Lenna’s Inception (PC)
Jul. 14th, 2020 10:34 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chuckroLenna is a normal schoolteacher in the world of [Insert Seed Here], but when the legendary hero accidentally gets killed, it’s up to her to save the kingdom and rescue the Prince.
I got this in the Itch.io Bundle for Racial Justice and Equality, but it had actually been on my Steam wishlist already and would have been worth full price. This is a goddamn delight of a Zelda clone.
The world is procedurally generated based on a seed you enter, and then you explore it, collecting items that let you get past obstacles and explore further. There are most of the standard Zelda items, including bombs, a bow, a hookshot, a jump item (that oddly takes the shield slot), a combination candle/charge attack, etc. Each item lets you pass different obstacles, as is standard, so you get the item in a dungeon, use it to finish the dungeon and fight the boss, then use it to reach the next dungeon. I think it forces a certain amount of linearity, but I’m okay with that—there wasn’t ever a point where I couldn’t figure out where to go. You can also collect library books to eventually get the librarian to join you as a sidekick (and she’s great—she has a lot of health and a ranged attack); and meteors that you can trade to the blacksmith for better weapons. There’s a set of color-coded potions and tunics that are randomized in each seed, with each color sharing an effect (so a Strength potion and Strength tunic share a color, but that color is different each time).
The first and last dungeon bosses/items are the same each time, and there are things like a trading game and a battle arena, though their location changes. And unusually for a procedurally-generated game, there’s a solid plot that works and makes sense.
For my first run-though (seed “Lanord”), I played in the standard expected way of clearing each dungeon fully. I died against the final boss the first time I tried him, and then went back and cleared a bunch of sidequests (and found more secrets) before returning and getting the “Sacrifice” ending. This took four hours and change. I then restarted with a new seed (“Peaseporrage”) and proceeded to “dip” the dungeons for their items but avoid the bosses. Irritatingly, my traditional playthrough gave me lots of heart pieces (at least four hearts worth) so I finished the game with lots of life to spare. My second playthrough drowned me in meteors but only four heart pieces…which meant I was trying to get through everything with four hearts. (My first tunic was the Strength tunic, which almost made up for it, but not quite.) Beating the final boss without fighting any other bosses gets you the “Catastrophe” ending. If you use the Power of Compassion and various sidequest items on each boss (rather than killing them, which means you still don’t get hearts!) you can get the “Perfect” ending, which pits you against a glitch-tastic final boss extravaganza and gets you a happy ending.
Fortunately, the game is also fairly easy, especially as Zelda clones go. No attack does more than two hearts of damage (and most do a half-heart); there are a limited number of enemies with a limited selection of patterns; the controls are solid and hitboxes generally err in your favor. Also, heart drops are common and healing potions are available. (They were in the first store in my first seed, and while I never found the store for them in my second seed, there were 6 of them hidden on the map.)
There are a set of challenge variations of the game, if you get tired of running various seeds in Story Mode; including the no-hearts version where you need to beat the game without getting hit at all. That’s…a bit much for me.
Overall: If you like 2D Zelda games, this is absolutely recommended.
I got this in the Itch.io Bundle for Racial Justice and Equality, but it had actually been on my Steam wishlist already and would have been worth full price. This is a goddamn delight of a Zelda clone.
The world is procedurally generated based on a seed you enter, and then you explore it, collecting items that let you get past obstacles and explore further. There are most of the standard Zelda items, including bombs, a bow, a hookshot, a jump item (that oddly takes the shield slot), a combination candle/charge attack, etc. Each item lets you pass different obstacles, as is standard, so you get the item in a dungeon, use it to finish the dungeon and fight the boss, then use it to reach the next dungeon. I think it forces a certain amount of linearity, but I’m okay with that—there wasn’t ever a point where I couldn’t figure out where to go. You can also collect library books to eventually get the librarian to join you as a sidekick (and she’s great—she has a lot of health and a ranged attack); and meteors that you can trade to the blacksmith for better weapons. There’s a set of color-coded potions and tunics that are randomized in each seed, with each color sharing an effect (so a Strength potion and Strength tunic share a color, but that color is different each time).
The first and last dungeon bosses/items are the same each time, and there are things like a trading game and a battle arena, though their location changes. And unusually for a procedurally-generated game, there’s a solid plot that works and makes sense.
For my first run-though (seed “Lanord”), I played in the standard expected way of clearing each dungeon fully. I died against the final boss the first time I tried him, and then went back and cleared a bunch of sidequests (and found more secrets) before returning and getting the “Sacrifice” ending. This took four hours and change. I then restarted with a new seed (“Peaseporrage”) and proceeded to “dip” the dungeons for their items but avoid the bosses. Irritatingly, my traditional playthrough gave me lots of heart pieces (at least four hearts worth) so I finished the game with lots of life to spare. My second playthrough drowned me in meteors but only four heart pieces…which meant I was trying to get through everything with four hearts. (My first tunic was the Strength tunic, which almost made up for it, but not quite.) Beating the final boss without fighting any other bosses gets you the “Catastrophe” ending. If you use the Power of Compassion and various sidequest items on each boss (rather than killing them, which means you still don’t get hearts!) you can get the “Perfect” ending, which pits you against a glitch-tastic final boss extravaganza and gets you a happy ending.
Fortunately, the game is also fairly easy, especially as Zelda clones go. No attack does more than two hearts of damage (and most do a half-heart); there are a limited number of enemies with a limited selection of patterns; the controls are solid and hitboxes generally err in your favor. Also, heart drops are common and healing potions are available. (They were in the first store in my first seed, and while I never found the store for them in my second seed, there were 6 of them hidden on the map.)
There are a set of challenge variations of the game, if you get tired of running various seeds in Story Mode; including the no-hearts version where you need to beat the game without getting hit at all. That’s…a bit much for me.
Overall: If you like 2D Zelda games, this is absolutely recommended.
