*MASSIVE SPOILERS FOR END GAME*
I legit beat Lies of P (Neowiz Games/Round8 Studio) yesterday. Before this, I had beaten the purported last boss, but then had to make a choice. With one choice, I would have ended the game. That involved giving something to Geppetto, and no way in hell I was doing that. Geppetto was a big ol’ jerk and the reason the whole world went to ruins. Just because he wanted to bring his son back to life. That’s not a spoiler, by the way. That’s the main gist of Pinocchio. It’s funny because when RKG did the demo of the game, Gav was explaining the story of Pinocchio. Geppetto’s s son died and he wishes so hard for him to come back to life. He’s a puppet maker and makes a boy puppet. A blue fairy brings the puppet to life and tells him that if he does good things, he can be a real boy.
I commented on the stream that the blue fairy was kind of a jerk, and Gav laughingly read it out loud. I stand by it, though. It’s cruel to bring the puppet to life and then make it go through all these trials before maknig it a real boy. If she could have just made him a real boy in the first place (which she apparently could), then why make him jump through all these hoops to become one?
I know the answer. There would be no book is the real reason. I get it, but it’s still a flimsy basis for a book. Then again, most premises are.
Back to the game! I was not going to give something to Geppetto. I hated him and was convinced he was the true last boss. Which he was not, but he might as well have been. No, the optional last boss is called The Nameless Puppet. And he fucking comes out of nowhere. Well, he comes out of a box that Geppetto is carrying and there are magical strings controlling him.
My theory was that he was actually Pinocchio or at least the one that Geppetto wants to make into his son. That was kind of shot down in the end cutscene, but I still can make it work.
Anyway. I tried so many of the cheese strats to beat this guy back when I was playing the game on the daily. The biggest cheese was to use Aegis as your Legion Arm. The first time it gets hit, it explodes and does damage. Then, someone found out that if you hold it down while tapping LB (block), that’s supposed to do the perfect block without actually having to do the perfect block. Or something. I watched someone do it, but you still have to be able to time it and have good stamina. I had neither.
I tried it and kept running out of arm juice (as Rory called it). I asked in the Discord, and people said you can’t do it the entire first phase. That’s when people were doing it. Then, doing the throwables in the second phase. Which was the way I did all the bosses in the sceond phase from the fourth chapter on.
By the way, I don’t think that’s good gameplay. Let’s talk about this for a minute. There is no magic in this game. None. I joked that the throwables were the magic, but it’s basically true. Everyone keeps calling it puppet Bloodborne, but this game was much more like Sekiro at heart–despite its aethestics.
Sekiro also didn’t have any magic. It’s one reason I did not like that game as much, either. I am nothing without my magicks. At least in Bloodborne, they had Hunter Tools that were like magic. My beloved Augur of Ebrietas was a Hunter Tool. So, yeah. there was some magic, even if it wasn’t as good as the magic in the Souls game and especially Elden Ring.
There is nothing in this game. Which made it miserable for me. There’s a reason they had a merchant who sold throwables in the middle of the fifth chapter. If they hadn’t had that, I would have quit the game. Grinding for the throwables for the fourth chapter boss fight made me drop the score of this game a whole point. Well, that and the terrible level design of that chapter–the cathedral in particluar. The devs do not know the meaning of the word restraint and threw everything and the kitchen sink into that level.
The RKG Discord was pretty split about the game, but everyone agreed that it was too much. There was not one person who thought it was a well-designed area. And that’s when I lost all faith in the game. I saw where it was going, and I should have just stopped there. But I was in it, and I could not get myself out.
How did I beat the final boss? Back when I was playing the game on the daily, I got him down to two or three hits. I was enraged. I also decided that I was going to make the choice of walking away without choosing the one ending and without beating this boss. I did not think I could do it because I could not even see his attacks. He was way too fast, and he was on me before I could blink.
I changed my skills so many times. It’s the P-Organ system. No idea why it’s called that, but that is what it was called. I pumped up everything that boosted the Legion Arm to do the Aegis cheese. That did not work. I just could not get the tap down. I was rocking the pipe wrench because Elbethium (the guy whose videos I watched to beat all the bosses since the fifth chapter on) had that as the weapon of his cheese vid.
I had watched it before, but I did not buy that the pipe wrench made the first phase a ‘phase skip’. He says that in the video, and I scoffed. Even when I used his cheese, I could never get as much damage as he was getting. Watching him get through the first phase in less than thirty seconds. When I tried, I was not getting anywhere near that. But I was getting through the first phase more quickly.
I decided to go all in on the Fable Arts. Something I did not use all game. Each weapon has a special move it does when you hit Y (and it takes a certain amount of blue). I just didn’t find it worth it most of the time and I rarely had blue when I needed it. Then I learned during this fight that if you go out into the courtyard of the Hotel Krat (your hub world), you automatically got all your Fable bars filled. Was that all the time or did I pick a P-Organ skill that did that? I did not know. At any rate, I went into the courtyard before every time I fought this boss yesterday.
One time, I got him down to one hit. I was also down to one hit. He won, and I erupted in fury. I said so many curse words that I never say on the regular. I told myself to walk away and not play this game again, but I was so close. So. Close. The thing I realized was that running around–which was my usual M.O. was actually detrimental because his tracking was insane. Better to walk (backwards) and block as needed (which was Elbethium’s advice) than to run. Tossing one or two throwables at a time. Get the status effect going and then wait for the next opening.
On the good run, I felt a calm I had not felt before. I had gotten the first phase down to a true phase skip and having four fable art slots rather than three. The pipe wrench did such good damage, plus it stunned The Nameless King–er, Puppet in two hits. Doing the first phase perfectly with three fable art hits, I got it done in like thirty seconds. I had all my health for the second phase (I might have used one pulse cell).
In the second phase, I stifled my impulse to run and just walked away from him–backwards. I chucked two or three–oh, that was the other thing. I upped the number of consumables/throwables I could throw to the max and added one more belt slot to both belts. That made the difference so I didn’t have to press A and then a direction for a throwable. You might not think one button would matter, but it really did. Just having to flip through the consumables was bad enough because there were two belts and you had to go up or down as well.
OK. I still have more to say so we’ll come back tomorrow.