text: ,- _~. , ,, (' /| _ || || ; _ ' _ (( || < \, _-_, =||= || _-_ \\/\ < \, \\/\\ \\ < \, <> (( || /-|| ||_. || || || \\ || | /-|| || || || /-|| ( / | (( || ~ || || || ||/ || | (( || || || || (( || -____- \/\\ ,-_- \\, \\ \\,/ \\/ \/\\ \\ \\ \\ \/\\ <> _-_- |\ /\ /, \\ || || /'\\ ,._-_ / \\ _-_, /'\\ =||= ~|| || || || || || ||_. || || || || || || || || || ~ || || || || ( -__, \\,/ \\, \\/ ,-_- \\,/ \\, -_-/ ,, |\ (_ / || _ \\ ; (_ --_ ||/\\ < \, / \\ /'\\ \\/\/\ --_ ) || || /-|| || || || || || | | _/ )) || || (( || || || || || || | | (_-_- \\ |/ \/\\ \\/ \\,/ \\/\\/ <> _/ FAQ/WALKTHROUGH VERSION 3.2 Authored by: BkStunt_31 ( Gregorio31 @ gmail . com ) ============================================================================== \/ \/ \/ INTRODUCTIONS \/ \/ \/ ======================================================================== Hello everyone, Bkstunt here with a walkthrough for Castlevania: Lords of Shadow. As I'm sure you know, Lords of Shadow is a reboot of the famous Castlevania franchise, developed by Mercury Steam with some insight from Hideo Kojima of Metal Gear Solid fame. It introduces a new protaganist, storyline, and new game play to the series. Having always been a huge Castlevania fan, it is my HONOR to bring you what I will strive to make the most complete FAQ and Walkthrough on the net. Here you should find everything you'll need to conquer Lords of Shadow. Onto the table of contents, and don't forget to have fun! ============================================================================== \/ \/ \/ Table Of Contents \/ \/ \/ ======================================================================== Note: Press Ctrl+F and enter in the code to skip to that section. Version Updates:......................................(LoS 1.0) Walkthrough:..........................................(LoS 2.0) Chapter I: Part I: Besieged Village..............................(LoS 1-1) Part II: Hunting Path.................................(LoS 1-2) Part III: The Dead Bog................................(LoS 1-3) Part IV: Pan's Temple.................................(LoS 1-4) Part V: Oblivion Lake.................................(LoS 1-5) Chapter II: Part I: Enchanted Forest..............................(LoS 2-1) Part II: Underground Caves............................(LoS 2-2) Part III: Labyrinth Entrance..........................(LoS 2-3) Part IV: Waterfalls of Agharta........................(LoS 2-4) Part V: Agharta.......................................(LoS 2-5) Part VI: Dark Dungeon.................................(LoS 2-6) Part VII: Sanctuary Entrance..........................(LoS 2-7) Part VIII: Sanctuary of Titans........................(LoS 2-8) Part IX: The Black Knight.............................(LoS 2-9) Chapter III: Part I: The Three Towers..............................(LoS 3-1) Part II: The Dark Lord of the Lycans..................(LoS 3-2) Chapter IV: Part I: Mountain Fortress.............................(LoS 4-1) Part II: The Crow Witch...............................(LoS 4-2) Chapter V: Part I: Veros Woods...................................(LoS 5-1) Part II: Wygol Village................................(LoS 5-2) Part III: Abbey Catacombs.............................(LoS 5-3) Part IV: Abbey Library................................(LoS 5-4) Part V: Abbey Tower...................................(LoS 5-5) Part VI: Brauner......................................(LoS 5-6) Part VII: Castle Sewers...............................(LoS 5-7) Chapter VI: Part I: Castle Courtyard..............................(LoS 6-1) Part II: Maze Gardens.................................(LoS 6-2) Part III: Castle Hall.................................(LoS 6-3) Part IV: Refectory....................................(LoS 6-4) Chapter VII: Part I: Balcony.......................................(LoS 7-1) Part II: Electric Laboratory..........................(LoS 7-2) Part III: Chromatic Observatory.......................(LoS 7-3) Chapter VIII: Part I: Outer Wall....................................(LoS 8-1) Part II: The Clockwork Tower..........................(LoS 8-2) Part III: Olrox.......................................(LoS 8-3) Part IV: The Throne Room..............................(LoS 8-4) Chapter IX: Part I: Bones Forest...................................(LoS 9-1) Part II: Woes Moor.....................................(LoS 9-2) Part III: The Music Box................................(LoS 9-3) Chapter X: Part I: Titan Graveyard................................(LoS 10-1) Part II: Fire Pinnacle.................................(LoS 10-2) Part III: Fire Cemetery................................(LoS 10-3) Part IV: Crematory Oven................................(LoS 10-4) Chapter XI: Part I: Necromancer's Abyss............................(LoS 11-1) Part II: The Dracolich.................................(LoS 11-2) Chapter XII: Part I: The Final Fight................................(LoS 12-1) Trials................................................(LoS 3.0) Complete Move List....................................(LoS 4.0) Magic and Move List Discussion........................(LoS 4.1) Complete Enemy List...................................(LoS 5.0) Trophies..............................................(LoS 6.0) FAQ...................................................(LoS 7.0) Credits and other ramblings...........................(LoS 8.0) ============================================================================== \/ (LoS 1.0) \/ \/ Version History \/ \/ \/ ======================================================================== Version 1.0: October 5th-6th Main Walkthrough well underway, covering Chapter's I and the impressively huge Chapter II. Some Trial's done, but no where near close. Many items require return trips in the earlier chapters, using new moves or skills, which I remind myself of using the guide. Just finished Chapter III as well, which is really short. Chapter IV looks short as well. Version 1.2: October 6th-7th Added in Chapter's IV and V. IV was pretty short, V was fairly decent. Did some minor editing and added in strategies on the black knight as well as some credits. Version 1.4 October 7th-8th Added in Chapter's VI and VII, and one of VIII. Haven't gotten a chance to get to all the emails to verify/check them yet, but I will before the main part is over and give credit where credit is due. Version 1.5 October 8th-9th Verifying alot of user emails, adding in credits. Did a few more trials since I had company. Did some minor editing. Found some more gems that I had been missing. Stayed up late and finished Chapter VIII. Added in all the places you can now reach with the Seraph Shoulders. Version 1.6 October 9th Finished Chapter X. Still missing some gems from that chapter. Version 2.0 October 10th Finished the walkthrough section. Added in more trials, as well as every gem locations. Also added in what I could on the trophy section. Updated the credits as well. Version 2.5 October 17th/18th Took a (well-deserved break). Finally ran the walkthrough section through a spell checker. I know, that whole 2 weeks or so that this has been posted, the whole time it wasn't spell checked! Crazy! (I'm a pretty good speller, though). Added in xXNuttaXx's Monster List. That list is awesome, check it out! Did some more editing and email answering (a lot more). Also added in and personally completed all of the trials. Just need to add in the move list, which will be in the next update. Version 3.0 November 1st Took another break. Updated the move list, along with an interesting discussion of the best way to utilize magic that I stumbled into on the gamefaqs boards. Answered a LOT of email, but it's dying down now that the game has been out for nearly a month. In between versions, I did get a chance to play through Bayonneta and Dante's Inferno, which were both fun but I still found Castlevania LoS to be better (really impressed with this game still). No more planned updates from here on out, just answering emails and making changes or inputs as needed. Also thank you to everyone who's made the guide a starred one on gamefaqs. Yes, I know it's the only one, and hopefully you'll find everything you could want to know about the game here. Version 3.2 November 27th Did some much needed grammer checks and added in some lines to make the chapters and parts stand out more (trying to reduce the "wall of text" feeling). Also highlighted the gems like ::[THIS]:: (Which took FOREVER to go back and do!) to make them stand out and easier to collect. Also got to a few more emails, but not all of them. ============================================================================== \/ (LoS 2.0) \/ \/ Walkthrough \/ \/ \/ ======================================================================== I have written this guide while playing normal ("Warrior") mode. Also, one important thing to note before we jump in is that almost every level has a upgrade somewhere in it, such as life, shadow magic, and life magic gems. You can also find Brotherhood Arks as well. These upgrades will, of course, increase your abilities. Castlevania is also very user-friendly. As the game is structured by chapters and parts (levels), after beating any level you can go to the world map and check out any stage you've beaten to see what upgrades you can find there. You can use this to see what upgrades you may have missed, as well as how many are in any given level. If you follow the guide though, you will get them all anyway. I will also highlight them like ::[THIS]:: to catch your attention. Ok, onto the walkthrough! =========== Chapter I: =========== ---------------------------------- Part I: Besieged Village (Los 1-1) ---------------------------------- "Victory is the natural objective for every creature on this world." We begin the game with the great Patrick Stewart telling us that we are witnessing the end of mankind, then view a cut scene of Gabriel approaching a village on horseback. It appears that the village is evacuating, but a number of men stay behind to defend their homes. Well, there's a fine line between courage and foolhardiness. Soon a few werewolves appear over the gate. This first area is a tutorial (and also the first part of the demo off of the PSN). The first wave will show you the difference between direct attacks with the square button and area attacks with the triangle button. The next werewolf will give you your first sub-weapon, the daggers (which werewolves are very weak against). Go ahead and try out the dagger while taking care of the next wave, where you will learn how to grab enemies. The next wave you will kill for experience, which you can use to buy new skills in your travel book. The travel book is a useful tool indeed, as it can explain any of your abilities, let you upgrade and buy new abilities, and keeps track of Castlevania's lore, people, and items. For now, buy the skill Guillotine like they tell you to in order to earn a new ability and the game's first trophy: "Welcome to the Club". You can also check out the travel book now to see what it has to offer. Basically, all we have now is the direct and area attack combo's, plus the rising strike and rising assault, which lets us pop smaller enemies up into the air. You can also learn about Gabriel's past, dark moods, childhood sweetheart Marie, and how he ended up at the Brotherhood of Light's doorstep. Castlevania fans will also note the name "Cronqvist" (from Lament of Innocence). After taking care of the remaining werewolves, you'll encounter your first warg. Quickly tap the displayed button to get him off of you, and you'll soon learn how to block and dodge (and the quick recovery if you get hit). Time to confront this level's boss. -------------------\ BOSS: Greater Warg | -------------------| Difficulty: 1/10 | -------------------/ Use the blocking and dodging skill you just learned to protect yourself from the warg. You can get in several hits before dodging away. Keep attacking the creature and soon you'll kill it and learn how to interact with items in a kick-ass cut scene. Afterwards, Gabriel will introduce himself, and leave to find the guardian of lake through the nearby forest. Poor horse. And so, Belmont will continue on foot. You will now learn about the world map, as you can revisit levels throughout the game and accomplish trials in them. For example, you can complete the first trial in Part I by defeating the Greater Warg with at least one surviving villager. ------------------------------- Part II: Hunting Path (Los 1-2) ------------------------------- "What motivates a man to confront the challenges that most of us run from? ... The answer, is love." We are now in the middle of the woods, as Gabriel wakes up meets a strange horse thing. Kind of weird, but I guess it beats fighting wargs throughout the forest. You'll get a quick tutorial on how to ride the horse and how to attack from it. Go ahead and use triangle to kill off the werewolves and then square to take down the wargs, pressing R2 to finish off the wargs. If you get hit, you'll have to press the lining-up circles to stay on your mount. You'll also unlock Marie's profile in the travel book, learning that she was Gabriel's wife and was murdered. Gabriel will then get hit by a branch and you'll learn how to counter-attack, a very useful skill indeed, but requires precise timing. Since you can use it in the middle of a combo, it's ideal for taking out enemies while laying on an attack. Make sure to check out the knight to your south for a ::[Life Gem]::, as you can miss it easily if you kill the werewolves too quickly. After another kick ass cut scene, Gabriel will be back on the horse. After two more warg riders, Gabriel will finally be knocked off, and forced to fight another greater warg accompanied by several werewolves. The greater warg is no different than the one from the besieged village, only it doesn't have a life bar this time. Use the nearby health font if you need to and take it out to finish the level. -------------------------------- Part III: The Dead Bog (LoS 1-3) -------------------------------- "Nothing will stop him... nothing will stand in his way." No intro cut scene here, head down the path and examine the knight's corpse for a ::[LIFE GEM]::. Collect five to increase your max health. The next knight has a scroll which will tell you to wait for the bubbles to pass lest the bog monsters get you. Past the second knight is a dead end, so jump onto the nearby ledge to learn how to grab onto ledges and move across them. After another great cut scene (man, this game has good cut scene's), you'll then have to fight some goblins. Quickly throw the bomb back and use whatever attacks you wish to take out the little creatures as they aren't too hard. You'll soon unlock two new monster entries. Now we have to cross the bog, so as the scroll told us, wait for the bubbles to die down. You can only cross certain parts of the bog, as the rest is poisoned, and it's extremely slow going, so time your passing over the bubbles well. From the island, you can go left towards the health, or right up the stairs. I recommend taking both paths, as we can find goodies on either side, or you could revisit the level, trying out a different path each time. Left Path: Here you'll find more goblins to kill, so dispose of them. Here, jump past the log to your right and go down the first bog path to reach a knight with a ::[LIFE GEM]::. From here you can move left to cross some more bogs and another goblin camp, or right to intersect to the cave portion of the right path. Either way, keep going to drop down a cliff and continue on the paths merge section. Right Path: The right path is the logical choice, as it takes you away from the bubbles. Head up the stairs and down the ledge to eventually find a big drop which has a cave to your right. You can find a ::[LIFE GEM]:: on the knight in the cave, but you'll have to fight off a few goblins to claim it. Keep heading onward past the short bog sections to come to another goblin camp. Dispose of them however you see fit and jump down the cliff to the paths merge section. Paths Merge: Jump down the ledge to reach another goblin camp, where you will learn to grab the goblins to make them give up a grenade. Use the grenades to throw at the tree, making a new path. Check out the knight to your left for another scroll, telling of a relic which will help out Gabriel, and to hear yet another name that Castlevania fans will know, Rinaldo Gandolfi (yet again, Gandolfi from Castlevania: Lament of Innocence). Keep heading down the bog for the most challenging portion yet, with no less then four bubble sections. Time your movements accordingly, going around the mud if you must, but don't take too long as you can actually sink too far into the mud. Keep going along the stairs and expect some goblins to ambush you from the bushes. You'll soon come to yet another split in the road. Keep heading down the path and you'll find more goblins as well as a life font if you need it. Head up the stairs for now to reach the mausoleum the knight's scroll told you about. Go around the side of it and use the ledges to find your way inside. Here you will obtain the grip hook, which turns the combat cross into a grappling hook. You can use your new-found hook at predetermined grip points. Go ahead and use it to get out of the mausoleum. Now you'll finally meet the monster that has been stalking you, the swamp troll. He is resistant to daggers a little, as shown by his bestiary page. You'll also learn to jump above the ground pounds that the enemy does, but keep in mind that you can also just outrun them, as their range is limited. ------------------\ BOSS: Swamp Troll | ------------------| Difficulty: 3/10 | ------------------/ The beast acts as a boss for the chapter, and is somewhat aggressive as he will pick up gravestones to try and smack you with and will charge at you. He'll also do ground-pounds occasionally. Use the ground pounds to jump and attack him with guillotine and side step his charges to have a good period of time to smack him, as he leaves himself very open. Only use a few quick hits at a time to play it safe, or use counterattacks to lay into him. After awhile, he will start to glow, so get close to him and hit R2 to finish him off. You'll have to go through a few timed button presses and then jam on a button to put him away. Afterwards open the nearby ::[BROTHERHOOD ARK]:: to upgrade how many daggers you can carry to 10, and grip the tree nearby. You'll find a health font to the west, down the path, if you need it. Head down the stairs for one of the game's breathtaking landscapes. Follow the on-screen instructions to learn how to use the grappling hook and edge-hanging to platform in the game. You'll also see a dead knight under the third set of stairs, so get to him before you grapple down for another ::[LIFE GEM]::. Continue following instructions to finish the level. ------------------------------- Part IV: Pan's Temple (LoS 1-4) ------------------------------- " The amulet senses its master... " Even though we apparently entered a temple, we find ourselves back outside. Examine the nearby carving to have it light up on the amulet, as you can see on the new HUD display on the right of our screen. Looks like we need to find four more carvings. Head down the beautiful forest path to find another one on your right. You'll find the laments of another knight nearby, explaining the usefulness of life gems and how he senses one nearby. Go down to the creek and up to the right side of the screen to find the third carving. Continue further past the carving (to the right side of the screen) to find a nice little area with another ::[LIFE GEM]:: for us. Head back out and go further down the path for the fourth carving. Keep going down the path and in front of the tree you'll find a dying knight's last words. Head into the tree to see a ::[BROTHERHOOD ARK]:: that the game tells you to come back for once your skills are improved. We need to come back here after finishing Chapter VIII, for a Holy Water upgrade, but I'll remind you later on (aren't I nice?). You'll find the last carving further on to your right, so go to the green glow and use pan's amulet. Here, you'll have to match the runes in the order that's displayed on your HUD, and the path will open up. Head up the path to reach a cut scene. Here Gabriel will talk to the guardian of the lake of oblivion, where the living may commune with the dead. Gabriel will tell the guardian of his and his brotherhood's views on what is happening in the world, and ask the guardian to help him. Apparently the heaven's are now isolated from the earth. You'll now have to complete a puzzle to reach Marie before she is taken. You can also view your travel log to see that you'll get 200 experience for completing the puzzle, or you can unlock it and get no experience. But we might as well do it ourselves: First, turn the outer ring counter-clockwise. Second, turn the inner ring counter-clockwise. Thirdly, turn the middle ring clockwise. Fourth, turn the outer ring counter-clockwise. Lastly, turn the inner ring counter-clockwise. After the puzzle, view the scenes and continue to complete the level. Here's another five-move way to solve the puzzle: [TIP SUBMITTED BY: Daniel Weissenberger] Only moving the pieces clockwise, you just have to turn the middle ring once, the inner ring twice, and then the outer ring twice. Fast and easy. (It gets the job done without worrying about changing directions. Thanks Daniel! ~ BK) [END TIP] ------------------------------- Part V: Oblivion Lake (LoS 1-5) ------------------------------- " A chill wind blows through his heart; I can see it. Feel it! " Go down the path to come to a gorgeous frozen lake and the knight nearby to claim another ::[LIFE GEM]::. Isn't it awesome how the snow sticks to the screen? Jump onto the lake to view a cut scene. -----------------\ BOSS: Ice Titan | -----------------| Difficulty: 5/10 | -----------------/ You'll now be free with the ice titan, and unlock a new bestiary page. Dodge the titan's ice spikes that he shoots toward you and run up to him. He will sometimes encase the area around you in ice, but just smack it to set yourself free. Wait until the titan smashes his fist into the ice, and jump up and grab him on the highlighted part of his arm. Be careful to grip him to hold on when he tries to shake you off. Climb up his left hand and find the rune, then press square as much as you can to destroy it. The titan will attempt to crush you, so dodge to the left and grapple onto his other hand's wrist, then onto his neck directly afterwards. From here shimmy yourself to the left, grabbing on when you need to, to find the next rune and destroy it. He may try and grab you when your up here, but just grab-jump (hold and press right and x) to avoid him. After you destroy it you can grab onto his chin and swing around to get to his back. You'll see the next rune below you, so go down to it and start hitting it until you see the camera pan upwards. This means he's about to try and swat you off his back, but just move down below the rune and chill out there as he can't reach you. Go down as far as you can, then go back up and finish off his back rune. Now, you must climb up his back and up to his head, circling around his head when you can to find another rune on the right side. Go to it and hit it, but watch out as he'll try to smack you, so quickly jump to the left to avoid him. After hitting it, you'll see a final cut scene, ending the level. =========== Chapter II: =========== ---------------------------------- Part I: Enchanted Forest (LoS 2-1) ---------------------------------- "Perhaps he is the one, a warrior of pure heart who can deliver us from all evil... perhaps." Head down the path and down the cliff to find a grappling point. Grapple downwards until you can see another grappling point off to your left. Use it to grapple down the other side and find a knight with a scroll nearby, who states that his comrade went ahead for supplies and has a gem. Down in the river you can find a hidden grotto behind the waterfall, but the seal there tells us we need shadow magic to make it work, so we'll have to come back later (there is a ::[BROTHERHOOD ARK]:: here with a dagger power up). Keep going through the level and you'll meet a werewolf further down the path. Take him out to learn about neutral orbs and how to absorb them. Thanks to the device that Zobrek gave you, you can now use light magic, which lets you heal yourself with each hit by turning it on and off with L1. Awesome. You'll also get a couple of buyable new moves based off of light magic. You also have a light gem medallion so you can upgrade your light magic capacity by finding light gems. You'll also learn about magic fountains further down, where you can fill your magic up. Keep heading down the path and take out the werewolves until you find the path split. Right Path: As you make your way along the right path you'll see some water down below you. Drop into it and you'll fight some goblins. Further down the waterway you'll find a corpse and a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]::. Back at the main path you'll see a tree across from you. Grapple it and pull it down a bit. swing across and grapple to the ledge above. From here the path will merge with the other. Left path: Follow the path down and you'll have to fight some goblins. Be generous with the dagger's here, as further on you can refill them. Jump onto the broken wall section on your left and grapple up to the ledge. Use the ledges here to climb your way up, just follow the ledge to the right, moving up and across the waterfall until you reach the top. At the nearby bridge the right and left paths join Here you'll find a knight with a scroll, damning Cardinal Volpe for sending them on their pointless quest. Head up to the church and break through the window, examining the nearby knight for the focus scroll. You'll now get a quick tutorial about the focus scroll and how to use it, basically just fight well and you'll get neutral orbs on each HIT instead of each kill. Using magic will pause it, though. Kill the warg and use the goblin's bombs to open up the nearby door. At the bottom of the stairs you'll fight three werewolves. Go to the right of the big tree to find a knight and get his scroll. This scroll will tell you that the nearby tree is dead due to a spell cast by the dark lord. Now head to the left of the tree and jump up the ledges, repel up the tower and swing from the boom arm to the opposite ledge. From this ledge swing from the nearby tree limb to the big dead tree thus completing part I. ------------------------------------ Part II: Underground Caves (LoS 2-2) ------------------------------------ "Goblins are one thing, but there are other creatures in the dark places of the world." Now you'll find yourself inside the great tree trunk. Take the nearby path down into a tunnel. Climb along the wall and leap over to the ledge. JESUS!!! Look behind you Gabriel. There's a giant... oh well. Now you'll have to fight a giant spider. The fight isn't horribly difficult just dodge and attack. If your hit you'll need to use light magic to counter the poison. Also, if you have the ground cutter attack it's extremely useful here. After the spider is dead go through the nearby doorway and grapple up the wall. Then, grapple down to the clearing. Here you'll fight several werewolves and another giant spider. Once you've dispatched them you'll have to choose a path. Right Path: Climb up the platforms to a narrow ledge. From this ledge grapple down to another ledge and shimmy your way to the right. Then, jump to another ledge to your right. Follow the path over a spider web to a dead adventurer. His scroll tells you that you can ride the spiders apparently. This path will drop down to a portion of the right path from the barrier room. Left Path: The left path will require you to climb across a gap. Once you do you'll find a room with a barrier (you'll have to come back when your cross is upgraded). You'll have to choose another path. The paths here will circle around and join up. Left Path (barrier room): The right path leads to another door that you'll need to destroy. Thankfully, some goblins will ambush you, so use their bombs to destroy the door. Inside the door is an adventurer's body containing the first keystone. You will also notice yet another left path to the side of the door. Yes another left path (door room): Down here you can find a health font and further past that a soldier with a scroll. Keep going to find yet another split. The left door leads to a door you can't open. To the left is another dead adventurer, and a path leading to the right path from the room with the barrier. Right Path (barrier room): After a web filled hallway you'll find a series of ledges connected by spider webs. At the end of the spider webs is a giant spider you'll have to fight. Once you kill it scale the nearby cliff and jump to the ledge with the tunnel going into the wall. Go through the tunnel where you'll swing across a ledge to a body and the last keystone. From here you can jump down to the door and open her up. Inside the door you'll receive the spiked chain upgrade. This will allow you to saw through certain barriers, and tame creatures. Now that we have this upgrade, let's return to the barrier room. Saw through the barrier and you'll find a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]::. Once you've collected the gem, return to the upgrade room and grapple the ledge to complete the level. -------------------------------------- Part III: Labyrinth Entrance (LoS 2-3) -------------------------------------- "I wonder if you know what truly lies ahead for you, Gabriel..." Ahead of you is a door no goblin grenade will breach. As you examine it a small platoon of goblins will ambush you with a wild boar mount. Hit the boar until you kill the rider and wear him out. At this point you can mount him, be prepared for the timed button press. Once you've mounted the boar get some room and charge the door. After two rams the door will break. Once through the door you'll have to strangle the boar. Here you can find a knight with a scroll to the right, he's hidden quite well behind a breakable statue though, then you can climb a nearby wall. At the top of the wall you'll find some scaffolding. Walk across it and down the stairs to the right to find a knight with a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]::. Go back up and near the end of the ledge to your north is a night with a scroll. Follow the platform and jump to the tower in the middle of the area. From here you can cross to the other side. Be careful of the crumbling section. From there drop down the ledge and grapple on the overhead scaffold. You'll then learn how to use the grapple to leap off of a wall. Use this method to reach the adjacent platform. A little ways down the path is a crank in the middle of a small courtyard. The crank lifts the nearby gate. However, each time you try to open it you'll be repeatedly assaulted by werewolves. After three to four waves you'll finally get it open. Pass through the gate and you'll soon find a health fountain and eventually a knight. Soon, you'll pass through a doorway into a hallway. To your right you'll find a bundle of daggers and a breakable wall (Though none of your attacks seem to be strong enough now, so we'll have to come back. I'll remind you when, and also take note that the ::[BROTHERHOOD ARK]:: can be found behind this wall). Now, head down the obvious left path, be sure to grab the ledge when you jump across the gap. You'll find yourself in a courtyard where you'll be attacked by goblins. Kill them and you'll initiate a battle with a greater werewolf. He's tougher than the lesser ones but still susceptible to daggers, the dagger wave will especially hurt him and let you get in a few hits. Be careful of his ground-pound and take your time to kill him. Once he's dead, grab the lever you need for the nearby crank. Insert the crank from the back, turn it a little and....OH GOD!!!!! ---------------------------------------- Part IV: Waterfalls of Agharia (LoS 2-4) ---------------------------------------- "This journey will take him longer than anticipated and deeper than any man has ventured in centuries" Well apparently Gabriel is superman or some godlike equivalent because that was one heck of a drop. Anyway, you're at the bottom of a very deep hole, yet your in a very open chamber full of waterfalls. Near you is a corpse possessing a scroll informing you of a nearby crystal. Follow the path and jump to the center of the room where you'll fight a spider. However, this spider you can mount after damaging him a bit. Do so and you'll receive the proper instructions. Now learned in the ways of spider equestrian-ship, use the spider's web to pull down the nearby tree. Kill the spider now as we no longer need him, and you'll be rewarded with a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]::, so grab it and swing across the gap. Follow the path a ways and you'll be attacked by a greater werewolf again, although he seems to be easier than the one from the last chapter. Once the wolf is dead scale the nearby wall. You'll now be able to swing from side to side on the wall. Using this technique jump the gap to the ledge. A short camera pan cut scene will detail the road ahead. Walk through the cave into the open area on the other side, but here you'll be attacked by a greater werewolf and some lesser ones. Once you kill them get the knight's scroll from nearby. Then, go to the edge of the cliff and tear the face off the adjacent wall. This will form a bridge and allow you to climb down to the lower area. Keep climbing and jumping and you will unlock a cut scene. Now you'll have to fight a large group of small trolls and one cave troll. After abusing (and getting abused by) the greater troll for a while you'll be able to mount him. This is good because there is a large rock nearby that needs smashing. Use the troll to do so and you can grapple down to the next area. Here there are once again two paths. Take the right path out to a nearby ledge and inspect the area past the waterfall for another knight who has a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]:: for you. Now go back and head through the left path. You'll immediately need to saw through a pillar. Once you do so you'll gain access to the next room. In this room there's some more lesser werewolves, once you kill them climb the nearby wall and jump across the waterfall gap. This will grant you access to the rest of the path. Follow it until you see a grapple point way up on a cliff. Climb up and be ready to fight another spider. Wear the spider down and then mount the spider and use his web to create a bridge. Cool. Nearby you'll find a magic fountain. Through the nearby doorway you'll find a statue you can saw through. On the other side there is a knight with the shadow magic amulet around his neck, letting you control shadow magic now, as well as light magic. Now you'll have to return to the fountain and fill up your energy. With your energy full you can move on through the door that required shadow magic. On the other side you'll fight some lesser werewolves. After you dispatch them begin to scale the wall nearby. You'll have to use the grapple several times but once you reach the top you can jump to a ledge. Continue scaling the wall using the grapple when necessary. At the very top you'll have to grapple to a point that's kinda difficult to see as it's in the sun, but once you do that you'll have finally escaped the waterfalls. Now that you have shadow magic, you can also go back to chapter II, part I and obtain the brotherhood ark for more daggers. ------------------------- Part V: Agharta (LoS 2-5) ------------------------- "Eventually the Titans fell and then the people were massacred one by one..." Now THAT'S how you kill a troll! After the girl makes Gabriel look like he's trying too hard, go up to the stairs and jump across them, using the grappling point to make it across. Here you'll find a knight with a scroll. You can find another knight by going up to the left side of the screen. Go down the main steps to find and kill some more werewolves. You can find a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]:: by going down the stairs up north and following the northeast path, heading left by the stairs (it's on a knight's body). The stairs you just passed have a statue that you need to be stronger to push, so for now head back a ways, up the stairs you took to get here. (You can get the ::[BROTHERHOOD ARK]:: dagger upgrade behind the statue after you find the Dark Gauntlet from Chapter II Part IX). Go towards the screen and use the grappling point on the right to come to a rather large area. Here you can fight and mount a Warg, which will let you jump across the large flashing gaps. Use the wart to jump the gap. Further to the left in this area is another gap that you can jump. Kill your warg here and jump over the wall. Here you'll find another cave troll. Before you mount it, run to the back of this area and up the stairs, then head away from the tv. Here you'll find a knight with a ::[LIFE GEM]::. Go wear down the troll and mount it, then take it down the stairs to the left, killing the werewolves and bashing down the nearby door. Continue this way and up the stairs, killing your troll in the process. Climb up the ledge and you'll soon face another warg. Kill it and the small werewolves it summons, then use it to get across the gaps north of of you. There's a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]:: at the end of the first gap, as you can see it through the gate, but you'll have to kill your warg to get it. Don't worry, you can go back and get another one afterwards, and then use it to get up the vines at the end of the path. Once you do you'll be at the end of the level. ------------------------------- Part VI: Dark Dungeon (LoS 2-6) ------------------------------- "Something tells me she has a part to play in all of this..." Head downward until you can reach a ledge to your left, then crawl around it and jump down a ledge. Kick yourself to the next ledge on the left and use your grappling hook to swing across two grapple points to another ledge. Head right here and grapple downwards, until the camera view changes and then kick jump to the ledge below. Ah, finally firm ground. Not for long, though, as you have to jump to the ledge across from you and shimmy left, now you can use the grappling hook, but don't take it down to the floor, instead kick jump off of it to grab a nearby ledge past the waterfall. We're going for the dead knight you probably saw on the first solid ground. Use the grappling hook to the left and swing to the wall on the far side (you'll see the knight again), then simply wall jump to the left to get a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]::. Now use the nearby grappling hook. Head through the door and read the nearby knight's scroll. It seems the shadow gem is affecting a fellow knight's mind. Hopefully that won't happen to us. Anyway, head up the stairs and you'll see the girl again, who seems to be leading you further inside. Alas, you need two more keys, though, so take the left path for now. You'll learn from another dead knight that gremlin guano is essentially lighting your way, before you meet the creatures further down the road. These things fall easily and are weak to daggers, but kill them with some short aerial combos. The next knight has one of the bridge's keys, while another knight up to your right (jump up to him) has a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]::. Go back and put in the key to open a portion of the bridge, leading into another cave. Activate the door nearby (investigate with R2) to summon a giant spider. Kill the gremlins it summons and punish the spider so you can mount it and open the door nearby. Kill the spider and use the health font inside, as well as finding the next bridge key on the knight. Be careful, a whole horde of gremlins will ambush you on your way back to the bridge. (Thanks to Zephadus for pointing out that you NEED to examine the door to make that spider come down. Don't forget to examine things, guys!) With the bridge open, travel across to climb up some ledges and use the grappling hook to go further up. Now shimmy across some ledges towards the screen but don't jump back just yet, instead jump to your left and you will see a knight down there, who has the last ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]:: of this level (you can barely see him down there). Now you can jump to the ledge on the right and use another grappling hook to get up even higher. Up here, absorb the magic and jump to the huge area nearby. You'll have to fight another gremlin horde, so use some light magic if needed. After a short while you'll go into another cut scene. Well, we're dead. But, maybe not, as the girl again comes to our rescue, and can seem to talk to us without moving her lips. After she reads our mind, she insists on coming with us. Well, at least the big guy is on our side now. -------------------------------------- Part VII: Sanctuary Entrance (LoS 2-7) -------------------------------------- "My dear friend, I see your destiny before me, and it is terrible indeed..." Well, it seems we need four crystal shards and Claudia sends us to find them. The only way to go for right now is to the west, so head that way and kill the petty werewolves that bother you. Further on, Claudia will tell you the crystal shards grow near purple areas. Examine the fellow knight for a scroll and climb up the wall. Sling yourself over to the next area and take out the werewolves. Head south to your first purple area, netting you a crystal. After Claudia gives you a quick counting lesson, use the grappling point down the hallway. But before you continue, head towards the screen to find a knight with a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]::. Follow the path straight for now and kill some more werewolves down below the drop. Climb up the nearby ledge and jump left until you can head upwards, finding some daggers and a knight with a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]::. Head back down and into the new area to fight some more werewolves and get another shard. There's a lever here that you can't open yet until you upgrade your combat cross again, so keep that in mind for now. (This ::[BROTHERHOOD ARK]:: has a dagger upgrade for you). Head back the way you came and grapple back up. Before going all the way up, notice the second grappling point to your upper left, so jump off the wall and grapple that. Use that to swing over to the ledge on your right, shimmying to your right to jump on the fragile floor. Use the floor to continue to the next ledge, and to the left wall from there and down to the ground. In this large area you'll face THREE greater werewolves, probably your toughest fight yet. Try and focus on one at a time, use shadow magic and healing magic, and kill them as fast as you can once they are dazed to make you life MUCH easier. They come shortly one after another, so after dying once or twice I layed into one with shadow magic, and a dagger wave, killing him off around the time the third one showed up. After that, two of them aren't so bad. After they are dead, use the ledge in the northwest corner and climb the ledge to your right. Now grab the crystal to your south and head north. Just one more. Jump into the big area to see the last one, but you'll have to take out a troll before you grab it. Once you have the troll mounted use it to break the nearby glowing thing-a-ma-jig and finish it off. Collect the last crystal and use it in the device out by Claudia. This will open the big door, but once it's open you can remove the shadow crystal at will. Do so, and go into the troll room. Now, use the shadow crystal on the device to your northwest and turn in so that it shoots the beam straight to the east. Turn that statue so that the beam reflects to the middle statue, which as you guessed, needs to reflect to the door. You'll gain some experience for solving the "puzzle" and be able to continue on. You also may have found a knight nearby who offers the solution to the puzzle, but we don't really need him. ---------------------------------------- Part VIII: Sanctuary of Titans (LoS 2-8) ---------------------------------------- "The board is set; the pieces in play and we shall see what occurs..." You know what's coming, you feel it don't you? Watch as the might titan wakes once more upon Gabriel's coming. -----------------------\ BOSS: Stone Idol Titan | -----------------------| Difficulty: 6/10 | -----------------------/ The battle starts, and Claudia warns you not to get too close to the titan. Well, what are we supposed to do, Claudia, we don't have magic stones like you! There's also a tricky ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]:: to find by running around the edge of the battlefield. It took me longer than I'd like to admit to find it, but remember that EVERY GEM so far has been on a corpse (well, almost). The camera doesn't help, either, but start running right and check the edges and you'll find it. Now, go back to where you came from (or get some distance). Away from the titan, just jump when it tries to use it's foot to hurt you from afar. Wait until it throws a firey rock (just one!) and use its own momentum to throw it back (by grabbing it, of course!). Now start running toward the beast, the black knight will help to make it kneel, and you'll have your chance to mount it. Climb up and around it's leg, holding on when you have to as it will try and shake you off very similarly to the ice titan. Eventually you'll get a chance to grapple to it's other leg and head downward, so do so. Keep heading down and you'll encounter the first rune spot, so break it, heading down even further when you have to. When you do break it, head all the way down to grapple onto the thing's hand next. Perfect. Now you'll get a cut scene where the thing is about to squash you but Claudia distracts it. Quickly use this borrowed time to scale upwards to the next rune. Destroy it when you can and grapple to it's other hand, although it may punch that hand downward, making you hit the ground, but you can get back up easily. Crawl up it's arm to destroy the next rune, but be careful as it's shaking is a lot more erratic now. Jump up two spaces once it's done, to avoid it's other hand as well as to grapple a floating piece of rock, which takes you right next to the beast's face. Grapple onto her hat and up to the next rune, holding on when you need to. Smash the thing but be careful as her shakes are very close together now. Once you have her down aways, a cut scene will occur, but this ISN'T a normal cut scene, as you'll have to get the timing event down in order to finish the titan off. ----------------------------------- Part IX: The Black Knight (LoS 2-9) ----------------------------------- "Life is so fragile here on the edge of humanity..." What. Have. You. Done? It seems that Claudia is dead by your own hands, and now the Black Knight is ready to tear you limb from limb, as he loved his ward. Read the new monster entry for an interesting read about how the knight was created. -------------------------\ BOSS: Black Knight Golem | -------------------------| Difficulty: 6/10 | -------------------------/ (with chain saw and upgraded guillotine). The boss has a short range fire shockwave, as well as standard sword swipes. He can also extend his sword much like your whip at times, and also uses a unique looking move to decimate things in front of him. Stay on the move and use whatever exploding daggers you have, then take quick hits. When he uses a big move, I recommend using the upgraded guillotine, as even if he blocks the big attack, the second one will make him pay, and you can use it easily while staying on the move directly afterwards. Dodge when you have to. After a while you'll stun him, and can grapple him to pull off some armor. His shock wave range will also increase, so be careful. After another stun animation, he will start to make liquid slime move towards you, which will freeze you in place if it catchs you. If. Who am I kidding, it probably will, since he summons it so much. He'll even put two of them out there, so it's not safe to use any time consuming moves now, but they'll dissapate after awhile and you can still run and put in some quick hits. You can also kill the slime creatures with chain saw move, which I started using to damage the knight and kill the creatures at the same time. Put on shadow or light magic to do a lot of damage or healing respectively. After the next event, the knight will have no body armor. If you do have the time and can line it up right, guillotine's floor move can kill those slimes as well, just make sure you line it up right or your a sitting duck. Keep at it and soon you can take off the knight's helm, ending chapter II and giving you a dark gauntlet, but costing you a friend. [TIP SUBMITTED BY: Shuo Ragnarok] BkStunt, this is Shuo Ragnarok of the GFAQS boards. I read a bit on your FAQ and just wanted to submit a little tip for the Black Knight boss. The Direct Heavy Combo (upgraded at least once) makes the 2nd half of the fight a cakewalk. Once he raises his sword in preparation for the Slime Summon move, that's when you start hammering him with the DHC. Not only will you destroy the slime as soon as it's summoned, but you'll also score alot of free hits on the Knight, since it takes him a bit of time to recover from doing the summon move, and the DHC is quite effective at boosting your Focus Gauge. Also, there's a pretty clear indication of when he's about to use his flame-wave move (where he launches five waves of fire in front of him, which is probably his most damaging move). He'll usually start by bringing his left arm back. DO NOT DODGE until his arm is all the way back, otherwise if you dodge too soon or right before he begins the attack animation, you're almost guaranteed to take the hit. (Thanks alot Shuo, the DHC really does punish the knight a ton while taking care of the slimes.) [END TIP] You can now also get a dagger upgrade from Chapter II Part V: Agharta. ============= Chapter III: ============= ---------------------------------- Part I: The Three Towers (LoS 3-1) ---------------------------------- "Most would abandon the quest, but something deep inside forces him ever onwards..." Use your new toy to punch the statue forward and create a path by hitting L2 and square. Now turn on the shadow magic and punch it through the wall. Take care of the werewolves outside and use the magic font to the south if you wish, then punch the statue one more time to make a grappling point. Down the path past the arch and to the south is a crystal point if you need one. Go north and jump to the next bit of land to find a knight and his scroll. The next bit of land is a big jump, so grab on when you leap. You'll also see a ::[BROTHERHOOD ARK]:: that looks like it's quite a jump away. Looks like we'll have to come back for that. (You'll need the boots that you get after Chapter III Part II. You'll get a Fairy upgrade.). Keep moving around the structure, and then use the grappling hook to kick off to the next one. Move up the ledge and kick off to the higher ledge on your left, where you can use the grappling hook to get back onto land. Here you'll have to take on quite a few waves of lesser werewolves, but after awhile, a strange green creature will show up to help you. It's the fairies, similar to the one's that you met in the forest. They basically stun the enemy so you can hurt them, very helpful! Afterwards, they will give you a fairy container, and you are told to look for them in the tower. After the fight, check out the knight in the lower east corner, who dies happily knowing the cake is not a lie (Portal much, anyone??). Further in, you will find another knight who has a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]::, as well as a magic font and a destructible wall to the west. Use the wall and jump up the ledges to view a spectacular background, as well as the ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]:: the knight has past the grappling point. Go back and use the lever to get into the tower, where you will find a few werewolves and a door that requires three fairies to open (that you have to find). Go to the left to find a warg that you can tame, once you have him mounted, go back through the central area and to the right, going down the left hand path to find some vines for him to climb. Use the warg up here to jump the gap on the upper right path and take down all the werewolves, including a greater one. Sweet. Kill him off and use the nearby lever to open the door, which stays open. In here, put on light magic and touch the first rune, then shadow magic and touch the last two. This will solve a puzzle and give you 300 experience. You can also go back and check that knight we passed for a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]::. There's also a health font to the left of the hallway where the knight is, if you need it. Now swing past the huge statue using the three grappling hooks, and go into the next area. Here all you'll find is a bunch of pots and a lever stick. Put the lever stick into the nearby lever and start to use it, and a greater werewolf will spawn. Bah, take him out. I recommend the shadow magic chain saw technique, man that's powerful. Go back to opening the gate, then take the lever and go back to the right side and open that gate in there. Use this door first, and go outside to start to climb up the tower. Jump to your right and keep climbing up the tower to reach the top, where you can find one fairy stone. Just two more to go. Go back to the first gate you opened and use the grappling hook there to reach the base of another tower. Use the grappling hook and ledges you find to ascend it, being rewarded with another fairy stone at the top. Also be sure to grab the ::[LIGE GEM]:: just south of the fairy stone, you can grab it before the fairy stone in fact (I just happened to get it afterwards). Go back to the stone and go down the glowing ledge to the right. Keep going down until you hit the second grappling hook, then go up to grab the ledge. You must've seen the glowing knight, so shimmy to the left and go inspect him for a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]::. Keep going down and you'll end up back by the first dead knight. Now go back to the puzzle room and use the grappling hook to the left to jump out of the tower, then quickly use the upper hook to scale the building where you'll find the last fairy stone, a knight with a scroll, and a magic font. Go back to the fairy door to finally get it open and end the level. Now, on your way back to the fairy door, depening on how you choose to get there (there are a couple paths) could mean some more fighting, as Paul DiCocco points out: [TIP SUBMITTED BY: Paul DiCocco] Hiya bud, OK, here's something that's not in your walkthrough which I found: Under Chapter 3, Part I: The Three Towers ---> Before the very last sentence "go back to the faerie door" En route to the faerie door, I used the grapple point next to the knight and health font. I grappled alllll the way down and wound up towards the beginning of the level. When you approach the turn crank that opens the 2 iron-gated doors, you're greeted by three Greater Werewolves. Defeat them, then approach the upper right part of the screen to break down the wall there, exposing a few ledges. Jump up the ledges and crawl through a small opening which will put you back into the room with the Faerie Door that you have to open with the 3 faeries. Go ahead and verify this if you can :). It's a nice addition, I think. Paul (Paul is very right here, if you go that way a second time, those werewolves WILL destroy the crank and force you to use the ledge on the right after you pull it down. Here's another interesting tidbit I found, if you let them, those werewolves will actually destroy the crank on your FIRST pass through there too! Thanks a ton Paul, that definitely needed pointing out! ~ BK ) [END TIP] ---------------------------------------------- Part II: The Dark Lord of the Lycans (LoS 3-2) ---------------------------------------------- "I fear he will suffer more than he knows once he discovers the truth..." Are you ready for a boss fight? Use the health and magic font's and jump into the arena ahead. The dark lord of the lycan's (werewolves, same thing..) will have a little chat with you first, telling you how your order came to be. Those three strong warrior who founded the brotherhood wanted nothing more than to assist God in bringing down the devil, and so fought tirelessly, eventually finding places on earth that were so strong with God's light that they used that power to ascend into the heavens. However, they left their mortal shell's full of their inner darkness, as they became beings of light, and you are about to fight one of them now. -----------------\ BOSS: Cornell | -----------------| Difficulty: 4/10 | -----------------/ You can now read the bestiary entry about Cornell, which is quite interesting and sums up the previous cut scene quite well. You can also find out that, to no one's surprise, the werewolf lord is weak to silver. Keep on the move as you learn his attacks. You'll see he can dash at you, but will never connect if your on the move. He can also enchant his hammer and spin the head around. Oh, and the standard boss ground-pound, of course. Use some hard direct combo's when he dashes at you and misses, and the upgraded guillotine when he does his ground pound, and he'll soon push up daisies. Honestly not very hard for a dark lor... uh oh... ----------------------------\ Boss: Lycanthrope Dark Lord | ----------------------------| Difficulty: 7/10 | ----------------------------/ You had to fight him on a full moon, didn't you? Well, start running circles to check out his attacks. He's also got a second bestiary entry. He'll try to catch you with a super fast dash attack, as well as some standard swipes and a much much larger ground pound. He'll miss the dash attacks as long as you have some distance, so you can get in a couple quick hits there. The ground pound is time to use a guillotine, upgraded if you can pull it off. Try and get in the full five hits when he dashes by you, as sometimes he'll try and evade, which may make you miss the fourth hit, but get him with the fifth. This helps A TON, as it also knocks him down, so try and nail him with it. Once you do, put in a shadow magic chain saw for good measure as he's getting up. Once you defeat his first life bar, he'll send his power into the statues surrounding the arena. Go around and smack them to break them. They are easy to break at first, but soon take more and more hits, all the time while Cornell is trying to smack you. Well, at least he can't dash anymore! This may take a few tries, but focus on the statues and dodge Cornell and soon you'll break them all, leading to the ending cut scene, so nail those timed button presses and destroy Cornell once and for all. Here's a tip from a reader about killing off the statues in the third phase, on Paladin difficulty! [TIP SUBMITTED BY: Arctica_Keeper] Hey there, Great FAQ you've created. Here's a tip that has helped me when I went up against Cornell in the third fight phase on Paladin, and that is to use the holy water flask on the statues. It does either enough damage to destroy 1 - 3 statues or critical damage so that you can hit it once or twice with you whip. It also stuns Cornell a bit if he's caught in the AoE. (BK: Just tried this out myself, it IS good! Save it for the last half of the battle though, as the first few statues are easy to destroy with a couple whip hits. Thanks Arctica!) [END TIP] You'll gain the Cyclone Boots after the fight and a host of new combat moves. I'm a big fan of sprinting, so this is awesome. Use the boots to sprint and jump over the gap, to meet Pan up the ledges, who will carry you to the next chapter! You can now get a fairy upgrade in Chapter II Part III by using the shoulder charge against the weak wall (past the cut scene where you see a troll get taken by a greater werewolf). You can also get a fairy upgrade in Chapter III Part I. ============ Chapter IV: ============ ----------------------------------- Part I: Mountain Fortress (LoS 4-1) ----------------------------------- "Such a pity that the brotherhood of light... should also be the reason why the world is in such chaos." Pan will drop you off on top of a mountain, since a witch stops him from going any further. Go down the mountain path and you'll see a beautiful cut scene showing a pan of the area. Refill your magic here and check the knight for a scroll. You'll also notice that Gabriel moves noticeably faster than before. Huh. Use the shoulder charge technique to break down the door and take the right path to find a ::[LIFE GEM]:: on the knight. Take the left path to find a place to shimmy across to the other side of the structure, where you'll find several small trolls ready to taste your whip. Now get a running start and jump across the gap. Use the shoulder charge on the wall to the right to find a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]:: on the knight nearby. Now go left and use the grappling hook to climb up to another grappling hook. Here you can find a crystal spot as well as a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]:: on the knight. Continue to the next area. Wow, look at those mountains in the background, that's one of the prettiest gaming landscapes I've ever seen. Continue up the road and sprint jump past the gap to find a knight with another scroll, telling you about a bird creature guarding the top of this place. Great. Should be easier than Cornell, though, right? Jump up the ledge to the left and grapple further upwards, using the ledges and one final grapple point to reach an outcrop. Here you'll see the ogre come check you out while you fight small trolls. He wants at you, though, and will pound on the walls. Stay to the right side, as the left will soon crumble and fall. The barrier will fall down to, letting you jump to the right and use the grapple to get to a new area. Here, the Ogre's hand will break through the wall, and try to find you. Use some hard combo's to take down his life bar. Yes, the hand has a life bar. It's not quite boss worthy, though, and the hand will withdraw after taking enough punishment. Continue on and soon you'll have to face the beast itself. -----------------\ BOSS: Ogre | -----------------| Difficulty: 3/10 | -----------------/ For the first part of the fight, the Ogre will simply try to smash you, so dodge and lay into his arm. Feel free to use magics as a magic font is nearby to the left. His health will then turn grey and he'll use his hand to pound at you now. Dodge it and grapple his hand and press at the right time to turn the beast into a cyclops. Now the beast will rub his missing eye occasionally and try to hit you with a rock. Move close to him and do some hard direct combo's, as you can actually hit him from the wall. Soon he'll pound his fist again and you can grapple it again. Do a few more button presses to blind the beast. Now the thing is trying to smell you! Ha ha, he doesn't give up does he? He's actually somewhat dangerous now, as he will do four to five quick hits at you and then stop and scream at you. Dodge his hits and get him to scream at you while he is facing towards the center of the area, so his head is directly above the sharp looking monolith thing. Now grapple his tongue and end the beast. Move onward past the beast to find a large gap in the floor. You can fall down this gap to examine the brotherhood knight and his scroll if you wish. Further on ahead is a statue that you can punch with your gauntlet which leads to a fairy stone and a knight with a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]::. Keep going down the main path to see another wheel mechanism that you can't use yet until you upgrade the cross (Behind it is a ::[BROTHERHOOD ARK]:: with a Fairy upgrade. Don't worry, I'll tell you when to come back!). Keep going to enter a courtyard full of small trolls. Take the little buggers out until the big one appears, then hurt him a bit until you can mount him. Use him to brake open the iron gate to start a cutscene which shows you that the trolls are afraid of whatever lies ahead. Bah, trolls are always afraid... Keep going up the stairs for now, even if you want explore the portion to your right. Soon you'll meet a chupacabra, who likes to play games with people, as he'll take your relics and want to play hide and go seek. Now go climb up that section down the stairs, and you'll come to another wide open section. Go around to the left and scale the wall section, jumping to the scaffolding to your right. Jump on the boards to the north and work your way up to the support beam, now you can finally grapple to a new part. Fall down here to get to the chupacabra and get all your stuff back. Dumb thing... Keep going up the stairs and break into the castle doors, ending the chapter. --------------------------------- Part II: The Crow Witch (LoS 4-2) --------------------------------- "Pity is not something he can feel anymore..." Now that we're in the fortress, move forward and check out the knight for a scroll. Up the steps to the right is another knight with a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]:: for your pleasure. There's not much more to do here, so go to the left hand side of the area and go through the broken stained glass to get outside. Here, head down the stones and jump down below to another ledge. Grab the ledge to your right and grapple the wood to reach a cave. Drop down here to fight some trolls and pick up the ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]:: from the dead knight. Now you can use the left exit and break through the door (Shadow Magic, L2 + L) and you'll end up in the beginning area. Now you can continue out the window and go up. Go up the stones and grapple up the side of the building to reach the ledge. Jump up the next ledge and grapple up further. Use the next ledge to shimmy left and crawl onto the eagle, then pull yourself up. Grapple here and move up to the glass. Oh, time to break some glass! Move forward in this area and watch some magic turn some nearby drapes into an enemy! This bad boy is a swordmaster, and shows up wherever foul magic is around. He has a fast dashing attack and can block, but other than that isn't too hard. You can grapple him to finish him off, and you don't even have to do any button presses! After the first one dies, two more will appear. Use your direct heavy combo's to deal with them easily, leading to a cut scene which shows the crow flock flying through the place. These crows break the door nearby, so head up the stairs and grapple to the next floor. Here you'll have a somewhat challenging fight against three swordmasters. Not quite as bad as three greater werewolves, but challenging. The will use a sword energy projectile attack, which you can dodge fairly easily, and they will even occasionally use a ground pound. But they'll also electrify their swords and stick it into the water on the ground, which makes half the arena dangerous as it will electrocute you, so either fight in the middle on dry land, or back where you started where it's all dry. Afterwards, you can climb the nearby stairs to see a ::[BROTHERHOOD ARK]:: that is inaccessible right now, so just go in-between the eagle statues on the left to find a grapple point to climb, using the ledges to pull yourself up. We can come back here after the end of Chapter VIII when we have the Seraph Shoulders and do a running double jump to get a Holy Water upgrade. Up on top of the second floor to your left is a health font (around the balcony), and to your right and outdoors is a magic font, as well as a knight with a ::[LIFE GEM]::. Use the nearby ledges to ascend upwards. You'll have to jump over to new one's from time to time, but keep looking for upwards ledges and you'll climb the tower. Up here, you'll reach a wide open area, and of course meet the boss of this chapter. -------------------------\ BOSS: Crow Witch Malphas | -------------------------| Difficulty: 5/10 | -------------------------/ The dead knight nearby gives you a scroll that basically explains your objective here: throw the eggs back at Malphas. As you'll soon see, Malphas will throw eggs at you that hatch into weird bird type creatures who will try to melee you and who can breath fire and have a nasty dash attack. These creatures are called witch children, and you can wear them down and grab them when they are flashing to break their necks. You can also get orbs off of them if you need to. When you break their necks, try to throw them at any other children nearby, as they explode on impact. If you're really having trouble with the bird children, Alexandre gives you this piece of advice: [TIP SUMBITTED BY: Alexandre ] You just have to jump, grapple them up and air-combo them! As odd as it comes, these birds are quite helpless in the air. (Divide and conquer, I like it. ~Bk). [END TIP] Aside from that, Malphas will try and hit you with the crows, which is easy to dodge, and will also scream at you. If you're caught in the waves on the ground, you will have to mash a button to get free (this obviously leaves you open to her children's attacks). Keep chucking back her eggs at her to whittle down her health. After about the third one, you can run up to her and grapple onto her, leading to a short cut scene where you need to mash on a particular button to make her crash down to the ground. Use this time to smack her a few times, before she gets back up. Once she gets back up, just keep doing what you've been doing, as the next egg you throw back will let you grapple her again. Do the button push thing again and then when she's down on the ground, turn on your shadow magic and lay into her until it let's you grapple again. Grapple her and button mash one more time until Gabriel rips her head off. After the fight, the fortress will start to crumble, and Pan appears and whisk's you to safety. Good thing he's always around, huh? Onto Chapter V. =========== Chapter V: =========== ----------------------------- Part I: Veros Woods (LoS 5-1) ----------------------------- "This night a warrior will come. A knight in shining armor with death at his side..." And so we go from mountains to another woods place, as Pan saves our ass once again. We are now on the outskirts of the vampire lands. Move forward to take out some goblins. To your left is a fairy stone, while further on to the right is a crumbling wall you can break for a shadow crystal and a knight who is holding onto a ::[LIFE GEM]::. Ahead is another one of those damned chupacabra's, who will steal your powers and relics. Bah! And he does it right in the middle of a goblin camp, meaning you need to kill the goblins without any of your relics, which isn't too hard as they are only goblins. Go down the path to the right, as you can hear him taunting you down there. There's a health font nearby, as well as two more breakable walls that we can't do anything about for now. Go down the path and you'll wind up in another goblin camp, where they'll soon break out a warthog. Punish the warthog until it let's you mount it, then use it to kill the goblins and break down the door by ramming it. Use the health if you need to, then read the brother's scroll, which tells you to use a fairy to distract the chupacabra's. Climb up the nearby ledge and go left to be able to get on top of the small cliff. The chupacabra is to your left, but will zap you if you get close, so let out a fairy to distract him so you can jump over and grab him, getting your stuff back. You can also grab another scroll and refill your magic nearby in the cave. You can't go back the way you came, so keep on going to fight some more goblins and drop down in front of another magic font. There's also a breakable wall here, with another knight and a scroll shortly after. If you head up towards the screen, you will come to that first goblin camp that you lost your powers at. Do so and go down the chupacabra path to break the dusty wall on your left for another crystal spot and a knight with a ::[LIFE GEM]::. There's one more dusty wall on the right of the chupacabra path that has another crystal spot and a knight with a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]::. Head back and keeping going forwards to view a nice panoramic scene of what must be the vampire's castle. Keep going to finish the section. -------------------------------- Part II: Wygol Village (LoS 5-2) -------------------------------- "The pain is etched on his face still but in his soul only hatred drives him." We are now in the cold Wygol village. From the start, go down the path and up the stairs to your left. You can actually break through this wall, and find a ::[BROTHERHOOD ARK]:: behind it, but you can't reach it yet. Go down the stairs for a scene. (We can reach this ark after obtaining the Seraph Shoulders from the end of Chapter VIII, I'll remind you later). Here we will meet Zobek again, who will tell you of the abbey nearby and the abbot who has a powerful relic, but may be not right in the head. Soon after, the graveyard will spit out ghouls. These things are weak to just about everything, and you have Zobek helping you fight for now. Kill the ghouls nearby, and then grapple the statue to stop and have Zobek help you push it down, blocking the ghouls from returning. However, they will come out of another hole nearby, so kill those ghouls as well (notice how they regain health by eating corpses?) and then quickly use your dark gauntlet to punch the statue closer to the hole (hold L2 and hit square). Now you can pull it down. Take too long and you'll have to kill a few more ghouls. Now you have one more hole to block. Kill the ghouls and you'll notice the statue is too far away to pull down. Instead, go around to the left of the small room the statue is blocking and break through the dusty wall. Now you can punch the shadow closer and pull it down when you can. There's also a magic font here as well as a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]:: on the knight by the gate. Smash through the gate and use the health font here if you wish. Examine the knight nearby for another scroll. Enter the mausoleum for a cut scene. Here you will gain the stake attachment on the combat cross, which as the travel log states, eventually gave the cross the nickname of "Vampire Killer" (a nod to the lore of Castlevania). Now we can finally open up those levers we've been seeing, as you will have to do to the lever mechanism nearby. Head down the door to end this section. Feel free to visit the lever sections we've missed up until now, which should be in Chapter 2 Part VII and Chapter IV Part I. ----------------------------------- Part III: Abbey Catacombs (LoS 5-3) ----------------------------------- "We delve deep below the Abbey, ready to face the evil confronting us." With Zobek still by our side, move along the path. Soon you'll see a scene where a poor monk falls limp at your feet. Vampires! Well, we finally get to fight some vampires. Zobek will help you here, so lay down some direct hits and and some guillotine upgrades to help take them out. When you kill one you can read about them in the bestiary. Kill the three vampire warriors here with Zobek to get a little scene showing the lever to the turnstyle nearby. You won't be able to do much right away though, as three more vampires show up. Dispense them and use the lever to open up the door. Have Zobek hold it while you go through to the other side. In here, punch the statue down to the door you just entered, and then put on some shadow magic and punch it again to break the door. Now go help out Zobek for bloody sake! Grab the lever and go into the next room. You'll learn that you need two keys to get out of her. Put the lever in the right switch and go through with Zobek for a scene. In this section, just press the button on the screen until you can hit the triangle, which will let Zobek move to the next slab. You need to keep doing this until you are both safe. You'll find a key nearby, so grab it and head back to the main room. Now open up the western path. Take the lever with you when you finish, trust me. In here, Zobek will point out the second key. Use the lever on the device to the north and have Zobek hold it, then quickly jump on the platform to get across. Here you can get a ::[LIFE GEM]:: from a knight, who's on the path south of you, towards the screen. Now grab the gem and open the doors, heading up the stairs and into the abbey's courtyard to view a quick scene. You'll see a strange seal on the ground as well as a portal, which takes you to the seal if you step through it. You can find two knights lying around as well, one who talks about Gandolfi and another who offers you the answer to this puzzle. Pfft, you don't need him when you got me! One of the eastern walls is dusty, so bust through it. Here grab the lever and take it out to the courtyard. With this lever you can change where you zone in at when you move through the portal. But before you use it, kill the vampire warriors and ghouls. Once you do, you have a limited time to use the device, and when you get it to where you want it you can press triangle to have Zobek hold it for you. Ok, to solve the puzzle you want to aim the device south, but before you do that, aim it north to get to the knight beyond the grate with a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]::. Use the ledges nearby to escape. You can also aim it east to get to a knight with a scroll and a health font, if you wish. Now aim it south and go through the portal to solve the puzzle. Continue onwards to finish this section. -------------------------------- Part IV: Abbey Library (LoS 5-4) -------------------------------- "The needs of the many outweigh those of the few now." Head into the building, heading north at the intersection to find a knight with a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]::. Go back and head into the library proper for a scene. Of course, the two of you become separated while two gigantic suits of armor come towards you. You will have to hold them back while Zobek looks for an exit. These armor's aren't too difficult, they have standard swipe attacks and can do a ground pound. Just attack them, being careful of the upcoming ground pounds and use a guillotine when it comes. The books are in the way here, so get rid of them as well. Don't bother with fairies, as the armor's are immune to them. Once you hurt them a bit, you can take away their shields. Keep hitting them and soon you will be able to grab them and tear open the armor, killing the spirit inside. Once you kill both of them, Zobek will open the way for you to escape. Search the nearby knight who will tell you how to solve this room's puzzle. This first room is easy enough, just punch the mirror forward and turn it to hit the door. In this next room, you can find two knights lying around (lazy knights) with a scroll and a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]::. Here, punch the mirror by the light magic gem knight and then the one by the sunlight. Turn the sunlight mirror to angle the light towards the other mirror and it will open the way. In this third room, kill the gremlins that come out and punch the nearby mirror into position. Go down the stairs by the mirror and hit the books away to find another knight with a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]::. Now this room is a little harder. First I recommend you go around and explore a little bit, and each mirror you come across you may as well punch it into place. You'll soon head across the room via the stairs in the middle of the area, where you will find a dusty wall to your left. Break through it to find a new area that also has an armor inside. Kill the armor and punch the mirror into place. Over here you'll see the door to the exit, so line up these two mirrors to angle light to that door. Now go back to the main light source and send it east. Move the mirror to your left to send the light across the room, and if those mirrors are good, you will have this puzzle solved. If you don't, check your mirrors again and make sure they are lined up right. For the third room, the first mirror sends the light east. All the other mirrors send the light north. Go through the door to end this section. ----------------------------- Part V: Abbey Tower (LoS 5-5) ----------------------------- "Now it is the refuge of a man driven insane by fear." Head out into the air and you can find a dead knight and a scroll to your left. As you move right, several ghouls and some gremlins will come after you. Deal with them as you see fit, and then move down and into the walkway. Move towards the screen to find a knight with a ::[LIFE GEM]:: on him, then keep going forward to a new area where more gremlins and ghouls will attack. Kill them and inspect the knight to the north for another scroll. Now jump across the gap to your left and use your cross to make the bridge come down. Go across it to be ambushed by a bunch of gremlins. Take them out and use the lever nearby to open the gate. Follow the path around the rubble to start to climb the tower. The climbing is pretty self-explanatory, but there's a section where you need to move quick, as dilly-dallying will make the ledges fall, so move quickly around the building and grapple as soon as you can. Pull yourself up to some more ledges and grapple again before the fall. Swing right and pull yourself up onto the ground. Here you'll have to jump to another ledge, but it's a bit far away, so get a running start first! Follow this ledge to the left and drop down on the ledge below for a ::[LIGE GEM]:: courtesy of the knight. The gap to the left is too big, so head right instead and use the first tower's rubble to jump up higher and then back to the main tower. Shimmy right and jump the gap. You need to be fast again right here, as these ledges will fall. Move right around the building and one space up to use the grapple. Move up the grapple a bit and you'll see a shimmer to your upper left. Build up some momentum and jump to the left to grapple that hook. Use this one to reach a ledge further up and another hook. Kick in the window to start yet another kick ass cut scene and end this section. ---------------- Part VI: Brauner ---------------- "The power to defeat the vampires is now in our hands..." Well, now we have holy water. Sweet. Replenish your magic and your health and move onto the burning village. You'll have to fight a couple of waves of vampire warriors now, which is a perfect place to test your holy water. Wait until all five of them are somewhat grouped together and toss one at them, which makes them all go into a dazed state and nearly kills them. Use a few area attack moves to finish them off. Do it one more time on the next wave to view a cut scene. Well, now you meet Lieutenant Brauner (A nod to the villian/vampire from Portrait of Ruin). He was turned long ago, but since he was never human he can't take that form. -----------------\ BOSS: Brauner | -----------------| Difficulty: 5/10 | -----------------/ Brauner has a few moves, including an un-blockable swipe, and a quick dash attack. He will also throw his sword at you and stupidly taunts you to catch it if you can, so catch it and throw it back at him. It will impale him and let you get a few free hits. Run around and hit him with two or three quick hits and keep your distance, as you want him to throw his sword. When he does hit R2 and throw it right back at him to punish him. It even seems to work when your not quite in the swords path. He can also turn into a bat form, but just run away to avoid that. After getting him about half way, he will be dazed. Run up to him and grab him him to get a scene where you need to time your button presses and you'll be able to rip his wings off. Awesome! It's not over yet though. Keep up your same tactics, but this time throw in a holy water to knock him on his ass. Use this time to punish him and soon you'll see another dazed scene. Go up to him and grab him, hit the right buttons, and you'll soon get undeniable proof that Gabriel is indeed a badass. --------------------------------- Part VII: Castle Sewers (LoS 5-7) --------------------------------- "The Villagers called him 'God's Savior' and his weapon they called 'Vampire Killer'. Ah, Gandolfi, how that would make you smile." Well, it seems Wygol village is safe for now. The villagers show you a secret entrance into the castle: through the sewers. Eck. Oh well, a Belmont's gotta do what a Belmont's gotta do. Head into the sewers and use the health font. Go down the steps to check out the knight's status report. Well, it looks like the annoying sludge mechanic from the bog level is back. Use the lever by the health to temporarily stop the sewage, and move across. Fill your magic here if you need to. Now hit the next lever to open the gate below and jump down. Before going on, move through the sludge towards the screen, aiming for the southeast corner of this area. It's a long trip, but you should make it. There's a knight over here with a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]::. Now you can go onward. This next room's entire floor is poisonous, so take a running jump to the concrete on your left. Move down from here to find a bag with some holy water and a knight with another scroll explaining how to finish off skeletons. Handy to know, for sure. Go back to the first lever that you used to turn off the sludge and use it again, but this time run past the second sludge thing as well. Over here you can use the lever to raise the door down below, but will be ambushed by some skeletons in an amusing cut scene. These things are pretty vicious and there are three of them. They mostly use blockable moves, but do have one unblockabe move as well as a weird whirl wind attack that's hard to avoid. Plus, when they die, you have to hit their bones with a strong attack to keep the dead, otherwise the will just reanimate. I recommend Guillotine or one of the hits from the DHC (Direct Heavy Combo) to finish them. If they happen to come back, and you kill them again, they will stay dead. Head back to the holy water area and continue on. Here you will find a hallway that is obviously a floor trap as well as a bag of daggers. Punch the button nearby so we can open the door down the hall. Run down the path once the spikes are gone, only to have the door close. Well darn. Not to worry, simply use your shadow magic and throw an explosive dagger down the hall to solve this puzzle. Now grapple up the hole to end this chapter. ============ Chapter VI: ============ ---------------------------------- Part I: Castle Courtyard (LoS 6-1) ---------------------------------- "This castle I fear will push him into the abyss from which there is no escape." Grapple up to the ledge and shimmy across the well to the right where you can grapple up all the way. Up here use the health font if you need to. There is also some holy waters in a bag to the right, if you want to jump for them. Climb the ledges by the health and jump over the fence. Here all you can do is try and move the lever in the middle, but when you try two suits of armor will show up. Take them out and then work the lever; it will open the grating ahead of you. Jump down as soon as you can as the grating will shut. Down here there are a lot of skeletons as well as a knight with a scroll. Some of these skeletons will get up and attack you, and after awhile, the vampires will let a warg loose to attack you as well. No worries, though, since you have a magic font nearby, feel free to use your most magic intensive attacks like holy cross or shadow flames. Make sure to shoulder charge the first door to your left, as a ::[LIGE GEM]:: is in there. Also, mount the warg when you can and use it to get out of here via the glowing pillar. Up here teach the vampires a lesson and then kill your warg. You can cross to the other side for a crystal and a health font, as well as a knight with a scroll if you wish, but jump down the hole in the first area to continue. Move down this path and jump down to fight three more skeleton's. These things can be tough, so use however much magic you want as there is another magic font past the gate. Get past the gate and head up the winding staircase to end this section. ------------------------------- Part II: Maze Gardens (LoS 6-2) ------------------------------- "In this place a man can be lost forever..." Head past the courtyard to meet a new enemy, the mandragora. These things are weak but will try and drain your life energy, so kill them fast. We basically have three ways to go here: left, straight, and right. Go right for now and up, killing all the mandy's in this area and punch the statue. There's a gap you can't jump here, but we'll be back. To your left is another statue you can saw (haven't seen those in awhile) and behind that is a knight with a ::[LIFE GEM]::. Now lets head left, just head in that general direction as these paths all loop around to each other, and you'll be in a open area with a dead knight and a bunch of mandy's. Take care of the stupid plants and read the knight's scroll. Up to the left is a breakable wall, so charge through it to find a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]:: on the knight. Now go back to the statue and climb up it to jump to the other side. Over here head right after killing the mandies to fight a giant spider. Once you have it mounted, there is a lot of things we can do. First make a bridge back to your left in the area we came in at. Then go back to the spider area and head upwards and destroy the door on the right. Keep going past the knight and pull down the doors to the left (which leads to the first area we were in). Remember that gap we couldn't jump on the right path? Now you can go put a bridge over that too. Kill your spider and go over the bridge to get a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]::. The knight that we passed earlier has a scroll for us. Ignore the broken door for now and head across the first bridge you made to reach a knight with a puzzle solution and the puzzle further on. Each piece moves another piece and also turns everything, but the solution is actually really simple. Just turn the middle statue counter-clockwise twice and you'll be done. Now head to the broken door and go down the path. Use the vampire key on the gate and go through it to... the first section! Here jump over the fence again and put the key in a slot by the front door to open it up. Nothing like strolling through the front door of a vampire's castle, huh? ------------------------------- Part III: Castle Hall (LoS 6-3) ------------------------------- "I have heard that in this place, one may face ones deadliest foes without realizing it until it is too late." Well, this place is fun. Vampire will come up from that hole in the ground until you pry the boards off the window and let in some light. Kill the first wave of vampires and use the other windows to help you. You can let in some light on those windows easily by whipping back the curtain. Fighting in the light hurts the vampires gradually and makes your job much easier. Once they are dead you have enough time to take down a board or two, then you'll have to deal with another wave. Take them down and open the window to stop them. You can also make the mirror shine some light north, so do so and use the lever to head north. Here you get another vampire hole and have to fight some armor. Open up the windows you can and fight in the light. Focus on the armor first and then kill the remaining vampires, taking down the boards like before until you stop them. There's a knight in here with a scroll as well. Now head into the room on your right, as there's nothing left to do here. Before we do anything, lets break all the stuff on the left hand wall. See where the ice seems to move up the wall a bit, and the wall is broken? You can jump up here and get a ::[LIFE GEM]:: from the knight. Use the lever to your right and continue. The knight here has a scroll for the puzzle solution. Punch the mirror here and into the previous room so you can reflect the light to the east and open up that door down there. Here you have to light up runes again to proceed, so use the magic font nearby if you have to. Light the two runes outside red, then move to where the three runes are. Light the west one red, and then the other two blue to solve the puzzle and open a door in the big room outside. Notice the ::[BROTHERHOOD ARK]:: high above you as well, we'll have to come back for that. (We can come back for it once we get the Seraph Shoulders at the end of Chapter VIII. I'll remind you again at that time.) Solving the puzzle also seems to have made the sun set. Fun. And of course some vampires want to come and play. I'm not sure if they ever stop, but you can get some good experience here. Move through the door for a new cut scene. Here's an interesting FYI from Chop: [TIP SUBMITTED BY: Chop] In chapter 6-3, when you finish the rune puzzle and it turns night, the vampires do end after a few waves. If you stand and kill all of the vampires, the last one seems to drop a full load of EVERY item (daggers, holy water, faeries, and crystals.) Just a FYI. (Very interesting. ~BK) [END TIP] It seems that the vampire girl wants us to play the vampire wargame with her. It's kinda like chess, with only six pieces, and each piece can do different things. You can choose to skip it if you want, but what fun is that? Read about the pieces in the tutorial and then play the game. Due to the random nature of the game, I really can't help you out too much. Here are some helpful tips: Try not to lose both of a single unit, as it will make rolls on that unit worthless. Gang up on the enemy, and try to take out one unit type first. The necromancer can fire from two spaces away, which is very helpful. Once you are past the puzzle, examine the knight by the chessboard for a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]::. You can now go towards the stairs in the northwest corner to end this section. ---------------------------- Part IV: Refectory (LoS 6-4) ---------------------------- "She will kill Gabriel in a heartbeat if she could..." Head north to view a gruesome cut scene, then head down the stairs and kill the ghouls. You need the key that the cook is carrying, as the knight with the scroll nearby will tell you, so head west and grab a... leg... and put it in the dish. Hit the bell to summon some more ghouls. Forget about fighting and run up to the opening to grapple yourself inside. Move through the cramped spaces here until you can go up or down. Go down to find a knight with a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]::, then head up to reach a cut scene. -------------------\ BOSS: Evil Butcher | -------------------| Difficulty: 5/10 | -------------------/ This big guy is an interesting fight. He doesn't have too many attacks to start with except some melee swings and a lashing attack that has some range to it, but he knows his way around his own kitchen. Throughout the fight, he will move around the kitchen and pick up items to use against you. For example, he will pick up knives to throw at you, pick up a jug, drink it, and then spit fire at you, and pick up body parts and eat them. He will often ignore you as he is going off to pick up an item, so get some heavy direct combo's in with some shadow magic when you can. It will take awhile to wear him down, as he has quite a bit of defence. Make sure to side step his knives and stay out of range of his fire. It looks like he tries to gain some health when he eats, but the damage you're doing to him pretty much negates that idea. His most dangerous attack is the lashing one, as there's very little warning before he uses it and you'll probably get hit once or twice, but nothing a little light magic can't overcome. Keep at it and you'll see a scene where he will pull a bowl full of a mysterious liquid out and drink it, turning his health bar grey (so that he's invincible), and then he'll use the bowl as a helmet. You can't really hurt him now, but after a few hits on him there will be a mini-scene where he taps at his 'helmet'. Jump up and smack it to daze him. As soon as he's dazed, rush in for the grab. Enjoy the cut scene. (Did you see Gabriel smirk? Ha! Cocky bastard...). After the boss, use the key to exit the kitchen and defeat the ghouls from earlier. Go to your left and enter the store room to find a knight with a ::[LIFE GEM]:: to the left. Back track a ways and head down the other door that needs the key that you passed on the way in here. Here you will have to battle an armor and skeletons. The knight nearby has a scroll you can grab as well. You'll find some more magic runes here that you need to light up with magic. They are, far left to far right: Blue, Blue, Red, Red, Blue, Red. You may have noticed the lack of a hint scroll nearby, huh? Well, see the broken stairs on the right. Walk up them to see a grapple point. Grapple up to the wood and work your way right and up, getting up to the second level. Here you will find the hint scroll, not that you need it anymore. Also, cross the beams further on and keep heading south to the other end of this room. Go down the stairs to find a knight who has a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]::. Return back to the first level and walk through the dragon door nearby to end Chapter VI. ============= Chapter VII: ============= ------------------------- Part I: Balcony (LoS 7-1) ------------------------- "She holds the next piece of the mask and I fear that he will fall at the last..." Head out onto the balcony and defeat the three vampires there. Drop down the nearby open spot and down further onto some crumbling remains so you can walk across the planks. Here, drop off the spot to your right and shimmy around to your left so you can get the ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]:: from the knight you saw earlier. Continue past the roof and head down to enter into a fight with some sword masters. You start off with just one, but soon two more will show up. I recommend a shadow crystal here; in fact as soon as I used it I got a new one! If not that, strike hard and fast on the first one while it's a 1 vs. 1 battle and it will be much easier. Go up the ledges nearby to reach the top of this structure to find that you need ANOTHER key to move on. The knight here also has a scroll. On the west hand side, drop down the ledge to reach a window that has another knight with a scroll, a health font, and a sword master. Go back outside and use the grapple point and kick off to grab the ledge behind you. Shimmy around to the next room to find some skeletons, who will drop a key when you kill them. The knight here also has a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]::. Now you can open the gate on the roof and proceed into the next building. This room seems like a store room, and you can find a dead knight on the right to claim another ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]::. The knight north of here has a hint scroll for the nearby puzzle. Examine the door now... This is kind of like a game of plinko, except you know exactly where the ball is going to go. To solve it, drop the balls from these spots: 1. Left 2. Middle 3. Middle 4. Middle 5. Middle 6. Middle 7. Right Puzzle Solved! Go up yonder stairs to end this section. -------------------------------------- Part II: Electric Laboratory (LoS 7-2) -------------------------------------- "As a Dark Lord, she was able to keep her word." Right away we come to a puzzle, and the knight nearby has a scroll for it if you want to take the easy way out. It's clear we have to punch the first button here, so go ahead and do it (I was using landslide punch, but in retrospect, that is dumb. Use L2 + Triangle, and you can punch the ground without jumping. Much faster.). Now punch the next button on the right, and then the one on the left to get out of this first room. Go down the hall to see yet another puzzle along with a panoramic. It looks like we need to get that battery onto the glowing object. Punch the only button you can and grab a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]:: from the knight in the south east corner. Now you can punch the battery down the lane. You'll have to switch the power again to put it all the way in. Go down the new path and punch the switch on the wall (Oh, they put this one on the wall...). Punch the lower switch and move around to get to a magic font and some daggers. Take a lesson from the spike floor room awhile back and throw a charged dagger (Shadow Magic) at the switch to get past the first thing of lightning, and again to get past the second. Move onto the next room. Oh my god, they really want to test us don't they? In here you have a center platform that can turn as well as a dusty wall to the left. Break the wall to find a switch. Hitting this switch turns some of the electricity off, letting you get to another switch in the north west. Hit this one and pick up the red glowing object to get a red lens. Now a cut scene will occur and the Mechanical Monstrosity will attack! -----------------------------\ BOSS: Mechanical Monstrosity | -----------------------------| Difficulty: 7/10 | -----------------------------/ This giant scorpion thing will try to swipe at you, lunge at you with an unblockable lunge, and shoot lightning at you (on the ground and in the sky). These things are fairly easy to avoid, and the ground lightning is easy to punish with a guillotine, but what really makes this a challenging fight is the small area you have to fight in. Oh, and the fact that the half the borders are covered in ELECTRICITY! Dodge the attacks and get in some quick hits. Whenever you see his tail glow and he pauses, jump up and put in a guillotine to avoid the ground lightning and hurt him. Once he's about 25% dead, there will be a cut scene of the thing recharging his health at a nearby pad. They'll also show a switch. Hmm... 2+2+4 right? Hit that switch fast to stop him from regaining health. It'll also take away any health he gained, leading to a much fairer fight. Keep up your previous strategy and hit that switch whenever he goes to recharge and you'll be good. Well, back to the puzzle. Move the center lever counter clockwise to open up a path north. Here you can jump on the moving platform and grab the ::[LIGE GEM]:: that the knight has in the corner. Go back and turn it counter clockwise again to reach a button on your right. Now turn it clockwise twice to where you started to reach another button on your left. Now turn it one more time clockwise and ride the moving platform again to reach the button in the southeast corner. Hit that one to solve the puzzle. Move through the door to finish this section. ----------------------------------------- Part III: Chromatic Observatory (LoS 7-3) ----------------------------------------- "This next challenge will tax his mind further and I fear, it may break it forever." Move into the room. Nice scenery. Go ahead and hit the lever, which activates the lens thing in the middle. For now all you have is the red lens, which we got before fighting the freaky scorpion thing. Enter the red room and take out the vampires. Remember, might as well use a holy water if you have them stocked to full. Here you can find a locked door up the stairs and a dead knight in the middle of the room. You'll also see that the floor wants you to light it up. Reading the note, and looking at the scene, you'll know you have to use shadow magic. Well, running, and heck even sprinting aren't fast enough, so use your shadow magic and then use your ramming move (L2 + L) to move around the tiles. Start in the lower right-hand tile and move clockwise to solve the puzzle. In the room above you will find a knight with the green lens. Go back and use it by itself to open up the green door. In here you will have to fight three sword master's again (use the crystal for an instant win). Now swing across the gap and move to the left area to grab that knight's ::[LIFE GEM]:: (You can grab it from him even though you can't see him. Tricky!). On the floor is another puzzle similar to the red room, so use your shadow magic and make the pattern to get the white key. Head back to the lens thing and combine the two colors. This will, of course, make yellow. If your low on magic, fill up near the entrance, as the yellow room has another dashing puzzle after you kill some vampires. Start at the bottom and go clockwise to open up the gate, getting the blue lens and a fight with a couple of sword masters. If you use the blue lens alone, you'll fight a suit of armor. Well, you can if you want! You may as well use blue and green though, cause even though that wakens up an armor, it also nets you a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]:: from the poor knight underneath the armor. Line up all the lens' to unlock the white door. In here check the knight to learn about the castle being alive, when it belonged to the Bernhard's (Yet another nod to Lament of Innocence). Take a right and use the grapples and the planks to follow the linear path to the other side of the room. Here, if you have the white key (and you should if you've been following this guide), you can open the door and obtain a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]:: from the knight. Go back to the lens room now. Now combine the only combo we haven't done yet: red and blue. Fill up on your health and magic and enter the door for a cut scene. Well, SOMEONE is a poor loser! Laura will summon three deadly toys to attack you. Now is the time to use a crystal, if you have one. If not, or if your like me and want to save it, just dodge the toy's needle attacks and occasional ground pounds and keep hitting the same one (turning on the health meter helps for that). When you get them low enough, they will let you grab them, and Gabriel will beat the stuffing, or spirit, right out of them. There are two timed button presses here followed by some button mashing. After you kill the toys, you will watch a touching cut scene. Well, it seems Laura isn't entirely horrible. Hmph. How's Gabriel supposed to beat her mother if he can't beat her? ============== Chapter VIII: ============== ---------------------------- Part I: Outer Wall (LoS 8-1) ---------------------------- "A child's love is without bitterness or boundaries, a pure love." We start out on a balcony with a dead knight. Read his letter and drop down, using the ledges here to make your way right. Grapple above and continue right so you can grapple up some more. Head all the way to the roof. Use the health font here if you need to, then jump up the two broken steps. At the steps, head straight left to find a knight with a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]::. In this area you will have to fight vampire's and skeleton's together. Fun. Take out the vampires first if you can as they are easiest. A holy water helps a lot here. You can also find a knight with a solution to the nearby puzzle here, which is yet another colored rune puzzle. Here's the answer. Starting on the bottom left rune, and working up to the gate it is: Blue, Blue, Red. From the top of the gate on the right, working down to the bottom it is: Red, Red, Blue. Continue past the gate to walk along the chains towards the main tower. Now, I've heard alot of comparisons between God of War and this game, and I definitely remember walking along chains in God of War, but this is ten times better than that! This scene is absolutely epic and has stunning visuals, so enjoy. In between chain segments is a mini tower which has a rotating gate around it. Defeat the gremlins and rotate the gate as far as you can. Run south when you let go as the gate will go back to it's original position and you need to get through it. If you time it right you should be outside the gate now on some stairs. Go down them to find the tower key on a knight, but you'll have to duel a couple of sword masters first to get out of this place. Once your past the second chain segment, enter the room and grab the ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]:: from the knight on the left before using the tower key. Continue on to finish this section. -------------------------------------- Part II: The Clockwork Tower (LoS 8-2) -------------------------------------- "Gabriel will make her pay for the injustices he has felt at her hands." Wouldn't be a Castleavnia without a clock tower, right? Anyway, move across the beams here and over to the other side. Before you jump to the right, jump to the left to find a knight with a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]::. Now you can jump back and jump on the moving platform, and then again to the other one that is circling counter clockwise. Stay on this platform until right before it goes under the gears (you can't jump to that thing on the right) and try to jump to the shining ledge above the gears. Now jump up one more ledge, shimmy right, and wait for the big gear to stop spinning so you can jump right. Here drop down onto the platform and jump across this one until you can jump onto the platform moving up and down. This takes you to a turning lever that brings that first beam platform back up to you. Cross it and grapple onto the ledge above you. There will be two electricity barriers here, and the bottom one never goes off. This can be a little tricky, but you want to jump off the device (stay on the grapple) twice and move up. Jumping off once and trying to move up isn't enough, and you'll get more distance if you jump off twice in a row. Move up to the ledge now and jump right to the next ledge. Drop below to the platform, which will move under a structure, forcing you to jump onto the structure and back to the platform. Grab the shiny ledge here before you get smushed and use it to reach a platform to your right. Jump to the next one on the right and then to another shiny ledge (I sprint jumped this one, it looked a little far). Shimmy your way right and jump to the platform to reach another platform with a magic font. This is just a timing puzzle, so jump three spaces up on the ledges when the way is clear, as this space doesn't have electricity. Now time you next ascent and shimmy to the platform. Before you use the grapple, jump to the platform on your right for a ::[LIFE GEM]::. Use the grapple here to jump to a very large space with a turning lever. Try and turn the lever, only to meet a familiar face. --------------------------------------\ BOSS: Mechanical Monstrosity Round II | --------------------------------------| Difficulty: 4/10 | --------------------------------------/ Well, he's back, but this time there is no restrictive arena or any way for him to recharge his health, instead it's just a regular fight to the death. He has all the same moves as last time, but adds in one more where he will pick up debris from around the room and it will circle him, as he occasionally throws it at you. Very easy to dodge if you're on the move. Lay into him when you can, dodging his easy to see attacks and using guillotine whenever he tries that lightning move of his. The debris tossing is easy to avoid and lets you get in some more hits. He is much easier this time around, and when you get him around 80% dead, you'll be able to grab him. Follow the button presses to finish him off in dramatic fashion. Now you can move the lever in peace. Walk to the center of the device to end this section. ------------------------- Part III: Olrox (LoS 8-3) ------------------------- "But now he will meet one who is greater, more powerful than he... Olrox, meet Gabriel Belmont and his Vampire Killer!" Well here, we go straight into the boss battle. -----------------\ BOSS: Olrox | -----------------| Difficulty: 7/10 | -----------------/ Well, time to fight Brauner's brother. Olrox has some very similar moves compared to Brauner, as he also uses a sword and his claws. Most basic attacks are blockable, but he does have a two-hit unblockable attacks. He also has a throwing move similar to Brauner, but uses two swords and you can't catch them and throw them back. He also has a quick dodge move of his own, followed up often by a quick slashing move. Dodging him is quite easy, as he leaves himself very open after his two strike claw and sword attacks, and just stands there as he throws his swords at you. So hurting the demon vampire thing isn't really hard, as you have plenty of opportunites to get in some three hit combo's and even a chain saw. HOWEVER, unlike his brother, Orlox is much smarter. There are four iron maidens, two on each wall, in this areana, and when Orlox is hurting he'll go over to them, open them up, and feast on the werewolves blood inside. AND there's nothing you can do about it. The only thing you can do is when the game lets you move, get over to him and smack him, which will make him teleport away and let you 'kill' the werewolf in the iron maiden. Now you have to do that three more times. You can see how this is a test of endurance. Thankfully, it's easy to get your focus up and refill on orbs (and magic) while you are knocking down Orlox's health. My best tip is to smack him with a shadow chainsaw when he tries to throw his swords at you. That and dodge a lot. Once you take away all his healing iron maidens and get his health down again you'll be able to grab him and start a quick time event. Nail the circles and you'll be done with the fight. Whew, what a marathon battle, huh? Also, notice how his blood drains into the center area? Here's a tip from a reader! [TIP SUBMITTED BY: xxNuttaxx] Hey man its xxNuttaxx again, When you get to the Olrox boss fight i came up with a rather good strategy, like any other boss fight dodge his easily avoidable attacks and get your attacks in when able. But this fight gets really annoying whenever he leeches life from the lycans in the coffins, the first lycan is unavoidable when he leeches life. But after you take him down to almost dead he will teleport to 1 of 4 lycan coffins to regain life, have a holy water secondary ready with shadow magic and as soon you are able to act throw your holy water it will hit him and stop him from regaining health at all if you do it right. Repeat this 4 more times and the boss fight will easily end in your favor. (Bkstunt: Interesting, I hadn't thought of throwing holy water there. I went back and tried it, and it definitely is the fastest thing you have that stops him. He still seems to regain a bit of health though, but not much. Also, if your short on Holy Water, bbdw86 recommend shadow/explosive daggers. ~BK) [END TIP] Before you inspect that, though, go check out the knight in the iron maiden for a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]::, then inspect the center area. This is a puzzle, where you have to steer the blood into all the circles around the maze. Also, you are being timed from circle to circle. From the start, steer the blood right, up at the first chance, left a bit, and then up to the circle. Now, steer it up a bit, left at the first chance, down, then left past the turns, then up and left to the next circle. From here go up and around the bends, heading straight up to the next circle. You have to be fast here. Press in the direction you want to go BEFORE you actually get there to save a few seconds. I made it with one fire left. Now go up and right, turning down and going right past the first intersection and go up at the second up to the next circle. This is a bit easier than the last part, but again, press the directions ahead of time. Now go up and left, then down and left, then up and right to the last circle to solve this puzzle. ---------------------------------- Part IV: The Throne Room (LoS 8-4) ---------------------------------- "Poor, beautiful Carmilla, you will cry bloody tears before this night has ended!" Ok, first of all, notice the quote and the phrase "Bloody Tears", which is perhaps the single best piece of music in Castlevania history. If that doesn't ring a bell in your head right away, go youtube "bloody tears castlevania" and listen to it. I'll wait right here for you to do it. You can thank me later. Anyway, welcome back from youtube. At the start, refill your health and magic, and don't forget to grab the ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]:: from the knight on the right hand side (he can be easy to miss). Walk forward for a scene. Here Carmilla (yet another reference, this time from Castlevania II) will offer you eternal life to be by her side, which Gabriel wisely refuses. She also seems to want to show a lot of side-boobage for some reason. She goes on to state that the mask CAN'T bring anyone back to life. Huh. Anyway, soon the fight will start and you'll get her bio page. -----------------\ BOSS: Carmilla | -----------------| Difficulty: 7/10 | -----------------/ Her first form is strong against virtually EVERYTHING, and if fact is encased in a shield that you cannot break. You can, however, kill the vampire warriors that first appear. Killing them will seem to only make more appear, but the stop coming after perhaps a dozen or so. Carmilla will leave you alone now for the most part, but she will occasionally come down and shoot lighting out of her fingers at you, so run around in circles. On a related note, it seems she is related to the sith somehow, what with the force lightning and all. After killing her minions, you will view a scene where Gabriel tries to stake her, and she transforms into a more beastish vampire form. You'll also get a new bio for the "Vampire Dark Lord" now that she's changed forms. In this form, Carmilla takes a more direct approach to trying to kill you, as she will close in and try to smack you with a blockable attack, or charge at you and try to hook you with an unblockable uppercut. Both of these are easy as pie to dodge, since she has to come near you to do either. The only other thing she does is summon two vampire warriors to help her, which you can deal with by now. After she tries to hit you and fails, she'll often just stand there for a bit giving you plenty of time for a chainsaw or a DHC (Direct Heavy Combo). Take note that she'll often just resummon the vampire warriors if you kill both of them, so focus on Carmilla. After about 33% of her health is gone, you can grab her. Follow the QTE's and she'll seem to gain some lightning powers. Now, in this stage, she adds in two more attacks, but won't summon any more vampire warriors. The first new attack she does is that she'll fly up and summon bats to home in on you. There's two waves, and if they get you, you're probably going to be hit multiple times. They are easily dodgeable by making a "C" movement when you run. The second new attack is where she will fly up and call down lightning around her, for a moderate range. Either stay out of range (if you already are) or jump up and attack a bit to give yourself more airtime (the more likely option). Now, most of her attacks, like I said, are very easy to avoid especially when you know what to look for. But when/if she does get you, she packs a punch. When you whittle down her life, you will get another chance to grab her. You'll see a scene where you have to button mash to absorb some of her lightning attack into your arm, then she'll fall down with a shield. Well, go up to it and punch through it (Use the Tremor Punch: L2 + Square), and you'll grab her. As a reward, you'll get to see one of THE BEST cut scene's in the game so far! Man, that's some good stuff. Epic. EPIC. Keep your eyes open for the QTE's that you'll need to nail in the cut scene's though, as they are there and can be spread apart. After your inevitable victory, you will gain the Seraph Shoulders, as well as some more cut scenes and the chapters end. We can get several things now that we couldn't before, now that we have the Seraph Shoulders, which let us double jump. You also unlock several new relic moves that you can buy. The new things that you can get are in Chapter I Part IV: Pan's Temple (Holy Water upgrade), Chapter IV Part II: The Crow Witch (Holy Water upgrade), Chapter V Part II: Wygol Village (Holy Water upgrade), and Chapter VI Part III: Castle Hall (Dagger upgrade). Whew, that's a lot of upgrades! ============ Chapter IX: ============ ------------------------------ Part I: Bones Forest (LoS 9-1) ------------------------------ "He must go where none may follow... into the abyss." After exiting the mirror, you'll get an explanation on how to use your new found toy. Of course, since you've gotten all those new upgrades, you already know how. Go around the right of the middle area to find a knight with a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]::. There's also a knight with a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]:: directly left of where you start. Not much to do here now, so head towards the screen where they make you use your wings to keep on going. Once you come to the pit, you can find some trolls and a scroll on the cocky knight. You're going to have to do a sprinting double jump to cross though, kinda like the one you did in the crow witch stage for the holy water upgrade. Keep moving down the road. Here you'll see a cool scene and then have to fight a new enemy, the headless burrowers. They are weak to holy water, but for now just smack the heads that they summon to get them to pop up out of the ground so you can hit them and then R2 them for the kill as their bodies are very weak. Sometimes they'll try to grab you while they are burrowing, and sometimes they'll try and miss, leaving themselves open. If they do grab you just hit the circles in time. A very easy enemy overall. [TIP SUBMITTED BY: Tygriss] Hi, I noticed in your walkthrough that you seemed to neglect the best way to decimate the Headless Burrowers is with a charged up ground strike from your gauntlet. On normal mode at least it will put any hit by it into a critical state where they can be grappled, and if you are having trouble getting the time to charge one up either a shadow magic strengthened one works or, alternatively, an airbourne charged ground strike will get a single one (theres almost always 1 directly below you when you jump straight up). Also i think DHCs and Guilotines work. (Thanks, Tygriss ~Bk) [END TIP] Take the right route first here, and run/double jump up to the ledges. Climb them to find a knight with a scroll and a cave full of trolls. Go back and take the left path now. Run/double jump to the next land mass and you'll have to fight some more burrowers. The knight here also has a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]::. If the things annoy you to much, just use some holy water to pop them all out of the ground and near death. When you jumped over here you noticed the path below you, right. Jump down to that now, using your double jump as a second jump. Here you'll see another panoramic scene. Here they want you to swing across the gorge while using your double jump. Once you do, you'll unfortunately run into that damn chupacabra that the knight warned you about. Sigh... Man I hate that guy... Well, jump up the ledge to your right and go see your knight buddy who has a nice ::[LIFE GEM]:: for you. Keep going as you'll see the chupacabra, so you know your on the right trail. In the cave you'll have to fight a big troll, so take him down and mount him so you can use him to break the rocks on the right. Use the troll to kill the smaller trolls and then break the next set of rocks. Finally, there it is! Kill your troll and grab the chupacabra to regain all of your relics and powers. Backtrack to where you came from, as going forward just leads to the beginning area. Now we can continue. Here you'll have to do a running double jump to reach the next piece of land, which may catch you unaware and crumble at your feet. Quickly do another running jump to get to the next piece of land. If you drop (like I did when I first did that part) you'll have to follow a series of ledges and do some more running jumps to get back up to the piece of land after the one that dropped. Either way continue on to see a knight who has seen Gandolfi, and believes that he will save them all. Continue on to complete this section. ---------------------------- Part II: Woes Moor (LoS 9-2) ---------------------------- "In the dark, he weeps for her or perhaps it is for his own lost soul." I'm sure you've noticed throughout the last few chapters that poor Gabriel is being driven to madness. Having not slept, barely eating, trudging ever onwards to complete the mask, he has even seemed to lost his sense of compassion and ability to forgive. I can't imagine what it would do to him if Carmilla is right about the mask... Here you'll get a scene where Gabriel visits the witch to try and find a way to the land of the dead. It seems she wants a favor in return though, and needs you to get a blue rose out of her music box. Of course, you need some keys before you do that even, so you set out to get the three keys. First things first, move back to the screen to find a knight with a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]::, then head down into the abandoned village to find another knight with a scroll that holds this puzzle's answer. Here, go up to the wheel and shake it to make the crows move on. Further in you'll also have to fight a few mandies and can find yet another knight who has a scroll about the witch Malphas. Stick to the left for now and move deeper into the village to fight some more mandies and come to a saw-able barrier. Saw it down and go up the ramp to find a knight with a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]::. Go back to where the crows are currently and take the right path, sticking to the left hand wall. You'll find another barrier you can break down with yet another knight here, who also has a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]:: (man, there's a lot of poor knights here, huh?). There's also a magic font south of you if you ever need to use it. Move back up and go straight towards the red glow, but head right into the shed area to find yet another knight. This one has a ::[LIFE GEM]:: on him. You can also find another knight with a scroll if you follow that building's edge south and run around the building counter-clockwise. Ok, after that huge haul of gems, go back to the crows and shake them out of their perch one more time to get a scene. Now you'll have to fight the scarecrow. -----------------\ BOSS: Scarecrow | -----------------| Difficulty: 3/10 | -----------------/ The Scarecrow isn't really a BOSS boss, like Olrox or Malphas, as his health is pretty limited, but he does get the standard boss health meter. He has a standard attack with his scythe arms, which DO have some range on them, as well as an impressive unblockable dashing attack which he can use with very short notice. He can also grab you, which leads to some button mashing, and has a move where he makes the ground under you damage you, which you should of course counter with guillotine. He likes to block as well, so be careful for any counter-attacks and don't get too greedy. Feel free to be liberal with the magic attacks though, as you can always refill it at the magic font nearby after the fight. Since his health is so low, you're not in any real danger here. Watch out for his dash attacks, which you should be able to dodge given your practice with Cornell, Brauner, and Olrox, and lay into him when you can. After awhile, end this pathetic "boss" with a grab and use his own scythe's against him. You'll learn afterwards that Malphas has a direct hand in watching over Babe, as she put the scarecrows there. Hmm, Baba must've been the one to kill Malpha's lover then, I guess. Interesting. Move the crows again to make a new flock of crows appear. Move the first crows back and then go move the new crows five times to trigger another scarecrow fight and collect your second music box key. Moving back, you'll get the message that the crows moved somewhere else. Go find the next scarecrow, who is to the right of the place the crows first flew to. You'll find some crows here too, but leave these ones alone. Instead, go behind the barn to find some more crows. Move these crows until you get the message that one more flock of crows is needed, then move into the area that you picked up the light magic gem on your left. A third flock of crows will arrive, so use them to reach the scarecrow. One more fight and you'll get the last key, solving the "puzzle". Now you can go back to Baba and open the music box. She will cast a spell on you, ending this section. --------------------------------- Part III: The Music Box (LoS 9-3) --------------------------------- "Something she said has filled me with disquiet. She mentioned the 'King of Angels'... What does this mean?" What now you are apparently small and inside the music box itself. Grab the green cylinder nearby and put it in the spinner near you. The green activates the spike traps, and with it playing you can cross the path to the west. You can also grab that ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]:: from the knight if you're fast enough. Even if you aren't, you'll get the gem but die (but you'll keep the gem). You have to wait until the spikes disappear and then sprint down the corridor to grab the red cylinder at the end. By the way, do you recognize that tune that's playing? It's "Vampire Killer", the famous song from the very first Castlevania game! Anyway, put the red cylinder in the first slot followed by the green cylinder. The red activates platforms in the box, which you can use to move past the east corridor (just wait for the next platform to appear and jump to it quickly). Jump past the platforms to the next area and run past the spikes to get the magenta cylinder. All this time the witch rattles on about how many knights tried to help her and how tasty they tasted. Eck, I'm glad Zobek is planning on killing you! Now put the magenta cylinder in, and make it go red, magenta, green. Go down the path you just went down, but head right this time. This path is full of saw blades, but you have a lot of time to get through it. Watch for the saw blades to disappear, then dodge through the path to reach the yellow cylinder at the end. The yellow cylinder controls fire traps in the box, which is the most annoying trap here. Make them go red, yellow, green, magenta and head north past the platforms. Now go left. You may want to use this first run to just observe the fire. See how the first fire barrier lights up? You can get through that with a well timed run, which will leave you in the spiked section. There's one more fire barrier here, which is a lot faster than the first. For this part, use your shadow magic dash. Have it ready to go and the SPLIT SECOND the first fire wave disappears, dash to the left! Grab the blue cylinder here and warp make. Put it in the spinning device and make it go red, blue, purple, then yellow. We're going to make a side trip to grab probably the hardest gem in the game. Head north past the platforms and now the blue cylinder will make it possible to get past the lightning. The lightning is far easier than the flames, as it just shoots between orbs, so you just have to time your way through it. It'll shoot in the first place, then the second, then the third, fourth, and fifth. So be standing in the path of the first one when it shoots and move up one at a time. The second part does a simpler version of that, and you can literally just walk past it once the first stream is gone. Duck under the saws past the lightning and then head left to reach another flame part. You'll probably have to wait a bit for the music to catch up by this point, but once it does, treat this flame portion just like the last one. For all your work, you'll find a knight with a ::[LIFE GEM]:: past the second set of flames. Hit the music again and go the same way you just went, except past the saw trap turn right and wait for the spike trap to start. Sprint past it to solve this music box's puzzle. Now you'll get a cut scene where Gabriel gives her the rose, and asks her to keep her promise. She smacks her staff down, ending Chapter IX. =========== Chapter X: =========== ---------------------------------- Part I: Titan Graveyard (LoS 10-1) ---------------------------------- "The land requires sacrifice... a sacrifice I hope that he can make..." Apparently the old hag kept her word and sent you to the underworld. Well, hopefully that's probably the last thing she ever did, as Zobek confirms that he killed her. Jump to the platform to your north and jump up the three ledges to your left. Jump right and head up until you can grapple the beam above you. Use it to reach another ledge and shimmy to your right, jumping a gap, until you can grapple further up. After another ledge you can grapple again. Use the ledges here to find your way up and out of this pit. Outside you'll get a nice panoramic view of the graveyard. Think anything big will attack us here? Head down the ledge and use the grapple points to get down to the ground. Here, check the knight on the right, who mentions that no one holy can enter the land of the dead, and that you need to give into evil temptation to enter. Is this the sacrifice that is required of Gabriel? Move on, to the left of the rock, and sprint jump to the middle island. Go further to the next landmass to fight a new enemy called the creeping corpse. They aren't too hard, as they merely try to crawl towards you and hurt you, and a holy water will take them all out. You'll also have to kill a few skeleton's. Once you kill them all, check the knight to the north, who advised that you must learn shadow magic to understand the evil you face, and that you must become evil to destroy it. "There is no place in heaven for us, when we become that which we fight against." You can also find a knight with a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]:: by jumping up the cliffs to your left and jumping down the ledge below. Now go back to the first island and stick to the right, jumping onto the arm in the distance. Here you need to jump all the way to the top of that land mass, so get a good running start and jump. You'll fight some more creeping things here, but one of them will go into the nearby coffin, making a monster out of it! It really isn't any harder than your average spider, so wear down it's health so you can grab it and finish it. Use some holy water if you're having trouble. Before you pick up the rune, run down the titan's arm to the left, as you'll find a dead knight down here with a ::[LIFE GEM]::. How nice of him. Pick up the rune it drops afterwards and use it to make the giant's arm move. You can now walk down the arm and jump to the landmass in the distance. Spring jump to the next one and jump to your right. If you go down and to the right you will find another scroll along with a bag of holy water. Head up that path and you'll find what appears to be a dead end, but if you head right it will lead to a wide open area where a bunch of creepers and a couple of coffins await. This is a very confusing path, and shows a little bit of bad level design. Anyway, take out the creepers and the coffins to recover another titan rune piece (you'll see that you need two) and head back to that island you were on earlier before you jumped over here. Now jump left to the hand island, and left again to a bigger landmass. Head north here to find a knight with a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]::, then head south and around the creature to put your rune in. Once you do it's arm will move. Move back to the north and use the ledges there to get onto the arm so you can jump across. Once you do, you'll have a VERY tough fight against three coffin creepers. Use your holy water and shadow magic liberally here to make things easier, and try to focus on one at a time. The fight is mostly tough due to the cramped fighting space. Also, and I recommend doing this after the fight, you can find a knight with a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]:: near where you landed. Once you win, pick up the next titan rune piece and jump up onto the higher level ledge here to get on the other arm and jump back to the runestone island so you can put in the last rune. This is a tough jump, so walk down the first arm and drop onto the one finger kinda sticking out. You can do a short sprint from this finger and double jump to make things easier on yourself. Put the last runestone in and head towards the new arm bridge. You'll have to fight a skeleton and a couple creepers first, but then you can use the ledges to the north to get up on the arm. Jump towards the center arena area to end this section. --------------------------------- Part II: Fire Pinnacle (LoS 10-2) --------------------------------- "No man has travelled here without meeting death." Well, it seems Pan has come to cheer us on... wha? What are you doing!? Read the new character bio on the silver warrior for an interesting read on what Pan is doing. -------------------------\ BOSS: The Silver Warrior | -------------------------| Difficulty: 8/10 | -------------------------/ Pan don's his warrior form to test Gabriel. He also takes away all your magic at the start of the fight! Gah! Don't fret quite yet. He has a few basic swiping moves with his sword, which seems to be able to detach to extend his range. For this first part, I recommend either the tried and true hit and run tactic (although he WILL hit you with his swords elongated swipes), or just letting him attack you and perfect blocking him to lay down some serious hurt. It isn't as hard as it sounds, because if you stay close to him, more often than not, he's just going to do a normal hit. His normal attacks are easy to see coming as well. Once you have him around 20% dead, he will let you grab him. Do the events to hurt him and he'll give you back your light magic. Yea! Use it to heal up with if you need to. Keep hurting him (preferably using the blocking strategy) and you will get to grab him again. This time he also restores shadow magic. You may also notice that he himself is also using light and shadow magic against you, and will sometimes (if your a bit aways from him) use a special attack, usually sending out a spirit bird or horse to try and hurt you. You can dodge these fairly easily by rolling when you see his animation in the air, as the things he summons just go in a straight line. The only other thing to note here is that they want you to use shadow and light magic to counter act against Pan's magic, but it's fairly hard to do, since he changes magics so often. Try and do it if you can, but keep up with the blocks as a priority. Also note that after he does a mini scene attack, he will almost always do a range slash at you, so be ready. When he is nearly defeated, you will get one last grab event with a very fast circle to hit. RVH1987 also pointed out to me that if you have the "Ultimate Light/Shadow" abilities, that you can use them to take a good chunk of Pan's life away. I tried using Ultimate Shadow on Pan after he gave me my shadow magic back, and boy does it drain his health. He was also glowing blue at that time though, so that helped too. Watch the cut scene afterwards to learn of Pan's sacrifice. ---------------------------------- Part III: Fire Cemetary (LoS 10-3) ---------------------------------- "I worry for him though, his mind is tired, broken even. He questions his faith, he questions his heart. Can he succeed?" Spring and jump to the far ledge, but be quick and shimmy left around the corner and jump to the opposite ledge, as the one you are on is about to fall. Jump up the ledges here and use them to jump to the cliff on your right, where you will meet another new enemy: the zombie. Zombies are traditionally the weakest Castlevania enemies, and even though they show up so late, they are no exception here. Kill them as you see fit and grab some daggers from the south if you need them. Go north here and fall into the pit to meet a TON of zombies. Don't worry, just toss a singe holy water to take them out. Go to the other side and use the ledges there to reach the knight with a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]::. Head back and past the walled section to find another ledge to your right. Hurry left here, as these ledges also fall, and then use the grapple to go all the way down to reach another piece of land. Here you'll get a panoramic of the landscape. Move down the path and look into the distance. See that glowing spark? You're going to JUMP to that. Sprint to the edge and jump, and the game will seem to slow down your jump (probably to make it more epic, as if the game needed more epic in it). As you start to descend sharply, use your second jump and you should make it. Don't use your second jump too early now! Move on a bit to be raped AGAIN by that damn chupacabra. What is it even doing here! Gah! Right in front of you you can find the puzzle solution knight, but head down and to the left to find a ::[LIFE GEM]:: on a knight. To the right of where you start is another knight with a scroll. Now put your power crystal into the flashing gargoyle thing north of you and point the column of light towards the column to the southwest. Use this column to shoot the light between the rocks to destroy a face. Two more to go... Now you want to whip the column down the line. Grab the knights ::[LIFE GEM]:: crystal on the way. Once you get the device in place, you can shoot a beam towards the chupacabra which destroys one of the faces protecting it. One more to go.... Now whip the lowest column all the way west and put your shadow crystal in the device north of you. Make this column go south and shoot the light towards the first column. This should reach between the cracks, and you can now reflect it off the first column to destroy the last face protecting the chupacabra. Go grab the thing to regain all your powers and head north. Here you can fight a TON of zombies, even though they don't give much exp. Once you are done, activate shadow magic and punch both gongs to open the door to your north. You need shadow magic active to make the punches go quicker, as the gongs need to be punched quickly and they are a ways apart. Fill up your magic and go through the door to finish this section. ---------------------------------- Part IV: Crematory Oven (LoS 10-4) ---------------------------------- "I sense Gabriel's rage welling up within him and I wonder who is the more terrible, our hero or the demon?" After you meet the grave digger, move forward and fight the creepers here. Did you notice all the coffins? Yeah, you're going to have to fight about four of them in total, which can be a pain, but this area is nice and big. You can also use your magic liberally, as there's a magic font up ahead, so feel free to use it all if you want. After killing them, you'll see the gate open. Move forward and refill your health and magic, then keep going to get into the inevitable boss fight with the grave digger. ------------------\ BOSS: Gravedigger | ------------------| Difficulty: 6/10 | ------------------/ Like any boss, he has a standard two hit swing with his shovel which you can block. He also likes to do a ground pound, but give you plenty of warning before-hand, so get in a guillotine. He can also shoot tentacles out of his mouth for a makeshift range attack, but it's easy to dodge if you stay on the move. He'll mix up his two hit combo with one giant unblockable swing at times and can also plant his shovel down to make the earth spit fire in a straight line, which is his better ranged attack. His last trick is to dig up creepers, like you saw him do in the cut scene. Use a holy water when he digs up the creepers, as you don't want to have to worry about them and it damages him at the same time and lets you get a few hits in. You should be a master at avoiding the ground pounds by now, so you can also get in some guillotine's there. You can also lay on the shadow magic and while you are circling him and he uses his flame attack, that leaves him wide open, letting you do a shadow magic chain saw. Keep up those kind of attacks until he goes grey. Now the natural thing to do when an enemy goes grey is to grab them right? Well, don't do it here! Instead, go use the lever to the Gravedigger's right to open the furnace doors. If your fast, you can still go grab the boss and start a series of button mashing events. When he falls down into the furnace, he'll send his tentacles after you, so be ready for a quick button press. After the fight, you'll be left dangling on some steel. Use the ledges and grapple points to get up. There's a few times when you have to jump straight behind you, but they are obvious. Also, note that when you have to jump to a piece of land from another piece of land, the ledges you use can take you either up or to the right. Shimmy to the right first to find a knight with a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]::. You're going to want to be fast on this part, as the lava below you is slowly rising. The first two grapple points you go up on will give you a lot of leeway though, so you should be able to grab that gem with no problem. Continue grappling and climbing upwards to get out of the furnace. Now you just have to grapple a few more points towards the north west portion of the screen and soon you'll finish Chapter X. ============ Chapter XI: ============ -------------------------------------- Part I: Necromancer's Abyss (LoS 11-1) -------------------------------------- "There is nothing but hate in his heart. Hate for those who have taken his beloved." Move forward here to find a knight with a scroll to solve the puzzle in front of you. You can also find a knight with a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]:: by going down the ledge to your left. Now we have to solve this astronomical puzzle. Basically you want to get the sun and the moon to overlap through the hole in the background, which I first did just by dilly-dallying with. To not waste a bunch of time like me, make the puzzle match the following: First symbol (Zodiac Sign): Virgo (it's the one that looks like a M with a jesus fish pointing upwards). Second symbol (Day): 24 Third symbol (Moon Phase): Pure black (Eclipse?). Once you do that, a path will open up to your right. Just keep running as the path will appear below you. Here you can inspect the knight to get this puzzle's solution, but we don't need him. This is basically a punching puzzle and each color of tile is a different direction. Go look at the picture in the background. We start from below, and the line goes: Up, Right, Up, UP, Left, Down, Left, Up, Up, Right, Up. So now we gotta punch the tiles to make those directions, Go punch the outer ring for up (L2 + Triangle) once, then the ring below it for right once. Punch two more outer rings for the "up up" part. Now punch the ring below the "right" ring to make the puzzle go left. Below the "left" ring is down, so go punch that one next (there's only two "down" tiles to punch, just hit one). Now that you know all the directions, go finish by hitting left, up, up, right and up. Then hit the glowing tile to solve the puzzle. Jump into the empty hole and go through the portal to find a new enemy, the reaper. They have extremely low health and will fall in two cracks of your whip, but they can kill you in a single hit if you let them. They also show up in packs, kind of like zombies, but more dangerous. Go down the cliff to the left to find a knight with a ::[LIFE GEM]::. Run into the portal and it'll drop you off in the air nearby, so you can double jump to the ledge above the portal. Use the ledge to the north and inspect the mirror for a scene. Here jump onto the moving land masses to make your way to the next mirror. You'll have to fight some reapers on one big landmass, and then make a running jump to a ledge from there, but other than that everything here is just waiting on your rocks to arrive and making some easy jumps. Past the next mirror, you'll have to fight a new enemy, the necromancer. He is somewhat weak to exploding fairies, and you'll get a bio on him right away. He also has a screen life bar, making him a boss. Don't worry, he hardly deserves to be called a boss, kind of like the warg from chapter one. ------------------\ BOSS: Necromancer | ------------------| Difficulty: 3/10 | ------------------/ The Necromancer is able to enchant his staff with with magic to make it extra long (it's already long) and can summon multiple zombie waves to attack you. He also has a ranged fire attack similar to the GraveDigger's. Why the 3/10 then? Well, for starters, he will spend A LOT of time summoning zombies. When he does, ignore the zombies and keep hitting him. After awhile, the zombies will disappear (he takes them away), and you just got a bunch of free hits. You can also use a holy water to kill all the zombies and gain a bunch of orbs as well. His other attacks are easy to avoid if you circle him, and lead to some free hits. You can also use explosive fairies to stun him, followed by a shadow magic chain saw or a DHC to whittle his health down fast. Grab him when he turns grey and follow the prompts to put him out of his misery. Here's a tip from Andrewlee1982, which may help: [TIP SUBMITTED BY: Andrewlee1982] I have a guaranteed tactic to shave the first necromancer fight from 3/10 to 1/10, and the second fight from 5/10 to 2/10 :-) Your tactic says, "ignore the zombies." I say, "BRING IT ON!" Why? Did you notice that the Necromancer sheds part of his hp is used to summon zombies/ reapers? (To answer your question, Andrew, No! Hehe. :) ~BK ) After defeating the summons, his hp doesn't recover. My tactic? Bring out the holy water and watch his life shrink to nothing, especially when he spawns three waves of zombies. Then the rest is dodging business and cleaning up. Close-up tactic: I usually leave him alone and play keep-away when he extends his staff. Otherwise, get up close, and poke with square. When he sidesteps and lunges at tries to lunge at you, that's the golden opportunity to parry and unload some payback. [END TIP] After the battle, TWO mirrors will show up. Lets take the right path for now. Right Path: Before you go to that first portal, jump left and hit that portal to be able to grapple the rock, then you can jump back to a knight with a ::[LIGHT MAGIC GEM]:: on him. How nice! Go to the first area, and just sprint into the portal and jump to the next mirror. Now you'll be out in the storm again. This mirror will drop you in the middle of the stone's path, so time it to land on the stone. If you miss, don't worry, as a portal below you will take you back. Jump to the next floating stone to find a knight who calls this puzzle a result of "Apeture Magic" (Yet another Portal reference to "Apeture Science"). There's also a bag with a crystal here if you need it. Take the ledge path now and hop back and forth between the rocks like a gimped Ninja Gaiden. Take out the reapers at the top here and go through the next mirror. Here, kill all the reapers and hit the glowing green button to make a mirror beyond the circle door where the two mirror are, then take this mirror to get back there. Now let's take the left path. Left Path: Here jump to the ledge on your left and shimmy across so you can drop down into the portal. This portal will drop you off in the air to the left, but there's a grapple point you can use to the left to reach a landmass over there. If you miss it, don't worry, as the portal below will let you try again. Here, kill the reapers and drop down to the path below to find some ledges you can use to get over by the health font. There's also a button here before the mirror, so hit it and use the mirror to go back to the central area. Use the left mirror again, and this time sprint-jump to the portal to the right. Jump from where it puts you to grapple and reach the upper path (the path below just has some reapers) and you'll find a mirror. This mirror takes you to another switch which opens the center area. Now that the path is open, take the new mirror into another wide area to face a familiar face. ----------------------\ BOSS: Necromancer V.2 | ----------------------| Difficulty: 5/10 | ----------------------/ The Necromancer is able to enchant his staff with with magic to make it extra long (it's already long) and can summon multiple zombie waves to attack you. He also has a ranged fire attack similar to the GraveDigger's. THIS Necromancer is a bit tougher, as he can also summon multiple reapers with the zombies and has a ground explosion move as well that you just want to run away from, as using guillotine will just end up getting you hurt. His other attacks are easy to avoid if you circle him, and lead to some free hits. You can also use explosive fairies to stun him, followed by a shadow magic chain saw or a DHC to whittle his health down fast. Grab him when he turns grey and follow the prompts to put him out of his misery. Notice that the V.2 Necromancer also has some new death/grab animations. Nice touch! After the fight, go check out the new mirror which will take you to a new piece of rock with a lot of platforming. Use the ledges here to make your way up, followed by two grapple points and even more ledges to reach some land. We don't get a break yet though, as you'll have to do a long jump to some more ledges on your left, followed by some grapple swinging. After that is some more grapple swinging with some portals, so keep your second jump handy if you need it. Head up the ledges and grapple up to see a mirror in the distance. Jump to it to be taken to yet another area. Here, go down the staircase on your left to find a knight with a ::[SHADOW MAGIC GEM]::. Head back up and use the ledges here to shimmy right and make your way up this structure. Once you get to the top, you will FINALLY complete this very long level. --------------------------------- Part II: The Dracolich (LoS 11-2) --------------------------------- "What has happened to you, Gabriel? What have you become?" After Death and Gabriel talk for a bit, without Gabriel even denying that he revels in death, the sorcerer will bring to life the Dracolich Titan, which is the huge re-animated remains of a fossilized dragon. Oh boy... ----------------------\ BOSS: Dracolich Titan | ----------------------| Difficulty: 6/10 | ----------------------/ Well, getting to the first rune is going to be a chore! First off, wait until the dragon crosses your small arena and tries to spit stuff at you. Follow him once he passes to latch onto him. Now you're along for the ride! Shimmy left and get up on top of the dragon. Don't forget to hold R2 whenever he shakes! Move right down his spine until you get to the colored ribcage. Drop down onto it and jump across them until you can sling down to it's belly again. We are going to do this a few times to get past certain obstacles. Climb him again and head to your left, using his ribcage again to drop down onto and head right so you can get back up to his spine. Keep going down the spine and you'll see his first rune. Punch it when you can and a portion of his spine will break off. Jump past this to get to the other side and head left using his spine and ribcage to reach another runestone (much easier to get to the second one). Punch this one until it shatters and then you'll really piss the dragon off, as he starts to fly straight up! Shimmy to the left and travel up what I assume is his belly. They'll force you to go out of your way left and right at times, but keep treking and you'll eventually reach the third rune. Break it to view a cool cut scene. Press the button at the right time to be taken closer to the beast's head. Use the spine here to head right and go down and around it's chest to reach the other side. Smack the rune here to bring the creature down in another cut scene. Now you're back to the starting arena, and the creature is no longer flying around, but clinging to the side. He can spit at you here, but you'll notice his jaw is grey, so quickly go grab it. He'll try and charge up a spit while you are in his mouth, so quickly go hit the rune in the back to stop him. You'll get to hit the rune three or four times before he spits you out, so repeat the process to finish him for good and end the chapter. ============= Chapter XII: ============= ------------------------------ Part I: Final Fight (LoS 12-1) ------------------------------ "And now the final battle is come. Marie is waiting for you, my friend." As you can expect, watch the lengthy cut scenes here to be told the bulk of how Gabriel was led down this path. Quite a shocker isn't it? I don't think I could have seen that coming, or what happens next. After the main cut scenes, Marie will help to bring Gabriel back from the dead, because we can't have a dead hero, can we? Satan will then offer to love Gabriel more than God, but Gabriel advises him that even though he's committed such atrocities, God is willing to forgive him, which of course drives Satan to attack you. -----------------\ BOSS: Satan | -----------------| Difficulty: 9/10 | -----------------/ Being the final boss, let alone the prince of darkness, you would expect Satan to be hard. Well, he doesn't disappoint. He's actually a lot like the fight against Pan, since he will alternate between using light and shadow magic. He has a few basic strikes, and a flame wave attack similar to the Gravedigger. He can also make colored reapers appear that only die when they are hit with the opposite colored magic. He will also throw out five magical colored circles that almost encompass the entire arena and move around it. If you stand in them you will get hurt, but you can safely pass them if you turn on the SAME colored magic. He also has a ground eruption move that you can counter with guillotine. You seem to have an unlimited supply of magic here, though (at least on warrior difficulty) and you'll need it with all the magic changing you have to do and use. Use hit and run tactics here, along with your upgraded guillotine, and at around 15-20% of his health gone, he will stop to "catch his breath". He puts up a multi-colored barrier here though, and you'll have to walk through it and switch magics as you get close to him. Remember to use the same colored magic when you start, and then switch and THEN walk, because if you try to walk fast/run to the next barrier while switching magic, more often than not it will just repel you. Grab him and nail the two quick button presses in the cut scene. He gains a few new attacks here, including one where he makes fire rain from the sky. You can tell where it's going to land at least and can stay away. Keep up your assault, dancing between his rings and you can now get his health down to around 10%. Once you do, he tells you to stay back as he puts up some more barriers. Yeah, like we're going to stay away... Anyway, these barriers move around the arena, so you have to be quick on your feet. It's impossible to tell you exactly how to do this part, but just do what you did on the first barriers to get close to Satan and grab him. Follow the button presses to see some of the game's final cut scenes. I also have a quick note from Gregory Peters about the last boss fight: [TIP SUBMITTED BY: Gregory Peters] First I want to say thanks for your FAQ. Even though I played on 360 it helped me greatly. Second, I just have a tip for the final fight with Satan. I played on "normal," whatever they call that setting, and it seemed it was WAY easier to just let the colored diagrams on the floor hit you can get caught instead of running from the reapers trying to switch colors. It takes way less time then avoiding them, avoiding the floor, avoiding Satan, and switching between the different magics. Get caught, two quick hits on Satan when he releases you and you're at full strength again. And the reapers do not hit you when you get caught. They disappear. (Very true on Normal. Satan is kind of a wuss, to be honest. ~ BK) I also noticed if you have magic activated and swing at the balls (The Reaper balls only. ~ BK) when he throws them, you can destroy one color before they hit the floor, the opposite color of the magic you're using. That helps also. Anyway, again, great FAQ, and just thought I'd throw in some stuff I noticed. Thanks again. (Thanks Gregory, you make a very good point about the last fight. I had no idea you could hit those reaper balls in mid-air like that! I tried on the trap balls too, but that didn't work. Oh well. ~ BK) [END TIP] Congratulations for beating Castlevania: Lords of Shadow. I hope you enjoyed the guide. Make sure to watch after the credits for yet another cut scene, which shows the future of Gabriel... ============================================================================== \/ (LoS 3.0) \/ \/ Trials \/ \/ \/ ======================================================================== Ok guys, here's ALL the trials in the game, what you have to do, a general difficulty rating (how hard *I* thought they were) and how to do them. I'm not even going to pretend that I'm the ultimate gamer out there, so feel free to send in tips where I might be lacking. Everything in this game is definitely do-able though, and taking on these trials WILL make you a master of Castlevania: Lords of Shadow. Enjoy. General Trial Tip: If you're having trouble on a trial, make sure to set the difficulty to "Squire" (If "difficulty" matters...). Do trial runs on the titan fights, or anything that's timed. Every second counts, and you NEED to know the level ahead of time. =========== Chapter I: =========== ------------------------- Part I: Besieged Village ------------------------- Defeat the Greater Ward while keeping at least one villager alive. Difficulty: 1/10 Being the tutorial level, you don't face many enemies here. You'll encounter warewolves, which shouldn't kill a single villager, and one greater warg, who definitely has the potential to. Keep the warg focuse on you and use direct attacks with the occasional counter move or dodge to easily complete the trial. ---------------------- Part II: Hunting Path ---------------------- Finish the level without recovering health by any means. Difficulty: 1/10 This trial is fairly easy, just do your best not to take any damage. Take out the warg riders first, as falling from your horse simply means going to the next section. In fact, it's probably faster. once you kill the Warg and his friends you'll be in the clear. ---------------------- Part III: The Dead Bog ---------------------- Finish the level having killed 50 goblins. Difficulty: 4/10 This one is a bit more challenging as you'll have quite a few goblins to deal with at once. Take a right at the first fork, going up the stairs, killing as many goblins as you can along the way. When you reach the large goblin camp (where you blow up the tree) fight the goblins. They will continue to spawn until you hit the tree with two bombs. Once you've killed 50 goblins, blow up the tree and finish the level. Don't use any bombs until you kill 50 goblins. --------------------- Part IV: Pan's Temple --------------------- Finish the level after completing Pan's trial in 5 turns. Difficulty: 1/10 First, turn the outer ring counter-clockwise. Second, turn the inner ring couter-clockwise. Thirdly, turn the middle ring clockwise. Fourth, turn the outer ring counter-clockwise. Lastly, turn the inner ring counter-clockwise. --------------------- Part V: Lake Oblivion --------------------- Finish the level and defeat the Ice Titan in 1:30. Difficulty: 7/10 Ok, this trial may have you wondering how in the world are you going to do this (I know I thought that when I first tried it!). Well, it's not meant to be attempted until AFTER you get the shadow crystal sub-weapon. When you use the crystal on these titans, it makes it so that you destroy each runeston in ONE hit. But even when you have that, go ahead and do a trial run of this boss again, and memorize every movement and runestone placement. You can't afford to be confused for a second. On your trial run, run up to the titan and use the crystal. The time doesn't actually start until he's about to do his second punch, so we might as well use the crystal now. Double jump to avoid his punch shockwaves and start climbing this beast. Now, you should have your route down due to your trial run. Just some tips: Remember that you can hit X to jump while moving, that helps cut out some seconds. As your ascending his arm, there's a few places where that'll help, and then there's the long shimmy to the first runestone, where you can get in around three of those X jumps. Just keep that up and avoid his hand slap after the first rune stone. I finished this trial at 1:26 on my fourth try (yeah, I sucked on the first three tries). Also, if you fall before the second runestone or get hit by his hand slap (or just want to try and do better), restart from the last check-point. Thanks to all the tipsters about the shadow crystal! ========== Chapter II ========== ------------------------ Part I: Enchanted Forest ------------------------ Finish the level killing 30 goblins with their own grenades. Difficulty: 2/10 This may sound hard at first, until you realize that you can grapple a goblin, and while holding any direction hit the square key while the circles will line up, and Gabriel will light the goblin's grenade on fire while it's still attached to his belt. Do this thirty times in front of the door you need to explode and you're done.. -------------------------- Part II: Underground Caves -------------------------- Kill 10 enemies while being poisoned. Difficulty: 7/10 This one was a pain! You have to kill 10 things while being poisoned. The best place to do this is right after the first spider in the level, in the area where you have to fight a bunch of werewolves and a giant spider. The hardest part is GETTING the spider to poison you. The best way to do this is to let the thing do it's grab on you, and DON'T hit back. This will poison you for sure. From there, use your daggers to kill the werewolves. "But BK, there's not enough werewolves to get 10 kills!" True. But you can go further into the level (down either path) and after the game auto saves, hit start and restart at the last checkpoint. You get your kills AND those werewolves will respawn. The poison DOES wear off, so be quick with your work! Don Crowner pointed out that you can kill the first spider in the level as well as another spider later on in the level for two more targets to kill while poisoned (which is true, as any spider can poison you). Thanks Don! --------------------------- Part III: Labyrnth Entrance --------------------------- Finish the level having killed 5 boars. Difficulty: 3/10 In the very beginning of the level (where you would normally break the door). kill five boars. They will continue to respawn until you break the door. Of course, wear them down, mount them, and then kill them. ------------------------------ Part IV: Waterfalls of Agharta ------------------------------ Finish the level after killing 20 small trolls while mounted on a big troll. Difficulty: 4/10 This trial requires you to get to the first cave troll you ever meet, which is a ways into the level. Once you do, focus your attacks on him like normal and mount him. Now the game wants you to use the troll to break down the rock to the right. Of course, you want to just kill the small trolls instead. Of course, stay away from the rock, as it's better to be safe than sorry. --------------- Part V: Agharta --------------- Finish the level without using any shadow magic. Difficulty: 3/10 Well, you haven't been using shadow magic very long up to this point, so honestly this isn't too hard. Just finish the level without hitting R1 and you win. --------------------- Part VI: Dark Dungeon --------------------- Finish the level without using a grip attack against a single Gremlin. Difficulty: 2/10 Ah, another "don't do this" challenge. This one is fairly easy as you just don't have to grip attack (R2) and the chapter doesn't have any hard hard enemies. ---------------------------- Part VII: Sanctuary Entrance ---------------------------- Finish the level and absorb at least 20 Neutrual Elemental Orbs simultaneously. Difficulty: 6/10 Significantly harder than the trial before, here you have to absorb 20 orbs at once. Two recommended places to do this are by the brotherhood ark, where four werewolves will ambush you, or the spot where you fight three larger werewolves. If you pick the small werewolf spot, let them hit you a couple times so you can perfect block them to build up your focus. Then try and smack them all into the cornter with area attacks. Be careful that they don't hit you, you need your focus up for the orbs. And since your smacking them into the corner you can suck them all up at once. I got 22 this way. The bigger werewolves have more health, meaning more orbs. You gotta be fast though, and make all the orbs drop in one spot too! Definitely a challenge. Here's another tip by xXNuttaXx, which is sure to help everyone: [TIP SUBMITTED BY: xXNuttaXx ] There is an A LOT easier way of completing this trial. First you need the fairies, once you acquire the fairies if you go through the board to the swamp troll area and fight him. Here's how to do it. First put on your light magic, second spam about 4 fairies with light magic and then spam a couple of regular fairies to stun him. By this point you should have your focus meter full without any issue of him coming close to attacking you because he is stunned. Finally keep on smacking him until he is stunned, once he's stunned all of the neutural orbs will be clumped in one location and you can absorb them. First time doing it this way I got 34 orbs with no issues at all! (Wow, 34 orbs. Nice. This all makes sense since the troll's "like" fairies and have the health to withstand all those hits. I imagine using area attacks helps even more. Plus, since it's only one enemy, the orbs are bound to be clumped together! Thanks a ton Nutta. ~ BK ) [END TIP] ------------------------------ Part VIII: Sanctuary of Titans ------------------------------ Finish the level and defeat the Stone Idol Titan in 2:00. Difficulty: 8/10 Well, another titan fight. Yes, you HAVE to use your shadow crystal here too, just like the Ice titan fight. Like last time, make this as easy as you can on yourself and do a trial run ahead of time. Get to know where you can do your X jumps at and the best and fasted ways to get to the runestones. The noticable things about this fight are that you can use your crystal right at the beginning, and then wait for her to throw her first rock at you and throw it back. Here, you can get in a little sprinting and save a few seconds before the rock-hitting-her cut scene takes place. Make sure to make use of the hiding spots that you have to get to after breaking the runestones (which you know of from your trial run, right?). You WILL be knocked to the ground after the second runestone, there's nothing you can do about it but get back on right away. You'll also have the option to skip several cut scenes throughout the battle (INCLUDING WHEN YOU NOTICE THE FLYING ROCK GRAPPLE POINT), so be sure to skip all of those when you can. This one isn't easy by any means, I thought I had a really good run and I did it in 1:56. So that sprinting in the beginning and my trial run made this possible. Every second counts, guys! ------------------------- Part IX: The Black Knight ------------------------- Finish the level without using light magic. Difficulty: 2/10 This trial is exceptionally easy, especially if you come bact to it after you've played through most of the game. Plus, you know the bosses tactics and moves. Be sure to DHC the knight and his slimes, and throw in some shadow magic to make this fight even easier. =========== Chapter III =========== ------------------------ Part I: The Three Towers ------------------------ Finish the level killing 15 enemies dazed by fairies Difficulty: 3/10 If you have some fairies on you at the start of the level use them on all the werewolves you see. But, be sure to wait till they are actually dazed (ie not swiping). Be sure to save your silver daggers. When you reach the part where the fairies come to help you wait until they daze the werewolves and then use the silver daggers to kill them. You should have no problem completeing this trial as there are at least 15 at this point alone. ------------------------------------ Part: II The Dark Lord of the Lycans ------------------------------------ Finish the level without using any light magic. Difficulty: 6/10 Here, the trial is essentially "Don't get hit by Cornell" as you can't use light magic to heal yourself. As you've fought the boss before and won to get this trial, at least you know what you're getting yourself into. Getting in quick hits while constantly running circles around him is the key here, of course. Anything to not take damage. Read Chapter III Part II for more help in the actual boss fight. I recommend saving up your shadow magic for the last few statues in 'stage three' of the fight to make the statues go down easier. And heck, even if you die, you can restart the section and the game will GIVE you more health, and it doesn't count against you! =========== Chapter IV: =========== ------------------------- Part I: Mountain Fortress ------------------------- Complete the level and defeat the Ogre without being hit by his attacks. Difficulty: 7/10 This one can be a trial of patience. You can't be hit by ANY of his attacks. Thankfully you know his moveset already, so make sure to dodge his attacks no matter what. Remember that you can restart from the last checkpoint if you get hit! ----------------------- Part II: The Crow Witch ----------------------- Finish the level and defeat the Crow Witch, only killing up to two of her sons. Difficulty: 9/10 Oh my god, what a PAIN this one is. You know those eggs that the witch spits up at you, that turn into hatchling things? You can only kill TWO of those in this challenge. The fight itself is simple, she spits these eggs at you and you have to grab them out of the air and fling them back at her (kind of like the stone idol titan's rocks). She'll launch FOUR eggs at you on her first attack. Quickly grab the first one and throw it back. I was standing at a fairly close distance to her, so I could catch the egg, throw it, and get back, which let me catch the second one as well. You should be able to get that second one RIGHT before a small scene that shifts the camera on her showing you that the eggs are hurting her. In fact, that shifting of the camera is part of what makes this so damn hard. Get that second egg though, it's all-important, and go through the motions with the L stick even if you can't see it on screen. There's no way in hell you're getting that third egg, and it will hatch into a chick, but keep watching the skies because she fires a delayed fourth egg afterwards, and hitting her with it will let you do the grapple event. After the first bird dive and the ensuing hits on the crow witch, kill the chick, and you'll have killed one now. Now you can get her next two eggs that she throws at you without an annoying camera messing you up. Don't worry about getting the second one here, we have some room for a little lee-way, just get two out of three. Two for three will let you get another grapple event, and from there you can focus on the witch and end the battle. So yes, doing it this way means you'll only kill 1 chick, but you gotta be FAST on throwing those eggs back. I had A LOT Of trouble with this trial until I took a closer stance to Malphas (Like I said above) and released the eggs quicker. Make sure to hit R2 as soon as you can for that second egg! ========== Chapter V: ========== ------------------- Part I: Veros Woods ------------------- Complete the level and recover your relics from the Chupacabras in under 3 minutes after having them stolen. Difficulty: 2/10 This trial is pretty easy. First of all, proceed normally until you meet the chupacabra. The timer will start once he takes your stuff. Now ignore every enemy and chase him as far as you can go (to the right, remember). You'll come to an orc camp and will need to mount a boar to break down the door. Be sure to inspect the door right away to get the boar to come out. I recommend using ultimate light on the boar to wear it down, but be sure not to kill it! Break down the door, kill the boar, and use the nearby ledges to get up on the land. Throw some fairies at the chupacabra and jump over there and get him! I got this done in 2:22, so I had 38 seconds left over. Go ultimate light! ---------------------- Part II: Wygol Village ---------------------- Complete the level without allowing Zobek to kill a single Ghoul. Difficulty: 3/10 In this trial, you just need to be faster than Zobek. I did it after I had defeated the boss of Chapter VIII, and by that time I was much more powerful than Zobek. I highly recommend turning on the enemies life bar option here, so you can aim for the ghouls that are about to die first. Also, holy water just decimates them, but often leaves them one hit away from death, so only use it when Zobek can't kill them before you. There should only be three waves of ghouls that you have to kill before the end of the chapter. Make sure to get all the statues in place before you kill the ghouls, as you don't need to give Zobek any opportunities. Martin Block has a tip on this trial as well: [TIP SUBMITTED BY: Martin Block] One tip I wanted to share with you about Wygol Village trial (Ch5 Ep2). Initially the ghouls spawn at 3-5 at a time. Fastest way to kill them, even before you proceed further in the game is to grapple them. Its a one hit kill and usuallly you can do it fast enough where Zobek won't even get a hit on many of them. Using this technique I've been able to get it down to one wave of ghouls per statue. :) (Thanks, Martin! -BK) [END TIP] ------------------------- Part III: Abbey Catacombs ------------------------- Finish the level without letting Zobek fall in combat. Difficulty: 3/10 In this trial you need to protect Zobek. You'll be right there with him most of the time, except the time near the beginning where you have to punch the statue through the gate. Do this part fast and rejoin him asap. Use holy waters in this area and later on in the puzzle area to ensure that you complete the trial. ---------------------- Part IV: Abbey Library ---------------------- Finish the level and complete the mirror and lights puzzle in under 2:30. Difficulty: 10/10 Ok, this is tough. You have NO room for mistakes here. First of all, go through the stage again and memorize what you have to punch and where to solve this puzzle to prep for your trial run. On your trial run, do everything as fast as possible. That means always dashing! Also, skip any scene that you can, as they eat up time that you don't have to waste. A few very valuable pointers I learned from the gamefaqs boards: Use exploding faries to take out the gremlins. This helps a ton, as you want to be focusing on the puzzle, not any enemies. Also, punching things with shadow magic takes less time. Be sure to save some shadow magic for the two dusty doors you have to break down in the puzzle though! Get a good time for portions one and two of the puzzle, as the game saves after those. Now, you can return to the last checkpoint if you mess up in portion 3. Use Ultimate Light to kill the armor in portion 3. Seriously, you need to kill that guy asap, so have a full light bar (minus whatever the fairies use) ready for him. And, those are my pointers. I finished this trial with about 7 seconds left. Good luck. Here's a tip from Goalminer, who blasted my time out of the water (which means we should listen!): [TIP SUMBITTED BY: Goalminer ] A bit more to shave off some time. The only thing that I did differently from your tip was once I got to the statue on the far side, near the end, I hit it the first time with a normal charged punch. The second time I hit it with a shadow charged punch, since this is the part that you would normally have to hit it with two charged punches. Then one more normal charged punch once it's around the corner. Backtrack to the wall, break it down, and keep your shadow magic active. Before the Armor has time to fully spawn, run over to the statue, and hit it with a shadow charged punch. Crank it clock wise will send the beam of light to the wall that you haven't broken yet, and give you time before the Armor strikes. Run from the armor, break the wall down, and turn the statue to solve the puzzle. I had 25 seconds on the clock when I was finished. [END TIP] ------------------- Part V: Abbey Tower ------------------- Finish the level after finding and destroying 100 breakable objects. Difficulty: 9/10 Ok, this one is hard. First I recommend you do a dry run and be sure to do this one on easy. Get to know where the objects are. You need to break EVERY object up until the point that you start to scale the tower. EVERYTHING. So do some scouting, because i'm not about to list them all. Also, use direct attacks, they go faster. When you do your main run, spring whenever you can, and use holy water to get rid of the vampires who should be blocking your way while your in the alcove. Use two if you have to. You start out with 20 seconds, but get more time as you break more objects. I had somewhere around 29 secons getting out of the alcove hallway area. Break the few objects outside of that and get that bridge down ASAP. Sprint across. Here a ton of gremlins will ambush you, so I recommend you use ultimate light to hurt them and break items. Use some holy water after that. It's easy to miss the barrels in this room, so be careful. Now you gotta get that gate up, which sucks and takes time. Also, the camera doesn't really help after it's up, but there are some barrels right there. Finally there are some more barrels around the corner. I think there may be around 101 objects in all, so that's why you need to break EVERYTHING. I had six seconds left when I did it. Hey guys, I got a good tip from Goalminer to help out with this trial! Tygriss also pointed this out afterwards as well. [TIP SUBMITTED BY: Goalminer ] Hello again, One more tip for you on this trial that will really knock it down in difficulty. Once you are past the drawbridge, and have broken the items in the courtyard area, you can shave an easy 10 seconds off of your time by skipping the gate opening sequence, and instead go over to the far wall that has the stairs on the opposite side. With the Seraph Shoulders, you can jump through the opening, landing on the staircase on the opposite side. Plenty of time left on the clock now that you don't have to deal with the gate. Hope this helps! [END TIP] ---------------- Part VI: Brauner ---------------- Finish the level after attacking the elite vampire 4 consecutive times with his own blade. Difficulty: 6/10 For this trial, you have to toss back Brauner's blade four times in a row. Doing this isn't too hard, but if you miss ONCE, you have to start back from scratch! Once you do it though, finish killing Brauner and you will be done. ----------------------- Part VII: Castle Sewers ----------------------- Finish the level after killing 3 Skeleton Warriors without destroying their shields. Difficulty: 3/10 I actually got a tip about this trial BEFORE I did it, and it worked well, so here's that tip (From Pablo Gutierrez / Angelbless) [TIP SUBMITTED BY: Angelbless ] For Chapter 5 (sewers), you have to kill 3 skeletons without breaking the shields, I found it was way easier by holding LT(L2 in PS3) and X (square) attack, that way you can kill those skeletons the first time they appear on the stage, and you can even kill their bones with it. (I just got done doing this, and L2 + Square is, of course, the charged up punch attack. It pretty much can kill a skeleton on easy in 2 hits, and does seem to leave their shields intact, which is awesome. However, you can't kill their bones by L2 and square, instead use L2 and triangle for that. Thanks Pablo! ~ BK ) [END TIP] =========== Chapter VI: =========== ------------------------ Part I: Castle Courtyard ------------------------ Finish the level and kill 3 skeleton warriors while you are mounted on a warg. Difficulty: 3/10 This one is pretty easy, you just need to kill the armors and drop down into the holding cages like normal. but dodge the skeletons until the vampires let the warg out. I recommend breaking the left wall and leading the skeletons in there until you can mount the warg. Once you do, kill the two skeletons and wait until a third one forms, then kill it. After that, just finish the level. --------------------- Part II: Maze Gardens --------------------- Finish the level after defeating 15 Mandragoras in less than 15 seconds. Difficulty: 6/10 Eck, that's one enemy per second! How the heck! Anyway, the key here is timing. You want to go into the first area and get a bunch of the mandy's to start sucking on you. Don't kill them, just let them hurt you (They only hurt a little bit on easy). Now go towards the wide open area to your right and let those one's hurt you. Some of the middle ones will follow (try to lead them over). Over here you'll have a ton of them sucking the life out of you. Now throw a couple of holy waters to kill them all. You should have killed 10-11 in that first attack, which starts the timer going. Now, just toss a holy water at any stragglers to get 4-5 more kills. Holy water is fast, you don't have time to be whipping them. I got 17 kills with 2 seconds left. You may have to hunt down the stragglers. Make sure to turn on the enemy life bars to make it easy on yourself. --------------------- Part III: Castle Hall --------------------- Win the Vampire War Chess game only losing up to three pieces. Difficulty: ?/10 This one is somewhat dependant on how good you are at the war chess mini game. Follow the tips in the section for Chapter VI Part III, and remember that you want to take out BOTH of one type of enemy first, and that zombies make a GREAT distraction (the enemy AI will often focus on a zombie before anyone else). Keep at least one piece of each type and try and keep as many pieces alive as possible. If all else fails, practice makes perfect. I got my trial done on my third try. Good luck. ------------------ Part IV: Refectory ------------------ Defeat the Butcher after he's used 15 items from his kitchen. Difficulty: 6/10 Avoid the butchers attacks and wait while he gathers tools to chuck, spew, and fling at you. You may also want to give him a light pounding here and there, just make sure you don't kill him until 15 items have been used. Check out the Boss part in Chapter VI, Part IV for info on the boss. ============ Chapter VII: ============ --------------- Part I: Balcony --------------- Finish the level after beating the logic gates puzzle in 7 movements. Difficulty: 1/10 Well, just follow the walkthrough for this trial. Here's that section copied and pasted, for your reading convience: This is kind of like a game of plinko, except you know exactly where the ball is going to go. To solve it, drop the balls from these spots: 1. Left 2. Middle 3. Middle 4. Middle 5. Middle 6. Middle 7. Right Puzzle Solved! Go up yonder stairs to end this section. ---------------------------- Part II: Electric Laboratory ---------------------------- Finish the level and deactive the Mechanical Monstrosity using only the tesla coil in the lab after it was activated. Difficulty: 6/10 Not TOO hard, but it can get annoying if you have bad luck or the boss moves when you have him where you want him. Basically, after the tesla coil is activated, you can ONLY use it to defeat the boss. That's three times on easy. When you first start the fight, just beat on it until you get the tesla coil to activate (I used Ultimate Light). Then watch the scene but be ready to hit the button they show you (L2 + Triangle). That's one easy hit out of the way. Two to go. Now, you want to lure him to stay over that tesla coil spot. I like to make him follow me away from the button, get right in his face when he's facing away from the button, and force him to try to hit me. When he tries, I dash over to the button and punch it. In the meantime, the monster is finishing his attack animation and turning around to face you. That should do the trick. Of course, it's easier said (or typed) than done. That's the gist of it; you are going to have to work out your own timing to shock the beast. ------------------------------- Part III: Chromatic Observatory ------------------------------- Finish the level, destroying 10 Deadly Toys using normal hits before completely killing any of them with a grip. Difficulty: 4/10 Proceed through the level like normal, and you'll get to the fight with the deadly toys. Now here, all you have to do is keep hitting them (normal hits) until you kill ten of them. Don't grab them! And yes, you can use light magic. See, not so hard! ============= Chapter VIII: ============= ------------------ Part I: Outer Wall ------------------ Finish the level and kill 10 gremlins using only your silver daggers. Difficulty: 5/10 Ok, first of all be on easy and have your max stock of daggers. The gremlins don't show up until your in that center area past the first chain, so make your way there. Now, when the come, give them a little whip first to soften them up, but don't kill a single one with the whip as there are ONLY 10 of them. You want to make them red, and then chuck a dagger at them. Sometimes they dodge them, so throw another until you get them. Easier said than done when you have 6-7 ganging up on you at a time. But with enough daggers (30), you'll be fine. ---------------------------- Part II: The Clockwork Tower ---------------------------- Finish the level in under 5 minutes. Difficulty: 8/10 Another hard one. First of all, it helps to be on easy and have the seraph shoulders. It also helps a ton to know ultimate light/shadow. Basically, you gotta get through the level as fast as possible. Try and take shortcuts where you can, such as jumping to cogs further ahead. Also, time the electricity parts perfectly. Remember that you fight the mechanical monstrosity again at the top, so break out ultimate light AND ultimate shadow if you need them. Gotta be fast! I made it in, no shit, 4:59. I let the first lightning trap kick my ass for a bit. Restart if you don't think you're making good time. Good luck. --------------- Part III: Olrox --------------- Finish the level after keeping the focus meter at it's maximum value for over a minute. Difficulty: 6/10 No where near as hard as the clockwork tower. Here, get your focus gauge up to maximum and then dodge everything he has. You gotta hit him still though, so just get in the very safe hits, like a quick one-two when he throws his swords at you, or maybe a quick holy water/dagger here and there (it all works). Stay away from him though, because he has a QUICK dash/grab move that breaks your focus. ------------------------ Part IV: The Throne Room ------------------------ Finish the level and defeat the Dark Lord after she kills at least 10 of her own Vampire Warriors. Difficulty: 5/10 This isn't too difficult, it's just another exercise in patience. Here, I prefer to get the trial out of the way asap. In her first form, Carmilla will summon exactly 10 warriors while she fires electricity at you from her orb. So all you have to do is hit the warriors with a holy water and make sure her lightning hits those warriors (make sure the warriors are in between you and Carmilla). It may take a few tries, but on easy you have PLENTY of time to line up her lightning. Plus with the holy water, the vampires are one shotted by it. =========== Chapter IX: =========== -------------------- Part I: Bones Forest -------------------- Finish the level after killing 10 headless corpses without being grabbed by a single one. Difficulty: 2/10 One word: Holy Water. It puts them near death and lets you do a grab move to kill them fast. You're welcome. ------------------ Part II: Woes Moor ------------------ Finish the level and get the three keys, scaring the crows only 13 times. Difficulty: 2/10 Another trial where you have to do the puzzle in the least amount of moves possible. I checked the guide, and if you just follow that section, you do it in exactly 13 moves. So, in other words, just beat the level again. ----------------------- Part III: The Music Box ----------------------- Finish the level and get the blue rose without falling in any of the Music Box traps. Difficulty: 5/10 Well, you already know the traps, so now it's just a matter of avoiding them. The hardest to avoid are the flames, for sure, but nonething here is too hard. Remember you can restart if you get hit, to go back to a time before you got hit. Reference the walkthrough if you're unsure of which paths to take, as you basically have to beat the level again. ========== Chapter X: ========== ----------------------- Part I: Titan Graveyard ----------------------- Finish the level after receiving 100 points of poison damage from the deadly mist. Difficulty: 1/10 All you have to do here is get poisoned. Simply walk into the first poison you can and sit there. At a full life bar (and on easy) you can easily survive 100 points of damage. You'll be in the red, but alive. Now just survive and beat the level. ---------------------- Part II: Fire Pinnacle ---------------------- Finish the level without allowing Pan to recover any health during the fight. Difficulty: 6/10 Ah, I was good at perfect blocking before, but this is the level I became a master at it. Pan recovers health when he's glowing blue (like you), so simply avoid his attacks when he's in that state to finish. Easier said than done. Perfect blocking like a madman helps a ton. Make sure to use your magics against him to end the fight faster. Here's a tip from Naraku2099, to make your life easier! [TIP SUBMITTED BY: Naraku2099] Just an observation I made for the 10-2 trial (don't allow pan to recover any health), it is MUCH easier to complete if you simply don't switch on your magic, because he can't absorb health unless you have on the opposite magic. Then, perfect block an attack when he activates his light or shadow magic, quickly switch on the opposite magic, do the counter and switch it back off. Repeat until you win and it doesn't matter if he hits you with magic on, you will not fail. (Huh, I didn't know you had to have on shadow magic for him to absorb health! I went and tried it out, and sure enough, Naraku2099 is right as rain. Just don't use shadow magic guys, and this trial is MUCH easier!!) [END TIP] ----------------------- Part III: Fire Cemetery ----------------------- Finish the level after killing 20 Zombies in a single aerial sequence. Difficulty: 6/10 This is actually one of the funner trials in the game. First, play through the level until you get your powers back from the chupacabra. Now go north towards the gongs. Here is the area where dozens upon dozens of zombies will spawn. You can also restart from the checkpoint and it will take you to right before you get your powers back from the chupacabra, which is a really nice starting point for this trial. This one took some experimenting on my part to figure out, but with the check point so close by, it's not bad. The way I actually did it (thnikaman and I) was to head into the zombie area and let somewhere around 3 dozen zombies spawn around us. Then we let them hit us so they could get nice and tightly packed in around Gabriel. On easy, you will lose a bit of health, but it's nothing to worry about. Now you want to do a single area attack followed by a jump. SO... triangle and then X. You want to follow this up with shadow magic being turned on and triangle again (and a few times for good measure). So basically hit triangle, X, R1, triangle. Doing this, I got 23 in one shot. It's a big bloody mess when you do it, as a shadow magic area attack kills them all in one go. The biggest part to completing this trial is to let them pack in around you as you guard. You gotta get 20 of them up in the air! ----------------------- Part IV: Crematory Oven ----------------------- Finish the level and kill 20 summoned creeping corpses during the fight against the Gravedigger. Difficulty: 5/10 Another boss fight that simply requires patience. Stay alive until you've killed the required corpses. Refer to the boss for his attack patterns. =========== Chapter XI: =========== --------------------------- Part I: Necromancer's Abyss --------------------------- Finish the level after destroying 60 reapers. Difficulty: 4/10 Well, just play the level and you'll around 50 or so before you get to the second Necromancer boss fight. Remember that the second Necromancer can summon reapers, so let him live unti you get 60 (Kinda like the Gravedigger fight). Refer to that boss again if you're having any trouble. ---------------------- Part II: The Dracolich ---------------------- Finish the level and defeat the Dracolich in under 5:00. Difficulty: 8/10 The last of the titan trials! Yea! This one is fun, since the Dracolich really doesn't fight back when you're on it, but boy there's a lot of plat-forming going on here. First of all, you'll need a crystal, so make sure to bring one. You'll also want to do a test run of the fight, to make absolutely sure you know which path to take to the runestones. THIS IS ABSOLUTELY ESSENTIAL on the Dracolich, as it can seem to have multiple paths when you're jumping around him, when in fact there's only one right way to go. Do that test run! Once you have the path down, that's all there really is to it. You can't afford to fall once. Also, use your crystal as soon as the fight starts and make sure to grab him for the ride on his first pass. If you fall or miss either of those things, you might as well restart. Other important things to note here are that there is a mandatory cut scene with a QTE that DOES count down your time. There is also a few good spots to use some X-jumping on the vertical climbing portion of the fight. The last important note is that once you bring him down, you NEED to grab his jaw RIGHT AWAY and hit that last runestone in his mouth ASAP. Honestly, I did a good run, but there was at least 4-5 times when I was a split second away from making a jump or moving to another ribcage and the beast made me stop and grab. I also wasted a few seconds moving the wrong way at one point. But even with those "oop's" moments, I did the trial in 4:56, so I know you have around 10-15 seconds of lee-way in this fight, at least. I'm sure someone out there will do it with like a minute to spare or something. Just pay attention to the notes above, do a test run, and don't goof up and you'll do it. I got that 4:56 on my second try. ============ Chapter XII: ============ ------------------- Part I: Final Fight ------------------- Finish the level and defeat Satan without being hit by any attack with the opposite magic color. Difficulty: 5/10 Not as hard as it sounds. You might be thinking like I first did and noticed that you have to have magic on to be hit by an opposite color. True, but that is the SLOW route. We're high speed over here. When the fight starts, start using Ultimate Shadow. Make him hurt. If he is red, use Ultimate light. On easy, it doesn't take long until he does his first "catching his breath thing". The only thing you really gotta worry about (and when I STOP using ultimate techniques) is when he has colored circles on the ground. Wait those out. Otherwise, use your ultimate techniques (remember, you have unlimited magic). Snake2410 pointed out to me recently that you CAN be hit by the circles and still complete the trial. Huh. Good to know, I just tried it and sure enough! Guess this trial just got even easier. Thanks man! You'll never be hit by a light attack when using shadow magic's ultimate technique, but he may get off a lucky shadow attack when you're using ultimate light. Try and stay on his side when you do your AoE spin. Worse case scenario just start over. Once you get to his second phase, it's pretty much more of the same, except you can go back to a previous checkpoint if you mess up, which is nice. ============================================================================== \/ (LoS 4.0) \/ \/ Complete Move List \/ \/ \/ ======================================================================== Hey guys, here's a complete list of Gabriel's moves along with how to pull them off. First off, let me say that you can find the complete move list in the game, and it too will tell you how to do it as well as give you a nifty little animation showing you what it looks like. In short, the game is the best place to look at the moves, so by all means check them out in-game. But what we do have here is not only a list, but also some pointers about which moves to get, and how to use them effectively. This includes magic as well, as magic plays a huge part in this game. You can skip down to (LoS 4.1) right now, if that's what you're after. First, the move list: -------------- Basic Actions: -------------- Direct Attack: A basic direct chain attack. Will only hit enemies directly in front of you. How to perform: Hit Square. This is your starting move. Area Attack: A basic area effect chain attack. Will hit all nearby enemies surrounding you. How to perform: Hit Triangle. Another starting move. Keeps back weaker enemies giving you room to breath. Use Secondary Weapon: Use the currently selected secondary weapon by pressing the circle button. Switch between available secondary weapons with the directional buttons. How to perform: Hit Circle. Check the various secondary weapons for more info. Jump: A basic jump. Combine this move with other attacks to perform aerial combos. How to perform: Hit X. A basic move in most action platformers. Block: Press and hold the L2 button to block enemy attacks. Unblockable attacks are indicated with a bright warning flash. How to perform: Hit L2 to block any non-flashing attack. Sychronized Block: Press the L2 button at exactly the right time to synchronize your block. When performed correctly, the enemy will be stunned for a few moments. How to perform: Hit L2 at the exact moment the enemy hits you with a blockable attack. Necessary to perform counter-attacks. Dodge: While blocking (L2 button) use the left stick to evade enemies. How to perform: Use the left stick in any direction while blocking to move in that direction. Another necessary move. Stomp: Similar to dodge, but performed while airborne, this is a good defense against enemies who attack you while in the air. Landing back on the ground can also knock back smaller enemies surrounding you. How to perform: While in the air, hold L2 and hit X. A good move to try and evade enemies in the air, due to the rapid descent. It's much harder to evade in the air due to camera angles; use it when you can. Very good animation. Grab and Interact: Press the R2 button to grab enemies or interact with a glowing object. Smaller enemies can be thrown against other foes by moving the left stick in the desired direction while performing the grab action. How to perform: Press R2. Not everything is grab-able however. A very necessary move and makes certain trials a cinch. Rappel and Climbing: You can navigate vertical surfaces using the Combat Cross. Press R2 to interact with a shining Grip Point and then use the left stick to move. Pressing square or triangle will kick away from the surface, and pressing X will let go from the Grip and allow you to jump away. How to perform: Hit R2 to grip things and rappel them. You'll learn this while playing through the game, as you can't really advance without learning it. Combat Focus: The combat focus is an ancient technique from the Brotherhood of Light. Once fully focused, a capable warrior can extract Neutral Elemental Orbs from his enemies after each successful hit. How to perform: Well, this is a truly great element in Lords of Shadow. As you fight, perform various moves, and DON'T get hit, your gauge will fill, granting you those neutral orbs, the only true way to fill magic outside of font's. We'll go into this later. Experience Points: Experience points measure the progression of your skills in the game. Points are earned by defeating enemies and solving puzzles. How to perform: Well, you acquire these, not "perform" them. You'll need them to buy moves. --------------- Advanced Moves: --------------- Direct Attack Combo: A linked series of direct attacks. The last hit of the sequence is a block breaker, and will expose an enemy to further attacks. How to perform: Chain five square attacks in a row. The fifth hit will break an enemies guard. You can dodge and counterattack out of this combo at any time. Area Attack Combo: A linked series of area attacks. Less powerful than a direct attack, but very useful for crowd control. How to perform: Chain up to eight triangle attacks in a row. Keep button mashing for more, if you wish. Bigger, tougher enemies may go right through this, so be careful. Again, you can dodge or counter straight out of this at any time. Rising Strike: This direct attack will lift up smaller enemies in front of you, allowing additional attacks to be comined with it. How to perform: Hit square and then jump to bring a single small enemy up into the air with you. Not as practical as ground combat in my opinion, but fun to chain attacks with. Rising Assault: This area attack will lift up all surrounding smaller enemies, allowing additional attacks to be combined with it. How to perform: Hit triange and then jump to bring up all small enemies around you. Necessary for a certain trial in the game as well. Direct Counterstrike: Immediately after a sychronized block, you can unleash a devastating direct counter attack. How to perform: Just hit square three times after a perfect block. Fills up the focus guage quite well. Somersault: While blocking (L2 button) use the jump button (X button) to leap over and land behind an enemy. Requires the Cyclone Boots! How to perform: Press L2 and X to jump over an enemy and land behind them. Decent when surrounded by enemies to put yourself on the outside edge, or for fun. Obviously meant to be a positioning move. Guillotine (Upgrade): Press and hold the square button while airborne to use this direct attack as a finisher in any aerial attack sequence. Your chain will smash down on any enemies in front of you as you land. Good for dispersing groud-based enemies! (Upgrade) Hold the square button longer to perorm an upwards blow after landing the Guillotine. How to perform: Hold square down anytime you're in the air. A must-have move for punishing any enemy using a ground-pound in the game, and the upgrade is nice as well. Spinning Chain: Press and hold the triangle button while airborne to use this area attack as a finisher in any aerial attack sequence. Your chain will sweep around and hit any enemies around you as you land. How to perform: Hold triangle down anytime you're in the air. Good for providing a landing spot among smaller enemies, best ignored otherwise. Air Grab: Press the R2 button while airborne to grab an enemy and pull them into the air. Combine this with further aerial attacks to extend the combo. This attack only works on smaller enemies. How to perform: Use R2 to pull small enemies up to you. Not too practical, but fun. Downward Punch: If you are airborne with an enemy in the air nearby, press the R2 button to blast it down to the floor below you. How to perform: Be in the air with an enemy near you and hit R2. It'll also effect smaller enemies when you throw an enemy down. Entertaining in a group of smaller enemies. Flying Kick: Press the R2 button while airborne to grab an enemy and launch into them with a downward kick. This attack only works on larger enemies. How to perform: It's the same as the air grab, only for big enemies. Be careful after using this, as the big enemy you just kicked may be hitting back soon. Area Counterstrike: Immediately after a synchronized block, you can unleash a devastating area counter attack that affects surrounding enemies. How to perform: It's the same as the direct counterstrike, just affecting the surrounding area. Use this when you can hit nearby enemies. Direct Heavy Combo (Final): Press and hold the square button to start a sequence of heavy direct attacks. Repeated square button presses will add further hits to the combo. (Final) This upgrade adds a final blow to the combo sequence that's also a block breaker. How to perform: Hold the square button down for the first hit, then press square up to eight more times. These attacks do more damage, and can also be directed somewhat as you move. You can cancel into a dodge or block as well. Particularly good if you know you have time to punish an enemy, or if you want to lay the final smack on a skeleton. Chain Barrier (Upgrade): Press and hold the triangle button to start a sequence of heavy area attacks. You can control the direction of attacks during the combo with the left stick. Enemies in front and behind can be hit with this series of chain attacks, too. (Upgrade) With this upgrade, you can finish the combo sequence at any time with a second press of the triangle button, which will perform a massive final hit that's also a block breaker. How to perform: Hold triangle to swing the whip in front of you, creating a whip wall that's lethal to smaller enemies. Big enemies may break through, so stay on your toes. It does go behind you as well. I love the upgrade to this move, as it's a massive frontal blow able to break guards with ease (and you can do it anytime after Gabriel starts his whip sequence). Circular Chain: A combination attack useful in many different battle situations. It begins with a direct attack, closely followed by two area attacks. Use this to attack an enemy directly while keeping others at bay. How to perform: Press square, followed twice by triangle. A short move that keeps smaller enemies at bay while you attack. I prefer more direct attacking with skillful blocking or evasion, personally. Chain Saw: Shred any enemy in front of you with this chain spin attack. Holding the square button at the end of the combo will extend the duration of the spin. How to perform: Ah, a personal favorite. Press square, triangle, then hold square. This attack takes some time, but hurts an enemy bad if you land it right on top of them. Useful for when you know you have a few seconds free, and visually pleasing at the same time. Ground Cutter: This variation of the Chain Saw attack can be used at the end of an aerial combo sequence. Press the square button while in the air, then press and hold the square button a second time. Make sure you are holding the button down as you land. Finally, press the square button one last time to launch forwards into enemies with a spinning chain attack. How to perform: First, be in the air and press square, then hold it down a second time until after you land, that press it a third time. Visually appealing just like Chain Saw. Somersault Strike: After leaping over enemies using a Somersault, immediately press square three times to attack them from behind before they can react. Requires the Cyclone Boots and the Dark Gauntlet! How to perform: After a somersault (L2 and X, remember), just mash square three times. A good way to punish enemies after a somersault, but it's usefulness obviously depends on how much you like somersaulting. ------------------ Secondary Weapons: ------------------ Throwing Daggers: With the Daggers selected, press the circle button to throw one towards an enemy. You can manually aim the throw by pushing the left stick in the desired direction. Daggers are particularly effective against lesser Lycanthropes, greater Lycanthropes and Wargs. How to perform: Um, select daggers, aim, and press circle. Manual aiming is a nice touch. Explosive Daggers: With Shadow Magic active, Daggers will explode on impact. Some switches can be activated from a distance using Explosive Daggers. How to perform: Use shadow magic combined with daggers. Necessary to get through some parts of the game and effective against certain enemies. Dagger Wave: Press and hold the circle button to throw multiple Daggers at one time. You can throw a maximum of five Daggers simultaneously. How to perform: Hold down the circle button for a bit and release. You can also aim manually. The daggers fan out and can kill multiple enemies at once. Dark Crystal: With the Dark Crystal selected, press and hold the circle button to destroy it, releasing the demon contained inside. This secondary Weapon requires four crystal shards fused together, but is powerful enough to annihilate most enemies around you, and will seriously damage even the most massive and powerful of foes. How to perform: Hold down the circle button until the crystal shatters. You'll then be treated to a cut-scene. Required for the Titan Trials, but otherwise just makes life easier every so often. You may as well use them from time to time, as holding onto it does nothing for you. Or you could save it for any life-threatening situation that may arise. Fairies: With the fairies selected, press the circle button to release one against the nearest enemy. Additional fairies can be released by pressing circle again. Fairies will home in on their target and can distract certain enemies, allowing you time to execute a devestating attack on them. Fairies are very fragile and will die after one use. The magical forces that animate the fairies can also be used to reactivate certain ancient devices. How to perform: Press circle to call out fairies to distract enemies. Useful for dazing certain enemies, and needed at times to progress through a level. Light Fairies: With Light Magic active, Fairies will explode on contact with the enemy. This explosion deals a great amount of damage and can be fatal to some enemies. However, fairies will also perish in the attack. How to perform: With light magic on, summon some fairies to attack. Useful on enemies that are weak to light fairies. Holy Water Flasks: With the Holy Water Flasks selected, press circle to throw one at the nearest enemy. Using this weapon while airborne will throw in directly downward. Holy Water is particularly devastating against Vampires and the Undead. How to perform: Use circle to throw a flask of holy water. Lights-out to vampires and ghouls. Divine Shield: With Light Magic active, throwing a Holy Water Flask will create a magical barrier around you which can deflect many enemy attacks, while still allowing you to move and fight normally. How to perform: Use light magic and then a holy water for a moveable shield. A great option for when you're full on holy water. ------- Mounts: ------- Note: You can always strangle your mounts my holding down the R2 and L2 buttons. Well, except the horse. You're not a monster are you? Are you!? Also note that mounts are invincible when you're on them (as far as I can tell). Ride Horse: Press Square to attack the Wargs. Press Triangle to attack the Lycanthrope riders. Both attacks can be aimed left or right with the left stick. How to perform: Just like the game says, the horse is only used in stage 1-2. Too bad your first horse was killed, huh? Ride Spider: Press the R2 button while the Spider is stunned to mount it. Press Square to perform a melee attack. Press Triangle to perform a ranged attack. Special Abilities: Spiders can use their web to interact with the world around them. Press triangle to use the web on a glowing interactive object. How to perform: Get the spider to critical health to stun it, then grab it. Follow the QTE and you got yourself a mount. Necessary to complete several levels. Can make web bridges and pull apart weak doors. Ride Warg: Press the R2 button while the Warg is stunned to mount it. Press Triangle to slash with the claws. Press and hold Square to charge a bite attack, release the button to attack. Special Abilities: Wargs can jump further and climb better than humans. To jump, further double tap the left stick in the desired direction and then press X when you reach the edge. To climb, simply press X next to flowing surfaces. How to perform: Get the Warg to critical health to stun it, then grab it. Follow the QTE and you got yourself a mount. Necessary to complete several levels. Quite a good climber and jumper! Ride Warthog: Press the R2 button while the Warthog is stunned to mount it. Press Square or Triangle to perform melle attacks. Press the left stick towards enemies to charge into them. Special Abilities: Watrhogs can be used as a battering ram. Press and hold the left stick in the direction of the target and charge against it. How to perform: Get the Warthog to critical health to stun it, then grab it. Follow the QTE and you got yourself a mount. Necessary to complete several levels. Quite fun to charge into goblins for easy kills. Ride Troll: Press the R2 button while the troll is stunned to mount it. Press Square or Triangle to perform melee attacks. Special Abilities: Trolls can use their mighty blows to smash heavy obstacles. Move near to the glowing obstacle and press square or triangle to attack it. How to perform: Get the Troll to critical health to stun it, then grab it. Follow the QTE and you got yourself a mount. Necessary to complete several levels. Square is a more direct attack while Triangle is a ground pound. ------------- Relic Powers: ------------- Light Magic: Attacks made while Light Magic is active will replenish your health, at the cost of Light Magic energy. How to perform: Press L1 to activate and deactivate Light Magic. You can also absorb neutral orbs into your light magic bar by holding down L3. Light Magic is a MUST for regaining health, and can be used at virtually any time. I would advise against using it while focused and making neutral orbs, or using it to kill an enemy with, as you'll just lose out on some neutral orbs in those cases. It also is needed to use several secondary weapon types. Shadow Magic: Attacks made while active will inflict more damage, at the cost of Shadow Magic energy. How to perform: Press R1 to activate and deactivate Shadow Magic. You can also absorb neurtal orbs into your shadow magic bar by holding down R3. Shadow magic is used to deal extra damage and may change the property of some attacks. Also it is needed to move past certain parts of the game. I would advise against using it while focused and making neutral orbs, or using it to kill an enemy with, as you'll just lose out on some neutral orbs in those cases. It also is needed to use several secondary weapon types. Tremor Punch: A powerful forward punch. Charge it up by holding the L2 and Square buttons until your Dark Gauntlet glows red, then release for extra devastation. This attack can knock back enemies in front of you, or even kill them in one shot. The Tremor Punch can also activate certain mechanical switches. Requires the Dark Gauntlet! How to perform: Hold L2 and Square until you see the gauntlet flash, then let go. Needed to activate certain switches and push certain blocks, so you'll be well used to it by the end of the game. Takes awhile to charge, limiting it's usefulness in battle situations. Earthquake Punch: Powerful downwards punch. Charge it up by holding the L2 and Triangle buttons until your Dark Gauntlet glows red, then release for extra range and power. This attack can knock back enemies surronding you, or even kill them in one shot. The Earthquake Punch can also activate certain mechanical switches. Requires the Dark Gauntlet! How to perform: Hold L2 and Triangle until you see the gauntlet flash, then let go. The downward, area affecting cousin to Tremor Punch. Also needed to activate certain switches. Sprint: Double-tap the left stick to perform a sprint. While you are sprinting, you can jump longer distances. Requires the Cyclone Boots! How to perform: Double-tap the left stick in any direction. Very very usefeul and a welcome mobility addition. Thankfully you get this beauty rather early in the game. Shoulder Charge: With Shadow Magic active, you can power up your charge into an attacking move. The shoulder charge can also be used to smash through weakened doors and walls. Check for the tell-tale sign of falling dust and debris. Requires the Cyclone Boots! How to perform: Put on shadow magic, hold L2 and move the L stick in the desired direction. You'll need this quite a bit to advance in multiple levels, so you'll get used to it fast. Very nice animations, too. Flame Dragontail: Dark Gauntlet assisted uppercut. This attack will lift up many nearby enemies, allowing you to continue the combo with additional aerial moves. Requires the Cyclone Boots and Dark Gauntlet! How to perform: Hold L2 and charge up X. Another, fancier aerial lift move. Not as fast as either one you've seen up to now, but hurts more. Be careful. Double Jump: Tapping the jump button twice in quick sucession will allow you to jump again in mid-air. Use it to rach new heights or change the trajectory of your jump. Requires the Seraph Shoulders! How to perform: Simply jump again in mid-air. A very welcome mobility move that will open up the world to you like never before. Required to get past several parts of future levels and needed to access several Brotherhood Arks. Holy Jump: With Light Magic active, a double jump will unleash beams of Light energy around you. The first attack made against a blinded enemy will inflic bonus damage, but will remove the effect. Requires the Seraph Shoulders! How to perform: Just double jump with light magic on. To be honest, not a very useful move and probably best just forgotten about. By all means, experiment with it to see if you like it or not first. Sprint Thrust: Finish off your sprint with a blast attack. Double-tap the left stick and then press Triangle followed by Square when you are close to your enemy. The closer you get to your target the more effective this attack will be, often knocking even the mightiest foe to the ground. Requires the Cyclone Boots! How to perform: Sprint, then press triangle followed by square for a close range blasting effect. A good choice to start a fight with if you're in the middle of a sprint already. You can also use it to knock down foes (even certain bosses), but it's not a serious choice in the middle of a battle. Light Flash: A sychronized block while Light Magic is active will detonate a flash of magical light that will blind nearby enemies. The first attack made against a blinded enemy will inflict bonus damage, but will remove the effect. How to perform: Just have Light Magic on when you do a perfect block. Not a bad move, but not really a go-to move either. Nice to have when you have light magic on already for sure. Landslide Punch: While you are airborne, use this attack to swoop back down to the ground with a huge Dark Gauntle punch. Press and hold the L2 and the Square buttons, charge the Gauntlet for as long as you can, and then release to set off the attack. Requires the Dark Gauntlet! How to perform: This is pretty much the Tremor Punch from an airborne start. Good to take yourself out of a crowd and punish them, but risky as well. Avalanche Punch: While you are airborne, use this attack to throw a wave of Dark Gauntlet power downwards. Nearby smaller enemies will be lifted into the air, allowing you to continue the combo with further attacks. Press and hold the L2 and the Triangle buttons, charge the Gauntlet for as long as you can, and then release to set off the attack. Requires the Dark Gauntlet! How to perform: Again, pretty much the Earthquake Punch from an airborne start. This one keeps you up in the air a bit longer, though, which is an important distinction. Erosive Chains: With Light Magic active, this combo extends a cage of whirling chains around you. The cage draws surrounding enemies into it, while also damaging them and replenishing your health. How to perform: Turn on light magic and then hit square, followed by holding down triangle. This move should be used when you need health and are facing 2 or more smaller enemies, but when those situations pop up (and they will) you can't go wrong with this move, as it will heal you FAST. Quite a good animations as well. Shadow Flames: With Shadow Magic active, this combo creates a flaming vortex of Shadow energy from your Combat Cross. This fire is extremely deadly, but you will be rooted to the spot while you use it and it cannot be adjusted mid-stream, so line up your enemy carefully. How to perform: Turn on shadow magic and then hit triangle, followed by holding down square. One of your best shadow magic move before ultimate shadow, but as the game warns you, be very careful of your target. Flame Claws: Use the Dark Gauntlet while sprinting to throw several claws of damaging Shadow Magic energy towards your enemy. With your Shadow Magic active, double tap the left stick to begin the sprint, then press the square button at any any time to use the Flame Claws. Requires the Dark Gauntlet and the Cyclone Boots! How to perform: Sprint and then press square when you have shadow magic on. Looks a lot like one of the Black Knight's attacks. An ok move leading into a group of enemies, and capable of knocking down certain enemies as well. Harder to pull off in the middle of a fight due to the sprinting requirement. Upward Guillotine: Using the Seraph Shoulders to double jump, this attack can lift enemies in front of you much higher ino the air than the Rising Strike combo, creating more time to perform additional attacks on them. Requires the Seraph Shoulders! How to perform: Hit an enemy with square followed by jumping twice. Higher than anything you've seen before, leading to more time to attack in the air. Whirlwind Flap: Using the Seraph Shoulders to double jump, this area attack can lift enemies all around you much higher into the air than the Rising Assault combo, creating more time to perform additional attacks on them. Requires the Seraph Shoulders! How to perform: Much like the Upward Guilloting, only an area effect. Hit triangle followed by a double jump. Air Wave Flap: After lifting enemies into the air with a Dark Gauntlet uppercut, you can flap the Seraph Shoulders to repel them away from you with this combo. Good when surrounded or in a tight spot to buy time! Requires the Dark Gauntlet and the Seraph Shoulders! How to perform: After a Dark Gauntlet uppercut, hit L2 and hold X, then "flap" the wings by hitting X again. Very good animation, not very good practically since it relies on the slow uppercut. Holy Cross: With Light Magic active, this combo creates a dazzling blaze of light energy from your Combat Cross. This glare can blind and damage any enemy caught in its beams, but you will be rooted to the spot while you use it, so select your target carefully. How to perform: Press triangle, then hold square with light magic active. It roots you to the spot, so get your angles lined up. Particularly useful against vampires and ghouls, and very nice to look at as well. Be sure to try it out! Exploding Quake: With Shadow Magic active you can call forth a series of fiery explosions from the earth beneath your enemy's feet. The final eruptions will release a larger shockwave against all nearby enemies. Tap the Square button, then press and hold the Triangle button unitl you smash the Combat Cross against the floor to start the combo. Each subsequent Triangle press will create an additional explosion, climaxing with a final press and hold of the Triangle button for the last devastating attack. How to perform: Hit square then hold triangle until Gabriel slams his cross into the ground. Pound triangle for each explosion, then hold it to explode the ground around you. Quite a visual feast, but drains the meter fast. Best used in groups or when magic use isn't a problem (aka by a magic font). Ultimate Light: Press and hold the L1 button to activate the Ultimate Light mode. While you are in this state you will spin constantly, attacking any surrounding enemies. You can use the left stick to aim the spin in order to deal the maximum amount of damage. However, be aware of your Light Magic supplies! How to perform: Press and hold L1 to start swinging, then L to move. It's definitely called "Ultimate" for a reason, this is one hard hitting attack. Best used when you know you can refill your magic or to make boss fights a cinch (even on Paladin!). Ultimate Shadow: Press and hold the R1 button to activate the Ultimate Shadow mode. While in this state, the left stick will make the character perform powerful charge movements in the desired direction. How to perform: Press and hold R1, then flick the L stick towards any enemy. The counterpart to Ultimate Light, it hits just as hard and is super easy to use. Again, best used when you know you can refill your magic or to make boss fights a cinch (even on Paladin!). --------------------------------------------------------------- Magic and Move List Discussion........................(LoS 4.1) --------------------------------------------------------------- Well, there's all the moves in the game. Now, an interesting topic on how best to effectively use magic, which should help any reader. Made by and posted here with permission my EmptyBlade, alot of which I couldn't say better myself: There's a couple things I think a lot of players don't realize about how magic works in this game. First, I think a lot of people don't realize that it's generally almost impossible to "waste" magic. The magic meter does NOT deplete when you're just standing around with magic activated. In fact, it doesn't even deplete when you attack with it, unless your attack hits something or you use one of your advanced relic attacks that uses magic. So unless your magic bar is overflowed, you can't lose magic unless you use it on something, there's no way to accidentally 'waste' it. So for example, if your health is low, you can just activate light magic and run around all you want looking for an opportunity to use it. There's no need to waste your efforts turning it on and off all the time. Also, it's what makes it worthwhile using skills like "light flash"; you don't have to worry about wasting your light magic by having it active while waiting for an attack to synchronized block. You won't lose any light magic until you successfully get a synchronized block or hit something (Good points, remember that guys, you can't "waste" magic just by having it on!) Secondly, I think the way people are using shadow magic is sorely underestimating what can be done with it. Sure, it gives you a damage boost, but spending shadow magic just to get this minor damage boost is wasteful. What's a lot more significant, is that it changes the properties of your attacks. All attacks become unblockable attacks under the influence of shadow magic. And all attacks that were already unblockable become knockdown attacks, that make even bosses stagger. So to make efficient use of your shadow magic, you should activate it just for the attacks when the added property would be useful, and deactivate it right after. Doing this, you can get a LOT of mileage out of your shadow magic without using a whole lot of it. (Editor's Note: It's important to note here that there are times when you want to get a lot of mileage out of your magic bars, and times where it's OK to go crazy because there's a magic font nearby. You'll have to judge these times for yourself, but the guide will always let you know about any magic font's. ~ BK) So for example, say you're doing an ordinary direct attack combo on Cornell. You see him raise his hammer to block. Most people in this situation would immediately roll away to avoid the counter attack. Instead, just activate shadow magic for the next attack; it breaks his block, then you deactivate shadow magic and finish your combo. You spent barely any magic at all, but got a lot of extra hits in. THAT'S an efficient use of shadow magic. Sure, it takes more practice, but once you get good at this, it pays off. (Note: The key to getting good at this is to not be mashing the button for your combos. Make sure you are pressing the button only once per attack, this gives you time and control to decide what to do for each attack.) Furthermore, once you reach the 5th hit of your direct attack string, activate shadow magic just for that hit and deactivate it right after. Maybe he jumps out of the way; fine, since it didn't hit you didn't spend any shadow magic. But what if he doesn't? Since that attack is normally an unblockable, it now becomes a knockdown, sending him reeling. Now, if you held the button press for that attack, you can go straight into a direct heavy combo to pile on some more damage. Or you can do area attack, direct attack to cancel straight into chainsaw. Another good attack to do this with guillotine upgrade. Say you jump over a shockwave attack, and hold direct attack. You'll guillotine down, then pause for a bit and do a heavy attack when you pull the chain off the ground. Activate shadow magic for this attack, and it'll become a knockdown attack, giving you the opportunity to pile on more damage. In general, you should not spend shadow magic just to get the damage boost. You should only spend it when it will get you extra hits. Good post, Empty! Combined with the note I threw in, the advanced Castlevania Brawler will have a lot of good tips. When it comes to picking which moves to go with first, everyone is going to be different. What works for me may not be your playstyle. One thing everyone agress on fast is that Guillotine >> Upgraded Guillotine is nearly a must for punishing the baddies who try to hit you with a shockwave. DHC (Direct Heavy Combo) and Chainsaw are agreed upon to be situational damage/time-based attacks that are good to have, especially by the time you encounter skeletons. If you focus a lot on keeping smaller enemies at bay instead of positioning or evading, circular chain and spinning chain are must-have moves. One final combat-related note about the focus gauge: It's all about now gettting hurt first and foremost. Next you want some variety in your attacks. Advanced moves, relic powers, and a perect block all do wonders. Once you get that gauge full, do your best to use multi-hit moves like chainsaw or any area based attack move to make those orbs pop out. ============================================================================== \/ (LoS 5.0) \/ \/ Complete Enemy List \/ \/ \/ ======================================================================== [ This section was made by xXNuttaXx, a good friend who I met while making this guide. He lists all the monsters, along with their resistances and weaknesses, along with tips for defeating them. Thanks Nutta, this monster list is perfect! ~BK] -Complete Monster List- Resistances & Weaknesses Table Weak: 1 Weaker: 2 Very Weak: 3 Resistant: -1 More Resistant: -2 Very Resistant or Immune: -3 ........................... Monster: Lesser Lycanthrope Size- Medium Difficulty- Low Description- Small Werewolf Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: 3 Dagger w/Shadow: 3 Fairy: 1 Fairy w/Light: 1 Holy water: -2 Holy water w/Light: 1 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: Dagger takes them out without problems. ................................................... Monster: Great Warg (BOSS) Size- Big Difficulty- Medium Description- Large Werewolf Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: 2 Dagger w/Shadow: 2 Fairy: 1 Fairy w/Light: -1 Holy water: -2 Holy water w/Light: -1 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: Dodge attacks get in quick 1-2 combos, throw some daggers if needed. ................................................... Monster: Warg Size- Big Difficulty- Medium Description- Medium Werewolf Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: 2 Dagger w/Shadow: 2 Fairy: 1 Fairy w/Light: -1 Holy water: -2 Holy water w/Light: -1 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: Dodge attacks get in some quick combos, throw daggers if needed. ................................................... Monster: Goblin Size- Small Difficulty- Low Description- Diminutive, mischievous and crabby small green creatures. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: 1 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: 1 Fairy w/Light: 1 Holy water: -2 Holy water w/Light: -2 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: Grab with R2 do a QTE and they die. If you get swamped by them area attacks work well. ................................................... Monster: Naiad Size- Small Difficulty- Medium Description- Hands that come out of ripples in the water, found in swamp and sewer. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: N/A Dagger w/Shadow: N/A Fairy: N/A Fairy w/Light: N/A Holy water: N/A Holy water w/Light: N/A Dark Crystal: N/A Tip on defeating: You cannot attack these creatures, so pretty much just avoid them by not getting caught in the ripple, if you are caught you will have to do a QTE. ................................................... Monster: Swamp Troll (BOSS) Size- Big Difficulty- Medium Description- Subspecies of the larger cave troll. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -1 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: 1 Fairy w/Light: 1 Holy water: -2 Holy water w/Light: -2 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: Refer to Swamp Troll Boss fight ( LoS 1-3 ) ................................................... Monster: Ice Titan (BOSS) Size- Giant Difficulty- High Description- Left behind from titan war, a huge iced over Titan. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -3 Dagger w/Shadow: -3 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: -3 Holy water: -3 Holy water w/Light: -3 Dark Crystal: 2 Tip on defeating: Refer to Ice titan Boss fight ( LoS 1-5 ) ................................................... Monster: Giant Spider Size- Big Difficulty- Medium Description- ONE BIG UGLY SPIDER! (Mountable) Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: 1 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: -1 Fairy w/Light: -1 Holy water: -2 Holy water w/Light: -1 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: Ground cutter or chainsaw work well whenever you are able to get them in. ................................................... Monster: Warthog Size- Big Difficulty- Medium Description- A big hairy warthog (Mountable) Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: 1 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: 1 Fairy w/Light: -1 Holy water: -2 Holy water w/Light: -2 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: Easy to avoid his attacks get a chainsaw in here and there. ................................................... Monster: Greater Lycanthrope Size- Big Difficulty- Medium Description- Pureblooded Werewolf that walks on hind legs. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: 3 Dagger w/Shadow: 3 Fairy: -2 Fairy w/Light: -1 Holy water: -2 Holy water w/Light: -1 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: Daggers with shadow work wonders! If you have neither chainsaw him! ................................................... Monster: Small Troll Size- Small Difficulty- Low Description- Ugly small looking troll. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: 1 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: 2 Fairy w/Light: 1 Holy water: -2 Holy water w/Light: -2 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: Just kill them with whatever they drop quick. ................................................... Monster: Cave Troll Size- Big Difficulty- Medium Description- A big troll found in mountainous areas. (Mountable) Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -1 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: 1 Fairy w/Light: 1 Holy water: -2 Holy water w/Light: -2 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: Fairies really do work on these guys allowing you to get some really good blows in quickly taking him out. ................................................... Monster: Gremlin Size- Small Difficulty- Low Description- Flying imps Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: 2 Dagger w/Shadow: 2 Fairy: -1 Fairy w/Light: 1 Holy water: 2 Holy water w/Light: 2 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: Grapple QTE, or off ground area attack/combos. ................................................... Monster: Stone Idol Titan (BOSS) Size- Giant Difficulty- High Description- A powerful artifact made by magesmiths. HOLY CRAP! Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -3 Dagger w/Shadow: -3 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: -3 Holy water: -3 Holy water w/Light: -3 Dark Crystal: 2 Tip on defeating: Refer to Stone Idol Titan boss fight ( LoS 2-8 ) ................................................... Monster: Black Knight Golem (BOSS) Size- Medium Difficulty- High Description- Claudia's big black body guard made by her father. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -2 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: -2 Holy water: 1 Holy water w/Light: 1 Dark Crystal: 2 Tip on defeating: Refer to Black Knight Golem boss fight ( LoS 2-9 ) ................................................... Monster: Cornell (BOSS) Size- Medium Difficulty- High Description- Dark Lord of the Lycanthropes Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: 3 Dagger w/Shadow: 3 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: -3 Holy water: -2 Holy water w/Light: -1 Dark Crystal: 2 Tip on defeating: Refer to Cornell boss fight ( LoS 3-2 ) ................................................... Monster: Lycanthrope Dark Lord (BOSS) Size- Big Difficulty- High Description- Cornell's Final Form Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: 3 Dagger w/Shadow: 3 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: -3 Holy water: -2 Holy water w/Light: -1 Dark Crystal: 2 Tip on defeating: Refer to Lycanthrope Dark Lord boss fight ( LoS 3-2 ) ................................................... Monster: Ogre (BOSS) Size- Giant Difficulty- High Description- A big ogre with a bad attitude! Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -2 Dagger w/Shadow: -1 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: -3 Holy water: -2 Holy water w/Light: 1 Dark Crystal: 2 Tip on defeating: Refer to Ogre boss fight ( LoS 4-1 ) ................................................... Monster: Chupacabras Size- Small Difficulty- Low Description- Annoying little SOB'S that take your equips. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -3 Dagger w/Shadow: -3 Fairy: -1 Fairy w/Light: -3 Holy water: -3 Holy water w/Light: -3 Dark Crystal: -3 Tip on defeating: Chase after him and get your gear back. These enemies are probably the most annoying ones in the game! ................................................... Monster: Swordmaster Size- Medium Difficulty- High Description- Fast attacking ghostly swordsman covered in rags. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: 1 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: -1 Fairy w/Light: 1 Holy water: 1 Holy water w/Light: 1 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: A couple of fairies with light magic usually does the trick just attack while he's stunned. ................................................... Monster: Crow Witch Malphas (BOSS) Size- Giant Difficulty- High Description- A huge crow that lunges her babies at you, what a bad mother.. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -3 Dagger w/Shadow: -3 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: -3 Holy water: -3 Holy water w/Light: -3 Dark Crystal: 1 Tip on defeating: Refer to Crow Witch Malphas boss fight ( LoS 4-2 ) ................................................... Monster: Witch Child Size- Medium Difficulty- Medium Description- Crow Witch Malphas' kids. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: 1 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: -1 Fairy w/Light: 1 Holy water: 1 Holy water w/Light: 1 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: Stay far away from them and get a few quick hits in then fall back. Rinse and repeat. ................................................... Monster: Ghoul Size- Medium Difficulty- Low Description- Undead beings that can poison you. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: 1 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: 1 Fairy w/Light: 1 Holy water: 2 Holy water w/Light: 2 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: Grapple QTE, or when they start spawning out of the holes use holy cross on the hole and it will kill them all. ................................................... Monster: Vampire Warrior Size- Medium Difficulty- Medium Description- Vampires, Vampires oh my. FINALLY! Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: 1 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: -1 Fairy w/Light: 1 Holy water: 3 Holy water w/Light: 3 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: Holy water, Holy cross, Light magic in general crushes these foes. ................................................... Monster: Animated Armor Size- Big Difficulty- Medium Description- Magical Armor that serves the vampire dark lord. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -1 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: 1 Holy water: 1 Holy water w/Light: 1 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: Avoid his obvious set of attacks and pound on him with Direct attacks or Chainsaw. QTE to finish him. ................................................... Monster: Lieutenant Brauner Size- Big Difficulty- High Description- One of the Vampire Dark lords elite generals. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -1 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: -1 Holy water: 2 Holy water w/Light: 1 Dark Crystal: 2 Tip on defeating: Refer to Brauner boss fight ( LoS 6-1) ................................................... Monster: Skeleton Warrior Size- Medium Difficulty- Medium Description- Made by the human form of the Dark lord. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -3 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: -1 Fairy w/Light: 1 Holy water: 1 Holy water w/Light: 1 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: Fairies with light magic and holy water does the trick. Or Direct Attack combos and dodge. Remember to ground pound when they fall the first time or you will have to fight them all over again! ................................................... Monster: Mandragora Size- Small Difficulty- Low Description- Mandrake roots gone bad. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -1 Dagger w/Shadow: 2 Fairy: 1 Fairy w/Light: 1 Holy water: 2 Holy water w/Light: 2 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: Just hack and slash them they fall easily. ................................................... Monster: Evil Butcher (BOSS) Size- Big Difficulty- High Description- A fat butcher that has a hunger issue. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -2 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: 1 Holy water: 2 Holy water w/Light: 1 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: Refer to Evil Butcher boss fight ( LoS 6-4 ) ................................................... Monster: Mechanical Monstrosity (BOSS) Size- Big Difficulty- High Description- Dr Friedrich Von Frankensteins experiment into artificial life. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -2 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: 2 Holy water: 1 Holy water w/Light: 1 Dark Crystal: 2 Tip on defeating: Refer to Mechanical Monstrosity boss fight ( LoS 7-2 ) ................................................... Monster: Deadly Toys Size- Big Difficulty- Medium Description- Laura 'daughter' of the Vampire lords toys. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -1 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: 1 Holy water: 1 Holy water w/Light: 1 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: These guys can be tough especially in that tight room. Holy water and quick attacks and dodges ending with a QTE to finish them off works well. ................................................... Monster: Commander Olrox (BOSS) Size- Big Difficulty- High Description- Much tougher than Brauner and much quicker with the attacks. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -2 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: -1 Holy water: 2 Holy water w/Light: 1 Dark Crystal: 2 Tip on defeating: Refer to Olrox boss fight ( LoS 8-3 ) ................................................... Monster: Carmilla Size- Medium Difficulty- High Description- Dark lord of the Vampires, I'd let her bite me. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -3 Dagger w/Shadow: -3 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: -3 Holy water: -3 Holy water w/Light: 1 Dark Crystal: -3 Tip on defeating: Refer to Carmilla boss fight ( LoS 8-4 ) ................................................... Monster: Vampire Dark Lord Size- Big Difficulty- High Description- Carmilla's less attractive second form. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -2 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: -3 Holy water: 2 Holy water w/Light: 2 Dark Crystal: 2 Tip on defeating: Refer to Vampire Dark Lord boss fight ( LoS 8-4 ) ................................................... Monster: Headless Burrower Size- Medium Difficulty- Medium Description- Decapitated remains of the warriors from the Brotherhood. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: 1 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: 2 Holy water: 2 Holy water w/Light: 2 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: When you see red on the screen run! Otherwise Direct Attack Combo and Grapple QTE. ................................................... Monster: Scarecrow (BOSS) Size- Big Difficulty- High Description- Most badass scarecrow I've ever seen. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: 1 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: 1 Holy water: 2 Holy water w/Light: 1 Dark Crystal: 2 Tip on defeating: Refer to Scarecrow boss fight ( LoS 9-2 ) ................................................... Monster: Creeping Corpse Size- Medium Difficulty- Low Description- Creatures that roam around looking for coffins. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: 1 Dagger w/Shadow: 2 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: 2 Holy water: 2 Holy water w/Light: 2 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: Just hack and slash them, they die super fast. Or Grapple QTE. ................................................... Monster: Creeping Coffin Size- Big Difficulty- Medium Description- Creeping Corpses that jump into coffins making spider coffins. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -1 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: 2 Holy water: 2 Holy water w/Light: 2 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: 3-4 holy waters should daze them or Direct Attack combos or chainsaw. Then QTE to finish them off. ................................................... Monster: The Silver Warrior Size- Big Difficulty- High Description- Pan, once a god, now putting you on the right path for victory! Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -1 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: -3 Holy water: -3 Holy water w/Light: -3 Dark Crystal: 2 Tip on defeating: Refer to The Silver Warrior boss fight ( LoS 10-2 ) ................................................... Monster: Zombie Size- Medium Difficulty- Low Description- MMmmm Brains!! Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: 1 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: 2 Holy water: 2 Holy water w/Light: 2 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: Really just hack in slash them, they die in one hit. ................................................... Monster: Gravedigger (BOSS) Size- Big Difficulty- High Description- Keeper of the army of the Necromancers. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -2 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: -3 Holy water: 1 Holy water w/Light: 1 Dark Crystal: 2 Tip on defeating: Refer to Gravedigger boss fight ( LoS 10-4 ) ................................................... Monster: Reaper Size- Medium Difficulty- Medium Description- A corporeal manifestation of Death itself. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -3 Dagger w/Shadow: -3 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: -3 Holy water: 2 Holy water w/Light: 1 Dark Crystal: 3 Tip on defeating: They die pretty quickly but, STAY AWAY from them as its one hit and you die! Holy water and a couple of quick attacks from a distance should do.. ................................................... Monster: Necromancer (BOSS) Size- Medium Difficulty- High Description- They control the energy of the undead and reap havok on the living. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: 1 Dagger w/Shadow: 1 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: 2 Holy water: 1 Holy water w/Light: 1 Dark Crystal: 2 Tip on defeating: Refer to Necromancer boss fight ( LoS 11-1 ) ................................................... Monster: Dracholich Titan (BOSS) Size- Giant Difficulty- High Description- A huge dragonesc creature made of bones, made from all the deceased creatures and humans. Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -3 Dagger w/Shadow: -3 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: -3 Holy water: -3 Holy water w/Light: -3 Dark Crystal: 2 Tip on defeating: Refer to Dracholich Titan boss fight ( LoS 11-2 ) ................................................... Monster: SATAN (BOSS) Size- Medium Difficulty- High Description- The mastermind behind it all, Wearing the god mask this is your final challenge! Resistances & Weaknesses: Dagger: -3 Dagger w/Shadow: -3 Fairy: -3 Fairy w/Light: -3 Holy water: -3 Holy water w/Light: -3 Dark Crystal: -3 Tip on defeating: Refer to Satan boss fight ( LoS 12-1 ) ................................................... Monster List created by : Matthew Stroud - (email@example.com) Game Faqs Account - XxNuttaxX ============================================================================== \/ (LoS 6.0) \/ \/ Trophies \/ \/ \/ ======================================================================== Trophies in the order they appear on the PSN with brief descriptions on how to get them. Platinum - Receive all other trophies. The ultimate trophy, which you're bound to get last. Received when you have acquired every other trophy. Chapter I - Defeat the Ice Titan. Achieved by completing Chapter I. Chapter II - Get the Dark Gauntlet. Achieved by completing Chapter II. Chapter III - Acquire the power of the first Dark Lord. Achieved by completing Chapter III. Chapter IV - Kill the Crow Witch. Achieved by completing Chapter IV. Chapter V - Gain access to the Vampire Castle. Achieved by completing Chapter V. Chapter VI - Leave the Refectory with the Butcher's key. Achieved by completing Chapter VI. Chapter VII - Survive the encounter with Laura. Achieved by completing Chapter VII. Chapter VIII - Acquire the power of the second Dark Lord. Achieved by completing Chapter VIII. Chapter IX - persuade Baba Yaga to open a portal to the Necromancer area. Achieved by completing Chapter IX. Chapter X - Vanquish the Gravedigger. Achieved by completing Chapter X. Chapter XI - Acquire the power of the third Dark Lord. Achieved by completing Chapter XI. Chapter XII - Defeat Satan and save the world. Achieved by completing Chapter XII. Trials-Chapter I - Complete all the trials for Chapter I. Achieved by doing all the trials for Chapter I. Trials-Chapter II - Complete all the trials for Chapter II. Achieved by doing all the trials for Chapter II. Trials-Chapter III - Complete all the trials for Chapter III. Achieved by doing all the trials for Chapter III. Trials-Chapter IV - Complete all the trials for Chapter IV. Achieved by doing all the trials for Chapter IV. Trials-Chapter V - Complete all the trials for Chapter V. Achieved by doing all the trials for Chapter V. Trials-Chapter VI - Complete all the trials for Chapter VI. Achieved by doing all the trials for Chapter VI. Trials-Chapter VII - Complete all the trials for Chapter VII. Achieved by doing all the trials for Chapter VII. Trials-Chapter VIII - Complete all the trials for Chapter VIII. Achieved by doing all the trials for Chapter VIII. Trials-Chapter IX - Complete all the trials for Chapter IX. Achieved by doing all the trials for Chapter IX. Trials-Chapter X - Complete all the trials for Chapter X. Achieved by doing all the trials for Chapter X. Trials-Chapter XI - Complete all the trials for Chapter XI. Achieved by doing all the trials for Chapter XI. Trials-Chapter XII - Complete all the trials for Chapter XII. Achieved by doing all the trials for Chapter XII. Master achiever - Complete all the trials. Achieved by doing all the trials. Dark collector - Gather all the 30 Shadow gems. Follow the walkthrough to acquire all the gems. Light collector - Gather all the 30 Light gems. Follow the walkthrough to acquire all the gems. Green collector - Gather all the 30 Life gems. Follow the walkthrough to acquire all the gems. Master jeweler - Gather all hidden magic gems. Well, if you get the above three trophis, you get this one. Master philanthropis - Buy all the extra artwork. Go to the main menu and buy all the unlocked artwork under the extra's menu. If you're doing the game's trials, you'll have more than enough experience to spend. Skirmish - Finish all levels in Esquire difficulty. Achieved by finishing all the levels in squire difficulty or up. Gest - Finish all levels in Warrior difficulty. Achieved by finishing all the levels in warrior difficulty or up. Crusade - Finish all levels in Knight difficulty. Achieved by finishing all the levels in knight difficulty or up. Epic Victory - Finish all levels in Paladin difficulty. Achieved by finishing all the levels in paladin difficulty. Welcome to the Club - Buy a combo. No doubt the first trophy you will get. Simply buy a move! Brawler - Buy 15 combo's. Keep checking that move list and spending exp! You should get this somewhere around Chapter V or so. Master Fighter - Buy all combo's. Buy everything. This is spendy, as Ultimate Light/Shadow both cost 50,000 exp together. If you're doing the game's trials, this will come easy, If not, just grind exp until you can afford them. Experienced - Acquire 1000 experience points. You'll get this easily as you play the game. Seasoned - Acquire 20000 experience points. You'll get this one easily as well as you play the game. Veteran - Acquire 100000 experience points. You'll have to try for this one. If you're going for the trials, don't worry, you'll get it easily. If not, you're just going to have to go out and kill stuff. Master improver - Find all the secret Brotherhood arks. Follow the guide and you will get this one. You should get it after going back with your Seraph Shoulders, so after Chapter VIII. Eleventy party - Get 110% completion rate in all levels. You'll have to beat EVERYTHING as a paladin, acquire every item, and do every single trial. It's essentially, besides platinum, the ultimate trophey. ============================================================================== \/ (LoS 7.0) \/ \/ FAQ \/ \/ \/ ======================================================================== Q: Where's the US demo for this game, I can't find it!? A: To be frank, there is none. They only released the demo a week early for european customers. You can find it there if you make a european playstation account. A2: [Tip pointed out by Matt Kennedy] Xbox Live now has a demo available, if you have a gold membership. I personally don't have an Xbox, so there's no way I would have known. Thanks Matt. A3: I just confirmed PSN also has a demo. It seems that the US in gneral got a demo a week after the game came out. (Give or take, I wasn't STARING at the TV looking for one). Q: Where can I find [insert gem] ? A: Read the Section of the gem you want, since you already know where the gems you are missing are in the game, so just follow the walkthrough which should lead you to your gem. Q: How can I get [insert brotherhood ark] ? A: Read the Section of the ark you want, since you already know where the ark you are missing are in the game, so just follow the walkthrough which should lead you to your ark. Edit: Notice that I also tell you when you can go back and collect arks after you've acquired the required relics to do so. Q: What's (or where) is the best way to get extra experience? A: Now, here's an interesting question. You want somewhere with a steady supply of enemies that keep respawning over time, for sure. The ghouls in 5-2 aren't bad, I've heard. Here's a tip from Ralthor 125, regarding this very area: [TIP SUBMITTED BY: Ralthor 125 ] When you get to the Wygol Village (vampire level) you will be tasked to close the graves to keep the ghouls from continually spawning. They are worth 50 points apiece, but there is a way to get 100 for each (500 a round). Close the first two graves and smash through the wall at the back left corner for the neutral magic fountain. If you don't have it, you will want 6000 points to get Holy Cross (this is what you need to double the points from 50 to 100). If you continually farm the last grave when the 5 ghouls come out, you can make 500 points every 30 seconds or so (I did not really count this and I'm just making a guess here) [END TIP] Ergheiz Zero (Awesome name) also chips in: [TIP SUBMITTED BY: Ergheiz Zero ] Also, this is a place to get some experience as well. It is a bit challenging, though the payoff is rewarding. In 7-3 if you play the level on Squire and get to the Deadly Doll fight keep killing the dolls but do not grip finish them. They will respawn and they will grant 200 EXP per kill. [END TIP] ============================================================================== \/ (LoS 8.0) \/ \/ Credits and other ramblings \/ \/ \/ ======================================================================== [Walkthrough Help] These are the people that prove that a guide is built for gamers, by gamers. As a community we figure out everything there is to know. EmptyBlade for the topic on how to use magic effectively. Ergheiz Zero for the xp tip and making 6-3 clearer in how to get the life gem. Chop for his tip in 6-2. Daniel Weissenberger for his tip on the Pan Puzzle. Shou Ragnarock for his tip on dealing with the Black Knight. XxNuttaxX for helping me find a missing gem in 2-7 and the tip on the Olrox fight. HE ALSO PUT IN THE KICK-ASS MONSTER LIST SECTION. Big props. Moony Drak for correcting the ball dropping puzzle solution and pointing out a gem in 6-3, as well as a table of contents error. Scott, Jason Li, and Michael (Rom Rom) for the shadow gem tip in 4-2. Michael (Rom Rom), Kyle Gibson, and Jason Li for the gem in 6-3. Kyle Gibson for the shadow magic gem in 6-4. The Archer, for pointing out that you can get the brotherhood ark in 3-1 with the cyclone boots. Matt Davila for a tip with the trial on 2-1. Matt Kennedy for the Xbox demo date. Glenn Carangalan and Matthew Stroud for the advice on how to do the titan trials. Thnikaman for helping me out with the trials and even typing some of them up for me (since he did them). Gregory Peters for the Last Boss tip. Snake2410/Nick for the 12-1 trial tip. We oughta play RE5 agains someday man! Paul DiCocco for the first scroll in 2-3 and the path tip in 3-1. Don Crowner for the spider trial tip in 2-2. Martin Block for the tip in 5-2. BBDW86 for the Olrox tip. Ralthor 125 for the experience tip. Naraku2099 for the kick-ass trial tip in 10-2. Tygriss for the burrowers tip. Goalminer and Tygriss for the 5-5 trial tip. Goalminer for the 5-4 tip as well! He blew my time out of the water! Pablo Gutierrez/Angelbless for the awesome trial tip in 5-7. RVH1987 for the Pan fight tip. Zephadus for the tip in 2-6. Titan Trial tipsters: Mario Melendez, Glenn Carangalan, Nathaniel Hubert, Pablo Gutierrez, Michael Dowlin Spelling/Grammar: Joeseph Vissagi, PD18750, My wife, (and more to come, I'm sure). A few other's whose email I unfortunately lost. Gamefaqs Board in general, you guys had some interesting topics and debates. Gamefaqs FAQs board, for all the advice that they've given me: Games (Glacoras), Kratos51354, threetimes, vinheim, Devhatesyou, and oblivion from aoc. Thanks guys. [General] Konami for the wonderful franchise. You guys have given me so many wonderful Castlevania titles. Thank you! Mercurysteam for making such a wonderful game. And with much less staff than most A+ action titles. Bravo! My wife Lisa and daughter Sadie for putting up with me. It takes alot to write such a big guide! It takes even more when your married! ~Fin