Mysteries and Clues?

[nanostrike]

Is there any way to get clues for mysteries beyond randomly finding a "Clue Room", then doing one of those long, tedious puzzles?

It was okay the first time, but realizing that I have to do literally dozens of these things to get the mysteries "Solved" has killed any desire I really have to do the mysteries.

[mrhanman]

I still do them when I run up on them, but - you're right - they aren't very fun.  Not that that answers your question.  I can't help you there. 

[LintMan]

I don't know of any alternatives to get clues, but here are some tips to help make them easier to do:

- use a bat spell if the balls are too close to a wall/floor, to get better shot positioning.
- Use something piercing like Energy Slice to quickly flip entire rows at once.  Use this to flip any rows that have more of the color you don't want
- use Miasma Whip to flip inner rows of the balls.  (Fire touch can also work, but Miasma Whip is more accurate).  Get all the inner rows the same before worrying about the outside rows.
- use Forest Rage or Plasma Bolt to flip the remaining outside balls to the desired color.

[nanostrike]

I don't know of any alternatives to get clues, but here are some tips to help make them easier to do:

- use a bat spell if the balls are too close to a wall/floor, to get better shot positioning.
- Use something piercing like Energy Slice to quickly flip entire rows at once.  Use this to flip any rows that have more of the color you don't want
- use Miasma Whip to flip inner rows of the balls.  (Fire touch can also work, but Miasma Whip is more accurate).  Get all the inner rows the same before worrying about the outside rows.
- use Forest Rage or Plasma Bolt to flip the remaining outside balls to the desired color.

Thanks.  That helps a bit.



But devs...any news on there being alternate ways to get clues?  I'd rather there be a non-puzzle way to do so.  I would love to go after the clues and learn some of the lore of the game, but I really, really hate those puzzles and right now, they seem to be the only way to do so.

[Quaix]

I got six clues so far. I expected them to fill me in on the backstory, but so far they said nothing new. If these six are representative of the rest, you're not missing much.

[mrhanman]

But devs...any news on there being alternate ways to get clues?  I'd rather there be a non-puzzle way to do so.

Personally, I'm fine with a puzzle being the mechanic to unlock the clues, but what's currently there isn't much of a puzzle.  It's a test of ones patience and manual dexterity.

Anyway you can shoehorn a game of Tidalis in there? 

[Bluddy]

But devs...any news on there being alternate ways to get clues?  I'd rather there be a non-puzzle way to do so.

Personally, I'm fine with a puzzle being the mechanic to unlock the clues, but what's currently there isn't much of a puzzle.  It's a test of ones patience and manual dexterity.

Anyway you can shoehorn a game of Tidalis in there? 

That would actually be a pretty awesome idea if it could be pulled off. Introduce the players to a simple version of Tidalis. At least this could be done for some of the puzzles. You could have a Tidalis-like board as background, and you could go up to blocks and hit them from the side to change their direction, or hit them from below to start a tide (or something like that).

[Wanderer]

As a bonus, I'd have to say that plugging your own puzzle game as a puzzle room in another game is NOT a bad thing!

Additionally, I currently hate the puzzle rooms, so anything would be better to me.  They're simply an exercise in patience, not puzzling.

[Penumbra]

As a bonus, I'd have to say that plugging your own puzzle game as a puzzle room in another game is NOT a bad thing!

Whoa... what if you were inside a Tidalis puzzle. Oh my, the possibilities 

[mrhanman]

I just meant an actual Tidalis match.  I was mostly joking, but it would be awesome.  Trying to play with your character seems like it would be awkward, though, and would give the wrong impression of Tidalis. 

[Bluddy]

It's surprisingly hard to come up with good puzzles in a non-puzzle game. That's why if the devs can leverage the Tidalis system to make a Tidalis-lite style puzzle (perhaps with no timing -- you control the time for drops), that would make sense.

[Penumbra]

I was thinking of the puzzle mode in Tidalis, which inherently had no timer or dropped pieces.

[Bluddy]

I was thinking of the puzzle mode in Tidalis, which inherently had no timer or dropped pieces.

Great. I'm not that familiar with the Tidalis puzzles, but I'm sure that could really be good. If you have a Tidalis board and walkways above and below it, as well as ladders on both sides, you could use long range spells to change directions of tiles and just click on the blocks to start waves. It would be a small variation on Tidalis (since you'd have less control over changing block directions) but would serve as a great intro, and the devs already know how to make puzzles for Tidalis.

[Calli]

Personally, I'm fine with a puzzle being the mechanic to unlock the clues, but what's currently there isn't much of a puzzle.  It's a test of ones patience and manual dexterity.

Pretty much this.

The first room had just 100 to change, in a fairly simple configuration (no 3x3 squares), and while I managed to solve the puzzle, I couldn't put any rhyme or reason to why it worked.  (Now I think it's a simple matter of 'hit button to change color' and the reason my shots sometimes flipped one, other times multiple buttons, was due to my own accuracy rather than some hidden 'if button hit from THIS angle, changes two, from THIS angle, changes one' mechanic.)  The second one I found had 300...I turned around and walked out.  Not worth it.  Even now that I think I know how the puzzles go, it'd be too time-consuming and boring when I could be out exploring.