Game:

Steven Universe: Attack the Light (2015)

Duration: 19:45

2,700 views

24

Well, another area (mostly) cleared, and now it's time to move on to-- wait, what? You want to know about all that OTHER stuff I'm not doing in each area? Like the ever-tantalizingly-teased (by immersion-busting system messages, even!) Gauntlet stages or whatever's behind those red doors with the slots?!

...wait, you weren't? And you want me to continue onward with new and heretofore totally unseen content?! ... ... ...well, this is awkward, isn't it?

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Indigo Caves
Stage 1-4:

Our first step is... actually this stage we've already been to. C'mon, you know we saw this door, right? You have to go TO the door to put the Gemstone in it, duh. THEN we can go somewhere new. I mean, jeez, that's pretty basic adventure-y stuff, right? Right! They even put a handy line showing the connection between this stage and the place we couldn't go! Nice!

...I suppose this also serves as confirmation of the fairly obvious that you can revisit old stages, in case you missed something and need to go back, which the topmost level of the world map helpfully showed the Indigo Caves weren't actually completed yet.

Huh, a warp pad... and... it's... different? That's odd. GAH! More pop-in messages from beyond the fourth wall. This is a SECRET warp pad! Okay! I don't think I was going to put that together myself, so it's nice that you were here to explain that and "reward" me with such validation.

(We also get treated to confirmation that, indeed, 1-4 is finally totally 100% completed now!)

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Indigo Caves
Stage 1-6:

Yep, I shall now hold for your surprised gasps... this stage is known by the astonishing and unbelievable name of... 1-6. (Wait, what? You read the video title? H-how resourceful of you...) This shows that they had always SOMEHOW intended for us to arrive AFTER defeating the area's boss, so the stages are numbered accordingly... also they ensured this order by placing the Red Gemstones in the next area entirely.

As one might expect, an area one ordinal designation more advanced than the boss stage is bound to have some fearsome challenges between us and the exit! Oh, hey, look, the exit! ...hmm, this wall might be our toughest adversary yet... ... ...

That aside, there are actually only two enemy encounters to be had here... but both are ambushes and both feature giant enemies, so the battle won't be especially simple. If you'll recall, giant enemies feature higher stats than normal... so they hit harder, take less damage, and have substantially greater health reserves. Typically, this means you'll want to drop their defenses with Garnet's Shield Breaker as a matter of course... but things like inflicting burns for consistent passive damage and using more expensive and more damaging attacks are also great places to start.

Oh, hey, didn't we get some brand new attacks very recently? Let's bust 'em out! ...unfortunately, Amethyst's attack stat is still pretty abysmal, and Garnet's new attack, while neat... is more focused on spreading damage around to multiple targets at the expense of concentrated stopping power. (They're also pretty tough action commands to get peak results from compared to what we've been using so far.)

Actually, all this begins to make me wonder if we haven't made some kind of huge mistake in coming here so relatively "soon"... because damage is clearly swinging the wrong way for our heroes. It's not insurmountable, but who knows what else might be lurking around the next corner?

The rest is fairly self-explanatory, except for a brief period where I furiously attempt to get Pearl to apply a burn so that I can feel like I'm not "wasting" initiative only healing my party... thereby wasting vastly more time waiting for it to happen than simply doing it and getting it over with. (It also shows how simply switching to the most powerful attack you've got can outmuscle even the beefiest of defenses... the difference is rather staggering, I must admit.)

Unfortunately, reaching our destination reveals that indeed we picked the wrong direction at the initial fork in the road and must backtrack... ... ...never fear! We're armed with knowledge and encouragement that will tide us through any turbulent times! (Er, sorry, got stuck in the drama zone for a second...)

... ... ...great job, warp pad. You forced me to reconcile my having missed a secret... by pickpocketing a skeleton (who, indeed, had no pockets at all!) for some... surprisingly modern Cookie Cat Bites(tm)!

This warp pad is ALSO discolored... and based on the map we saw at the beginning, that can only rightly mean--!

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