Anyway, I finally beat this last night. Gotta say the game in general was awesome. Lots of beauty as the theme both in the visuals, music, plot and even the voiceovers...all were really light on the senses. Awesome work by the developers. I loved the scene when you met Li and I loved how if you leave the two alone they'll hug and smile at each other. It's these little touches that make a game special. Sorry if I'm wordy but I get pumped up for games like this. It even inspired me to dig up my old Metroid game for the NES and play some of that.
I had a big challenge on a few bosses. The one crab stuck to the ceiling drove me nuts. I knew I used nature form to knock him from the ceiling and I knew the bombs he threw could be binded but I kept trying to blow them up by the crab's head or tail and didn't realize you had to hit him on the side until I did it by accident when a bomb detonated on accident. I must have spent twenty minutes trying random things before I got it to work.
Strangely, I think I cheaply beat the Arnassi Boss where I just shot the charged Nature shot, he would walk into it and leap into the air and I would then shoot him while he was jumping up there with charged Energy shots and he went down after maybe two or three rounds of this. I read a guide later about needing to shoot his eyes and such which I couldn't figure out how to damage.
Simon Says was neat but was much easier when I used the mouse instead of the "not-as-precise" gamepad. Also, my gamepad only had one analog stick so I was thrown off by the huge door to the Sunken Cave that Li needs to open since you need to move the mouse to it and right-click it. This was never an issue with the gamepad since I could just move Naija herself on top of stuff that I would right-click before but it wasn't an option for this door...I had to look up what to do there.
The final boss was great and I loved all the multiple forms. I was helped GREATLY by the Jelly armor which would heal me to half HP in normal form...that was helpful for taking a breather when I got in trouble. Also, in the final form, it took me FOREVER to figure out that Sun Form was needed to attack his eye. I even did it on accident and damaged it and couldn't figure out how I had done it since the shining effect on the eye after you use a Sun Charge was very subtle.
In the end, I was able to find almost all the treasures except a few. I recall missing the Old Container, Sun Key, Anemone Seed (I had clean forgotten about that Anemone), the Baby Walker and the Glowing Plant (never found that hidden passage but I did find the other in Abyss 2) and had to look all these up. Also, it was funny how I went nuts to get three Ruhk Eggs from the Turtle Cave before with tons of attempts to get to that Ruhk and then felt stupid when it was MUCH easier to get the other Ruhk in The Veil. Wow, I wasted some time there.
A question...obviously I get that the Creator was the kid at the start of the game. But was he also the ghostly kid in the Sunken City? I think he was but I couldn't quite be sure. And if so, how would his parents become like that with his Dad as a golem and such?...Did he try to recreate them and it went horribly wrong?
And the secret ending was a bit obscure since I couldn't figure out who the characters in the images at the end were but it's more clear after reading some posts here. I still wasn't sure if Naija had been taken or put into that blue crystal. Or is the blue crystal supposed to be Li's grave and with Li gone, Naija's kid decides to look for his mother? Interesting stuff.
Either way...phenomenal game. I haven't seen a game like that on ANY console in a while and yet it still a more old-school style than anything. It's like developers have forgotten that folks still love side-scrollers like this. Very nice work.
