Baten Kaitos: Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean (Baten Kaitos I & II HD Remaster) (Switch)

 

Take me on your mighty wings tonight!

Yet another GameCube remaster for the switch. This time Baten Kaitos that Monolith Soft worked on, the company behind the Xenoblade Chronicle-series. Got the original back in the early 2000's after watching a clip from the intro movie that enticed me... and frankly disappointed me at the time. Don't trust CGI-cutscenes. And Namco as well that made Tales of Symponia, so I thought I was in good hands. Story begins that you, the player bond as a spiritual guardian with the main character Kalas, a one winged anti-hero. You then wake up in a village on one of a couple of floating islands where the spirit have amnesia after Kalas was attacked by some monsters. Going back to the forest they meet Xelha who's attacked by a monster and her two guards are killed before Kalas can make a move. They join up since Xelha is following a pendant that leads her to a spring which it reacts with and another monster appears which leaves a card called End Magnus. And then the soldiers of the evil empire arrives, kidnaps Xelha, take the End Magnus and knocks Kalas out. 

Waking up a rescue follows and an escape to a nearby kingdom of knights that lives in the clouds, but the empire strikes again so with the help of the knight turned fisherman Gibari and the disgraced ambassador for the empire Lyude tries to stop the empire, but they get away with yet another End Magnus. The knights king sends them to an island with a world tree and protected by a magic shield. The Emperor Geldoblame is already there on a visit. Our heroes goes to the library to look for information on the End Magnus, but it's a trap set by one of Geldoblames henchmen, but our heroes are saved by the former mercenary Sylvana. After some errands they climb the world tree to get an End Magnus. With that they get the leader of the island to join up with the knights since the End Magnus is the parts of the evil god Malpercio that was sealed away by the wizards of old 1 000 years ago. Next stop is Mira, the island that phases in and out of dimensions, but on their way they are shot down by the head henchmen of Geldoblame, Giocomo. Out of bonds they are trapped until a wizard, the Great Mitzui comes sailing by and leads them back. In Mira they meet the granddaughter of the Duke, Melodia. Looking for the End Magnus hinted to be in a Garden they found nothing, returns and Melodia have been kidnapped. After they have been accused for it and escaped they follow the suspects into a forest. It's the empire again and you defeat them and get Melodia back. Returning her to the Duke they are once again attacked by the empire, The End Magnus is under the Duke's mansion in a labyrinth of mirrors. Foiled again the Empire get away with the Magnus and somehow stole the Magnus our heroes gathered. They have to take the fight to the Empire so Melodia helps to smuggle them in on her ship. They find the Fire Caverns where the Last End Magnus is hidden, but too late, Geldoblame have already recovered it and unleashed its powers on himself turning him into a monster. Defeating him Melodia turns up with a platoon of soldiers to dispatch him and in a plot twist, Kalas is actually a bad guy, joins Melodia and gets a new set of white wings and then he sewers his link with the guardian spirit, turning the screen dark.

You hear Xelha speaking and as you reach out to her you connect with her. You break out of prison and returns to the world tree island. As the other islands tries to fight of the demons that well up from the arriving Cor Hydrea, the castle of the gods that was banished from this dimension 1 000 years ago. Why is it always 1 000 years ago? Anyway, reports of strange phenomenas around the places the magnus was found Xelha sets out, rescue her compatriots that have been trapped in pocket dimensions. They unite up and head back to the Empire to confront Melodia and Kalas before they release the power of Malpercio. But it's all a set up, since they need our heroes powers to break the seal on Malpercio. Xelha uses a mirror she got from the witches off the ice lands to awaken Kalas from the darkness. Doesn't help since Malpercio gets released, but the Great Mitzui summons the wizards of the Earth to try to banish the gods once again, but the spell fails, but Malpercio and Melodia escapes back to Cor Hydrea. 

As Kalas comes back to the light our heroes decide to go to the Earth beneath the toxiclouds. They submerge down and tries to find one of the three treasures to fight Malpercio, the Sword of Heavens (the other being the Cloud Mirror and the Earth Sphere, which both have been destroyed by Malpercio). But a schism between the Earth people leads an outbreak group to take the Sword and offer it to Malpercio, destroying the magic shield around them. After driving Malpercio away and at the same time breaking the sword our heroes return up, do some side questing like in Chrono Trigger to get some more information about the different characters. After that it's time to gather all forces to make an attack on Cor Hydrea to destroy it's shield. The five islands joins together and uses the last of the magic from the End Magnus (that have kept the islands floating) and breaks the shield. The heroes flies in and battle through the different corridors and fight of Malpercio, it's revealed that Melodia died 9 years ago, but the Duke used the End Magnus of Mira to revive her, which probably set her on the path to release Malpercio due to his dark influences. As she joins Malpercio the demon now gets a soul and actually becomes a threat since it been pretty much a mindless puppet. Well, not for long since it's just one boss battle left. Malpercio is defeated, Mitzui seals the god and Kalas enter the body of the god to bring back Melodia and emerges with the help of the player spirit. Afterwards Malpercio's body disappears, the islands crash back to Earth as the toxiclouds goes away. A banquet is held and everyone celebrates, except Xelha that sneaks away. Kalas follows and the last twist of the game is revealed that the Ocean was hidden away by the Queens of the Ice lands in her own body and she has to give it back as the Earth is restored, giving up her life, but they are interupted as the spirit of Geldoblame comes back as a sandhead that you quite easily defeat. Xelha gives up her life, the ocean rains back and then every major character appears in the spirit forest in a farewell for the guardian spirit. Some kids you met early come by with a pendant from Xelha where you hear the ocean and from it water springs forth and returns Xelha to life. Everyone's happy, the end!

Finished it for the first time in 20 years. I still have the save from the last save point before the final boss. If I load it up I would assume that my problem would be that I probably didn't enhance the deck that well. Well, just wait a moment as I start my old save... oh god! What is this suboptimal deck? 8 damage on Kalas weapon output? And Mitzui and Xehla still have level 1 spells? How did I make it to end with such a bad output? A pity there isn't a New Game + since then I could probably have pilfered the mages to that one at least have a decent output and hopefully find enough for Kalas and one more to get a decent damage output to finish it and then replay it with that, but alas, you gotta start over from the beginning. I tried to replay it some 10 years ago, but quit when I realized I chose the wrong answer for a question, losing out on a equipable defense item early in the game, so I just quit. It's a nice looking game with interesting environments and locals and the music is by Motoi Sakurabi so all that is great. The story is a bit cliched at times, but it has its twist and turns that makes it a bit interesting. And the fact you as a player gets a role is rather interesting. I get that a couple of people experienced that sort of thing with Earthbound, but this was my first time with it and it was interesting. A pity the dub made it cringe by just having an empty space of silence every time your name was mentioned. 

Now the remaster... looks fine for the most part. I found at least one instance where they botched the graphics. In the early game after getting an End Magnus you see this body of water with five cocoons that hang over it, after getting a magnus one cocoon falls in and blood taints the water reflecting Malpercio getting released. Now, in the remaster you can't see the cocoons as they disappeared in the darkness at the top. Someone said they might have used an AI enhancer to get it too HD and I think it might have missed that part of the picture. I don't know the technical specs behind it, but it sounds plausible. And then we have the one thing that irritates me to no end, they got rid of the english dub! I know people complained about it and I agree on the child actors, but going back I found the main characters decent and even some of the side characters. Of course I only played the first hours again, so I haven't heard the the major child actors that appears on the first three island! I think that was the major problems with the dub. So here I am again with a GameCube remaster where I can't just get rid of my old games since I still found them more playable. The only one that works is Nintendo's games!... and Capcom's Resident Evil games... alright so it might just be Namco's games that doesn't work! Doesn't look good for Star Fox Assault.

But in serious, had the dub been in I would probably been playing it even more, but now I gotta play the gamecube version next time. And I don't look forward to it since the games mechanics makes it a really slow game. Main battle mechanic is that you have a deck of cards that you draw magnus from. You can reuse the cards in the deck how many times you like so it's a bit of luck, but you can come very far with the knowledge of the element system and straights and pairs, but you need patience and always healing up. Normal battles can take 5 minutes while bosses goes for 30 minutes or so. This time around I also used the saving up to get better stats at level. Didn't know it, but apparently you could save up for a max of 10 levels and level up at once and get a stat boost, makes it harder in the beginning, but it pays out in the end since you basically pushed the stats higher than normal leveling up. Does help that in the remaster you can put on auto-battle and one hit kills on enemies and speed it up by 300 % and just run around saving time and not wearing down the sticks. I gonna miss that when I play the Gamecube game. Still, the AI is really bad. My characters been close to dying since they priorities something awful if anyone is a bit damaged. Especially when they don't heal the most damaged one, but seems to go by player 1, player 2 and player 3. So be at full health while doing it, and hope that all 3 are faster than the enemies... don't know why they decide to photo the player characters and not heal at the same time, or even a full heal for that. Another annoying part, which is in the base game, is the transformation of the magus. Some are time sensitive so for example after 1 hour of gameplay some bananas can go from green to fresh and then onward to rotten, and that can happen mid battle I learned this time around. Makes it a hassle, but it's probably a thing to keep enhancing your deck. The last thing I noticed they changed for the remaster is that they gave you more money for selling photos, meaning I very quickly got over 1 million gold... and nothing to buy but more cards, except paying the damn woman on the knight island who forces me to pay some percentage (tip, be nice since it cost less).

Overall it's a decent game, maybe not for everyone, but try it at least. The remaster recommended for playing, but I won't say the GameCube version maybe have some better moments (and don't f*** up some graphical problems). At least no slow downs or shut downs like in other remasters I've played. Happy Christmas everyone! See you all in 2025!

Heroes of Might and Magic III: In the Wake of the Gods

Here there be dragons!

My brother-in-law mentioned that they apparently was doing a board game of Heroes of Might and Magic III, and as I wrote before, I like that game. So I got a craving to play it again as I put in some cash to get the whole package when it releases in October 2023 (all 11 kilos of it). Couldn't get the old workarounds to boot the game so I had to check around a bit. My MacBook is now so old that they don't support it with updates anymore and I was on the verge to look into getting a new one (and have to choose if I'm getting a PC or Mac and what kind and so on), but I was able to crack it open. First I had to get a Heroes III Complete version from Gog.com. Then get a program called Osu (that they also have discontinued for this computer). And a side program to just update the version to allow it to run. Then pick the files from that installation within the wineskin and then use another program called VCMI to actually be able to run it. And it run fantastic as well with modded content. Some monster have changed appearance and others are new, different heroes appear, you know have a commander unit that levels up with the hero, there's a threat indicator for monsters on the map so that you can gauge if you stand a chance and I think they also added a quick way to see combiner artefacts so you know which to put together. And a lot of new maps.

So I played around a bit and satisfied my cravings for the game. It's been a while as well and this time the computer doesn't sound like it's powering a car while trying to get the game running. Small hassle is that I don't seem to be able to get sound to the intro or voices to the cutscenes (at least for Shadow of Death). But at least all campaigns are open without need to play through them all (some are really tiresome).

Thunder Sub (Space Carrier Blue Noah)

 

To Certain Death!

Well, went on a nostalgic binge so rewatched the anime series Thunder Sub (aka Space Carrier Blue Noah), made in 1979 in Japan and dubbed I guess in 1986. As I said before my parents had recorded the TV-movie that started the series. Of course, we had it on two different tapes. The ending part which I saw first was on a VHS tape I think we had recorded Raiders of the Lost Ark and a Bugs Bunny Special where Bugs tells the history of the US to his... nephew (?) followed by some road runner cartoons. The cartoon ends on Wile E. Coyote shrinking after running through a pipe, but he gets the roadrunner and realises he is so small that he holds up a sign where it says something like "you always told me to catch the roadrunner... so what do I do now" and as the Swedish dubber said the line it cuts to Thunder Sub and it sailing away on the attack on the first Death Force fort. The first part was recorded on a VHS with Spitting Image special on Ronal Reagan after he ended his run as president of the US, but the ending is cut off. 

Story is... well, depending on which voice over you listen to, it's either 2052 or the 22nd centuary and the world is at peace (see, clearly fiction!) and have colonised the planets of the solar system (or at least Mars, Jupiter and Saturn). The earth is one united federation and have created 9 scientific research centres around the world to help the exploration of the world and space. N1 being the most important one for this story and focused on Oceanography and placed in... well, the map shows Japan, but they dub it to Hawaii. 

Beside the N1 problem I also noticed there is no centres in Africa (maybe N5, but hard to see) or South America.

One night a meteor shower causes concern when one is studied by scientist and they discover spying equipment and reports of signals beaming out from Earth into space and no known transmitter. All scientist and politicians meet in Hawaii (aka Tokyo) to discuss this alarming news. From N1 head director Cromwell Colins meet his son Colin Colins (not much fantasy in naming really) who been accepted to the science academy. During the meeting the aliens causing the meteor shower attacks from their satellite Terror-Star with their army, the Death Force. Terror-Star is home to the Gothamites from the planet Gotham that is 30 light years away near the constellation Gemini. Their home was destroyed by a wandering black hole that devoured their sun and planet. In desperation they give dictatorial powers to General Zee who have the plans for the Terror-Star that will save 200 million gothamites. Colin with his two friends Chris and Jamie survives the initial attack and enter the conference centre where both Colins and Chris fathers is. They find Cromwell pinned under a large stone slab dying. He gives Colin his pendent and the task of going to N1 with the word "Thunder Sub" before passing away. They find a futuristic hoover craft and pick up their classmates like Jeremy, Robby and Fenton and some more unnamed ones before visiting their families. At Chris's house they pick up this girl Anna that seems shellshocked from the destruction and they leave, finding no other survivors they can help. At Terror-Star we learn that they placed themselves between the earth and moon and with it changed the poles. The attacks and disasters that follows kills 90 % of the human population leaving 600 million alive. Collin and his friends reach N1 and is sucked down a whirlpool to a hidden cave where they open doors with Collins pendant and at what looks like a ship bridge Collins utters the command input "Thunder Sub" and it awakens the weapon to save the earth!

It looks amazing!

N1 was in actuality built to create Thunder Sub as a weapon against a possible war between Jupiters moons and Earth due to Earths economical dominance... so much for a world in peace. At the same time another sub observes them, the Tempest Junior controlled by the Thunder Sub crew lead by Captain Noah. They board Thunder Sub and confronts the students at the brig. As they learn about the creation of Thunder Sub by Colins father they are spotted by Death Forces lead by Colonel Lupus that tries to sink her. They fire back and submerge and goes away. The student are drafted as the crew for Tempest Junior and taken on a two week training course where they discover a downed fighter jet from Earth with the pilot barely alive. Rushing him to the infirmary he says the words Point N9, Bermuda to Colin and Anna. Captain Noah informs them that Bermuda is where N9 is stationed, he also begin asking Anna about her brothers and it is revealed (to Colin, there was a scene earlier where Noah and Grogan, first mate and now skipper of the Tempest Junior discuss the kids) that Anna is Noah's daughter. Ricky and Jason didn't make it according to Anna since they where hit by a missile. Their relationship was also strained since Noah's wife died while he was working on Thunder Sub. 

With this Thunder Sub prepares its first attack on the Gothamites by destroying their Heavy Water Plant by using the Tempest to lure the forces so that Thunder Sub can attack them from behind and then go all out on the Plant. There's entangling bombs, a missile creating a whirl pool under Thunder Sub and other things, but the humans prevail and uses their Anti-Proton Gun that obliterates the plant, but Colonel Lupus and his superior officer Admiral Zogal escapes. At the Gotham Headquarters in the Sahara they ask for materials to fight Thunder Sub from Commander Gulf, but are denied so Lupus contacts General Zee himself and is granted the manpower and materials to build his own submarine. At Thunder Sub the N9 pilot have awakened is named Captain Domingo that informs them that N9 survived the attack and have completed the space engine for Thunder Sub. With their new goal they set out rescuing Earth from the alien invasion.

The adventure continues for 23 more episodes. You get ideas as space elevators, how best to protect the Earth, either focusing on the human element or other animals. They rescue locals and destroy most of the alien invasion force. The strange thing is that both sides knows information they shouldn't have until later. In the very first episode the humans know that the aliens squadrons are known as the death force and their satellite is the Terror Star and vice versa from episode 2 the Gothamites knows that the warship they fought are named Thunder Sub with the commander named Captain Noah. There is an episode where they interrogate a gothamite prisoner and learns about the command structure and history of Terror Star, but the prisoner exchange isn't completed that follows so the Gothamites shouldn't knew anything about this. Especially when Thunder Sub only was known to pretty much the crew and a handful of people, most probably killed in the initial attack (like the President of the World). Even more curious is how civilians knows about Thunder Sub when they are rescued from a slave colony and there is no communication between Gothamites and humans until they have the tongue twister from the interrogation episode.

And the tongue twister is a bit of other problem with the show. Any obstacle they face is solved by using another gadget they just happen to have access to. Is Thunder Sub under attack by kamikaze barracudas at 2 000 m below the surface? Let's try these experimental scubas we just happen to have here. Is the Tempest caught in a living water organism that is weak to ice? Use these ice bombs we have here. Some things like the battle copter I can accept since it looks like a different part of the ship. And since the show tries to look very scientific (everyone has a degree, scientist saves and dooms their respective planets) it feels like they might should have foreshadowed some parts more. The ending is rather short as well, but on the other hand, they at least don't bring out the Anti-Proton Gun 2.0... they just make it so it can fire more often since they have two engines which makes sense to me (who doesn't have a degree in natural science). Also, how many people where on the crew? They use fighter jets in the first episode, but who pilots them? They show Spencer and other pilots run to them in the episode following that, but I got the impression that the reason they hit the slave colony to rescue everyone was to get more people to man the ship? And where is the women? There are 7 women in the whole show, and that includes Colins mother that I assume dies in the first episode (and isn't mentioned at all compared to Colins father after that). And Gotham seems to have no women at all, and how could they have an army stationed after travelling for 30 years?

Small nitpicks, the bigger problem is that they didn't dub the second-to-last episode where they kill the main bad guy and set up the confrontation between Lupus and Thunder Sub that have been anticipated since the very beginning. And missing out the plot point that General Zee intended to take the cells off the dead gothamites and recreate them on earth as a new race devoted to him and for that betrayal is killed by the commander of the death force. At least the commanders noble sacrifice in the final episode is shown. Although why it's him and not General Zee must have been curious for the watchers... did the other dubbers translate it? I found some episodes on the Swedish dub on youtube, but episode two is horrendous where they cut away the music every time someone speaks (and I happen to like the music) and I don't know, Åskbåten sound kinda childish. And that Gunnar Ernblad is like 5 main characters stretches the imagination. He's not bad, but the english is at least varied. And I think Jamie's voice actor also was in Batman Beyond as a minor roll professor and Colin Colins was Batman himself on some of the animated movies. Of course some moments was a bit weird, for example the first flash back to the death of Colins father must have taken another actor and Domingo in one scene almost sounded like his voice broke during the line read. And I don't like the clothes change in episode 8-9 without explanation. Before they had their blue and white shirts and after that everyone wore green. But Colin in total have 5 different clothes. Civilian clothes, academy clothes, the blue shirt, green shirt and space uniform. And that not counting the awesome black scuba gear and the underwater suit.

I would recommend watching it. Youtube have most of the series in english (missing something like 2-3 episodes), think I've seen the greek one complete. I got a boot leg dvd collection back in 2007, but the website seems to be defunct. Sadly the DVD's seems to have been dirtied enough to not been able to be read by my PS3 completely, but my DVD-drive for my Mac works fine. Tried to clean it, but I ain't able to get every speck of dirt so it might be scratched. Doesn't make it better that using the soap and water cleaning destroys the paper glued on top of the DVD. Commendable effort. This is probably to niche to get a whole sale release with commentaries and other things. A pity really since it was one of my first anime's. 

Pikmin 2 (Pikmin 1+2) (Switch)

Attack of the Lobster!

Continued with the second game in the series. Olimar returns home, but due to a shipment being destroyed by a lunar bunny according to Louie,  the other pilot for the Olimar's company, the company is now in deep debt. Their CEO has to sell Olimars ship, but Olimar drops a capsule cap that he brought with him from the Pikmin planet and it is apparently worth a lot of money. The CEO sends Olimar and Louie back to the planet to find treasures to pay off the debt. 

So back in action Olimar and Louie search the planet for stuff to collect and finding a couple new pikmins, the purple and white one. After getting enough treasure they head home. but oops, Olimar left Louie behind. Credits roll and afterwards Olimar pays of the company debts and the CEO and Olimar returns to find Louie. Which I didn't do this time. I cleared the last area and went through the final dungeon, but when I lost all but 5 pikmins I just got to the first out and quit pretty much. The newer games clearly is superior. The ability to replay a level of a dungeon if it went sour speeds up and don't cause as much stress, especially when you have to survive a bit of an ordeal to get to some of them with the respawning monsters. The fact that grinding white and purple pikmins is a hassle also add to the stress... or maybe more accuratelly, waste your time pretty much. I have more games to play!

Now, some might think I left Louie in the ditch, but really? Who likes Louie? That space bunny that ate the shipments? Was him all along! And then we have the damn dogs he sicks on me in 4, or when he stole all my food in 3. No, Louie can be left behind with no remorse. The CEO is at least symphatetic as he is hunted by the debt collectors and lives together with animals under a bridge.

Didn't get the Gamecube original, but got the Wii version and finished it ones, not 100 % since the dungeons is past my abilities it seems. So that concludes the reason people love the newer game is that it is easy enough and I prefer them.

Pikmin (Pikmin 1+2) (Switch)

 

Feeling Hungry?

Due to releasing Pikmin 4 they also released Pikmin 1 and 2 for the Switch and it also came in a physical collection... a month or two after the digital release, but I gotten a lot more patient. So I waited and played the first game again after what must have been 10 years. I bought the original gamecube version near release, and it was one of the first game I actually went and bought myself. Still have the copy. Got the game mostly from the hype around another Miyamoto IP and a demo they had on a Super Play DVD. It looked amazing for the day and I wasn't that averse to strategy games, I played Warcraft.

Story is that Captain Olimar is on his way home when an asteroid hits his ship the S.S. Dolphin and he crash on this familiar looking planet. He has 30 days to find at least 25 of the 30 parts to be able to travel back to his home planet and meet his family again. To help him he finds the local creatures called pikmin that sprouts from onions that can fly. In the original it was the standard red, blue and yellow pikmins.

Now, I finished it once before and I think I did that in something like 25 days, this time I did it in 20 days. Dandori skills through the roof. It was fun and even if the time constraints due to the 30 day limit it was decent enough. That I finished the whole final area in one day, including fighting the final boss is kinda impressive since I think I spent a couple of days last time. Overall I felt smaller last time playing than now.

A problem I encountered though was that the improvements made in later games greatly enhances the gameplay so going back is a bit archaic. I miss switching between different pikmin's just by clicking a button. Having several captains that you can order around makes the game easier since you can multitask, here you just have Olimar that have to keep track of everyone. I didn't get the sequel for some reason until it was released for the Wii, I wonder how that will feel.

A DnD Tale - Waterdeep: Dragon's Heist - Cult of Personality

 

Please allow me to introduce myself
I'm a man of wealth and taste
I've been around for a long, long years
Stole million man's soul an faith

So the day was finally here. It was the big midsummer festival and the Cassalenters have pulled no stops, hiring our heroes to cater food and drink to the masses. What our heroes didn't know was that the Cassalanters intended to kill 100 people and sacrifice 1 000 000 gold in order to release their children from a contract that would have turned them into monsters. So they show up at the party and make the excuse that they are checking the sound in the rooms for a performance. So they go around and check it all. They don't read the books or such so they don't get the clues, they don't attempt to get through the office of Vittorio so they can't get any keys and even though they find boxes filled with red robes and golden masks they don't know what they will do with them. They find a hidden dress belonging to a noble lady, but don't look for her. They are recognised by a guest whom they don't recall (which they now think is the Black Viper, but is actually a doppelganger from the Yawning Portal). They at least finds the poison Midnight tears and know what they do, they don't connect that the poison is in the lady's chambers and the party has an ending at midnight.

They find the hidden attic, but can't get in since they don't have the keys. So they go back down and through the cellar and finds the hidden vault that leads down to the Temple of Asmodeus. They hear chanting and goes down a staircase and finds the crypt of the Cassalanter. They find the tomb of the former Lord and as they speak with him he gives them a magical armour and mace, which only Parker can carry and use. They also notice the bearded devils standing guard so they go up again and find the balcony overlooking the chamber with 30 praying cultists and a statue of Asmodues carrying the golden skull they are looking for. They get Parker to use Control Water so that the river that runs behind them rises and drowns or sweeps away all the people for 10 minutes so that they can get the skull and then destroy the statue and fire beneath it. They at least left the golden skull replica they fixed in the last session.

And then they goes back to the party not to raise suspicion, says farewell to the hosts, toasts with them and then returns home without a care in the world. They hide the skull in the tower and then goes to sleep. As midnight strikes they awake to horrible pain as the poison course through their veins. In the morning they hear that over 100 people are missing and they suddenly realise that they forgot about the poison and what it was supposed to do. In the evening Vincent Trench arrives and gives them a hint about the whereabouts of the Jade skull. It belongs to Jarleaxle, the drow mercenary leader and the place where they know about drows is in the docks where they stopped the drow assassin. And with that the session ended. 

In my mind I had this great tale where they started investigating the Cassalanter mansion and would find this different clues, like the journal hinting them about the search for the treasure and why, breaking into the study and finding the Black Viper maybe giving them hints about the Asmodeus activities and the real truth behind their recent fortunes... and some clues about Jarlaxle hinting them toward the right place without me using Vincent as a crutch. I was gonna tuck their heartstrings about the transformed children and the desperate pleads from the parents, but alas. At least I had to use all my things to create maps in order to cover the temple and the mansion floors.

TaleSpin

Time for another TaleSpin!

Another Disney Afternoon series, this time based on the Jungle book. By some seen as the pinnacle of Disney afternoon adventure shows and probably the one with most focus on the characters motivation for the plots and not just random things happening and characters that need to be changed in demand for the plot... or so at least the fans says about it. Overall 65 episodes, mostly adventure focused and some slapstick comedies. We had some episodes taped from Filmnet on VHS, the Bermuda Trepaziod one where Baloo thinks he's dying, the parrot treasure, Daring Dan, Molly Cuddled, the Hollywood episode, the flying petrol stations and Baloo back to school to be able to go to a class reunion. Those all in english and then a couple of episodes recorded from the Disney time on Fridays from Swedish Public channels. Those I recall was when Baloo lost his memory, the Vandersnoot kid, the Frankenstein episode and when Baloo starts a Pizza operation. And some doubles like the treasure, Daring Dan and Petrol station. I recall seeing more episodes on TV, but for some reason we hadn't recorded them.

A fine show, rewatching it I probably rank the amnesia episode as one of the best ones for me. Although rewatching any episode with Shere Khan is a delight, both in the ambiguity of the character and the voice acting of Tony Jay. Sadly due to the batch nature of the 65 episodes there isn't a finale that ends it on a definite end, like Gummi Bears or Ducktales. Music great and all that, still prefer Ducktales music and the animation in the first season of Ducktales also outshines this effort. Might be that I prefer the Ducktales mythos of Barks that makes me more inclined toward that show. Good then that two episodes was worked on by Don Rosa himself, the premier Scrooge writer after Barks... or maybe even before Barks. Unfortunately I don't find those episodes as interesting since he shines more in the comic format. 

On the other hand, a lot of episodes seems to copy Ducktales in several ways. We have one episode where a robot pilot is better than the standard pilot, there is the shrinking episode, there is two episodes copied directly by the same writes, jumping a day to get paid and the main character thinks he is gonna die when a doctor calls about a defunct machine (many of course probably standard tropes of series overall). Or that DuckTales and TaleSpin is pretty much the same idea for a name. Other problems is that I find the basic characters of Baloo is someone I dislike, always lazy and prone to lying. Kit is probably one of the better kid actors, but then we have an episode where he is so intent on flying he runs to Thembria and then just pesters everyone that he wants to fly and don't listen to anyone. I actually have more sympathy with the hounded Spigot in this one... then again, that might be my work as a state official shining through. I kinda find the health inspector in the Pizza episode and the inspector in the gasoline one to be very relatable as well. 

But aside from that it is an entertaining series, stories are rather fun with great voices and music. Would like a physical blu-ray release as with everything else. 

Etrian Odyssey 2 Untold: Fafnir Knight (3DS)

 

I thought Fafnir was the dragon?

Had to continue the series so I started up the second Untold game. Being not so keen on playing another 86 hours over the course of 8 years I choose the picnic mode and guess what? 45 hours later and I'm done... and I actually recall the whole game! And playing it this close to the ending of the first game I can see that it's pretty much structured the same way. Explore 5 floors, fight a boss, go into this side dungeon (Ginnungagap in this game), explore till stuck, back to labyrinth for another 5 floors, a new boss and so on until you reach floor 20 and the twist is revealed, go to floor 25, defeat boss and back to final stretch in the side dungeon for the true final boss. Cap the level at 65 and you are good to go.

In between floors do some quests and gather materials and money to upgrade your equipment. Another side thing is gathering ingredients for helping your guild restaurant and deciphering the clues for the recipes, a bit like the alchemy clues in Dragon Quest VIII (the PS2 version that is). So that is the basic structure, what is the story? You, the main character and your best friend Flavio have been sent by the Midgar Library (where Simon, Arthur and Raquna came from in the first game) to escort Princess Arianne. She's been tasked with performing a ritual that's needed every 100 year to uphold a seal on the Calamity, another Yggdrasil core. Entering Ginnungagap for the first time you meet Chloe and Bertrand forming the last part of your Guild as you continue the adventure. 

Bertrand is probably the most interesting character. A former fafnir knight that lived over a 100 year when his princess took his place in the ritual to stop the calamity. Cause the twist is that the fafnir knight is doomed to die and that happens to be the main character, chosen by Arianne when you saved her as a kid. Due to having 2 fafnir knights the system breaks down during the final phase so you have to save Bertrand that was taken instead of you and then you have to find another way to stop the Calamity. So you gets hint about the Overlord living in the flying castle. You meet him, turns out to be some sort of computer program, kills him and have now the power to fight the Calamity. Back in Ginnungagap you meet the Calamity and defeats it, but during the celebration it awakes again, putting all your compatriots out of commission except Arianne that intends to spare you from your faith, but you take her place and her love for you (I think at least) awakens the dormant powers that the Overlord gave you after dying so you get a super powered form that destroys the Calamity once and for all.

After that someone is talking with the citizens you meet, explaining that a bright light shone from the labyrinth and a shooting star flew south. The guild left sad as they missed one of their members, pretty much hinting that you died. The final scene is the guild deciding to go south in order to try and find you as they believe you are still alive. The end!

It was a fun little adventure. Don't know if it's due to the easier difficulty or the fact I got the skill system better this time around. Passive skills for the win. Sadly the last Untold story and with it the more story oriented games in the series. I will probably play the Switch versions afterwards, both to compare and play through the third game before continuing with IV and so forth.

Etrian Odyssey Untold: The Millennium Girl (3DS)

 

There can be only one!

I got this game back in April 2015 as a portable RPG I could play while not having my own place, but renting a room in someones apartment while traveling to the nearby town for unemployment stuff and then work as I got my current job in august the same year. And now 8 years later (as of September 2023) I finally finished it. 86 hour... what was I doing? I recall that I maybe restarted the game at one point while traveling the ruins since I got stuck, but still. 

The game, the things I remember at least, is that you are the Highlander. No, not the one from the 1986 movie, this Highlander carries a spear. You end up in the town Etria that lies in the outskirt of the Yggdrasil labyrinth. Travelling through the stratums he encounters three other travellers, the Magician Arthur, the Healer Simon and the Knight Raquna. Together you find some ruins and in it the girl Ricky that have slept in suspended animation for a 1 000 years, hence the title. You form a guild and explore the labyrinth and ruins to uncover the secrets.

Apparently the world is a post-apocalyptic Earth where for example Raquna is a noble from the kingdom of Ontario. In the middle of the labyrinth is the Yggdrasil core which threatens the world and the ancient world sent Ricky into the future to stop it from destroying the Earth together with the computer AI M.I.K.E. It gets a bit hazy here, I recall fighting Gungnir, the machine that was plan A, which would have destroyed all life as well. Final stretch was the fifth stratum which was the ruins of a modern city... I guess in Japan due to the name Shinjuken or something like that. That was where I ended the last time until now where I was able to get through the floors and fight the final bosses. I pushed through when the recommended level was 50 and I was at 63. It was 4 damn boss battles (lucky with rest between some of them). I was clearly suboptimal leveled with my skill points, too diverse, should have a focussed on some skills and should have gone for the passive skills. 

But the ending battle was epic. So, even if it took me 8 years I found it rather fun. Probably should have read a guide on the skill levels to avoid spreading the skills too thin. I got Untold 2, 4, 5 and Nexus on the 3DS and the HD collection on Switch so I have a lot to catch up with. The gameplay is actually rather fun, you map out the map yourself and put in hints here and there so that you can get through it. Some problems though is that certain icons are supposed to represent certain things, but if you don't see them until the final floors you might use it for something else. And there's also a limit on how many you can have so suddenly, when I'm mapping out all poison flowers on a certain floor I hit the limit so I have to use another colour to indicate danger which irritates me a bit. Same goes for teleportation markers, I assume that was what the numbers where for, but the one floor that has them have more teleportation points than numbers so I improvised the symbols to fill the map. Small nitpicks.

The rest is fight monsters, gather items, solve quests and so on. Only a couple of weeks before finishing it I learned that you could auto-battle making traversing older areas a bit better. Might even have speed up my game if I knew that. The items you gather you sell and unlocks more weapons, armours and items. Love the idea, but since that is coupled with "use fire on this monster to get this item" or "use a slash attack to get this item" instead of just pure RNG I need to recall all this... and that is hard when you play a game across 8 years. 

Look back on the Mysterious Cities of Gold

So now it has ended, a series that started 40 years ago finally finished. Still open for continuation if someone picks it up, but we finally have seen the seven cities of gold. I wrote about my first memories of the series back in 2012 when they announced the continuation series. Saw them on cable TV back in the early 90's, but only had memory of one episode as the kids climbed the golden condor in the episode that introduced it, and then in the early 2000's dad found the VHS we had recorded the last episode on. I watched it several times and it had Eldorado, the solar reactor and the tale of Mu and Atlantis destroying each other in war, pretty much a commentary on the cold war and the threat of world war 3. The images of that particular scene was haunting. And at university I could watch the whole series on Youtube back in 2006-2007 and then in 2007 they released the DVD collection which I still got.

And in 2014 me and dad discovered that they would show the second season on Nickelodeon that we watched after work or in my case the day at the assigned unemployment centre. Being poisoned by black mould, having no job, having a depression and being forced to move back into my parents house was a pretty downer feeling. That sense of childlike nostalgia and wonder helped me through that dark period. Season 3 and 4 obviously don't have that emotional connection (although, I've watched season 4 at a tumultuous time at my job so it might be after the fact). 

They might have sparked my interest in pre-colonisation civilisations of South America, it talked to my interest of history and the ideas of Eldorado and Atlantis have always have interested me, just look at my enjoyment of The Journeyman Project 3. It has it flaws and it's clear the first season is a completely different thing than the others and the retcons is not the best (If you needed artefacts from all the cities... what was the purpose of the first city? It had the reactor, but I don't think they got that from the tunnel, maybe should have used it as the engine for Ambrosius ship if they had thought it through and bring it from there giving a reason to bring back Mayuka), but with the emotional connection I have with series and the ending being decent enough (it's no Rise of Skywalker at least) I feel it's worth the watch. 

The Mysterious Cities of Gold - S4E26 - End of the Adventure?

 

Yeah, they must have messed up the colouring of one of the yellows, but we know that King in Yellow, Queen in Red.

So, Esteban, Zia and Tao discuss the place they found with the cities, but Tao makes them promise that they won't go there until after the meteorite has been dealt with... which I feel is strange since if there is some people who would now anything about the meteor and the solar cannon it would the sages of the cities that seems to exist in this almost other dimension? Anyway, one night Nostradamus and Kokapetl observes the arrival of the meteorite in the sky... which is like Tintin and the mysterious star... it's even in the title!

The next day they begin firing up the cannon, but before they can fire it malfunctions, the cracks in the stone seems to divert the power so that it can't create the energy beam. Tao has only one option... going to Ambrosius in the dungeon... or maybe speak to sages? I mean, they built every city, wouldn't they know how to fix it? NO, we go to the bad guy, but of course he won't do it to save the world, he needs to be payed. We don't see what it is, but when the kids tells Mendoza he's furious of the demand and walks away from it. He's released for a short while and creates another black sun that Tao uses in the cannon that seems to fix the stone, but now there is a storm so Esteban, for the final time, uses his powers to summon the sun, powering the cannon. The cannon fires and obliterates the meteorite...

Wait, that's it? Where's the doom and gloom? The screaming public, both Thundersub and the Belvision Tintin captured the sense of dread from people at flying meteorites. Well, the king announces his decision to seize all the artefacts to protect it from Spain and England. The children protests until the adults go away and then they set their plan into action. Gaspard, Sancho and Pedro (that have awakened from his coma thanks to the Chinese alchemist Esteban's father brought) takes the artefacts to Zimbabwe while Leguerra and Mendoza frees Ambrosius and take him to the Olmecian Flying Machine while the kids deconstruct the 7th city and turn Chambord back into it's original and current form. They say good-bye to Ambrosius and then runs trough the gate of the elders and back in Zimbabwe they take out the medallions and lock the gate for the soldiers of Francis I.

So, at this moment our friends separate. Esteban and Zia decide to explore this other world which only they can enter with the medallions so they say good-bye to the others. Tao is given the golden condor and together with Mendoza, Leguerra and Gaspard are to travel to India to set out the Order of the Condor to protect the artefacts from Mu. Mendoza releases Sancho and Pedro from his service, Pedro now have the princess and Sancho... gets to hook up with the nurse that nursed him back after his coma... feels like time went short here. Sancho is a bit thrown under the bus here I feel, since my perception from the first season he was more important and loyal than Pedro and here is just given a girl with no name actually. Esteban and Zia unite their medallions, leaves the city and meets the other sages and as they walk down the stairs, Esteban and Zia runs after them, hand in hand... The End!

The documentary was a bit of summation of what they have been about from season 2-4. And that's it. Hopefully we get an official release on DVD/Blu Ray with actual translated subtitles or an english dub. I'm a bit miffed about the ending, the Chinese alchemist only purpose was curing Leguerra and Sancho and I expected a call to arms from all people we had seen. I don't think Ambrosius earned that ending either, he has killed people and almost doomed the world for his own greed and ambitions, yeah, he's right that you can't trust the kings, but he's no different. And probably more panic before they destroy the meteorite would have been advised. But overall, it's a workable ending and it's bitter sweet to see it after... well 30 years for me, but 40 years for the whole series. I might have two more posts after this, one personal reflection on the series overall and an unknown date of the video game based on the second season.

The Mysterious Cities of Gold - S4E25 - The 7th City of Gold

 

Apparently a solar cannon.

Great, yet another episode that actually manually translated by a human. Well, Mendoza has a concussion, and Leguerra is poisoned so they go back to Zimbabwe to get to Chambard in order to heal them, but Ambrosius beat them to it, take the orichalcium maxtrix, blows it all up and runs trough the portals, grabs the medallions and lock it. In the attack Sancho ends in a coma. Esteban and Zia arrives too late to prevent it, but Leguerra tells them that Ambrosius medallions lie where they fought and Mendoza tells them where it is, but can't follow due to his injuries. At the ravine they fall in and grab the medallions, but are attacked by snakes. They put in the medallions and are transported to... I don't know but it seems to be place where the cities of gold exists beside each other. They end up in a room with several gates and find the one that take them too Chambard and as they leave one of the sages appear in the flesh.

Meanwhile Ambrosius have overheard Francis I talking to Esteban's dad about taking over all the artefacts, renegading on his promise to Leonardo da Vinci in that the Order would be independent. Ambrosius catches Nostradamus that take him to Tao, he injures Kokapetl, steals all the treasure and uses Tao as hostage. Esteban arrives and opens the gate to Zimbabwe and looks for his father, but sees the hostage situation instead. He uses an experimental crown to grab the stone from Ambrosius. He hunts down Esteban that drops the stone and a crack appears on it, but Mendoza intervenes and gets slapped around until they end up outside where a trap was laid by Pedro and Gaspard who dropped several bars of Orichalcium over him.

The documentary was about snakes and the serum from their venom.

The Mysterious Cities of Gold - S4E24 - Revenge

Won't he ever die!

It's a smoke bomb, but they clear it by opening the glass and Mendoza is able to push Ambrosius out of the cockpit and land on the wing together. Leguerra is able to make him loose his footing so he crashes into the jungle below. And then it seems to be a time skip since everyones working and the kids are back in Chambord until a message to Esteban and Zia leads them to visit the village with the freed slaves. Zia has another vision showing Zares, but with the faces of Leguerra, Mendoza and Tao, implying that he's gonna kill them I think? So they head back to the others.

Mendoza, Leguerra and Gaspard is hunting and Gaspard is tricked so that Mendoza and Leguerra can be alone. Gaspared gets attacked by a lion and the next shot is off Leguerra standing up and putting her belt back on with Mendoza lying on his cape. If that isn't a euphemism for sex I don't know what is, it's basically Kiera Knightly putting on her boots in the end of Pirates 3. Well, Ambrosius push some rock on them knocking out Mendoza and tries to kill Leguerra, but she is able to grab his medallions and chuck them away and he flees when Gaspard, the lion and a couple of hunters arrive. One of the hunters arrive and ask if she is ok, but she coils back as she just been bitten by a snake.

Documentary was more about predators on the savanna.

The Mysterious Cities of Gold - S4E23 - The Last of the Atlanteans

 

*sniff* Why does this show make me so sad now?

Well, the Olmec friend survived the shot, for the moment. He tells them to overheat the generator and destroy the security mechanism, and as parting words ask them to tell tell Esteban that he is the last of the Atleanteans and is the only one that can undo all the evil the Atlanteans have done. As Mendoza and Leguerra runs away after following his commands, he brings back his hologram machine looking at his loved one, the princess that was one of the sages and buried in the tomb in the 4th city of gold. And then he dies. Gaspard is about to be killed by the last Olmec but to his indignity is saved by Mendoza yet again. They escape the building and the leader Olmec awakens in the generator room, is only able to figure out what they have done to it and then the whole place explodes. After that follows scenes as they get away from falling rocks, steps and lava.

Reenactment with Arnold

The kids oversee the construction and then Esteban and Zia heads to Zimbabwe and gets the condor to the cave to pick up Mendoza and gang. While waiting they talk and reveal their feelings for each other and kiss. Only took them 40 years. And Kokopetl discovers Ambrosius that is hiding and while Esteban checks it out he runs out of the cave and disappears, at this moment Mendoza and the others arrive, they board the condor and flies away. During flight they hear a strange sound, Mendoza opens the back door and a ball rolls out and are about to explode or gas them.

More stuff about Zimbabwe, bird that are on the flag and coins and also a bit about the acropolis above the city, especially interesting was the fact that some of the corridors was just 25 cm wide and no one knew the exact purpose. Some guessed that it had to do with leading cool air through the structure and other thought it was used by different classes. And that is classes in the marxist sense or something like that.

The Mysterious Cities of Gold - S4E22 - The Gate to Hell

Doesn't get more heavy metal than this!

Mendoza's group infiltrates the Olmec camp and tries to locate the stone. They are spotted and pinned down in the hangar. Gaspard uses one of the flying machine to distract the olmecs and the other escapes through a hatch leading to the generator. They are stopped by the Olmec Esteban saved. He seems to have his doubt and seems to mourn a woman from before he was frozen down 12 000 years ago. As they explain the danger he agrees to help so he shuts down the generator and gives them the stone. The leader Olmec shows up fires a shot at him and Mendoza lobs his sword, both olmecs appears dead.

The kids meanwhile starts construction of the city and uses Zimbabwe as the orichalcum furnace to create the parts they need. They also recalls the condor factory in the second city and that orichalcum supposedly hardens by sound so they use drummers to recreate the sound.

Now the documentaries are on the tribe of Zimbabwe and hunting during the court of Francis I.

The Mysterious Cities of Gold - S4E21 - Hand in Hand

I won't cry! *sniff*

The heroes tries to tell Gaspard and Leguerra that the world is ending if they don't assemble the artefacts from Ambrosius, but Gaspard won't listen. Leguerra proposes a duel between her and Mendoza for either taking the treasures and build the 7th city or take the treasures to Charles V. While the dual is going on Pedro and Sancho is looking for food and angers an ostrich that hunts them and Gaspard away. The duel ends with Leguerre winning, but accepting that their quest is more important.

They get the treasures, but learns that the stone is still with the olmecs, and through the paintings in the cave they learn that the story of the shaman being kidnapped by the olmecs where the truth and that the cave probably is the end point of his escape from the Olmecs. Leguerra and Mendoza checks it out and believe it might lead to the Olmec base, but fail to notice the shadow of Ambrosius lingering around. Mendoza, Leguerra and Gaspard tries to get to the Olmec base while the others head to Chompard to begin constructing the city. At the castle Esteban is reunited with his father again that seems to be cured from his radioactive poisoning. He has to leave and assemble people he can think of helping them construct the city. Hopefully they save Mayuka that was imprisoned back in season 2 episode 1. Also, Nostradamus appears and informs us that the cataclysm will happen during the summer solstice, 3 months from the present day.

More Maasai documentary and a bit of the creatures of the savanna like giraffes and ostriches.

The Mysterious Cities of Gold - S4E20 - The Sacrifice

 

It's time to DUEL!

The adults are reunited with Gaspard and Leguerra and are to be brought to a lake for the sacrifice to appease the demons that have cast the locusts upon the maasai village. The sacrifice is a duel between to people on top of a rickety bridge over this lake of poison that I think turns them to stone or something like that. Mendoza and Gaspard is first and fight each other to settle their differences from the first season and onward.

The kids was able to locate them and finding a kid that have been around they learn that the demons appears to be olmecs that kidnaps children like they did back in the first season, the shaman being one of them that returned. They arrive at the sacrifice and Zia uses the crown from the fire witch to summon the locusts that chase away the shaman. They are all freed and sets out together.

The documentary is more about the maasai village and the women's role in their society as well as a bit info on locusts swarms.

The Mysterious Cities of Gold - S4E19 - Fallen From the Sky

 

Guess they saw the Exorcist II: The Heretic.

Gaspard and Leguerra is captured by the maasai tribe warriors and brought to their village. The shaman is ordering them as a sacrifice to appease the spirits that have sent the locusts toward them. They try to escape but are quickly surrounded. 

Our heroes are beginning to prepare the building of the city, but news from Zimbabwe is talking about disturbances (told you it was gonna be a riot) so the king, Mendoza, Esteban and Zia returns and is able to calm the people with a really empowering speech, I think, it sounded good and I think the auto-subtitles got the gist of it. Tao appears and tells them that to complete the city they need the artefacts Ambrosius had gathered and they don't know where he is. The princess tells them that the tom-tom (I assume it's a drumming system, like in the Phantom and Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers) talked about a crashed ship near Kilimanjaro. Which explain how information could travel so fast over Africa. They leave and Pedro gets a kiss from the princess.

They find the crash site and also notices the maasai warriors so the adults let themselves become captured since they figured they must be the footprints besides the survivors. The children follows in the condor, but as they are intercepted by another locust cloud they loose track of them and then they are completely engulfed by the locusts.

And the documentary was about the maasai tribe in Kenya and then cattle markets. Which makes me recall that I heard about maasai's as a kid, but I don't recall connecting it to an African tribe. 

The Mysterious Cities of Gold - S4E18 - Beyond the Mirror

 

Calm before the whirlpool.

They head back to Zimbabwe and then onward to Chambord, running past the king and finding Nostradamus and confirms his predictions. As he runs away they investigate the salamanders around the castle which leads them to an F they push and it pulls the special staircase down underground, leading to a lake and some inscriptions on to slabs of stone with salamanders in pools of oils or whatever they burn creating the fire scenario from the prophecy. Next is the mirror and that is obviously the lake. Esteban is diving into it finding some structure, but Tao find some contraption that activates and drains the water, revealing a giant golden cube. Putting in the medallions reveal instructions gathered from all cities of gold.

At the same time Mendoza and the king of Zimbabwe is meeting with Francis I and as he show them the staircase they follow the children and witnessing the golden cube. Back in Zimbabwe Sancho and Pedro is snapped up by the princess, but they have given up hope and only talks about the end of the world. One of the guards overhears so I'm guessing we will have a riot or something.

At the same time Gaspard and Leguerra is wandering the savanna until another swarm of locust appear and they hid in a cave. After the locust disappear they discover that the paintings looks like the Mu pyramid and the olmecs, and as they look out of the cave they are surrounded by several warriors from the tribe that have been watching them.

The documentary focused on the staircase and the emblems of the castle.

The Mysterious Cities of Gold - S4E17 - Revelations

 

I assume it's the rainbow colours, but it looks like two yellow and is indigo missing?

The kids return as the city of gold reverts back, and the light bridge take form. As they are about to leave Zia gives the white gorilla the helmet, and they place it at the cave entrance and starts working up a frenzy, almost feels like 2001: A Space Odyssey. They tell the others about the meteor heading for Earth but they don't know how or when to stop it. All they know is that it has something to do with fire and that it seems connected to the image of the salamander. They decide to use the Gate of the Elders to get to Chambord and talk to Nostradamus as he as an astronomer might predict when it will happen.

Back at the castle he has indeed predicting the end of the world. The other in the Order don't believe him and then Francis I shows up reading the final line of the prediction about the enemy long thought gone is making a return and we are back at the Olmec base and Ambrosius climbs up and filled with rage against all who has betrayed him and a red light envelops his skin and he seems to have healed himself, probably due to bathing in the light of the philosopher's stone.

Back with Leguerra and Gaspard they finally have been able to fix the airship and is about to set sail towards Spain, constantly guarded by to African warriors, but they suddenly disappear and they are attacked by a locust swarm that they try to escape but they crash the ship yet again and this time it's probably for good.

The documentary was about the tree that inspired the city of gold, everything from living up to a 1 000 years, storing 10 000 litres of water, the healing properties and the food you can get from the tree as well as some candy made from it.

The Mysterious Cities of Gold - S4E16 - Orunigi

 

Getting Final Fantasy IX vibes... and they had two giant trees.

The storm forces them to crash land in the Congo jungle. There they are surrounded by gorillas who seems ready to attack them, but Zia uses her mind reading abilities to talk to them, but the smell of leopard on them causes the main gorilla to go berserk and is about to attack Mendoza when another, white gorilla intervenes and fight it off, and seems to react to Zia's medallion... I got two references here. First, Lovecraft since I read a couple of his stories by now and he seemed to have the idea of precursor humans that was more apelike and their reaction to this puts my mind toward that area. The second is that this is an homage too Tarzan with the white ape and the leopard hostility. Kinda clever, but no Phil Collin songs sadly.

Have a soft spot for the Swedish versions.

Zia gets the mask and the gorillas seems to go in a frenzy. The white gorilla takes them to a mountain by a ravine and points out the 6th city beyond the ravine. Zia puts on the mask and sees a golden path across, but Esteban's vertigo makes him unable to move on. As a call back to the first season Zia reminds him of the promise he made that he would always protect her and that now she will do the same. The gorillas prevents the adults from crossing with the children so the kids hold hands as Zia leads them with the mask, getting stuck only once as Estebans courage fails him in the middle of the light bridge. It's actually a sweet moment as he sits their shivering with tears falling and his friends supporting him to stand again so that they can continue.

When they get to the other side the mask shows them marking on the trees leading to a structure where they use the medallions to summon the 6th city in the form of a gigantic tree, and they call back to Tao's home on the Galápagos. Seems someone wanted to tie the whole series in with call backs to all seasons it seems. There they find a projection of one of the Ancients, and according to the translation it seems to be more Atlantean in this part of the world. The projection recap the war, but warns them off an even greater danger. The astronomer from Mu and Atlantis foresaw that a meteor was coming toward Earth and that it would take 12 000 years for it to arrive and might destroy the planet. Suddenly we're are in Final Fantasy VII!

The documentary of course focused on the Gorillas, but also giant ants. Wonder if that will show up. But this means 6 cities have been found and that they need to build the 7th one in order to destroy or alter the course of the meteor to save the planet. Which probably will destroy the city and leave the course of the world toward what we have today, explaining why none of the Atlantean or Mu tech was used to advance us into the future.

The Mysterious Cities of Gold - S4E15 - The Witch

 

The People Laughed Until She Said, "Burn"!

Tao and Esteban climbs down to the cliff where Zia is and she leads them to what she found, a shelter constructed by those that made the golden cities, seemingly being of both Atlantean and Mu heritage. They see the sages from the different cities they encountered in holographic form as golden statues and as they activate them they show a map toward the sixth city. They climb out and Kokapetl awakens and tell them Mendoza is a prisoner and need them to rescue him.

Meanwhile Sancho and Pedro is able to untie him and knock out several of the leopard men. Mendoza corners the queen in her channeling chamber by using water to douse her fire where she summons the fire leopard. With that he takes the mask. But the adults are surrounded outside with another fire leopard and the queen uses the mind powers to grab the mask and Mendoza's sword. Mendoza do what he usually does and start goading her with her inferiority toward a little girl with more powers than her that actually can wear the mask that she doesn't dare try on. As the fire leopard engulfs them the condor arrives and puts out the flame and then makes the queen lose her crown and Mendoza's sword. Mendoza corners her but in a last ditch attempt she throws the mask in the fire so that it can't be used by anyone. This makes her men lose faith in her since she destroyed it so they leave her leaving her powerless. Pedro investigate the mask and as the wood is burned away it reveals a mask of orichalcium that looks like the mask the High Priest of Eldorado wore from season 1. They fly away and follows the Congo River as shown by the map and Zia puts on the mask for more information as a storm suddenly appears. Which I feel is another retcon since I thought the condor needed constant daylight to fly and that it crashed immediately as the sun disappeared (or so I recalled it from season 1, but it might just have been entering a Mu ruin that dragged it to the ground).

The documentary was even more about the Dogon region the city was in and about the traditions of the elder who is made guardians of a temple and can never leave it, but is blessed with infinite knowledge from snakes that whispers it to them in their sleep.

The Mysterious Cities of Gold - S4E14 - The Spirit's Cliff

You know, this screenshot reminds me of King's Quest VII and Valanice in the well.

 Mendoza, Tao and Esteban is informed by Sancho and Pedro that the Leopard men was the one staging the attack and they spot them leaving the village so they run after. Mendoza duel one of them and is able to capture him. Esteban and Tao try to follow the others with the mask and Zia, but they can't keep up. In the morning after the fire is out they unmask the captive and he belongs to the village. The chieftain informs them that he won't talk since he is too afraid of his queen. She apparently sought Zia and the mask since with it she could hold sway over most of the tribes in the area and since Zia could use it she was a threat to the queens own powers. They notice a tattoo on the captive and a child mentions it looks like the one from the forbidden city in the mountain. The chieftain gives them the directions to it.

The adults go into the city while Tao and Esteban lands the corridor on the cliff and wait for them. Mendoza gets attacked and have a great action scene with his cape and Sancho and Pedro is able to knock out two leopard men and escape being captive. Mendoza isn't as lucky and is tied to a pole and Zia is dragged before him. The queen arrives and put on a crown like Zia used back in season 3 where she learned most of her powers. The Queen demands Zia tells her how see the visions and the secret city, but Zia refuses so the Queen uses her powers in order to manifest a fire leopard that are about to swallow Mendoza, but Zia seems more powerful and stops it. The queen order her to be taken to the cave of spirits without food or water to soften her up. Tao and Esteban notice her being taken to the cave and Zia finds another cave within the ave hidden by a statue with ancient markings, leading her to what I assume is the 6th city, but they cut away from it before reveal.

The documentary is about the inspiration for the cliff side city, which looks a bit like some native American city that I read about in a Don Rosa Scrooge McDuck comic. The one where the running gag is Donald getting stuck with a constantly refreshed contact glue, The Dutchman's Secret.

The Mysterious Cities of Gold - S4E13 - The Night of the Masks

Ooh, see that girl
Watch that scene
Digging the dancing queen

Halfway through the season. Leguerra and Gaspard is trapped and tries to get the airship floating again. The olmecs gets an Olmecian flying machine and are about to blow them up with a destruction ray, but with some bombs and the liquid orichalcium Leguerra is able to create a bomb that stops the olmecs machine, and with another bomb she opens up the gate and they can escape.

Meanwhile our heroes have been taking a nap on the savanna, talking about the creation of the 7th city and even namedropping the Solaris, a ship from season 1. Mendoza wakes up shouting Leguerre's name as he seems to have visions of her predicament. Lucky for them he is awake when the Leopard men attack so they can defend themselves from them. They set off and a montage in the style of what I assume is classical African paintings shows our heroes traveling different tribes to find the origins of the mask. They end up in a village that prepares the Night of the Mask where they will dance and in honour of the returning mask. They also knows for some reason that Zia can wear the mask without getting hurt... since the kids have the condor and travels rather fast with it compared to walking or running I find it a bit of stretch, same goes for the leopard men that shows up, first getting Sancho and Pedro, then putting a hut to flames and then snatching the mask and Zia. The leopard men seems to be seen as bandits lead by this queen. Don't get what they are about.

And then it ends pretty much on Leguerra and Gaspard crashing the airship since their is a hole in the balloon. And the documentary is about the different tribes and how there is a special hut for talking that has such a short ceiling that if one gets angry and stand up you bonk your head. Also, the translation was talking something about the bad guy Obama for some reason and I found that really funny.

The Mysterious Cities of Gold - S4E12 - Farewell Master!

 

He probably will be back.

Ambrosius starts up the philosopher's stone in a bid to get immortality. At the same time Gaspard and Leguerra finds the armoury and the frozen bodies off the olmecs. They escape the big muscle of the olmecs. Ambrosius gets taken hostages by the others. Apparently the stone used to belong to the Atlanteans but was stolen away by the so called pacifists in order to stop the war. The stone is really a conduit like everything else and is going to be used in order to awaken all the olmecs. Leguerra rescues Ambrosius and spill the beans about the olmecs plans and as they try to escape Ambrosius suits up and want to go back, but the others have had enough of his schemes and after a tussle he falls off, but when Leguerra is about to drag him up by his hook-shot, it fails and he seemingly falls to his death. Gaspard gets control of the ship, but the gate to base closes and they crash.

Meanwhile Zia, Tao and the boy returns with mask to the village and is told that the mask must be brought back to its home, this unknown city. To find it they must follow the patterns on the mask in reverse order since it has chronicled the journey of the mask. And as they leave the woman elder tells the boy yet another part of the story, that when the mask returns, the end of times is near. And then we see a city in a cave where a woman in leopard dress dances, a leopard dressed warrior appears and tells her that a girl is on their way and they head out.

The documentary was about the Ethiopian highlands that was the inspiration for the ravine where the Olmec base was hiding. With this I can't see another end that Ambrosius have to make a redemption sacrifice and die at the end saving... maybe Tao since he seemed closest to him. The Olmecs have clearly taken over the villain part of the show and it ramps up. Also, the first seconds of the episode amazing with the small hints of synths and the visuals of the base looks just fantastic. Gets vibes from the Burning Shield back in season 1.

The Mysterious Cities of Gold - S4E11 - The Bako

 

(He's Back) The Man the Behind the Mask!

And He's Out of Control!

Zia flies toward Mozambique and she also have a stowaway, the boy hunter that happened to be in the condor as well. They sneak in by the sewers and is caught in Gomez office as they have grabbed the mask. The boy tricks Gomez to put the mask on and as he does it shines with golden light and he screams and runs off the balcony and lands on the ground. Zia and the boy grabs the mask and runs back through the sewers and Zia tells the rats to attack the soldiers. Back at the condor she puts on the mask and is again granted a vision. This time on top of another city of gold as Sancho and Pedro is sobbing and Esteban tries to pull Mendoza away. Zia isn't able to speak and she sees Tao through a could off fog and as she runs toward him he is pulled back and then falls off and disappears from the city and then she wakes up.

With this fear of Tao's life she heads toward Zimbabwe and drops the boy of the king's sister that longs for Pedro and ask the king permission to use the gate now that she have both medallions since Esteban gave his to her before the duel to avoid injuries. She finds Tao and he tells her of da Vinci's clues and show her the Mona Lisa that seems to have inscriptions in the eyes. Right eye just a signature of da Vinci, but the other had a code that Zia translates to "build the seventh city", meaning that the 7th city doesn't exist, but they have to build it. so I was wrong back at the final of the second season about the cities, but right regarding the Olmecs at least.

Speaking of the Olmecs, back at their base they set out fixing the airship and Ambrosius goes away to experiment on the stone. Gaspard and Leguerra eavesdrop on the three Olmecs and they are on their way of getting rid of them since they only need Ambrosius. The one Esteban saved show some hesitation on what they are about to do.

There was also a brief scene in the beginning when we were back in India from Ambrosius old base where a girl from the village (can't recall if she was an important character in the last season) is taking some fruit where she encounters Estebans father Darth Vader style as he goes out from his healing chamber. I think they hinted at him knowing about Tao in Chambard. 

Documentary about how Saint Sebastian seemed to actually be alive during nighttime with markets and and other things and then a bit about the Mona Lisa and the mysteries surrounding the painting. Beside the usual I didn't know that some believed that it was sort of a hidden self portrait of da Vinci. Interesting!

The Mysterious Cities of Gold - S4E10 - The Lady Who Smiles

 

Främling, vad döljer du för mig!

I dina mörka ögon!

Episode starts with Kokapetl getting kidnapped by an African boy who is doing some initiation rite and as Esteban shows up to rescue the bird he gets caught in the trap that was set for another animal. Zia shows up and they take the condor to follow the boy. They end up by a village that happens to be the village from where the people they saved from slavery belongs to and where Mendoza and the other had ended up. To get Kokapetl back Esteban and the boy have to duel which he wins.

Zia meanwhile finds the mask she saw in her dream from episode 2 and the woman they saved explained that they make copies from the real one since they want to take it with them as good luck charms. Sancho appears and tells Zia that he saw the real one back at Gomez place. Zia tries to tell Esteban, but he's so full of himself from the victory that he pretty much hurts her feelings when he boast that he could have gotten the stone from Ambrosius. Zia take the condor by herself and flies to Saint Sebastian.

Meanwhile at Ambrosius the nasty Olmec sabotage the engine to get Ambrosius to head back to base. I assume that it's because the stone that might be able to cure the Olmecs condition.

And as that is going on Tao wanders the castle with Nostradamus looking for clues from da Vinci and ends up finding the Mona Lisa... I was just kidding about the da Vinci Code. I gather also that they hint that da Vinci might be a reincarnated person, probably one of the sages, from Mu and that is how he got the knowledge, or someone told him about it.

The documentary was more about the castle how they prepared and emptied it for the king's arrival and departure and something about him only spending a total of 72 days there. And Kokapetl talked about the tapestries and their function as isolation from the cold.

The Mysterious Cities of Gold - S4E9 - The Stone of Eternity

 

A fate unknown, the Arkenstone
What was stolen must be returned

Sancho and Pedro is able to knock out Gaspard before he shoots Mendoza. Mendoza orders Sancho and Pedro to get Gaspard away together with the Olmec that seems to not be as violently inclined like his brethren. Zia is able to get back the medallions as well as the philosopher's stone, but as she does it seems the gravitation is set back for the stone so they plunge into a whirlpool down below. Mendoza joins and they are washed out into the falls. The same for the other group as the city is filled with water. The olmec that never entered climbs back to the airship and picks up Ambrosius.

The olmecs with the others is knocked out and is saved by Esteban and he now according to the atlantean code of honour now lies his life to Esteban. Shocker! This must be a retcon since I thought it was clear that the olmecs just was a third ancient civilisation that survived the war by hiding, but apparently they are atlantean soldiers lying dormant in the wait to awaken. If the translation is correct there where 4 different sites around the world, and we know 2 of them... maybe three if the frozen olmec in season 2 was anything to go by. Gaspard ends up by the shore with a bunch of crocodiles and fight his way out until Esteban and the Olmec stumbles upon him. Esteban hides and looks for the others as the olmec covers for him.

Zia and Kokapetl wash up somewhere else with the stone and is then caught by Ambrosius that sends the olmec after her. After a tussle he's about to take the stone, but Leguerra shows up and take the stone, sets Zia free and returns to Ambrosius. Zia finds the golden condor and no one else.

Meanwhile Tao and the Order of the Hourglass looks into the paintings of da Vinci making it almost like The Da Vinci Code, but instead it is visions of the seven cities hidden in his paintings. Which tells us that Ophir was the fifth city and there are clues to the sixth city by da Vinci, and apparently a hidden seventh.

The documentary talks about the Zambezi river and the bicycle Tao was riding around the castle with. Apparently some believes that the drawing in da Vinci's books looked too modern and might be a forgery. Never knew that, only heard that is was a da Vinci concept.