Saturday, June 16, 2012

TEXT PLAY SIDE GAME: Final Fantasy (NES 1990/PS 2003 [Origins]): Issue #4: A Pain In The Astos


This one was a while in coming, but it's worth the wait.

Once we beat Bikke the Pirate and take his ship, we're on our way to a place called Elfheim. En route, we run into exactly the kind of sea creatures you'd expect to fight in a game like this. Eyeball monsters, sea hags, privateers, that sort of thing.

In the town of Elfheim, everybody's all up in arms because Astos, king of the dark elves, has put a curse on the ruling prince and horked the crown. Astos is hiding out in the Western Keep. Tool up as best as possible, with new armor and lots of antidotes and potions, and then go check out the castle. The prince, as everybody's told you, is in a bad way. The only thing that can cure him is a magic herb held by Matoya, who had the bad eyes and needed her crystal to see.

Once that's taken care of, the way I usually go after Astos and the Marsh Cave is to go to the Western Keep first so that I can build up gold and levels and then go back to Elfheim to stock up on healing items and tents. We'll be needing those to get through the Marsh Cave. It's a pain in the ass to get through it, but a necessary thing.

After stocking up, it's off to the cave. The trip there is hard enough as it is because of all the monsters that can inflict the poison status, which is part of what makes this section especially so hard. And then there's actually getting into the cave. On top of all the poisonous monsters, there are undead monsters and the slime creatures that are notoriously hard in these early Final Fantasy games. One does not simply beat them to death with weapons, and sadly, magic is very limited, even on easy mode, as I'm playing here.

This runthrough of the Marsh Cave was easier than it has been in previous attempts. It could be that I've got a better feel for these dungeons that I've been through it a few times recently. Of course, I'm sure Apple's Let's Play for County Line Gaming has helped with that some, too. There's a lot of good treasure to be had in the Marsh Cave, and for now, I'm leaving a good two thirds or three quarters of it behind, simply because I don't have the levels or the resources to go for them right now. Plus, I'll want to come back and level grind a little bit once I get the class change taken care of. The items I did get here were a broadsword and some steel armor for my fighter and a cottage, which will restore full health and spell charges. That cottage will come in handy in a bit.

The crown we're looking for is in a well guarded chest. You'll know you've found the right room when you see a chest with walls around three sides. That fourth side has a group of Mindflayers that has to be fought before the chest can be opened. Beat them and the crown is yours. Take it out and head back to the Western Keep.

This is where the cottage came in handy. I needed my health and magic refilled before I went after Astos. Astos reveals his true form when you show up with the crown and says he's going to kill you because he can become the true king of the elves now that he's got the crown and Matoya's Crystal Eye both in his posession. It wasn't a particularly hard fight, as far as boss fights go. But Astos does have an instant-death attack called Reaper. When he used it, the game hung up on me for a minute, which makes me think I only made the problem worse when I tried to fix the disk. We'll see what happens when I get the Ice 3 spell later on, though. The worst part is that when the game started going again, the attack killed off my Monk, which made getting back to Elfheim a lot like the movie The Grey, only I did eventually make it to town. Along the way, my White Mage died, too, so when I got back, I had to revive both party members before saving at the Inn. I also got Copper Armlets for my mages and loaded up on Level 3 magic. For the white mage, I got Cure 2, Dia 2, and Heal 1. For the black mage, Fire 2, Bolt 2 and Bind.

But since we're a little more than halfway through the chapter now, this is a good place to stop for now. Next time, we'll be paying Matoya a second visit, getting the Mystic Key to open a bunch of stuff, and doing exactly that. See you next time, and hopefully also in Legend of Mana, folks.

Until then, have fun, stay safe, and keep gaming!

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