Next on my list of detours was Mount Fay. Once you have the Clawline, you can reach this icy area from the Slab. And I climbed the whole thing for my biggest achievement in the game so far. Spoilers for this whole area ahead. In addition, I visited the Sands of Karak and finally challenged an old advisory.
Now, when you can immediately find a bench at the beginning of a new area, then you know something is off. Though, in this case it's only provided temporarily by Shakra, but still... Mount Fay is quite reminiscent of Mount Hebra from Echoes of Wisdom, where you have to stay inside warm zones. Or else you will freeze to death, but it takes about 10 seconds before you rapidly lose your health.
There are even Weaver-installed lights to keep you warm. And a tablet the cave at the bottom tells you how climbing this mountain is a challenge that none of their kind was yet able to overcome... Sounds like fun. In fact, this sounded like some endgame challenge and certainly felt like it, where you have to perfectly align your Clawline shots on enemies, air-dash, float, climb, and even bounce off spikes to make it to the top. Now add some buzz saws and you make the White Palace proud.
And since the whole area is freezing, you're constantly on a timer, going from one warm light to the next, with little to no leeway between. Still, I gave it a try, but once I reached upper section I felt like the game wanted to troll me, because I was standing in front of an abyss that I could only cross with a double jump:
Well, eventually you can make the jump with the Clawline somehow, but I tried twice and fell down twice. And going all the way back up there for another attempt is purest frustration fuel... However, I noticed on my fall down that there is another pathway in the middle of this abyss. And you can proceed from there, into a long passage with ice water, which will instantly damage you, so better not miss a single shot with your Clawline.
This whole thing was essentially screaming, "Return here once you have the double jump! It will make this much easier. Don't push yourself so hard when not necessary!"
It's a mentality that I had before with a variety of other challenges, though I eventually bested them nevertheless. And there was also this other thought in my head that I couldn't shake: What if this leads to the double jump? While it makes you go in circles without one, you still can push through. And so I kept pushing...
As a motivator, you do find some benches on your way, but they are bit tricky. I arrived at the first one with only one mask left, only to find it blocked off. Luckily, I figured it out before losing my last hit point to the cold. But I froze to death after passing the next bench, which is hidden without any warning. This one is evil, because you have to backtrack a loooong way to return there. You have to climb up an entire ski slope and then go through multiple sections in another ice cavern, which brings you back to the icy abyss from before:
But once you've created the shortcut on the outside afterwards, you could just drop down here to the first "bench" at Shakra's place. That's what I did the second time, just to be "safe"...
Well, I do like how this area mirrors the other end of the map with the Deep Docks and Far Fields. It makes me wonder whether each direction on the map will represent a certain element. Earth with the Moss Grotto in the bottom left, ice with Mount Fay in the top left, probably water with the oceanic region in the top right, and finally fire with the Far Fields and Deep Docks in the bottom right. If these regions are arranged like the locks on the Grand Gate, there might be a fifth one representing air, above the Citadel. When you're reading this, you will probably know already, and I'm going to find out.
But clearly I had too much time to think when doing this climb, repeating the same jumps over and over again. The Weavers also tell you about a beast awaiting at the top, granting you a wish. And that you should know what to wish for. So, I kept thinking what I wanted to get out of this, after torturing myself for about an hour, which were really only things:
- A double jump
- Something to protect me from the freaking cold
Much to my surprise I received both in one item, the Down Cloak. It lets you perform another jump mid-air AND protects you from the cold with its downs. This is amazing, and the best I've felt after getting something in this game done.
Thank you so much, mountain bird beast! I honestly expected this to become another boss battle to test my patience even further... But this wasn't the case and now the world has opened up to me. There are a number of locations that I can now check out. And the excuse of not having a double jump is finally gone. I'm free now, yippieh!
I first have to get used to it, however, because my muscle memory is locked to Hornet gliding when you jump mid-air. This even got me into trouble while further exploring down Mount Fay. There is this one passage where you have to get through some spikes:
My instincts still tell me to jump from the wall, then glide, and then maybe clawline to the other side. But now I keep jumping into the spikes like an idiot. And this caused also some frustrations in the next area I went to...
Even though I have the double jump now, I wasn't even done with checking all Clawline locations. And there was another one at the Blasted Steps, at the tent of the "Pinstress" in the far edge, where on my way I met Nuu again feasting on the dead Conchfly.
By the way, the sand worms don't deal double damage any longer since the first patch, so they nerfed this area quite a bit, which is a welcome change. Especially with where I was heading...
From the tent you can enter the "Sands of Karak", the coral region I already heard about. That's were I should be able to find another delicacy, but first you have to make it through the place. As I mentioned earlier with Mount Fay, the later areas usually are extremely stingy when it comes to offering benches.
You have to hit these yellow rocks, which temporarily make some corals bloom, which can be used for platforming. The area was designed for the Clawline and while you think that the double jump should make it easier, I was messing up quite a lot, because it can break the flow. And of course they had to add more Drizbits to make this truly frustrating. And then you have to return all the way down from the tent in the Blasted Steps again... Ugh...
It takes a while to reach a bench, but this has to be one of the most rewarding benches for me... Because it sits right atop the Last Judge! You can create a shortcut here, which leads back down to the Blasted Steps. And you will drop down right before the chamber where you fight this dreaded boss.
So, this was fate. I now had to do it. Well, I had planned to do this next anyway, because with the double jump it is easy enough to return to this boss from either bench. So, the fight was on...
And this was easy enough. I don't know why the internet keeps complaining about this particular boss... Just kidding, of course, I wouldn't want to have done this without the double jump and the more convenient bench right above.
As a Wanderer enthusiast, this is also a boss who invites you to smack wildly at her, only to get punished quickly by that whirling attack whenever you get too greedy. But eventually I've learned...
Sadly, there was nothing really to gain here, other than finally completing that main quest. You open the hall to the Grand Gate and that's really it. This is the problem when bosses only act as a gatekeeper and nothing else. In the least there could have been a Mask Shard or so in the room that was inaccessible before. So, back to the Sands of Karaks, I guess...
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