Dungeon Siege: Return to Arhok (Complete Playthrough) - Part 6 of 6 - Return to Arhok

Dungeon Siege: Return to Arhok (Complete Playthrough)

Part 6 of 6 - Return to Arhok 

Gameplay Notes:

This part is completely unnecessary, since all you can do after saving the king is to return to Arhok and to be thanked by NPCs. So, this video is just a long backtracking. But still, I decided to include it too. This Bonus Pack called Return to Arhok after all...

Dungeon Siege: Return to Arhok (Complete Playthrough) - Part 5 of 6 - The Dungeon

Dungeon Siege: Return to Arhok (Complete Playthrough)Part 5 of 6 - The Dungeon

 Gameplay Notes:

Dungeon is your final destination in Return to Arhok. You need to save the king by killing a monster, because king won’t want to escape while beast is still alive. Even though the one can easily walk through the bars of his cell (reminds me of «idspispopd» cheat from FPS game that everybody knows). He’s pretty stubborn this king… The actual playthrough ends here, there’s no ending, credits or even «the end» message like in Yesterhaven campaign. All you can do after saving the king is to… Return to Arhok.

Dungeon Siege: Return to Arhok (Complete Playthrough) - Part 4 of 6 - The Temple

Dungeon Siege: Return to Arhok (Complete Playthrough)
Part 4 of 6 - The Temple

Gameplay Notes:

This Temple is just a generic Dungeon Siege dungeon («Dungeon Siege dungeon» sounds horrible, but you got the idea) with nothing special in it. Just some rooms to explore and some monsters to kill. All you need to do is to find and kill Rowan (damn traitor...) and then go down to the Dungeon.

Dungeon Siege: Return to Arhok (Complete Playthrough) - Part 3 of 6 - The Jungle

Dungeon Siege: Return to Arhok (Complete Playthrough)

Part 3 of 6 - The Jungle

Gameplay Notes:

All we need to do in Jungle is to reach the Temple. It’ll be nice idea to level-up our skills a little though. Yet again, no need for that on easy difficulty, but you may want to explore Jungle thoroughly on hard. Also, you can find some better equipment in the chests that’s hidden all around. I won’t pay much attention to all of them though. My companion will die during this video, but whatever, I never liked him.

Dungeon Siege: Return to Arhok (Complete Playthrough) - Part 2 of 6 - Town Surroundings

Dungeon Siege: Return to Arhok (Complete Playthrough)
Part 2 of 6 - Town Surroundings

In this chapter we'll learn about the source of the evil and will get a companion. Unlike the normal party members though, our new friend can't be equipped properly and won't level-up with us. He can be very useful on high difficulty, but on easy one you shouldn't care about him much.

Dungeon Siege: Legends of Aranna - Return to Arhok (Complete Playthrough) - Part 1 of 6 - The Town of Arhok

Quick playthrough of the free official Bonus Pack to Dungeon Siege: Legends of Aranna - Return to Arhok. This Bonus Pack is officially free and can be downloaded anytime from the official Legends of Aranna website.

The story of Return to Arhok starts soon after the end of Legends of Aranna. Your avatar should return to the world and save the town of Arhok once again. The whole bonus pack is pretty short though (much shorter than Yesterhaven campaign from Bonus Pack to the original Dungeon Siege) and you can fully complete it in a few minutes.

Return to Arhok also known as XP level and requires both original Legends of Aranna and Windows XP to play («Want to play it? Buy our new OS!» Microsoft well known for such a moves). Also, unlike Bonus Pack to the original Dungeon Siege, Return to Arhok should played in a single player mode.

Part 1 of 6: The Town of Arhok

Gameplay Notes:

We start in Arhok as our old avatar, but he / she lost all his / her powers. There’s not much places for us in Return to Arhokto level-up, so, we supposed to use one of the magical scrolls to get some experience from very beginning. There’s no characters to invite to your party, there’s no backpacks, there’s no mules, etc. The only thing you can do in the town is to buy yourself some cheap equipment.

Technical Notes:

Easy difficulty. Just because I’ve used my old PC to record this videos and there wasn’t enough free space on my HDD to record a long battles. No need for high difficulty here anyway, since Return to Arhok is pretty straightforward and it won't let you to show your skill anyway. Moreover, it won't be fun to watch on Hard, since there's no shops on the way and useless backtracking will be boring to watch. Therefore - quick run on Easy.

Ečstatica: A State of Mind - Bad Ending (Male)

Ečstatica: A State of Mind - Bad Ending (Male)

Male version of the bad ending of the game. All you need to do is give up the relic (same way you drop the items from your hands). You won’t need to fight with Demon this way, but, well, it’s a bad ending.

P.S. To be continued in Leisure Suit Larry: Love for Sail!

Ečstatica: A State of Mind (Male Playthrough) Part 4of4: The Lord Demon

Ečstatica: A State of Mind (Male Playthrough)

Part 4of4: The Lord Demon

Our unlucky hero has suffered through many things. But it looks like his unlucky journey is near its end. Now he only needs to make himself a better weapon, find proper armor, get the dead King’s blessing and enter the Demon’s chamber to fight him and save Ečstatica. Will the luck finally turn to him, or will he die, killed by many deadly traps in the dungeon? Watch the final video and find out!

Things covered in the video:

• Entering the castle’s dungeon

• Learning about the Demon

• Finding the magic book

• Making a magic weapon

• Fighting the Lord Demon

• Leaving the Tirich village with Ečstatica

Ečstatica: A State of Mind (Male Playthrough) - Part 3of4: The Holy Relic

Ečstatica: A State of Mind (Male Playthrough)
Part 3of4: The Holy Relic

Our hero became The Knight of Tirich, so, now he can enter the castle without fear of being transformed into a frog again. But guess what - that Lady of the Lake has taken his sword, so, he has no weapon anymore. He can get his old rusty sword back, but it looks like in the castle there is some sort of recipe for a better weapon. Let’s try to make it. It won’t be easy though, since both parts that he’ll need are well hidden. First, let’s pay a visit to the arrogant pope in the monastery and steal a holy relic from him…

Things covered in the video:

• Entering the castle
• Finding a recipe for a magic weapon• Entering the monastery• Reading the books in the library• Stealing the holy relic

Ečstatica: A State of Mind (Male Playthrough) - Part 2of4: The Knight of Tirich

Ečstatica: A State of Mind (Male Playthrough)
Part 2of4: The Knight of Tirich

Our hero has survived. Believe it or not. And now looks like it's time to make himself a magic potion - the only thing that can lead him to a Golden Sword. But our hero still has an incredibly bad luck and the werewolf is still after him, so, it won’t be easy. Maybe the legendary Lady of the Lake will bring him a better luck if he gives her his Golden Sword. But before that, he’ll need to suffer through the Green Misery…

Things covered in the video:

• Making a magic potion
• Getting the Golden Sword• The Green Misery (ribbit)• Becoming a Knight of Tirich

Ečstatica: A State of Mind (Male Playthrough) - Part 1of4: Angry Werewolf

You can call me crazy, but I just can’t miss a chance to upload the male playthrough of Ečstatica: A State of Mind. So, here he is, a dork with a pony tail who’ll soon become a noble knight and will fight the Lord Demon himself! This playthrough is different though. Well, every playthrough in this game is different, because the whole game is like a pack of random monster encounters, but that’s not what I’m talking about. This playthrough is so-o-o unsuccessful that it’s nearly laughable (very depressive…). It looks like that werewolf is mad at me because of my previous playthrough and now he takes it personally and wants to kill me no matter what. It looks like he’s everywhere! No matter where I’ll go, there’ll be the werewolf. It’s like someone turned on the hard mode (there’s no difficulty selector in this game, it’s a joke). So, there’ll be some ridiculous scenes and ridiculous fights in this playthrough. If you just want to see a walkthrough, check out my female playthrough here. It’s more movie-like. This playthrpugh is all about crazy situations.

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Ečstatica: A State of Mind (Male Playthrough)
Part 1of4: Angry Werewolf

Watch our hero arrive at the Tirich village, which is now flooded with monsters. The bridge through the gulf that leads to the village has collapsed, so, our hero has no choice but to discover the source of all this mess. There’s a strange little girl there who wants her Teddy Bear, but there’s also an angry werewolf who wants our hero dead. Run, run, hero! We need you alive, since you're the only one who can save Tirich!

Things covered in the video:

• Exploring the Tirich village• Finding Teddy Bear• First look at Ečstatica• Many various unfortunate events

Ečstatica: A State of Mind - Bad Ending (Female)

Ečstatica: A State of Mind – Bad Ending (Female)

Female version of the bad ending of the game. All you need to do is give up the relic (same way you drop the items from your hands). You won’t need to fight with Demon this way, but, well, it’s a bad ending.

Ečstatica: A State of Mind - Bug: No One Can Kill the King!

Ečstatica: A State of Mind - Bug:
No One Can Kill the King!

I’m not sure if this bug is present in all versions of the game, but it is in my version (Argentum Collection official CD re-release). As you can see in this video, the problem is, when you try attacking the King, the game crashes with an error. Well, it looks like you can’t kill the King, baby!

I’ve edited the video a bit to make it look funnier.

I mean, if we imagine that the King in the game is the King, it’ll explain everything.

Ečstatica: A State of Mind – Bug: Female character vs. Male character

Ečstatica: A State of Mind – Bug:
Female character vs. Male character

From today on, I’ll start showing you various bugs in the games. I’m not a bug maniac and I have only a few of them recorded, but I’ll try to show you something interesting.

In this part of Ečstatica: A State of Mind, our hero was supposed to meet her doppelganger, but sometimes if you flee and return to fight later, there may be a different character. For example, in this video, my female character will fight the male character of the game. The bug is very annoying and won’t disappear even if you load your saved game file and try again.

I’ve edited the video a bit to make it look a little funnier.
Didn’t know that this cute little girl was that evil, huh?

Ečstatica: A State of Mind (Female Playthrough) - Part 4of4: The Final Battle

Ecstatica: A State of Mind (Female Playthrough)

Part 4of4: The Final Battle

She was close... Our hero was very close to the core of all the problems - the powerful Lord Demon. But it won't be easy to fight him. She needs a better weapon, an armor and King's blessing to enter the Lord Demon's room. Will she be able to get all of these or will she die as did many others who visited Tirich before her?

In this chapter, it's time for our hero to meet her enemy - the evil Lord Demon who'll try to buy her through promise of a better life. But there's no way it'll work! Remember Ečstatica's diary? You can't trust him! It's time for you to die, Lord Demon!

Gameplay note: The dungeon is the hardest part of the game. Well, it's not that hard, it's pretty easy actually, most of the time you'll just need to dodge at the right moment, but be very careful on the stairs. There are deadly traps in the middle parts. If you step on them, you'll be killed immediately. There are two different techniques to avoid the traps: you can walk ve-e-ery slowly by ve-e-ery corner of the middle parts of the stairs, or you can make your character look in a very specific direction that'll allow you to run through the whole staircase without staying even half a second on the middle part and make a quick dash. I'll show you both techniques in my videos, but let's start with the quick one. Actually, it's my favorite.

Note that you can easily kill most of the enemies in the game with your new weapon. Even that red minotaur will be a piece of cake for you. But it's better not to try leaving through the lake. Why? Well, there's a chance that you'll be ambushed by red minotaur and there's a cliff there, so, he'll be able to kill you immediately, without any fight.

There are actually two endings in this game. You can make a deal with the evil one, but honestly, I don't like that ending. I'm a good guy, my D&D characters are always NG (Neutral Good), so, let's fight the Demon and get rid of him for good.

The final battle is surprisingly easy by the way; you can just stay still and tap any of the attack buttons continuously. He won't deal you that much damage when you have a new armor even if he'll hit you several times. Don't be afraid. I won't take any damage from him in this video. 

If you want to know how the bad ending looks though,

I'll show it to you a little later.

Also, note that there's no different scene for the female character when she awakens Ečstatica, there'll always be a big hug. You can take it as you like, but who need a male character when there are two girls on the horse anyway?

Technical note: Do not try to attack the King. My version (which is Argentum Collection official CD re-release) always crashes with an error when I try to do so.

P.S. How did our hero get to the horse if there's still no bridge?

IT'S A SECRET!

Enjoy the good ending of the game.

I hope you'll like the video. CYA!

Ečstatica: A State of Mind (Female Playthrough) - Part 3of4: The Green Misery

Ečstatica: A State of Mind (Female Playthrough)
Part 3of4: The Green Misery

Life isn’t easy for our hero. She has no magical talents, but now it’s all about magic for her. Thought it was bad enough for her to turn into a ferret? Think again, because now she’s a frog! But don’t be afraid! The Lady of the Lake will help her, so, soon she’ll become a valiant Knight of the Tirich!

In this chapter, our hero will be turned into a frog by the wizard who won’t allow anyone but  Knight of the Tirich to pass to the castle, will be turned back human by a very… em… eccentric witch, and will finally become Knight of the Tirich. Also, our hero will make a visit to a monastery to steal the holy relic. Well, not the best thing for a noble knight to do, but that pope doesn’t looks like a good person anyway. Remember how they didn’t open the door for our hero previously when she asked for it? Well, it’s our time to laugh. Let’s use their library a little though and learn one or two interesting things there.

Gameplay note: There’s no need to turn yourself into a frog. It’s just very funny, so, I decided to show it to you. But be careful if you decide to try it by yourself. Save before you try, because if there’ll be minotaur nearby, he’ll most likely kill you. Just because minotaurs (both of them, but especially the red one) are very fast and a frog is very slow and can’t attack or dodge properly.

Ečstatica: A State of Mind (Female Playthrough) - Part 2of4: The Magical Potion

Ečstatica: A State of Mind (Female Playthrough)

Part 2of4: The Magical Potion

It was hard to escape the monsters’ claws for our hero. Actually, it was pure luck for her to survive. But new task is even bigger – there’s no more bridge to get to her horse and escape the cursed place, so, she needs to think of something. Maybe it’s a good idea to understand what exactly happened here…

In this chapter our hero will learn the story of Ečstatica, the young lady who made a mistake that caused all this bloody hell, and make a magical potion via her recipe. Why? Well, find out by watching the video.

Gameplay notes: Note  that there’s no need to fight that table. The only reason to do so in the game is to get yourself a knife in the early part of the story. But since it’s much easier to get yourself a sword (which is obviously a much better weapon), you can skip this part. I just like the guy.

Ečstatica: A State of Mind (Female Playthrough) Part 1of4: The Girl and Her Teddy Bear

Ečstatica: A State of Mind is one of my favorite survival horror games for DOS. Even though the term «survival horror» wasn’t there at that time (this game was released in 1994). The first survival horror (let’s stay with this term, OK?) I’ve played on my old DOS machine was Alone in the Dark and I’ve played the whole classical trilogy before I got myself Ečstatica: A State of Mind, but it was love at first sight for me. This game is absolutely unique, so, if you like the genre, don’t you dare miss it! It was developed by Andrew Spencer Studios (if you haven’t heard about them, it’s OK, since they’ve developed only Ečstatica and the sequel to it) and it uses very interesting ellipsoid graphics, which look absolutely awesome (Next to polygon-based games that were very angular back then, Ečstatica looks incredibly great). Like in Alone in the Dark series, the game has deep atmosphere (even though there are some humor elements in it), but unlike Alone in the Dark, it’s completely random. Everything in the game is random. So, every new playthrough will be different. The goals will stay the same, but you’ll never be able to know where and when monsters will attack you. And that’s why I love it that much. It’s like real experience. As a nameless male or female traveler, you’ve arrived at the village to get yourself some water, but the bridge that leads to the village has collapsed and now… Now it’s all about surviving for you. The monsters will hunt you in real time, so, you’ll need to hide, run, or fight for your life.

Gameplay notes: Here’s my complete playthrough of this amazing game. I wasn’t after complete longplay (it’s not possible anyway, since, as I’ve said, many things in this game are random and it’s impossible to show everything in a single playthrough), but I tried to show you the most interesting stuff. I tried to make these videos interesting to watch, so, yes, I’ll turn myself into a frog without any reason to do so, etc. I hope you’ll like the videos. Also, note that it’s a no-deaths playthrough; there are many funny scenes when you get yourself killed, so, if you decide to play the game by yourself, save often and die from time to time – there are many things to see.

Technical notes: Sound may glitch on me from time to time (sound is the biggest technical problem in this game: it won’t work at all if you try to run this game from Windows 95 or higher; the only way to get it to work is to run this game from DOS). Not a big deal, it’ll be OK most of the time, but still, I thought I'd mention this.

Also, as you can see, I decided to play as a female character. First of all, I love her very much and play as a female character every time I want to replay the game. Also, most video playthroughs of this game include a male character. So, I decided that the female one deserves more attention.

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Ečstatica: A State of Mind (Female Playthrough)

Part 1of4: The Girl and Her Teddy Bear

Welcome to Tirich, a peaceful village with friendly people! But wait… Something is terribly wrong here… The smell of dead bodies everywhere and that silence… Let’s take our first steps into the frightening unknown and learn about the destiny of Tirich.

In this chapter, our hero will meet the strange girl who isn't afraid of werewolves and wants to find her Teddy Bear at any cost.

Gameplay notes: Let me remind you that all monster encounters in this game are completely random. You have two kinds of attack and you can dodge, but it may be much smarter to run most of the time. The monsters won’t let you have a second chance and that werewolf is impossible to kill at all, so, don’t be ashamed to run where you can. Monsters will follow you in real time though, so, try to hide somewhere, or make a circle run to get rid of them. The first thing you need to learn in this game is how to survive in any type of encounter. And you’ll absolutely need to know the village for it. So, try to remember the paths.

The girl in the dungeon is Ečstatica herself. You don’t need to visit her in this part of the game, but since this chapter is all about her, I’ve decided to show her to you. Our hero will feel a very strong presence of the dark powers there, so, she’ll escape.