans, but this doesn’t seem to be the case anymore. I mean, sure, there are wikis and old fan sites, but not many people are actively creating new content. I found a review and a mod which I intend to check out, but that’s about it.

Oh, by the way, the CRPG addict is actually playing a game I know off, so I strongly recommend visiting him.

The CRPG Addict – Knights of Legend

Pokemon Platinum [7] – The Sinnoh League [COMPLETED]

March 25, 2013 by Nikola·0 Comments

Pokemon Platinum is hard! This is something that absolutely needs to be said. Cynthia, the League Champion of this game, actually has all of her Pokemon around level 60. Level 60!

You Need to Evolve in Pokemon Platinum

Suffice to say, I had to do a lot of training. This time, I actually used the Exp. Share for training as well, hoping to get Gible to a high enough level so he’d be useful, for once, but even at level 50, I did not get a chance to use it properly. In fact, even Pikachu was for the most part useless, not to mention Buizel. Maybe it’s just my imagination, but the stat gap between unevolved and fully evolved Pokemon in Pokemon Platinum seems to be far bigger than in the previous games. My level 55 Pikachu had about 130 HP, while my Torterra reached 200 with a lower level.

Thanks to Surf, Buizel was easy to train at the Victory Road.

Aaron and Bertha Are Easy

It didn’t take long before I was consistently able to beat Aaron, the first of the Elite Four and a bug user. Once Infernape got to the mid-50s, it could sweep through Aaron’s entire team. Soon after that, I could also sweep through Bertha, a Rock user. My Torterra was able to handle it, but I was also able to use Buizel here, once its speed got high enough to make it act first in battle. Before that, though, a single hit, even with a type resistance, would often nearly kill it.

If You Can Get Through Flint, You Have a Chance

Flint, a Fire user was the first hurdle I needed to get through. He was also the one I couldn’t get through until I got Buizel to the high 50s. Once I managed to do that, I was able to sweep through his three weaker Pokemon. His Magmortar and Houndoom gave me trouble, though, Magmortar far more so. I really couldn’t find a way to beat it without abusing items.

I finally beat you, you bastard!

Once I got through Flint, Lucian was relatively easy. I didn’t really have a proper type advantage against any of his Pokemon, but by using Flame Blitz, I could still sweep through most of them, thanks to Psychic Pokemon having low physical defense.

Cynthia is Hard!

Finally, I got to Cynthia and by this point, I decided to win it, no matter what. Most of my Pokemon got close to or even beyond level 60 thanks to my many failed attempts, so I was able to survive a hit or two on occasion. I used these opportunities to generously throw items at my team, mostly Revives and Hyper Potions.

I think Cynthia is my favorite Champion.

Cynthia’s Milotic and Garchomp and Togekiss gave me the most trouble, in that order. The other three, I basically one-shoted, but these guys burned through almost my entire Potion and Revive supply. I pretty much had to wait until their strongest moves ran out of PP before I could even act. Once they did, though, that was it. I won!

A Cheap Victory

Yes, it was cheap. I threw money and items at the League instead of winning it by grinding. I can live with that. Grinding is simultaneously my most- and least favorite part of Pokemon, depending on my mood and the general situation. In this instance, I just fought random battles for so long already, I didn’t feel like doing it any more. It’s not like playing for a couple of more hours would somehow made me more skillful or smarter, I just wouldn’t need as many potions.

It looks like I lied. I didn’t get even close to the 60s with most of my team. My memory is bad.

In any case, there’s only one generation left, and this one will be tough to incorporate into the challenge. As far as I understand it, the anime didn’t get to the League yet and we already have two games for the generation, with a next generation game (Pokemon X & Y) already announced. I’ll see what I can do. I might just go with Black 2 or White 2, since it technically is an upgrade of the first two, kind of like Platinum was an upgrade for Diamond and Pearl, etc. Sure, the story is a bit different, but it’s no more or less true to the anime. Right?