The author | Yu Bei ming
Recently, a series of emojis common in the circle of friends, called "hesitation, will lose", painted in "Only Wolf", the player in the duel "Sword Saint" Reed Yixin, he suddenly pulled out a fire to the face of the wolf. I opened the "Only Wolf" to take the Dragon's Return Line, I don't know what the shuluo line will do at the end of the old man,But in the line of returning home and returning to ordinary people, the peak era of Rei Ming Yixin is indeed known as the Sword Saint, but the fight is long guns and knives and fire bolts, in a sense very unworthy of the name.
In terms of difficulty alone, Reed is indeed the highest in "Only Wolf", and it is appropriate as the final boss, but after the end of the whole story, I thought about it, and what impressed me the most was not the spear of the heart, the bitterness of Madame Butterfly falling from the sky, or the slash of the monk who broke the vows, but a monkey who threw stool.
The story of "Only Wolves" takes place in the name of an elevated national reed at the end of the Sengoku period in Japan. The ninja "Wolf", who is tasked with protecting his master, Kuro. Kuro is the son of Ryu yin, and the blood flowing in his body comes from the ancient dragon "Sakura Dragon" from the west, which can give people the power of immortality. In order to save the dying wolf, Guro divided his own blood, and the wolf who gained the power of immortality later began the journey to save his master and even never die. In order to reach the source of Long Yin's power, the wolf needs Fangxin Water Lotus to open the way to the source land. This flower is located at the bottom of the collapsed valley, and the one who guards this hundred flowers is the giant ape that will only smash at you, the lion ape.
Many of the boss battles in Only Wolves can be greatly reduced by using the correct props, such as using firecrackers to scare the fire bulls in the main city and the sakura cows in the source country, after they hit the wall in a panic, the torso value will soar, making it easy to endure the killing; or take the Naruto seed to deal with the Phantom Ring Breaker, or the fire attack the Red-Eyed Monster. Other bosses choose the right tactics in wartime, which can give you a huge advantage, like the thunder of The String Ichiro, seeing the timing of the air block to catch the lightning strike and then counter-splitting back, which can put him in a huge stiff stage and let the player ravage for a while.
Shinichiro Rei, who gave everything to save the country, was nicknamed By many players as Ichiro.
From these points of view, the lion ape, especially its first stage, is not difficult. You have several ways to deal with it, such as frightening it with firecrackers or burning monkey hair. Other bosses are a bit unsympathetic to the meaning of not being able to do it, the lion ape is different, you can play more creativity in it, try more tactics.
But the real great thing about this boss is that it starts at the end of its first stage. Most of the bosses in Only Wolves have two blood bars, and you have to endure killing them twice, but the lion ape only has one blood. When you cut the blood and break the torso, jump head execution, and cut off its head with the knife that was originally inserted in its neck, the word "endure killing" appears on the screen. In other boss battles, the appearance of these two words means that you have successfully defeated them.
But the lion ape is different. I remember very clearly, when I let go of the mouse with both hands and began to reminisce about the battle. But a few seconds later, the headless giant ape actually stood up again, first picking up the head that had fallen to the ground, then grabbing the knife, and shaking at me, starting the second round of fighting. I had no idea that this would turn out to be the case, and I was caught off guard by it.
At this time, you still think that you have successfully killed the lion ape.
This second stage is the most unforgettable part of the whole reed trip. The lion ape that has lost its head is extremely uncoordinated in its movements, and its swinging posture is twisted like a snake, which is creepy and creepy. When I was a child, I read the story of the torture day dance and felt that the giant without a head should also "take the milk as the eye, the navel as the mouth, and the dry qi to dance", and the scene was very perverted. However, Tao Yuanming also praised him for his "fierce ambition", which is compared with the headless lion ape with strange and abnormal movements, which is simply sunny and healthy. When challenging the headless lion ape, the player is not so much fighting against the boss as it is fighting against his own San.
Leaving aside these, the lion ape has more corresponding strategies after it has no head. For example, when it temporarily places its head on its neck to howl, it can use the upgraded purple umbrella to resist the "horror" effect. You can also take a spear and stab the neck and pull out the centipede hidden inside. The monkey-like monkey appearance of the lion ape in the first stage, the unexpected resurrection during the turning stage, the ghostly and strange in the second stage, coupled with the flexible correspondence of various props and tactics, this BOSS battle undoubtedly poured the designer's painstaking efforts. In order to make greater use of it, you will find that later in the game, you will have to fight with lion apes, but this time, there is an additional female ape in the scene.
The brilliance of this boss design is not only in the battle itself, but also in The narrative ability of FromSoftware. There are many bosses in "Only Wolves", but many of them do not clearly explain the background. Ichirō's depiction is successful, but in the middle of the repeated confrontations with him, you insert a lot of bosses who do not have much scenes, or simply have nothing to do with the plot, such as the fire cow Sakura, or the faceless and the seven-faced samurai.
At first, the lion ape gave people the feeling that it was just a shouhua boss casually placed at the bottom of the valley, similar to the function of the fire bull. However, as the story unfolds, you will find that it has become the intersection of the major clues in the game. A seemingly normal thing, placed in the context of the whole story has a deep meaning, this is especially FromSoftware.
At the beginning of the game, the wolf has a hand cut off, and the ninja prosthesis given to him by the Buddhist sculptor becomes the key prop for the game to be carried out. Over time, we can learn more about the past of the Buddhist carvers. It turned out that he had once been a masterless ninja, known as an "orangutan", and practiced with his companion female ninja "Crying Ghost" Kawachi in a collapsed valley full of apes. Sichuan cicadas like to whistle with their fingers. After defeating the lion ape, you get her thin phalanges. Giving the finger bones to the Buddhist carver evokes nostalgia for him. After killing the two apes, return to the lion ape's lair, and you will find that there is a seven-faced samurai representing resentment, defeat it, and get the ring of the cicada, which can upgrade the phalanges as a prosthetic hand ninja. And when you play against the non-mainline boss grudge ghost at the end of the game, you may find that blowing the "Crying Ghost" has the miracle effect of making the boss fall into an inner struggle, thus making the player output crazy. In fact, this resentful ghost, which resembles a twisted giant ape, is the embodiment of a Buddhist carver who cannot control the resentment in his heart.
The ghost of resentment
The relationship between the lion ape and the Buddhist sculptor gives the player a deeper understanding of the world. We can deduce that Sichuan Cicada once tried to kill the lion ape, and she successfully inserted the knife into the neck of this giant ape, thinking that it was done, but did not expect that the giant ape did not die, but swallowed her stomach. The loss of the place made the ninja "orangutan" go crazy and began to kill. It was not until his arm was severed by Reina that the "orangutan" wanted to seek inner peace by carving a Buddha statue. And the prosthetic leg he had originally made for his broken arm was finally given to the wolf who also lost his left arm.
As for why the lion ape becomes a twisted undead creature, it is closely related to the main line of the game. We know that the source of the immortal power of the dragon is the sakura dragon. Located in the deepest illusion of the Immortal Origin Palace, the Sakura Dragon spread its vitality into the underground water veins, bringing prosperity to the Source Palace and being worshipped by the reed kingdoms downstream. However, hundreds of years later, perhaps because of the water and soil, perhaps because of injury, the power of the Sakura Dragon gradually decayed, and under its influence, the Source Palace changed from a fairy country to a place full of twisted monsters, and the carp living in the water of the metamorphic source (that is, in the game, it became like water) also appeared immortal parasites. The lion ape, which lives in the Valley of Collapse, drinks water from the land of origin, and thus becomes the victim of this immortal insect. If we choose to poison the Fish King of the Source Palace, its corpse will appear in the drinking water of the lion ape, which is a clear proof of this upstream and downstream relationship.
Like the Buddha sculptor and the wolf, the sakura dragon also broke an arm
Like many soul games before it, the theme of Only Wolves involves immortality and power. The wolf's master, Kuro, wants to cut off the immortal bloodline; Rei's name, Shinichiro, drinks the water and regains his footing after being fatally attacked by the wolf; the insect-infected lion ape and the ring-breaking monk gain twisted immortality. The monks of Xianfeng Temple gave up their duties in pursuit of immortality, and even killed the faithful in order to study immortality; the wolf himself was constantly reborn, consuming the lives of the surrounding people, bringing them a terrible dragon cough. The inability to die is a curse, which is in line with the Buddhist philosophy. Buddhism believes that sentient beings are constantly repeating the process of birth, death, rebirth, and rebirth, calling it "reincarnation." Beings in samsara suffer forever, and only after reaching the state of nirvana can they leave the eternal cycle of suffering. Many of the characters in Only Wolves are not included in the traditional concept of reincarnation, and they either actively pursue immortality or fate.
The lion ape is closely linked to this grand theme. Reed is not only a war-torn country, but also a place where the natural order is distorted and misplaced. If the ultimate goal of all beings in the world is to liberate nirvana and no longer suffer from rebirth, then whether it is wolves or lion apes, what they achieve is a distorted and tragic version of nirvana--they do live forever, but the suffering is not reduced by half, but more than ever.
The statue of Vishnu Buddha in the fire behind the boss phantom butterfly seems to tell us that this is the age of the end of the Dharma.
This boss battle of the lion apes may not be a pleasure in itself. It's not like those humanoid enemies, which can make you sting at the knife and hit the iron, the amount of blood is high, and the second stage also makes the scalp tingle. Even if you succeed in defeating it, it will fight you again when you are at the bottom of the reed. But it is this giant ape that pesters the player, forcing us to have a deeper understanding of the mechanics and themes of the game. Yes, this monkey will throw shit at you, but the depth of the shit is beyond our initial imagination.