Inca II – Won!

By Ilmari

Now that was easy! But let’s not be hasty, since we still have things to do.

Breathtaking landscape, part XVI

My next stop was a planet resembling Tibet (it is a well-known fact, attested by many fictional works of scientific nature, that most planets in our galaxy have only one type of biome). In yet another cutscene, I saw Eldorado searching a rundown temple and finding a monk stuck under fallen beams.

Apparently soldiers had come and destroyed the temple and imprisoned the guru to a fort further down the valley. It was my job to free the holy man.

Eldorado, this is a family blog

When I was finally given back the controls, I had to find a way to get up a wall of stone. I tried throwing a rope to the root you see in the picture, but alas, it was too heavy. Ballasted thread did the trick, but wasn’t sturdy enough for climbing. Still, I could tie the rope to the ballast and pull the other end of the thread to raise the rope to the root. I also hammered a peg I had to a big rock with my mallet and tied the other end of the rope to it (and the other end probably to myself).

Like this

Now, kicking the rock down lifted me up to where the guru was held prisoner.

So, was his cell just beside the cliff?

Before the guru was willing to get out of here, he wanted me to pray.

You couldn’t pick a better time?

Praying here meant just choosing random praying scrolls, which let out notes when pressed, so I guess I was playing music. I have no idea if there was any logic to this exercise, but after hectic clicking and going through all possible combinations, gods rewarded me with a conch. (Addendum: Checking the internet aftewards, apparently there was some logic. Some of the praying scrolls turn left and only few of them turn right - and the latter are the right to use.)

And then we were here

And then I was alone

It was time to do some random clicking. Within the hole in the small building I found a chain. Connecting it to the point at the top of the building did something.

So is this a lightning rod or something?

Well now it’s broken

So, I guess the metal of the ball shaped point at the top of the building melted into the tray at the ground.

Or this is what is surmise from this picture

I just had to use my crowbar to detach the tray/shield from the ground.

And now I am again elsewhere

Hidden under the ice? You wouldn’t have any matches with you? There were some logs, so maybe I am supposed to make fire?

No, a gong (that’s the tray/shield I just made)

So, I had to give the conch to the guru to blow it like a horn and hit the gong with my mallet, and the ice broke.

You took the words right out of my mouth

I was now in the place where I was supposed to place the second Inca power. Again, I had to find a way to destroy a transparent globe. Let me see what we have here: an icicle that I can break with my mallet, a ray of sunlight and a goat skin…

Yep, melt the icicles with the sunlight and collect the water in the goat skin

The filled goat skin could then be put as a weight to the cup, which opened up the crystal egg and let me insert the Inca power. It was time to go to the last planet!

Great

Before getting to the space battle I was treated to some exposition. Kelt Cartier appeared and told me that the space conquistadors knew our plans, since Doña Angelina (the woman who at the beginning of the game convinced Eldorado’s son to get himself killed) was actually a mole and had revealed everything to Aguirre. And had vanished. And had taken Eldorado’s wife with her. And took her as hostage to the last planet.

All this travelling around the galaxy for nothing

And my decisions come to bite me back

It took me something like six tries to get me through the battle. The trick was, of course, to change the DOSBox cycle to ridiculously low numbers to make everything very slow. Then, as the evil forces were very close together, it was easy to destroy the majority of them with my megabombs. Then it was down to tracking down the two or three remaining ships and hoping they didn’t get me first. Getting the final enemy vessel killed was one of the most boring 39 minutes of my life.

Here I come!

Is the guard in the picture off duty or did I clobber him? Who knows. What I do know is that this guard had a necklace with three geometrical figures, which I could take after first cutting the necklace with my shaver.

And here’s the panel where I’ll use them

This was the first puzzle where I really couldn’t just click my way through. First, putting the figures in the holes was not enough, since they kept dropping: I had to hammer them in with my mallet. After placing the figures in their places, the sliding doors opened and revealed a new interface.

You’d think that I should now press the buttons to light the whole key. Well, I did that and the result was that the sliding doors closed and the three geometric figures dropped from their holes.

Not the result I expected

Checking the place more closely, I noticed that putting the figures in their places opened up another panel with similarly shaped holes in a different part of the cave. The problem was then to get the three figures back to my possession. I could get them by returning the first panel to its original position, but then the second panel closed again.

Lucky I got my trusty crowbar to hold the second panel open

After this, it was pretty easy to get the three figures and place them in the holes at the second panel. I had now managed to free Eldorado’s wife.

Another puzzle?

Apparently not

Leave? Why? Will the asteroid take a holiday from killing? Are you sure you didn't mean destroying it?

Is this the next puzzle or action sequence?

No, it wasn’t!

The game is ending already! Did they run out of money? Well, it’s time for Final Rating in the next post.

…

…

What’s that you are asking? You want resolution? Did the Inca energy destroy the asteroid of the evil conquistadors?

No. It found better things to do and literally left the scene

The end.

Yes, really. It’s just credits here on. I guess we'll return to the story of the new planet-god in the Guardians of Galazy 2. 

Session time: 3 h
Total time: 7 h