Part 32: Kibombo, Part 1

Now we're going to backtrack across the entire two continents again, still for no discernible reason. Just for reference, by this time last game we had already fought the main antagonists, climbed a lighthouse, and gathered a full party; I really don't understand how Camelot managed to take a step backwards in this.

If you're talking about the pirate incident, I believe we resolved that to everyone's satisfaction.

Madra is out its money, Alhafra is jealous of Madra's prosperity (?), Briggs is in jail, Piers spent time in jail for absolutely no reason, the boat isn't getting fixed, and Champa is still starving. I don't think there's actually a single person who's satisfied with how any of that got "resolved".

This has nothing to do with the Champa this time, old man! This time, the Kibombo attacked us!
Wait... Did you say you were attacked again? By the Kibombo?

If I have to put up with Camelot constantly reminding me of Kraden's role in the game, you get to put up with me constantly reminding you that, yes, this is still Kraden's role in the game.

Was anything stolen?
Only a single black orb... Everything else was untouched. Maybe you could look around at the mayor's house. It's the only one that was robbed.

If nothing else was touched, what would we accomplish by looking around his house? Did you look around his house? If not, how do you know about what was stolen? If so, why not just relay that information?



Ah, so the mayor decided to do a favor for a guy he didn't think robbed his town before locking him up with no evidence for robbing his town, then warned another town that they would be robbed by a different group and victoriously freed the man he didn't think was involved until a different group of people again robbed the town and took an orb from the man who didn't rob the town despite having no reason to know of this orb yet ignored everything else in the town, suggesting they went with a specific purpose despite the fact that nobody outside the town had ever seen the orb.

Plot! I'm sure glad we're getting this over frivolous things like, say, an antagonist. Or a goal.



The white dot on the far left is us, post backtracking. The blue dot is Air's Rock. In order to get through this area, you need Scoop, which you get in the other gigantic desert slightly to the left of Air's Rock. The path between these dots is substantially less straight forward than it looks.



As for these cliffs, they're completely uneventful. We can get some items and that djinn on the return trip, but for now it's just more blind jumps that punish a lack of luck and/or GameFAQs with additional backtracking.



On the other side, intentionally going the wrong way and wandering through nondescript wilderness nets us another djinn, which actually doesn't affect anything seeing as Vall already has about seventy. On another note, check out that suddenly improved screenshot quality; is there anything Vall can't make better? Well, besides the quality of the game he's in..



Naribwe, to the North, is another useless flyover town. There's a fortune teller who can give you hints about what you need to be doing, but his advice is so vague (actual "fortunes" include "You will raise a mighty column and gain assistance where it is least expected" and "The object that you seek lies somewhere in the west") that you're probably better off reading an actual fortune and taking comfort in the fact that, while you're currently experiencing difficulties, good luck may await you in the future.



No one must be permitted into Kibombo until Akafubu has completed his ceremony.

To continue further north we get to do another stealth section. I sure do love having a sense of direction and purpose when I play these sorts of games.

\

Thankfully, we will not see a break from the proud tradition of Golden Sun guards being roughly as good at their jobs as the Camelot writing staff.



A bottleneck valley made up entirely of smaller bottleneck valleys would probably be much more secure if they concentrated guards at a single checkpoint. Or built a gate.



Two dungeons and one city later, we're finally at Kibombo and might get to see actual events happen. Also, thanks to the wonders of graphical glitches, Vall has evolved beyond the need for trivial things such as legs.



Putting lit torches underneath straw awnings connected to straw roofs connected to wooden huts seems like a poor architectural planning decision.



As you can tell, I'm trying to really expedite this section game, so here's the short version of our info-gathering: Akafubu took a cross-continent trip to steal an orb he somehow knew about so that he can offer it to the Great Gabombo in a ceremony that, if it succeeds, will make him witch doctor of the Kibombo (yes, these are their actual names). I suspect that the naming scheme for Riki and Tavi was only the beginning of this game being influenced by Rudyard Kipling.



Wait a second... You're the travelers who came seeking me when I was in jail.
We were worried about you, Piers, so we followed you here...

We did? We were? We care about this random man? Trust me, I'm as lost about all of this as you are.

Tell me something... Exactly when did I ask you for your help?
SILENCE!



For reference, we're having this conversation on that ledge to the left, just five feet off-screen. During this ceremony, everybody will fail to notice us as we loudly exchange 1,100 words.

O Great Gabomba! Accept this jewel!



I am honestly unsure if I could find a single way to make this image more ridiculous.



Your prayers were weak! Sing your praises and dance for the Great Gabomba until your prayers reach his ears!
Akafubu is no witch doctor! He's an Adept!

Piers is referring to the way Akafubu raised and lowered the orb to the Gabomba's face, which to everyone else might have just been it raising and lowering on its own because it's mysterious. Or maybe they're all adepts even though there's no reason for them to be since they don't live near a psynergy stone. Or maybe they think it's just the Witch Doctor magic which is distinct from psynergy for no reason other than because Camelot has almost gone two whole towns without shoehorning in yet another incarnation of the "Main characters explain psynergy to somebody who uses psynergy so that person can respond by explaining psynergy" scene.

Just as a reminder, Gamepro gave this game a 5/5 review and cited the fact that most people don't know about psynergy as "a nifty little plot device that Golden Sun knows how to manipulate for maximum dramatic advantage". As always, just saying.



Who keeps leaving these wooden columns at the edge of precipices, anyway? It's hugely inconsiderate.

That power... Was that Psynergy? I should have spotted it at once! You're Adepts!

Why are you shocked that we can do this when you weren't shocked that the witch doctor could five seconds ago? Didn't you already know this based on that time we read your mind and you noticed that we were doing it because we were adepts?

Wait, so does that mean you're--
Yes, my name is Piers, and I too am an Adept.

Yes, I think we figured this out somewhere around the time you were freezing things with the power of your mind.

To be honest, everyone in Lemuria is an Adept, and not just me.
Wait a second... I've heard that name before... It was Lord Babi! He often spoke to me of Lemuria. He said it was so advanced that we can scarcely begin to imagine what it must have been like...

You were hired by him specifically for the sake of researching it, and later in this game you'll reveal that you've been helping Babi since you were about four. Everyone in this game is an idiot and I hate them.

Hold on a moment... Babi... I've heard that name somewhere before...
Well, yeah... Everyone knows about Lord Babi... He's the ruler of Tolbi...
I've never heard of Tolbi. Until recently, I had never left my home of Lemuria...
Piers, are you just playing games with us?
Piers is not playing games, Jenna. You can trust him.
Thank you for believing me, master sage!

How did you glean that he was a sage? He's an old man who does nothing except repeat information to Vall, the only one of us you've actually seen do something (assuming Sheba reading your mind doesn't count).

Babi believed that, in Lemuria alone, the power of Alchemy remains unbound. Since we could not find Lemuria, Lord Babi went me to unlock the secrets of Alchemy myself.
Ah, yes! Babi! If I recall correctly, a man named Babi came to Lemuria long ago... He stole one of our ships and fled the isle...

Was this conversation written by taking the actual conversation and randomly reordering the lines of dialogue?

But if he already found Lemuria once, why doesn't he just go back the same way?
Once you have left Lemuria, finding it again is quite difficult, even if you know where to look. The waters around Lemuria are wrapped in a perpetual fog... It is very difficult to navigate. The ocean currents around Lemuria are swift and treacherous... Only one who can sail a Lemurian ship can complete the journey.

So... how did Babi get there in the place? The eventual explanation is that he got carried there by a tidal wave, because, fuck, this "writing a video game" thing is way more difficult than we thought it would be.

But... Babi stole a Lemurian ship from you, right? That means that he can sail it...
Unfortunately, Babi was the only one of us who could use the ship.



Somehow it took me until this far into the series to realize this, but right here it finally hit me that Kraden isn't an adept. In other words, the main characters in GS1 learned psynergy from somebody who didn't know psynergy. And he's the only alchemic sage in the world not to know any psynergy. And despite living next to a giant psynergy stone for several years and adventuring with people who have come into contact with a thousand other psynergy stones he's never acquired psynergy. I am positively amazed I never noticed this and I'm incredibly glad that I finally did.

I have to get my black orb back! I must be able to captain my ship!

Since the orb isn't actually working the way Akafubu hoped it would, couldn't you negotiate this rather easily? He has literally no use for your orb at all.

Wait a moment, Piers... We want to help you get your orb back. I am on this quest for many reasons... one of them being that I wish to see Lemuria. If you would allow it, that is... I'd like to visit Lemuria myself. I want to go to Lemuria so that I can see the full power of Alchemy!

Time to character motivation: 1 full game and 5 hours of another. Also, this motivation is terrible. Why are we being given a reason to help Piers after it's been well established that we supposedly already had one? How does Kraden want to see the full power of alchemy if alchemy isn't unleashed?

What do you say, Vall? [No]



Aren't there some things we're supposedly working on? Like lighthouses? I seem to recall there at some point having been something to do with lighthouses. Aren't you completely forcing every component of this plan on Piers the exact same way you forced the disastrous(?) Sol Sanctum plan on us last game? Why is Piers joining us?



Next time, we move ever closer to the hope of one day, just maybe, having an actual objective. I'm holding my breath as I type.