Yeah, it's great you can even upgrade your bag. I think mine right now can hold 50 items. And it's easy enough to drop off excess items into the trunk that you won't be needing for the moment (but want to hold on to for material building, just in case).

I've started the 4th tower, Crimson Keep, and the game's difficulty just took a sharp turn upward! Some of the enemies here are much more powerful than ever and can kill me rather quickly, while at the same time, I find my attacks are not doing much damage. I did find a shortcut already (dropping ladders from an upper floor so I can easily make my way back up) which encourages me to leave the tower so I can replenish supplies, give Elena the flesh she needs, sell stuff, etc. I have a new weapon at my disposal but haven't been able to upgrade it yet due to lack of necessary materials (and I can buy them, but they're expensive). I have my eyes on buying that book that is supposed to enhance my battle readiness, but its 5,000 price is high.

Is it just me or does this game have a Castlevania feel to it? Partly because of the level art design and the use of the chain as a weapon and tool. It's pretty awesome once you get accustomed to your entire move set, especially how you can target specific locations of an enemy's body with the chain. Oh yeah, @r_hjort mentioned Pandora's Tower resemblance to Castlevania. Along with other games that Pandora's Tower seems to borrow from.

I'm still intrigued by the story, too. Very cool stuff. I just want to have more free time so I can keep playing!

@roykoopa64

You're not just kidding about the difficulty spike in Crimson Keep, and its pretty much IMMEDIATE! Maybe a "flesh going spare" run might be necessary to get the 5G together, and CK seems like a good place to get some quality pieces of meat.

Ooooh, I'm so happy that you guys are playing this game!

If you're strapped for cash, getting quality flesh is a good method where you're at, but you could also craft items and materials from common stuff that you might come across while you're whipping up some monsters for flesh. You could also go hunting for the more rare materials that only appear every so often under special conditions, but you might want to hold on to those for future crafting purposes.

From what I remember, there are some good spots for getting money in certain ways later in the game, but that might be quite a bit later, I think.

Awesome, I finished the 5th tower!

Wow, sometimes it's kind of tricky figuring out what to do. In the 5th tower, Ironclad Turret, I was going along and destroying that 'gunk' holding the pistons in place. I broke all the chains to open the master door, but I just couldn't figure out how to get to the master door. However, I finally realized there's one small location where I'm supposed to make a small jump! After that, I just made my way up the large chamber to the top!

I love fighting these masters. This one in particular took a little bit of figuring out, but I remembered the notes I picked up about how he overheats. Then I got it!

Whoa, I can now pick any of the next five towers?

So I go to tower 6, Arcadian Tower. Enemies really do keep getting tougher. I've been doing well upgrading my sword (just got it to level 3). My other weapons, Twinblades and Military Scythe, are not quite level 2 yet.

I was fortunate enough to find that 5,000 price item while in the tower! That saved me a lot of cash, and I bought some more gifts for Elena.

Is there a way to know if you already bought an item that won't be useful if you get another? I don't want to buy the same gift for Elena I bought before, but I don't remember which ones I already gave her. And they can be quite expensive.

@r_hjort

We're all happy!

@roykoopa64
I don't think there's any way of telling if you've already bought a certain item, beyond looking around the observatory to see what Elena has decorated with, or is wearing. Unfortunately I can't remember if the last item of any given type is the only thing she'll use, or if she changes things up depending on her mood, every so often.

@r_hjort

That's cool. One thing I need to watch out for is not letting Elena start to transform too much, because once she does, all that nice clothing and jewelry she's wearing becomes 'broken,' and the cost of repair is high! There's no way I would not repair that stuff, she deserves it!

I've completed 7 towers now! At this point I'm doing them in order and will head to Tower 8, Torrent Peak, next.

It seems some of the towers look very similar, or at least have the same theme. For example, Rockshard Rampart had the crsytals and ore like that other mine tower. And now Torrent Peak has the water theme going for it, like the other water themed level with the waterwheel.

Each boss battle is unique, challenging, and very involved! They're fantastic. On Rockshard Rampart I fought that four legged crystal creature. I had to find a way to chain up its legs and reach its back to go for the flesh. I could slow the master down by chaining its weak spots on the legs to delay him from climbing the walls and shaking me off. It's important to have plenty of time saved up for the boss, it seems!

The checkpoint system definitely makes things easier, for sure.

Sunday will be a busy day for me; not sure I will be able to play as much, but I'm grateful for the time I spent with the game this Saturday.

@roykoopa64
They break?! HA! I didn't know that! That's pretty awesome. Getting back home too late, finding Elena in the cellar scarred me enough to have me make sure she wouldn't transform too much when I was away.

There are sort of mythological reasons for the towers sharing themes, or however I should put it. At first I thought it was a pity, but after exploring them a bit more I started to warm up to the idea. Or maybe that's just Stockholm Syndrome. But yeah, the boss fights are awesome. The newer 3D Zeldas could learn a thing or two from Pandora's Tower, I think.

So last night was a little frustrating as my game had several freezes.

First freeze happened about 10 minutes into the game when I went to talk to Mavda.

I reset the Wii by holding the power button until the light turned red, then I turned the system back on.

The next freeze occurred when I selected Tower 9 (Blazing Citadel) from the tower select screen. The game froze as soon as the loading screen came up after I made my tower selection.

I reset the Wii and tried playing again, and the game froze at the exact same spot!

So I looked online, and apparently there is a known bug with the game, but this well-known bug has to do with towers 11-13. I'm not the only one who had a problem with Tower 9 loading, though, as this GameFAQs thread shows.

So based on what I read, I figured I would try selecting the other tower available to me, Tower 10 (Truegold Tower), and I had no problems. I then backed out of that level, and tried going to Tower 9 again, and this time I had no issues!

I wasn't actually able to play much though, it was getting late.

I really hope I don't run into any more problems.

@roykoopa64
Well, that sucks. I never encountered anything like that, but I suppose this could be an issue with the US print. At least it isn't game breaking and/or save corrupting.

@r_hjort

Yeah, maybe it has something to do with the US print.

And now... I've run into game freezing again! I'm at the point where I can select either Tower 11 or 12. Any time I try to go to Tower 11, the game freezes on the loading screen, just as I described in my previous post.

If I reset the Wii and try again, it freezes at the exact same moment.

I am able to go to Tower 12 without a problem. Maybe I'll just play that tower for now, and worry about how I'm going to get into Tower 11 later?

A quick online search shows this to be a fairly widespread problem (here's a GameFAQs thread), and there's really no good way around it. People have come up with different solutions, and it seems there's some luck involved whether the game will freeze or not.

I'm still trying to figure it out myself.

Yeah, it's true that this isn't a save corrupting bug or something like that. I just hope I will be able to finish the game; I believe I'm getting closer to the end now.

Ugh. And this is such an awesome game too.

I beat the game!

26 hr 34 min.
72%

My weapon of choice was probably the TwinBlades.
I was at level 39. I have no idea if I was overpowered or not, but I didn't feel underpowered.

Yes, this game has multiple endings, and it looks like I got the best ending! (Ending S). Apparently it all has to do with how good you build up the relationship between Aeron and Elena, so I must have made sure she really likes me.

The final boss was a bit of a chore, and one of her attacks was quite difficult to figure out to how counter (when she creates a vacuum effect then unleashes a large, powerful energy beam).

Overall this game is very satisfying. Sure there were a few flaws: with just a bit of roughness in some of the textures, as well as music that starts to get a bit repetitive from one tower to the next. Yet the game was challenging (not the combat so much but just navigating the towers, especially with the time limit of having to go back to feed Elena every so often). Boss battles were always fun!

Oh, I did think that Tower 11/ 12 were a bit... cheap? with the way they handled the invisible vortexes. How was I supposed to figure out where those hidden vortexes were??? I know it gives you some clues but you only have a limited number of light and dark stones, so it's not like I can keep trying them out in a lot of different locations. I must say, towers 11 and 12 (dusk and dawn) were really cool in the way they linked to each other and made navigating them very challenging.

The thing that infuriated me the most is the consistent game freezing problem I mentioned previously, whenever I would try to enter Tower 11 or 12. I think I found a way around it, finally. I'm so glad that with Wii U, these kinds of things can get patched if they ever arise.

I had planned to write a review, but I'm having trouble getting started writing it. I will put it off for now and see if I'm in the writing mood later on.

EDIT: OK, I've started putting my thoughts down for the game, but it's all still very unorganized.

EDIT2: Review posted! See OP of this thread.

I've just started playing it for Retroactive. I haven't even reached the first boss yet, I think I had to save just before it (I broke the chain blocking some door) and go to work.

The gameplay sure is interesting, and I'm digging the reports lying around that I've read. The story is more intriguing than I expected.

@Guillaume
I approve! It's one of those stories that grow on you more than you might expect. I like the whole mythos and game world quite a bit.

Very impressive so far.

Guillaume said:

I've just started playing it for Retroactive. I haven't even reached the first boss yet, I think I had to save just before it (I broke the chain blocking some door) and go to work.

The gameplay sure is interesting, and I'm digging the reports lying around that I've read. The story is more intriguing than I expected.

You're going to approve of this game by the time you're a little further in. I guarantee it.

My copy came in on Saturday and I have only put in a couple of hours so far. But so far I like it the set up and the gameplay seems interesting.

Combat has lots of nice options.

Thanks to a crazy, crazy busy summer (and Pikmin 3), I've had to step away from the game for a while, but now I'm back and I've just beaten my favorite boss so far, the boss of the Ironclad Fortress. (The one that has to let out heat).

This game is pretty damn incredible. I'm struck by how straightforward the towers are even when it doesn't seem they should be. I'm never really lost, the path I'm on always seems to be the right one. Yet the game never feels linear. That's pretty damn good design. And then, somehow, you unlock a variety of shortcuts as you go along, and they seldom repeat. In one tower you're knocking down ladders, in another you start a giant water wheel and hang on to it, in another you activate some sort of trolley system...

And the combat is right up my alley. I love up-close action games, but I don't really care for dial-a-combo games like God of War or Devil May Cry. I much prefer timing-based systems, which this (kind of) has. It's no Arkham Asylum, but it's pretty fun. And the chain is a ton of fun to use. I keep discovering new ways to use and abuse it.

@Guillaume

I shake my head at the fact it took project rainfall to bring this game over. Why Nintendo didn't put this out with a major ad blitz aimed at the adult swim/daily show crowd boggles my mind.

@Guillaume
All this and more.

My one complaint basically lies in the repetition of music. I dislike how all Towers have the same music (at least up til the third one). Not sure why they'd do that.

Other than that I have next to no complaints.