OK, we're back to the game this LP is actually about. When we left off, I'd gotten Lemeza killed. This time I'm gonna try to be a little more careful. Maybe consult the manual a little more.
Speaking of the manual, here's the cover. It's pretty great. I'll break out my non-existent Japanese:
Top:
アクシヨン アドベンチャー
Akushiyon Adobenchaa
ラ ムラーナ
Ra Muraana
"Action Adventure
La-Mulana"
Bottom:
ユーザーズ マニュアル
Yuuzaazu Manyuaru
"User's Manual."
Turns out I didn't need any Japanese after all.
I check the shops a little more thoroughly this time. There's lots of stuff to buy once I have some money. The merchants won't tell me what the sold out items are, but they are listed in the manual: the box with B on it is bullets. The blue star is shurikens. I'm guessing they'll come up for sale once I find them in the ruins.
User's Manual:
Hand Scanner: Can be used to examine anything.
Buckler: Can block weak enemy shots.
MSX2: An MSX2 laptop with an internal disk drive and two cartridge slots.
Waterproof case: Lets you use your MSX underwater.
I head one screen left and destroy the pot to get 10 coins before checking out the MSX shop.
User's Manual:Although the cart for sale here is called Game Master, I've included the manual's description of the "10x Cartridge" because I think they're both referring to Konami Game Master: The Cartridge that Allows Konami Games To Be Enjoyed Ten Times More, a cart that could be put into an MSX computer to enable extra functions in some Konami games, including saving, which is what it allows here. It's the only thing I can afford, so I pick it up. This shopkeeper will swear at you if you look at an item but don't buy it, either because you choose not to or you don't have the money. I don't know if that's in the original version or was added to the translation, but I don't care for it.
10x Cartridge: The Elder Xelpud will save your game.
Glyph Reader: Instantly decodes any ancient glyphs.
Ruins RAM 8k: If you have the right map, displays the map of the Field you are in.
I head back to the opening screen and go right. There's a bird here.
But not for long. I find the timing to hit these birds when they swoop at you almost impossible, so any time I can take them out first is a good time for me.
Here's a demo of me getting hit by the swoop, but also a useful trick with the whip. There's a delay before it swings forwards, but it hits behind and above Lemeza immediately. If you can get below an enemy and face away, you can get in a quick hit. The bird drops a weight:
You put them on daises to activate mechanisms. There's a dais on the right side of the current screen that opens the entrance to La-Mulana. Let's head over there and get inside:
Or not. There's a barrier here that sort of blends in to the pillars in the background that won't let you in until you talk to the Elder. I did that in the last update, but I haven't been back since dying and starting over. Whoops.
Instead I head up on to the roof on the entrance and carry on up the cliff face. The thing I'm whipping in the last image here is a treasure chest. I've opened this one on one of my video recording test runs, and I'd swear it was by whipping it, but it's not working this time. I'm keen to get the item inside, too. Oh well.
Eventually I give up and move on. The signpost in the third image I think I'll be able to read once I get the Hand Scanner, and I've broken a pot in the last image to get ten more coins. That's not enough to buy anything, since I already have the only 10 coin item for sale so far, but it's halfway to the Hand Scanner.
Nice view up here. You can jump off the right side of the screen here, but like Popolon, Lemeza will take damage when he's in water so it's not a good idea at the moment.
I head back to town and talk to Xelpud to get the entrance opened. Along the way I spent time more time fruitlessly whipping the treasure chest and getting hit by the falling feathers on that screen, which accounts for my decreased health. How do I restore health, anyway? I know I get a refill when the experience gauge fills, but is there another way?
Go back in and Xelpud gives some advice.
Keep going in and he starts spouting nonsense. A lot of it is references to MSX games. I don't know what the deal is with iron pipes and crotches, though.
User's Manual:
ELDER XELPUD
His age is unknown.
He is the elder of the "Guardian tribe" that protects the ruins of La Mulana. He is an old friend of Shorn, and actually met Lemeza when he was a child, though Lemeza was too young to remember.
Xelpud holds to the tradition of his clan in protecting the ruins, but is remarkably easy-going and does a lot more than "protect the ruins of La Mulana" and is actually quite a technophile. He even set up a hydroelectric power generator for his personal use by the waterfall on the outskirts of the village.
However, thanks to his efforts, his village has become quite prosperous for being in the middle of the jungle. Xelpud is famous on the Internet as an MSX expert.
I equip Game Master and go in again. This time Xelpud offers to save the game for me. My health is pretty bad, so I'm not sure it's a wise idea, but I take him up on it.
I head back to the entrance. The barrier is gone, so I can reach the dais and the statue beyond. I try to interact with the statue but don't find a way. Oh well. Let's try this mechanism:
Weights are placed by pressing down in front of the dais. This one immediately causes a path to open in the floor.
I head down and into a previously invisible area of the screen below.
Most screen transitions in La-Mulana scroll, but moving from one area to another has this special transition. We're in the ruins themselves now. I think this area is called the Guidance Gate. Does the true La-Mulana start here?
As I enter the stage the skeleton at the lower right comes to life and wanders about. I wait up top until it goes back to sleep then drop down and whip it until it explodes. Archaeology!
I can't seem to interact with either the skeleton at the lower left or the stele on the level above (I suspect both can be inspected once I get the Hand Scanner), so I head to the next screen, where I am attacked by bats. Miraculously, I manage to hit one with my whip before it deprives me of my one hit point. Hey, what's that red line on the platform above me?
I step on it and the treasure chest opens, scoring me a Life Jewel which increases my maximum VIT and also refills the gauge. According to the manual, "A limited number of these are hidden in the ruins." It doesn't show up in my inventory. Note that the lid of the chest is darkened now that I've taken its contents, meaning I can tell at a glance if I've gotten something from it or not.
I try whipping the skeleton down below, but it doesn't seem to be an enemy. Then I put my newly increased VIT to good use getting hit by the remaining bat. Eventually I manage to catch it on the upper level, and it drops a coin. That's one step closer to getting the Hand Scanner!
I take the ladder down to the next screen, where I kill a skeleton and head right. The upper part of this room can't be reached from the ladder, but I think it's possible to drop to it from the room above by taking the lower path in the first room. I'll have to try that later.
In the next room there are three of these hopping enemies. Frogs? Giant insects? Tiny elephants? Anyway, two of them I take out easily, but one of them gives me some trouble.
Also in this room is what looks to me like a Birth Lock, which I should be able to open once I find the Birth Seal, pictured above. Maybe that will open the chest? Or perhaps I need to light the unlit torch on the right?
I take out the pot on the top level and get two weights for my efforts, then get hit a few more times by the enemy before taking it out for a coin and moving to the next screen. I remember this room well from the Wii version, but even knowing what'll happen as an LPer I feel obligated to do the following:
User's Manual:It seems the ruins of La Mulana are protected by a holy power. This is why it is not easy to be a grave robber or invader here. Don't destroy or touch things at random. He who defiles the holy ruins will have divine retribution brought upon him! Proceed with caution when solving puzzles!
Ouch! I don't remember if this thing does anything other than bring on divine retribution, but I'll be trying not to hit it again. I hope there are no long term consequences to this act of blasphemy.
I move to the next screen. The pot I'm whipping doesn't drop anything, but I get a coin from the bat. I totally missed the ladder at the upper left of the right screen, so I didn't get into the lower part of the chamber. I'll have to try that later.
Moving to the lower part of the screen, I fall victim to a trap. Fortunately it only takes a little VIT away.
At the upper right of the first screen is a ladder, but it leads to a different Field (area of the ruins) and I want to look around this one a little more before taking it so I backtrack to the area in the second screen. The stele with blue things at either side obviously has some significance, but I don't know what just yet so I take the ladder down. The enemies on this screen are in the manual:
User's Manual:The description is borne out by the gameplay - they walk around and die in one hit. I'll probably be killed by one at some point.
MYRMECOLEO
A monster that is a cross between a lion and an ant. It doesn't do much, and isn't very dangerous unless you get close.
Jorge Luis Borges, The Book of Imaginary Beings (trans. Andrew Hurley):It’s kind of sad, really. That said, I’m pretty sure ants will eat meat if they get the chance.
The Physiologus said [of this creature]: “Its father has the form of a lion, and its mother that of an ant. Its father eats flesh, but its mother grains. If they engender the ant-lion, they engender a thing of two natures, such that it cannot eat flesh because of the nature of its mother, nor grains because of the nature of its father. It perishes, therefore, because it has no nutriment”
Putting a weight on the dais here activates a trap. To my own surprise, I manage to dodge it. Maybe I should have looked closer at the bodies in the area. There's something about that in the manual:
User's Manual - A final note:
Let's say you were an archaeologist. You're standing in front of a dark hole that you can't see the bottom of. Would you jump in? In real life, your response would probably be, "Heck no!" After all, you don't know what's down there. Or say you're in a room filled with corpses and a bunch of switches. Would you just press them haphazardly at random? In this case too, you'd probably never do something so reckless. We wanted to try to incorporate this type of tension--a "Proceed with caution" type of feeling into the game.
I'd forgotten when I said a minute ago I'd be killed by one of these eventually that I was about to take a hit from one, so there you go. Not dead yet, but not for lack of trying.
Speaking of which, this was obviously foolish.
The next screen has another chest and a nearby dais that maybe opens it, another dais behind some kind of barrier up above, and what looks like a poster of an umbrella on the right side. But none of that matters right now because the pot drops ten coins, enough that I can afford the Hand Scanner, so I immediately bail.
Miraculously I make it back to town without incident, pick up the Hand Scanner, and head back to the Elder's place to save. Whew! That'll do for today, I think.
Maps:
Village:
Guidance Gate:
To-Do:
Village:
-Kill the blue Algol at -5/1, probably with the Serpent Staff.
-Read signposts at -4/1 and 3/3
-Open treasure chest at 2/2
-Explore beyond the waterfall at 3/4
-Purchase:
--Buckler (0/0) 80 Coins
--MSX2 (0/0) 150 Coins
--Waterproof case (0/0) 80 Coins
--Glyph Reader (-1/0) 100 Coins
--Ruins RAM 8K (-1/0) 30 Coins
Guidance Gate:
-Do something at altar at -1/1
-Reach upper section of -1/1
-Open treasure chests at 2/-1 and 0/-2
-Get past barrier at 0/-2
-Get past holy rock at 1/-2
-Take ladder to other Field at 4/-1
-Put weights on daises at -2/0 (x2) and 3/-1
-Use Hand Scanner on:
--Steles: 0/0, 1/-2, 2/-1, 3/-1, 4/-1
--Skeletons: 0/0, 1/0, 1/-1, 1/-2, 3/-1, 4/-1
Birth Locks:
-Guidance Gate 2/-1
Life Locks:
-Village -4/1
Next Time:
Part 03: Guardians?
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