When we left Albion the last time, our valiant heroes have just entered the 3D part of a dreaded dungeon called Drinno...
We lit a torch and advance.
Closed. Maybe in the second corridor.
Closed! Dammit.
Fortunately there's a button on the eastern wall.
Inside there's a switch that opens one of the gates. We come into a large room with a corridor to the north, a closed door and some fireworks:
We press all of the plates, which opens the door. Inside we find some crappy stuff. We move ahead, and bump into one of the fires
Shiii-eeet! Damn those fires.
Now being more careful, let's move north.
A typical fight here. I won't post all of them, most are just filler combat with warniaks like this. It doesn't mean it's too easy - just look at my hitpoints.
I won't post all the level-ups either, as it's not really interesting. Worth mentioning is Drirr getting a second attack sometime ago. He'll get his third (and unfortunately last) by level 18, he'll be a killing machine then.
Anyway, we come to a fountain. Let's fill our buckets with water, I'm absolutely sure they'll be needed.
Automap so far. The eastern corridor first.
Moooooore fire extuingishing! Our work opened a previously locked door:
PHAT L00T for our fire brigade
(the dagger is actually a cursed one)
Now the south-western part.
Don't worry, these are stationary.
Our spoils are better this time.
South-eastern...
This comfy table and stools, nothing more.
South-central (or whatever): a fire
A fight
And stairs down! level one finished.
We rest to heal a bit, and descend.
There's a floor plate before the hole. We must press it several times to create a passage through the green wall.
We enter a small room, inside:
another fountain,
two locked doors,
and a hole in the ground. We forgot to take a rope with us, so we must do it the hard way.
It wasn't too bad actually.
The door on the left leads us back upstairs...
... but we backtrack to one of those locked doors. Back downstairs,
We push the lever and this wall collapses:
leading us to a fight with a new creature: the Fear.
Fear's a tricky opponent. It's not very tough or heavy hitting, but it can cast spells. Mainly Boasting, which makes a party member run away in, well, Fear. One is not much of a problem, trouble starts when there are several of them.
And non-native humans aren't really magic-resistant, which makes sense.
At last, there's a key!
Now we can open the door between this level and the room with a fountain, and also the other door there.
That's how it looks now:
In the first chamber we find a chest protected by green walls, I couldn't find any way to disable them. Who cares, there're probably some cheap trinkets and a cursed weapon inside.
Further east, and then north, we bump into an action part!
[Agility]Passed.
Red wall protects us from a raving Animal (yes, with a capital A).
^ The eastern branch looks like this.
Another lever. And yes...
It all comes down to defeating that bastard.
Fortunately it's only Animal 1, but it's still a very hard fight. Animals are the fastest creatures in the game, its final tier's quicker than a fully boosted Sira with a Speed Amulet. And speed is the least of our worries, cause one of these can take down Tom or Drirr in one round. They're also quite resistant to magic. In short, I hate them with a passion (but honestly, designers took extra time to make many of Albion's creatures annoying).
Drirr's down.
The rest managed to take the beast down, fortunately. Time for level 3!
Red plate gives access to a small room with enemies and l00t. Green - to another big chamber.
There's at least a dozen of them. Remember what one did to us.
To advance further, we have to press all the green plates, while avoiding the red ones.
Moar plates, this time both lead us to some minor treasures.
I don't know. We should probably be careful. Who knows what we might unleash.
Well, it would be interesting to know what would happen. But we...
Exactly! Hold tight, the entire building is going to collapse over our heads!
with this remark, Drirr steps on one of the blue plates.
FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU-
Drirr! You'll destroy us all! Damn, keep your hasty fingers away from any switches until we all agree!
Oh, damn, that hurt! Yes, you may be right. I will try to pull myself together. Before you chew me out, let's find out how well we've all survived the landing.
we find yet another fountain in the western corner.
A stash of pickaxes shows us what we should expect on this level.
Further east, we find ourselves in a room with a red floorplate.
Gulp.
After a quite hard fight, we pull another lever,
and find a forcefield!
I'm beginning to doubt my sanity! This field does not appear to be of electrical origin and no other energy source can be detected. What in the world sustains it? This planet appears to have been created just to disturb the beliefs of physicists.
Let's find out what happens if we enter it!
Ouch.
A corridor opens, but it's blocked by another three or four fields.
Something isn't right. I poke around the dungeon for a while, and then find a collapsable wall.
That's better.
Back upstairs.
This time we descend using the door, for once.
More fiery surprises.
We explore the western part first.
We do some mining.
After some more mining, fire-extuingishing, and mining again, we find a button in a hidden chamber (I think I've lost some screens in between)
This button is really important. Why?
Cause this
gate can only be opened by this button or these three levers:
However, all three levers have a surprise inside: a MOTHERFUCKING ANIMAL THREE HIDDEN BEHIND!
It IS beatable, if I recall correctly I couldn't find the hidden button the last time I finished the game. It's just so fucking hard.
Anyway, we advance
West first, as always.
Pressing the plate gets us forcefield nullifiers (really important), but releases a real horde of enemies.
A grate is comfortably placed though.
We're slowly coming to the end here. Only some forcefields
some really neat stuff
here comes the last level!
It's really short. North we go,
fight against a horde of warniaks and a pair of fears
and reach a door.
There's that moron druid!
Bero, I think I can save myself the reprimand. You know what you have risked.
It was certainly a mistake to climb down to Drinno. However, I only regret having put Mellthas and his companions into danger because of my foolishness.
I would like to thank all of my rescuers again.
With which I would like to concur. Bero is quite often a pigheaded plague, but nonetheless I am happy to have him back with us in one piece.
Now, as I have understood, a, well... unusual incident has happened between Mellthas and oh... Sira?
Nemos, as you can guess we were quite surprised ourselves. We would like to continue this journey together.
Well, why not. I wish you much luck, Mellthas.
Not everyone here on Gratogel would understand the bond between human and Iskai and, so, perhaps it is better if you leave for a while.
Speaking of continuing the journey, Bero, I must ask you for a specific amulet which we were ordered to procure.
Of course, Tom. Please follow me into my work room.
At last, our quest for a Viagra(tm) Amulet comes to an end!
But there's one thing more: a choice for you to make!
In the next city, we can fill our ranks with one more adventurer!
Should it be:
a) A strong, valiant and couragous celtic warrior-princess?
b) a treacherous, shady Kenget mage with a pedo-beard?
The choice is yours!