There has to be something here I can hit...Let's Play The Sword of Hope

i can read good

Is it generally the case that enemies use spells that Theo can learn as well? That would be interesting, actually.

I support the notion of hearing more of that sweet GONG! sound. So let's go to Martel's domain and HIT things!

Sword of Hope Post #6 – Entering Martel’s Domain

Tunlan, I’ll double-check as we go along, but I’m pretty sure that Theo eventually learns every named spell in the game (which doesn’t include things like the moths’ ability to blow poison).




So, in our first instance of using an item in the game, we USE the KEY M on Martel’s Gate.


Unlocked!


And the gate actually vanishes from the screen image afterwards.


The first part of Martel’s Domain is basically an extension of the forest, with more Moths and Skeletons causing trouble.


There’s a crossroads here.


If we head north, there’s a door.


But that door is so tight, we can’t OPEN it!


And no one answers when we HIT it.

If we travel west from the crossroads…


We get to a house.


With a scary guy. (Who apparently has a pigeon among the list of things we can interact with.)


This is what I see in his room.


As my audience seems to want to see violence...


This is Martel’s reaction to being HIT.


And the pigeon’s. Such cruelty!

We’ll LOOK at Martel expectantly.


Then we’ll hang around and LOOK at him again.


Martel’s being kind of a dick, you guys. Maybe I shouldn’t have punched him.


But he magically unlocks the tight door for us.


In the WORSHIP SITE, we encounter a new enemy: The Big Bat. They’re stronger and hardier than the last batch of enemies, they are fast enough to usually get in the first hit, and they can bit you to reduce your Agility. With the Silver Armor, their attacks don’t actually do much damage, but it can take a few rounds to actually kill them.




They give better rewards than the weaker foes, though: 2-4 Gold and 7-10 XP, which means I gain a level shortly thereafter.


RAISEA raises your agility for the duration of the battle. It’s not usually worth using.


Within the church, we’ve got the pews,


the alter,


and the pipe organ. What should we do around here, Talking Time?


Here’s the map of Martel’s domain so far.


As a side note, it occurred to me that I hadn’t gotten a password yet. Here’s one for where we are right now.

Hit the pipe organ!

No, no, you got that wrong. Martel isn�t a dick because we HIT him, we HIT him because he is a dick. He earned it. (Though I feel a bit bad about hitting the dove. Maybe we should say sorry by taking an apologetic LOOK at her).

And I guess we should pray a bit in front of the alter. After that, let�s take a look what is waiting for us outside of the church.

What do you think about the non-attack spells in this game? Last time I tried to use them, but found it to be way more effective to use the attack spells (or simply punching things to death). Are some of them useful?

Sword of Hope Post #7 – We Haven’t a Prayer

So, welcome back! I hope you all had happy Thanksgivings. (I really would rather update more than once a week, but holidays and family illnesses have been getting in the way.)

Okay, so, first we’ll go back and LOOK at the pigeon.


She has some kind words.

Then, let’s HIT the pipe organ.


Hunh. Strange. I wonder what that means?


Trying to OPEN the pipe organ only gets me this message, though.

So then we’re supposed to pray at the altar. But there’s no pray command!


Taking a LOOK at the altar only gets us this message.


What if we use that GRACE spell?






The mysterious voice gives us a CHARM, and offers us advice if we return here. Sounds like a good thing to remember.


The CHARM is a usable item in our list. What should we do with the CHARM? (Hint: The fact that I’m not showing additional artwork yet implies something.)

Finally, some exploration:


Behind the church is a small segment of forest. (We can interact with trees and the path.)




Leading into a graveyard, where we can check out graves and the surroundings on each screen.


On the far end, it looks like we could go west, but the way is blocked.




Heading southwest leads through a screen on forest to a mysterious well.


Along the way, we meet another new enemy: The ELEMNTAL. At this point, I can take one down in a single hit, but they explode when killed and do damage to you in the process. (They can also blow flame at you when left alone.) Two battles with them left me likely to be visiting the Shaman before our next post.


Also, this happened. Different types of enemies in the same battle will sometimes fight each other instead of you.


Here’s the full map of Martel’s domain.

What do we do from here?

My general impression has always been that anything worth casting them on is likely to resist them, and smashing stuff is the better way to go. But I'm planning to experiment as Theo learns more magic. I wasn't exactly a game expert in my Game Boy youth, so deliberately going against my old playstyles has occasionally benefitted me.

Sword of Hope Post #8 – The Graveyard

Well, if no one has any suggestions, I’ll just figure some stuff out myself.


Trying to USE the CHARM by itself does nothing.

But if I USE it in front of the pipe organ…


The magical red light that was apparently blocking the pipes comes out and upgrades my CHARM into the RUBY.


Nintendo Power had custom artwork for that.

Then we’ll go back and show Martel how cool we are.


All we need to do it LOOK at Martel to get him to notice the RUBY. He’s impressed with our wisdom, even though we kinda lucked into this.




The bonus from the sword upgrade goes straight to my Dexterity (aka, my attack power).


How do we help the pigeon?




Also, I figured I’d note this: LOOKing at trees often gets hints from them. This one basically spells out how to get the CHARM.


This is the standard message from LOOKing at a rock.




Looking at the chairs in the church reveals a free herb. (I love the phrasing here, like we watch the chair until a herb scurries by and we grab it.)




And then I gain a level fighting bats.


The third level spells hit everyone involved in the battle, including Theo. This has some utility in an emergency, but usually isn’t worth it.


Recmin is the first healing spell we learn, and will probably be the major drain on my MP for a while.


And when you return to Martel from here on, you get this message instead of the “thin man” one.

The fact that you're WEARING your new sword makes me wonder how many times you've managed to survive stabbing yourself in the gut with it :P

Very interesting so far. I have no ideas about how we can help that poor pet pigeon, so let's concentrate on what we can achieve right now:

LOOK at Graves, HIT Graves and OPEN Graves. Also, OPEN that strange well.

Can you also look at the Charm or find out how might be useful within the game?

Of course, we could also try to LOOK at pigeon. Maybe the game has a good idea on how to help it...

I feel like the whole sequence to get Martel to really like you is a bit on the side of Sierra-logic. Maybe you talk with everyone again if you can�t continue, so you get the Grace-spell, and the trees tell you how to get the charm. But is there any reason to know that it transforms when you use it at the organ?

I like the text in this game, it�s so strange sometimes, like when you look at the stones or the chair.
By the way, I never mentioned that I like you maps. The overview of the place you are at is nice.

We need new ways of continuing. OPEN the WELL and find out what�s inside. And when you are at it, HIT some of the GRAVESTONES. Show them who is the boss.

I should mention that last night, I dreamed about me watching you play this.

I don't even know.

LOOK WINDOW

Sword of Hope Post #9 – Wanton Destruction

I think the organ puzzle is one of the more obtuse ones in the game; it’s also not strictly necessary to complete it, but the more powerful charm will be very useful later, as we’ll eventually see.

Unfortunately, I can’t look at items in my inventory; the only way to find out what the RUBY does is by using it and seeing what happens.

And thanks for the compliment on the maps! They’re modified from the Nintendo Power Game Boy guide, because I thought their format was the best one to use but I didn’t want to start from scratch.

And I can’t comment on my ability to invade people’s dreams. I’m flattered?


First, let’s have a LOOK at this poor pigeon.


You…want me to HIT you? Well, okay.




That…was odd. I don’t really want to contemplate the biology at work here.


But hey, free egg!


Here’s some artwork that accompanies these plot developments.

Now, we’ll circle around and go LOOK at the windows in the church.


But we can’t see them from here.


From the altar, they look pretty.

Heading into the graveyard…


LOOKing at the Graves on any of the three screens gives me this message.


Attempting to HIT Graves and OPEN Graves on any screen gets me this.


I’ll also note that looking at the surroundings on the middle screen gives me this warning.


LOOKing at the Well reveals that the lid is rotten.


We can easily OPEN it.


And head down into the well.


The well is a series of ladders and holes, with side-paths containing chests.


Though not all paths are accessible.


Chest #2 is at the very bottom.

This center column of the well is just a long stretch of ladders.


The new enemy down here is the GOBLIN, which sometimes comes in pairs. Their physical attack isn’t a threat, dealing 1-2 points of damage at this stage of the game. The problem is that they take 3 hits to kill (and are agile enough to dodge some hits), are immune to Fireballs, and cast Fireball themselves. (Though it’s the first-level version of the spell, so sometimes it’ll hit an enemy instead of Theo.) If they tag you with a fireball, that could easily be 20 points of damage.


Which results in me ending up back at the Old Man.


I stop at the Shaman to heal up, and snag a password.


Then I come back and fight a bunch of monsters. Level 7 gives me LIGHTNG, which is the first tier of our next elemental attack spell, and PILLAGD, which steals some Dexterity from an enemy and gives it to Theo.


Level 7 stats.


The west side of the well has two more chests for us to check out.

Which chests would you like me to examine, HIT or OPEN?


And then there’s a well exit in the north-west corner, though it’s not clear how we can reach it. Chest #5 is here.


At level 8, we get FIREBAL4, which hits all enemies but not Theo; and BAGEFIRE, which is the first tier of the bizarrely-named wind elemental spell set.


Level 8 stats.


I explored just about all of the well, so I’m going to put up a fairly complete map here.

Next time, we can HIT and OPEN objects of your choice.

I vote for chest #2 -- the one at the bottom of the well.

I love lamp.

I remember the time when I encountered two goblins. I think I was at a level were they still were a threat, but I beat one. Before I could beat the other one, a new one appeared. The same thing happened a second time. I died a horrible death.
Conclusion: Goblins are jerks.

HIT and OPEN all the CHESTS. And if you can, HIT some of these STALACTITES. After that take a look at the place "B" on the map, the other way out of the well.

Sword of Hope Post #10 – Chests

So, a couple of things of note:


The first is that 255 Gold is the max you can carry, and it’s surprisingly easy to hit that total. I’ll want to hit the forest shop to stock up on items.

Second, sorry Felix, but the STALACTITES don’t seem to be a valid target.


Third, Ifnkovhgroghprm has chosen the correct chest, in that it’s the one that will advance the plot. So we’ll go there first.


SLUG! Oh noes!


I open with a casting of STRIPALL and a casting of PILLAGD. This drops the SLUG’s normal attacks from doing 6 points of damage to me to doing 0-2. Theo’s attacks on the SLUG do 5-10 points of damage.


But the SLUG has a secret weapon: Blowing out strong acid that can do 25+ damage to Theo. You basically have to pray to the RNG that it doesn’t do that twice, because RECMIN only restores 20-25 HP and Theo doesn’t always act first.


When you beat the SLUG, you get KEY S, which will get us into Shabow’s domain.


Which we have fancy artwork of.


Random note: Hitting the chest doesn’t open it, so it’s still closed while you fight SLUG and get the key. You can open it afterwards, but it’s empty.
Let’s do a little more exploring while we’re here, eh? We’ll check out all the chests.


Chest #1 holds a nasty surprise, whether you HIT or OPEN it.


You generally don’t want to meet a MIMIC: They can hit super-hard (20+ damage on a lucky hit) and take three FIREBAL2s to take out. They also don’t leave any noteworthy prizes.


You can still look at the CHEST, even though it’s gone from the screen: It alerts you that the chest is, in fact, gone!


By the way, this is the message from examining the water in most parts of the well.


And this describes most of the walls.


Chest #3 is also a MIMIC.


Chest #4 contains a message. Apparently there’s at least one other brave knight out there, but for reasons that will soon be apparent, he’s not going to join my party.


Chest #5 contains a special item, the DOLL. You can use the DOLL during combat for a random chance of Theo getting a stat boost. It’s free and infinite-use, but usually not worth it.


So, how do we deal with this hole out of the well?

The same way we deal with everything: HIT the wall.




Then we can climb the IVY.


This leads to a little nook.


Where the trees tell us about the Swordsman’s grave…which is on the next screen.




LOOKing at the grave makes the ghost appear.


He has a sidequest for us.


The narrow path here leads back to the graveyard, so we don’t have to go back through the well. (It’s one-way, though.) The other alternative, which I’m planning to take, is just to teleport back to the Shaman.


Though I’ll do a little grinding on GOBLINs first. Level 9, here I come!


PILLAGAS steals Agility and Stamina from an enemy, the same way PILLAGD works.


LIGHTNG2 is the better version of LIGHTNG, which never hits Theo. If we’d had problems beating the SLUG, this spell would have solved them.


Then I go back, heal up and get a password.

I feel like passwords were a brilliant and sadly-lost art: Those sixteen digits contain all sorts of information about our game, including XP total, gold total, which items we’re carrying and weapons and armor we’re wearing, and what plot triggers we’ve hit. For a side-scrolling platformer where the only real information in the password is what stage you’re at and maybe your extra life total, this is simple. For a game like this, the linearity of the plot must be very carefully calculated so everything can fit into the password. (I actually wonder if what sword, eggs and keys you have is rolled into the “where you are in the plot” increment, because you can’t progress without them.)
I love reading translation diaries of games, catalogues of things dummied out of games, all that sort of thing. But I’ve never seen—and I’d love to see—a deconstruction of the password system for a game like this.


Level 9 stats.

Next time, I’m planning to buy some stuff, then go explore Shabow’s domain. Any more plans for Martel’s domain or the forest before I go?

I'd like to see you do the Yeti quest, unless it's impossible at your current level/equipment.

Can't think about anything else right now, so I'm in favor of doing the Yeti thing!

Also: I love Poliniyak's story. This game has a great mythology.

IIRL the Yeti isn�t accessible yet, but you should absolutely do it when it comes up.
Speaking of passwords, did you ever try RRRR RRRR RRRR RRRR?

I think there is nothing to do anymore here, so let�s take a look at Shabows domain.

Felix is correct here: The Yeti quest isn't accessible yet, but I'll do it as soon as it is.

Tunlan: Keep an eye on the screenshots pertaining to Poliniyak. His name is spelled differently pretty much every time.

...fascinating. No, I hadn't heard of that until you posted it, and it shows me some interesting things about the password system's setup. It appears that the event flags for meeting the wizards and getting all of the items are tripped, and Theo is 25th level with all of the spells learned and the best armor; but he still has the starting-level sword and because the last event flag won't trip, the game appears to be in an unwinnable state.

Now more than ever I want to see a dissection of the password system!

I'll head over to Shabow's domain early next week.

Just chiming in to say that I'm enjoying this LP and just haven't had much to say regarding our choices. Along with the final fantasy games it's interesting to see developer's workarounds for the limited cart space on the gameboy and their ability to craft decent RPG's.

Sword of Hope Post #11 – Shabow

So, I’m not entirely sure I’ll get another post up before Christmas, but I’ll try to give you a lot to speculate on before then. And thanks for the kind words!


The first thing we do is hit the forest shop. Notice that the prices have gone up: They’re pegged to your level. At higher levels, it’s easier to earn gold more quickly, but wheat, barley and herbs cost more.




Next, we’ll go unlock Shabow’s gate.




We haven’t made it two screens in when Theo is attacked by an APE.


APEs represent a difficulty spike: They use the BAGEFIRE spell which (if you’re lucky) they can hurt themselves with,


…but can also totally murderate Theo. They also cast STRIPALL, which is less deadly but a pain. They can reflect FIREBALL spells back at you, but LIGHTNG2 will make short work of them. They have something like 25 HP and give similar rewards to GOBLINs.

After stopping by the Old man and Shaman again…


We’ll take the north fork at the crossroads.


The other new enemy is the CYCLOPS. They can cast RAISED to boost their attack power, but generally aren’t strong enough to be dangerous. They have more HP than APEs but are easier to beat with your weapon, and give slightly better rewards.


Going all the way north leads to a dead end.


There’s an herb in the grass, though.


This is the default message when you LOOK at a tree but it has nothing to say to you at that point in the story.


If we back up here and LOOK at the mud pit…


...it reveals a new path.


Following that north leads to Shabow’s house.

Shabow wants to test our courage.


So he pushes Theo down a waterfall. Ah!


Into a swamp.


North of where we land is the cave Shabow spoke of.


Trying to go west is blocked—it would be back up the falls.


South west takes us through several more screens of swamp.


In the swamp, you can encounter a FROG. It spews poison like the MOTHs do, which affects you at the end of each turn, dealing damage and draining your stats. LIGHTNG2 is a good way to deal with these guys, too.


Then through a one-way passage back to the forest area.


North of there is a bridge that leads to a hole.


But there’s a blast of air from that hole that prevents entry.


If we go east we get back to that original junction.


And if we want to return to the swamp, we need to come back to behind the falls and jump off.


Anyway, that’s a big circle. Check out the map.


I fight enough to get up to level 10, where I learn BAGEFIR2 (the version of BAGEFIRE that doesn’t hit Theo) and RAISED (which we saw the CYCLOPS use; it raises your attack power).

Then I pop back to the Shaman for healing and a password, though my screenshot of said password has flitted off into the aether somewhere.


Level 10 stats.

There’s plenty of scenery to LOOK at and try to HIT in all of these screens before we enter the cave. What should we check out?

LOOK at the swamp and the windy hole.

HIT the bridge.

Hit that windy hole if you can. Maybe it's just a bunch of built up air and the pressure is pushing it out too hard, so hitting it will break some of the wall and let it flow gently.

Is his name Shabow or is he the Shabow?

At any rate I love how he's like, "let's test your courage," by apparently trying to kill you.

I say we LOOK at everything as Nintendo power so urgently wants us to do.

There must be something in that dead end at the three-way junction by Shabow's place. I say we HIT, LOOK, and OPEN anything we can on that screen.

After the prince has goofed around enough he should be strong enough to take on that SWAMP CAVE. Maybe there is something in there that would let us get to the WINDY HOLE.