|
 Lost in Blue is a "survival simulation" series developed by Konami which started with the initial release in 2005 on the DS. Lost in Blue is often referred to as a kind of spiritual successor to Konami's Survival Kids games for the Game Boy, which I have not played much of but the influence is pretty obvious. The game revolves around a teenage boy and his attempt to survive on a deserted island after being flung overboard from a ship following a rough storm, the game is serious about the whole "simulation" part of "survival simulation" because Lost in Blue is pretty hard due to all the minutiae of your well-being you need to pay attention to and manage along with very extensive preparation needed to make any sort of headway into your exploration, consequently Lost in Blue also moves very slowly, if you can bear with it like I did you'll find an absorbing game but it requires unreasonable amounts of patience to get there. Luckily, the medium of LP can help grease the wheels of the game's otherwise glacial pace. Spoilers Don't do it. The entire point of this game is exploration and discovery, spoiling stuff ruins that. If I haven't seen it in the LP, don't mention it. Updates Days 1-2: Getting Our Bearings Days 3-4: Maroons With Spoons Days 5-7: Behind The Waterfall Days 8-20: Setting Sail Days 21-23: Beyond The Ruins Days 24-Escape: Lost In Blue SuccinctAndPunchy fucked around with this message at 05:49 on Nov 29, 2014 |
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 02:25
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 25, 2024 02:25 |
|
|
Music: Title Screen  We begin with a barren title screen and a pretty nice piece of music; right now we can only play the Story Mode but we'll have access to some other game modes later. For now, let's get stuck into it. Music: Intro At this point I want to mention that Lost In Blue never had an official soundtrack release and in the actual files the songs only have generic names like "BGM_PLACENAME" etc. The names I'm giving to the tracks are completely made up.  I can't breathe... Why am I here?  It was a terrible storm. Am I going to die..? I can't think anymore... I'm losing consciousness... Music: Beach   Where am I?...the ship...Is anyone else here?Okay, now that we're done almost drowning in ellipses we now have control of the boy! First though, I would like to direct your attention to the top screen.  These are our needs that we'll need to manage to stay alive, they're fairly intuitive so here's a quick rundown. HP (Full Body Gauge): Overall health, if this hits zero we die and the game ends, starts decreasing if any of the other three needs hits zero. I'm not massively clear on how to restore it but I think sleeping with all your other needs in good condition restores it. Stamina (Muscly Arm): How tired we are, decreases as we move about and explore. Restored by sleeping or resting. Hunger (Stomach): How hungry we are, decreases over time, fill by eating. Biggest pain to manage. Thirst (Waterdrop): How thirsty we are, decreases over time, fill by drinking. Generally not something you have to worry about. Also number of days and time. Some events cycle every few days and some things can only be done at certain times. Enough of the mechanics info dumping, let's get back to the game. I immediately set off running down the beach.  Hm? There's something on the ground.The game does this irritating thing where it splits single sentences between two or three speech bubbles seemingly at random. Press the A button to pick up items. Still in the admittedly fairly brief tutorial section for now unfortunately, but let's see what that weird yellow ball thing is.  Before this game I had no idea coconuts could be yellow. The boy then interrupts again to state the obvious. There's water inside.Press the X button and select Backpack menu to see items I'm hungry and thirsty, is there any food around?I feel like this line is meant to happen earlier but some reason it only triggers after having already picked up food. Music: Inventory  This is our inventory, we get 20 items worth of space and nothing more. I'll explain what those weird symbols on the side of the screen mean when it's actually relevant, for now let's chow down!  The coconut is fairly unique in that it sates Hunger and slakes Thirst, what is not unique about it is the extremely paltry amount of Hunger you gain for eating it. I'd have to eat 20 whole coconuts to have a full belly and Hunger deteriorates so rapidly that this wouldn't even last me the entire day. Clearly we need a more efficient food source. Ah...That feels a little better. Continuing down the beach, we discover a mound of sand.  In one of the game's many uses of the DS hardware, we need to wipe away the sand to get at the delicious shellfish hidden therein. The implementation of the hardware in this game is extensive but very natural and intuitive to use, it does a very good job of making the most of the platform it's on. I wonder if it's okay to eat this raw...He says this but the game won't actually allow you to eat something raw if it would be logically harmful to do so. It's one of the stranger courtesies the game grants.  You can also shake trees with the stylus to try and get things to fall down. However, one of the things I've noticed is that trees will never drop things if you shake them on the first day. Presumably because you're not meant to know about this mechanic yet. After some more picking the beach clean for its coconuts and shellfish, the boy once again pipes up to inform us of one of the more annoying gathering mechanics of the game.  I wonder if there's something on the ground.Touch the screen to check the ground So we do and we discover...  A crab scuttling about, all we do is drag the crab to the bottom left of the screen where our bag is to collect it. Where this mechanic is annoying is that other than this one time where the game introduces you to the mechanic, there is never any indication that something lurks on the ground near you. In fact, I'm pretty sure it's totally random. You just stand there and repeatedly poke the same patch of ground over and over again until something shows up, thus it's kind of a crapshoot and not something to rely on but crab meat is good early-game if you can get lucky enough.  Travelling north from the beach we follow a fast flowing river until the boy stops to comment. I want to cross the river but it doesn't seem safe to do that now.Over yonder lies the rest of the game but we're not done with what little handholding the game will provide so we're arbitrarily prevented from going over there for now. Heading a little northwest from the soon-to-be river crossing we discover where we'll be spending a lot of time.  It's a cave, I wonder what the inside is like. Looks like a nice place to rest.Ugh, it's cold. I need to dry my clothes. I wonder if I can start a fire somehow.Maybe if I have some twigs and a tool I can start a fire.Heading out of the cave in search of the elusive twigs results in my Stamina dropping below 20% which leads to the boy complaining at me for a bit.  I need to find a place to rest, if it's for a little a bit I think I could also sit on the ground to rest.Press the X button and select Rest to rest for a while Resting will cause you to sit down while time rapidly passes, you'll regain a fair bit of Stamina but time just flies by and your Hunger and Thirst are still dropping during this. It's kind of mean of them to ask you to do this so early on when the game has set all your needs to rock bottom.  We press onwards and begin collecting the materials for a fire-making tool. We need Tree Bark and Twigs which are conveniently located two steps of each other just north of the cave. Maybe I can make a fire making tool with the things I've found so far.Press X button and select Make Item to make tools.   Crafting in this game is as easy as selecting the items you need and pressing X.  Voila! A fire-making tool. The weird symbols next to the numbers show the attributes of the tools you make, what each symbol actually means I don't know and neither the game nor the manual imparts such trivial information to me but as a general rule of thumb, higher numbers are more efficient tools. I think this is how it's supposed to look like. Can I really start a fire with something like this? Heading up the ledge we find another Tree Bark and some more Twigs, enough for a second Firemaking tool! Tools in this game eventually break and need replacing so its important to keep spares around. Don't you dare make that spare right now though, you need Twigs on their own to make a fire and right now these two Twigs are the only ones you have access to. You can't shake the trees to produce more because trees don't drop anything on the first day and there are no other Twigs lying around. Basically, if you craft a second tool right now you've hosed yourself about 10 minutes into the game. Anyway, heading back to the cave...  Push A button to make fire  Firemaking is done via a little minigame where you push the L and R button in rhythm to start the fire, you can't do it too fast or you'll drop the stick. It's pretty easy but you have to do it so many times throughout the game that it swiftly gets tedious.  When you get the bar halfway filled, the game will tell you to "Blow" (that's what the little bubble says, I started blowing way too quickly so the bubble never became legible). Unlike kindling a real fire, you don't have to blow with any amount of control, just cause as much noise as you like to fill it up and start the fire. There's no alternative to the mic in this minigame which has resulted in me making a tit of myself in public many times playing this.  I made a fire!Ah, my clothes are getting dry.Where am I...? What do I do now...?I guess thinking about it won't do me any good.I need to search this island for other people.I'd recommend being more concerned about the lack of a water source right now but that'll resolve itself in a few minutes.  Where should I lie down? Push A button to go to sleep Yeah, you rest on that, whatever the hell that actually is because I can't make it out and it certainly doesn't look comfortable. Music: Today's Results  Going to sleep gives us a nice little list of everything we're carrying around and also shows us what our needs are going to be at once we wake up. Hunger and Thirst drop by a lot when you sleep and at the start of the game there isn't enough food to compensate for this and no water. It's pretty much certain that you're going to wake up on Day 2 with your Hunger and Thirst totally empty. Music: Good Morning  I guess it wasn't a dream...I should keep searching...Oh, the fire's out. I guess it'll go out when it runs out of twigs.This kinda alludes to the fact that you can stick twigs on an already burning fire to keep it going without having to play the firemaking mini-game again. Fresh-faced from a good night's sleep and almost starving and dehydrating to death, we head out to continue our exploration. Let's take care of our thirst, first. Music: Beach  The water seems clean enough to drink.Heading out of our cave back to the river, we find the river isn't flowing as fierce anymore and now there's a neat little bank to take a sip from.  Drinking here instantly restores our Thirst meter to 100%, which takes care of that problem quite nicely. You can do this infinitely to no drawback so for the beginning of the game, managing your thirst isn't really a problem. Hunger on the other hand, continues to be an issue.  Oh, the river is calm today. It seems safe to go across.He says the river is calm "today" but it is only not calm for the first day and always calm from this point onwards. Anyway, since I've already picked this side clean and found mostly inedible until cooked stuff, it's time to head on over and pick that side clean!  Before I'm able to nab that coconut and crack it open for its delicious contents, I'm interrupted by a passing cutscene. Music: Discovery    Hey! Are you ok?  The ship...! A storm came and...!I know, I was on it too....!Umm..is there anyone else?I've been looking around since yesterday but you're the first one I found....I see...Anyway, are you hurt?Ah, no I'm not hurt but I dropped my eyeglasses when my lifeboat washed ashore.I'll help you look for them.They dig around in the same for a while until...  ...the boy steps on them and breaks them like a dumbass. Good going, Gilligan!  No no, it's ok!We will soon learn that this is not even slightly ok. ...... The girl attempts to break the awkward silence with her sweet dance moves. You'll get sick leaving your clothes wet like that.There's a cave where you can rest close by. You should get yourself dried off before anything.You're right...This way. The girl takes like four steps forward, comes to a complete stop and then flops on the ground like someone comitting insurance fraud. Are you OK?Sorry, I have very bad eyesight.Sorry. It's because I broke your glasses.Give me your hand.Huh?It's too dangerous. Let's walk together.Ok...Push Y button to hold hands. Push L and R to sit in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G.  You know, I'm pretty sure people who need glasses who then lose their glasses don't suddenly become comically clumsy and incapable of functioning without assistance. Like for all intents and purposes now the girl is totally blind and will need your assistance to go and do anything. For the entire game. As we lead her back to the cave by the hand the game fades out... Music: Title Screen   Thanks for the reminder of what game I was playing, I'd forgotten. This however marks the point in the game where the training wheels come off and you're left entirely to your own devices on the island. Music: Cave  Sorry, would you mind waiting while I start it up again?At this point, I notice the time on the top screen.  7pm. I started that loving cutscene at 7am, somehow escorting the girl back through the tiny patch of land and over the river took 12 goddamn hours. Thankfully my needs don't reflect this sudden irritating time compression but still come on guys there were coconuts I wanted! Also the girl comes with her own set of needs that we need to maintain as well, if either of us die the game ends. I need another pair of twigs to start the fire so I head out in search of some.  Shaking the trees now actually makes stuff drop from them! Twigs in hand I return and show my blind companion the gift of fire.   Holy moly branching dialogue trees! Although right now it's not particularly branching since I'm going to ask her all of the above in due time. For now though, let's ask for her name, referring to her as "the girl" is getting annoying to write. What should I call you?Oh, sorry. I haven't introduced myself. I'm Skye.I'm...I'm Keith. I'm a senior.Oh, then you're a year older than me.Ah...nice to meet you...Nice to meet you too.At this point we loop back around to the initial set of choices sans the one we just chose. Were you on the ship with someone?No, I was on that ship by myself......I see. Me too.......I'm not sure if the dialogue is intentionally stilted and awkward to convey the current relationship between the two or if the translation's just not that stellar. Probably both, actually.  Oh hey, an actually branching choice. Each of these will ellicit a different reaction from Skye so let's try being optimistic for once. I'm sure they all got rescued.Yes...I'd like to think so.(She looks a little relieved) A cheery beep played as that line came up, what this means is never made explicit in the game but it indicates that Skye now likes you a bit more. No, there isn't a dating sim sub-game, it's a hidden friendship stat you weirdos. Things you say can cause Skye's opinion of you to go up or down and where this becomes important is that the better Skye thinks of you, the more likely she is to do things you ask of her and she'll also generally just survive smarter and take better care of herself with a high friendship value. While I'd love a vote on whether to play the game as an rear end in a top hat or a nice person, Skye becomes borderline retarded with low friendship values, it's too much of a pain to play that way so we're keeping her on our good side for now. Where do you think we are?I washed ashore during the night...But when I approached the island in my lifeboat, it was completely dark. No lights at all.Do you think...we could be on a deserted island?Naaaah, who would make a game about that? It'd be way boring. Choice 1 (Bad): Maybe we are... Choice 2 (Neutral): Haha, It couldn't be. Choice 3 (Good): Well I'm here and that means this isn't a deserted island. Well, I'm here and that means this isn't a deserted island.Hahaha, you're right.(I made her laugh a bit) Having now exhausted all dialogue options we have no choice but to end the day. Let's rest for today.Let's not. You're both starving to death and Skye needs a drink, there's a river just outside if you ne- You're right. It's already dark outside...Well, it wasn't bloody well dark before the game skipped half the day for no reason. Choice 1: It's not really comfy here, are you going to be ok? Choice 2: Well, good night then... Both options here are neutral. It's not really comfy here, are you going to be ok?Yes, I'll be fine. I'm just glad to be on land again...Yeah... Good night.Music: Today's Results  You may have noticed I've spent the entire first two days perpetually starving and dehydrated. Lost in Blue has kind of a rough start. Next time on Lost In Blue: Maroons with Spoons!
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 02:26
|
|
|
So, now lacking glasses and with them basic competence, does Skye have any useful skills at all, or she just an added nuisance to deal with for our ravenous, dehydrated and beat-up protagonist on this deserted(?) island? But otherwise, this looks like a good start!
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 02:37
|
|
|
Wow, this game did not have anyone who could hack the textboxes at all. Ouch, those limits are kind of terrible. I mean when you have only this much space for your words it can get to be a pain. No wonder the translation feels a little stiff, it's like back in the olden days where it had to fit and that's it.
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 02:42
|
|
|
This looks like a really interesting game, though I suspect I never would've gotten very far with it. It's great when people LP more niche games and I'll be looking forward to seeing how the game develops from here.
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 02:51
|
|
|
Oh, good, I'm glad this LP is now live! I'll be looking forward to Keith and Skye's adventures. 
Sketchie fucked around with this message at 03:16 on Jul 5, 2014 |
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 03:11
|
|
|
Heavy Sigh posted:So, now lacking glasses and with them basic competence, does Skye have any useful skills at all, or she just an added nuisance to deal with for our ravenous, dehydrated and beat-up protagonist on this deserted(?) island? I never actually finished this game because it can REALLY drag at points, so I'm looking forward to following this!
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 03:25
|
|
|
I remember this game. First time I tried to play it I ate some bad food, became deathly ill, and then died a few minutes later. Second time, I lived about a week and was actually makeing some nice progress. Then I ate some bad food, became deathly ill, and died a few minutes later. I was not very good at this game. 
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 03:40
|
|
|
I have really good memories of this game. By 'really good memories' I mean that I got it when I was really quite young and suffered a few dozen horrible deaths before eventually giving up. But I really dug the concept behind the game and wish I hadn't sucked at it so badly. Now I can experience it vicariously! Hooray!
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 06:35
|
|
|
Oh, hey, wow. I remember hearing about this game a loooong time ago and thinking it sounded neat before I promptly forgot about it for loving years. Looking forward to seeing how it plays out!
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 06:53
|
|
|
If Skye's practically blind without her glasses, why not, y'know... make her actually blind?
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 07:08
|
|
|
Kaboom Dragoon posted:If Skye's practically blind without her glasses, why not, y'know... make her actually blind? Makes it harder. People who are actually blind figure out how to get along without a sense that the rest of the human population takes for granted. People who are practically blind rely entirely on their glasses to allow them to function. If Skye were actually blind, she'd be able to get around on her own and probably help out with some of the tasks you need done to stay alive. This way, they can make her utterly helpless so that instead of being grateful for her company and assistance, you resent her for making your life harder than it has to be.
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 07:15
|
|
|
Every time someone breaks glasses in media it annoys the hell out of me because glasses aren't made of glass anymore, they're usually made of plastics. You're far more likely to break the frames then the actual lenses.
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 07:25
|
|
|
For what it's worth, I looked at a guide and the four symbol attributes are apparently 'Durability, Resilience, Straightness, and Sharpness'. It didn't say what the difference is between durability and resilience though, and those seem pretty similar, so it's hard to know what the distinction would be. The tool's initial health and the rate at which a tool becomes breakable, maybe?
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 07:39
|
|
|
Ah, I have played this game before as well. Calling the pace glacial is an understatement. You're going to spend a lot of time looking for resources and food until you can finally make something that lets you spend just a little less time. And taking Skye anywhere... Well, good luck. I'd like to see more of the game than I could withstand boredom to play.
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 08:07
|
|
|
I never played this, though I loved Survival Kids, which is in the same series. Looking forward to it all.
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 08:47
|
|
|
This game also has a secondary game mode where you play as Skye, so if she were actually blind they wouldn't have been able to do that. I would be all coy about spoilers or whatever, but the instruction manual reveals the existence of this mode freely so I don't feel it's a secret at all. Also, like I said, Skye will start to do some things to earn her keep soon, and again, if she were fully blind some of these things would be fairly difficult.
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 08:56
|
|
|
The Sezza posted:For what it's worth, I looked at a guide and the four symbol attributes are apparently 'Durability, Resilience, Straightness, and Sharpness'. It didn't say what the difference is between durability and resilience though, and those seem pretty similar, so it's hard to know what the distinction would be. The tool's initial health and the rate at which a tool becomes breakable, maybe? Yeah, the names are kinda vague and don't really provide any useful clue as to what they actually mean or how to translate the numbers into anything meaningful for the player so I just go with "higher numbers = better". I'd double check the manual to make sure but at the present moment I seem to have just totally lost the sodding thing.
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 13:17
|
|
|
I'm pretty excited to see this; I've played a number of the sequels to this, but I've never tried finding the original... Mainly because I've heard about how much of a headache Skye is compared to your companion in 2. I'm looking forward to actually seeing exactly how useless our legally blind companion is. Also, I have never liked the fire-making minigame. I'm just terrible at it, and the stick flies everywhere.
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 14:50
|
|
|
Man, this is the sort of game, I love. I'm looking forward to seeing if it is actually fun or if I'd hate it.
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 14:51
|
|
|
D3m3 posted:Mainly because I've heard about how much of a headache Skye is compared to your companion in 2. 2 is so much better about everything than the first game, might actually get onto 2 after this one, not promising anything but still mom's the word on stuff in the sequels just in case.
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 15:15
|
|
|
There was a time I wanted to pick up this game. Looks interesting, I will be following this intensely.
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 16:04
|
|
|
The Sezza posted:For what it's worth, I looked at a guide and the four symbol attributes are apparently 'Durability, Resilience, Straightness, and Sharpness'. It didn't say what the difference is between durability and resilience though, and those seem pretty similar, so it's hard to know what the distinction would be. The tool's initial health and the rate at which a tool becomes breakable, maybe? Maybe how easily it breaks and how fast it degrades? An axe made of glass stays sharp until shattering but a golden one last longer but quickly loses it's edge? Or maybe how much misuse affects it?
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 17:26
|
|
|
I remember wanting to get this game back in the day, let's see if I should have.
|
|
#
?
Jul 5, 2014 19:37
|
|
|
I remember reading about this in Nintendo Power years back. As someone who wears glasses I really loving hate when movies and videogames make a glasses wearing person become completely useless when they lose their glasses. I can get around just fine without them, as long as you don't expect me to point some detail out.
|
|
#
?
Jul 6, 2014 00:14
|
|
|
Some folks aren't quite so lucky as us. I'm 20/70 in one eye and 20/80 in the other without my glasses. You certainly don't want me flying a fighter jet, but it doesn't stop me from doing any of the major activities of daily living, and there's no reason I couldn't go crabbing or whatever either. This is especially true since I'm nearsighted, and if I'm working at less than double or triple my arm's length, for practical purposes I can see as well as anyone. However, some people who are legally blind without their glasses (20/200) can still be corrected to 20/40 or better, particularly if they don't have astigmatism. But...if their glasses are destroyed or lost, they're still legally blind. Presuming Skye is legally blind or close to it without her glasses, it actually explains her role and behaviors in Keith's playthrough pretty well.
|
|
#
?
Jul 6, 2014 02:09
|
|
|
Yeah, I have a friend that literally cannot see without his glasses on. That part's not a stretch.
|
|
#
?
Jul 6, 2014 06:25
|
|
|
senrath posted:Yeah, I have a friend that literally cannot see without his glasses on. That part's not a stretch. I doubt he falls to the ground every three steps. Either way, it's a stupid excuse for a companion mechanic that just seems like someone watched too much Scooby-Doo. Every glasses wearing character seems to suffer from the same eye problems it feels like. I'll bet she looked super nerdy when she wore them too. 
|
|
#
?
Jul 6, 2014 07:12
|
|
|
Hitlers Gay Secret posted:I doubt he falls to the ground every three steps. Either way, it's a stupid excuse for a companion mechanic that just seems like someone watched too much Scooby-Doo. Every glasses wearing character seems to suffer from the same eye problems it feels like. If he wasn't wearing glasses on uneven ground in an area that he was unfamiliar with I wouldn't put it past him. Edit: I'm not saying it's not overused and cliche'd as all hell, I'm just saying it's not totally impossible.
|
|
#
?
Jul 6, 2014 07:28
|
|
|
I hope we come up with ideas for new tools in good order. Doesn't seem like we have much chance of keeping two people fed.
|
|
#
?
Jul 6, 2014 07:50
|
|
|
God, I remember looking *everywhere* to find this cartridge. No store would stock it. Finally found it in some back-alley Gamestop, and it made it all the sweeter. Really is a decent game, not great, but not awful. Always did find that the main problem was that the main character would take five steps and need to have a snack. What the hell rear end metabolism do you have, buddy?
|
|
#
?
Jul 8, 2014 06:17
|
|
|
So this is Robinson's Requiem: Anime edition?
|
|
#
?
Jul 8, 2014 09:23
|
|
|
anilEhilated posted:So this is Robinson's Requiem: Anime edition? That's what I wanted it to be when I bought it, but it is neither as hardcore nor as interesting as Robinson's or Deus.
|
|
#
?
Jul 8, 2014 15:35
|
|
|
This looks interesting, but also potentially extremely tedious.
|
|
#
?
Jul 9, 2014 20:01
|
|
|
ViggyNash posted:This looks interesting, but also potentially extremely tedious. You haven't seen the half of it.
|
|
#
?
Jul 9, 2014 20:07
|
|
|
Welcome back to LOST, both Keith and Skye are still starving to death and picking up random fruits isn't cutting it, we need to deal with our food problem. Music: Cave #2  Morning. Ok, but are you ok without eating first? That's true. First, I'll go out and look for things we can eat. I have a knife I found on the lifeboat. With this and a fire, I think I can do some simple cooking. If you find any food that can't be eaten without being prepared, come talk to me and I can cook them, ok? Ok.In spite of being so totally blind that she cannot move without being dragged everywhere by the hand, Skye inexplicably still possesses the ability to cook because she's a woman. Mechanically, Skye won't be much more than a castaway housewife for the entire duration of the game and no Keith cannot elect to take on cooking responsibilities if you want to. Game's got kind of an iffy outlook on gender politics if you haven't noticed. Stand in front of her and push the A button to talk. Music: Cave  Choices! This menu encompasses all of the surprisingly few ways we can interact with our companion. Let's be civil and pleasant in the hopes of extracting more character out of these two. How are you doing? There's nothing really new.Well that was a bust. Regardless, it's important to ask how Skye's doing every day because it can trigger certain conversations that unlock stuff to build or just improve Skye's opinion of you. Both good things. Let's eat now. Hehe, I was getting hungry too. Let's eat something. Here we hand our food to Skye for cooking, Skye can also hold 20 items but any food handed to her is immediately cooked then shared so it hardly matters any, Skye has no concept of food conservation so you need to give her exactly as much food as you need to satisfy yourself and no more lest you overeat and waste food. At the moment though, we only have fruits and cold rocks so I just dump the lot on her. I can only make really simple things, but... Skye then walks off to the corner of the cave and pulls a frying pan out of her rear end and starts carelessly tossing assorted coloured pixels into the air paying no heed to the stark absence of a fire. I forgot to light it but despite her saying she can cook provided a fire, it turns out you do not actually need a fire to have her cook food.  Sorry...it doesn't look too good.Skye presently lacks culinary proficiency, this improves given time, better relationship values and locating better cooking equipment but at the start she's a very poor cook. Another contributing factor to Lost In Blue's already incredibly rough start.  Food is automatically shared amongst the two when cooked, and the right foods cooked in the right combinations will produce actual recipes with their own unique names with greater bonuses rather than random crap which just results in the "Strange Salad" you see before you. So-so   Mixed Fruit Salad So-so   Raw Sand Crab So-so  Food is distributed into "meals" where there's four food items maximum to a meal. The "strange salad" is where all the clams and assorted rubbish went, while the fruit salad must be where the coconuts went since it maintained the water bonus. A total of 19% hunger restored is woeful right now, we evidently won't get by on picking random crap of the ground and cooking it. Before we can make any headway into exploring the island we need to secure a better source of food.  COME NOW WE MUST MAKE HASTE! Music: Beach  Maybe I can find things in the ground by digging.Push A button anywhere to search the ground. This is distinct from tapping the stylus to maybe find critters in the ground in that at the moment, you can randomly find spices that Skye can use in her dishes provided you know the recipes to give them an extra kick. Don't let go of my hand, OK? Ok, but if you want to walk alone, you can let go and I'll stay where I am and wait. Only... Don't worry, I will come back for you. Thank you.Press Y button to let go of her hand. You can rest and drink water together while holding hands.  Yep, that's definitely drinking together. It bears mentioning that no matter how many times you bring Skye to the river to drink in spite of it being three steps out the front door, Skye will never ever be able to find it herself and quench her thirst. You must drag her there by the hand and instruct her to drink every single loving time. After this, I drop Skye off back at the cave and commence exploration of the other side of the river that I was denied by Skye's appeareance last time.  Near Skye's lifeboat, I locate a stone. Not useful presently, but this is one of the closer to home Stone spawn locations and they will be useful for tools eventually.  On the far right side of the beach, I locate some potatoes which is about the only new food discovery to be had here. But potatoes are a nice, filling food so hopefully they'll provide some better nourishment. My hunger is at this point around 4%, so I immediately rush back to the cave and throw a bag full of coconuts and potatoes at Skye and tell her to get cracking.  Short neck Mystery Bake So-so  okay so potatoes totally suck as well, good to know. Not pictured: Like five Fruit Salad bakes from all the coconuts to bring the pair of us up to a much better but still totally paltry for a full inventory 35% hunger. The search for good food continues.  Back across the river, I discover mushrooms of varying colours sitting around.  Tempting fate, I immediately shove the black one down my gob with nary a thought as to the consequences.  Then heading onwards to the corner of the beach, I find a little ledge with an appealing item on it. Also, at this point an hour has passed and bugger-all happened with the mushroom so I guess shoving random fungi down your throat goes totally unpunished in this otherwise harsh survival simulator.  Now we're talking, bamboo makes an excellent material for crafting, but there's nothing we can craft it into at the current moment.  At this point, I tempt fate once more by eating a mushroom of a different colour I picked up at some point during the sweep of the beach.  It must be that mushroom I ate.Booyah! Precisely what I was looking for. Okay, time to stop playing coy about the mushrooms. Each colour of mushroom has a different effect, but the caveat is that which colour carries what effect is determined totally randomly at the start of the playthrough. Almost all of the effects bar exactly this one are negative, inferring status ailments like poison which will slowly deplete your overall health, or dry throat which makes your Thirst drop rapidly. The black mushroom doing absolutely nothing threw me a little because I didn't know the game could decide a mushroom to have no effect. The effect of this mushroom is that for a short length of time, my stamina cannot decrease at all. Considering 1% of stamina is consumed every single time you perform an action like climbing a ledge or jumping a short gap, working out which mushroom carries this effect as early as you possibly can is absolutely essential to making good headway into your explorations. It's awesome and I'm now stockpiling these fabulous fungi for the rest of the game.  On the north side across the river with the sun starting to go down, I climb a few ledges and find some carrots. Unremarkable in every way but it's a new food so I felt like pointing it out. Also logs.  It's too heavy for me to carry but it seems possible for me to push it and make it roll.Stand next to the log and push Y button to make it roll. Logs act like ledges, Keith can climb up ledges that are up to two "blocks" tall, while Skye can only climb up to one block tall. The presence of these logs makes it abundantly clear we'll need to make a path for Skye through here eventually.  It is now super late, but back at the far right corner of the beach, we discover the tide has pulled out and we can safely run around the wall to the other side.  Immediately I start scaling the other side of the wall separating the normal beach and this slightly hidden area. The tide incidentally, lowers at Idontknowwheno'clock and rises back at 9pm, it is presently 8:05pm in this screenshot so I am really pressed for time. If the tide rises while I'm still on this side, I'm stuck until it lowers again in which time I will surely starve to death.  Climbing up a few more ledges reveals bamboo jackpot. There's around six pieces of bamboo here, a great haul since the material is otherwise fairly scarce. We'll soon put it to good use but for now I grab as much as I can carry and get the gently caress out of there before I perform the impressive feat of stranding myself on an even smaller island than the one I am presently already stranded on. The time of exit was 8:50pm, so I got out with precious few seconds to spare since in game time passes at a rate of roughly five minutes every five seconds. At this point, the day is pretty much over so I head back to the cave. Music: Cave  I've done enough searching for today. Oh...ok...Oops. Guess that wasn't the answer she was looking for. Music: Progress  What's that, is that a bamboo stick? I thought of something, is it ok if I use that?No it's not ok you vulture, I need this for manly things lik- Yes, go ahead.gently caress you keith  Skye then proceeds to vigorously massage the floor before walking back to us. Look! I made a basket. If you find more bamboo, I can make more baskets. If you want more baskets, you can ask me anytime.Basket has been added to Job Request. One of Skye's other abilities is that there are certain items only she can craft given the appropriate material. Takes time for her to make them though, so give her the word in advance if you like having your stuff on time.  More bamboo sticks you put here, I can make more baskets. I'll put the baskets I'm done making here, so take them whenever you need them.Push A button in front of basket and bamboo stock area to check You know, this never bothered me until I started having to transcribe the dialogue for this LP but holy poo poo is the translation awkward as hell. Can you think of any good use for it? Hmm...Oh! Maybe I can make traps to capture animals with this! Traps to capture animals? Yeah, I'll set up traps so that I can capture small animals that are too quick for me to catch. I see, I wonder what kind of animals you can capture?Trap has been added to tool-making. Traps are not useful at the moment since we've seen nothing to capture and I don't like doing it anyway, much like everything else in this game it requires more patience than I have to spare. It also bugs me greatly how this is forced on you after you get your first bamboo, this cutscene is the reason I picked up more than one of them, I have plans for those bamboo sticks and I will not allow some basket-weaver to get in the way of those plans. After having this brief moment of small progress, I go to sleep and end the day. Music: Today's Results  Both still starving to death! At this rate, the simple fact that objects respawn on a three day cycle is going to eventually kill us if we don't locate a more stable source of food. Pepper Seed is one of the random spices I found digging up the ground, they don't actually occupy regular inventory space but are nontheless counted as items in the results screen. Music: Cave #2  What's wrong? We can't get enough food by just going around picking food off the ground...Thanks for noticing the thing I've been pointing out since the start of the update. There's an ocean and river right here. If we could catch some fish somehow... I know, I should make some kind of weapon. A weapon? Yeah, like a spear. If I had a stick, I should be able to make one.Now you're talking my language. I don't have a stick, but I do have something green and stick-esque! Let's get cracking.   Pick stone, press X, you now have sharp stone. Stones have little use outside of being sharpened so the extra step is just pointless busywork.  Taking our newly sharpened rock and some bamboo we craft ourselves a high quality spear for eventual animal murdering, now we're finally going to start getting somewhere with the food situation.  You can also just sharpen a piece of bamboo on its own to make a lower quality spear, so I do this to the rest of my bamboo stock. Bit less sturdy than the ones with stones but I don't have many stones to go around and I don't ever want to stop stabbing things.  Spear in hand and belly empty, it's time to stab some aquatic wildlife for fun and survival!  See fish, poke fish with stylus, stab fish with spear. Intuitive and simple, precisely what touchscreen controls should be. Sadly, rudimentary experimenting with savestates reveals that where the spear actually ends up is only loosely related to where you poked on the screen. It feels natural, but it's provably imprecise.  We also get a jarring and creepy photo-realistic image of whatever animal life we just snuffed out to sustain ourselves. Try not to let their cold, dead eyes unnerve you while you hunt. The kinds of fish you can get are determined by place, time and the odd random weather condition.  From that river, I only found two kinds of fish, but I stabbed a bunch of them and am now totally ready to finally eat well for once.  Crucian Strange Salad So-so  Sweet. We're getting somewhere.  Black Bass Strange Salad So-So  Holy poo poo! For the first time in four days since the game's start, we are actually well-fed and in a good position! Fish are great and fulfill lots of hunger and are relatively easy to get, I rely on them pretty much exclusively to sustain me for most of the game. Black Bass in particular are incredibly filling and easily found in the river just outside the cave, we're finally getting over the initial game hump here people! Music: Beach  Now that Keith and Skye are well-fed, I shove an Energy Mushroom down both of their throats and head back across the river to start scaling the northern walls.  Moving a log one space consumes 1% Stamina like any other action, so without the infinite energy property of the mushroom, I'd be exhausting myself fast. Pushing this log to the wall makes me able to drag Skye up it, so we can make progress in our exploration.  The energy mushroom lasts for a fair bit of time but not long enough for the entire trek. Probably should've packed a couple more because I'm going to end up cutting it pretty fine.  Further north Keith and Skye choose an inappropriately precarious location to re-enact The Creation Of Adam.   I think I'll have a better view of the island. Maybe I could come around from that way?I have no idea what way he means by this, so I'm just going to continue moving along the entirely linear path up the waterfall.  Up a few more ledges, I ditch Skye and have a rummage around on the top of the cliff by myself.  Restores incredibly small amount of hunger. Generally not worth bothering with other than to consume an entire field of them on the spot to restore a decent chunk of Hunger.  Further on, I find a stick. Also, Skye's tired. Totally should've packed more energy mushrooms. A stiff wooden stick. I can make a weapon with this!Spear has been added to Tool Making. But I already have a spear? It's added to the menu when Keith and Skye have their little chat about it, I have no idea why this only triggers after collecting a stick since it's not like I broke the sequence by finding bamboo first. Maybe I can make stronger weapons by being creative. I made a spear! I should try equipping it.Go to backpack and select tools to equip them. Apparently creating a spear out of bamboo has totally caused the game's script to poo poo the bed since it spat all this out at me at once. I don't see why, bamboo can be found just lying around in the very first area.  At this point I remember pushing L or R cycles the function of the top screen, the most useful of which being this map. Our cave is just slightly out of shot to the right, so we're basically on the cliff just above our home right now.   I need to do something about this boulder...So I walk in front of the boulder and immediately start another cutscene. Music: Progress  Yes. Now push! Yes! It's moving! Pathway created. We did it! Now we can go through here. Yes, I'm just a little tired. Maybe we should go back to our cave and rest before going further. Yeah, that's a good idea.Music: Cave  The game takes a shocking amount of mercy on you at this point and instantly warps the pair of you back to the cave. Thanks, I couldn't have done that without you.He really couldn't have. If you go up there on your own there's another separate cutscene where Keith realises he needs Skye's help to move the boulder. I did not want to make that journey twice for some minor flavour text, so I cheated and broke the sequence a little for my own convenience. No problem.Story progress made, I hit the hay to recuperate the Stamina the trip drained.  Looking good for once. Join us next time to explore what lies beyond the waterfall.
|
|
#
?
Jul 9, 2014 22:51
|
|
|
One thing I do and don't like in games like that is the insistence on being proactive in your own survival. You can never get comfortable, you always have to be working on the next survival event. It sucks because sometimes I just want to sit and play a game about gathering coconuts, but I suppose I really should just get Animal Crossing for that kind of thing.
|
|
#
?
Jul 9, 2014 23:02
|
|
|
Jesus, even Velma could pad around on the floor to find things, and the lady can't find a river just outside the door?
|
|
#
?
Jul 9, 2014 23:49
|
|
|
How do you gently caress up potatoes? They're potatoes. They're edible regardless how badly you burn/boil them.
|
|
#
?
Jul 10, 2014 00:29
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 25, 2024 02:25 |
|
|
SSNeoman posted:How do you gently caress up potatoes? They're potatoes. They're edible regardless how badly you burn/boil them. She's not really loving them up. To elaborate a little on how the cooking system works, if a food can be eaten raw like potatoes, a "So-So" is just the food's basic value if eaten raw divved up between the two. The basic value of the potato in this game just happens to be jack poo poo. Food that can't be eaten raw function in pretty much the same way only you can't see the basic value in advance and its moot anyway since cooking shares the food by default. Eventually Skye will get better at cooking which will make all food magically more filling. Emphasis on eventually.
|
|
#
?
Jul 10, 2014 00:40
|
|