The Let's Play Archive

Shadow Hearts

by The Dark Id

Part 60: Episode LX: The Runabout

Episode LX: The Runaround


Music: Sanctuary Ruins



OK. That's one chest opened. Spoiler: Three more to go! Mind's Eye is an item we've already seen. It's that one that doubles attack power but makes the Judgment Ring's Hit Areas invisible. I'm not THAT good at this game to pull that one off reliably unless I wanted to go full emulator save scum. I have at least integrity when it comes to battles. Fuck the Lottery Rings!



Now we're going to retrace our steps back to the original split in the road we saw to the west of the Door of Judgment and take the southwestern path this time. Which leads us to...



Guess what? It's another split path! It looks like Yuri is walking on giant stone tablets with some manner of writing. But Yuri is the type that thinks conveying plot details in item description lore is stupid as hell and cannot be bothered to read it. Plus punchman builds were only decent in Dark Souls 2 so I see where he'd be coming from, honestly...



Anyway, let's head to the north where we find a red button. Now slamming down buttons? Yuri Hyuga is ALL about that shit!



The Red Button + the Blue Button results in a purple flame. This just happens to be the color of the treasure chest seal right next to where Yuri is standing! Which lets Yuri pillage the box to discover...



Hell yeah! Gimme those holy texts with heavy metal album covers! Alice has gotten progressively sassier but she definitely needs more edge to her character. Alice's second strongest book provides +72 Physical and +84 Special Attack power.





Let's continue down the path to another fork in the road. So we may as well cover why we are unlocking all of these chests, to begin with, and not just blazing towards Albert Simon's evil plan and the stopping of it.



Let the power of destruction be released as all seals are broken.



Yep, that sounds like something you'd stumble across in some random cave in Wales. It is extremely on brand. We will just keep that font of pure evil in mind as we continue to explore this dungeon and unlock all of those chest seals.





Speaking of unlocking seals, continuing down the path we find that mysterious flame we'd been seeing off-screen the entire time. It's always fun to think that as far as Yuri can tell, he's just been mashing random buttons and something has been happening in the dungeon. Incidentally, every once in a while one of those chests is no longer being zapped by energy. Huh, that's a weird flame color would be his only thoughts passing by this room.



We've got another sealed chest and a final split path up ahead here. The way to the east might lead to the end of the dungeon. It's much too early to venture there yet.



But to the north, we've got a path which leads to a GREEN button overlooking the sealing flame. If Yuri mashes that sonuvabitch, we get...



A white flame. One of the first chests we saw had white energy protecting it. Which naturally means...



Running ALL the way back to where this update began, naturally. This better be a good reward...



Those without spiritual power cannot touch it, huh? Well, Zhuzhen better get his creaky old ass in here on his own time if he wants his unique armor with its +71 Physical and +79 Special Defense. It's bad enough I had to go already back to London just to see its description.





The next step is a little counter-intuitive unless you're familiar with how colors react to one another and remember the color of all the buttons we've tapped so far in this dungeon. If we return to the blue button (the one with the three open chests and steam) and DEACTIVATE it, the white flame will turn yellow. This gets us the last of the sealed chests unlocked. Mind you, we need to both unlock 'em AND pillage their contents for it to count. No sequence skipping here.





But... before we take another trek clear across the entire dungeon yet again, the party has been blazing through random battles this entire time and we've managed to max out the Light element's Soul Energy.


Music: Graveyard Moon



So let's take a quick jump back to the Graveyard to cash in all those Light energy tokens for a new prize. Also to clear Malice because that too is getting all gunked up and could use an oil change.



You know the song and dance for this by now...


Music: NDE - Near Death Experience



Meet Sandalphon, an abstract nightmare of a fusion creature. Which is saying a lot considering how freaky just Heaven's Fiend looked.



This fella has a very limited move set. Indeed, on the offense, it only has a very brief physical attack where it will swipe Yuri with its tail and... an orbital bombardment called Pulse. The latter does a hint more damage than the former...



He can and will also throw up a barrier that will reduce Special Attack damage by 30% which is really aggravating when coupled with its final ability.





Which is Revive -- a full 100% heal. This isn't even a remotely hard fight, it's scaled to Yuri's current level after all. But there is nothing more obnoxious in a fight than a boss just doing a full health reset with nothing you can do to stop it.





Thankfully, the jerk only has enough juice to use Revive once or else we'd just be a stalemate all day. We've got shit to do, ya jag-off. You're not even a particularly useful Fusion anymore now that Alice can do a full heal too without transmogrifying into a nightmare creature.


Music: Graveyard Moon



I think that's just heartburn. Still feelin' it from eating and drinking too much over the holidays...



Cats move aside, there's a new top curious boy in town! Much like Czernobog, we need to unlock Sandaphlon's top ability -- Pulse. It's not really hard to unlock those third abilities, it's just extremely counter to what the game has been telling us the entire time. Going Berserk is a bad idea. We'll sort them out in the endgame.

Sandaphlon provides:
Not too shabby, as are most Level 3 Fusions.


Music: Sanctuary Ruins





Enough getting sidetracked, let's return to... err... doing a sidequest. Hmm...



I am not quite sure what is going on in the art there... It's clearly a bearded, aging man and... he's up against some other flesh toned mass while hiding in a bush. You know what, let's just not dwell on all that...



If we return to that hell well from earlier, now that all the chests have been unsealed and raided a stone will sort of unceremoniously float down from the ceiling and into Yuri's hands.



Our reward is the Stone of Destruction. What does this do, you ask? Well, your first instinct might say it has something to do with the Graveyard. And you would be... kinda correct. But, not really. There's nothing that can be done with the Stone of Destruction just yet. But it is absolutely essential we possess it before reaching the end of this dungeon.



Speaking of the end of the dungeon, here it is... It was just past that previously yellow energy sealed chest. There's no further locks, switches or key items that need to be sorted out before entering. Indeed, the thing is unlocked from the start. As I said, it's possible to blaze through this dungeon in about five minutes. Just not recommended. Before we tread any further, there is a duo of treasure chests by the door. The one to the left is merely another Seal of Strength. But the one on the right contains...



This gaudy street punk armor for Halley. I'm sorry, that child cannot pull off this jacket. What are you even playing at, Shadow Hearts? It does have +73 Physical and +77 Special Defense. But Halley will have to wait another 60ish years for punk to actually be invented before it is socially acceptable to wear.



Another Door of Judgment lies ahead to mark the end of the dungeon. You know it's serious when the game gives us a prompt to proceed.



Before we go forward, we will do a tiny bit of prep work. Remember those Will Power accessories we got from Roger Bacon's vending machine? Everyone needs to equip those. Additionally, Leonardo's Bears (prevents Death status) go on Margarete and Yuri. Alice has the Crucifix which prevents all status effects, so she's good.



Other than using a tent to fully top off our meters, I think we're good to go. Hopefully, Albert Simon is actually down here. I mean... we are just operating on Roger's hunch that his old student is hanging out in his parent's basement the hidden underground vaults.


Music: Wind Which Blows From the Dark II



Tune in next time for the climactic showdown with Albert Simon. Surely, no complications will arise. Yuri will just punch a hole in his head HARDER this time and we'll be done before sundown.






Video: Sandaphlon Battle





Sandaphlon Render - I hate it.