Huzzah! Let's Play Cave Story

Chapter 6: The Waterway

♪♪Living Waterway♪♪

And now for something completely different. Stepping through the lion's head in the Dark Place
whisks you away to the Waterway, a small area that acts as a much-needed palette-cleanser
after the events following the Core fight.



The Waterway is also designed to give players a chance to rest and recuperate after a pretty
difficult battle. I made it through the Core fight in pretty good shape this time around, but
sometimes you'll arrive with little health and underpowered weapons. That's why this place is
populated by garden-variety critters and bats - the same enemies you saw in the First Cave.
You can scavenge weapon energy from them to get your guns back into fighting form.



The Waterway is a linear area that takes you down a twisty path. Water currents and spikes make
the navigation a bit more challenging, but for the most part it's pretty straightforward.



See that suspicious-looking alcove below us? You won't find anything initially if you head down
there, but fire a few shots and...



...a bunch of hearts will appear! There are a few spots in the Waterway where this will happen,
for the benefit of players who arrived with just a handful of HP left.



Farther down, we come to a section with a powerful current heading to the right. No choice but to
jump in - cowabunga, dudes!



From here on, we'll mostly be riding the currents. Pixel tosses some spikes in here and there to
keep you on your toes.





After the chicane, we find ourselves in a room with two exits. Do nothing and you'll be swept into
the one on the right...



...which just takes you back to where you came from. You have to hold left in order to take the
correct route.



Like so!



The next area is a large room filled with jellies and swirling currents. You should probably clear
out some of the jellies before diving into the moving water, because it's pretty hard to predict
how you're going to move once you're in there.



We bob around somewhat randomly for a little while, taking care of the last few jellies, before
the current eventually sends us up and to the right.



Hey, there's a door here! To reach it, you have to jump as soon as the current deposits you on
the little ledge to the right of where we are in this shot. If you aren't careful, you can mess up
the jump and wind up missing the door completely, which would be a shame.

♪♪Pulse♪♪

Inside is a quiet spot where we can rest up and save the game. There's no missile refill, unfortunately.



This terminal has a cryptic message on it. As far as I can tell, this actually refers to the real-life
birth of Pixel's first child. The Japanese use the correct, logical YYYY/MM/DD system for
their dates, so presumably this would have happened on August 8, 2004. That's just over four
months before the original release of the game in Japan, so it seems plausible.



Over here on the bookshelf, we find a dusty notebook. None of what's written inside seems to
warrant its own text box, however.

We have a quick sleep in the bed and save our game before heading back outside.

♪♪Living Waterway♪♪

Time to take the path downward.



Next, the currents take us all the way to the left...



...and then all the way back to the right one level farther down. There are a couple of tricky jumps
over rows of spikes here and messing up will cost you a cool 10 HP, so you'll want to be careful -
especially if you missed out on your chance to rest in the cabin. It's not too hard to clear them
with the booster, and we still have a level 3 Machine Gun if all else fails (though many people won't).



Just as we reach the end of the hallway, we get this message. Looks like we have company!

WARNING!

A HUGE BATTLESHIP

IRONHEAD

IS APPROACHING FAST

♪♪Run!♪♪

It's Ironhead! While the whole Waterway section could be considered something of an homage to
one of Pixel's older games, Ikachan (in which you play a small, white squid), this part absolutely
references it. To wit, Ironhead here is actually the big bad of Ikachan - guess he had some down
time between gigs and decided to do a walk-on.





Ironhead is accompanied by a school of porcupine fish, whose sprites are also directly lifted from
Ikachan. The fish appear from behind you and are harmless until they unfurl their spines, at which
point they then float back toward the left side of the screen. There are also chunks of rock floating
in the water that do hefty damage to you, so there can be quite a lot going on at any given time.

Note that this boss fight plays out like a space shooter, as you're being continually carried along
by the current and you always face to the right. It's a fun little change of pace.



Ironhead swims back and forth, spending equal parts of the fight ahead of and behind you. When
he's on the left side of the screen, he'll shoot these red energy shots at you.



This isn't a very challenging fight, but that's just as well given that some people will still be
low on health, ammo and weapon levels. I don't have a lot of missiles left at this point, but I
managed to grab a few from the porcupine fish and put them to good use.



We land the last hit and Ironhead slowly drifts off screen. If you manage to complete the fight
without taking a hit, though...



...the screen is filled with a swarm of Ikachans! Like I said, it's definitely a tribute. Ikachan also
shows up in one other spot in Cave Story - on the back of our hero's trucker cap! Check it out:

Sure, that may just look like two plain white pixels, but in time I will prove to you otherwise.



Anyway, with Ironhead out of the way, the current carries us off and the screen fades out. When
we come to, we find ourselves...



...back at the reservoir in the Mimiga village.

♪♪Quiet♪♪

Wait a second, I killed that fish! And I did it expressly to show you guys that it wouldn't ever
come back! I guess I just imagined that it stayed dead if you shot it? I don't know whether to
feel better or worse about killing the first one, now.



Checking our inventory, it seems that our flawless victory over Ironhead is commemorated with
this beautiful collectible coin, called the Alien Medal. I don't typically get this item on a regular
playthrough, since I almost always wind up swimming into one of the chunks of rock during the fight,
but for you guys I made a special effort.



Well, now we're back at the Mimiga village, and some sort of creepy music is playing. Guess we
should have a look around the place, huh? Look forward to that, next time on Let's Play Cave Story.

Huzzah!

The Alien Medal gets hinted at if you bring up the Map Screen during the fight. Not something most players would try to do, but a nice reward if they consider it.

R-really? How?

I didn't know about the medal or the homage stuff at all! Neat.

Chapter 7: Egg Corridor Revisited

♪♪Quiet♪♪

So here we are in the Mimiga Village, but things are awfully quiet (hence the song). Anybody home?



No one in the assembly hall...



No one's at the farm either. Where did everybody go?

Well, the village appears to be deserted, but that doesn't mean there's nothing for us to do here.
Now that we have the Booster and the machine gun, we can explore a few places that used to be
out of reach.

♪♪Cemetary♪♪

First stop: the graveyard!



Remember this door? Let's go see what's inside.



Inside this storage room is a strange blue mushroom. It doesn't seem hostile, so we head over
for a chat.



Smug little jerk, isn't she. You can also answer the question in the negative, which gets you this:

Fine, so mushrooms aren't the best conversationalists. Let's get out of here, this place is dead,
anyway (JOKE).

♪♪Quiet♪♪

Back in the village, we can use our powers of flight to go check out the top-left corner. You
may recall that this is where we first fell down into the village, interrupting King's interrogation
of Toroko.



There's a door here, which logically has to lead to...

♪♪Gestation ♪♪

...the First Cave!



We can make pretty short work of the enemies here with our powered up machine gun.



Hey look, the Hermit Gunsmith finally woke up! Wonder what he has to say?



Uh...nope, don't know anything about that! I've never even heard of the Polar Sta-uh, whatever
kind of gun it was. Check out this dope machine gune I've got! You for-sure didn't make it,
that's all I know! Bye!

Interesting stuff that he said about making a really good weapon from the Polar Star, though. Too
bad it's permanently locked behind a super-thick blast shield in an area that we'll never return to.

♪♪Quiet♪♪

With nowhere else to go, we head back to Arthur's house.



Hooray, missiles! I haven't had a full stock of these since we beat the Core.



We find a message on the computer from Kazuma. Guess we'll head over to the Egg Corridor and
see what he's up to.



No new destinations for us on the teleporter right now, in case you were wondering.

♪♪Scorching Back♪♪

Dang, the Egg Corridor isn't looking so hot. The music underlines that things have taken a
pretty nasty turn here. Also, for the record, I'm not 100% sure what the name of this track is,
because the two versions I have have different names. It's either Scorching Back or Scorching
Bank (and neither of those makes a lot of sense, so I guess it doesn't matter).



I'm not entirely certain, to be honest. The game never really explains why the Egg Corridor
exploded; perhaps the Doctor wanted to prevent anyone from escaping the island and sent his
goons to wreck the place? Then again, a bunch of flying dragons would be pretty useful for when
he sends his Mimiga army down to earth. Man, a rabid Mimiga riding on the back of a dragon.
How scary would that be?



Sadly, the poor little dragons are no more. For such a cute-looking game, Cave Story can be
pretty dang grim.

Although maybe you figured that out back when all of our friends died.



The Egg Corridor is still filled with critter and flying bugs, but now the game adds two new
things to the mix. First up are the sad baby dragons, crying tears of blood. They can't move,
but they'll shoot fire at you from time to time before you put them out of their misery. There
are also falling stalactites, but those are much less sad (though still somewhat dangerous).



This hatchling is guarding a treasure chest. Sorry about this, buddy. =(



More missiles! Now I'm not sad anymore! =D



Occasionally you'll have to deal with a jumbo stalactite like the one that is falling on the left.
One of those landing on you means - you guessed it! - instant death. I've definitely had a
few nasty surprises due to them in past runs.



After a while, we come to Cthulhu's Abode.

♪♪Gestation ♪♪

I'm reasonably sure there weren't spikes and thomps in this place last time we visited! What
kind of bomb did they detonate here, anyway?



We very carefully make our way to the upper door.

♪♪Scorching Back♪♪

There are a couple more dragons and another big stalactite here. If you aren't paying attention,
it's easy to get crushed.



A little farther on, we find this guy, who I'm pretty sure is unique to this one spot in the game.



If you shoot it, it starts counting down from 5. Chances are we don't want to be around when
that timer runs out.



The bomb creature explodes, covering a very large area in the process. You can stop this from
happening by shooting it a bunch, but it has a lot of HP and it's easier to just back up a bit to
get out of the blast radius. Apparently getting hit by the explosion does 30 HP damage, but
amazingly I don't think that has ever happened to me.



One more jumbo stalactite tries to smush you as you climb up this narrow passageway. Yes, this
one has killed me. Several times!

♪♪Gestation ♪♪

Boy, this place sure has changed. Gone are the rows of terminals, although you can still see where
the floors that supported them were. The elevator remains, although it's pretty useless now.



There are more missiles inside the chest! This brings us up to a max of 30, which is pretty swell.

You feel a chill.

~ENTER: THE DRAGONS~

♪♪Gravity♪♪

Two dragons materialize! These are the Sisters. I am relatively certain they are ghosts.



The Sisters basically orbit our hero, staying on opposite sides of the room for the whole fight.
You can't damage them until they open their mouths to breathe fire at you, at which point they
become vulnerable. Do enough damage and they'll stop their attack, plus it leaves them with an
adorably goofy expression for a few seconds. A single volley of powered up missiles typically
does the trick.



It's a pretty straightforward fight once you know what to do. You're basically just managing the
two enemies by shutting down their attacks as soon as possible. If you do it right, they won't
even have a chance to hit you.



Once the Sisters are low on health, they change their pattern and start slowly circling you,
breathing fire all the while. I let things get a little out of hand here...



Got 'em! Once defeated, the two sisters fly toward each other and then disappear in a flash of light.

♪♪Victory!♪♪

A block appears beneath the entrance on the left, allowing us to head back if we want. But we
don't! Instead, the way forward is through the little hole on the right side - it's easy to miss.

♪♪Scorching Back♪♪

We continue toward the far end of the Egg Corridor. You'll notice that I scraped through the fight
with the Sisters with a measly 5 HP remaining. I only took one hit during the fight, but I went
into it in pretty rough shape. Gotta be very careful here! I haven't used the Fireball very much
since I got the Machine Gun, but it's still useful when enemies are below you and it's a safer way
for me to deal with this poor hatchling.



Finally, we make it to the end of the corridor, where we fought Igor back in Chapter 2.



PHEW, Ok.

♪♪Pulse♪♪

Inside Egg No. 00's room, we find the remains of a shell, but no dragon.



Cool, but where's my ride?



Kazuma appears from the right side of the screen. Remember how there was a draft in that corner
the first time we were here?

Well, there was this old lady, right? And she had a bunch of dogs and- Look, it was complicated, OK??

The Crown in question is the one that the Doctor found on the title screen, with the creepy red
eye in the middle. The game never really says what kinds of powers it confers upon its wearer,
other than control over Misery and Balrog and I guess the ability to float? Really, you almost
never see the Doctor use it for anything.





You know, that doesn't sound like a bad deal, all things considered. Let's blow this popsicle stand!

Dude, you don't even know how many toaster ovens I had to kill to get here.



Kazuma exits to the right, thoughtfully leaving the door open for us.

♪♪Moonsong♪♪

And here it is, the outside of the island. The sight of the night sky, the moon and the clouds
as you step out of the caves for the first time has always really struck me. Combined with one
of the more beautiful songs on the soundtrack, it's one of my favorite moments in a game filled
with great moments.



Kazuma's waiting for us, along with a healthy, corporeal-looking dragon.



Not a particularly friendly one, though.





We climb onto the dragon and fly away, leaving the island and all of its troubles behind us. Hooray!



Before long, the Doctor began his attack on the earth, using the floating island as a base.
Were the countries of the earth able to withstand the Doctor's assault?



Together, deep in the heart of the mountains, far from the Doctor's reach, you and Kazuma
quietly lived out the rest of your days...

♪♪Hero's End♪♪

And there you have it, the end of Cave Story! I want to thank you all for coming along with me
on this journey. We might not have stopped the Doctor or saved the Mimigas, but come on, that
would have been really hard. And you know what they say: any ending you can walk away from,
am I right?

Of course I'm right! Huzzah!

GOOD JOB ON THIS LP THAT IS NOW DEFINITELY 100% DONE AND WILL NEVER BE UPDATED AGAIN.

A Winner is You

Great LP, thanks MCBanjoMike

I had honestly completely forgotten about the bad ending.

10/10, would read an LP of this game again.

Aaah ha ha ha, you guys fell for it! You really though the LP was over! You should have seen the looks
on your faces when I said it was finished and you all totally believed me. Man, I am such a card.

Chapter 8: The Outer Wall

♪♪Pulse♪♪

But of course your good buddy Mike isn't gonna leave you hanging. I just wanted to show you Cave
Story's super secret ending that nobody knows about. Such wonders we are uncovering together!

Anyway, we've got a Doctor to stop and a world to save, so we reject Kazuma's offer.



I don't see how crashing the island to the ground will restore the Mimigas to their "natural state"
unless you think their natural state is "dead". But it's still probably better than an all-out war
with the surface, so let's give it a try.

With those inspiring words, Kazuma heads outside. We follow him out again.

♪♪Moonsong♪♪

I understand Kazuma's concern, but this ain't Prince of Persia - we can take as loooong as we want.



Same to you, buddy.



And we're off! The Outer Wall is an extended section of vertical platforming set to a lovely backdrop.
Note that the island appears to be moving to the right at a pretty decent clip, so item drops don't
fall down, but rather to the left, where they'll bounce against the walls. It's also possible to jump
off the screen and die (either at the bottom or to the far right), so don't do that. It will net you a
special death message, though! It says something like "You were never seen again", but I forgot
to screencap it.



The outside of the island has all these isolated blocks that appear to be chained to it with barbed
wire. I'd complain about how weird it is that they stick straight out without sagging, but I think
we're already well past the point of credible physics, what with the whole "floating island" thing.



A little farther up, we come across the enemies of the Wall. The little orange guys hop along the
wall, sticking to it much like the powerups they drop. They can be a little hard to avoid just
because it's tough for my brain to deal with enemies that obey a different gravitational orientation
than I do.



The white cat ghosts are just super adorable, except that their attacks look like...well, you know
what they look like. I keep expecting one of them to swim into the moon there.



I don't know what hit me right before I took this shot, but it really hurt. Say, what's that length
of rope railing doing by the wall there?



Interacting with it brings us to a hidden room. Hey look, treasure!



Ah, phooey.



We keep heading up, making good use of our Booster (and occasionally Machine Gun). It's tricky,
though certainly not impossible, to fly all the way up the wall by shooting. But chances are you'll
run into a cat or its reproductive cells or something and lose the ability before long, so I usually
play it safe. Also, I just really like this part of the game and don't want to skip it, you know?

~AAAAAAH SANDCROC!!~

What in the gosh darn heck is this guy doing here??



In flagrant violation of the rules of Sand Croccery, there are no skulls here to indicate the danger
to our hero. There should be bones! Unless...



Nah, it can't be. Anyway, step lightly as you make your way up here. That or...



See you never, sand losers!



<immediately gets hit> Oh crud.



In the end, we make our way past the sandy horrors using nothing but our trusty Booster.



The cat ghosts have a lot of HP and tend to stay far from the wall, so it's often expedient to
whip out the missile launcher and feed them a volley.



I like this jump, it's just a little trickier than it looks. You can't actually make it across that little
gap by jumping, and it's easy to get tripped up and end up falling. The simplest thing to do is
to walk off and fall down onto the block below, then jump to the other side.



Almost there...



...and this is the top! Let's go back inside, all this open sky is giving me vertigo.

♪♪Gestation ♪♪

Stepping into the Storehouse, we scare the dickens out of a poor Mimiga.



He runs off to cower in the corner, but I'm feeling mean today, so I go torment him some more.



Yeah yeah, I've heard that one before. Actually, I guess we can add that to the list of things
that the Demon Crown can do:

• Control Misery and Balrog
• Float
• Ominous music
• Turn people into rabbits

Truly, a fearsome power to behold.



I was going to make a joke about how he isn't wearing any pants, but in fact he seems to have
some sort of labcoat on. I never noticed in the past, what with it being the same color as the
rest of him.

WHAAAAT. It was Misery?? Now I have to update my list again!

Evil Crown Powers:

• Control Misery and Balrog
• Float
• Ominous music
• Turn people into rabbits

Grumble grumble...

Nice job working the gratuitous humblebrag in between all the complaining, guy. I bet you're
tons of fun at parties.



Too true. We out! Let's ditch this guy and see what's behind door number 2.



Whoa, hey look at this place! It's so big that it just might require its own update! Join us next
time as we explore the boundless wilds of the Plantation. Huzzah!

Those are balls of white yarn, thrown by a ghost cat. Of course they are. What else could they be?

For those of you who haven't been clicking the music, I highly suggest Moonsong. I made it my ringtone once!

I mean.

Crown -> Misery -> Rabbit transmogrification

I'd say it's fair to assign the power to the Crown.

Moonsong and Scorching Back are my alarm tones. Amazing songs.

BALLS OF YARN.

THEY LOOK LIKE BALLS OF YARN.

BECAUSE CATS.

Chapter 9: Plantation

♪♪Cave Story♪♪

What's that sound? Could it be...the theme song?? Yes, stepping into the Plantation, players are
finally treated to the main theme of Cave Story, which they will be familiar with from the title
screen. It is a very iconic piece of music, although if we're being honest, it isn't one of my
favorites on the soundtrack. It's still pretty good, though, and since it's one of the longer pieces,
it gets a chance to develop in a way that most of the songs don't. The solo section before the
song repeats is definitely my favorite part.

Anyway, this it the Plantation. It's a big area, so let's look around some.



The first enemy you'll see here is this big swarm of bats. Mama bat doesn't really do much aside
from fly from side-to-side, but the baby bats will swoop down to attack you if you pass underneath.
They aren't especially dangerous, though.



The Plantation basically consists of three fairly wide floors. Let's head down to the lowest of them
first.



Down here, we find a Cthulhu chilling in a little room. Aside from this bit of exposition, he doesn't
have anything to offer us. Let's go left!





I've mentioned this before, but you can actually stand on quite a number of enemies in Cave
Story without taking damage - though often you risk falling off and getting hit when they move.
Standing on these guys is actually pretty easy! They don't move at all, so the only real risk is that
you'll get hit by the water that they spray.



If you fall into the water, you might notice the pipe on the left. Go inside and you'll be transported...



...back to this pipe on the right. Totally useless, but kind of fun?



At the far left, we find a locked door. If I've learned anything from my cat, it's that I NEED TO BE
ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THAT DOOR



The last thing of note down here is this mysterious shiny thing, glimmering from inside the INSTANT
DEATH SPIKES. We'll leave it alone for now.



Let's go check out the middle level. Up, up and away!



Hey, there's a door in that floor!



Navigating to the hidden door is pretty easy, but that doesn't mean we're getting inside. Nertz.



Continuing to the left, we find some Mimigas working the soil, guarded by these big monster guys.



The big guys won't move or attack you unless you shoot them, at which point they'll start jumping
around and throwing what appears to be their own arms(?) at you (you can see one on the right).
They have a lot of HP and are somewhat dangerous, so often the best idea is to just jump over
them without provoking them.



None of the Mimigas in the field have anything to say to us. What's with the silent treatment?



There are sprinklers scattered around the Plantation that shoot water everywhere. I don't personally
find them frightening, per se, but then I am pretty tough.



The little green guys that look like peas run around erratically, which makes them annoying, but
not very dangerous. I clear one out here before investigating this door.

♪♪Safety♪♪

Inside, we find a bunch of Mimigas taking it easy. Hey, I know that guy with the fishing pole!





With that, he heads out.



None of the other rabbits here will talk to me. The one on the left seems to have stack of sprinklers
for some reason, though.

♪♪Cave Story♪♪

But dude, I'm not a human! Loophole!

...No? Fine.



That does it for the middle level, so let's go up to the top. There's a door over there that we'll
check out in a minute, but there are a couple of dragonflies up there that I want to see first.



AAAAAAH TOO MANY DRAGONFLIES!!

We deal with the swarm of dragonflies and go see what they were guarding. It's a life capsule!



Back to 4 HP - I've gotta say, the numbers for these things seem extremely arbitrary.

Now we can go see what's inside door number 2.

♪♪Gestation ♪♪

Appropriately, it's Jail No. 2! We haven't found Jail No. 1 yet, but it's a little discouraging
to think that they needed to have more than one.



The inmates clearly have no compunctions about talking to humans. Or, in the case of this one,
maybe he's just perceptive enough to realize that I'm a robot? Either way, he talks pretty tough.
Incarcerated Mimigas ain't got no hecks to give.

The next bunny over just says "Lemme out!".



Man, what a turn of phrase. As someone who works with doctors regularly, I might just have to
start using this one.

We head over to the left cage to talk with the other prisoners.



Is that so? Too bad I haven't seen any secret hideout-WAIT A MINUTE



On the left we have another extremely-obvious secret passage leading to a teleporter.



Damn right I do, I'm a risk taker!



Hey look, it's that room where Kazuma was stuck at the beginning of the game! Back in Grasstown!
That's neat, but there's nothing useful for us to do here right now, so we head back.

♪♪Cave Story♪♪

There's another cloud of bats over here. Just thought you'd like to know.



Here's another of those big fellas guarding a door. Must be something good inside, right?

♪♪Gestation ♪♪

Whoa, it's Sue! And Jack! And...that guy who eats a lot and doesn't care about people!
We can't get through these bars, but there is another way...



If you go back outside and fly up, you'll find another way in.



This almost looks like some kind of secret passage. I love secret passages!



Fat lot of good it does us, though. The way into the cell is blocked, so I guess we won't be
busting anybunny out today.

♪♪Cave Story♪♪

The only thing left to see in the Plantation is this delightful spot. At the very top, we find a
bunch of warning signs and what seem to be sideways thwomps. Couldn't hurt to fly up there
and get a closer look, could it?





Ha ha of course it could.

So we've been everywhere in the Plantation and we don't have a lot to show for it yet. But!
Without realizing it, we've already put things into motion. Because way down on the bottom-left
of the screen is...



...our buddy the fishing Mimiga. And he's got something for us!





A key fished out by a certain Mimiga.

Nice! If you somehow hadn't guessed what you need to do with this key, talking to our fishy friend
will give you a pretty clear hint:

Well, OK, that last part isn't much of a hint.



*kssh* I'm in *kssh*



Inside the teleporter room we see - oh no!



Kill it!



Kiiiiiiiiillllll iiiiiiiiiit!!!

Oh, uh, looks like you can't shoot this guy. In fact, you can even talk to him! Not that he has
a lot to say.



Well then, let's just stroll over to the teleporter, since this guy's apparently harmless.

~WRONG~

Oh dear! The big golem thing, apparently concerned with the safety of the Mimiga farmers, jumps
on top of us. The screen fades out...

♪♪Gestation ♪♪

Man, I'm just starting to realize how frequently Gestation gets used on this soundtrack. It's number 1 with a bullet!



C'mon!
You're not dead, are you?
.....



Well this is a fine how-do-you-do. Not only are we in jail, but Sue and Jack are nowhere in sight!



And even worse, we're stuck with the eating guy!



Crazy old Sue, you might she cares too much.

That would explain why my face is so sore. All that "caring". Talking to our gourmand friend again
gives us this:



Look at that, it's a letter from Sue! Let's see what it says:



Fun fact! Litagano Motscoud is actually a messed-up transliteration of Doukutsu Monogatari (the
game's original name in Japanese) spelled backwards! Normally, Do-u-ku-tsu Mo-no-ga-ta-ri
would turn into ri-ta-ga-no mo-tsu-ku-u-do when the syllables are reversed, but the translator
at Aeon Genesis didn't realize that this jumble of symbols was related to the game's title and so
they changed the "ri" into a "li". And voila!, Litagano Motscoud. This is one area where the Nicalis
translation has AG beat, since they simply went with yrotS evaC. Mind you, there is a certain
elegance in AG's nonsense phrase.



Oh, shove off.



Talking to Muncho a second time didn't just alert us to the presence of the letter, it's actually
the trigger that makes this block disappear, allowing for us to escape the prison. Huzzah!

♪♪Cave Story♪♪

We say the magic words and the door opens for us.

♪♪Safety♪♪

Welcome to the Hideout! Who's that lady down there? Let's find out!





That's an understatement.

You gotta respect Momorin's can-do attitude. She isn't going to let one little island-tossing
get her down!



Momorin grabs the booster, leaving us sadly earthbound. If you don't count our magical flying
Machine Gun, that is.



You can say "Yes" here, but it doesn't lead to anything interesting. Of course I'm not too busy
for you, Momo.





A Mimiga mask Sue's mother made. It's a bit big...



I mean, no-one's going to fault you because your bespoke Mimiga mask doesn't quite fit a robot
that you've never met. But hang on a second, when did Momorin hear about us in the first place?
When we last heard Sue talk about her mother, she wasn't sure where she was. Then in her letter,
she knows about Momo's secret Plantation hideout, complete with the password to get in. Did
Momorin sneak out at some point to visit Sue while she was in jail? Heck, I wouldn't put it past
her. Lady's got moxy.



We may have lost our jetpack, but our new look is killer. And I don't mean "killer robot", just
regular killer.

Now that we can talk with them, let's go see what the bunnies tending the fields have to say
about their situation.

♪♪Cave Story♪♪

Looks like ol' Doc has been using a little more honey on the bunnies, saving the creepy music and
threats for folks like King and us. These Mimigas have swallowed his stories hook, line and sinker,
but not all of them have (as we'll see in a second).

♪♪Safety♪♪

This younger Mimiga, for example, isn't buying it. Surprised he hasn't wound up in juvie...



To be fair, it has only been about 10 years since a bunch of robots showed up and really did kill
tons of Mimigas. So it's not hard to imagine how the Doctor could convince some of the Mimigas
to follow him under the pretense that it's for their own safety.

The old Mimiga's last comment is worth examining, but we'll do that on another day. Let's go talk
to the guy on the bed for now.



Aww, poor widdow bunny is all tuckered out.



Cool, cool. So...could you hook a brother up? No? Dang.

♪♪Cave Story♪♪

I'm on break!



You only do two days: the day you get in and the day you get out.

If you talk to our seasoned felon again, however, his tough facade cracks a bit:

Depends, how relaxing do you find it when you turn into a giant monster and shoot energy beams
at robots? Though admittedly, that does sound pretty relaxing.





Sprinkler get! Good thing that other guy was feeling lazy. Before we take that back to Momorin,
though, I want to try talking to the other Mimigas.

♪♪Gestation ♪♪

The prisoners react the same to you whether you have the mask or not. I supposed that makes
sense, since they're in jail for rebelling against the Doctor and his stupid Doctor rules.



Sadly, you can't go visit Chewsbury with the mask on, as our secret passage has sealed itself
back up. Note that you can't even get here with the mask on unless you have the Machine Gun at
level 3, so I guess it's not surprising that nothing special happens (but I'm still a little bummed).

♪♪Safety♪♪

Momo isn't having it with this busted-ass sprinkler. Hold up while I go talk to Shades.



Handed over the *Broken Sprinkler*.



It's brand-new. ...Perhaps.

Do you think the Doctor went to Home Depot to buy like 40 sprinklers before coming to the island?
"What's all this gear you're loading onto the helicopter?" "Oh, you know, Doctor stuff. Cotton balls,
band aids, those little triangle hammers."





I'd say you're right! Let's go pay him a visit.

♪♪Gestation ♪♪

And strong in the force, yes.





We hoof it back to the secret hideout.

♪♪Safety♪♪

Has Itoh been bragging about this controller for a while now? Like, does he bring it up at lunch
every day? Sounds like working with this guy would suck.

Anyway, we head down to the bed below to get some shuteye.





All is quiet in the hideout when we wake up. I made a backup of my save here, for reasons that I will

reveal...eventually.

♪♪Cave Story♪♪

The gang's all here! Looks like Itoh finally found the inner strength to leave that storage shed.



Guess who's back? Back again? Itoh's back. Please oh god don't tell the Doctor



Before talking to Momo again, I take a minute to explore the Plantation. Everything has gone quiet,
there isn't a single Mimiga to be found anywhere...

♪♪Safety♪♪

...except for this one.

Don't worry, guy, we'll get him back! Or, uh, crash the island into the ground and pulverize him
and you and everyone on Earth for like a 2km radius. Definitely one of those, anyway.



Even the jail is empty. What could that dastardly Doctor be up to?

Only one way to find out. Let's go test out that rocket!

♪♪Cave Story♪♪

Before we do that, I make a point of re-equipping the Booster. Forgetting to do this can lead to
a nasty surprise the first time you try to use it.



Ok, let's fire this puppy up!

~FWOOOSH~

The rocket starts to climb, but as we ascend we see something worth hopping off for.



It's a pupper! You know I can't resist a good pupper.





It's our final life capsule! This one brings us up to an even 50 HP. It'll have to do, because we
won't be getting any more. I've read that this dog will also bring you a replacement Life Pot if
you've used yours previously, but that's not something that's every happened to me. All the
really hard bosses are still to come...



Oof, thanks for that parting gut-punch. Way to bring down the mood, guy.



Just as things start to get awkward, the rocket falls back down. Looks like it's ready for another
trip!

~FWOOOSH AGAIN~

Up we go! Time to brave the long hallway of horizonti-thwomps.





Not only is this pretty cool, it's also dangerous! If you're standing on the edge of the rocket, part
of you can touch a thwomp and you'll get exploded. Note that the rocket doesn't shoot past the
thwomps, exactly - the thwomps land on either side of it, but it soldiers on undeterred. It must
be made of some pretty strong stuff!



Our reward for making it to the top is this door, which takes us to...



...the Final Cave! That's right, there are no other caves in the game beyond this point. Kinda makes
you wonder what's in store for us on the other side, huh? Join us next time to find out, when Let's
Play Cave Story returns. Huzzah!

You can always tell things are getting real when you get to a new area and the background music is the game's main theme.