A friend of mine recommended the game to me when I told him that I would like to continue my acquaintance with the classic PSOne games, but did not know what to do. He proposed her, Alundra. Almost like “polundra” only instead of “po”, “a”. I think this will make it easier for you to remember the name. Here we take on the role of a young man named Alundra, who finds himself on a mysterious island, on which he was thrown by the waves onto a sandy shore after a shipwreck. People from Inoy, a village near the beach, helped him regain his strength and come to his senses. The boy was almost immediately sheltered by local gunsmith Jess, for whom he became the son he never had. Our hero is not an ordinary young man. He can travel through other people’s dreams. Alundra learns about her gift at the very moment when a deadly disaster comes to the inhabitants of the village of Inoya.

The demon god Melzas and his servants invade people’s dreams, turning them into nightmares from which they cannot wake up. Only Alundra, that is, you and me, can save the inhabitants of the village of Inoya. Thus begins a classic action-adventure game from the Playstation One era. Be patient if you want to see the ending of this story. You will need it..

Dream Warrior

From the first seconds of the game, you can see that Alundra is very similar to the series of games The Legend of Zelda. We play as a similar little guy, solve puzzles in dungeons, save the world from a big evil that has a name, and our hero, like Link, also has a princess. Only this one is less picky..

Remember girls: A real young lady will not disdain having a man jump on her head to solve a puzzle. A real young lady will say “you’re welcome” and will be proud that she has been useful. … It looks like this game couldn’t come out today ..

You could say that Alundra is a Zelda clone, but there are a few important differences. Firstly, the story is darker and a little more adult, touching on themes of people’s blind worship of religion, life and death, and even drunkenness in the family. Secondly, this is the main mechanics of the game – journey through nightmares villagers. Each nightmare that the main character enters is a unique dungeon with puzzles, mazes and a boss at the end, directly related to the personality and characteristics of the dreamer. The most amazing thing about these mechanics is that each of them has something new that you have not seen before in the game and an unexpected plot twist at the climax of the nightmare.

Don’t forget that Alundra ended Gamblingsitesnotongamstop.co.uk up on a mysterious island full of secret passages and places unknown to anyone, which means we need to study it thoroughly. Some places on the map cannot be reached without a certain item, others are skillfully hidden. The game world is expansive and rich in a variety of locations and enemies, making it a pleasure to explore.

I already told you what complexity is, but?

Alundra is not only an action adventure, but also a role-playing game. As the player progresses, he will gain new abilities, acquire useful equipment, increase the number of his life points and find more and more powerful weapons to fight with enemies. At the same time, the difficulty of the game will increase. At some point, Alundra’s difficulty will rise so high that you’ll start to seriously worry about breaking the buttons on your controller.

We’ve all played hardcore games. They are still coming out now and are even seriously becoming very popular. So, it would seem that complexity can’t scare anyone these days. But Alundra is a classic hardcore game and you might have forgotten what it really means or not know it at all. After completing Alundra, any modern, quote-unquote “complicated” game seems casual, laughable.

When I wrote that you’ll need patience to beat this game, I wasn’t exaggerating at all. Despite the fact that, in general, the passage takes no more than thirty hours, it took me seventy. These additional forty hours were spent by me on countless attempts to pass this or that point in the game.

The puzzles here force you to think outside the box. They are very unusual, different and creative, but very easy to get confused about. I often remembered the riddle with piano from Silent Hill, playing Alundra. This association arose for me because Alundra not only has really smart and difficult puzzles, but also very fun in the process of solving them.

Another element of the game, Platforming, requires pixel precision, and sometimes so that you can meet very strict precise timing. Jumping segments are extremely difficult. Sometimes you need to jump in a certain order, which you can only find out through trial and error. Sometimes for a period of time that lasts for a few seconds. If you hesitate and don’t have time, start all over again.

The opponents look very menacing, so much so that you don’t want to approach them.

The devil is not as scary as he is painted?

Alundra’s gameplay is extremely well balanced and fair to the player. Don’t be afraid, you won’t be thrown into the deep end right away. Some moments in the game will seem difficult only at first glance. Boss battles that take quite a lot of hit points with their attacks can be intimidating at first. But then it turns out that one of them in the arena where you are fighting with him has a “dead zone” where he cannot reach you, but you can easily. Another main villain is quickly killed by a certain type of weapon and you can find ways to evade his attacks or even extinguish them. And everything would be fine, but there is a “BUT”..

When I completed Alundra, I looked for Takeshi Kitano’s name in the credits. Because the endgame is hell. This is a hardcore gaming nightmare come true. Not only because of the sometimes annoying complexity of the puzzles and especially the platforming, but also the final boss, which turns out to be several at once with no way to save between them. And now they are really heavy and will not give you a break, especially the last one. After defeating them I can confidently say: “Have not played Alundra – casual”. You can quote me.

An adventure worth experiencing

The game is very well drawn in 2D style with a bright visual aesthetic, although in terms of the number of colors it looks more like a game from the SNES or SEGA platforms than a PSOne. The music fits well with the mood of the moment: you go on a journey to a solemn melody, and in a risky battle with enemies, menacing drums and a trumpet enter under the sonorous blows of a hammer on the keys of a xylophone.

The dungeons, terrain locations on the island and in the rooms are done superbly, but some elements of the gameplay in the game are repeated. For example, I would like to see unique ordinary opponents in the dreams of villagers, and not just those we meet in the open world of the game.

The main thing I cannot disagree with is that Alundra truly is amazing PSOne classics. A wonderfully enjoyable adventure game that has a dark tone and fun humor. Despite its similarity to games in The Legend of Zelda series, players remember it by its own name. That says a lot.

Lost Ruins is a game where a schoolgirl with an anime appearance can put on a maid costume to more actively wield a broom, women’s panties drop from enemies, bosses need to be hit on the chest to deal damage, and zombies give a quest to find a dakimakura. Usually fan service alone is not enough for a good game, however LR is also a very exciting metroidvania.

And it also has its own lustful Argonian maiden.

The anime world won, the merch turned out to be stronger..

Sometimes the backgrounds are really disappointing, they are so flat and static. It’s always more interesting to look at what’s right in front of the heroine.

"I won’t die in the toilet!»

In general, the game is able to reward the player with pictures that are pleasing to the eye. Not Owlboy, of course, but I can’t even call the graphics completely primitive and mediocre.

The developers placed the main emphasis on effects and animations. Enemy blood spectacularly floods the floor, it’s easy to get splashed at waterfalls, lightning flashes when it rains, and the screen becomes wet, all the friendly heroes dance like Rottytops in a series of games Shantae. It’s a pity that the sewage waters, into which we often have to plunge, react poorly to the heroine. Remember Touhou Luna Nights, where any liquid, when interacting with Sakuya, instantly lost calm, becoming covered in bubbling waves – this is WATER. However, even without this, the work done in the studio’s first game is impressive.

In a winter location you can see falling snowflakes, and when rolling, the snow will fly into the air right from under your feet.

When it rains, the screen becomes covered with drops, and the heroine gets wet. What’s interesting is that if you go under the roof of the building here, these effects will disappear, and the sound of the rain will disappear, the player will hear only muffled rumbles of thunder.

In this location, the animated sky resembles its counterpart in Royal Chapel from Castlevania: Symphony of the Night.

At the top of the tower you can always see twinkling little stars.

In some places there are even dynamic shadows that react to the light emitted by the heroine.

For comparison.

The developers also did a good job when they were doing sound design, although not perfectly. I love it when the game sounds, thanks to which I can believe what is happening on the screen. The heroine stomps almost everywhere in the same way, but different surfaces usually have different sounds; I definitely won’t confuse the creaking of wood and snow in Lost Ruins. When she swings her sword, she makes different sighs, the sounds of blows are always different depending on whether you broke a lamp or a floor candelabra, cut an orc, or break a living skeleton. Magic balls explode loudly when they reach their target. As for me, there is also a lack of additional work with water: when we find ourselves in it, there is a noisy “plop", but movement is almost imperceptible to hearing.

As mentioned above, the dialogues here are presented in the form of windows from visual novels with sprites of the speakers. Why the characters in the game even know about such things as NRIs is explained as the story progresses.

If you don’t like this https://gamebookerscasinoonline.co.uk/ kind of thing, then it’s better to play something more serious.

Of course, they won’t amuse you all the time, for this you need to get to the right characters. The research here is presented in a trivial way: we move forward, jump on platforms, sometimes choose the path we need from several available ones, while locked doors, behind which you can find unique loot, are opened with the help of magic, a found key, or after solving a puzzle, as well as if you come to them from the other side. It is worth clarifying that the usual acquisition of new abilities, as in most Metroidvanias, is not here, instead we are looking for new equipment, weapons and magic that allows us to move further, open closed gates, activate bridges and get into secret areas. There are very few hidden places, occasionally you can see a gap in the wall where you can crawl through, or a bridge from which you can jump, after which you will find yourself in an unfamiliar cave. Probably, today for some developers secret walls are bad manners, but I really missed them. Along the way there will be traps like swinging blades, statues that shoot fire arrows, machines that produce an electric barrier, etc., which can easily throw the player back to the last save. They are manual here, which is what computers from the Paleozoic era are for, next to them you can usually find a vending machine, each selling different items, and a portal. Sometimes you will come across statues that grant autosave, but keep in mind that they will not be allowed to be used again any time soon. If I understand correctly, you need to make at least a couple of such saves in other places, then you can use the old one again. The characters you meet in such places may be traders with unique equipment, as well as quest givers. It is unreasonable to skip tasks, because for their completion Heroine gifted with keys and useful weapons. Surprisingly, you can even fail some of them.

I don’t recommend skipping this knight’s quest if you want to complete the game to all endings. True, she will ask you not to open chests with useful items until the next meeting… The developers cruelly mocked those who like to loot everything in sight on their way. Oh yeah, guess who ruined the quest by saving after opening the chest? I had to start the game again.

Probably the funniest quest is related to this goblin. Long life to him.

It’s clear that you can’t do without battles in a game like this. At first I wasn’t particularly interested Lost Ruins, after all, many write in comments or reviews that she is a soulslice, and I’m not the biggest fan of this genre. Seriously, many reviews, especially negative ones, mention games FromSoftware. Well, so what?? The game is difficult, there are rolls, the character is slow – a clone Dark Souls, it turns out. However, in Lost Ruins there is no pumping with a ton of characteristics that still need to be figured out, which ones are responsible for what; no loss of souls or other currency after death; there is no build that you stick to throughout the entire playthrough; no stamina and long cooldown after a roll; there are no trillion ambushes with dishonest opponents; there are no enemies with hundreds of unreadable attacks for which you need to memorize timings; there is no active pause and other pleasant and not so pleasant elements of soul games.

All the developers went crazy as soon as they discovered how popular Fromov’s games were. Do you want a driving slasher a la Devil May Cry or Ninja Gaiden? No, keep the next one Dark Souls. Looking for a new Metroidvania to play?? Get ready that half of what you see will be with the note “souls-like». I recently took it for myself The Last Faith, which looks gothic and brutal Castlevania, and if at first everything was good, and I was ready to put up with the soul elements even before the purchase, then the game began to tire me: slow rolls with a long recovery time make me angry during battles with bosses and fat opponents; For some reason, healers are not restored at the fire, and enemies drop less and less of them as locations are explored; when a burning or electricity effect is applied to the hero, the lack of a normal pause is only annoying, and if the necessary items are in the active slot, then they still need to be found among the others, and the hardest thing is to remember in a couple of seconds which medicines are responsible for what. And my whip does such negligible damage to the skeletal dragon boss in the dungeons that it’s a shame to show it even to my relatives. Well, let’s go grind and level up. No, it’s clear that I’m a noob, but the game is great, I won’t argue. GiT GuD, as they say. But I don’t like these gameplay features.

And how glad I am that Lost Ruins hurts differently. The combat system is based on inflicting long-term negative statuses on the enemy. Each enemy has its own strengths and weaknesses, anyone can be wetted and struck by lightning, set on fire or first doused with oil for a better effect, poisoned, frozen, forced to spit blood non-stop. We must not forget about the surroundings: there is an electrical trap ahead? Stand right in front of her to instantly deal with the nimble slime attacking you. A jug of oil hangs above the zombie? Break it and then set fire to the spilled liquid on the floor. All this applies to Heroine. When colliding with any enemy or falling into a trap, you can die almost instantly if you are poorly prepared, so you always need to have the necessary consumables on hand, there are a lot of them hidden in locations, but they must first be discovered, and usually there are not enough items if you constantly miss enemy attacks.

From the very beginning, the developers warn that the game has a survival element. And, indeed, you have to constantly look for new items, adapt to the situation and use any means at hand to finish the battle with fewer losses. Thank Markus Persson, no crafting.

Spilled poison gets in the way?

So set it on fire!

The ideal way to deal with enemies is to freeze or electrify water.

Sometimes enemies can blind your alter ego. This is probably how people imagine console games when they say that they are nothing but soap.

Of course, you need to fight enemies somehow, not just throw cans of oil at them. To do this, the game has a rather large arsenal of bladed weapons: various types of short and long swords, daggers and two-handed weapons. Each sword has its own radius of destruction, as well as damage and a passive bonus such as increased damage to orcs or the ability to set the enemy on fire. The more powerful the weapon, the lower its speed, so it is better to remember the distance at which you can reach the enemy. However, usually the speed of some heavy ax is enough to destroy fast demon assassins in a few hits without taking damage, especially since you don’t need to worry about stamina, the same applies to rolls, which are restored instantly. What really needs to be taken into account is the type of animation of the weapon used: with a two-handed sword the heroine swings, causing damage to those who are a meter away from her, and with a dagger she makes piercing attacks directly in front of her. This is very important, because if a small spider comes close to you, then you can’t hit it with a long zweihander. Also, for those who like to play rangers, there are bows and throwing weapons, and for magicians there are many runes with homing arrows, stealing health, summoning electric spheres for protection, ice explosions, etc. – use it for your pleasure, as long as you have enough mana. The main thing is that the pause here is just that: a pause, so at any moment you can retrain from a fighter to an archer or drink a potion to resist burns.

Difficult to approach the enemy? Shoot with a bow!

The shield is your best friend. It can even be used with two-handed weapons.

Almost every weapon is useful, if not until the end of the game, then at least in certain locations.

The heroine has few active items: two slots for weapons, two for magic and from one to three for equipment, depending on progress in the game. Equipment should always be changed according to the situation. There are constantly not enough slots, and you need to choose whether to put on a swimsuit to quickly overcome the water section, or equip armor to increase protection from bleeding, because there is a spearman on the way, which causes the corresponding effect Heroine. Some things can not only be found, but also bought from sellers or in vending machines, but the prices are such that it is better to spend money on a couple of inexpensive consumables, anyway, these are the only things you have enough money for. Over time, you will come across imbued equipment, which allows you, for example, to heal one at a time HP after striking or gradually restore mana without consumables. I would say that this spoils the balance, but even so you can die with a couple of missed attacks, and sometimes it is more profitable to equip yourself with a less powerful thing, but it will definitely protect you from specific opponents. Often a suitable item is not available, which is especially critical in boss fights; in such cases, it is better to strengthen yourself and rely only on your skill, or maybe you will discover a weakness in the enemy and develop tactics against him with existing equipment.

The bosses here are varied, each has two or even three phases, while they change not only the moveset, but also their appearance: an aggressive schoolgirl with a katana turns into a large flying demoness and summons levitating swords, a huge ice queen causing a storm, on the contrary, becomes your height, but now creates her own doubles, etc.d. They are never limited to applying Heroine one negative status, so you always need to prepare before traversing again. With the right equipment and knowledge of the enemy’s weaknesses, battles go quickly, the main thing is to change equipment in time and use consumables if you could not avoid damage and your health quickly decreases.

Initially I passed Lost Ruins on medium difficulty, but to get the true ending you need to play on hard. And, you know, the developers did everything right: they motivated players to complete the game on “Veteran”, where it is fully revealed. Yes, enemies hit harder and absorb more damage, but you already know their weaknesses and remember about rooms with useful loot. In addition, it was on “Veteran” that I began to use almost all the weapons and equipment, and began to beat bosses using cunning rather than stupidly inflicting as much damage as possible. Now it wasn’t me who was locked up with them – it was them who were locked up with me. I don’t recommend starting the game on high difficulty, but when you play through it again you get the same wonderful sensations as when starting the same Dark Souls on NG+. True, the ending, as usual, was disappointing. New art. Thank you…

At the very beginning, you can find one interesting item… Well, at least the developers are not hiding what exactly has changed on the new difficulty.

After completing the game, several new modes open up: killer mode, in which you will have to use only daggers from edged weapons, witch mode, designed specifically for players who love to play mages, and, most interestingly,, boss mode. The player will control three characters locked in one body after a battle with Heroine, namely we will play for Kanu, bloodthirsty girl with a katana, Yuri, an anime-obsessed magician and a silent archer June. We will replay the game and fight old bosses. This mode differs from the main one in that the heroines already have a ready-made motion set with weapons, and they constantly need to be juggled in order to reach the finale. When we visit the place of the heroine’s death, she turns into a boss, and you’ll have to deal with her together, so I strongly recommend learning the techniques of all your charges in advance. For example, Yuri can sprinkle various oils and poisons on the road, which can be set on fire using a beam from her staff, and I don’t remember anyone talking about this, I discovered it by accident. At the end a new boss will be waiting for you. It’s a pity that no other new opponents appear throughout the entire playthrough.

You will replay the game as these beauties, always quarreling with each other.

The game menu has a separate Gallery mode, where you can see various sketches, arts and endings that open after completing the game.

Indeed, real art.

I think it’s time to take stock. I can highlight the following pros and cons of the game:

+ The game is moderately difficult so that it can be completed without broken gamepads, but you will have to work hard.

+ Good graphic effects for a 2D indie game.

+ Fanservice. Although for some this may be a minus.

– Few changes in new modes.

– For a metroidvania, the map is cleared too easily. I want more secrets.

– Memorable boss themes.

I had some fun playing Lost Ruins, and this is a rare case when I immediately decided to go through the game again, several more times. Of the last similar exceptions, I remember only any parts Resident Evil, where the whole point is in replaying, Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, because I wanted to understand the local history, River City Girls 2, after all, you need to upgrade all the characters, and the same Shantae: Half-Genie Hero with its modes for other characters. The game is definitely included in the collection "Favorite games». Hope, Altari Games fate doesn’t wait Atari, and developers will continue to delight gamers with their games in the future.