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Golden Sun
Dug out another old game from the past. Came out in 2001 (in North America) for the Game Boy Advance. Shares a year with Super Smash Brothers Melee, the original Pikmin, and the original Animal Crossing. Remembers beating this game (and the sequel) a few times. Has not tried it in a solid decade or so, though.
Tried to change things up as well. Knew exactly what to focus on: Djinn. What are Djinn? A little elemental creature with its own special attack. Might be a shield, healing, buff, or elemental damage. Comes in all four elements: Venus (Earth), Mercury (Water), Jupiter (Wind), and Mars (Fire).
Also affects your character's class, depending on how you assign them. Take Isaac, the Venus adept, for example. Normally learns Quake with no Djinn or with Venus Djinn. Picks up Growth instead with a Mars Djinn. Learns more fire-based spells with more Mars Djinn.
Usually stuck the Djinn with their adept type. Worked alright. Wanted to experiment with the other classes. Supposedly offers better stats, but maybe weaker spells? Shrugs. Never really messed with it much, outside of a spell necessary for the field.
Decided on the following final classes:
Isaac: Conjurer (6 Jupiter, 1 Venus). Learns some buffs and debuffs.
Garet: Berserker (6 Venus, 1 Mars). High Attack stat. Also Revive.
Ivan: Sage (6 Mercury, 1 Jupiter). Strong spells...supposedly.
Mia: Water Monk (6 Mars, 1 Mercury). Process of elimination. Grabs party-wide healing spells in any split like this.
Notes one other difference with this approach. Skews towards a spell-heavy combat strategy. Typically spammed Djinns and summons on bosses (except with Mia, the dedicated healer). Affects your class when you do that, however. Drops your stats and changes your spell list mid-battle. Feels like a higher price with the fancier classes.
Quickly discovered why experimentation never happened. Do you know what happens when you take away Isaac's Venus Djinn? Loses the only healing spell your party has until your fourth (and final) party member arrives. Gets nothing good in return either. Could get that heal back on Ivan, the Jupiter adept, with a Venus Djinn. Disappears if the Djinn is ready for summoning, however. Might lose access to your only heal when you need it.
Stuck with it anyways. Kept Isaac's Djinn offline to retain the heal while waiting for Mia to show up. Did not feel great.
Remembered a good chunk of the early game. Forgot how puzzle-y the game is, however. Went in expecting a decent number of puzzles with the Move ability. Forgot about the sheer number of log, pipe, and hopping puzzles. Grew a little tired of them over time. Hated some poorly marked hidden doors needed to progress near the end too.
Exacerbated the puzzle situation with random encounters and big rooms. Waded through inconsequential encounter after inconsequential encounter. Ran from some, perhaps unwisely, given the amount of money on-hand. Wanted Earthbound's autowin feature so bad. Offers some Repel-like items in the item shop. Lasts nowhere near long enough.
Recruited Mia and immediately shut off her Mars Djinn. Was not going to sacrifice healing.
Appreciates some of the less important story bits in the game. Saved someone by dragging their tree-ified body ashore early on. Rescued another person from a boulder, which is also missable. Wrote new dialogue for everyone back in Vale (the hometown), especially for Isaac's and Garet's families. Still likes the general setting of the world too.
Grabbed more and more Djinn. Reached the full 28 Djinn in the game. Enabled the above endgame classes. Only raised more questions about the class system. Example: Looked at Isaac's (Venus adept) healing spells.
- 0-1 Venus Djinn and nothing else: Cure, Cure Well, and Potent Cure.
- 1-4 Jupiter Djinn and nothing else: No healing spells
- 6 Jupiter Djinn and nothing else: Cure, Cure Well, Potent Cure, and Revive.
- 6 Jupiter Djinn and 1 Venus Djinn: No healing spells (same spell list as 5 Jupiter Djinn).
Starts with healing by default. Loses it by adding a little Jupiter. Gains it back with tons of Jupiter. Loses it again by adding in a little Venus. What? Please explain how that makes sense.
Gave the fancy classes a whirl. Describes it as disappointing. Yielded good stats, yes. Weakened their spells to the point of preferring normal attacks for single target. Made good use of the attack and resistance buffs. Considers the debuffs bad (short and a chance of not working). Appreciated two people with a party heal too. Did that make up for basically playing without Djinn and summons? Not really (based on memory, anyways).
Became annoyed with the story at times. Asked the bad people why they are doing what they are, probably several times. Look at this exchange after the final boss:
Ivan: "They're gone, Felix! You don't have to light the beacons anymore..."
Felix: "Yes, I do. If I don't light the beacons..."
Garet: "What will happen?"
Felix: "It's no use talking about it...Just wait and see!"
Useless. Refused to tell the player about the greater story time and time again.
Raced through the game surprisingly quickly. Expected to begrudgingly put it down to do the Pokemon DLC. Not so. Finished the game in a few days.
Remarks on one other feature of the game. Passes off save game data to the sequel, The Lost Age, via password or link cable. Spits out a real doozy of a password. Puts the old games with password-based saves to shame. Only tested the Gold password.
Spoiler: Passwords
Bronze:
$hKm2 QJZnp
T76&E M
Skipped Silver. Only adds stat changes in. Transfers levels and Djinn with the Bronze password. Declines to record a password half the length of the Gold one.
Gold:
TQ9b% h8pTE
yYUmU XtGHD
P+SWz 48yA3
hMpih Th5ZP
7#ceU rFyzx
jZ?av kTgik
eN49t nQXL!
kpbp4 XSEVs
rqHvE ckwXX
z&%=6 bmpNe
k8d+h CaHjh
ayv$j fQHRn
4QDw2 DA4ri
qxMjs FVWNW
KfJzL etq98
VAY$5 T?Ez#
ZsKw4 CPA8s
HUFdM YKhRy
5QnU9 Us2dJ
Zx7i4 3tn9x
+gqWC cxuYn
r#pMv +tRz8
DyW$H $zAMV
=7FSD bKWHq
gQ3Nk qGTq5
ZcXv5 dMzUi
For anyone reading this:
+: Plus sign
t: lowercase T
Picked up the Cleric's Ring and Lure Cap. Beat Deadbeard. Grabbed all 28 Djinn too. May have forgotten to grab the Gold Ring from Feizhi. Saved Hsu, though. Ended around level 28 or 29.
A quick rundown of overall thoughts:
- Never grew tired of the music. Slowed down to listen to it sometimes.
- Cannot say anything too bad about the graphics. Looks kind of grainy when you size up the resolution. Feels unfair to criticize that, though. Designed it for a smaller screen. Looks fine at the proper resolution, even today.
- Too many random encounters. Halve the encounter rate. Double the experience.
- Does not like the class system.
- Likes the game's magic system (in terms of setting). Rates the storytelling as subpar, though.
Rating: 6.5/10? Okay. Is not particularly enthused to play it again anytime soon.