Hi gang! When we left off, I'd done pretty much all there was to do. Now it's time to finish this thing! But where is the final dungeon?
Looking around, I find a mysterious arrow in the sky above town. Where could it lead?
!
I smash my way inside. But what is this place? What's with those star blocks?
You might remember way back when I took Mouse-Man down the well in town and picked up the magical saber. This is what it's for. I use it to convert the star blocks to smashable blocks, then switch back to my Legendary Sword to smash the joint up. You only actually need to convert/smash one of these blocks (if you pick the right one), and you certainly don't need to convert them all at once, but that's just the way I like to do things.
I score a tornado magic, which is nice, but otherwise all that effort was wasted. The central block contains the thing that reveals the door.
I head through and enter the final dungeon. It's got this wierd checkerboard block pattern going on.
The first area is pretty simple. The way forward here is to go up through the gap in the roof, but I'll check out what's through that door first:
I don't need healing! Well, I didn't, at least. The timing for getting past these fireballs is a little tricky.
The second attempt goes more smoothly, and in the next room I just have to kill a few enemies so I can move on unobstructed.
A dead end!
Or is it? PROTIP: It is not.
You have to be careful flying as hawk-man, because you don't hold your shield up when you do and so you're open to attack. As seen here, with me being thrown back a ways by those fireballs.
I take a much safer approach, jumping with my shield up, and manage to reach another blocked passageway. There's no way hawk-man can get through a gap that small! Who designed this stage! With no other choice, I head through the door.
I change into mouse-man to proceed. There's actually a segment for each form in this level, except for lizard-man since he can't do anything. Maybe they could've put something you had to hit in a position where it could only be reached with his projectile shot, I guess, but they didn't.
This bit is kinda annoying, actually. You have to navigate the path without being able to see it. It isn't hard, and there isn't a time limit or anything, it's just an obstruction.
Mouse-man moves on to face mouse-man sized enemies, and I remember that I've got the heavenly shield equipped. For hawk-man it's the best one, but for everyone else it's 100 points behind the legendary.
It's just like being back in mouse-man's stage! I move onwards and downwards. You might recognise the area in that last screenshot as looking a lot like a place I passed through as hawk-man.
This room is pretty familiar, too, but now I'm small enough to move through this hidden passage. Earlier in the level you can see an enemy move through the same tunnel in a different room.
In fact I seem to be travelling backwards through hawk-man's part of the stage but with different enemies. Strange.
That's new, though. And quite nice! With that I reach the maximum health limit for the game.
Clouds. Love 'em. These are the ones whose fire chases you along the ground.
It's so nice to meet them on equal footing.
This is starting to get repetitive.
Oh, something new. I can't get up to the higher door as mouse-man. Whatever shall I do? What could be behind the lower door?
Goodness me! Who could've seen that coming?
If I'm low on health or trying to save up money sometimes I stop here and grind for a bit, but today I don't need to.
Piranha-man leaves behind the area where his special ability is useful, but maintains the nautical theme by taking on some ropers. And ninjas. Without lion-man's overhead swing, ninjas can be a bit tricky to hit.
Double ropers are hard, guys! Fitting between the fireballs proves too much for me and I get hit about six times. Luckily these are early game enemies and I've got end game gear, so I don't lose much health.
Yeah. Take that!
Oh. Two hits to kill, huh?
That's more like it.
This sort of thing goes on for a while.
Piranha-man is not made for this kind of scenario. He's out of his depths.
I start using magic and things improve slowly.
I'm losing health, but not much.
At last I reach another dead end, this one clearly intended for lion-man. It'll be nice to see him again.
He's so cool.
I can't use the shortcut in this room anymore, but I can make short work of the enemies.
I considered stopping to deal with that shadow-man, but decided to live and let live.
After another simple room, the game decides to mix it up and cuts the lights.
So far so good.
There are shadow-men all over the place! I can't decide if that makes sense or not, given the darkness.
Having to turn back every few seconds to catch a fireball on my shield makes dealing with this ninja a little harder than it would be otherwise.
Ditto for this one, but now the end is in sight.
Now things are getting interesting. If you wait, you can figure out the shape of the room from the movement of the enemies. There's a block in the middle of the room that I'm standing on, and you can drop to the lower level on either side. The left is the side to go down on, because the shadow-man will stop popping up when you're above him. Once on the lower level, I just have to go right until I fall through the floor.
This room is the same shape as the ones with the mouse-man only hidden passage from earlier. I move on.
Another dead end! This looks like a job for hawk-man.
Fortunately there's a hidden door under the floor and I'm allowed to move on.
Just like earlier, I have difficulty with the lack of a shield while flying, but I manage to get up there eventually.
I even make it past this fire stone!
And these! Mostly.
No enemies here. I pick up a little health and reach a rather ominous looking door.
It's the final boss, the Vampier Dragon! Easily the most difficult boss in the game, as my performance here demonstrates. Let's watch that again in super-slow motion.
It starts by descending from the ceiling. I move in for a hit with my usual panache.
The dragon pushes me around the room for a while.
Eventually I get away, but it's fled to the top of the room, out of reach unless I take flight myself, which I don't think would be wise when it's moving towards me.
I get another shot at it when it descends, but miss completely.
I chase it back and forth for a while.
This is getting embarassing.
Yep.
After another rather sad failed attempt to score a hit, I finally manage to land a blow. At this rate of damage, I only need to hit it twelve more times to win. Ohboy.
It swoops back in from offscreen, and I take another shot. Not a very good shot, unfortunately.
That's more like it! And it did more damage than the last hit. Notice that, unlike every other dragon, you've gotta hit this guy in the belly rather than the head. Sure, there's a face there too, but not being aware of that little quirk ended a lot of attempts at this stage for child Yimothy.
Those times when the dragon comes onscreen through the floor are a prime opportunity to hit it (so long as it isn't spewing fire as it comes up). Never one to utilise an opportunity, I swing at it from way out of range and miss.
I can usually do better than this, I swear.
I try flying after it and miss again, but miraculously manage to swing again on the way back to earth and score a hit. Four four measly hit points, sure, but a hit.
I don't manage to follow up on this very well.
This shot sneaks under my shield and I'm out of HP. Thank goodness for potions!
I get three hearts back and set to work losing them.
I manage it pretty well, if I do say so myself. Time for another potion!
With two hearts restored I decide it's time to get serious and hit the dragon. Sadly, it hits me at the same time.
We trade blows like this twice, in fact, and I find myself in need of my final potion. Things are getting sticky.
I'm lucky enough to get four hearts back, and I score another hit. The dragon, sensing a turn in the fight, tries to sneak up on me.
To no avail! I follow up by making a ridiculous attempt to hit it and lose some health.
Looks like I'm in with a chance here.
Aww yuss. I did the victory!
The Salamander Cross descends from the ceiling, and one by one my animal forms are stripped away, making me HU-MAN again.
Wonder Boy makes his way back through town to his house, which didn't have a door during the game.
We're treated to the epilogue.
Just in case you forgot, here's the forms taken during the game.
The credits. Note that my spelling of the last boss's name was not a typo.
The end! Goodnight, brave readers. Goodnight, Blogger...
And there you have it! Wonder Boy III: The Dragon's Trap, in its entirety. You now know all there is to know about this wonderful game, aside from some secrets and glitches and stuff like that. Boy, it sure is nice to be all finished with this after all this time. Thanks for reading, gang!
Next time: Some secrets and glitches and stuff like that.
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