LP Beach

Poison Attacker, and then Status Booster for later (unless you can buy Status Booster later, if so then wait).

What if after we put in a huge deposit they just steal our money and run to a hot spring or something!?

Likely this is a reference to another buggy game Hollow Knight.

Before I get into replies, a quick question: did anyone notice something different about the animated GIFs in this last update, and if so, what do you think of the change?

The software I've been using to make them updated with some new options, so I tried a different approach: it's easier to get them under the required file size (with fewer artifact/blurring issues) this way, but it causes discolouration in some of them. Better? Worse?

(Also, there's still plenty of time to get votes in if you want to influence my medal purchases. Next update won't be affected so I don't have to push the button right away.)

Kacie wrote: ↑

Wed May 05, 2021 9:57 pm

Poison Attacker, and then Status Booster for later (unless you can buy Status Booster later, if so then wait).

What if after we put in a huge deposit they just steal our money and run to a hot spring or something!?

Likely this is a reference to another buggy game Hollow Knight.

I'll count this as a vote for both medals; we'll be able to buy all of these later eventually, but there's not really a good reason to hold off buying things now if we want them. There are exactly enough crystal berries in the game to eventually get everything Shades will stock, so we're really only choosing the order in which we get them.

I do know about that reference (though I've not actually played the game so I've never seen the scene it refers to), I was trying to be a little coy about it because of the ongoing blind LP.

19: Games Within Games

Before we start, once again Alien Arcana has provided more insight into the boss scripting:

Alien Arcana wrote: Interestingly, it looks like the fraction [Monsieur Scarlet heals] is actually variable! He recovers 1/2 the damage he deals at first, but that increases to 2/3 once he's at half health.

On hard mode, he gets the Attack Up at 65% and the Defense Up at 40%.
On normal, the Attack Up comes at 50% and he doesn't get a defense boost at all.

It looks like [the explosion] attack heals Scarlet for 100% of the damage dealt, but it's capped at 8 HP.

It's no wonder I didn't figure out how his healing worked.

34 - Dodgy Business



When we left off last time, we hadn't yet talked to Carmina from this side of the table. Let's remedy that now.



Um, what?
What's a deck?
Tch. Have you come to waste my time, then? I live and die by the card.
If you're not here to play, leave.
Sounds interesting. Won't you tell us more? We may surprise you.
You expect me to teach a newbie the ropes?
...Well, sure. It's been a slow day.
The first thing you'll need is a proper deck of cards.
We aren't gonna have to buy some, are we?



Oh, yes! I do love spying!
You'll need at least one Boss Card, two Miniboss Cards, and one Enemy Card.
Come talk to me when you're ready. I long for battle.

This sounds interesting! We've definitely got enough spy data for this, so let's talk to her again and see how it works. (If we didn't have enough cards somehow, Tatel's right behind us and would be happy to sell us the data.)



You'll battle us, then?



Listen closely, rookie!

Minigame time!

29 - Team, This One's Stronger! (Miniboss)













Numb: One of your opponent's Attacker cards is numbed.
If X: If played alongside X card, gain an effect.
If Atk (X): Gain an effect if your total ATK reaches X.
Unity: Gains ATK for every member of its tribe. Like a swarm of Midges...

Cards do what they say on them. The only real difference between "Attacker" and "Effect" cards is that only Attackers are vulnerable to Numb.

Ironically, Midges don't use the Unity mechanic any more, they're just Attacker cards now. They did have Unity(1) on them back in v1.0.5, but for some reason they were changed. This isn't all the keywords either, but it gives a decent enough overview of how different types of card work.

You can check many more effects in your Discoveries menu.
You can include as many repeated copies of Attacker and Effect cards in your deck as you want.







At the end of each turn your TP is restored, so go wild with your plays.

(What Carmina's neglected to say here is that your maximum TP also increases each turn, until reaching the cap of 10; it's pretty reminiscent of Hearthstone. It's intuitive enough once you see it in action.)

To summarize, your deck must contain 15 cards: 1 Boss, 2 unique Mini-Bosses, and 12 Attacker or Effect cards which may be duplicates.
Now, try building your deck.



It just throws us right into deckbuilding! This is just for the tutorial, we'll get to build a new deck when it matters so the stakes are low here.



We can choose the card of any Boss we have the spy data for, which right now is these three. For the tutorial, I'm not going to pick things strategically, so let's use the Devourer because it's cool. I've certainly never used it in the Spy Cards tutorial before!



Now we need to choose two Minibosses.





Again, we have the choice of everything we've spied so far; this time, we need to pick two different ones. Mothiva and Zasp have abilities that work together, so let's try them.



And now we have to pick 12 more cards. Let's see what we've got:













This is a much wider range of choices! We've encountered 16 different enemies so far, and we can include multiples.



For now, let's just go with a healthy variety of Attackers at different costs, and a couple Numbnails and Venus' Buds to round things out.

We also get the option to save our deck, so we can skip this step next time we play this game. I won't be saving this one, I'll build a more synergistic one once we're out of the tutorial. You can't store multiple decks, any time you save a deck it'll overwrite your previous one.

Let's do this.





(Did you think Carmina was done talking? Oh no. She's barely gotten started.)

Mine are turned back, of course. But you can tell their type through their back.
I'm holding a Mini-Boss and 2 Attacker or Effect cards.
Attacker and Effect cards share the same back. Leaves you wondering, right?
Use as many cards as your TP allows you to and try to win the round.



This is a bit obvious, but reduce the opponent's HP to 0 and you'll win the match.
What a mouthful... Let's start our duel.
I'll be holding back during this practice match, okay? Pick your cards and give it your all!



Okay, we're finally in the game. We can see our status in the top left, and our opponent's in the top right: each player starts with 5/5 HP (some cards heal, but you can't go over the maximum), and 2 TP on turn one.

Our hand is in the bottom left. We have Thief, Numbnail, and Zasp.



Of the cards we can afford to play, let's pick the Thief, at least with that we'll have a chance to win the round. Once we've selected all the cards we want to play, we press (X) to submit.



Here's what happens after you submit. It reveals the cards the opponent played, then each side's effects get tallied up and compared. We tied at 2 Attack, so this round ends up being a push and neither player loses HP.



Now the next turn starts.



That should cover everything. Let's continue!

Well, she didn't explain the card drawing rules, so I'll take care of that. Each turn, you draw two cards (up to a maximum hand size of 5), or three cards if you had an empty hand. So this turn, our hand contains four cards.





Let's just do this. (Notice we had 3 TP to spend this turn, each turn our TP goes up by 1 until it maxes out at 10. We gradually ramp up to more expensive cards.)



Yowch. There's Numb in action: it disables one Attacker card. Specifically, it hits the one in front (the first one you selected), so if you're playing multiple cards you can lead with the weakest to be slightly safer. We only had the one, so we lose to a puny Seedling, and lose 1 HP.







Let's try this?



So much for that. Her Numbnail cancelled out our attacker, and this round's another push. The Inichas didn't end up doing anything: its ability says Coin (1), which means it literally flips a coin and only gets the bonus on heads. She didn't get heads.







We have both Zasp and Mothiva, and exactly 5 TP lets us play them both. Each of them gets a bonus from the other so this is an easy choice.



Yeah, that was an easy win. Notably, because Mothiva and Zasp are both Mini-Bosses, Carmina's Numbnail doesn't do anything against us, it can only disable Attacker cards (the ones with green backgrounds).

Also, you can see Mothiva's Heal ability triggering, which gives us back 1 HP. Heal is pretty good.







Keeping it simple. I think that's the way to go here.



Another loss.







Tough call here. Looking back at it, I'm not sure why I made this play: the second Venus' Bud is redundant (Lifesteal heals you if you win the round, but we're only down 1 HP so the second is pointless), and playing the extra doesn't get us extra card draw or anything. I should've played Mothiva instead.



See? Would've won if I played Mothiva, instead it's a push.





Ooh, Carmina has her Boss this turn.



Let's just go with straight power.



Let's unpack what happened here. The three cards she played were Spider, Zasp, Seedling. Spider goes first and its summons trigger, adding Inichas and Jellyshroom to her played cards. Then everything else gets totaled up.

We actually lost this on a coin flip: if the Inichas had come up tails, she wouldn't have gotten that 2 defence, and then our 8 attack would win. But with the defence, 7 beats 6 and we lose.





Let's just play everything we drew, I guess.



We win. Not by much, though.





Again, just playing everything we drew. The late-game often ends up looking like that.



We lose again. This deck isn't impressing me.





Another turn where we just play everything we have.



This time, though, it works. We also get 1 HP back from Lifesteal.





Finally, the Devourer showed up! We may as well play everything.



Devourer's "Vs Bugs" kicks in (Zasp counts) and gives us an extra 3 Attack, which ends up winning us the round.





Another turn where we'll just play everything we drew. I'm not showing a lot of strategic play here, I promise it can be more interesting than this!



And we win this exchange, and with it, the match.





Seems you are ready for the real thing...

34 - Dodgy Business



When we come out of the Spy Cards game, we briefly see Logbook Updated show up in the corner; we also get a Discovery for this, as Carmina alluded earlier.











The Discovery text goes into more of the various keywords we might find on cards. It's handy to have this here as a reference (though it's a bit awkward we can't check it in the middle of a game!).

Let's talk to Carmina again.





If we decline:

A shame you turned out so spineless...

That said, let's go.

Ready yourself. This will be a duel for the books!

Click me for video!

29 - Team, This One's Stronger! (Miniboss)





Let's build a new deck.



This is the Venus deck, my favourite deck for Spy Cards. I'll explain how it works in a moment; I'm not going to claim this is the best possible deck, but it's quite reliable, and it can be built entirely from enemies you're guaranteed to have met prior to this point. If you can't make out the cards, here's what the list is:

Boss: Venus' Guardian
Miniboss 1: Acolyte Aria
Miniboss 2: Monsieur Scarlet
Venus' Bud (x4)
Thief (x2)
Bandit (x3)
Burglar (x3)

The core idea here is that we're building around Venus' Guardian. It gets +3 Attack for each Venus' Bud played along with it, and they're cheap, so we'll play a bunch of them. They also have Lifesteal, so we can tack them onto other turns in the hope of getting more HP. Aria plays into this strategy too, she gets three coin-flip chances to summon a Venus' Bud.

Monsieur Scarlet is more or less a default choice, since neither Zasp or Mothiva are much good if we're not playing the other, but he has a conditional heal so he plays into what we're doing anyway. Then we fill out the rest of the deck with Attacker cards at various costs. (I go with the bandits rather than, say, Seedlings, because there's a real risk of opponents playing Weevils.)

It's not terribly sophisticated, really, but it gets the job done. We're not going to do better with our current card pool, though it's possible my ratios aren't completely optimal.

Let's give it a go.





Well, this is a bit unfortunate, but not that surprising given we're only playing two copies of Thief. We don't have anything we can play. We can just press (X) without selecting any cards and pass our turn, though. This deck often forfeits the first turn, but it's fine.



As we expected, we lose. (As I mentioned before, Midges used to be classed as an Effect card and had Unity 1, but now they're just 1 Attack.)





We have a full hand this turn, but with 3 TP we can't play many of them. Bandit it is.



That's a push.





An actual decision! Burglar, or double Thief?



I'd rather do double Thief here, to draw more cards next turn (and be safer if she plays Numbnail).



It's a tie again.







This is the best play we can make this turn, I think. I want to cycle out the bud to draw more cards anyway.



Close one, but we still lose.







This was a bit of a misplay on my part, honestly. I should have played the second Bandit instead of Scarlet, they both give the same attack for the same cost and I could have held Scarlet for a later turn when I could have triggered the bonus.



We win the turn, at least.







If I'd played the Bandit instead of Scarlet, I could've triggered his heal this turn pairing him with the Burglar. Oh well.



We win the exchange, at least! (If you watch the video very closely, you might see something peculiar here - the Miniboss card Carmina plays shows a 4 TP cost initially, before turning into Acolyte Aria. She's actually playing her own card, which turns into a random other miniboss.)









Keeping it simple, let's just go for damage.



Overkill, but it got the job done.







I wasn't optimistic about winning this exchange; it seemed wasteful to spend too many cards on a losing turn, so I'm holding back.



What the hell, is Carmina cheating? That's two copies of Monsieur Scarlet! She shouldn't be able to do that. (It's her morphing card picking him. I think the game does cheat a bit here, and bias it toward cards we've already seen, the devs updated this minigame a couple of times trying to minimise how many future enemies it'd spoil.)







Making the best of what we drew.



We win the hand, and recover 1 HP from Lifesteal.







I wasn't sure whether I wanted to play Aria here or hold her in case we draw Venus' Guardian, but given Carmina has a Mini-Boss I thought it was better to go for it (especially since she's on 1 HP, so this is game point).



We heal 1 from Scarlet regardless of winning or losing the trick; on top of that, Aria won two coin flips, meaning winning here got us back to full. This deck is good at that (even if it's irrelevant right now, since the match is over).



34 - Dodgy Business



So it seems. Good game.
Ahahaha... Ahahahahahah!



We get anything for winning?
Don't bring your greed into our battleground, Vi.
Mhm. This was nothing more than a duel to clash our wits. To think I'd be bested...
But if you really want a prize, there's a big competition on Metal Island.
Rich bugs board the boat on the pier there, and watch us play for sport.
The entry is pricey, but nothing compared to the prize.
Wait, you can make money playing card games?
It sounds fun. Can we enter, then?
Take this, Leif.

11 - Key Item!



If you wish to enter... you'll need to fill up that Blank Card.
Search for the four Card Masters across Bugaria. That's all I can say.
Could we have a tip, at least? Bugaria is quite vast...
...Eh, sure. Why not. The first card master... is old. Good luck.



With that, she leaves.

Heheh. Let's go look for them! You've gotta win that prize!



I love how baffled Vi initially is at the concept of playing cards for money; characters like her are usually into gambling. Also, Leif's competitive streak comes out again; was anyone expecting him to get hooked on card games?



If we check our quest log, we'll see a new sidequest has been automatically added.



That's all we know, for now. We have Carmina's hint that the first one is someone old (you can probably guess who this is), and we might have an idea who one of the others is (the person we saw her playing with at the Golden Festival). We don't have any clues for the other two. We'll have to follow up on those leads and see if we can't qualify for the tournament.

This is one of the game's more involved sidequests, obviously. I love that they programmed in a complete TCG for this: it's not the most sophisticated game ever, obviously, but it's still fun and there's real gameplay here.

With this, we've wrapped up what we can do in the Underground Tavern for now. Next time, we'll get back to the mission: I could follow up on the Card Masters, but I happen to know we can't actually finish the quest until Chapter 3 is completed, so I'd rather postpone them until we have some more cards available and can maybe mix up our deck a bit.

If anyone still wants to vote on what medals to buy from Shades, feel free to do so. I'm seeing a solid consensus in favour of Poison Attacker and Status Booster, with HP Plus in a distant third; I'll grab all three of those unless more votes tip the scales.

Um. Well. I'd hoped to have an update done before now, but... to put it briefly, real life bullshit has interfered. Among other things, a work project I'd had on the back burner has suddenly become very urgent, so I'm going to have to focus on that for the next few days and that's going to delay the update even further.

I apologise for the interruption in service, I hope it won't be too much longer. In the meantime, I've finally gotten to updating the character page, at least.

Take your time. Things will get better!

20: Sandbox Gameplay (Part 1)

I'm sorry about the delay between updates; for better or worse, I've had a lot to deal with offline recently. I can't guarantee a return to the prior pace for the foreseeable future either, unfortunately, so thanks for bearing with me in the interim.

34 - Dodgy Business

We left off last time having explored the Underground Tavern, and been introduced to Spy Cards. Let's pick up there. Here's a bit of alternate dialogue I forgot to show:





(Incidentally, this is a complete lie, there's no way Leif could actually have read up on the rules! The Discovery Log entry doesn't get added until after Carmina's tutorial. That said, even if it doesn't make perfect sense, I appreciate having the option to skip the tutorial.)

You're a cheeky one, aren't you? I hope your "studying" proves enough.
When you're ready, let us battle!

From there it goes right into the deckbuilding screen. This completely skips the tutorial round in addition to all of the related dialogue, so it can save a lot of time on repeat playthroughs.

Now, before we leave, we have some business with Shades. The thread overwhelmingly voted for me to get Poison Attacker and Status Booster, so let's do that.



Kehehe! Here you go, my lovelies...



Come back if you still have any berries left to spend! Kehehe!





These will definitely both come in handy. Also, I made a mistake last time: I was going to buy HP Plus also, as that got a handful of votes, but as it turns out that one doesn't get added to his stock until next chapter, I'd had it wrong in my notes.



Despite everything I said earlier, I'm going to have Leif equip Status Booster. It may not work on Frigid Coffin, but it'll boost Icefall for crowd control purposes and I may as well get some utility out of it.

Let's be on our way.

06 - Outskirts



We need to pass through the Outskirts on our way to the Lost Sands. And would you look at that, it's Delilah and Stratos! They certainly weren't here before.

Let's check the banter first.

It's Team "Not Slacker".
Indeed. They must be thoroughly scouting this area!
Heheh. Let's get a lead on some exciting stuff!

Let's see what they have to say.



Ah! Team Snakemouth! We're doing fine. We were investigating the outskirts for secrets!
It seems there is a place Seedlings like to gather up ahead. But you need to cross the river to reach it.
Indeed. But we don't have time to try to cross it! More mysteries await to be unveiled!
So you will just leave that area unchecked?
Think of it more as an opportunity for you to find out more about it!
By the way, I have heard that the "Seedling Haven" is a great spot to find Golden Seedlings.
Be careful, though. Golden Seedlings are really strong and you shouldn't underestimate them.

(You don't have to rub it in, Stratos.)

But they are known for carrying rare berries, so it is up to you to fight them or not.
Well, I can't say no to treasure! Thanks for the tip!
No problem! Stay safe!

This is a pretty big hint. Specifically, you may remember that one of the Bounties we learned about from Doppel was for something called the Seedling King; maybe this is related to that?

Now that we've met Doppel, Stratos and Delilah will start popping up in various places to give us hints about where to find the Bounties. Seeing them is a pretty good sign that one of them is in a nearby area; once we beat the Bounty, they'll leave.

We can also talk to them again to get a truncated version of the hints:



Don't know why, though, but it seems it is easier to find Golden Seedlings there!

This is absolutely true; I'll cover it in more detail once we can actually go there.

I sensed a strong presence beyond the river. Be careful when going there.

And Stratos heavily implies there's a boss.

The banter stays the same. In fact, that banter in particular is shared among all of their bounty hint locations.



It's hard to see from this distance, but there's a path to the north behind the weeds on the other side of the river. That's the area Team Slacker were talking about, and where the Seedling King can be found. Unfortunately, we can't get across the water with our current abilities, so this is going to have to wait.



We actually need to be going east.



Specifically, this is where progress is. The Lost Sands are to the north, and we can use the crank to lower this bridge now. Also, why are Gen and Eri here?

It's Gen and Eri!
They seem stuck. Let us find a way for all of us to cross!

If we talk to them:

Ah, geez! How does this bridge work? Where's the worker?

I hope we cross soon. These Underlings don't play nice at all!



Also, the sign.

Let's lower the bridge. It's a simple matter of using Beemerang Halt on the crank.



Is that one of Venus' buds on the far side?



Mhm. We were stuck here for a while.
It wasn't much!
We'll get going now. See you in Defiant Root!
Be careful, now!

After this, they leave. Let's get going.





Looks like it wants to tell us something...

Let's talk to the bud.



Venus?!
Hee hee... Yes, that's me!
I decided to help you in your quest.
Really!? You're gonna beat up stuff with us!?
...I'm not a combat Goddess! But I CAN heal you up in no time!
...Y'know, for a small offering of 8 berries.
What?!
Why would a Goddess need money?
Listen, Aria and my followers want to thrive in life too, and they are way too dedicated to me to get other jobs.
So it's the least I can do for them! Besides, 8 berries is nothing for adventurers like you!
Sounds like a fair deal, team. It helps us, AND Venus' followers!
Mhm! Just shove the berries in this bud's mouth when you want some healing, alright?

This is interesting. I'm not entirely sure how the mechanics of this work (how does feeding the flower berries get them to her followers, anyway?), but I'm not going to complain. Yellow save crystals are going to become rarer from here on out, but Venus' buds often show up in their stead, and 8 berries isn't particularly exorbitant. May as well:

Hey guys! Venus here.



We're actually still injured from the fight against Monsieur Scarlet, I hadn't stopped at an inn or anything yet, so we may as well take advantage of this.

Here you go, some Venus special healing!



Venus' healing breath fully restores our HP and TP.

Please come by again, I'm always up for a chat.

Let's see what else she has to say while we're at it.



Ahead are the Lost Sands. There's monsters and bandits everywhere, and the sand makes everything way too hot!
I'll try to support you as much as I can, but be careful, as not even my roots can reach all of the desert.

She'll generally give vague hints and/or flavour text.

There's also a new banter now that we've spoken to the bud:

So Venus really is all across Bugaria...
Well, she's like a super Goddess, right?
Indeed. That she would bless us with her healing... I'm beyond grateful!
Easy there.

This seems to be a universal banter for any bud we find.



Let's move on.



This is the entrance to the Lost Sands. As soon as we start walking in, our team decide to have a conversation:



They're way too huge. It's gonna take ages!
It'd be nice if we could move just a bit faster...
...Well, why not just run?
If we tap (B) twice with me at the front...



Bleh... Whatever gets us outta there faster.
We'll try to keep up, Kabbu.





This conversation unlocks a new field ability for Kabbu, and with it a new battle skill. If this conversation and placement seems a little awkward... well, honestly, it is. This was actually added in v1.1, as a quality-of-life feature; the running ability didn't exist in earlier versions, and Dash Through unlocked later in the game.



Here's a demonstration of Kabbu's new ability. Double-tapping B will start him running, and then he'll keep going until you either press B again or collide with an obstacle. This is definitely much faster than we could go before (though honestly at times it can be a bit hard to see where you're going). Also, Kabbu runs horn-first, so this can help first-strike enemies, or just avoid battles by knocking them aside.



Dash Through is expensive, but we finally have another move that hits multiple enemies! This does (Kabbu's attack +1) base damage, ignores 1 point of defence, and can flip enemies. Not bad.

There's also a banter here:

It feels like just yesterday, when we crossed this gate.
With the current Wasp situation, it's become quite fortified.
Uh huh. It's a really big wall, too.
...Imagine if all the sand poured out into the Ant Kingdom!
Let's not, Kabbu.

It's not completely clear to me what prior crossing he's referring to (if he's talking about his backstory, I got the impression he'd have been alone, so I'm not sure why he says 'we').



Please do be careful, the number of bandits roaming the sands has been increasing lately.
To reach Defiant Root, keep going northwest to the base of the Big Tree.
Do NOT approach the Wasp Kingdom border to the northeast! Stay clear from it!

The gate guard gives us directions, and also a warning.

This Ant guards the Lost Sands gate.
What, that's it?
I... I don't know what else to say.
Stop wasting time! Get a move on!

This got a laugh out of me, I'll admit.

There's one other person to talk to, to the right of the gate.



But I can't go to the desert yet, I am still preparing for my journey.
If you plan on crossing the desert, keep in mind it is much bigger than it seems.
Everywhere you look, there is sand. Keep a mental map when you plan on crossing!

This is good advice.

That hat... would it not worsen the heat?
Apparently, it keeps you quite cool.
Seriously? I don't think I'd look good with one, though...

And this is cute.

Before we set off into the desert, let's take a quick peek at an alternate timeline. With all this talk of how the gate is now open, would it have been closed if we'd come here earlier?



Yes. If you come here before getting the mission from the Queen, the gate is shut.

Halt. The passage to the Lost Sands is closed for the time being.
We are investigating a series of cases under the Queen's orders. We'll open up when we're done.

The turbanned bug also has different dialogue:

Hey hey. If you want to cross the desert, tough luck. Right now, no one can pass from this side.
If you want to cross, you'll have to convince the Ant Queen to give you permission.
HAH! Good luck with that!

Enlightening. Anyway, it's clear you can't sequence break and go to the Lost Sands before fighting Venus' Guardian or anything, even though you just need the Beemerang upgrade to lower the bridge.



Enough ado, let's head in.

36 - Lost Sands



The giant tools lying around definitely help confirm that this desert is actually a literal sandbox. Also, let's see what this new discovery is about.







And, of course, the area banter:

The Lost Sands... we've come back at last.
The heat never gets any less awful...
You traveled all through this to get to the Ant Kingdom? Separately?
It would've been way easier with Vi around, though!
Heheh. Same to you.
Well, it's nice to have a guide... Lead the way, you two.

Aw, they're bonding.



We can get an idea of what a maze this place is going to be already, this screen has three visible exits. Before that, though, there's a new enemy here.



There's also a new transition animation!



Let's find out what these are.



It is otherwise unimpressive. Not even digging will spare it from our magic. Let's decimate it.

Um, Leif, it doesn't even have 10 HP. How do you propose to do that?

Psicorps aren't all that intimidating, but they're not trivial to deal with. (These are actually based on pseudoscorpions.)

We'll just do some attacks this turn; a lot of the enemies in this area have defence, so relaying to Kabbu continues to be a good idea.



This attack will cause 2 turns of poison if not blocked.



They can also choose not to attack, and just burrow underground.



Still, this isn't too scary. Kabbu can finish off the first one easily.



Underground enemies, of course, can be forced to surface with Leif's ice attacks. (Though it's worth noting, he does need to deal nonzero damage or they'll stay underground.)



Easy enough to clean up from there. Notably, we're a bit overlevelled, to the point we're just getting pity EXP from these.



Let's go west first.





The banter for this screen is short and sweet.



We can't cross the big gap full of cacti right now, though there's definitely something on the other side.



Let's just head north?



When we get close to it, the small cactus gets up and reveals itself to be an enemy.



It has an Underling with it, but let's find out what the new thing is before anything else.



It's a bit too tough for the Beemerang... Better let Kabbu handle it!

These Cactilings are the new Seedling variant for the area. We'll see what they're about soon enough; for now, though, let's just get some damage in on the Underling.



On its turn, the Cactiling uses this spinning attack. This looks a bit scarier than it actually is because Kabbu has Favorite One on (it's base 2 damage), but it's tricky to block and hits twice.



Leif finishes off the Underling.





Cactilings have a hefty 2 defence, but they can be flipped, so they're not quite as durable as they look.



With decent block timing, their attack looks a lot less terrifying.



Anyway, it's easy enough to clean up after that. These are still worth EXP, at least.



Let's actually go north now.



These poor cacti! It must be so difficult being bunched up together.



Heh.



This isn't a particularly difficult group.





With all the Underlings around, it's not uncommon to find Danger Spuds after battles in here.



This screen has two more exits that we can reach.



The southeast exit takes us back to the first screen.



There's an exit we can't reach behind the rubble; we'll need some later abilities to get past this log.



Let's see what's this way.



Uh, any idea what that is?
No clue... It's got some scribbles, though.
The ancient language... I'm sure Neo would love to check this out later!

It's not easy to see from this angle, but the awning-looking thing over that big rock appears to be a book. That's probably the writing they're talking about here, which does raise some interesting questions...





This burrowing enemy seems to be something new! With good timing, Kabbu can smack it right as it emerges.



Whatever it is, it starts the battle underground.



Its teeth are so sharp that they can bite through stone! Leif, we will need your assistance!



As usual, Leif's attacks can force these to surface. Then the others can attack it.



Arrow Worms only have one attack: they burrow underground if they weren't already, then pop out and lunge. This has a base damage of 4, which can really hurt if you're not expecting it. The predictability makes them a lot less scary than they could be, though.



Later in the fight, the Cactiling shows off their other attack, launching spikes at range. This only does one hit, so it's less painful than the spin, but it comes out fast.



Arrow Worms are giving 4 EXP at our current level; they're one of the higher yield enemies here.



The sand pit and boulder are blocking the way north, so this south exit is the only way we can go from here.



Which brings us back to where we started. We just went in a loop.



Considering I've taken some damage in these fights, I figured I may as well backtrack to Venus and heal before proceeding. This is far enough that it will cause the enemies we killed to respawn, but we'll be taking a different path this time so that's not a big deal.



Let's head east from the start this time.



What could be locked behind the door here?
Pretty suspicious... We could ask when we get to town.

We'll see what door they're referring to soon enough.



Ooh, that's an HP Plus up there. We definitely want that if we can find a way up. First things first, though, let's deal with this Cactiling.



It has a Psicorp with it. These fights are still honestly not interesting enough to show in full, but we do get to see the Psicorp's other attack this time:



The bouncing before attacking is the clue that this version is coming; this one has a fakeout before the actual hit, and causes 2 turns of sleep if not blocked. Sneaky.



That said, it doesn't stop us winning the battle.





There's some kind of fortress here with a locked gate, but we don't have the key. This definitely looks like something that will turn out to be important later.





Jumping onto these rocks from the ledge is the key to getting the HP Plus medal. This is trickier than it looks, the rocks are kind of tiny and it's easy to fall off.





Vi's Beemerang can grab it from there. This is our fourth copy!





For now, Kabbu can take off the poison medals in exchange for this. We haven't seen the last of the poison strategies by any means, but I don't feel the need for them right now.



A Cactiling waits for us by the north exit.



Another straightforward battle.



This one drops a new item for us, though! Cactilings have a decent chance of leaving behind Succulent Berries. These give us the option of more gradual healing, which could come in handy in long fights; also, if used outside battle, it restores 6 HP immediately. This also opens up some new recipes, though I'll wait to cover that until we get to town.

Let's go north.



This area looks different!

That rock formation is impressive. It almost looks bug made.
Was it always here? Did ya get to see it way back?
Err... no. This is our first time here, really.
That's a shame. I'm sure many researchers would love a glimpse of the past!
As long as it's not from us...

Speaking of researchers, it looks like Hawk is here. Let's see what he's up to.



Could there be a path I haven't noticed yet?

There's also a banter about him:

Hawk seems, uh... stumped.
Understandably. There really seems no way to climb up.
Hmm. If we get creative, there's gotta be a way...

This screen has a puzzle we can solve.







If we head over to the left side of the arch, there's a Cactiling we can freeze to make a big block. (If we fought it, we'd find it was a battle with a single Cactiling and nothing else, and it respawns immediately upon being defeated. It's here to be used for the puzzle.)



With careful use of the slopes, we can jump onto the block.



And from there up to the ledge. There's a bit of time pressure here, because the enemy will thaw if we take too long.



The whole point of getting up here was so Kabbu could kick this tyre down. It rolls into place to make a staircase up the right side.







I simply must see what's at the top. I'll see you there!

Hawk has new dialogue after doing that.

Alright! Let us climb to the top!

And the banter updates to this.



It can be a bit tricky jumping onto the tyre because of the way the ground slopes. You want to jump diagonally rather than from directly to the left of it, because the ditch it rolled through is a bit lower down.





What's this up here?



A new medal, for one thing! More on that in a moment. As soon as we pick it up, Hawk comes to meet us.



Not that I've ever seen one...
Weird place to put a statue, right?
Maybe this place looked much different, and only the relic withstood the test of time...
Hey! At least we found something we can use here!
A Medal, huh?
So this was a Medal covered in dust... Fascinating. I'll have to write up a hefty report.



Mmmmm. Would you mind testing its properties on the field? I don't really mind if you keep it.
I've got the data I wanted already.
Cool. Thanks, Hawk.
Once I am done with my research in the desert, I shall head back to the Hive.
May we meet again.



With that, Hawk leaves, and we get another discovery entry.





That's all very mysterious, isn't it? (I do like the use of tardigrades as a mysterious ancient artifact, considering they're known for their durability and resilience.)

Let's check out this new medal.





Tardigrade Shield is something new: this is a skill-granting medal that any of our bugs can equip. It's also only 1 MP, so the opportunity cost for equipping it is minimal. The skill it grants is called "Sturdy", and it's... interesting. It's basically a defencive stance: for 3 TP, the user will get +3 defence and status immunity for the turn. 3 defence is, frankly, huge. It negates any extra turns, though, so if you want the user to take other actions (like, say, using Kabbu's Taunt), you need to do that first. We'll have to test out the "converting extra turns into HP" feature, too.

This skill was quite severely buffed in v1.1; in previous versions, it only gave +1 defence, and therefore wasn't particularly worth using. At +3 defence, though, this skill is great (even if, at 3 TP per use, you can't afford to spam it).



Let's keep exploring.



Looks like the western exit from that room takes us back here, but on the other side of the sand pit!



Which means we can go north.



Well, this is certainly a room.

Woah! That's one BIG quicksand pit!
Doesn't seem like we can just walk through, either.
These twigs look quite flimsy... I should be able to open a path for us.
Good old reliable Kabbu!
Hehehehe...

This room is a sort of central hub for the Lost Sands. It connects to many other areas, though we can't reach everything yet.





This is the central gimmick: Kabbu can cut down these sticks with his horn, and they'll fall to make bridges. As we explore the area, we'll gradually knock down more and more of them to open new paths.



For now, there's only one way to go.



There's a Cactiling on this platform.



There are some enemies here, but these battles still aren't particularly interesting.



Nothing that happened was interesting enough to show, frankly.



We can knock down another stick to head west.



But that's a dead end for now.





Let's try going this way.



Hmm. Shall we test out Tardigrade Shield?



Let's get Kabbu in back and have him taunt first, to be sure something will hit him.



Then I had Vi relay to him, so we can test the conversion of extra turns into HP. I don't think I've ever used that feature before. (Also, I don't think I've shown it before, but in this screenshot you can see the status icon for taunted enemies. I often use Taunt as the last action in the turn, in which case you don't see this before the enemies start attacking.)





This is the animation. It looks like each extra turn is converted to 1 HP; it's nice not to completely lose the value if you accidentally do this before using the turns, I guess, but this doesn't seem like a very efficient way to heal. I certainly wouldn't advise having other characters relay just to get the healing.



And here, you can see Kabbu's in a defencive pose.





That damage certainly isn't getting through. This is very much overkill against these enemies, but it's proof of concept at least.



After that little demonstration, the rest of the fight is just cleanup.



We knock down more bridges.





And more bridges, though this one's another dead end for now.





Let's see what's over this way.

Oh, that artifact over there looks like Kut's tools!
It seems the ancients also sliced things.
Ya reckon they had Beemerangs too?
Eh, maybe? Or something cooler.
There's no cooler weapon!

It honestly took me a bit to notice the knife they're talking about; it's stuck into one of the rocks.



There's really nothing to see here, aside from the save crystal. Let's see what's to the north.



How did Stratos and Delilah beat us here?

This takes the prize for most boring place we've gone to.
The most innocent places can hide dark secrets. I wonder what's in here...

There's another banter if we get close to them:



Though it's not particularly enlightening. Let's see what they're up to.

It's Team... not Slacker!



You really did come all the way out here.
Do you remember our talk? We think this here's the fabled Sand Castle!
What, this brick?
Well, yes. This tablet's just waiting for its secret to be unearthed.
You think it's just gonna come out of the sand?
Maybe! No clue what's inside - but what good castle has no treasure?
So how does it come out?
Sorry, we don't know yet. And when we do, we've got to tell the Queen.
Aww...
It's still good to see a familiar face in the desert.



I get the impression we were supposed to see this conversation before the one in the Outskirts. Oh well.



We don't have whatever goes here, but we can certainly try this?





Kabbu is not amused. (Leif's reasoning here is quite funny though.)

We can try talking to Team Slacker again, but it just repeats their last line of dialogue. There is a new banter now, though:

How can they just stay here all day?
For a team of "slackers", they can do the tedious work.
I shouldn't have misjudged them...

That's all we can do here for now, though. Let's leave them to try to figure it out.



Let's head south from here, I guess.



So we've reached another limit of the desert...
It'd be kind of fun to draw a map of the whole area.
On your own time. There's stuff to do!

A map of this area would definitely be helpful. (I'll show one once we're finished exploring.)



The battle here is a pair of Cactilings. Still straightforward.





More Succulent Berries! I won't complain about this.



Going south from here would just take us to the big arch where we found the Tardigrade Shield.







And the west exit takes us back to the sand pit. We can complete the bridge on this side, I guess, though once again we've gone in a big (largely unproductive) loop.



This path is the last one we haven't tried.





Let's get this enemy group out of the way first.



Knock down another bridge...



At least we're getting a bit more enemy variety; here's a Thief. If we hadn't done the theatre sidequest, this would be our first time seeing one.

As it stands, though, this is still pretty simple.





Let's press on.

20: Sandbox Gameplay (Part 2)

36 - Lost Sands



Seeing a Venus' Bud next to a save crystal is at least vaguely alarming.



This is the banter for the area; Kabbu seems to have better vision than me (and the game camera), I certainly don't see them!



If we chat with Venus, this is all she has to say. The game is certainly telegraphing something is about to happen...



So let's buy healing.



When we get closer, we can finally see Gen and Eri, and start a cutscene.



Hiya!
Hey, Team Snakemouth. How's it going?
Well, it's a bit hot...
You're traveling to Defiant Root as well?
Yup. We're on a mission to protect these merchants!
Specifically, our dear Snail. We could fight or run, but this one's pretty wimpy.
It's been a super good day, though. Easiest mission we've ever had!



Of course. She just had to say it.







Dangit, Eri!
Bandits!
You've got some NERVE trying to mug us!
D-Dear, it's okay. We can make the money back. Don't get hurt fo-
As if! I'd rather go down fighting than yield to these scoundrels!
You speak brave words, for a powerless merchant.
This is your last chance to surrender to the Wasp Kingdom!
L-Like we'd let you take anything!
Yeah, it's time to s-show what we can do!



Hmm? Those three! They're the ones from the report!
That'll pay a pretty penny! Let's capture 'em!
You will keep your vile limbs away from my friends!
Let's kick their butt!
L-let's go!

24 - Oh No! WASPS!





Well, that escalated quickly! This is going to be a real fight. This is our first time seeing a Burglar outside the play, and we also have a completely new enemy in the Wasp Scout. Let's check her out first.



Even if you call for reinforcements, we won't falter!

Yes, there's an added complication of potential reinforcements here. Wasp Scouts can call other Wasp Scouts.



I'd put Leif in front thinking I might use Icefall here, then decided not to in the interest of letting the enemies show what they can do.





So instead I just ended up having Vi attack the Thief, and Kabbu taunt them all.





We've seen this attack before, at least.



The Thief used this wind attack, which we haven't seen yet. Like other mash-type action commands we've seen, you can Super Block this after successfully mashing, but the timing is tight and I didn't manage it here.



Wasp Scouts have a few attacks, including this diving kick for 4 base damage.



Now that he has a charge-up, I decided I might as well have Leif go for Icefall. (You can see the Status Booster icon shows up on Leif's skills menu. I like how they put indicators in the menus to show what your medals are affecting, even if in this case it might have been better to put it on individual skills instead of the entire menu...)



Status Booster seems to be doing good work here. Let's give it the credit, at any rate.





Vi finishes off the Thief.



I'll be less flashy for now, just rotating Kabbu in front and having everyone attack the Burglar.



On his turn, he chooses to use the last attack of his we haven't seen yet. Burglars have this charge attack which hits the entire party. The base damage is 3, this is a Super Block.



And here's another attack from the Wasp Scout, a needle throw which does two hits. Each hit of this can poison if you don't block it.



We should be able to clean up pretty easily from here.



Kabbu finishes off the Burglar.



Vi knocks down the Scout.



And Leif goes for the freeze with Frigid Coffin, to try to prevent reinforcements.



Now we can just finish her off.



And that's that. These enemies are worth decent EXP, too.

36 - Lost Sands





Shut it! Let's go!
You... We won't forget this!



They flee.



Yeah. Thanks, Team Snakemouth!
Hmph. We were going to be fine. They were weaklings.
You're welcome.
...Those wasps are showing up more, huh?
It's worrying indeed. We should report this as soon as we're able.
We're just humble merchants. We can't help too much...
But we are so very grateful for your help. This isn't much, but take it.



Yet another free crystal berry for progressing the plot. We've gotten a fair number this way by now.



Of course. You won't find merchants in debt. With this, we're even.
We can keep the merchants safe from here. We're almost at the town!
Yeah. Don't let us slow you down!
You would never! But thank you. We'll keep going now.
Safe travels!

Everyone leaves after that. Whew.



Before we leave this area, there's a new banter:

Smart of the bandits to hide behind that rock...
I wouldn't be surprised if this was a routine ambush spot. Why are there no guards around?
Two guards ain't gonna do anything against a bunch of 'em!
In any case, it's not our problem to solve. Let's keep going.



Before that, though, let's go back to Venus and get healed again. Can't be too cautious.



Also, it's worth making note of this sand pit for later. We can't cross it now, but it definitely looks like there could be something on the other side.



Let's keep going.



Quite the cliff, isn't it?
And a lot of cacti, too.
So thirsty... I wanna drink the cactus water... I'm gonna jump in!



This does make me wonder what sorts of cacti grow on this scale. There are definitely some tiny species of cactus, but I'm not convinced they look like the ones here.



There's a Succulent Berry in this weed hiding behind the cactus.



Also, is that a medal on top of the cliff? We can't get up there from this side, though, so it's moot for now.





There's an enemy by the exit.



Easy enough. Let's keep going north.



Looks like we might finally be getting close; we've reached the far wall, at least.

Defiant Root's just ahead! A welcome sight after so much walking...
And a break from the harsh sun.
We should drop by the Inn and sleep in a nice bed!





That's clear enough.



Wait, where am I going...



We have to check this out first, of course. Standard video game procedure: if you're told to go somewhere, go everywhere else first.

What a big gate.
This is the border with the Wasp Kingdom. So the area is heavily secured.
I only see one guard, though.
A new development. She, uh, wasn't here before...

Speaking of the guard, we can talk to her.



W-we're just passing by...
Passing by?! This is the border with the Far Grasslands, Wasp Territory!
Unless you want to start a war, you'd better get out of here!
No one crosses the border on my watch!
Eep! L-let's go, Kabbu!

Maybe this wasn't a good idea.

We can also, of course, talk about her:

The border guard's MASSIVE.
Perfect for the job. We'd better leave before she gets upset.



There's also this person in the corner.



*Sigh* ...I just wanna see the Wasp Kingdom!

Okay then.

Who'd even wanna visit the Wasp Kingdom?
She may be... seeking the thrill of an unknown culture?
Right, let's go with that...

Uuuuuhhhh, let's not speculate any further. I'm just going to get out of here.





Another easy battle.



We're getting close to the next rank, though.



This barely counts as a puzzle, really. We just need to turn a crank to rotate the bridge, like we've been doing for a while now.







We can't do anything about these rock piles still.



Another simple battle with some Seedling variants.





And finally, we've reached our destination.

37 - Defiant Root



Welcome to Defiant Root.

Ah, it's good to be back.
Oh yeah. You mentioned staying here back with Neo.
That means we've been neighbors all along!
Life truly is full of small surprises like that.
Uh, cute. Anyways... how do we get to the Hive?
We just keep going straight. There's a huge elevator there!
I-Is it safe?
No one's fallen off yet, so it's probably safe! Let's go get this overwith already!
Venus... watch over me...

This conversation happens as soon as we arrive. Also, we got a disovery.







We'll explore the town next time; this place is pretty big and there's a lot to see.

Here's a map of what we've managed to explore so far of the Lost Sands. (I didn't make this map, it's one of a few that are on the wiki, I've just redacted it so it only shows the areas we've visited so far.)

21: Defiant Root (Part 1)

37 - Defiant Root



Last time, we left off having just arrived in the desert town of Defiant Root. As usual with a new town, there are all kinds of places to see and people to meet, so let's get started on that.

First, though, a banter:

Not much has changed. There's quite a few places I want to visit...
Really? I usually just zoom past the town unless I need the inn.
We're not familiar with the area. What's good in town, Kabbu?
North of here is a commercial district. The baker makes fantastic honey treats!
Seriously!?
The mayor's around here too, I should greet him when I get the chance...

This town is Bee Kingdom territory (the Hive is up the nearby tree, whose root the town is named after), but Kabbu is the one who knows it best, since he spent some time recuperating here after the journey from his hometown. We'll be getting a lot of comments from him about the locals and such.

Let's talk to the gate guard first.



...I know that already.
Just doing my job.

There's also a banter, of course:

Vi, you're the only Bee explorer, right?
Huh? Uh, yeah! That I know of...
We've been thinking it's a bit weird, to see so many Bee guards, but only one explorer...
Look, they're not guards because they want to or anything, okay?
They were born to be guards, so they guard. That's it.
That's a bit somber...
...That's just how the Hive is sometimes.

This is interesting, and definitely raises some questions about bee society and how it functions. The real question, to me, is why Vi seems willing to accept this reasoning for the other bees but not herself. (This banter is shared between all the bee guards.)



Let's just check everything out systematically. First up is a clinic?



We're not sick, just passing by.
That's okay. If you're ever feeling bad, drop by. First consult's free!

There's also, of course, banter:

Isau is such a relief to my eyes. She's treated many of my wounds.
Your trip from the north sounds anything but fun.
...
Really though... it's not so bad to have someone else take care of you, right?
Can't argue with that.

We get more tantalising hints about Kabbu's prior adventures, though nothing concrete.

Despite this, Isau can't actually treat wounds for us in gameplay terms. She's just here. Maybe she'll become relevant for something later.



As we come outside, we can spot this person walking around.



That's all he has to say. Sounds like the ladybugs aren't the only ones getting a bad reputation as a result of the bandits, the dragonflies are starting to see knock-on effects too.

Poor Dran... He's had it rough lately with all these bandits.
Mhm... even though he is such a fine fellow, it's hard to escape superficial judgment.
...
He'll be fine. And if he's not, we can help.



I love that Kabbu actually calls this out.



Let's check out the next building.



Looks like this is the local tavern! There's a quest board and some familiar faces here.



Vi still absolutely refuses to interact with this particular bee, and won't let the rest of the team talk to her either.

Great... she's here too.
Wonder what she's up to.
Don't know, don't care.
Isn't Vi being a bit too mean...?

All right then. Let's go meet some new people, then.



This is all the proprietor has to say.

That eyepatch... so cool!
Seriously, Kabbu? Those are for covering wounds, you know.
Yeah. Can't believe you're so insensitive!
W-Wait, I said it was cool out of respect!

This is a cute bit of commentary, I like this. Kabbu also seems like the type who would genuinely compliment battle scars, anyway.



The other person behind the counter just points us in the direction of the quest board.

It's quite convenient to have quest boards all throughout the kingdom.
Must be a drag to update all of them...
Works for us, though. Completing these gives super good stuff!
Indeed. Let's check up on them every now and then.

The mechanics of how the boards get updated are probably best not thought about, despite the game drawing our attention to it.









There are three new quests for us now! We haven't met Crisbee or Vivi yet; Kut we definitely know. Looks like there's going to be some cooking in our future, among other things. I'll grab all of these for now, though we won't be doing them in this update.



I am certain he's fine!
Or maybe he...



Kina's hanging out here too; you'd think Leif would know better than to jerk her chain by now, but apparently not. (Leif is such a troll.)

Kina's search for Maki continues...
That's cute and all, but she better not forget her job!
Knowing her, she's already finished. She's scary efficient when making time for Maki.

Though that raises other questions, doesn't it? We usually see exploration teams working as a unit (to the point Eetl won't give permits to un-partnered bugs), but Maki and Kina have been operating separately each time we've run into them...

Anyway, let's talk to Dan too.



By mixing flour with different ingredients, it's possible to create so many different pastries! I must taste all of them!

He has a solid hint for us, too. As we'll see shortly once we get to the bakery, the cooking system is about to open up dramatically. Flour can be mixed with almost everything, and will roughly double the number of recipes available to us. It's worth experimenting with.

Ah... we can't help but be hungry around this bug.



Oh? We just might order some stuff, then...
Don't mind if we join you!

I'm including the screenshot in this banter, because Vi's unimpressed expression completely changes the meaning of what she's saying.

That's everything to be seen in the tavern, let's keep exploring.



To the south, we can find a big well and someone else to talk to.



Right, go down the well. Understood.

I dunno why bugs stay here. It's all sandy and stuff.
...You know, yeah. We wouldn't make this a permanent stay.
It's a very tightly knit community, with strong traditions!
Can't they just do their traditions somewhere nicer?
...I swear, Vi...

What this has to do with this person or the well, I'm not sure, but it's nice to get some insight into what everyone's thinking.



Right, down we go.



That said, there's not actually anything to see down here. Maybe it'll become important later.



What's this little stall about?



Only one way to find out.

We can see this banter first.



There's also a sleepy pillbug here.

...
Um, Leif? Is something on your mind?
We want it.
We're not getting any pets!
We really really really want it.
Whatever. Talk to the merchant. But I ain't helping you buy it!

Leif's love of cute little critters strikes again. Let's talk to the merchant and see what's going on here.



A bed bug... rental service? Sir, what exactly do you mean?
It's all in the name. This pillbug here is incredible, I tell ya.
If you're tired, he will lull you to sleep and heal you fully!
Let's rent it, team.
Seriously!? This sounds like a huge scam!
B-But the pillbug...
...Look. I don't ever do this, but if it'll earn your trust...
First rental's free, how's that? As soon as you sleep, though, he'll come back to me.
This is quite the interesting business model...
Well... if the first try's free, I can't say no!
Yes... yes!
You won't regret it. He'll show you his super powers!

11 - Key Item!



He'll do his best, so take care of him, okay?
We will. Oh, we will.
D-Don't forget we must return him...

The Bed Bug goes into our Key Items menu, and we can use it from there, once, as a portable inn to fully heal ourselves (outside battle only, of course). Once we do, though, it'll disappear from our inventory and go back to Morty, and he'll charge us 30 berries if we want to rent it again.

It's a pretty useful little feature, though honestly I usually forget I have it and never end up using it (there are enough healing points distributed across the game world that you're never that far from one). I suspect it's mainly here for the sake of puns, though of course it can come in handy in a pinch.

Hey. How's the little guy doing?
We couldn't be happier.
Just don't hang onto him TOO long, okay?

I don't think Morty quite realises who he's dealing with; let's hope this doesn't become a problem.

I must say, Morty's services were better than I expected.
It's super useful to rest anywhere! If I was him, I'd charge WAY more!
The idea that our dear bed bug could be rented to another bug... Team, we must keep renting at all costs.
Uh, just remember we don't own it or anything, okay?

Yeah, this isn't going to end well. Leif, don't steal people's pets? Please?



That toy car looks a bit suspicious, doesn't it?



Yes, we can use it as a staircase. It is, in fact, the only way to get to the upper level.



There's a free Berry Juice we can grab up here.



Looks like this is the mayor's residence. We met him before at the Golden Festival.



Mayor... thank you. I'm currently on a mission, however. I'll come back again.
Anytime, Kabbu. Bring your friends, too!

The mayor's a nice guy.

Getting to the mayor's house is super weird, isn't it?
Eh... we think it's a cute method.
Regardless of the route, this is a great place to live in.
He can easily oversee the whole town from here!
Look, all I'm saying is he could've paid for some stairs.

I guess it makes sense to use what you have? Though it is a bit weird they constructed this building without any inherent way to reach the upper level (maybe the bees built it, or at least someone else who could fly?).





We can walk along this balcony to the eastern side, but the second entrance is locked and we don't have any kind of key.



We haven't finished exploring this screen, but let's check out the northern sector of town first.



This is the commercial district of Defiant Root. There's a lot to see here. Let's check the banter first:

Business is booming.
There's so many shops, and they all sell unique items!
We simply cannot skip going to the bakery!
We feel there's more to this place. A little supply gathering detour won't hurt.

Look, it's Fuzzo!



...I'm bad at this, so I'll only say it once. Thank you.
It was no problem! Now, for a rew-
It was nothing! We look forward to buying from you in the future.
Heheheh.

The rest of the caravan are probably somewhere nearby too. For all that it's very much a recurring schtick, it's fun how many different ways they find to play with Vi asking for rewards for everything.

These merchants really get around.
Defiant Root's the best place to restock, you know? They get lots of stuff for cheap!
You're surprisingly well informed...
If it's about money, it shouldn't surprise you.
Yep! In business, knowing's half the battle!

Now to check out the shop.



That's a dumb question. How would she have our items if she wasn't?
Perhaps they work in shifts, and transfer items between each other...
So is she Amber or not!?
Dunno.

Again, the game draws our attention to things like this. Don't ask how Amber gets here, just be glad that she is.





Please do check my other wares.

This is a standard shop where we can sell items, unlike the one in the Golden Settlement. That one's a weird exception, most shopkeepers are happy to buy our things.

There's also a banter:

That dry bread looks go-...
Leif?
Are you alright?
Some sand just fell on it...
Nothing some shaking can't fix!
You have fun eating it. We've got standards.

Leif doesn't seem very impressed by their wares. That said, let's take a closer look:

Dry Bread (7 berries)
Crunchy Leaf (3 berries)
Clear Water (3 berries)
Agaric Shroom (7 berries)
Hustle Berry (11 berries)

Aside from Crunchy Leaves and Clear Water, this is all new! Let's see what they do.

Dry Bread
"Defiant Root's preferred snack will leave you thirsty. Restores 3 HP to an ally and 3 TP."
Sell: 3 berries

Dry Bread is actually a cooked item; as you might expect, it's what you get if you cook flour by itself. It's okay, though don't buy it, we can literally make it cheaper next door.

Agaric Shroom
"This mushroom gives you a very short-lived energy burst. Restores 6 TP, numbing the eater."
Sell: 3 berries

We could have found these dropped by enemies in the desert, but we didn't luck into any. This is yet another item that inflicts a status on the eater, and in fact this is the first source of Numb status we've encountered. We'll talk about Numb more once we encounter enemies who inflict it; right now, this isn't really worth using.

Hustle Berry
"Scientists say it's a bean. No one cares. Eating this will grant you an extra turn... next turn!"
Sell: 5 berries

Hustle Berry is a very interesting item (even aside from the fact it's obviously a coffee bean). It's based on the "Hustle Drink", a dummied-out item from Paper Mario 64 that saw a lot of use in the Pro Mode and Master Quest ROM hacks. Effectively, this lets you give up the user's action this turn, in return for an extra action on the next turn (kind of like using Turn Relay between turns, instead of within the same turn). It may not seem powerful, but there are definitely some clever tricks you can set up with these, and I've seen them used to very good effect in challenge runs. They've also been made cheaper in v1.1, they used to cost 18 berries.

Agaric Shroom and Hustle Berry can also be used as ingredients in cooking, but let's save that discussion for the huge cooking episode that's clearly going to be coming soon.

38 - Make it Crisbee!



Just west of the shop is Crisbee's Bakery. He's obviously our local chef.



When we talk to him, he mentions the quest we accepted, but we're going to ignore that for now. In addition to cooking, Crisbee also sells some items.

Oh, you noticed? I practice a lot, so I have leftover pastry and ingredients...
So I thought it'd be nice to sell them! Just press (A) near 'em and I'll tell you more.

There's also a banter, of course:

Ah, good old Crisbee's. It's nice to see this place again.
Again, Kabbu?
Mhm. On my first trip here, I would eat here every day.
I must say, I've heard the food's gotten even better!
Is that so? Now we've got to taste some...
A bee chef out of the Hive, huh...

Well, Crisbee seems to be a carpenter bee, and they're not eusocial like honeybees are, so it makes sense that he's relatively independent.

Let's see what he's selling:

Honey Drop (4 berries)
Bag of Flour (4 berries)
Nutty Cake (10 berries)

Once again, there are new items here. Let's look at them in some more detail.

Bag of Flour
"A bag of flour! Use it to bake many different things. Restores 1 TP."
Sell: 2 berries

Obviously, you don't want to be eating raw flour, but this is an ingredient that can be used to make lots of different things (pretty much every item in the game can be cooked with this). It's very similar to Cake Mix from the Paper Mario games. Crisbee's shop is the only place we can get it, but it's cheap.

Nutty Cake
"This cake's flavor is simply nuts! Restores 3 HP to an ally and 6 TP."
Sell: 5 berries

This is a basic recipe, made by mixing a Hard Seed and flour. I suspect it's here mostly to suggest the sorts of things we can try to make; we'd save a few berries buying the ingredients and making it ourselves.

We'll be back to explore the possibilities in more detail, and help Crisbee with his training, but for now let's continue getting to know the town.



Next to these shops is a smithy, apparently.



Is that a wanted poster for the desert bandits next to this person?



Interesting.

This fellow seems to be diligently guarding this sign.
Huh. I think I saw him when I left the Hive, but he looked a lot happier.
It's not like we know what's going on in his life. We shouldn't be too nosy.
B-But being nosy is a part of helping others!
...
Fine...

This is a fun conversation, too. Apparently we're not going to learn more about this right now. Someone he knows was injured by the bandits, that's all we've got.



A new frontier of WEAPONRY awaits! By my CLAW!

Okay then. Engira's a bit eccentric, isn't he?

Nice claw.
I don't get what's the big deal with it.
Well, he's the blacksmith... so long as it helps him out, it's all that matters!

If you look closely, you can definitely see has an artificial claw on one arm.



This is the last person for us to meet in here, but this is all she has to say for now.

Miss Butomu! What an honor!
Uh, is she special? She makes Medals, right?
Well, yes... but there are many tales of her strength. Of her journeys!
She'd slowly travel across the lands collecting materials, and no obstacle would be a match for her!
They say she walked right through a boulder!
Now that's gotta be fake...

And an interesting banter to round things off.

There's nothing we can actually do in here right now, just meet these characters. As you might have guessed, they'll each have sidequests for us later, but that's a ways off still.



There's another merchant for us to meet.

Hey, Kabbu, is this your dad?
What? Vi, we look nothing alike!
You look pretty similar to us.
Excuse me? The green hues are completely different!
Eh... Maybe all beetles just look the same.
Wow. So do all bees.
Hey!

After a banter, of course; this one always makes me smile. (As far as I can tell, his colouration and Kabbu's seem to be the same? I'm not sure though.)



Uh...
Worry not, I only wish to help. I've got some powerful berries on me.
Hmm. Just how powerful?
These berries can boost your combat abilities when eaten.
You can't really share them though... You'll have to decide who eats which.
Those sound quite helpful.
Bleh. Knowing these merchants it's gonna cost us a wing...
You're not wrong, traveler. I'm selling an HP boosting Heart Berry right now. 100 Berries.
What!?
Just think of the HP, Vi.
Just think of the 100 Berries, Leif!
Err, we'll come back when we've decided, sir.
Don't take too long. Who knows when they'll spoil.

This is something new! In addition to medals and ranking up, there are a handful of permanent upgrade berries around that can increase our stats. Sun here is a major source of them, though he's certainly not the only one, there are several to be found elsewhere as well. (Do note that while I say "permanent", the respec mechanic we will eventually get access to does allow redistribution of these bonuses, so mistakes can be corrected.)



I can afford this, and I want it.

Use it well, travelers.



This goes into our Key Items menu, and we can use it from there. I'm not making any decisions just yet about who gets it, I'll put that up to a vote in the thread.

I still have a few berries I can sell you, travelers. Come back later when you're interested.

Sounds like he might still have more; let's see.



...Travelers, I made my price clear. I will not be swayed.

Damn. I want this even more than the Heart Berry, but I don't quite have enough berries. I'll be back for this later.



The next building is closed.



Who's this?



S-Sorry...

He doesn't seem to have much to say to us.

Shady mosquitoes are everywhere, huh.
Hey. The juice seller in the Golden Settlement is honest.
Indeed. Vi, you shouldn't generalize a whole group!
Geez, I was just saying...

(I have to admit I'm cheating a bit here: I spliced in this character's dialogue from a different file. Shay here is one of the Card Masters, and I didn't realise that having started the quest would make me get his quest dialogue now. Apparently you can face them out of order if you want, which is a thing I never actually knew you could do before; that said, I'd prefer not to do that, and we'll cover the Card Masters quest later once we can complete it.)



Also, it's kind of hard to see, but there's a hidden passage here between the boxes!



What's this?



Err, where... no, WHEN did you hear that?
Kut mentioned him. His ingredients carry more toxins than you could imagine.
Do we even want to ask?
Look. We're buying these. And cooking them.
No way! Do it with your own berries!

Well then. A poison shop.



Kuku. If you're interested in pain, get close to its vessel and press (A) to call me!

Edgy. Let's check out his wares.

Poison Dart (8 berries)
Poison Bomb (28 berries)
Danger Shroom (3 berries)
Danger Spud (3 berries)

The Poison Dart is new, and a counterpart to the Numbnail Darts we've been finding: it can be thrown to make a 2-power attack that attempts to poison, which is a bit underwhelming. Otherwise, we have a convenient source of Poison Bombs if we don't feel like preparing them ourselves, and finally a way to buy Danger Spuds without having to hunt enemies (which is the best part here). Not too bad!



This alley also has a magician.



Here, I offer charms which can change how battles go for you, for only a few berries.
I have a few different charm types, which is how long their effects will last. The longer they last, the more berries they cost of course!
Could I interest you in any charms?



For now, let's ask for more information.

Simple! Once you're charmed, there is a random chance my magic will activate in battle.
Depending on when it activates, different effects can happen.
Like granting a boost of power when attacking, or increasing your toughness before an enemy attack...
Even recovering your HP or TP depending on what happens!
Charms only last a few times, however. Once they run out, you can just come back and reapply them to benefit again!
The charm types only change how long they last, but buying in bulk can net you a nice discount.
So, might I interest you in any charm?



Aw. Come back if you ever change your mind, alright?

Let's see what our party think before we make any decisions about this?

Ooh! The charm dancer! We simply must purchase one!
We thought you weren't too keen on fortune...
I've seen these work with my very own eyes. There's no luck involved.
Uh huh... Maybe just one, then.

Kabbu's attitude here is kind of interesting, especially since (according to external materials) the unnamed fortune-teller in the Golden Settlement is her brother.

Anyway, this is Charmy. She's Bug Fables' equivalent of Merlee from Paper Mario (even to the point of being found in the back alley of a desert town, good grief). If we choose to purchase her services, we'll occasionally get random bonuses in battles until it wears off.

Let's take a look at the mechanics (shamelessly cribbed from the wiki):

There are five possible boosts, each of which can trigger at a specific time. There's a 5.5% chance of the bonus activating, after which there's a randomly-determined cooldown of 3-8 turns before another bonus can activate (though the cooldown doesn't persist between battles). Here are the effects and their associated timing:

Attack Up (for 1 turn, on one character). Can trigger whenever a character attacks, if that character doesn't already have Attack Up status.
Defence Up (for 1 turn, on the entire party). Can trigger before an enemy's attack.
Healing (20% HP to the entire party). Can trigger after an enemy's action.
TP Refund (half the amount spent, minimum 1). Can trigger after using a skill that costs TP.
EXP Increase (1.5x). Can trigger at the end of a battle.

(When compared to Merlee's bonuses in Paper Mario, these are a lot more balanced.)

If we want to purchase this service, there are three packages available:
Cheapskate (10 berries): 5 charges
Regular (20 berries): 12 charges
Overcharmed (40 berries): 23 charges

Interestingly, it looks like "regular" is actually the best value, although you might still prefer Overcharmed just so you have to refresh it less often.

I'll admit I rarely use this service: even though the effects are entirely positive, I don't much care for them arbitrarily throwing off my plans. That said, it's pretty cool and I'm glad the option exists for the people who like it. This is the other thing I'll be taking votes on this update: do you want me to show this off?

Anyway, this is the last service available in the commercial district! Whew, there was a lot to cover here. Let's get back to the rest of the town.



I've been thinking of going on an adventure up there myself. But it's hard to find the time...
(Not like he's missing much...)

This person's wandering around in the foreground. There's also, of course, a banter:

Say, the citizens of this town really enjoy that pattern on their clothing, don't they?
Well, they're simple to weave yet appealing... I could see why it'd be a hit.
Oh. We should open our own clothing line! With squares instead of triangles.
No way. Circles would look way better.
I'll keep my triangles, thank you very much.

Seems like no discussion of local industries can be complete without Vi wanting to disrupt it.



Looks like the next building is a museum! Let's check it out.



Ancient artifacts, or historic pottery... we take pride in all of it!
Wooow...

I can't tell if Leif is legitimately impressed or being sarcastic here.

This moth looks just as old as the rest of the museum.
Heheh. You don't get to talk about being old!
Vi!
O-Oh. Sorry, I...
Heh, it's fine. Walked right into that one.
Phew...

I'm glad Leif took that okay, I could have seen that going badly.



There are some signs to check near the exhibits.



The union of those two clay artisan species made to the creation of all of Defiant Root's buildings, and our land's famous clay pots!
If you are interested, please consider purchasing your very own masterfully crafted clay pot as a souvenir!



Is this a museum, or a marketing scheme? Anyway, we get a discovery the first time we read a sign in here. Let's check the other one before we see what it is.





Historians deduce that these tools were made by either roaches or giants.
As for their use, they might have been used as traps to keep invading troops away during times of war in these very lands.
No consensus on their use or creation methods has been reached yet.

Jacks would look pretty weird if you're bug-sized; they're just a bit too big and dull to work well as caltrops, but it makes sense that's their first guess as to what they are.





The discovery is just for the museum itself.



There's just a bit more to see west of the museum, before we can move on to the next region of town.



This sad lady doesn't have much to say, but the banter is slightly more interesting:

Something seems off about this young lady.
Hmm? ...! Her leg...
Ah... We should probably shut up.
I pray she did not hear us gossip...

It's hard to see, but if you look closely, she has a peg leg. Could she be the friend of the butterfly in the smithy who was attacked by bandits?

Regardless, there's nothing we can do about that now.



There's a Lore Book sneakily hidden back here. It's been a while since we've found one of these!



Also, we can climb up the front of the building here.



Looks like somebody's hiding behind the boxes up here!

What the-!? ...Yikes, we didn't see him there.
Eep!
Interesting spot. Shall we see what he has to say?

Let's talk to them, I guess.





This person's acting surprisingly shady for someone selling legitimate merchandise. That said, it's completely legit, we can buy overpriced Spicy Berries here if we want to. Right now, though, I don't need any.

Fine. Don't tell ANYONE else about this!

As far as I can tell, there's no angle from which you can see this character's sprite. According to someone on the wiki, it's a pillbug, but I can't confirm that.



Let's finally go west.



Here we are. The elevator to the Bee Kingdom. Woo.
Gets the job done.
If we're going up, let's make sure we don't need anything from down here.

They don't have much to say about this area.



Up the stairs is this door, but we have no way to open it right now. There's not even a lock we can find a key for. Put a pin in this for much later.



The sign on the wall of the inn shows two characters, but we can only see one person inside. Wonder what that's about?



Uh... so he's sad, basically?
Indeed.
You're dying to talk to him, aren't you.
...No. When it's grief like this, only time can heal it. Let's not meddle.
Kabbu?

Heh. I don't think they believe you, Kabbu.

Anyway, let's talk to him.





The game just puts the option to be nosy right here, how are we not going to take it?

Oh, thank you... It's alright.
Some complex things happened, and I'm coming to terms with them...
I am grateful for your patience. Don't let it bother you.

Well, that was cryptic. Presumably we'll learn more about this eventually. (Anyone playing along, make sure you talk to him, it's necessary to start a minor sidequest much later in the game.)



We've never seen that instrument before, actually. Is it... an artifact?
Isn't it just a rock with holes in it...?

Samira's here, offering her usual sound test services. She has nothing new to say about that, but that banter was new.



Is that Diana? We haven't seen her in a while!



She doesn't have new dialogue, she just immediately offers to dig a shortcut for us. Of course I want this.

Oh, that's what I'm talking about!
Those berries don't even taste good...
We don't think her taste would be the only weird thing here...
Oi, I'm doing you a favor, okay? Just sit and watch!



Phew... All done! Thanks, y'all!
We're in your debt once again, Diana. Thank you.
Well, I'm off! See you some other time, folks!

The screen fades out, and when it comes back she's gone. The dialogue was identical to the last time we saw her, but at least we get a new shortcut!



The guard's dialogue is the same as others we've seen at these, but there's a new banter about her:

Hmm... It's a bit weird to see Ant Guards so far from the city.
With the mines, we could say they're not too far...
Mhm. These tunnels were a super great idea!
Guess we'll have to give the Queen credit for that...

And with this, I've hit the character limit; see you in the next post.

21: Defiant Root (Part 2)

18 - In the Court of the Ant Queen



We come out here, under a sign for Defiant Root. Just to our left, the stairs up to the Ant Palace, and to our right, the exit to Golden Settlement.



Also, this lady is here, and we have a quest from her.

Oh, great! I really, really want to visit the Bee Kingdom... but the Queen hasn't allowed us to leave yet.



Sorry. Nothing yet.
Aw... I will be waiting here.

We haven't been to the Hive yet, so we don't have what she's looking for. That's the dialogue we get if we don't give her anything, but what if...





Yeah. Would that do?
It's not a Bee, so... no.

Heh.



I went to check my bank to see if I'd had enough for the Bond Berry, but no such luck. Oh well. Let's get back to Defiant Root.



Just be careful with the monsters on the way.

Looks like there's a bit more of the Lost Sands we can explore past this exit! Let's check it out.

36 - Lost Sands



So this is where our caravan friends have gotten to!

This place's got a good view of the big tree.
And the Bee Kingdom...
It's amazing to see such a large living being!
Makes you feel tiny sometimes, doesn't it?
Nah. When you're at the top, you feel like the coolest bug in the world!

Some interesting perspectives here.



Gotcha...

Cricketly certainly has her priorities straight.





While Huscada is, characteristically, a bit nicer about it. Let's check their shop:

Magic Seed (18 berries)
Burly Berry (12 berries)
Succulent Berry (10 berries)

They've changed their stock a bit: we can now buy Succulent Berries, but they don't have Spicy Berries so we're stuck paying inflated prices in town for the time being. (Or we could go back to Bugaria Outskirts and find the caravan miraculously there also, and get it at the usual rate... but let's ignore paradoxes for now.)



Let's head east first.



The Lost Sands sure love their rock formations...
And their thorns.
Perhaps one day, these barren places will be home to new settlements!





There's nothing we can do here. There are clearly platforms to the east amidst the spikes, but we can't get to them, and up on the cliff we can't progress because we'd need to knock down a log from the other side.



So let's try the other route.



Those vast walls cover the desert, don't they?
Mhm. When you see the Lost Sands from the Hive, it's one big box!
That can't be a coincidence, can it?
Nature works in most mysterious ways. It's possible it's mere chance.
We should ask Neo sometime...

I suppose a sandbox would be quite mysterious to bugs who don't know much of anything about humansgiants.



There's also an enemy here.





We're getting close to ranking up!



The battles here are worth quite a lot of berries, too.



For some reason, there's always a Crunchy Leaf in the weed up here.



More spikes we can't cross.



So let's keep going south.



This floor is unbearable. So uneven...
It could be fun to roll around all the hills!
And ruin my fur? You're nuts!
We concur.
Killjoys...

This one's cute. Kabbu's silly side is coming out again.



There are a couple of enemies to take care of here.



These battles aren't terribly interesting still, but I do like that they're mixing in old enemies with the new ones to switch things up. Midges are still annoying!



While it's not the best idea (the Midges will still counter!), there were enough enemies here I decided to demonstrate Kabbu's new Dash Through skill.



It's a simple button-mashing command, and it hits all grounded enemies for +1 damage relative to Kabbu's normal attacks. Not bad. Just like the rest of Kabbu's horn attacks, this also ignores 1 point of defence, and flips enemies if possible.







Another combination we haven't seen yet, now we have a Midge and a Thief.



I decided to deliberately miss the action command to show how enemies stealing items works. They can take anything we have, and once they do they'll hold it over their head.



Now we have a problem: once they've stolen an item, enemies will run away on their next turn and take it with them. Can we get it back?





Attacking won't do it, he's still got it.



Freezing him will keep him from running away, at least.



Kabbu finishes the Thief off, and in so doing gets the item back. Obviously, killing the enemy works, but Kabbu's actually doing double duty here, because any flipping attack is sufficient to make them drop the item.



Finishing this battle is enough to rank up, at least!







As usual, I choose MP.



Our bonus for reaching rank 11 is Vi learning Needle Toss! This is the first of her needle skills, which means the Poison Needles medal finally has a use.



That description isn't particularly helpful, is it? The most important thing to realise here, though, is that needles are piercing: this skill ignores all defence. We'll take a closer look at it in a moment.



Let's go further south.



This area looks different!

Water... Need... water...
We're close to... the Hills... Hang in there...
(We're not thirsty, but perhaps we shouldn't boast this once...)



Also, there's a Chomper in our face as soon as we step into this area.



This is a pretty simple battle (Chompers aren't very intimidating any more), but it gives me a convenient opportunity to demonstrate Needle Toss.





Vi splits her Beemerang into two needles and flies up, then takes aim. While the skill claims to target "all enemies", that's because we can aim the needles separately: each needle can hit at most one target. Like Icefall, the reticle moves automatically and we press (A) to launch. The needles pierce all defence and deal damage equal to Vi's attack.

In this case, I missed the second hit entirely (this can be tricky to aim, especially against targets with tiny sprites, like here), but if it'd hit, the damage would be reduced if it hit the same target. Each subsequent hit deals 1 less damage, or 2 less if the damage was 4 or more, though it will never be reduced below 1.

It's an interesting skill, though often not quite as effective as you want it to be. I like it though.



Anyway, let's finish the battle.



There are a bunch of weeds to cut down here; if you look closely, there's a bouncy mushroom peeking out behind them.





As we cut down the weeds, we get close to a cactus that reveals itself to be an enemy.





Another easy battle.



Yet another Succulent Berry. I have way too many of these now; this playthrough is showering me in them for some reason.



Using the mushroom launches us up to here, where there's a log we can knock down.



It doesn't look like there's much over here...





But we can jump down to find this medal!

Strong Start is a medal that opens up some interesting options. For 2 MP, the equipped bug gets to start with an extra action on the first turn of every battle, but in return, the exhaustion penalty reduces subsequent attacks by 2 damage instead of 1. That's not as big a downside as it sounds, though, for two reasons: one, it only applies on the first turn of the battle, and two, it only applies to the bug wearing the medal, so you can have them relay to someone else instead. This medal's really good.



I usually give it to Leif, but it's great on pretty much anyone.



Let's head east?



Not the most exciting of places...
Given deserts are just a bunch of sand... We're surprised it took this long to find a barren spot.

There's nothing here, or at least nothing we can do. Just more spikes we can't cross. Let's go back.



Let's go south again.



We come out here, behind this gate we saw earlier in the Golden Settlement!



Hitting the switch here opens the gate, allowing us to use this path as a shortcut. Of course, this is mostly moot, since we now have tunnels in both locations anyway. Regardless, I won't complain.

Now that we've explored the western side, here's an updated map of the Lost Sands. There are still some areas we haven't been able to get to, but we've seen a majority of it now.



Speaking of the tunnels, that's where I'll be going.



This person seems to want to talk to us; I overlooked them last time I was here.

Is there a need to wear a cloak inside a mine?
It's super dusty! We should wear cloaks here too!
Eh. We bet she just wants to look mysterious...

Let's talk to her, I guess.







This cloaked ant will offer us fast-travel to some locations, in case all the other options we had weren't enough! Going to the plaza is free, but some later options will cost a handful of berries. To be honest, I'd completely forgotten she existed; we're definitely gilding the lily a bit here.

Anyway, let's go back to Defiant Root.



Specifically, after those battles (and a quick visit to the bank), I can now afford to grab the Bond Berry from Sun.



I do not have any more berries with me at the moment, but I might find some more in the future. Please come back some other time.

If we talk to him again:

I no longer have anything that might interest you. Be safe, travelers.

We've cleaned him out for now. He will periodically get more berries, though, so it's worth checking in with him at the start of each new chapter.







There's no reason not to use this one right away, since TP is shared across the party. The game still asks me to choose who give it to, so I gave it to Vi, but it literally doesn't matter. Anyway, we have 14 max TP now.



Going into the menu to do that reminded me that I picked up a Lore Book earlier, so let's make a quick stop at the library before wrapping up the update.





Looks like you have enough for the next reward tier! Here you go!



That seems to be all for now! Come back once you have found more Discoveries!

We can also claim this, though it's kind of underwhelming. The next couple of rewards for these are much better.







Let's see what this is about!

Lesser Bugs. After the Day of Awakening, many bugs changed form. We "evolved" to be able to live as we do now. But not all bugs evolved. Some remained untouched by the Awakening. We call them "lesser bugs". Spiders, Midges, Weevils, and some others did not gain sentience. They remained unchanged. The causes for that are still being researched. But unless another "Day of Awakening" happens, it will be difficult to study the changes. However, it's been concluded lesser bugs have become more ferocious and will attack bugs that come near them.

We'd already noticed some of these patterns, but here it is in detail.



And with that, we'll wrap things up for now! Next time on Bug Fables... Cooking! Sidequests! Cooking Sidequests! See you then.

In the meantime, how about some voting? (a) Who gets the Heart Berry? (b) Should I buy Charmy's services?

22: The Great Bugarian Bake-Off

Last time, we picked up a couple of sidequests for chefs.





We've also recently learned about several new ingredients. There's a lot of cooking ahead of us today.

Before that, though, we'll need to track down some ingredients. Specifically, Kut's requested a Tangy Berry, and we're going to need to hunt down a Golden Seedling to get one of those. Let's take care of that first.

06 - Outskirts



04 - FIGHT!



I was prepared for this to take quite a while (Golden Seedlings have a 1% chance to replace any other seedling-type enemy), but would you believe I found one on literally the first encounter? I could hardly believe it.

We're a lot better prepared now than we were last time we saw one of these, so let's get ourselves a Tangy Berry.





First things first, Kabbu gets in the rear and taunts it to keep it from fleeing.





Leif and Vi get some hits in.





I decided to try to get fancy here, and have Leif use his second turn to toss a Numbnail Dart. These guys have 60% resistance to sleep (the only status they're not immune to), so I thought it might be fun to try, although as you can see it didn't take. It does damage, anyway.



Yeowch. Not unexpected, but still. If the damage looks too high, well, I had put Hard Hits on in anticipation of needing to grind a while before I found one (may as well get some extra berries, I thought). Without it, there might have been a chance for Kabbu to have survived the hit.

Regardless, though, he deals a point of counter damage thanks to Spiky Bod, and that definitely helps.



We've got this now.



07 - Battle Won!



These guys are worth a lot of EXP.



It also drops a huge pile of stuff. I don't think we've seen a yellow berry drop before yet, those are worth 10 berries each.



That's not what I was expecting! I think this might be the first time I've seen a Golden Seedling encounter drop other items. I suspect this is pulling from the encounter's normal drops.



The Tangy Berry was indeed there, it was just hiding behind Kabbu's sprite and all the other loot. Just what we needed.

Tangy Berry
"An exotic berry that isn't native to Bugaria. Restores 8 TP and cures an ally's paralysis."
Sell: 15 berries

Golden Seedlings are guaranteed to drop these when you kill them. Just looking at it, it might seem a bit underwhelming (though it's definitely not a bad item!); the real value is in cooking them.

We have everything we need now.

38 - Make it Crisbee!



Let's go help Crisbee first.



So I had this idea for a dish... I'm gonna need a Spud. Then I can make something really good! Um, probably.

This quest is pretty simple. Crisbee's going to ask us for ingredients, we bring them to him and he'll cook the thing. What if we try to give him the wrong thing?

Hmm... I don't think that'll do. Please bring me the right ingredient!

Okay, okay.



Ignore the rest of that stuff for now, please. We have a Danger Spud, that's what he wants. (If we didn't already have a bunch of these, remember the poison shop in the alley sells them.)

Yes! This is perfect!
I'll get right into it. Wish me luck!



Crisbee cooks by sliding things into his oven.





Yam Bread is okay. As you might expect, this is what you get if you combine flour with a Danger Spud.

How's it look?
Honestly? Pretty good.
Awesome. I'm ready to step it up a little! Just a little.
Let's see... Try to bring me a Succulent Berry. I'll try to make something super tasty!

All right. That's not too hard either, we're swimming in these (and if we didn't have one, we could get it from the caravan just south of town).



Yes! This is perfect!
I'll get right into it. Wish me luck!





I'm so glad I was right... The Succulent Berry's real flavor comes out when you bake it!



Succulent Platter is another new recipe, just a Succulent Berry cooked alone. This lets the entire party get HP regeneration, though it doesn't heal anything immediately when you use it, you have to wait for the end of the turn. If you use it outside battle, it heals each bug 4 HP. A bit situational, but it has its uses.





A... A bomb?
Then I'll bake it with an Abomihoney! I'm so excited!



We're curious, but mostly worried.
It's, um, really risky... but the legend says it'll bring honey to a new level!
I was really scared to try before but... I've trained so much! I think I can pull it off!
Team, let's believe in Crisbee! If we don't, why did we take that mission?
I mean, you're right, but...
If it's forbidden, it's probably super delicious. Let's do this.
Okay, geez! We'll bring it! I've got a bad feeling, though...
Oh, thank you so much! I won't disappoint you, I promise!

Well, that certainly escalated quickly. This sounds like a really bad idea, are we sure we want to do it?

A lot of people get stuck at this part of the quest, because the game gives you very little by way of hints for how to make either of these things. There is that one conversation early in the game where Vi says not to combine too much honey, which helps, but the Spicy Bomb in particular stumps a lot of people. I've already covered how to make it in the LP, of course.

We still need an Abomihoney. I've shown one way to get this before (combining two Honey Drops), but there's also another way.





Huff. Okay, here it goes! Wish me luck!



Here's the "cooking failure" animation for Crisbee, Abomihoney is considered a "bad" recipe.

Ah... I really did try... I'm sorry.



Come again, won't you? I'd love to keep improving!

So, yeah. Too much honey gets these, as Vi warned us early on, but so does overcooking honey. We have everything we need now.







If we say no:

Alright. No rush. But please bring them soon! I can't wait to get started!

Let's do it, I guess. What could happen?

Yes! This is perfect!
With these... I'm going to cook the forbidden recipe!







...it's alive? I expected a soggy bottom maybe, but this?

29 - Team, This One's Stronger! (Miniboss)





And now we're fighting... monstrous honey blobs? (Look closely at the background here, and you can see Crisbee hiding behind the boxes! He's animated, too, you can see him shaking in fear while the fight goes on.)

Let's get some information, I guess.



If it pulls anything funny, we'll use our ice magic to deal with it. Let's end this.

The Strong Start medal is really convenient for spying, among other things, since using Spy doesn't build exhaustion.

Anyway, these Abomihoneys don't look that scary, though they're definitely different from what we've been fighting so far. Let's see what they can do.



Kabbu attacks the first one. After being hit, it collapses into a puddle: it's effectively underground like this. You may recognise this behaviour from Underlings, it's very similar.



Leif's ice attacks can hit them and force them to surface.



Leaving Vi free to hit it again, though it'll go under again once she does.



If they're underground when their turn comes, they'll use this bite attack from underneath. It hits for 4 base damage, and they surface after using it.



While above ground, they use this bite attack instead. This also hits for 4, though I find it a bit easier to time blocks for.



It's our turn again.



Kabbu finishes off the first one.



Leif was feeling a bit ganged up on, so Vi heals him.



Leif attacks the remaining one.



It goes after Vi this time.



So far, so good. At this point, the battle's a foregone conclusion.



That wasn't too bad!

That said, we didn't see the most interesting thing they can do. I did manage to get some footage in an earlier recording session (that ended up being unusable for other reasons), so let's have a quick look:



Instead of attacking, Abomihoneys can also transform into a bomb! This gives them Defence Up (unlimited duration, which means you can't remove it), and also queues them up to explode next turn if you don't kill them. This attack seems to become more likely the lower on health they are.



The explosion does 10 damage to everyone (and also, as a suicide attack, robs you of the EXP you would otherwise get). Kabbu only lived through this because he'd used Sturdy. Obviously, you don't want to let this happen.







After being destroyed, they leave behind this... thing. That's terrifying. We'll talk about this more in a bit.





Abomihoney is super dangerous! Doesn't matter how good you bake it.
S-sorry... I guess the "forbidden" wasn't just for show.
It's okay, Crisbee. Even if it wasn't food, you cooked it to perfection!
Shame we couldn't eat it though...
Hmm... Wait up, okay? I'm gonna try again. Not following any old legend! This dish is all me!



That looks like Glazed Honey and a flour bag?







Well, this is nice!



I made some more for everyone!
Woah... It's super yummy!
Incredible... We must have more!
It's all thanks to your help! If you bring me a Glazed Honey and a Flour Bag, I'll make you more!
You've earned yourself a regular.
Heheh. You're gonna be famous in no time!



We're best friends now. Come whenever you want, and I'll bake you some real tasty stuff!



That completes this quest! There's actually quite a bit to talk about here, as far as rewards go.



First off, we get to keep all the items we helped Crisbee make, which is nice enough.

More importantly, though, we've now unlocked the first "chef's speciality" recipe: only Crisbee can make these doughnuts, and he couldn't do it before we completed the quest. They're one of the better TP-restoration items, and certainly the most cost-effective. I'm definitely going to be stocking up on them; they tend to be something of a mainstay for most of the rest of the game.

Interestingly, if you try to have Crisbee cook any of the recipes involved in this quest (Yam Bread, Succulent Platter, Abombination) before making them during it, he won't be able to make them successfully and you'll get a Mistake instead. We really did help him learn! Fry and Kut could both make them already, though.

If we talk to Crisbee now that we've finished the quest, we'll get his standard dialogue:





Oh... that's okay. Crisbee's always open!

This is also what you'd see if you talked to him before accepting the quest.

Let's talk about the Abombination. It's a fascinating little item that's very tricky to use, but can be quite rewarding once you figure out what to do with it. A demonstration:



It essentially lets us harness the Abomihoneys' explosion attack! It does 10 damage to everything onscreen, enemy and ally (although if there are any Abomihoneys around, they'll get healed by it instead), modified by defence. We haven't encountered shielding mechanics yet (either for us or for enemies), but that's the only way to avoid being hurt by the explosion. It does destroy the shield, though (as of v1.1), to make it harder to spam them. Abombination also restores 40% of maximum TP, rounded up, but only if it damaged an ally (if everyone is shielded, no TP for you).

10 damage is enormously powerful. As you might imagine, these are a mainstay of challenge runs, though for playing the game normally I think the downsides outweigh the benefits.

Fry and Kut can actually make these earlier in the game without consequence, I just thought this would be the most natural place to talk about them. Crisbee can now as well: the Abomihoney battle is a one-time thing, and this just works like a normal recipe from now on.

While we're here at the bakery, let's talk about the new recipes we can make with flour (and our other new ingredients). There are a whole bunch:

Drowsy Cake (38)
"This cake's super yummy but puts you to sleep after eating it! Restores 7 HP and 7 TP."
Inflicts sleep (2 turns)
Sell: 5 berries
Made by combining and

First up is Drowsy Cake. We already knew about this item since we could buy it in the Golden Settlement, but now we can make it ourselves with flour and Numbnail Darts.

Poison Cake (30)
"This cake is delicious, but... not recommended. Restores 11 TP. But really, don't eat it."
Inflicts poison (2 turns)
Sell: 6 berries
Made by combining and or

Shock Candy (33)
"This candy's shockingly sweet! Restores 9 TP, at a shocking price."
Inflicts numb (2 turns)
Sell: 10 berries
Made by combining and

Similarly, combining poisonous or shocking ingredients with flour can get us similar results for other status effects. Poison Cake can be really good for poison-based strategies if you're not using Weak Stomach, and presumably we'll get medals to take advantage of Numb eventually too.

Succulent Cookies (14)
"Delicious cookies made from Succulent Berries! Restores 3 HP, then recovers 2 TP for 3 turns."
If used outside battle, recovers 3 HP and 6 TP.
Sell: 1 berry
Made by combining and

Mushroom Gummies (34)
"Sweet treats made from mushrooms! Restores 3 HP to the party, and cures poison."
Sell: 4 berries
Made by combining and

Sweet Pudding (35)
"A simple, plain pudding. Restores 6 HP to an ally and 6 TP."
Sell: 7 berries
Made by combining and or

Leaf Croissant (36)
"Extra leaves for extra crunchiness! Restores 5 HP to an ally, 4 TP and cures poison."
Sell: 4 berries
Made by combining and

Honey Pancakes (37)
"A delicious and sweet morning dish! Restores 1 HP and 6 TP to the party."
Sell: 8 berries
Made by combining and

Combining familiar ingredients with flour gets us several new permutations of healing item. Mushroom Gummies and Honey Pancakes both offer new party-wide healing options, while Leaf Croissant and Sweet Pudding are both efficient hybrid recovery items for their price point (compare Sweet Pudding to our old favourite Drowsy Cake). Succulent Cookies are honestly kind of weird, and also sell for less than the value of their ingredients for some reason.

Spicy Candy (40)
"This spicy candy will rev you up! Restores 5 TP and boosts an ally's attack for 2 turns."
Sell: 12 berries
Made by combining and

Burly Candy (41)
"This candy's actually good for you? Restores 5 TP and boosts an ally's defense for 2 turns."
Sell: 12 berries
Made by combining and

With Spicy Candy and Burly Candy, we finally have an alternative to Spicy Fries and Burly Chips. These also activate Weak Stomach, so it's a matter of whether you prefer HP or TP recovery; they're both great.

Hustle Candy (39)
"This candy will pump you up some time later! Restores 6 TP and grants a turn next turn!"
**Prior to v1.1, recovered 4 TP
Sell: 8 berries
Made by combining and

Hot Drink (43)
"This boiled drink pays off later! Heals 5 HP, cures status effects, and grants a turn next turn."
Sell: 7 berries
Made by combining and

These two recipes are the reason you should never use a plain Hustle Berry. By incorporating the Hustle effect, these let you get either TP recovery or status recovery without any loss of action economy (they give back the action you spent to use them). Hustle Candy in particular is a mainstay of many challenge run strategies.

Numb Bomb (59)
"This high voltage bomb's ready to go! Toss it at enemies to paralyze them!"
Inflicts 5 damage on the targeted enemy
Inflicts 3 damage on other enemies in blast radius
Inflicts numb (1 turn) on enemies hit
Sell: 15 berries
Made by combining or and

Finally, we have the Numb Bomb, which is just like the rest of the bombs we've seen and can inflict the Numb status.

Which means, I guess, we should talk about Numb. It's a pretty straightforward status: it immobilises the affected character, but increases their defence by 1. This makes it a bit more practical than sleep for disabling purposes (at least you don't heal them), but makes doing damage afterward a bit harder. It's powerful, but hard to inflict for long durations.

Let's go to the Golden Settlement and see Kut. It's not far thanks to the tunnels.

27 - Kut it Up!





I need a Tangy Berry to cook my newest idea.
However, they are really rare. It's rumored that only Golden Seedlings carry them.
If you ever find one, bring it back to me and I will cook you my greatest dish!

Sounds promising. And since we've planned ahead, we can do this now.



Alright, then. Hand it over.

If we give him the wrong thing:

Hey... That's not a Tangy Berry! Don't try to pull my leg here!

Sometimes these lines are kind of fun, honestly.



Let's give him the real thing, though.

Hmm! You actually found one!
Alright then, leave it to me!



Here it is... My magnum opus!



Now that's an item!

This is a dish only I can make.
Just bring me a Tangy Berry, and I shall prepare it for you, free of charge.
Thank you very much for this.



Another quest completed! That was a lot quicker.



Just like with Crisbee, we get to keep this. And we've now unlocked Kut's speciality: he can make more of these whenever we want (provided we find Tangy Berries, that is, which is a bigger ask than Crisbee's recipe). This is by far the best HP-healing item we've seen thus far, and it heals the entire party!

While you can find Tangy Berries earlier than this, the quest doesn't appear until you reach Defiant Root for the first time, and Kut can't prepare this recipe until you've completed the quest (so don't waste the berries trying beforehand).

There are a few other recipes that use Tangy Berries, but none of them quite live up to this one:

Tangy Jam (52)
"A jam made from a Tangy Berry mixed with honey! Restores 12 TP and cures an ally's paralysis."
Sell: 20 berries
Made by combining and

Tangy Juice (53)
"Juice made from CRUSHING Tangy Berries! Restores 8 TP and cures an ally's status effects."
Sell: 17 berries
Made by combining and

Tangy Pie (54)
"This pie's citrusy flavor lingers for hours! Restores 4 HP to an ally, and recovers 2 TP for 5 turns."
If used outside battle, restores 4 HP and 10 TP.
Sell: 13 berries
Made by combining and

None of these are exactly bad, but they're not that impressive either; I'd recommend sticking with Tangy Carpaccio. (That said, I do have questions about that dish: does it even make sense to prepare a citrus fruit Carpaccio-style? Given the scale, I think Tangy Berries are probably something like a kumquat...)

There is one more recipe (and a really good one) that uses Tangy Berries, but it requires an ingredient we've yet to discover.

That's the second cooking quest done. We're finished now, surely?

26 - Golden Lands







Of course not. Once we've completed both Crisbee's and Kut's quests, these two quests appear on the boards. Let's chat up Aria first, since she's right here.



It was our pleasure, Acolyte. You look well... What seems to be the issue?
I'll be brief, to not waste your time. I'm planning on giving the Goddess an incredible offering.
An offering? Like a LOT of berries?
Goddesses don't need money. Bet it's a bunch of food.
That is correct.
It is?
Seriously?
I wish to give Her a banquet worthy of one as great as She is.
I have prepared several dishes, that I have. But I'm missing... something grand.
What sort of dish are you looking for?
It's hard to say. Something I cannot simply buy would be excellent.
We could ask Fry, Kut or Crisbee to make something. Their specialty, perhaps?
I've heard the chef Fry has been planning his "masterpiece".
The Goddess would be overjoyed to taste something that divine!
So uh... You think she'll give us something for it?
Of course. Venus is generous, kind and loving. If you make her happy, She will reward you.
Fry's masterpiece... We'll do our best to get it for you, Aria.
You have my thanks, Team Snakemouth. I'll be waiting here for you.
Let's make sure to make one for us too, Kabbu.

If we weren't already motivated to get Fry's speciality, Aria wants us to help her get one for Venus. Let's go see what Fry's planning, then.

21 - Fry it Up!





Alright, let's get to the chase. I had an idea for the ultimate dish...
Combining the most sweet thing with the most tangy feeling...
It will surely be something out of this world!
I need two dishes not found anywhere else, which will contain these qualities!
Once you have found them, bring them back to me! The reward will be well worth it! Hahaha!

Fry is definitely referring to the specialities of the other two chefs. Come on, Fry, we just got them! Do we really have to give them up so soon?





If we decline:

Hmph! Let's stop wasting time and get those ingredients!

And if we don't have them in inventory:

...You don't have them! Remember, I need the Sweetest thing and the Tangiest flavor to cook my best dish.
Bring me those 2 ingredients and I will get down to it!

Okay, okay, let's give him what he wants.

Ohoho! You actually did it! I am impressed!
Those ingredients are perfect for the ultimate dish!
Let's get right to it!



Yes, he just puts the doughnut and sliced fruit into his pot and stirs them around. This really doesn't seem like it should work...

Ahaha! Here it is! The ultimate dish!



Well then. He wasn't kidding.

This is something only I can cook!
Just bring these ingredients back here and I will make as many as you can eat!
Thank you very much for this!



That completes the quest. This is Fry's speciality, and what an item it is. Queen's Dinner is one of the best healing items in the game (nearly obsoleting the Tangy Carpaccio we just learned about, unless you're trying to do Weak Stomach things). If you want an "oh shit, save me" button in battle, this is it.



I'd really like to keep this, but Venus has a prior claim. We can always make more of them later when we come across more Tangy Berries, so let's go see Aria again.



If you try to give her the wrong thing:

...
Uh...
This isn't grand enough for Venus.
Sorry, we'll get back on it.

Let's give her the Queen's Dinner.

...
...So?
...Yes. I can tell that this dish is something worthy of giving to Venus.
Nice! So we just have to deliver it to her, right?
Indeed. We must venture to the top of the hills and deliver it to Her.
You go on ahead, I shall catch up in a bit.
Alright. See you at the top.

Not quite done, we have to deliver it personally.

Please go on ahead, I will catch up with you in a bit. Venus awaits at the top of the hills.

Aria just has this to say if you talk to her again. Let's go.



Thankfully, the way to Venus is still open, we don't have to repeat any of the puzzles.

28 - Harvest Festival





When we approach Venus and talk to her, Aria immediately shows up.

Vi! Kabbu! Long time no see! I'm especially glad to not get spooked by you, Leif.
Uh, sorry. We can't help it.
Goddess... I have brought you a humble offering, with the help of these brave explorers.
Please enjoy it to your heart's content, so that our village may be blessed for just a bit longer.



Aria! You know the festival's more than enough!
But thank you. I can tell it's going to be wonderful. Let's share, shall we?



A-Awesome!
Can earthly ingredients reach this flavor!?
We're gonna have to hunt for more Tangy Berries...
I-It was beyond my expectations. Thank you so much for sharing with me, Goddess.



Team Snakemouth! You're getting a healing discount from yours truly! Only 5 berries now!



It was our honor!
It was worth it as soon as we tasted that dish...
Please take this Medal too, as a token of my gratitude.



Prayer may not seem like much now, but it's sneakily good. This costs 3 MP, and makes the "Do Nothing" action heal 2 HP. That's okay, but the real power of this medal rests in the fact it's not the only medal that enhances Do Nothing, and you can stack them (there's an entire build there). Do note that any medals like this only function the first time the equipped bug does nothing in a given turn, you can't keep relaying turns and healing further.

I'm so relieved you enjoyed the offering.
I sure am glad I don't constantly monitor everyone, it would've ruined the surprise!
Come back again, yes? You are most pleasant company.
Anytime!



And with that, this quest is completed as well. The healing discount persists for the rest of the game, and Prayer is a solid medal, so I'd say we made out pretty well in the end.



If we talk to Venus again, that's all she has to say.



Likewise, talking to Aria when we get back to town yields this new line.

With this, we wrap up the Great Bugarian Bake-Off. Finally, there's no more cooking to be done.



There is a bit more eating, though! The thread agreed, pretty universally, that Leif is the hungriest and therefore should get to eat this.





Bringing him to 10 maximum HP.

37 - Defiant Root



And there was a general consensus in favour of seeing what Charmy can do.



While most of the votes were for Cheapskate, there were a few votes for more, and I think we have a better chance of seeing a variety of effects if we do that, so I'm going to put my thumb on the scale a bit and purchase Regular instead. (Let's say it averages out. Shh. Maths totally work that way.)

Alright! Let's start then!



Purchasing a charm gets us this nice little animation.

There you go! Now you're all charmed up.
Who knows how it will help you out? Might even get you out of a pinch!
Come back later when you want more charms!

Guess we'll have to see what that ends up doing for us.



Next time, it's a homecoming for Vi (like it or not), we're heading into the Hive.

23: The Queen on High (Part 1)

37 - Defiant Root

Last time, we did a lot of cooking and learned a whole lot of recipes, and our three chef friends each discovered their own speciality. Since you probably haven't been counting, we've now seen 56 of the game's 70 total recipes. There are still quite a few items to learn about, but the variety is pretty frontloaded.





I took the opportunity to do some cooking and fill up my inventory with a variety of things (including a bunch of Crisbee Donuts, you can never have too many of those); this is what I'll be carrying around for now, and I have a few more things in Amber's storage.



Back to the mission. Our next stop is the Bee Kingdom, which we can get to via this elevator on the west end of Defiant Root.



Uh huh. Get us up?
Sure thing. Hop on, explorers.
We're not done talking about your issues, Vi. We're just saving it for later.



Leif seems pretty fixated on getting Vi to talk, but she's not having it.



Everyone hops on the elevator and up it goes.





We're going to be having a conversation in transit, it seems. The effect here is pretty neat, you can see the leaves and knots on the tree trunk go by as you go up.



Indeed, we'll protect you if they speak poorly of you.
Hahahaha... That's... not really going to happen, ya know?
Huh. So they don't tease you?
Just, uh, a little bit.
Vi... could it be the Hive has done nothing to you?
...
Nonsense. Why would she be so unwilling otherwise?



I am?
The Hive didn't do anything. I did.
Vi. What did you do?
My sister kept teasing me, okay? Saying exploring's a job for other bugs.



So I got really mad and said a lot of mean stuff to her... and ran off.
Told my boss to shove it. Told the Queen she had no idea what I'm capable of!
Vi...
So in this story, you're the mean one?
Kinda. They had it coming, though.



All you have to do is say you're sorry. And it'll get fixed.
No way!
Even if I was super mean, they still teased me all the time! I'm not gonna say sorry!
Not even to your close sister? It's your family!
She can say sorry first! I'm not gonna lose after making a big scene!
...
Look. The mission's most important, okay? I don't wanna talk about this anymore.
We're almost at the top... you're not off the hook, Vi.



With that, we arrive at the top! (As you might expect, it's the usual thing where the tree's exactly as high as it needs to be for the conversation to fit.) We're certainly learning more about Vi's conflict with the other bees, seems like there were some other aspects she wasn't telling us (or was in denial about).



The logbook notification suggests we've gotten a discovery.





Not much to say, though.



We can talk to the guard here to go back down whenever.

Enjoy your visit to the Hive!

That's all she has to say otherwise. There's also, of course, a banter here:

The Hive's gigantic!
Mhm. Most bugs just see the main area, though. Most of it's just honey and housing.
So most of this Hive is honey? We'll have to investigate...
That honey's for bees!

Maybe bringing Leif here isn't a great idea? His endless hunger is even enough to squeeze a bit of patriotism out of Vi, apparently.



Let's go in.



This is interesting. A security checkpoint?

What a peculiar room.
This is the scan corridor. So they know we're clean or whatever.
That's weird.
Yup...

Enlightening.



Um, what?



The scan is apparently a lattice of laser honeycombs?



"Huh"? You saying we're not clean or something?
It's not that... Hmm, well... Yes. Okay.
Alright. You've been cleared to pass.
...



That wasn't cryptic at all. At least they opened the door for us.



Onward.

39 - Drums of War



As we enter, the camera starts on this stained glass image of the Bee Queen, then pans downward to reveal...



...a lot of soldiers waiting for us. That's ominous.





Vi, is this normal?
Uh, not really...
Hold it, folks!

Someone calls out to stop us from offscreen.





W-What?
Was it us?
Most definitely.
Is Leif okay!?
Dearie me. We've caused a scene. Could you come with me? I'll check it out ASAP.
You sure you wanna trust her, Leif?
Yeah. We don't have any leads right now. Nothing to lose.
Guide the way, doctor!

The scanner seems to have reacted to whatever's going on with Leif. I wonder if there were communication issues of some kind here; she's not quite reacting like she wanted all the soldiers there.



We fade back in to see we're in some kind of lab.

15 - The One Left Behind (Leif's Theme)



Doctor, is Leif okay?
According to the tests, ancient crystal fragments lie within you. If I'm not wrong, you can use magic?
Yeah. After we woke up in Snakemouth, it just suddenly came to us.
So that wasn't a super bad lie?
...You still doubted us?
Given the weirdness of it, I'd tally it to healthy skepticism.
Magical powers are a common side effect of a body being linked to these crystals.



Something else?



Er, put us under?
You know. Fast asleep.







Leif, you had this sort of power?



...Sorry. We don't know what happened. We're not too keen to be put under, however.
An involuntary self-defense mechanism...
Leif, was it? Give it some thought. Your condition is fascinating.
I'm starting to get worried...
Don't be. We feel fine.
We're getting closer to the truth, although there's much left to answer...
Well, I think we'll leave it at that for today. Sorry for distressing you.
It's okay, really... Thanks.
Welp... We're going to be late to the meeting, aren't we?
Ah, yes. The Ant Kingdom brought the materials for the key replacement, right?
I've heard there's four other explorers looking around the Hive.
Could you round them up in front of the throne room? I'll meet you there when I finish some things up.
Crow!





Round up the data! We have work to do.
Ah! Y-Yes, Doctor.
Great... A walk around the Hive.
Can't be the worst thing. We'd like to get to know this place.



Doctor H.B. might have the worst bedside manner ever, but in addition to raising further questions about Leif, she's gained him a new skill.

After that conversation ends, the Bee Kingdom's area music finally kicks in.

40 - High Above, Bee Kingdom

Let's check out our new skill before anything else.



Bubble Shield Lite is a defencive ability. This lets Leif cast a protective bubble on any one bug (including himself), making them invulnerable for the turn. As you might imagine, this can be quite handy, and 3 TP isn't too extreme a cost. It can stand up to nearly anything; one of the only exceptions is the Abombination item we learned about last time.

Let's check out the lab. First off, a banter for the doctor:

So Professor Honeycomb's not the only prestigious researcher around.
Those two are always fighting... if they're so smart, they should act more grown up!
(C-Coming from you, Vi!?)

This one's cute.

I still need some time to process the data, could you find the other explorers?
They should be around the Hive somewhere.

If we talk to her again, she just encourages us to get back on task.

H.B.'s lab is impressive, but we'd rather not be here...
Her proposition was quite startling, but at least she didn't press the issue.
Maybe she can open you up, Kabbu, to find out why you're so nice.
Not in a million moons!

And that's the general banter for this room. Always gets a chuckle out of me.





There's a big computer over here (with a face!) but it doesn't want anything to do with us.



Yes. You know any Card Masters?
Well, I'm a bit busy... I-I can help you find them later.

If we talk to Crow, we get this conversation about Card Masters. This is, in fact, the reason we can't complete that quest this chapter: Crow's too busy to help us with it. (It's reasonably obvious from this that she's Card Master #4.)



If we'd come here without the quest, we'd just see her griping about how much work there is.

H.B.'s running poor Crow ragged!
Science looks like a lot of hard work.
It's like, uh... the thinking version of exploring!



The last thing to see in this room is over here. There are two medals sitting on this table for us to check out.





Inspecting either of them also triggers this conversation:

Woah! That medal looks cool!
Let's snatch it.
No! Let's see if we can convince H.B. to give it to us somehow.

Sadly, we can't do this Leif's way. And the doctor is too busy right now to entertain any conversations about this, so they're just going to have to tantalise us for later. Both of these medals are handy quality-of-life things, we'll appreciate having them once we can get them.



Let's head out of this room and get our bearings.



We come out here, under a sign for HB's lab. If you look over to the left, you can barely see the save crystal near where we came in.



We can check this hologram, though this is all it has to say. You can see how the game styles dialogue from automata differently, though: we get these blue-on-black text windows, and it occasionally flickers random characters over the text to make it look like it's glitching out (which you can see the screenshot caught here).





Heading back to the entrance where the crystal is. Let's check the area banter before anything else:

Still feels weird to be home...
Despite everything, surely you're a little happy?
Well... I did miss the honey fountain.
We'll miss it too...

Leif is still obsessed with food.





The soldiers guarding the throne room don't have much to say.



Let's be methodical about this, we'll go anticlockwise around the entire Hive.



There are some young bees here.

(Psst! Leif!)
(What? Why are you whispering?)
(Don't tell Vi, but... Doesn't that little bee look like her?)
(Ohhh... yeah. She does, doesn't she? She looks so annoyed, too.)
You suck at whispering!!!

This conversation's cute. There's some truth in this, too (even if I don't actually think they look that similar, sprite-wise): eusocial insects have a higher degree of genetic similarity to each other than most other species, so it would make sense if a lot of them looked alike.



Over here, we apparently have a Mothiva fan. Nobody tell her.

Ah. Children are so pure!
Vi is right here.
Not in the mood.
It's not funny if she won't react...
Leif, you should take it easy on her while we're here.
Fine...

Leif continues to be a troll.



There's another pathway here.



Let's see what that area's like, then.





Yup. And it's super duper off limits!
First the ants, now the bees... I cannot help but feel excluded.
It's just how stuff is. Sorry!

Just like the Ant Palace, there are "off-limits" areas here which we won't get to see.



It would be great to have you at next year's festival.
You can count on us.

Here's a familiar face! Jud lives here when she's not running eating contests.

Ah... we want to join another eating competition.
The Golden Festival is the only one, though.
That's impossible. Eating is the best. How can it be once a moon?
Don't be such a glutton, Leif.
Indeed. You must watch your figure!



Kabbu seems to have some body image issues, doesn't he.



Can you get us in then, Vi?
Noooope.

This guard won't let us past, and Vi either won't or can't help. (This is another area that doesn't exist ingame and is just implied for flavour reasons. I continue to appreciate that they do this.)

Vi, can't you convince this guard to let us pass?
Noooope.

The banter just reiterates this.



Oh look, more people we know!



Let's start with Kenny.



Uh... you think?
The air is clean, and the people are nice. There's a great view and good food.
Think you'll stay here?
...No, I don't think I will. I want to see what else the world can offer.
May we meet again, explorer!
May we meet again, indeed.

He's still searching.





We met these two ladybugs at the Golden Festival.

These two seem to be together a lot, don't they?
Two friends traveling across Bugaria... not that unlikely, right?
They should become an exploration team already!
Shame. They don't seem like they can fight.

It seems to be working out all right for them so far.



Gen and Eri are two of the explorers we need to find for the meeting, as this banter suggests. Let's talk to them.



Thanks again, we owe you for back in the desert...
It was no problem. You would do the same for us.
They would try, at least.

Leif can be kind of an asshole sometimes.

We'll make up for it, you'll see.
Mhm. Hey, Vi? You're being real quiet.
Oh? Uh... sorry. Just thinking.
The Hive is SUPER cool! We have to come back together when we're not on the job!
Everyone's really nice. And they let us drink from the fountain for free!
Y-Yeah... Glad you like it. You ready to meet up?



We'll see ya there, Team Snakemouth!



And they walk off.



Hmph.
Vi.



Look at us, Vi. This is serious.
...
You're mad over petty things. You're acting like a child.



We're not finished.



Instead of acting so proud, won't you be happier if you fix things?
...
Vi, Leif is right! We never know what can happen. Friends are so precious to lose over nothing...
...But what if she doesn't forgive me? I was really mean...
If you really mean it, and show it, she'll forgive you. You're sisters!
......
F-Fine. I'll try.
Hmm. You're more mature than we expected.
Shut up!
We're on a mission now, but...
W-When we have time, I'll try and apologize. Okay? Are you happy now?
You promise?
I'll do it! I don't need to promise it like some kid!
Heheheh. Alright, Vi. We believe you.
We hope it goes well. Life's too short to have dumb fights.
Sigh... I feel all tired now.
Let's go find the other explorers, okay?

That was pretty heavy. We can definitely see where Leif is coming from (he's lost his entire family), and Kabbu sounds like he might be speaking from experience too. Only time will tell whether Vi will actually be able to make this better.

For now, though, we have more exploration to do.





Elias here has built a telescope. We'll check that out very soon.

We've been thinking for a while... what are those things some bugs wear on their eyes?
You mean glasses?
Never heard of them.
They're this fascinating gadget that helps bugs with poor eyesight see better!
Really? That small trinket improves eyesight?
Really cool huh? They started being sold a while ago.
It's good to see some things do get better with time.

Interesting that they apparently didn't have glasses back in Leif's day.

Let's check out the telescope.



Look, there's the pier!
Oh, there's the Golden Hills! Can't see Venus, however.
And there's Snakemouth. Wonder why we feel so drawn towards it...

This banter suggests some of the things we might be able to see. Let's take a look.



It's really easy to tell the Lost Sands are a sandbox from this height.

The telescope starts in that position, but we have full control here, we can pan the telescope around and look at everything.



This jungle-esque area is just next to it: the Wasp Kingdom's territory.



We can see Metal Island (as well as some others) out in the lake.



There's Bugaria Outskirts, but the foggy area is unfamiliar!



The Golden Hills.







And the gigantic wall and door are an actual human house. All of Bugaria does seem to be in this house's backyard. Don't ask me why it has a constant stream of water pouring out.



If you position the telescope roughly here and wait long enough, you can eventually see a big amorphous shadow move past in the fog, though it's too fuzzy to make out any detail. It's quite mysterious. It could just be a big animal, I guess? Or it could be... something else.



After we look through the telescope, we get a discovery.





With that, we're done on this balcony.



Let's head back inside.







Y-Yeah, thanks...

Talking to this bee and being encouraged to sample the honey fountain fully restores our TP for free. That's handy.

What a nice bee. It warms my heart!
So tall. Cheerful, too.
Even I can't get mad at Vilma...
I feel bad, though. All that honey for free...
Not us. We intend to keep eating.
How are you two not fatter!?

Okay then.



They sure managed to outlive even some of the new generation. Is this the power of science?

This guard has a neat little tidbit for us.



This place certainly seems crowded! Let's talk to the person outside first.



The banter is a little more interesting:

Hmm...
What's up?
It's nothing. I'm just thinking about clothing...
Gonna buy some?
No, no. I'm happy with how I look.
I'm not sure how to feel about others wishing to change their image...
Bugs can do whatever they want. If they wanna wear a big hat they can do it!
Can't say we oppose that view.
You're right. It's not my place to judge others, even if I'm not going to wear clothing myself.
Geez, it's not like you cut the scarf off of her. Stop apologizing!



Oh, that explains the crowd. It's Mothiva. Joy.

41 - Bugaria's Latest Sensation! (Mothiva's Theme)



Delaying the inevitable just reveals this store is mostly stocking her merch. Just what we wanted to see.

That scarf is so pretty!
Mothiva's a crook, but her clothing brand is pretty high quality.
Wait, what? Isn't it only those red balls?
It seems any item she helped create has a small icon... Look at the scarf's corner!
Ugh, that sucks... No way I'm going to buy it.
You could just cover her logo up.
Nuh uh! She ain't getting one berry from me!

Whatever else you might say about her, Vi does have principles.

Before we talk to Mothiva, there's another quick banter:

It's them!
Let's get the meeting underway. Maybe they've even repented!
Doubt it.





Cheers break out from the crowd periodically while she talks.

Ugh! How can she be so popular while being such a jerk!
Ignorance is bliss for this crowd...
Um, Mothiva?
More fans? Ohoho-





A-Ahahaha! Sorry, show's over! I hope you'll join me in my next tour!



The crowd complains, but does disperse.



We didn't do anything! And you're the jerk!
Your mere presence ruins my vibe, can't you tell?
Maybe you can steal some of ours when we're not looking.
Why you...
Enough! We're not here to fight you. We have a mission, can't we cooperate?
We need not hog the glory. If we work together, we will all be recognized!
Sigh. So naive. What good is fame when shared with the likes of you?



Look, just go to the darn meeting point. We can settle this later.
Hmph. I'll go, but not by your barking. See you don't keep me waiting too long.
And get Zasp to go too, okay? I can't be bothered after seeing you three.



At least she's going, I guess.

40 - High Above, Bee Kingdom



It's a shame her defeat didn't humble her one bit...
We'll have to be careful, we never know what they'll be planning...

Let's go find Zasp, I suppose.





You've got some nerve walking into the Hive!
Hmph. Pipe down. I'm here on explorer business, just like you.
Come to steal more credit, we assume?
If you expect an apology, you won't get it.
Ngh. So you're proud of your actions?



We saw an opportunity and took it. It didn't work out, but it's not the end of the world.
As you can see, even without the artifact, she is still respected.
Who's gonna respect someone so petty? Bet they wouldn't if they knew the truth!
Vi! We're not going to start badmouthing others!



Hmph. Look, we don't care. Can you just move it to the meeting point?
That, I can do. Business is business, after all. My interests are not petty banter with you three.
Yeah, yeah. Just go.
Mothiva must be waiting, anyways. See you there.

He leaves too.



Vi will say this line after talking to whichever explorer ends up being the last one (Mothiva, Zasp, or Gen and Eri).

If we'd talked to Zasp before Mothiva, we'd get this line from Kabbu just before he leaves:

We'll notify Mothiva as well. You won't wait for long. See you there.

instead of Mothiva telling us to give him orders.

Unfortunately for everyone involved, we still have more exploration and such to do, so we'll be keeping them waiting a while yet.



There's actually something we can buy in this shop!





This is one purchase you won't regret!



Thank you, thank you! Please visit Fashion Bee again!

We need this for a sidequest, of course. Hopefully Vivi will like this.



If we keep going around, we can find this area. Is that a whole pile of boomerangs?









Heheheh. Of course. My tools are the best there is!
Um, we seem to have forgotten your name.
Oh. Hmm... Right. I'm Professor Honeycomb. Renowned scientist of the Bee Kingdom!
...Or I was, until that Doctor H.B. took my spot!
H.B.'s creations all use weird tech she found studying the old roaches, you see.
Disgusting. While I do use ancient crystals, the roaches didn't create them. I'd never use borrowed technology for my experiments!
I'll create the perfect A.D.B.P. through my own superior intellect.
What? The Beemerang isn't good enough yet?



When I finish the Mk III... They will seem like children's toys!
What? Can't you upgrade mine again?
I'd consider it, if only because of the data you've helped me round up.



That's really not how physics work.
And then I'd reclaim my spot as the Bee Kingdom's lead scientist!



Maybe later. But for now, begone! You're getting in the way of my research!
Yikes. Fine. Let's come back later.

She might have a fair bit to say, but there's not really anything we can do here except look around.

I'm busy! Shoo, shoo!
HACK HACK COUGH!
We should go before we make her faint...

If we talk to her again, she just encourages us to leave.

I knew I'd seen her somewhere before!
She seems to have a bit of obsession with the A.D.B.P.
I thought it was A.B.D.P.
I already told you it's the Beemerang!

I still don't enjoy typing these acronyms.





There are even more piles of boomerangs everywhere and not much else in here. The professor does seem to have a one-track mind.

Woah, look at all these Beemerangs!
She seems to have been working on the A.D.B.P. somewhat obsessively...
And she's not even done yet. Her work ethic is admirable, given her age...

For all that, though, we can't do more than look around. We'll have to come back later to learn more about upgrades, I guess.



Let's finish exploring the Hive proper.



This person doesn't have much to say.

What a fluffy bee!
Bumblebees are pretty cute. Not cuter than me though!
We don't dare to disagree...

This is actually pretty interesting: apparently the Hive is open to other species of bee too!



Just past there is an exit that leads to the Honey Factory.



In addition to the guard, there are these helpful gears above the path to indicate where it leads.



Apparently the factory's not inside the hive itself, but across this bridge.

We're... We're so high up. No fence, nothing...!
Just keep looking straight, Kabbu. It's not a long bridge.
Ngh... So high up...
Look. If you fall, I'll catch you, okay? Just get moving!
Vi...! ...Very well. I won't give up. Let's go!

Kabbu doesn't do well with heights.



The guard stops us from going any further, though, so let's head back.



We've almost completed the circuit now.



Good luck getting someone to buy THAT portrait...
At least wait till she draws it before judging!

There have been hints before that the Hive is something of an artists' commune (among other things) but this is the first we've seen of it.

My, these paintings are quite... unique.
Artia really needs to add some color sometimes.
We agree, but maybe she won't be happy if she does.
Someone who's happy in a gray world... is that truly possible?
You're really overthinking this...

Well, it probably wouldn't be great if you're a bee, that'd make it a lot harder to find flowers...



There's another exit here, surrounded by art supplies, but it's blocked off by this sign. Presumably this will open up later.

And with this, we've completed the circuit. Everyone necessary for the meeting is here, but let's talk to them all first:



It's nowhere someone like you should be in!



Shut up, or we'll take even longer!

Vi is really not pleased to have to deal with these two again.





Meanwhile, Gen and Eri are a bit restless.

If we check for a banter on any of them, we just get this:

Let's gather everyone so we can get the meeting started!

I'm pretty sure you're supposed to see this one before everyone's here. Anyway, enough dawdling.







Oh, nah! She gave us the parts. So we're good to go.
She's shameless, that's what she is!



Be on your best behavior, for even glancing upon our Queen is a privilege.



Are you the same Mothiva...?





They open the doors and everyone files in.

(Continued in next post thanks to the character limit.)

23: The Queen on High (Part 2)

42 - Bianca, Queen of All Bees





Once again, the camera starts out high and pans down.



Oh! Adorable, aren't they? Welcome!



Y-Yes!



(Shut up!)

Mothiva's really laying it on thick here, isn't she.

Uh, yeah. It's nice to be back...



U-Um...
We have heard of your exploits here. You have brought pleasant surprises to my days.
That's great, Vi!



The Hive is wonderful! Makes me wish I was a bee!



This line does suggest that at least some of Vi's complaints are based in fact, even if she may have exaggerated them.



H.B.?
Yes, my Queen.

H.B. comes in from offscreen.



The core of the Honey Factory, which we owe this great kingdom to, has turned out to be an artifact.
Under normal circumstances, we would have to deny even the Ant Queen her request.
However, she has provided us with all we need to build a new core.
R-Right! Kina should have delivered them to the factory already...
Fufufu... Yes, I have gone there and gave a quick examination.
With my incredible intellect, I can quickly create a suitable replacement. All due to these materials' incredible quality!
It's quite a simple ordeal, isn't it? Almost feels like we've gone through a bit too many formalities...



Ahaha! If you are true to your word, that would make me most happy.
For I would like to invite you to accompany the doctor to the Honey Factory and witness this pivotal exchange.
You are not obligated to go, but it would warm our heart if you did...
Yes. YES!
Sure thing! We would love to see even more of the kingdom!
Yes. For one, seeing honey being produced sounds delicious.



Um, thanks. We'll go.
Vi...
Q-Queen?
Contrary to what I believed, it seems the outside world did you some good.
You look so grown up! Your team has my thanks.
Ah! Um, you're welcome, Queen.
I... I haven't changed at all. I'm still the same Vi!



W-Well! Shall we go?



No need to be so ruthless, my dear guard. Ahaha!
But you are indeed free to go unto the factory. It's to the west of my throne's entrance.
Vi, please take care of everyone as they explore. As sure as I am that there will be no issues.
...Yeah. I will. You can count on me!
Dismissed!
Sigh... Let's go, Zasp.
About time.
Now, teams. I still have to pick up some tools. We'll meet up there.
Don't let the wind blow you off the bridge!

(I'm sure Kabbu just loves hearing that!)

Everyone leaves.



Even we are disarmed by her words. They remind us of Elizant.



Even so, you shouldn't have badmouthed them.
Fine. I'm sorry, okay!? And I'll, uh... I'll fix stuff. Slowly. Can we just do the mission?
Heheheh. Alright. Let's go, team.

With that, we're finally back in control. There's a bit more to see in this room before we leave, though.



Please enjoy your visit!

Queen Bianca doesn't have much more to say, but the banter is more interesting:

Say, Vi. The Queen mentioned a mother knowing best...
Just a bee thing, really.
Do you think of the Queen as your mother?
Not really... She's the Queen before anything else.
I'm sure she does think of you as her daughter, though.
Dunno... Everyone's her daughter to her. Does it make anyone special then?
That's another way of thinking about it...
You two are overthinking this! Let's get going already!

It's interesting to think about what the familial dynamics for sentient eusocial insects must be like.

Also, I want to highlight this one because I've seen a surprising number of people react to the earlier "daughter" line with something like "wait, she's the princess in disguise?!" and, well, no. They're bees. That's not how bees work, and I'm glad the game goes out of its way to acknowledge this. (I don't have anything against "exiled princess" as a trope, but it has no place here.)

There's one more banter for the room:

This throne room is so pleasant, and the smell is fantastic!
That's what a bunch of honey and flowers will do to any place, really.
The Queen's demeanor also lightens up the mood. Shame we're here for business.
Eh... I'm sure I can get you both back in.
Oh? You're willing to come back?
...Let's go!



The guards by the door both say this. We should probably be on our way.



Let's take a quick detour to the Ant Mines first though. We bought that hat, after all.



Oh, great! I really, really want to visit the Bee Kingdom... but the Queen hasn't allowed us to leave yet.



Oh! That's really cute!
But I'm cuter, right?
You are! All Bees are SO CUTE!
...Err, thanks. Here you go.



I found this while digging here, but it should be useful to you.
It'll be pretty good.
We're glad we've made you happy!
Hee hee... it is so cute! I am totally wearing that once I get my leave! Thank you very much!



A second copy of Numb Resistance could prove useful, we're going to be facing a lot of Numbing enemies soon.

If we talk to her again:

Thank you for that hat! I really treasure it.

That takes care of the last sidequest we currently have the ability to complete. Let's head to the factory.



When we start crossing the bridge to the factory, Vi calls out at the halfway point.



Oi! Calm down!
A bridge's not the best place for sudden outbursts.
Look. Everything in the Factory's super expensive! And they don't let you leave mid-tour!
I see... We should shop beforehand, then?
Yup! Let's save some berries!
Or we could spend a little not to have to go all the way back...

This conversation is a pretty important hint. Entering the Honey Factory is a genuine point of no return (at least for the rest of Chapter 3; nothing becomes permanently inaccessible in the long run). There is a shop inside, but its selection is limited and the items are marked up, so it's probably a good idea to get your items in order now (that said, Amber will be inside, so storage isn't off-limits).

This is also a good time to go buy medals or complete sidequests if you still need to.

Having said that, I've taken care of everything already, and we're ready to go in.



We'll head into the factory next time. Something's obviously going to go wrong, in order for us to have dungeon gameplay... but how?

Hmmm. It is a mystery.

24: Lockdown (Part 1)



It's time we went into the Honey Factory, as Queen Bianca requested, to witness the cores being exchanged and have a tour of the premises.

43 - Work That Honey



Looks like we're pretty much the last to arrive.



Amazing, right? Here's where we produce all of Bugaria's honey!





(The placement of speech bubbles looks a bit awkward, but the asides are coming from Mothiva in the background.)

Yeehaw! Can't wait!
Sounds like a good opportunity, doesn't it? Science is incredible, but not the best spectator sport.



(notice Mothiva and Zasp slinking out of sight while everyone else is talking)

So go on, have fun!
Thank you, Doctor. We will enjoy this for sure!
Knowing how the honey is made... This is an opportunity we cannot miss.
It's seriously nothing that cool...
Maybe for a bee. For us, it's a great experience!
Alright, alright. Geez... It'll be fun, I guess.



Everything shakes.





Factory has been compromised! Alert Code 32 Engaged!
Complete Factory Lockdown in Effect!

13 - It's Getting Scary!



All the doors loudly slam shut.



What...? But Code 32 is...



Code 32 means... The factory has been attacked by hostile forces!
But how? We didn't see anyone on our way here...
Doctor, we must leave! We can retrieve the artifact later!
Indeed. It's not just us. Tourists and workers need to evacuate too.
Guide, do you know where the Overseer is?
N-no! It's routine checkup time... She could be anywhere!
...Tch. Without the Overseer, we're stuck.
What!?



That is, unless the Overseer enters the disarm code.
We suggest turning our trip around the factory into a rescue mission.
...Great idea! Finding her will fix all our problems, really.
A-alright. We'll help!
With such a capable group of explorers here, we should be okay.
For now I will work on the core's replacement... You should focus on the rescue mission.
Let's do this!
You heard that, Mothiva? Let's-



Huh, he's gone too...
I bet they have something to do with this...!
For this once, probably not... Guess we'll have to search for them too.
Cuz we didn't have enough to do... Let's go, team!

43 - Work That Honey



With that, the scene ends and we're back in control. This is certainly a situation, and we're going to have our work cut out for us (never mind "lockdown" feels a lot more salient nowadays than when this was written). First, though, let's assess the situation, have a look around and talk to everyone.

This trip didn't go as I'd hoped...
That's what I get for doing the Queen a favor...
It's just another mission. Let's stay focused, and take in the sights.

The banter in this hub area is nice and simple.



Dr. H.B. is with us... She will figure something out...!

Her text is shaking a lot.

Most workers are surprisingly... calm.



Never combine those words ever again.
...Besides, they're used to staying here a good while.
Even so, we do not know what caused the lockdown. We must hurry so they can evacuate!

This banter's fun (and is shared between most of the guards and workers in the factory; honestly, it seems a bit less fitting for this one). Vi, please don't tempt fate.





Doctor HB and Crow are hard at work here. (Is that a floppy disk on top of the pile? I'm genuinely not sure.)

Look at 'em go.
Goodness... They're assembling the pieces at an unbelievable pace!
Looks like a bunch of junk. Is this really going to make a new core?
I can't wait to see the end result!

They're going to be pretty busy, let's stop bothering them.





...I've never actually seen the core itself before. Wonder how it looks like.



If we head down that passage, we'll immediately hit a dead end. The door to the core is firmly shut and we can't interact with the console in here, the Overseer is going to have to do that.

This is the core room.
Great. It's locked. Let's find the Overseer and get this overwith.

Our team don't have much to say in here either. Let's go back.







Gen and Eri hint we should be looking for a key card if we want to get into the Honey Processing area.

It's a relief to have other teams here with us...
THEY should be relieved we decided to come along!
Why not both? We'll have to work together to get through this.
Meh. If you say so...

Honestly, I'm surprised Leif isn't taking Vi's side here, he's certainly grumbled enough about them in the past.



This console is obviously where the keycard goes, but we don't have it.



This area's locked off too.



That's a bit of a lead, at least.

Seems at least one is frazzled...
It'd be weird if everyone stuck to protocol.

She gets a different banter, at least.



Maybe they had something to do with it?

That's a bit suspicious. Do we think they're malicious enough to sabotage the factory? What would they get out of doing that? Something to think about.



The guide seems pretty frazzled too.

Poor Tuvi...
It must be rough, being a tour guide.
What about us? We're the ones cleaning up the mess...



Let's check out the lower level.



Maybe you can find something to help there?

We'll check this out in a moment.



There's someone crying in the corner by this door.

This poor bee is distressed! We simply must-
Yeah, yeah. Let's talk to her.

This banter can be seen only before talking to her.



I just got the job, and everything's already ruined. Ruined!
Why does this always have to happen to meeeeeeee?!
With the factory closed, I can't sell stuff to fill up my quota, and I'll get fired! Noooooo!
Err, management doesn't have quotas during emergencies...
Huuu...
Some make believe won't hurt, Vi. Miss, we'd love to shop here, if you'd have us.
Y-you will...?





She unlocks the shop and goes inside. Let's see what this is about.



If you want a delicious honey treat, stand next to it and press (A) to call me.

So, yes, this is a shop. With the lockdown in place, we can't leave, and this is the only reliable place to get items (certainly the only place we can get anything that's been cooked; enemies can still drop items, of course).

Yikes... Why'd you have to say that, Kabbu? Now we HAVE to buy things.
Vi, we cannot leave until we complete our mission. More supplies will be helpful!
I mean, it's not like we walked in here with our pockets empty.
And if we run out of berries, it will be hard to get more.
Let's just be very responsible with our exploration funds, then.

(Don't tell Kabbu, but I didn't bring in any berries to spend anyway. Leif is also overstating his case a fair bit, you can earn plenty of berries from battles.)



Amber is also here, and will happily let us access our storage if we need it.

Poor miss Amber's been trapped as well!
Thankfully. It'll be handy to take our items from storage.
Think about her feelings!
I dunno. She seems fine to me... Does she even know there's a lockdown going on?
If she doesn't, we better not tell her.

Once again, the game's hanging a lampshade on the mechanics here. I do enjoy that they're willing to poke fun at themselves about things like this.

Let's check out the shop's inventory.

Honey'd Leaf (10 berries)
Leaf Omelet (10 berries)
Glazed Honey (9 berries)
Honey Ice Cream (20 berries)
Shock Berry (11 berries)

Vi wasn't wrong when she said the shop here is overpriced, though it's not quite as bad as she might have led us to believe. The basic food items here can come in handy in an emergency, and they do have a few new things.

Honey Ice Cream
"This honey flavored ice cream's a real guilty pleasure! Restores 5 HP and 10 TP. It may cause brain freeze!"
Freezes user (2 turns)

Honey Ice Cream is a recipe, though we couldn't make it right now even if we could get to a chef (it requires an ingredient we don't have access to). When the description says "may cause brain freeze", it's a bit misleading: this will always freeze the eater unless they have immunity from a medal (which we don't have, and can't get until later in the game). This is hard to use strategically right now, unless you get it specifically for out-of-battle healing. If you came in here unprepared, you might end up using these whether you like them or not.

Shock Berry
"This high voltage berry tastes great, but really shocks your system! Restores 7 HP."
Inflicts numb (2 turns)

The Shock Berry is another new item, and I believe it's actually exclusive to this shop. As far as cooking goes, it works the same as Agaric Shroom in all the shock-based recipes. If you want to numb a character as part of a strategy, this could be useful.



We can also check out this hologram, though it doesn't have much to say. (I do like the way they have the text of digital entities periodically have glitches flicker in.)



That's it for the shop, though. It's worth keeping in mind if we find ourselves needing supplies, but let's keep exploring.



Looks like we've found a dormitory?

So many beds! Are these needed with the Hive close by?
Workers don't really leave the factory until their shift's over. Sometimes it's days long...
That sounds suffocating. And illegal.
Pays super well, though! And then they go on a huge holiday!
How come you didn't become a worker, then? It'd get you all the berries you want.
No way! It's so boring! Once was enough for a lifetime.
I wanted to fall asleep every second of it! I'd rather be poor!
Alrighty then...

When Leif says illegal, I have to wonder what labour laws he's thinking of. This factory's run by the Bee Kingdom, the ruling Queen obviously approves.



If you need them, just come see me.

This worker in the corner will sell us overpriced Magic Seeds. Once again, we really don't want to have to buy them, but the option's there if necessary.

Sorry, can't make the deal any cheaper. Not even for you, Vi.

She also has this line if you try to buy one while not having enough.



If some turret shoots it at you, make sure to block!

This is a hint at a core mechanic in the upcoming areas, we're going to be facing a lot of enemies with attacks that cause Numb if not blocked.



The last worker in here offers us the ability to rest for free, which is quite convenient. I'll take her up on this, we're not quite at full health.

Alright, I'll wake you if something happens.

20 - Night at the Inn



That's it for this room.





There's one place left we haven't checked.



Call it a hunch, but we think this is the Overseer's office.
Mhm.
Incredible! How did you figure it out?!
...A hunch.
...Oh. Ahem. Vi, there's no way the Overseer would be hiding in here, right?
I sure hope so. Would make our life way easier.
Then she's definitely not here. But let's look around anyways.



Looks like there's some kind of card on top of the bookshelf. One thing at a time, though.



This is all we get interacting with the computer.



It's not like that. This is the honored employee portrait!
Bees that work really hard get to be put up there for a few days.
Is there no hall of fame for all the honored employees?
Yup. It's inside the Hive, though, so you two can't see em.
So in our team, Kabbu would be the honored employee?
I-I would?
No way, it'd be me!



We get a discovery for interacting with the painting.





And, as per usual, once we have it, checking again just yields a short description:



Let's go get that card.



We can climb up using these boxes and sundry as a staircase.



And Vi can snag it with her Beemerang.



Just what we needed. (Make sure to read the description on this one!)



Let's open the way.





Heheh. It's our time to shine, Eri! Can't let them do everything, right?
Y-You sure we won't get in the way?
Relax. It's just a factory! Let's go in and do what we can!



Gen and Eri head inside.

Uh oh... The factory's super dangerous! It's full of sentry bots!
W-What!? Team, we must give chase!



Onward we go.



Certainly looks like there's a lot going on in here!

Alrighty. We're officially in the worker zone! We can just catch the tram and...
Doesn't seem to be working, does it?
Argh! Everything's going wrong!
Wouldn't be a mission if it was easy. We'll have to walk around normally.

Let's have a look around.





Contact Malbee for repairs.

Sounds like there's supposed to be a tram system here, but of course it's inoperative. Nothing is ever that easy. These little friendly robots are called Menders, we'll see them in various places throughout the factory.

An intelligent machine that speaks!? What is this sorcery!?
Has technology advanced this far so quickly?
It's not intelligent! It only knows, like, three sentences!
This is only the start, Vi. How long until three becomes thirty? And then even more!?
Will we be replaced by machines!?
How would something we create replace us?
You two seriously need to learn how to think less.

This one always makes me smile.



Let's head downstairs.



Looks like there are a few different new enemy types down here!



The battle-start animation is completely new in here: instead of the various leaves we're used to, it's honeycombs, and they move vertically instead of horizontally.



Let's see what this... bee drone? is about. (I'm halfway convinced the main purpose of the bees' technological advancement is to create opportunities for drone puns.)



...Of course it's called a Bee-Boop. Well, let's see what it can do.







Whenever you hit them, Bee-Boops swap between their two modes. It's not going to come into play in this battle, because we can kill this one before it gets a turn, but they have different attacks in each mode and this means we have some control over what they do.





Hitting it again makes it switch back. Leif and Vi will proceed to finish it off.



Hey, we're getting EXP again!



Really don't know why Leif thought it was going to be a problem to get berries.

Let's check out the other enemy now.



What are these odd things?



Denmuki are based on Monema flavescens, which is also known as "Denkimushi" or "Japanese electric bug". These ones are literally electrified.

We'll throw a full round of attacks at the one in front and see what happens.



This is their attack, they charge up and attempt to shock us. If you don't block this, it will numb on hit.



As we see when the second one hits Kabbu. Oops.



This is what Numb looks like. Kabbu's completely immobilised, though being numbed does give +1 defence so it could be worse. We're only losing out on one action, anyway.



You can still rotate the party even if one member is disabled, so let's get him out of the front so we don't miss out on the attack bonus.



Vi finishes off the first one.



While Leif gets in a nice chunk of damage on the other with the positioning bonus.



At least I blocked this time!



Now that Kabbu's recovered, it's trivial to finish this off.



These are worth a bit less than the Bee-Boops. Regardless, though, these enemies are definitely a step up in challenge and will punish you for getting careless.





It dropped an Agaric Shroom, too. Item drops aren't that uncommon in here either, so there's less need to resort to the shop than you might expect. We can't cook this, and using it in battle is probably not a great idea, but for TP recovery outside combat it's handy.



With the enemies gone, we can quickly realise there's nothing we can do on this level.



What we actually needed to do is strike this switch.



That starts the elevator platforms moving up and down. It also immediately triggers a scene.



S-Shocked!?
Whew, good thing I can fly...



What are you doing, Leif?

No way. What if I need to cut or freeze something?





The platform starts flashing while Leif stands on it.



Looks like that shield comes in handy!





We took some time to think about it... And we can control it.
If we hold down (B), we should be able to all cross safely.
Can't really jump or walk fast while doing it, though...



Eh, if Gen and Eri got through, we would have found a way. Let's go.

(This does make me curious how they actually got past this...)



You can also move while using it to push away enemies!
Leif can also use the Bubble Shield skill in battle!

This unlocks Leif's second field skill, and a combat skill to go with it. Didn't we already have Bubble Shield, though?



What we had before was Bubble Shield Lite, which protects one person. This is the big version. For 7 TP, Leif can put a bubble on every member of the party at once. The downside is that it costs him two turns to use: if he has multiple actions, it'll spend two, and if he doesn't, he can take a loan from the future and skip his next turn instead.

Even accounting for that, this ability is very strong (though 7 TP is a lot). It's a great way to dodge big attacks you know are coming (such as delayed or charged attacks), and one of the few ways to safely use Abombinations (though those will remove the shield). This spell is very exploitable, and a staple of challenge runs (often seen alongside Hustle Candy, to help mitigate the action losses).



The field version of this ability lets Leif wrap all of Team Snakemouth in a protective bubble. This lets us travel over hazardous terrain (like these electrified platforms), which allows us to get across this room.



It also protects against enemy attacks, meaning this turret's shots won't hit us. Touching enemies with the bubble stuns them, making it a very easy way to get first strikes.



Like so. This is a new enemy, let's see what it's about.



These things may not look scary yet, but they're very dangerous.





To start with, they have 2 defence, so Kabbu is really the only reliable means of attack against them without spending TP. So he'll do that, while the other two hit the Denmuki instead.







The first thing we see the turret do is cough up two missiles, each of which hits for 4 damage before blocks (I somehow Super Blocked both hits here, so the numbers look deceptively low; this can rack up damage fast). Each missile is targeted randomly at our party, so they can hit the same bug or different bugs.



While the Denmuki just attacks us. They, at least, only have the one attack.



It's easy to clean up from there, at least, so this one presents no further issue. We'll see what else they can do in later fights.



That could've been worse.



It leaves behind a Honey Drop for us too, which is nice.



Let's move on.



The next room has even more complex machinery everywhere.

This is the most honey we've ever seen...
Heh. It only gets better as you go.
This factory's design is quite... unorthodox. Moving about is quite difficult.
It's made for bees. We just fly around.
Can't you carry us?
Not if there's another way! Now shield up!
This power-up was a mistake...

Leif, you have wings too.



There's a Bee-Boop guarding the bridge. (If you look down, you can see honey drops moving past on a conveyor belt, and much of the floor in this room is a gigantic pool of honey.)



This fight has two of them, so we should finally get to see their attacks.





Kabbu attacks the first one twice after getting a relay from Leif.



When Leif attacks, something special happens: Charmy's spell triggers! This gives him +1 attack before striking, which makes it enough to get the kill.



Though as you can see here, the boost is only for this turn. I guess with a relay you could potentially get more use out of it, though with exhaustion that comes out mostly a wash.





Vi's attack leaves the Bee-Boop in its visored mode.



When in this mode, they attack with this diving charge. It hits pretty hard! Overall, though, I think this is probably the easier attack of theirs to deal with.



That said, we can finish this now.



We're starting to get some nice EXP yield from these battles.



Now that the enemies are gone, we can get our bearings. There's a switch on one of these electrified platforms which we obviously need to hit.





Judicious use of Leif's shield makes this a simple matter of timing.



That switch activated the platforms leading north, making them move up and down.



Unfortunately, it also activated the electrifying mechanism on them.



But we can get up just fine.



There's a Denmuki waiting for us up here.



We'll just have everyone attack the Denmuki for now. It attacks Vi and doesn't do much, but on the other hand... the Bee-Boop is in gun mode.



In gun mode, they launch these honey globs. This hits twice with a base damage of 2 (we're seeing more on Kabbu thanks to Favorite One), and will also cause Numb if not blocked. It's annoying.



After that attack, Charmy decides to heal us! This can trigger after any enemy attack, and heals everyone 20% of their maximum HP (though it looks like it's rounded down). Not too bad.



We can finish off the Denmuki easily enough, and do some damage to the Bee-Boop at least.





I missed the block on Vi and got her numbed, so I left this in, both to show the attack does this and so you can see her numbed sprite.



Easy enough to wrap up from there.



Now we can figure out how to move forward. This setup is much like the cranks we saw in the Golden Hills: we need to constantly turn one of these cranks to raise the platforms so we can cross.



Thing is, the platforms will lower down again if Vi releases the Beemerang, so we can't swap to Leif to shield against the shocks. Instead, we just need to hurry across with good timing between the shocks.



More enemies lie in wait.



The turret has a Denmuki with it.



After having Kabbu get some damage in on the turret, I decided to have Leif try to freeze the Denmuki, but it didn't take. This is a bit unlucky: all these enemies in here have 50-60% freeze resistance, so Frigid Coffin is significantly more likely to work than not. Still, more likely isn't certain.



On the other hand, Charmy decided to refund Leif some of the TP he spent. It looks like this is rounded down too, it's supposed to be half of the cost.



The turret does something new this time. This is a delayed missile, which hits one turn later. Honestly, though, I like seeing this, it's less scary than their other moves.

The Denmuki just attacked Vi.



Although it did something new afterward! Denmukis sometimes elect to curl up after attacking or being attacked. This temporarily gives them 2 defence. Flipping attacks can knock them out of it, and after attacking they return to normal.

The rest of this battle isn't terribly interesting, so I'm going to gloss over most of it, except for this:



This is what the delayed missile landing looks like. It's only 3 damage for some reason, so not only is it only a single hit, it's less damaging than the other missiles which it fires twice.



We're starting to get close to the next rank, which I appreciate.



After that fight, I decided to use the Agaric Shroom to restore some TP.



That's this room sorted. Let's keep going.

(Once again, this update required splitting. Back momentarily.)