Big deal

The Tower of Ordeals is the location for Chapter 23, a five-level section of the castle, with stone statues that come to life when the sections are entered. As the entire island is sailing over the ocean and won't reach its destination until I distract myself, I figure I'll accept the challenge.

This section is notable because it has fun, new music at the start of every Ordeal, and a symbol splashed on the screen to represent the various disciplines: defence, strength, intelligence, humanity and bravery. They might all say completely different things, or nothing at all, but I'm convinced they are what they say they are.

After each challenge a new piece of kit is given over: swords, shields, speed, that sort of thing. They'll all come in very handy in later battles.

The final challenge is to fight the General himself, and he is difficult (although as I learned near the end of the game, his second in command is even tougher).

After eventually succeeding and learning the new art of how to counter attacks, I head for the exit - only to be confronted by Calista's fiance. He seems really friendly and that immediately got me on edge - and he does two really nasty things: he poisons me via a handshake (final episode of 24 season 2, anyone?) and unleashes a stone Ogre on me. I have just 30 seconds to defeat it before I am overcome with a fatal case of Game Over.

Since I made it to the next chapter, I guess I did what was necessary - eventually. So many retries, but not the most - which I'll explain later.

It's like being inside a Rubik's Cube.

Chapter 22 is eventful. Lots to do - get up, swear allegiance to the Earl, make sure the public knows we're the saviours of radio one the entire kingdom, have an all-night party, visit the castle, discover the entire island can move by itself, discover secret passages, go to prison as a visitor, find the locking mechanism that keeps the island from moving.

It's the latter part that is the most fun.

Being told about the secret staircase means I can travel deeper than the prison and find a mysterious portal that leads to some kind of other dimension - which in actuality is about half a mile to the left of the castle.

Once inside, there is a Rubik's Cube-like structure with doors and stairs high above us and along the walls, but only by standing on a central platform can the entire structure turn and become accessible.

How my eyes deceived me when the room started turning - like one of those standing cinema experiences. I felt I was falling - but it didn't work for me the next three times I tried it.

Every time a new door becomes accessible, I needed to go through it and attack a shadowy creature that would become solid when I used the gathering. There were servants that were there to make sure I couldn't reach him, and each had different abilities - archers, poisoning the floor, attacking with swords, that sort of thing.

Eventually I reach a summoning floor and decide to level up Mirania - make her catch up the ten levels she missed by not being included in our big battles - and from now on she'll be uncatchable, levelling up before anyone else.

Finally I reach a strange possessing snake, taking control of my party and forcing me to fight them at the same time as the snake - but I can't seem to damage the snake. After a good ten minutes of not-sure-what's-going-on fighting, he withers and dies, leaving me with a hexagonal stone to stand on. Activating the gathering makes the floor power up and the island - the castle and the town - sets sail for a collision with the Gurak on the other side of the ocean.

Quick pint at the Shadow and Sixpence

Off to the pub for chapter 21. I was led to this particular pub has a shadowy figure wearing a hoodie, and he has a menacingly gravelly voice to complete the outfit.

When I confront him at the bar, asking him to turn around and take us to a missing girl, the entire population of the pub descend on us. Making short work of them, we head upstairs. We find a whole complex of well-defended rooms and enemy mages and crossbow operators all designed to slow us down.

Working our way up to a Locked and Sealed room, I commence a rather daring crawl along the outside of the building and through the window. Frenetic battle ensues and I have to focus on attack, defence and opening the door to let my companions in.

With all that cleared up the only thing I have to do is leave the building with the freed child.

Unfortunately, a giant shadowy figure takes up the generous floor area of the bar's lounge. It can't be harmed, it causes confusion and takes over the minds of my party. 

After a gruelling fight I stumble on a lighted coal stand and knocking it over causes the big bad to turn vulnerable. Now I've mastered this trick, every time he turns shadowy I light him up. Then, with his hissing, fizzing form disappearing back to the basement, we leave the bar and return the daughter to her father. Rescuers II, monsters 0.

Luigi's Mansion

Chapter 20 is a wonderful haunted mansion - much like my favourite Luigi's Mansion game. Dropping chandeliers, locking doors, dogs jumping into the mansion grounds - they're all here. All my team get dragged off, one at a time, into dark metallic mirrors by skeletons and there's nothing I can do to rescue them.

In my lonely explorations I discover ghosts of people who once lived in the house. Some are angry, some sad. One small, ghostly boy never seems to notice I'm there, but I think he does secretly.

I eventually stumble on an outdoor area with stone coffins. Opening the coffins causes explosions to go off in my face. After lots of wrong guesses, I find my party very much alive and we go to find a key to open an area with a big bad in it.

The big bad is a vampire, who can be powered-down by firing silver arrows, left for me in handy bundles by the small ghostly boy. Once he turns dark and powerless, we can perform a combo and cause him to melt away (although he'll be back beneath the castle later - and back in the mansion as soon as we leave)

We discover the weapons expert's wife is the valuable item he has lost, and we recover her. Quite how she puts up with the weapons expert cum explorer of catacombs, we'll never know. 

Now famed for our rescuing ability, we head off to do more rescuing. We could be called The Rescuers, except we're not mice.

Prison Break

Having scraped and scraped with the plastic spoon we reach a massive system of tombs under the castle (which isn't the last of the surprising things we discover reside under the castle) and plenty of monsters live there.


Apparently, almost everything I look at explodes in my face - something that occurs with greater regularity in the next chapter. Taking with us an expert in weapons upgrades and exploring unusual shapes in the rocks, we being to get lost through chapter 19 in a series of mini treasure rooms and massive halls.


Battling a giant spider, some regenerating skeletons, and a recurring necromancer menace, the prison break leads us to an ice-covered door. Fortunately, there's a sunstone we can use to open the passage. Unfortunately, it opens to a room with a sheer cliff-face of ice, and we have no way of getting out.


Reluctantly, we shuffle off to the gaol again. Fortunately, Count Arganon himself has interceded in my trial and I am set free. Calista's fiance is humiliated in court and exposed as a liar.


After a meeting with Count Arganon, I discover I will be offered the chance to swear allegiance, become a knight and be offered Calista's hand in marriage. Now, that's quite a turn around. Everything is less muddy and more optimistic.


The weapons expert has told us that he's lost something valuable in a mansion - and we speed over there with our new-found confidence to bust some ghosts.

Bars (Iron) Brouhaha

We're all locked up in chapter 18, but I'm the one in trouble because I like Calista - so her fiancé is doing everything he can to have me executed. That will definitely sort out his suitor problem.


Dagran has been released immediately and it's never really explained why or where he's going. Off he goes nonetheless.


In what appears to be a scene from the original Star Trek - but not the scenes with polystyrene rocks on a sound stage - I'm on trial. I choose to remain silent and receive several beatings before being thrown back into gaol.


Mirania heals me (because that's her specialism) and I speak to all the other inmates. One of them has lost something valuable to him in a mansion in the city (which we'll cover later), and is currently digging a hole with a plastic teaspoon and we agree to help.


Before long, we've dropped into a catacomb, huge, undisturbed and far beneath the city. Now I can experience some tomb raider fun.

Homeward Bound

On our return leg I can delay our imminent docking indefinitely by wandering around the ship buying, trading, assessing my weapons, upgrading, talking, selling, exploring. Chapter 17 is much like chapter 12 in that respect.


When I discover Calista, she is crying and we talk about how she wants to travel the world with us. Given we glow bright white when we're together, I think it would be lovely, but I say I'll talk to the mercenaries before I make any firm plans.


Before we arrive we're all discuss taking Calista away from the castle (and her impending wedding) but most of my band are against the idea on the grounds we will be fugitives. We collectively decide the best thing is to return her to the castle.


When we dock, Calista is taken away and we charged with kidnapping the princess by her fiancé and are slung into prison. We find our comrades that stayed behind. They've been put in prison for no good reason.