Thursday, September 25, 2014

Lufia and the Fortress of Doom #5 - Glimpse the World of Tomorrow

After a big lapse in my gameplay, I lost my old save. No need to worry, I've got another save to jump onto now. Picking things up with an alternate save shortly after where I left off. These last two posts should have much higher picture quality due to being newer images, as well.


In the new save, I've got six pieces of Alumina found, one left. Don't worry, I didn't skip anything important. The Alumina hunt is lameness.

Almost right away I find out what I need to do next, and it's a clearly-defined goal.

Jerin seems to be the only one with the all-important Warp spell. It's all-important because I DO NOT REMEMBER MY WAY AROUND.

 Next up... you guessed it, a cave!

This is a fairly quick dungeon, and I find the Purple Newt in a chest before long.

The red-robed guy immediately proceeds to fry it so I can bring it to the king of Herat. You know who I feel bad for? The Purple Newt.

The king now gives up his collection of treasure. Because we fetched him dinner? Seriously?

Looks like the king was a toker of the doobie. No wonder he's so excited about food, he had the munchies all along.

Oh, the seventh and final Alumina piece was in the trove, as well.

Uh, no thanks, mister guard.

 Meanwhile, it seems that Raile Shaia has been imprisoned in some island pirate fortress. Awful Wind Waker flashbacks commencing...

This pirate fortess is a lot less irritating than the one Link had to go through, at least. It's your standard tower dungeon.

Here he is, but he's under lock and key. If only we had that Skeleton Key from Elder Scrolls Arena, we could skip the rest of the dungeon.

At the top of the tower is the boss, and of course, he has the key.

Well, two bosses. I don't know which of these is the pirate leader, but they're both somewhat formidable.

Especially because they can put the whole party to sleep. The bosses in this game are way too trigger-happy with status effects...

Meanwhile, Raile Shaia has invented the phone. At this rate of technological advancement, I'm surprised that Lufia III doesn't have airplanes and internet.

 Raile Shaia brags a lot, then him and his assistant dude disappear into our boat. The boat then shakes violently for several moments. This apparent round of hot man-on-man action results in a boat that now doubles as a submarine.

 Now I can cruise around beneath the waves. The music is excellent down here. The soundtrack of this game is great across the board, actually; it is reminiscent of Secret of Mana quite a few times.

Somehow, flaming suits of armor can exist under the ocean. It makes zero sense, and I wish the developers had just turned off enemy attacks while underwater rather than pasting the same enemy set from the previous area.

There are a few caves down here with water currents that push you through. It's just like the underwater caves in some of the Dragon Quest games.

 At the center of this abyssal canyon is the Fortress of Doom. It sank to the bottom of the ocean a century ago, and here it is.

The music in HERE is even better than the music outside.

Somehow, there's no water inside. Not sure if this is a magical effect or if the fortress just formed a huge interior air pocket. The latter is doubtful because it's clearly open in a few places, such as...

 ...this hallway, which is recognizable from the intro of the game.

After traversing the oddly-short fortress, I find the most powerful sword in the world. This is what Maxim used to slay the Sinistrals once upon a time.

Speaking of which... here are their statues. Wonder what our heroes are going to think when they see the one in the back.

They're somewhat bewildered by this. Lufia has no idea what it means, either.

...or does she?

Back up, everyone. We'll need to do a blood test to determine who here is a Sinistral and who is human.

Before this conversation can go anywhere, our heroes are interrupted by...

 ...Daos, leader(?) of the Sinistrals. As far as villains go, he's somewhat underwhelming.

It seems that well after they were vanquished a century ago, Erim reincarnated as Lufia. Which in turn allowed the other three to revive. Or something. She's the Sinistral of Death, while the other three are stuck with lame Non-Horsemen jobs.

Our heroes flee the scene as Doom Island roars to life and flies off into the sky. Jeros has nothing to say about this turn of events.

Aguro lays down the tough facts. The Sinistrals will keep reviving as long as Lufia is alive.

Uh... won't she die well before another century goes by? Unless it wouldn't take a century. Well, either way I suppose she could just reincarnate again when the time comes for the revival. ...wait, what's stopping her from reviving if WE kill her? NONE OF THIS MAKES SENSE

Meanwhile, I Get Equipped With the world's most potent sword. It's a significant upgrade. Unfortunately, no spell effects/procs/passives to go with it.

The only way to reach Doom Island is flight. Luckily, our boat-submarine can also fly, but it needs... Power Oil? And there's only ONE PLACE IN THE WORLD to get it.

After this game ends, I wouldn't be surprised if Raile Shaia uses the Power Oil to start the world's first oil corporation. In addition to having flying cars and internet, the Lufia III of this parallel universe will also have tons of pollution and cancer.

...and now I'm sad.

Luckily, this random gentleman who was peeing in this corner this random gentleman is here to tell us where we can find THE ONLY OIL IN THE WORLD.

...And wouldn't ya know it, it's in a cave. It's always in a cave.

"WHAT'S IN THE BOXXXXXX??"

Whoa, settle down, Brad Pitt. Just a Dragon Arrow, dude.

A little later, another box holds a Dragon Egg. There are eight of these in the world and they're basically Dragonballs. Collect 'em all and take them to a dragon shrine and you'll get to choose from a list of wishes. They include things like Might equipment or extra experience levels. I could go for them in this playthrough, but there's no real need. Eager to move on to Lufia II. Regardless, they're a really cool idea.

Speaking of dragons, the boss of this cave is the coolest-looking dragon in the game.

Yeah! Now this is a dragon!

Moments after this picture was taken, Dick Cheney appeared in a cloud of sulfur and swallowed the dragon whole.

I bring the Power Oil back to the mad doctor. So... was the Oil Dragon secreteing the Power Oil somehow? Is...is this dragon pee that we've been collecting?

Here's the final town in the game. It's home to...


...this shop, featuring the best buyable equipment. Most of it is only a marginal upgrade over the second-to-last tier of buyable equipment, but that doesn't stop me from buying all of it. There's nothing else to spend money on at this point in the game. This happens a lot in RPGs. I think all games of this nature should have a WoW-esque lategame money sink. Roc Mount! Only 200k!

Know what's really weird, though? This store sells equipment for everyone...except Lufia.

The airship allows me to reach a new tower near said final town. This tower is home to the dragon king, Shenlong. He grants wishes, and so forth. Are we sure this isn't Dragon Quest?

He's got your standard dragon sprite. Welp, I don't have the Dragon Eggs. Maybe in the next game.

Our goal is Glasdar Tower, which Doom Island is hovering above. Not sure why we can't just fly to Doom Island, but doing so gets the airship repelled by a whirlwind.

Next up: The grand finale.






3 comments:

  1. Lufia and the Fortress of Doom v1.02 - Now with Alumina hunt removed!

    Teleportation magic is the realm of the elves in this game, Artea does the same thing in the intro. That's not really the case in Lufia 2, though.

    Not just any dinner, the most delicious food in the land. Sort of a "bring me pepper and I'll give you a ship" deal.

    Those flaming suits of armor drop the best armor in the game, Might Armor. It's a very rare drop though.

    I notice Artea's Bow is in the inventory, I wonder if this save already turned in eight dragon eggs for the Might Bow.

    Actually, Doom Island specifically moved over Glasdar Tower due to the whirlwind so you COULDN'T fly there.

    Always thought it was weird that Lufia couldn't wear Zircon stuff. I get "why", but it doesn't seem logical as normally she can equip the same armor Jerin can.

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  2. AH, these images are lovely-looking! A big step up.

    I can tell you love ring-customizing, so they must be half of your inventory.

    This king seems rad.

    I agree with you about Daos, he shows up last and seems more like a manager than the leader. He has a great name though.

    Raile Shaia inventing so much stuff he causes problems all by himself would be a fun subplot, you're right. But I'm guessing he's performing so overpoweringly well here because necessity is the mother of invention.

    Kinda sad that stereotypical pirate talk has gone out of fashion since Talk Like a Pirate Day got too big.

    The music in this game is not fucking around. They're serious about this being a hugely important quest for the fate of the world.

    Having this hallway back is AWESOME.

    HUGE. PLOT. TWIST.

    Aguro is right to give straight talk and Jeros proves his excellence by being loyal to Lufia.

    The plot possibilities you've mentioned are also all true. Everyone's too freaked out to think of all the permutations as yet.

    I LOL'd at this Dragon Oil section. Great work. The guy standing there on the map is so amusingly out of place.

    Imagine how much our media would freak if our world had a dragon just chilling in it.

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    Replies
    1. Manager is a great term for Daos, actually.

      I really wish we'd fought Arek somewhere. Lufia III would have been the ideal place for it, had that game been on a console. I guess the SNES was too old-hat by 1999 or whenever it came out...

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