Long ago, a tomboy princess kept sneaking out of her castle. Does this game have a framing device?
Princess Alena of Santeem is a monk. I thought that would give her more stuff to do in battle, but I was wrong. Fortunately, she has a party with her.
We start off with our monk being brought back home. She has the habit of sneaking out of the castle, much to the King's chagrin. Sadly, the King is an idiot. There's a broken wall in Alena's room that she can easily break. After exploring the castle and finding the feather cap (in her room), break the wall and jump down. Talk to the cat because it's a cat, and jump down to the ground floor. There's a guy on the opposite corner, but he's locked in, so head to the world map! As we approach the nearby village, two people will exit the castle. Rather than take us back, these guys will join us. We had the opportunity to talk to them earlier, where we'd learn these are our friends and tutors. Cristo and Brey join the team, and they're the things that make this adventure different from Ragnar's. Ragnar and Alena have the same mechanics, but Cris is our D&D style cleric. Meaning he brings the heals. Brey is our traditional black mage, but he only has one attack spell: Icebolt. But, for now, hang around the village to level up and get some money. We have three people we'll need to deck out, and making gold is tough. I got to around level four and bought a bunch of stuff before heading onwards. Mostly because I died at the upcoming fight.
To the north is the village of Tempe. The citizens bemoan the curse of their village, eventually telling us that a monster lives to the north and kidnaps young women. Alena is a young woman on an adventure, so maybe she could use this as a sneak attack. Speak to the priest in the back of the town, and we'll volunteer to be used as tribute. Two men will enter, and we'll get in their pack. The priest makes a pun as we're taken to the altar. While there, we see three monsters surround us, and we jump into a boss battle.
Chameleon Humanoid is flanked by two feral dogs, which are random encounters in the area. Take out the ads, and then focus on the lizard. I Upper'ed my defense and tried to sap the opponents before going in just for the fun of it, but I was probably too strong at that point for it to have meant anything. Getting money this early really is tough... And with that, we save the town. We skip to the next day, and everyone is super thrilled about us. This is what royalty should do for their people, right? The item shop is open now, so check that out before heading back north, past the altar, and on to Frenor.
Word around town is the Princess has come to Frenor for a visit. But I'm the Princess? We'll find her in the inn, so let's go and see who the real royal daughter is! As we enter the second story, we'll see someone getting kidnapped by two people. I tried to give chase but last them on the world map. And this is when I got confused. I couldn't figure out where to go, which will be a reoccurring theme tonight. I found a cave south of Frenor, but the difficulty spike had me turn back. I then walked around the world map and came to the desert oasis of Bazaar. But neither of which told me where to go. Apparently, there's a ransom note in the inn, but that passed me by. The note, I assume, would say they wanted the Golden Bracelet that Frenor is known for. An old woman informs us that they got rid of the bracelet long ago because it brought trouble. It's currently sealed at the bottom of a cave, south of here.
Now, this place sucks. The encounter rate is through the roof, and the mobs are tough. I ended up needing to grind for both exp and gold (to buy stuff in Bazaar) until around level seven. And even then, I had a tough time getting down there. I backed out twice, each after getting the first two treasures. On B2 is the chest containing our bracelet. I was at level nine at the time, and Cris learned Outside. Outside is the Dragan Quest equivalent of Exit, which I used to escape this hell. Return to Frenor and walk around the world map (more grinding) until night falls. We'll see our kidnappers and the "Princess" waiting for us in the graveyard outside of town. We'll hand over the bracelet, and they'll release the girl and leave. She tells us she was just acting to fleece people and apologizes. Her friends will enter, and the three of them will leave the world forever. As a reward, she gives us the Thief's Ring, which can unlock a bunch of doors around the world. There's nothing good right now, but it'll be useful later when I don't have it. But, even with it, we can't open red doors.
Return to Bazaar to get a reminder that something dire has happened to the King. I read it before going into the cave, but this felt more important. When we get back home, we'll learn the King has lost his voice, and we need to find a way to fix it. One of the guards says the guy in the locked room might know, and the Thief's Ring can open his door. The old guy tells us the bard in town once lost his voice. So find him in the large building, and he'll say that Birdsong Nestor cured him. We might be able to find some in Bazaar. The item seller there says they once had it but sold out. The faeries in the west of town might have some, though.
This is another dungeon with far too many encounters. I was pretty much geared out by now, but they just kept coming. Our mages have such low HP, so we need to heal all the time. And the mobs do so much AoE damage, and I hate this place! Get to the top, and we'll scare away the two faeries that live here. One will drop the Birdsong Nester, though, and we can turn to the King. It works, and he tells us that he gives us his okay to keep exploring. He's been having a reoccurring nightmare as of late. He tried to tell his council about it, but the grief of it caused him to lose his voice. But he thinks we might be able to save the Kingdom. We can now use the teleporter to the east of Bazaar. We can see Ragnar if we come to it at night. This takes us to the Kingdom of Endor.
Endor has a lot of forests, yes. More importantly, they're having a tournament. Buy new gear in town and talk to the King. Since both of us are royalty, we'll know each other and get on well enough. He informs us that he's throwing the tournament in order to marry off his daughter. The winner gets to marry the Princess, but he has doubts as to whether this is the right thing to do. As he should. Right now, the guy who's looking to win is named Necrosaro, and the Princess doesn't like him. He asks us to win the whole shebang because gay marriage is outlawed in this country, it seems.
We'll need to fight through five randos with great sprite work. It's way too good for how unimportant they are. It'll be one-on-one, though, so stock up on Healing Herbs. We'll be allowed to heal up between fights, but only Alena has them in her inventory. The only strategy she can do is attack, so Ragnar it up! The first four aren't special, but the last one can clone himself. We'll need to strike the real one a few times before we'll win, but I never got too low on HP for him. I managed to kill a metal slime outside the castle, so I was at level thirteen. We'll all wait for the final confrontation between Princes Alena and Necorsaro, but Saro will never show up. The King will declare us the winner by default, saving his daughter from his stupid plan. We can now continue our journey.
In theory... A soldier from Santeen runs up to us and asks us to return home. He'll immediately die, so something terrible must have happened. Go to the world map, and Return home. The music is gone, and the castle will be devoid of life. I didn't check the town, so do that for me, please. Alena, Cristo, and Brey will walk around the empty keep looking for anyone or a clue, but we'll find nothing. As we go to leave the castle, we'll end this chapter.
This sucked. I was lost for so long and got incredibly frustrated. Random battles happened every three steps at one point, and it just sucked the joy of exploring and spelunking around. And since I didn't know why I needed the Gold Bracelet, I felt like I was baptizing that damn kid again. Then I found the tower, it sucked too, and I had no idea why I wanted to climb that or even how to open the door (it's the Thief's Ring). I'm not looking forward to tomorrow's chapter. But once I get everyone together, it should be fine. Dragon Quest: Prologue Simulator!
No comments:
Post a Comment