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[twillight]

This is an FMV adventure-game. Not like Dungeon's Lair, which was motion-capture (so now I know what happened to FMV games), but live action stuff.


It is unlike Phantasmagoria 2 way more serious, adult if you like. And the interface is a bit clunky, could have been polished. But it look like ok. But I guess it'll take more time than I have right now, and that it is half-german, without subtitles, doesn't help either.


Also, don't forget to read the manual! it'll save you a bunch of headache, because the interface looks waaay too complex when you turn this on the first time. PLus there is a clue for a unique-mechanic puzzle.

[twillight]

I dunno what this wanned to be. Point&Click adventure, or visual novel.
Either way, it has 3 possible endings, from which one is unlocked by picking up that makeshift-weapon, another possibly by refusing to pick it up - or you have that and the 3rd unlocked either way.


Anyway, it is waaay to short, even for 4 bucks you get what, 20-30 minutes "gameplay" - actualy maybe 10 min gameplay and 10 min unskippable cutscene.
At best worth 1$, but just why bother.


This thing also eats too much memory for its own good. I mean lagging in this? C'mon!


PS: I did not do it before ditching the trial, but it seems possible to use the sharpened sawmill on the other door, so the game MIGHT have SOME hidden variation I do not know of. But beside this puzzle, it's just... It should be free.

[twillight]

This is an interresting one, though I wonder when it'll become at least a bit of a challenge.
So you roam around on a fixed map (no procedural generation), in a combat-system very much like Binding Isaac. The gimmick here is, you can change forms during combat, and customize your forms as needed.

The start is kinda interresting, even makes you think a little bit, on the other hand you soon find out things respawn if you leave the area, and death has barely any consequence aside porting to the nearest save-point and respawning some monsters.

The important thing is, you gain XP for the "original form", and FPs (form points) for the various forms. This means you'll get stuck with the rat for quite a chunk of time (until you meet the hammer, which unlocks the cutomisability of your forms).
This is a shame, because eg. in the first star-door-dungeon you are pretty much forced to fight as the rat (only that having the required elemental type for attacking the local monsters).

One of the weaker points of the game is, it is built to use a controller, though they did everything to make the gameplay keyboard -friendly too. But switching between the forms with hotkeys (1, 2, 3 etc.) would have been even more convenient. Not that you want to switch oh-so-much with customization being an option.

Anyway, try to advance with what you can, and here is a hint: you'll need the robot form for a quest available pretty early, teasing you to no end. The quest is to stand a hit from a dude who hits you 100% of your HP - the robot has a passive that circumwents this issue.
Annoying, I know. Especialy that you can't just look up all the attributes of the forms, data is only shown when advancing your form-levels. Argh!

But it's a pretty fun game otherwise. Have high hopes for NewGame+ mode.


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Forms:

Nobody:
size: normal
drawback: it can't have any ability, so don't bother being in this form unless mandatory. It has a base melee attack though until you get another form.

Rat:
size: small
drawback: its leveling is hindered by story-progression at certain times

Egg:
size: small
drawback: can only level up by special encounters (nests)

Guard:
size: normal
advantage: pretty tanky. Harvests mana like no other.
drawback: not really

Horse:
size: normal
advantage: it's a solid transitional form
drawback: awkward controls and attack-pattern. Not very tanky.

Magician:
size: normal
advantage: summons stuff
drawback: the summons are constantly loosing HP just by existing, the rabbit is kinda useless, the tiger is at best 33% to spawn
NOTE: its base attack is MELEE, so don't expect your usual wizardry

Turtle:
size: small
advantage: can swim (just walk into the "water"
disadvantage: no dmg, no HP, terrible moves.

Ranger:
size: normal
advantage: basic attack is ranged (costs no mana)
disadvantage: slow and awkward to use
NOTE: at least one dungeon demands ranged damage exclusively, so keep that in mind

Slug:
size: small
advantage: its basic attack is ranged, and generates mana very quickly So if you can solve swapping between this and the ranger, you have one blasting combo
disadvantage: it requires a passive slot to overcome its slow speed, but otherwise this form is surprisingly good

NOTE: some "form quest" requires BS things, like kill 10+ enemies with 1 attack, or hit one enemy 20 times.
The first can be solved going to the edge of an area, with a group of monsters close, or some monster groups close enough to each other, and hope your manapool will last long enough.
The other type of quest is very annoying a sit obviously limits your progress. Like if you pumped your dmg ASAP at the shop, or thorugh the token-system, or something, I bet you can even softlock the game for you.
NOTE 2: also found an artificial barrier on the Slug-tier, so the Monk, Rogue, Robot and Necromancer as well as the Dragon can not be unlocked until waaay deep in the story. There is SOME story.

Mermaid:
size: normal
advantage: can swim (not as fast as the turtle), ranged attacker.
disadvantage: its attacks are clumsy.

Body Builder:
size: normal
advantage: it can hit a bunch of monster in one go
disadvantage: its attack has a bit of a delay on it, plus it is a projectile with immense width, so it can get stuck in narrow corridors, doing nothing. It also refuses to work if stairs are in the way.
This is not a bad build, and if you get it zombie-making, it's hilariously overpowered.

Ghost:
size: normal
advantage: "floats" (poisonus liquid and lava still effects it, so it's totaly swimming)
disadvantage: this thing is a waste of space. It is supposed to be an aura-attacker, but the aura-size is too small, and you need like 3+ enemies at once attacking you at close proximity to enlarge it, while you don't have any kind of defense, no active attack. This aura also does not generate mana either to make other options accessible. As said: a waste of space. It is worse than the turtle, and that's an achievement.

Zombie:
size: normal
advantage: pretty good in combat
disadvantage: it constantly looses HP
You'll have to use this to unlock some of the Advanced Forms, so use it if your HP is high, mana is ok, and only when encountering some mob. Do NOT walk around in it between fights.

NOTE: basicaly (with 1 area on the NW, and the expansion's area) until you collect the 3 Shards, you are locked into the bottom 2 row of the map. This is still enough to "max out" all your available forms, and I did not even ivsit the dungeons without quest! That's somehow awesome.
I mean I upped pretty much everything to rank B, where the last moves are unlocked. Some forms only have 3 moves (so my zombie form is at C). I suspect that some of the forms which do not relate to the afformentioned Advanced Forms can be pushed to whatever level, B was plenty for me, I mean I even B-ed turtle, which is just the worst.
Oh, and the Egg also reaches rank B here! Crap, maybe there is even more, because there are 2 areas on the bottom two rows where no quest sent me, so I just left them for now.
ANOTHER NOTE: there is that horse-racing minigame for the mage guild. I THINK I had 2 races, won the first with Glaop and the "you have 100 speed minimum" passive. The second race I gave the horse the snail's slime which DOUBLES the speed-bonus compared to Gallo, and used Dodge to dash in when in the finish line. Picking up the raddish to boost the mana (via a passive) was also key. I tell you this, because I still not invested token into ANY skills.

Rogue:
size: normal
advantage: not much
disadvantage: pretty lackluster form with a very complicated basic attack.

Necromancer:
size: big
advantage: you do a mid-range force-lightning for free, and has an ok-strong summon which even lasts long
disadvantage: because of its size it can have trouble at unexpected places, also a bit slow. For some reason it can also loose HP very rapidly.

Robot:
size: big
advantage: kinda solid - on paper
disadvantage: it's missile requires enemies staying in range, so it's like useless if the enemy notices you, or an object is in your way. It also tends not to 1HKO enemies etc. The melee attack is nice, but pretty slow. So this form is not optimal if you ask me.

Dragon:
size: big
advantage: floats (it is immun to lava, but not to fire in general. Not sure about poisonous liquids.)
disadvantage: mainly a ranged attacker, though solid in either way. Worthy to unlock.

NOTE: ,uch lower level enemies get the "fear2 condition - AND DON'T EVEN COUNT AS "baddies" ANYMORE!

Because of challenges, you'll want these abilities upgraded to the max:
- Hardened Shell (egg)
- Incubate (egg)
- Hat Trick (mage)
- Slime Slide (slug)
- Fleet Footed (nobody)
- Magic Life (nobody)
- Boo (ghost, 3 was ennough)
- Horse Power (horse, 3 was enough)

NOTE: the Nobody form only requires rank B to max out his skills, while all other forms demand rank S.

For the final thief-initiation use Ghost Form with Fleet Footed passive (maxed), caltrops (1st wave), gallop (2nd wave), holy light + boo (final wave). one Boo lasts through the whole ordeal, so activate it whenever you like.

The mage guild just wants you to do some dungeon-work, nothing special, though once they'll charge you for 3,000 gold.

The fighters include the ranger form too for whatever reason. Either way: Fireball from dragon form will solve the ranger task, and Dragon Form in general also works wonders during the not-form-related quests (especialy the final one).

Whackamelee (Colosseum Challenge)
form: Rogue
passive: sure footed (4), mermaid resolve (any), magic lifeű
actives: pump up (any), flex (any)
strategy: pump back up when your buff drops to 3. Without Sure Footed the whole thing is a gamble, as spinner-enemies will just headspawn you, and interrupt your flex.

Barrel Breaker:
form: ghost
passive: mana shield, quick cooldown, horse power
actives: boo, holy light
strategy: for this to work you need to be hit by the fire-fans (hence mana shield), and gain mana from the barrels (thus horse power). You also need Boo active, so you cann ot spare quick cooldown, so you do not have space for Fleet Footed. So you must write up the patterns. There will be 5 waves, the number of set of barrels are: 4, 5, 6, 4, 5. For the patterns watch a video, but you can start from these notes: up, down, diagonaly up left to right, diagonaly down right to left. Left, right, up, down, center. Complicated. NW corner, SE corner, SW corner, NE corner. a whole circle starting from NE, and finaly the center. It is fairly easy once you know the setup and the patterns.


Power Defense:
form: necromancer
passive: magic life, quick cooldown, zomnomnom
active: necrotic lightning (necro default), arrow of flurry, water spray, rattler turret
strategy: your main damage-source will be the turrets. Use the other abilities to break wards (immunities on monsters). You ARE able to stack turrets at one point if you want to. Always start the level by pulling the lever and putting down a turret right there, then move to the side so you are in the first U-junction. Level up your skills as needed.

[twillight]

Ward Swap Boss
from: killer bee
bronze:
passives: crit cleric, slug secret, poison tipped
actives: killer sting, pump up, slime slide
strategy: strat with pump up*5 for buff and to break the boss' immunity. Then stick with killer sting. The poison from the passives should take care of dark immunity showing up, if not, that's why I put up slime slide.

silver: dark, light immunity
passives: crit cleric, slug secret, poison tipped
actives: killer sting, slime slide, pump up, water spray
strategy: Start with pump up*5 for more damage. No minion will spawn until you break the first ward. Aftert hat the minions will autohit you, not chance to manouver around. instantly swap in water spray, and start stinging. Because of the autodamage from the minions you'll need to upgrade you Crit Cleric passive for this (or slug's secret, or buy all stat-upgrade from the shop, those MIGHT work too).

gold:
passives: same
actives: pump up, killer sting
strategy: for some reason this challenge does not take away you pre-buffs, so pump up five times right before entering. You mana will be refilled instantly, hehe. Then sting it to death. To make this work you have to pump out dmg ultra fast, so you have to pump up your skills and stats. You definitely don ot have everything maxed out, so do whatever you feel comfortable with. Ranking the bee to S would probably pay out the most - so you can max out Sting, which would make the 0.5 sec delay disappear -, but I just didn't want to do that for now.

Dance, Dance
form: ghost
passives: fleet footed, quick cooldown, horsepower (huh?)
actives: rattler turret, barrier coil, arrow of fury, boo
strategy: I suggest upping the skills as much as you can (meaning rank 3-4), and setting the actives to match the direction of the immunities: light on the left, sword on the right. spook is fixed, but it is another fire-and-forget skill, so this won't pose much problem.
The trick is, to keep all your timed spells active. You do NOT "kill" the things coming at you, don't worry, you hit them and that's only whatt he game wants. Now again: KEEP YOUR SPELLS ACITVE. You have some leaway for Boo, but whenever you have half a second, lay down another barrier and turret! The turret is the most tricky, as you need it all the way down, possibly the middle of the road, so it will work for you. And keep an eye that you always shoot to the right with the arrows!
It's far from impossible if you realise you just have to keep renewing your spells (turret, barrier, boo), and just shoot whatever comes from the right. My record is 2 miss, but with some practice probably could go for 0. Warning though, once I had 5, and somehow the game still failed me mission! Maybe I missed when it turned 6, but if it happens to you, don't freak out.


A trick to level up a form: go into the Imppossible Dungeon. The goal is NOT progress within the dungeon, but to fill out your quest-bars.


NOTE: leveling up Nobody's only skill is actualy worthwile, as it generates an immense amount of mana just by breaking pots. 3-4 pots broken will fill up your entire mana-bar.
NOTE: if you need HP-healing, you should switch into Egg Form, because the skill heals number of HPs, but when you switch forms the HP% is transfered. It's a bit tricky, but in the dragon's tower I used this trick mid-battle against the boss there.


the Impossible Dungeon (gaining Dino Form):
don't be like me ton ot notice the Need To Kill counter on the top of the screen. And this build though at times inconvenient (when you fight single monsters to start with), but helluva resilient against big mobs, which is pretty much what Impossible Dungeon is made of (and you encounter mostly nowhere else).
form: turtle
passives: zomnomnom, strongman, crit cleric
actives: to be honest, you'll mostly just spam the basic attack. Add defensive/offensive buff moves if you feel like, and ward-breakers too (water spray for light damage will probably be the first absolutely necessary on the way to Floor 12). Floor 10-11 has sword immunity, so swap in that arrow-spell or whatever. Lvl 12 minions has that brown thing (hammer?) immunity, so the turtle is in its element. The boss don't have any ward on it. Definitely buff yourself to the brim, and bring Holy Light to the arena to hasten the process. This floor COUNTS.