Game Club 199X #22 - Aquaria (PC)

[zerker]

So I finished the Light Temple last night. To the left, I found a path that eventually leads to an optional Octopus boss. Has anyone had any luck with this guy? I couldn't seem to do any damage. Eventually I see some sort of thing stick out of his mouth, but it's there so briefly I haven't managed to even hit it once. I eventually gave up and swam away.

FYI, to elaborate on the "other option for jumping Jorpho mentioned; the Nature form's charged "attack" creates spiked plant pillars. You can use these as jumping platforms when you are out of water. This wouldn't work where I was having problems before, but it helps quite significantly if you are trying to get the secret at the top of the Light Temple.

[jorpho]

Aye, the Octopus is one of the nastiest bosses in the game (but not quite the worst!). I remember spamming healing items like crazy. I think you might need to hit it with light blasts when you're not shooting it?

If you didn't catch it before, I might as well spill the beans now: you can use the Roll maneuver to suck items towards you rather than manually swimming after each one of them.

[zerker]

I'll give him another shot later. I'm actually stuck again... on two fronts . I got partway through the Sunken City and got the Ghost kid to reach a door. However, I can't seem to get to the door open. There are six song symbols on the wall, but no combination seems to do anything.

So I took a break from that to explore and made my way to the Frozen Veil then the Bubble Cave. And ran into an optional crab monster. I figured out to use the Nature spike plants to get him off the ceiling, but can't figure out what to do next. He appears to have a weak underside, but energy shots don't appear to hit, beast form appears to be a wash, and I wasn't really able to do much by binding his fireballs and trying to drag them behind him.


But I did beat the Jelly monster boss. Anyone having trouble with this boss should use the Beast form. You can eat the little swarming enemies, then use the beast shot to damage the boss.

[jorpho]

Aug 21, 2013 18:46:48 GMT -5 zerker said:

I got partway through the Sunken City and got the Ghost kid to reach a door. However, I can't seem to get to the door open. There are six song symbols on the wall, but no combination seems to do anything.

There are notes being played in the background (possibly only in certain places) that you need to listen to and play back. (Think of Hard Mode in Loom, or the final melody puzzle in Super Mario RPG.) There will be a little symbol-flash when you play them correctly.

So I took a break from that to explore and made my way to the Frozen Veil then the Bubble Cave. And ran into an optional crab monster. I figured out to use the Nature spike plants to get him off the ceiling, but can't figure out what to do next. He appears to have a weak underside, but energy shots don't appear to hit, beast form appears to be a wash, and I wasn't really able to do much by binding his fireballs and trying to drag them behind him.

Memory fails me there, unfortunately – I only remember what searing agony it was to get to that boss at all. Hey, isn't anyone else playing this game..?

But I did beat the Jelly monster boss. Anyone having trouble with this boss should use the Beast form. You can eat the little swarming enemies, then use the beast shot to damage the boss.

Yup, that's the nasty one. I kept forgetting about shooting with Beast form.

[Joseph Joestar]

I've been dragging my feet in getting started with the game, but finally sat down and played for about an hour last night. Really pretty game. I have a question though - how complex are the later songs? Shield and Bind are easy to pull off with a control pad, but I use the pad to do the song to open the door to GET bind. It's not too bad to switch between mouse and pad, but it's kinda a bummer.

[Snarboo]

Most of the songs just require you to do a quarter circle motion from what I can tell.

[DPB]

Aug 21, 2013 18:46:48 GMT -5 zerker said:

So I took a break from that to explore and made my way to the Frozen Veil then the Bubble Cave. And ran into an optional crab monster. I figured out to use the Nature spike plants to get him off the ceiling, but can't figure out what to do next. He appears to have a weak underside, but energy shots don't appear to hit, beast form appears to be a wash, and I wasn't really able to do much by binding his fireballs and trying to drag them behind him.

I believe you're supposed to correctly time binding the fireballs, but there's a somewhat reckless method which is much easier. You need to time the spike plants so that he falls down when there's a fireball inside the bubble, then run headfirst into a fireball - the explosion will hurt both of you. Obviously you'll need a few healing items, but I found it a lot simpler than doing it properly, and you only need to hit him a few times.

Aug 23, 2013 13:47:17 GMT -5 Snarboo said:

Most of the songs just require you to do a quarter circle motion from what I can tell.

Yeah, there's nothing too difficult, though I would still keep a keyboard at hand for some of the optional bosses and the final boss. Many of them need you to quickly switch between forms, which you can do instantaneously with 1-8. There's a couple of Simon's says minigames (one is mandatory) which are rather awkward with a controller too.

[zerker]

Aug 23, 2013 14:33:20 GMT -5 DPB said:

I believe you're supposed to correctly time binding the fireballs, but there's a somewhat reckless method which is much easier. You need to time the spike plants so that he falls down when there's a fireball inside the bubble, then run headfirst into a fireball - the explosion will hurt both of you. Obviously you'll need a few healing items, but I found it a lot simpler than doing it properly, and you only need to hit him a few times.

Yes, I figured that out last night (the binding method anyhow). I just bound the fireball, quickly switched to nature form, and blasted him with it.

On the question of song patterns, I'd say Nature & Fish form are the worst. One is a "V" from opposite sides of the circle, and the other is a T. However, the game is somewhat forgiving with accidental "brushes" of adjacent song symbols when doing those two songs, so I haven't had that much trouble with them.


EDIT: Got through the door in the Sunken City that was causing me trouble. There is actually no guesswork involved, it's just a matter of interpreting the diagram on the wall. There are three symbols horizontally, then another column of three. What you need to do is sing the horizontal three symbols for EACH of the vertical ones.

I then proceeded to beat the boss. One hint for this boss: the floating woman appears to be only damaged by the beast shot. After hitting her, then you can wail on the giant.

And some other random hints that I haven't posted yet:

You can ride seahorses. Just "use" them (like saving), then sing in the direction you want them to go. I only found this out AFTER winning the Arnassi ruin speedrun the HARD way (Beast form + Hot Soup). In retrospect, that is clearly designed as a Seahorse race.

If you see clumps of leaves sticking out of the ground, you can use the Bind song to pull them up and get an item.


EDIT2: Beat the Octopus. Much easier than I thought. His weak point appears as soon as you get close to him. It's just a matter of getting close, blasting him, and retreating before he whacks you.

[Deleted]

Dagnabit, I STILL can't open the stupid door in the Sunken City. I sing the song that that lady hummed, and I see a symbol flash out of Naija, but it refuses to budge. What gives?!

[zerker]

The ghost kid needs to be there too. There are a couple minor puzzles to lead him back there. Nothing that should give you much trouble.

And I finished the game yesterday. Got the decent but incomplete ending because I missed some of Naija's memories. I remember finding in Mithalas, and another at the top of the Light Temple. What am I missing?

Similarly, I'm missing one pet: I have the piranha, the glowing dumbo elephant, and the first pet you get (spinning shell guy).

I think I'm also missing one health upgrade. I think the first one was somewhere in the Kelp Forest or Veil, and the second was in the bubble cave.

Any hints from anyone who has found what I missed? If I have some direction, I may go back and fill in the gaps



Here are some spoilery hints for anyone stuck near the end. It doesn't look like this forum has a spoiler tag that I can find, so I'm just making the text black

To free Li, you need to find four blue crystals throughout the Body. Once you have them, you will need to sing the first four notes of the main theme (same as the door song for the Sunken City).

Most forms of the final boss are obvious, except the last. Once you damage his eye, you need to use Light Form to damage it further and turn it black. You can then pull it out with Bind. This will free Li and let you use dual form. You need to blast his "stomach face" right before it fires a laser at you. This will release some minor enemies you can use to power up the Dual form super attack. Use this once charged to *actually* damage the boss.


Oh, and a minor hint for anyone using a gamepad: the final song is makes an arc of four notes with a gap between them. If you just sing all five notes in the arc quickly, the game will still think you did the song properly.

[jorpho]

The last stage was kind of a letdown and a poor way to end things, I thought – all dreary and brown and repetitive. Very unfortunate.

It doesn't look like this forum has a spoiler tag that I can find

It's the word "spoiler" in square brackets, like it is everywhere else..? (I guess it's not in the toolbar.)

Two of the things you mention are inside the whale, as I recall. If you're sufficiently diligent, you should find out how to get inside without too much trouble.

SPOILER: Click to show

You need a song hidden in one of the small dark caves – somewhere near the racetrack, I think.

I never did find a bunch of the recipes. There's one that upgrades your firepower to higher than anything else but poisons you at the same time, for instance. As near as I can tell, the only way to find them (without a walkthrough) is to just randomly fling things together, which is another highly unfortunate design decision, I think.

Be sure to check out what happens when you use the Soul form in the racetrack. It's a nice touch.

[zerker]

Weird. I tried that, but the "preview" mode didn't show anything, so I thought it wouldn't work. I guess I need to just "believe" and hit submit?

Anyways, thanks to your hint, I found the last memory and the health upgrade. I also explored a little bit and found another health upgrade, thus maxing out my health. For reference, it was on the same screen as the path to the Veil, in a sunken ship which you access via the Fish form.

And yes, the game tells you when you have all memories. I got to (re-)see the expanded ending with the whole "To be Continued..." thing. 5 years later and nothing even announced, I don't think that's going to happen for a while .

[Snarboo]

At the beginning of this thread, I made a promise to suggest indie games to you guys. For numerous reasons, that completely slipped my mind until now. So here is a short list of free games that I have enjoyed that you should probably play:

• FiNCK: Developed by Nifflas, FiNCK is platformer heavily inspired by the likes of Klonoa and SMB2, and is probably one of Nifflas' least popular games. This was in running for the original vote idea I had for this thread, but those plans eventually evolved into what the thread is now. The title is an acronym for "Fire Nuclear Crocodile Killer".
  
• Lyle in Cube Sector: This has already been featured as part of GC9X Game's Nite, but I can't stress enough how cool this game is. This was also in the original running for the vote, to be paired with FiNCK.
• An Untitled Story: An Untitled Story is a pretty lengthy metroidvania title with a paired down MS Paint aesthetic. It can be pretty difficult at times, but is a lot of fun as you get further in. Also worth checking out are the Runman and Jumper series by the same author. Click around the site to find it, as it doesn't seem to have its own page.
• Seiklus: A game I suspect is one of the catalysts for the modern indie gaming movement, Seiklus is a platforming adventure game where you cannot die. Your goal is simply to explore the massive world and collect all the orbs that are hidden around, as well as solve a few simple puzzles.
• Mighty Jill Off (Mildly NSFW): A homage to Mighty Bomb Jack, if it consisted entirely of the torture rooms and had BDSM overtones.
• Ripple Dot Zero: Ripple Dot Zero is hands down one of the best retro throwback games I've ever played. It simply NAILS the aesthetic and gameplay of mid-to-late era Genesis games. However, it does suffer from framerate issues, and it's pretty short overall.
• Black Shades: An unusual FPS game where you can slow down time and possess the bodies of innocent bystanders, all in the name of defending a VIP.
• A New Zero: A vehicle combat game that is entirely procedurally generated. Sadly no longer updated, and I doubt anyone plays the multiplayer either, but still interesting as a tech demo. The creator has a similar game in development called Sub Rosa that may be worth checking out.
• Maldita Castilla: An awesome love letter to Ghouls 'n' Ghosts and 80s arcade games in general. Locomalito are one of the few groups that seems to understand what made these games great while also nailing the aesthetic. Be sure to check out the rest of their catalog, as it's all great stuff!
• Hero Core: Yes, it's another metroidvania game, but an awesome one at that. Hero Core can best be described as Metroid II crossed with Cybernoid. Like most of the games listed here, the creator has quite a few other games you should check out, such as Iji and Hyper Princess Pitch.

If you're itching for even more games to play, take a look at the TIGSource Indie Game Database. While not exhaustive, it does feature some of the best indie games out there, as well as some not so good ones.

[zerker]

I second Hero Core!

Cave Story is the obvious elephant in the room, so you should certainly play it if you haven't.

I rather like the Knytt games by Nifflas, as well as Saira and Nightsky (the latter two are commercial)

And do NOT forget Nitronic Rush if you even remotely like driving cars (through evil death trap courses!)

Hydorah and Guxt are both great (but hard) shooters. The former is by Locomalto, while the latter is by Pixel. Note that Pixel's website is rather minimalistic; Guxt is the game released in 2007.

And then the higher-profile games that are certainly worth it:
VVVVVV
Rochard
Bastion
They Bleed Pixels
Offspring Fling!
Explodemon
Fez
Driftmoon

[xerxes]

Just a heads up. We are doing a podcast for this, but we haven't recorded yet because there's a possibility we'll be able to include one or both of Aquaria's creators on the show. They've expressed interest, but have been busy with PAX and such.

I'll let y'all know more as it develops. Thanks for your patience.