Final Fantasy Adventure Part #8 - Sorrow! Will Rock end up Alone?

Part 8: Sorrow! Will Rock end up Alone?

The desert is an interesting new area with a few rather bizarre monsters running about. The scorpions are rather flat, but the bug eyed things look kind of cute.

There are also sand crocodiles, which have an important role later.

On the far side of the desert is a quaint little shop that sells magic in a can. These items will give you a couple of uses of magic spells, and in some cases are more powerful than your own spells.

In the northeast corner is this area, which should be seen as a warning.

When you head east from here, the way is actually blocked by poison gas of all things. We wake up in the screen we just left.

Intriguingly enough, there's also a vine that leads up to a small plateau with... absolutely nothing on it.

As the vegetation grows more dense, we're getting closer to civilization.

The town of Jadd is, if anything, even more intimidating than Wendel on the outside. Unfortunately it's also a no chocobo zone.

Immediately upon entering Jadd the music stops. For a game that takes as much care in its musical score as FFA, this is a very bad sign. The first person we meet in town doesn't hesitate to share his opinion.

Evidently the local gentry isn't at all shy about showing their wealth.

We can also finally get a clue about the gas, although it's rather

. How does harp music affect poison gas?

This kid's got a secret and wants us to trade a rare good for it. I'm sure more than a few of you have harsh memories about this.

Many people went to his place and never came back!

...and Davias has now taken a turn for the evil.

It's by the oasis at the desert, but it's hard to find.

Having a monster for a parent can't have helped matters. Part of me can't help but think of Grendel.

How and why does he know this?

You might guess that being turned into an animal counts as a curse. You'd be right.

The town also features a nice upgrade for our armor, and we can certainly afford it. Let's go see Davias himself...

... Amanda...? Oh, yes! ....that girl. She went to the cave of Medusa. Nobody ever came back from there alive though.

I'm surprised there's not a villainous muahahahaha at the end of this.

Hell yes, he's going with us.

This is an oasis, but there is no cave.

In the southeast corner of the desert is a little inn if you need a rest after combing the sands for Bags of Fang or oases. Speaking of Bags of Fang, remember the sand crocodiles?

Killing the sand crocodiles will result in either an empty chest or a Bag of Fang to exchange for, to be honest, a not entirely helpful clue.

This secret message is "palm trees and 8" which I'm sure many of you have terrible memories about. You know what? Fuck that kid. I'm not walking all the way back there for that stupid clue.

The cave itself is at this oasis, where you can see the two palm trees standing in front of the cliff face. Somehow you're supposed to take the clue palm trees and eight and come to the conclusion that the right thing to do is to walk around these two trees and form a figure eight.

I'm sorry. I had to bring it to Davias. That Pendant was to exchange for my brother. But...

The old "Sure, you can have him back. Too bad he's a parrot now. I didn't say anything about uncursing him" trick.

I must get the tears of Medusa to uncurse him!

.. Amanda ... I'll help you.

Thank you.

For her Ask command Amanda has the very useful ability to heal the stone status effect.

We've got a variety of new enemies to fight in here. Shadows are fast and can inflict dark, and take a few hits to go down. The cobras are poisonous as you might expect, and the golems are immune to physical attacks and can cause the stone status. The lizards...eh, are lizards.

The golems also drop Flame spells, the instrument of their own demise.

The way forward is through the wall here. By the way, the dagger you see is Amanda's attack.

There are, however, no breakable walls here. Sometimes a pattern is just a pattern.

The designers of the dungeon were, however, kind enough to put some creepy statues to point the way we'll eventually need to go. But first, there's still some treasure we need to get that was mentioned back in Menos.

Entering this room, the door closes behind us. Two lizards is a rather weak guardian for a free set of gold armor.

The ice spell is guided by the direction pad and can circle around indefinitely if you need it to. The spell turns the enemy into a snowman that can be pushed around or destroyed with a couple of attacks. However, you get no experience for killing a snowman.

Passing between the creepy statues brings us to this room, which serves as a bit of a primer for the idea that you can use snowmen to trip switches.

The next room has live spiders to use the ice spell on. This can be a bit frustrating if Amanda is too effective with her daggers and manages to kill them all.

And then after that there is a room full of mice and zombies.

This certainly looks desolate...you know, all the pre-boss rooms start to look the same after a while.

Boss Fight: Medusa

Medusa Boss Video

The fight with Medusa can be either one of the easiest or the hardest ones for the game depending on how you approach it. The spear is a prime tool for attacking from a distance, and the fire spell has no difficulty hitting her. She attacks with flying snakes and body blows, with actual contact being enough to kill us in a couple of seconds. That said you might be wondering why I'd say she's easy, but if you watch the video you might see the answer in her pattern. Medusa never moves down into the bottom third of the screen, and you can block her snakes with the Gold Shield. Once you figure that out, the battle is as good as won.