Let's Play Dragon Quest 3 HD-2D! Part 10 - Changing Hearts
0To start off I'll say that the audio tweaking is still ongoing; I've noticed another issue that's only showing up now and that is that the game's audio is sort of echoing or doubling. This is down to leaving the recording configured to take both my PC's audio as well as from the capture device. As I have OBS monitoring and outputting the audio from the game to my PC, it's getting recorded twice, and sometimes the sounds are ever so slightly out of sync with themselves. It's going to be a few videos before I have this corrected, so please bear with me.
We left off having just acquired the Green Orb. No reason to rest on our laurels, so we'll just go get the next one now. Off to Lancel where a curious map formation awaits. We are asked to allow just the front party member, our hero this time, to go off alone into The Navel of the Earth. This is meant to be a test, but fortunately all the random encounters are much weaker enemies that would be way easier for us to deal with on our own. There's a spot here that we can't do anything with as the friendly monster runs from our footsteps; we'll have to return here with Videl later to recruit that one.
We solve the problem of needing to fight the fodder on our lonesome via liberal application of Holy Water, and also find yet another friendly monster in the Navel proper. There's a few good treasures to find here, so we make sure to open every chest, even the Man-Eating ones. On the bottom floor the path splits in two; the lower path leads to a dead end with some blue rock embedded in the wall, the upper path leads to our goal: the Blue Orb. As is usual for this remake there's a new boss encounter associated with this one: a unique looking wizard with his man-bat henchman. This isn't particularly difficult, but that's down to tactics and training. With this boss defeated we acquire the Blue Orb; only two left!
I've been avoiding it all this time, so it's finally time to take a travel door to the place the game has been trying to herd us. The land here is completely surrounded by mountains, making it impossible to get to via land or sea. We arrive in the city of Samanao (Manoza) which seems to be having some issues with their king. Entering leads to a cutscene where a funeral is taking place; it seems the king took exception to something they said or did.
Exploring lets us find the last Monster Arena on Earth which we will be saving for later, and the castle which doesn't let us in through the front gate. A side door will admit us entrance, though. Checking out the castle we find the odd treasure and approach the king... only to be thrown in jail. Too bad they didn't take our stuff, so we can just leave, though not through the guard; instead we go to a deeper part of the dungeon where we find... the king?! And a passage out that leads to the graveyard.
With nothing else left to do, we head to the nearby cave that hides away a treasure called the Mirror of Ra, a device that will always reflect the truth. The dungeon itself is a bit evil, though, containing a floor with a trail of treasure chest that are sometimes fine and sometimes Mimics. Fortunately wee have a spell now that will help us determine which of these are dangerous, so we utilize it as often as possible.
Retrieving the Mirror we sneak into the castle at night and approach the King in his bed and use it on him; it reflects that he's a massive ugly monster! He changes back into his Boss Troll form and attacks, and we are in for a ride let me tell you. He hits really hard, can reduce our defense and attack, and can even confuse us. We fight really hard against him, though we have a few secret weapons now: Videl has the Orochi Sword to reduce his defense, Kloe has Oomph to give our attack power a boost, Pomni has Egg On which gives us a massive one-time boost to our attack, the Hero has Flame Slash which Boss Troll is actually weak to, and finally Videl has Sleepy Slap which doesn't work often, but DOES work on occasion which is great for getting us a spare turn or two.
Defeating the Boss Troll restores the king to his throne, and nets us the Staff of Change (or... Mod Rod) which will allow the party to take on a new form when used. It doesn't serve a lot of purpose but it is needed. With this done we are prompted to return to Recetteburg where the town has expanded once again. The Cabaret is done, and there's now both a weapon and item shop. It seems, though, that Recette is letting the power go to her head a little, and the people are preparing to rebel. We learn of this plan, leave, and go back to find that they've deposed her and thrown her in jail. She tells us to go back to her mansion and search behind the old throne to find something she wanted to give us: the Yellow Orb! Just one left!