Wednesday, October 11, 2017

Annotated Appendix: The Cave and Floating Catacombs

Close to the end, now. We're almost there!

Unlike this Appendix entry, I thought this episode would be a challenge to make, but it came out pretty quickly. EXCEPT when I did a test run of the areas and saved the game without recording anything. Yes, boneheaded move, and yes, it happened before. I had a backup run at what I thought was the same spot, but found that I needed to bum rush a good chunk of the game to get back to the point of recording. So, if any of you detect something off about the weapon loadout, HP count, and conspicuously absent number of relics that briefly appear on the list, this is why. A little bit of sausage-making for you. I was even still equipped with the Spike Breaker armor, which you can clearly see when I fly through the specific room in the FC, much to my own surprise (and delight because I would have probably been killed).

Something I forgot to mention: Most Symphony players know this pretty well, but I neglected to point out that by skipping the Death scene and hanging on to the Alucard Shield, the game is shattered the moment you find the Shield Rod. I didn't mention it in the last video, and I didn't bring it up in this one. There. Mea culpa.

Ok, let's talk about the Galamoth fight for a bit. Someone called out in the comments that I did it in a "broken" manner by showing off the use of the Beryl Circlet, the teleport strikes, and the Alucard Shield/ Rod combo all in succession. I suppose that this is a fair point, but I don't think that there's a "right" way of handling this battle as Galamoth is a pretty hard boss and has a stupid amount of hit points. Sure, I suppose you can attack him little and then turn into Mist to avoid the lightning attacks, as was mentioned in the video, but we don't have time to do it that way with his HP count slowly whittling away. Honestly, I thought just going to town on him with the Beryl Circlet equipped would have been enough, but the clock was ticking so I threw in both other methods to get things over with instead of showing side videos of me just steamrolling him, which was the original plan. Incidentally, the first time I killed Galamoth 20 years ago was with teleport strikes and the Osafune Katana. I had the timing down to frames of animation, and in the right mode, could kill him without losing a single point of damage. But that was a long time ago. I never even heard of the Shield Rod combo until I was in my third year of college almost 3 years later, and didn't know about the hidden room with the Beryl Circlet until probably close to the same time. See? Without ubiquitous internet, we just had to fend for ourselves.

Of course, there are also videos floating around YouTube that prove that he can be hit stunned by getting to the ledge behind him and smacking him in the face. I have never tested this myself, but if I can get to it in the next few days, this might be thrown into the final video.

Here's something: Upon re-watching it, I'm also noticing that a speech impediment has formed when I speak quickly. It's weird because I'm a guy that used to basically talk for a living, and I do so relatively fast. I like getting in front of people and rambling, and had a pretty articulate delivery. As I've gotten a little older, though, I'm noticing that I'm starting to stumble with that delivery and mumble a little bit, and these videos have really confirmed this. Probably more than you wanted to know, but these Appendices are just as much for me as they are for you.

So one more to go. Just to temper your expectations now, the next episode should be on the shorter side from the where I'm sitting at the moment. I know that we're at the end, but obviously, there aren't any more new environments to deal with, so there's certainly less to show. That won't mean that it's only going to be the final boss fight and that's it, though, so please look forward to it.

Thanks again for watching.

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