The Dink Network

This is a Let's Play of Stone of Balance Redux. This should be interesting, since I haven't played through Stone of Balance prior to this.

I recommend also checking out SimonK's playthrough of the original Stone of Balance(pre-redux), check that out here

-Stone of Balance Redux-
Episode 1 - Enter Laghan
The Stone of Balance is fragmented, Jenny gets ditched in an awkward position, and we enter the town of Laghan.
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Enter Laghan

Episode 2 - Slay the Dragon
Time to finish exploring the outskirts of Laghan and track down the magical flute.
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Slay the Dragon

Episode 3 - Maze of Versata
Exploring around and tackling the Maze of Versata.
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Maze of Versata

Episode 4 - Maze of Daedalus
Fully exploring the ins and outs of the Maze of Daedalus.
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Maze of Daedalus

Episode 5 - Enter the Desert of Thirst
Let's enter the Desert of Thirst, explore the settlement and help out some townsfolk, maybe help some goblins too.
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Enter the Desert of Thirst

Episode 6 - Death and Jewels
Time to traverse the Canyon of Death, and then find a way to the Mountain of Jewels.
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Death and Jewels

Episode 7 - Church Crawling
Welcome to the Land of Reverence, tour the churches and maybe find a pot to piss in.
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Church Crawling

Episode 8 - Forest of Wickedness
Entering the dangerous and mysterious Forest of Wickedness to find the Soothsayer and acquire some magic.
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Forest of Wickedness

Episode 9 - Family Reunion
In this episode we save Richard and obtain the fourth fragment.
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Family Reunion

Episode 10 - The Midas Curse
Enter the town of gold, a product of the Midas Curse placed on the king by the Stone Giants. We must solve this dilemma so the King will give us access to his jewels.
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The Midas Curse

Episode 11 - The Land of Amoreia
We enter the Land of Amoreia... a unique place indeed.
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The Land of Amoreia

Episode 12 - Finale
Time to put this stone back together.
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Finale

Ah, the weird sound bit when first talking to the ring that gives Fireball and Hellfire magic, that is from Monty Python and the Holy Grail. There are a couple of King Arthur references in Story/Land 1. I used to read most books I could find based on the Pendragon saga, and films - like John Boorman's Excalibur. Man that film was so over the top back in the 80s. Shows how old I am I guess, sticking in stuff that reference the last century...

It is interesting watching you play

About the "bug" of being able to talk to the Oracle through the wall, while it wasn't my intention as such, I see it as a "happy accident", that let's a player get around the need to traverse the slimers path or answer the riddle of the statue head.

Similar to the way you got around not giving the angry boat man all your gold.

That's the funny thing about having multiple ways of achieving something, as a way of combating the single purpose, one way to achieve the task approach, you never quite know what people will do, or what order. So the fun thing for me is seeing people come up with approaches and solutions I would never thought of. The flipside is getting stuck.

> "Similar to the way you got around not giving the angry boat man all your gold."

Oh wait, was that not supposed to be a thing. Like you actually supposed to give him all your gold?

Well, you can, and that was my intention to be the way forward, but hey... it doesn't have to be as you proved. I was thinking as you were playing, oh he hasn't gone to find the boatman straight away, I wonder if he will raid the chests and then end up having to give away that gold before buying he oars or other stuff, and then you went and surprised me. So yeah... all's fair in Dink and beating up monsters...

I do provide, or at least attempt to provide, clues in the conversations with NPCs, but if you attack them, some take offense and don't talk to you anymore.

All's fair in thinking outside of the box; An easy fix for talking through the wall would be to add a talk proc to those same walls that then denies Dink from speaking to the Oracle, besides simply setting an x/y box that Dink would have to be inside for talking to count as from within.

Being able to lock yourself out of side content such as Hellfire with that ring always struck me as a bit too mean in any game; Alternative methods as an option is something I'd probably consider - Though I say this, I'm unaware if there IS an alternative method to getting the spell in the early game.
Guess I'll have to play the Dmod to find out

Me personally, in regards to the hellfire thing, I don't mind a reward that you might miss getting if you don't do a certain thing the right way, as long as it's not required to complete the game. Didn't mind in this case (I have recorded a few more parts, still editing for upload so I already have got hellfire). In this Dmod, hellfire makes things sooo easy to just plough through enemies, so it feels like it should be a secret that maybe you can miss out on.

I'm pretty sure I made it something you could buy in Story/Land 2 in the Redux version from the wizard who sells translocation magic. I think this was a response to some players not happy in missing out on Hellfire early on. Yes originally it most likely was a secret bonus for those who did things in a certain way come to think of it. The original version was more difficult in many ways that the Redux has softened with more clues etc etc - at least that was the intention.

Episode 2 is up. See top post.

Took a bit longer than it normally would for me to get the first and second part out, I was familiarising myself with Adobe Premiere Pro after making the switch from Magix Vegas for editing my youtube videos. Definitely worth the swap though, and now I feel like I've learned the basics.

Yeah, just watched you slay the dragon.

And fighting the goblin, which is optional. There is no real impact with fighting him or not. Originally I think there was going to be more of a goblin subplot but I canned it when Story/Land 3 took off in a Western theme, the goblins are still there, but they aren't planning some secret attack on the humans, that killing off the Cave Goblin in story 1 would have impacted.

Hellfire is the only real secret in Story 1 in the Redux now, the Goblin might have been considered one in the original as then the Oracle didn't warn Dink to find another head when he firsts visits, plus there wasn't the cut scene I added in the Redux version if you try to visit the Queen with the flute but no Hammer of Truth, warning Dink that he is missing something.

The sleep bomb potion man could be considered a secret too, of sorts.

Oh and regarding the water magic, it is not Acid Rain, the wizard of the Isle of Exiles says he only makes pretty things.

It does come in handy later in other Lands/Stories, and you can use it on NPCs in Laghan to some amusement. Just an added bonus like the Hammer of Truth NPC interactions that were added in the Redux.

Ah yes, I realise now it's merely a water magic.

Episode 3 uploaded.

Gonna hope you did what SimonK did for his Story 6 episodes and set an 18+ restriction on episode 3, considering you went through all the wish options there.
Consider this a safety reminder to do the same for Story 6 when you get to that point in the uploads yourself.

> Gonna hope you did what SimonK did for his Story 6 episodes and set an 18+ restriction on episode 3, considering you went through all the wish options there.
Consider this a safety reminder to do the same for Story 6 when you get to that point in the uploads yourself.

I have set that restriction now.

Also epsiode 4 is up.

EDITS:

Episode 5 up.

Episode 6 up.

Might be a simple fix idea to have Unfreeze(1) on every dialogue line of mud wearing off to deal with those freezes during dialogue.

And lucky score with that treasure hole somehow, lol

"Might be a simple fix idea to have Unfreeze(1) on every dialogue line of mud wearing off to deal with those freezes during dialogue."

Only thing is, that might risk unfreezing cutscenes and giving control back to the player in unintended situations though.

A better check for anyone wondering, which I believe Simon has now implemented as well, is to use sp_freeze(1, -1) to check if the player is currently frozen, and if so, delay said conversation line that has the potential to interrupt things until sp_freeze(1, -1) returns 0.

Yes, I've used the sp_freeze(1, -1) on the mud timer script, that plays throughout Land 3; for the amulet countdown, I used a global that was being changed once the wizard is killed to then kill the amulet script as soon as it sees the global variable has changed, as you don't need the amulet at that point, and you are about to head to the next Land.

Wouldn't it be simpler to stop the amulet degradation and just have it get removed when Dink gets captured and have the Church suffer possessing it? Could make for an amusing easter egg.

Church suffer? - I'm not following...

Basically everything is being removed now by the Church of Righteousness in Redux which makes more sense to me for the story of how nasty this Church is.

Yeah I meant the Church taking everything scene; instead of the Amulet disintegrating before getting to it, some poor sod in the Church getting the ghost amulet.

Ah, right. Unfortunately it is the amulet countdown script that was interfering with the cut scene after Dink picks up the third stone in front of the mine which was the problem, which led to a potential 2nd instance of the 3rd piece in the inventory. That itself can no longer happen, if Dink has the third piece the script checks for that before giving it.

So it all needed to work before the Church part of the cut scene.

Episode 7 just landed.

EDIT:

and episode 8

and 9.

You got the good ending - The bad ending, or rather there's a couple of other endings, ie a few ways to end up without the fourth stone and one other way to end up with the fourth stone, is to think you need to kill Mary to get the fourth stone and become a Priest of the Righteous Path to do this. This was the original way forward, as there was no chance to rescue Little Richard before.

Episode 10 and 11 are up. Nearing completion now.