#pps: came back to read this and am still laughing at how dismissed the fourth children are: 'just some fish people'

[cthulhubert]

Every now and then I think about La-Mulana.

It's not often. The actual experience of playing it was kind of painful. Like not only is it difficult-on-purpose, but it's just ungainly. And like, it's not ugly, but the original is is definitely targeting an aesthetic older than the one embedded in my nostalgia gland. And the remake's graphics are an unsatisfying compromise.

The puzzles were the primary gameplay draw for me, but they made me feel stupid. I looked up so many hints and answers... then regretted it 9 times out of 10 (the sign of a good puzzle really).

But the backstory.... Anemic as it was, it gently gestured at... something. I feel like I caught a glimpse, as if through a keyhole, of the transcendental.

The opening scrawl:

Long ago… Before humanity came into existence. Descending unto this place… She came from the sky… One unto this world. Trapped alone, she cries. "Let me return home to heaven. It is where I belong. Children, please help me. Children, send me back home. Children, for this reason you were born." That is the day that humanity was born. And when they angered her, they were destroyed. After several ages of destruction, the story begins…

I'm also deeply amused by the disconnect between, on the one hand, the harrowing gameplay and epic tone, and on the other, the comedic and cutesy vibe of the art and design:

A couple minor spoilers under the cut:

The Mother failed time and time again. The 1st children could not see for what the Mother truly longed, wanting only her powers. The 2nd children were destroyed in the civil war of the Giants. The 3rd children were only interested in their own powers. The 4th children were a race of men in the form of fish. The 5th children sought the secret to life and death, once again begetting a power hungry race. The 6th children were dolls of clay made by the 5th children. Alas, too many were made, igniting a war that extended all the way to the Surface. After some time, we, the 7th children were born of the earth. We came to know these ruins through and through, ultimately realizing that we would not be able to grant the Mother's wish. Thus we gave no memory of the Mother to ye, the 8th children.

The first children have the bodies of snakes below the belly, perhaps most similar to the Mother's "true form", and had powerful magic. The second children were giants capable of supernatural feats of engineering. The third were winged, (inspiring human legends of angels and devils), also powerful in magic but not as great as the first. The fourth were just merfolk, apparently. The fifth were described as being just like "regular people", and lore implies that they were the powerful precursor people of various myths and legends. It's unclear if they're like, genetically the same as 8th children (humans) and/or the 7th children (who also look identical to humans). The sixth are various artificial creatures, including but not limited to fairies, apparently.

Kind of interesting that the count of children includes grandchildren: the 6th, and maybe the 8th. Also kind of funny that out of 8 generations of children, only the 2nd and 7th like... even gave a shit about the Mother's reason for creating them.

Not directly mentioned, but while the giants were very giant, you fight two first children and one 3rd child, all much much larger than the main character. There's another boss that I always assumed was either a 5th child or one of their creations (a 6th child then), which is yet another giant. But this may be something about their powers, rather than their natural shape. (Edit: as I was closing La-Mulana wiki pages I noticed a particularly strong suggestion that the boss I was thinking about was a 6th child.)

I love little bits and pieces about how the 7th children can interact with the labyrinth in ways completely alien to how your character can, because they see it differently, because they "know" deep secrets about it (I love when games do diegetic explanations for stuff that's usually just a gameplay device, like NPCs following the PC to places that should be impossible to get; cf Mark of the Ninja). Things that also prevent them from being able to do what humans can.