Eragon DS
 By Sierra and Amaze
 
 General Walkthrough with Spoilers! No spoiler warnings!
 
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Intro
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~Niko~ 
Welcome to the world of Alagaesia, where our hero is coming of age and
destined for glory. I would love to start this off with a review, but this is
just a walkthrough. You can read reviews elsewhere. Like IGN.

This is a real-time fighting RPG. While there are no physical stats to upgrade,
you will be given items to increase your health, magic, and weapons.
Keep in mind the platform the game was made for. While it looks like it was
made using a Quake editor, the graphics are quite remarkable for the DS.

 Version 0.1.0 completed June 23, 2013

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Controls
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If you haven't flipped through the game manual, you're going to be a little
frustrated figuring things out. The game is sparse on internal tutorials
because of the graphics engine.

D-Pad.....move Eragon relative to the camera view (the camera tracks behind
and follows Eragon)
[A].......Special Attack: it starts as a slow snap kick, then upgrades to a
spinning blade attack that knocks over all surrounding enemies, or a double
thrust forward with the same effect.
[B].......Jump: starts as a single jump, then you are given a double jump
shortly after the jumping tutorial.
[X].......Strong Attack: develops over time.
[Y].......Quick Attack: develops over time.
[L].......Lock-on target, hold to strafe (sidle left and right)
[R].......Block, hold and D-pad to Dodge; while rolling forward, tap [B] to
leap into the air!

The touch screen is used also, initially for bow and arrow mode, then for
spells and items. You are shown what to draw to use an item or spell
(instead of simply tapping it)
1. Bow and Arrow: this icon puts you in first person mode so you can aim via
Legend of Zelda. Hold [R] to draw the bow.
2. Map: whenever there is an icon that looks like a paper with a red "X", you
can view the surrounding area on the bottom screen. Tapping anywhere or
hitting [SELECT] shows your draw screen again.
3. Spellcast Time Meter: this stops time briefly so you can draw the necessary
glyph to activate an item or spell.
4. Adjust Camera: a small circle with a dot. Spin it like an iPod dial to
rotate the camera around Eragon.
5. Draw and Flick: all spells must be cast at a target, so once you've drawn
the glyph, its corresponding colored icon appears, ready to be tossed at an
enemy. In any direction! 

More Tips:
In the map view, there are a lot of unexplained icons. The gold circles are
exit points, the dragon heads are save points, and further into the game other
icons appear to indicate challenge items. Enemies show up as orangey-red and
purple dots. Special packages, bonuses, and NPCs will not show up on the map.
There are quite a few places where Eragon can fall off a ledge and take damage.
If you are jumping purposefully then I suggest using the rolling leap instead.
The game designers didn't use real physics for reasons of processor and space
limitations, and didn't add damage detection for the rolling leap. You can
leap off anything and never take damage! 

In Bow and Arrow mode use the touch screen for precise aiming. The tutorial
tells you to use the D-pad or buttons to aim, but the speed of the aiming is
too fast to be accurate for most shots. Instead, hold [R] and move your finger
around on the touch screen until the reticule locks on a target.
Later on, you can lock on to a target (while you face them, if they are in
range, by tapping [L]), and shoot them with your Bow while in third-person
mode (tap the bow in the corner). This is useful once you've powered up your
BnA skill to tenth level and are being rushed by a heavy hitter.
IMO, the BnA is overpowered and makes it too easy to defeat enemies. You are
limited to a maximum of 50 arrows, so there's that.

This game is fairly linear, in that there are definite start and end points in
each area. This walk through doesn't literally walk you through an area, so
much as tell what things to look for. In reality, you're going to wander around
killing as many monsters as possible to increase your BnA and sword skills, as
well as spells skills, once you start learning spells.
Alternately, you could go through the game and only kill when absolutely
necessary, using only your sword, and not power up your bow at all. It wasn't
until I finished the game that I achieved several more sword levels from
monster kills and picked up the last spell.

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Locations Reference
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 The Spine
 Carvahall
 Palancar Valley
 Forest
 Therinsford
 Rocky Pass
 Ninor Valley
 Daret
 Underground
 Lake Isenstar
 Gil'ead
 Hadarac Desert
 Beor Valley
 Tranjheim

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The Story
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The game starts after you start a new game and enter a game slot name. A short
sequence of panned pictures are shown, giving you some back story, and
refreshing the memories of those who have read the book/seen the movie. In the
sequence, we watch two people riding through a scary woods with ogre-like
creatures in pursuit. The two riders are surrounded, but the female, who is
carrying a large blue stone, holds her charge in the air and it disappears.
Then, apparently, some dude smacks her down. Now enters our hero.
The game Pauses and you're given a quick view of the control scheme (as listed
above).

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The Spine
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In this area, Eragon is in a woods, apparently hunting a buck. You are given a
simple intro to the controls, then you fight a wolf. There are lots of weak
shrubs here, and a few drop instant herbs (you can't store them, and they are
applied to your health as soon as you touch them) which are of no use until
you fight the wolf.
Keep moving, and you'll come to a waterfall and be given a chance to shoot an
arrow. Once the cut-scene is done, explore to the left. There is a large herb
on a ledge. It's a long jump, but you can only "double-jump." The trick is to
jump again at the end of your first jump, meaning: jump towards the ledge, and
as you begin to fall, jump again. Once you do this properly, you will catch
the far ledge and can tap UP on the D-pad to clamber onto the ledge and collect
the large herb.
Continue on, chasing down the buck. Oh noes! More wolves! Tap [L] to target one
and perform three Quick attacks and a Strong attack [YYYX] to kill it and its
mate with alacrity.
At this point stop and check your map. Before you fought the wolves, the
camera dollies and pushes over to a clearing to show a glowing blue thing.
Before we go there, lets head down and to the left of that area (looking at
the map, it's down and left). Behind some shrubs to the left you'll see a
quiver with arrows floating over the ground. Grab it. You just added 12 arrows
to your quiver. Now head to the left and jump headlong over the gap there.
Tricky! It's nothing bad at all, just a silly jumping area. Grab some insta-
herb if you need it and go be with the blue thing.

"...fell from the sky." They forgot to animate that. It must be in the book or
movie, because I didn't see anything fall from the sky in-game.

Interacting with the stone earns you a new quest item in your Quest List.
Press [START] and select Quest List to view your quests. Once you gain Saphira
you can return to areas to finish out quests. *Warning: Tranjheim is so well
hidden, even Saphira can't find it. You'll have to trek all the way through
Beor Valley each time you leave.*

Follow the path and return to the village, or keep exploring. Two more wolves
attack, and then you are left to fight shrubs and squirrels. *Note* only
killing monsters will increase skills. *Altro marke* Blunt and Mist spells
don't need to target anything in order to increase in level.

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Carvahall
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When you enter town, the game tells you about save points. If you pop your map
open (which you will do frequently, because the game closes it every chance it
gets) you'll see the save point near you marked as a dragon head. Always save
at a save point so you can keep your current inventory and status. If you
"menu save," nothing since the last save point will be saved. Why? *shrugs*

Check your map. You'll see lots of little house icons. These are buildings you
can enter. There is one with a gold ring. That will continue the story. I
normally explore first. Explore everywhere if you want to find more special
packages containing images for your gallery. There are 3 hidden in this area.
Otherwise, head for the end point and continue the story.

******* Mirbell's QuickTime Quest *******
If you want to be confused by game design logic, talk to the lady sweeping the
dirt. She'll challenge you to find something in a place you've never been
before. Fun!  This challenge is easy though, providing your spatial
recognition is high. Answer: go down the street to the well, turn right and
run over the brown, red-bow-tied package. Ooh! it's an image for your gallery!
Super-keen! Notice you just ran past a dragon head. This could mean there are
a lot of save points in this game, which would be a good thing. However, it is
not so. The save points are quite literally spread randomly throughout the
game; some are bunched up like this, others are lonely islands in a level.
There is even a level with no manual save point! Next!
******* Quest Done! *******

******* Gypsy Romar Gathering Quest *******
Talk to the Gypsy gentleman and he'll complain about some lost beads he's too
lazy to look for. There are several other quests similarly arranged where you
collect "lost" items for lazy citizens. There is no timer on this, so take
your time. Additionally, you can actually leave this area and come back at
any later point to finish this quest. Just walk around town and find the
items. Check your map.
******* Quest Done *******

******* Gypsy Fae Challenge Course *******
Talk to the Gypsy lady and she'll challenge you to a trial. Accept and quickly
try to figure out what you're supposed to do. Quick! There's a timer counting
down from 15 seconds! No time to think, just run! If you run right, you'll luck
into a large green ring. That's your starting point. Just keep going. The rest
are blue. Stay to the right when you pass the well. At the end you get bonus
melee weapon skill points. Good job!
******* Quest Done *******

After being scolded by the butcher, and pitied by Katrina, go to your uncle
with your pity-meat and get scolded again. (Check your map for a gold ring
if you have trouble.) Next you'll be quested to hide your egg. Then you'll
be quested to hide your dragon. Then a quest to build a shelter and feed the
thing. Keep your eyes open for brown boxes; those things are super important. 
After you feed your dragon, a Pause screen pops up and tells you to trace the
symbols. Yay! Another useful game implementation, where tapping a button would
suffice! The Dragon Mindspeak symbols become a start menu challenge later on.
Because that's fun.
Now you're quested to find your cousin Roran. If you talk to Katrina first,
she'll mention some guy named Brom, whom I'm assuming is a main character in
the story; having never read nor seen the story beyond this game, I believe
my assumption is sound.
Complete your quest to talk with Brom and then you can leave this crazy
town... after you fight some Urgal. Easy enough.

Surprisingly, the game autosaves at certain points. Not before boss fights
though, which are usually unexpected and unannounced, but each time you
enter a new area, or when things drastically change in the current area.

"Dragon riders... Galbatorix..." sooo... people rode dragons. Weird. And
G-man IS a dragon rider. Which means he's still alive? So it's not just a
story old Brom is hamming on about. Great.

Next quest: go to bed! Ah ha! Haha, but you can't because suddenly you're a
nosy Nellie and eavesdrop on the butcher. Seems like some bad people want to
hurt some non-bad people. And with a sudden plop, Urgal appear and try to hit
you. Ignore them for now, you got- a dragon to mindspeak with? Nevermind that
now, quick Lassie, to the farm! Um. No, wait, now we're flying on a dragon, and
according to the Pause screen, we have to touch the screen to guide the dragon
through the rings. Surely, this was in the book, right?
I found the ring challenge to be the most frustrating "challenge" in the game.
Not only does it gratingly remind me of Starfox, if you miss a set of rings,
your dragon is hit by arrows! You can lose this challenge easily, and have to
try, try again. There is no other way to continue! Good luck, and remember to
breath.
******* Carvahill Done *******

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Palancar Valley
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Brom tricks you into leaving the burnt remains of your farmhouse and your
uncle's (where's Aunt Beru?) charred corpse. Boo-hoo. What's an orphan to do?
Journey onward, never looking back, never grieving properly. Now you're in a
beautiful country side, bordered by a river and thick forest. Plenty of Urgal
here to hurt you. Actually, if you do it right, you can level up your sword and
bow here. It'll take a lot of murdering, but you could do it. Just kill
everything and exit through the northeast entrance, turn around at town and
return to the countryside. All the monsters you killed came back! There's a man
on a dock with a dumb quest for you, but that only occurs once. The man by the
entrance to this area also only quests you once. But you can return again and
again and cover your blade with the blood of your enemies until your barbaric
soul is sated.
Once you've discovered all this valley's secrets, venture into the dark forest
beyond for more fun. There are three super packages "hidden" here, so search
hard for them! 

******* Otho's Challenge Course *******
Pretty straightforward. Run through the rings. But where are they? The first
two are on the path, so follow it until you get the second ring, then veer
right. You'll see the third one in a space between a hump and the thick
forest. Keep going straight from there. Good Job!
******* Quest Done *******

******* Macrin's Gathering Quest *******
Another straightforward gathering quest. The fish are all dead and washed up
on the shoreline and backed up in the creek. Maybe you could teach this guy
how to fish?
******* Quest Done *******

Save if you want. Destroy all the shrubs and even some barrels by the
collapsed house at the shoreline. Use this area to level up your skills.
******* Palancar Valley Done *******

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Forest
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Entering the new area starts a cut-scene with Brom, who tells you about Durza,
Galbatorix's main dude. Urgal are barbaric tribes, and Ra'zac are demons. He
reminds you the journey to Varden is long, and that you'll stop at Therinsford
and Daret on the way. 
Now where to? Some Urgal you can barely see start yelling and charge you from
way in the distance. Where'd Brom go? I thought he was meant to help? Anyway,
head left and get tric- *ahem* "quested" into collecting 12 Urgal sashes for
someone named Bava who won't help you until you help him/her. Jerk. Sounds
like the kid just wants some easy honor points but have you do all the work!
Whatevs. You've been quested again, so it's not like you have a choice. Take
the other path and kill all the Urgal.
Now you get to fight archers. These guys are a bit harder, but are limited by
range. If you choose to engage them, melee style, be prepared to dodge or get
hit. At the moment you can only take about three or four hits before you're
murdered your own self. So, don't get dead!

******* Bava's Gathering quest ******* 
Bava wants some easy honor, and you're just the suck- uh, "hero" to help. 12
of them this time. This is a great place to burn through your arrow supply,
as there aren't enough random quivers laying about. You'll need to go back into
Palacar Valley a few times to replenish until you can single-shot these guys.
******* Quest Done *******

Once Bava is sated with bloody sashes, the little punk walks up to the bridge
barricade and it falls. So simple, you could have done that. But apparently,
this game thinks you need social interaction to accomplish things in life.
Crossing the bridge makes the camera do a weird thing and you are left
wondering why you're being forced to look at a waterfall.

Oh! At the end of your forced quest if you tried to go up the new path to the
exit, you're dropped into your first boss fight with no warning.

******* First Boss *******
This guy fights mean. He looks like an Urgal with crazy armor. He'll swing at
you from his right to his left, and he'll charge and flip you for crazy damage.
Also, if you're able to pull off combos (smashing the Y button repeatedly; so
hard) he'll block them by crossing his arms. You must not be near him when he
crosses his arms. He will hit you and you will die... eventually.
Target him and use your block button [R] to dodge left right and away from him.
You'll notice your dodging slips you past his attacks and puts you to his
flank. This is the best spot to hit him. After a few gruelling minutes of dodge
attacking, he'll yell and fall over. Good Job! If you grinded your archery
skill up to level 10, you should be able to take him down a few "notches"
before closing in and slicing him up with your dagger.
******* Boss Done *******

There is only one save point, mid-way through this area, so try not to die.
There are also forced murder areas, where barricades appear and you cannot
leave until all the enemy are dead. I say enemy because they mindlessly attack
you instead of attempting to offer a more congenial solution. 
In the second forced MDK area, you'll fight two birds and two double sword
Urgal. There are also three Urgal archers. The birds will mostly hit you, as
they are set to constant hit mode, so that even target-dodging doesn't work
well. Stay up on the bridge and end them one at a time. ALWAYS fight your
opponents in single combat, otherwise you will be overrun and destroyed.
The double sword Urgal are surprisingly fast hitters. Actually the fastest, as
their animations have been clipped down by a few frames. They will invariably
hit you, even as you dodge. Just remember to target-dodge and keep your combos
simple. [YYXX] seems to work the best, but you have to do it two or three
times.

It's not until you kill the end boss do you actually get to "own" Saphira by
naming her. And now you can leave by heading toward the open circle on your
map.
******* Forest Done *******

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Therinsford
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Running down the path, you'll see some guy chilling with some angry Urgal. He
quests you with a timed run to a place you've never seen. Unless you run past
him and explore the area completely. I would suggest exploring. There are two
other people in Daret that think you know the place so walk around and talk to
people, just don't accept any quests until you've explored enough.
The path branches: left leads you over a ford across a wide, raging river;
right leads you through the back woods, where you double jump a fallen tree.
When you've crossed the river, another timed quest guy wants you to find
something somewhere, but you were smart and explored everywhere first, right? 

******* Oswyn's Quickfind Quest *******
Old man Oswyn is so kind, he hides things from people. Take the right hand
path from the large stone, jump the old tree, then go to the open stable in
the north-east corner of the map. Oooh, more experience for your dagger. But
only after you're interrupted buy a cut scene of your sexy soul mate Katrina
and her actual lover Roran. You're not yet man enough to talk to them so you
"choose" to stay away. Far away.
******* Quest Done ******* 

******* Atris' QuickTime Quest *******
Another benevolent soul who likes to hide things out in the open. Head across
the river to get to this spot quickly. You have much less time than other
quests. Turn left at the large rock and jump the fallen tree. Woot. 
******* Quest Done *******

******* Lutgar's Gathering Quest *******
Someone swiped 12 of old man Lutgar's gold mugs. Go find them. Good job.
******* Quest Done *******

There is little else to do here. Talking to the citizens is a drag; all they
do is complain. Exploring nets you three more arts, and two of the quests
give you two more. Come on. Let's get outa here. Go West, young man.
******* Therinsford Done *******

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Rocky Pass
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Old Brom notes the passage of many people here. Good job, old man. A blind
person in a snow storm could have seen these tracks. Then he leaves you again,
a small orphan, STILL ONLY ARMED WITH A DAGGER, to face down dozens of well
armed and highly skilled barbarians and archers. Is he trying to kill you?
After you kill an Urgal that's guarding a pile of rocks, Saphira "speaks" with
you, saying she'll be there, if you just call her name. She'll be there. Again,
this is a game mechanic that could have been done differently, where you guide
here to the correct point, or she blasts the area you select with fire or
something. Instead, it's a pointless exercise in fake interaction being forced
on you. Truly. There is no need for you to stand on a symbol and call your
dragon to destroy something that is blocking the only path forward. Tossing a
symbol would have been more useful. Just have her do it already! *sigh*

******* Lerin's QuickTime Quest *******
Why is this guy just standing around in the mountains? Doesn't he know there
are blood thirsty savages around here? And he has the nerve to hide something,
again, IN A PLACE YOU'VE NEVER BEEN. "Gosh your dumb. How come you couldn't
find my well hidden 'gift' in a foreign place?" Immediately head to the right,
down the steppes. Run past the archer and - oh! there it is, right out where
you can see it. Good Joerb.
******* Quest Done *******

Run around killing things, but be aware these are mountain Urgal and are much
more cunning and stronger than their wood and valley counterparts. Especially
the double bladed fellows, who cross their swords to block, then hit you from
this stance. So rude! 
During your random run around, you'll find a lever guarded by one or two
archers. You may wonder what the levers do or how many there are. This
question is easily answered if you just man up and pull the lever. Oooh, a
giant dragon etched stone drops! Cool. Check your map. Oh, it's an end point.
The other lever, that is. See, there's a gold ring where you need to go next.
It's across this chasm. Now to run around and actually get to it. 

With both levers pulled, the giant stone is out of your way. Yay! Now you can
leave this foreboding, snowy, Urgal-infested crag and do some real
adventuring! Oh, wait, no you can't because -

******* Second Boss *******
Another nameless barbarian wants to tan your hide. With swords. This guy's
tougher because he's got two birdies to do half his fighting. Dispatch the
birds post-haste, then hit this guy hard. A new set of birds appear, but
their spawn point is on one side of the arena. Be on the other side (stay
near where the dragon etched stone sunk into the ground). Be sure to pick up
insta-herb dropped by the birds, and just swing away until this boss is
whimpering at your feet.
******* Boss Done *******

Call Saphira again and go look at a stone she's standing beside. It says
Eragon. Because one of the old and famous dragon riders was named that.
Lucky you, to be given such a common name. Finally old Brom gives you a
sword. But only after admitting to extreme cowardice. You should restore
his honor and kill him, in the tradition of the ancient Samurai. But you
don't come from that tradition. And neither does he. Let's go. So much more
to do. So many more Urgal to MDK.
******* Rocky Pass Done *******

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Ninor Valley
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Ah, yes. Another quiet river valley filled with death and destruction. Just run
past it all to the next circle/exit. Oh, you want to explore? Okay. I'm not
stopping you. I'm only saying you've got a country to save from a horrible
dragon rider who would rule as a bloody tyrant, with a right-hand shade as a
horrible Sheriff. So yeah, go ahead and explore the wonders of this world,
while you still can. Hundreds of tortured souls can wait.
*whistles tunelessly, waiting*

******* Greta's Gathering Quest *******
Oh. I see. You're actually just a kind hearted soul who's sole desire is to
assist any and all around you. First you're running through rings, collecting
beads and sashes and gold mugs, and now: Bracelets. Great. Have fun on that
quest. Gooerd Jooeeaaraeob!
Oh, and if you can't find any bracelets, it's because Urgal are actually
carrying them. Yay! More forced murder!
*I would like to point out an inconsistency in the gathering quests. It
started with the Gypsy. You had to talk to him again to get your reward. But
in the next one, the Bava sash quest, you didn't have to see that pixie again.
She just opened the barricade without more prompting than you collecting the
12th sash.* 
******* Quest Done *******

******* Dexdor's Challenge Course *******
A whole valley and this guy wants you to run through some rings. Thanks.
******* Quest Done *******

Now can we go?
******* Ninor Done *******

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Daret
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Brom walks you into town then says he's got something to do. He quests you to
go get supplies and avoid being seen by guards. There's an end point, so go to
it. Uh oh, a cut scene. "Guards, and a hooded man..." But they show the
becoweled man first, then the guards. What's a wanted fugitive to do? Let the
cut scene do all the work, that's what. You run into a nearby hut and see a
lady, who's name you already know to be Angela, seated at a giant blue ball
she's rubbing.  She tells you things you, as a player, should have already
guessed. Typical vague things, like, you're destined to be great, and there is
a great ally with you, and there is great danger for those close to you. Great.

******* Bhoni's Quickfind Quest *******
This lady hid something for you, and if you explored first, you would know
where the two men are. If you did not, then follow the path back the way you
came, to the right, then take a left at the next intersection. Great run! 
******* Quest Done *******

******* Olric's Gathering Quest *******
Olric's a loser. You're so nice to help him.
******* Quest Done *******

So, upon leaving the fortune teller, you suddenly felt bad about wasting
supply money. Probably should have been more of a man and taken charge of
the situation by telling her "No." You leave the place, but guards are
guarding things and you can only go one direction: doom. You meet up with
Brom and receive your deserved chiding, then guards appear and try to kill
you both. Finally, the old man takes charge and attacks! But these guards
seem to be in endless supply. And they spawn from the same spot. So you
could stand in one place for an hour and MDK a slew of guards and get your
new sword skill maxed out. Be sure to share the sharp end of your sword with
each group of guards. Especially the ones fighting old Brom.
Once you've murdered enough guards, Brom will tell you to head for the
blocked off bridge. Then he'll destroy the barricade with a mighty bash of
his sword! Ah, but then you're stuck on the bridge between a guard and an
Urgal. Slaughter all the ones Brom's fighting, then maybe a few more and
you'll be able to call Saphira who will not know how to fly where you are
until you figure out how to fly her through some flipping rings. Argh. 
Once done with the flying, an image cut-scene pans and pushes slightly,
showing an explosion of blue light presumably coming from Eragon. Then we
have a fly-through of a dark and blue cavern. At the end of the fly through
is Drag- I mean Eragon and -
******* Daret Done *******

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Underground
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You learn a spell, suddenly. Probably from the energy burst with Saphira on the
bridge. Draw the symbol twice, like you're being prompted to. Oh. You've
somehow learned another spell. Okay. Weird, but okay. Done drawing that one,
now- uh, a third spell? Now I'm a little confused. Did that burst of energy
suddenly make our little hero into a mage-knight? Great. Whatever, we've got
three spells now, each one associated with a different color. Oh, you didn't
see the colors? That's okay. Press start and go to your symbols list. Here you
can see how to draw each symbol and its associated color. Woot.
Hey, did you try to run back out the cave to see where you came from? I tried,
and even though there's an entrance circle on your map, you can't go back!
What? ... fine. Move on.
Run past all the Urgal until you get to one that's by an obvious pile of
debris blocking the path. kill him, and incidentally the archer, and you'll
see a blue squiggle over a smaller boulder. Looking at the smaller boulder,
you'll notice it looks like there's a round thing under it. What's that? I
don't know. Make a blue squiggle on your touch screen and fling the resultant
squiggle in the direction of the boulder. What do I mean by 'fling' you ask? 
Flinging (Draw and Flick [TM]) is now a thing the game forgot to tell you
about. When you draw a spell symbol ('glyph' actually) a colored squiggle
appears to let you know your spell is ready to be used on a target. Put your
finger on the squiggle and flick it past the edge of the screen. In a way,
you are 'virtually' tossing it in a direction based off the camera view. So,
flinging up causes the spell to cast away in the distance on the 3D view.
Flinging down will cast at a target behind the camera, and left and right
fling in those directions. Happy Flinging!

So. Now you've destroyed a boulder with lightning. What more do you need
with Saphira? Oh the fun that awaits you, patient player, for the time that
you need to ride Saphira!
Go stand on the circle. It sinks beneath you and the pile of fallen rock
explodes and a large Urgal comes charging at you. Run away! Or kill. Your
choice.

You'll arrive at another archer/Urgal combination you have to kill to allow
the boulder to be destroyed. Once you've cleaned the blood off your sword 
(or don't, you horrible savage), blast the boulder and stomp on the button.
Charge! 
And so on. Eventually you will arrive at a save point. It's inside a well
constructed room. There is something up a side corridor in an adjacent room.
A weird statue with an orange emblem. Walk toward it and a picture slide show
pops up and some lady named Arya (oddly similar to lady Aria Stark) starts
talking to you... Apparently it's a dream because she's not really there,
she's in a castle being held captive by Durza, the Shade, the right hand man
for Galbatorix. Quick, hero, save your princess!
While she guilts you into saving her by saying her life is in your hands,
her life is actually in the hands of Durza who is going to kill her if you
come to save her. She's actually bait!
Done talking with her yet, loverboy? Walk up to the spiky construct with
the distinctly orange emblem. Oh, you're such a natural, learning spells
left and right with narry a teacher about. Harden is basically Petrify. It
turns unsolid things solid. Harden. Tell your friends.

Oh, check your quests. Even though you don't know where this cavern empties,
you find out it'll take you to Gil'ead. Fun note: did you know that Gil'ead
and Gilead are the same word, only one of them is an actual place on Earth?
Guess which one? Oh, no, I'm not telling. :p

Walking around, you'll meet a sword wielding manic who flings a bird at you.
Whack his bird, then whack him. Or don't. If you can get away from him and
cross the bridge, go for it. Oh, ho ho! You fell through the bridge! That's
because there's a symbol floating over it. It's a red squiggle. What does
that mean? Who knows? Wait. Remember the blue squiggle over the boulders
that matched up to Energy Blast? Well check your glyph list for the red
symbol. Got it? Well cast it at the bridge, dummy. 

Got across it? Great Job. You'll have to take out the archers at the next
bridge to be able cross it, because it's so long. And the next one. Then
another surprise boss. Actually not so much a surprise because it's a
large-looking area. 

******* Third Boss *******
A third nameless barbarian. This boss is broken. Back up to the edge and
target the boss. If you're back enough, he drops down and line-backer
charges you. As he does, dodge around behind him and hit him off the
ledge. Now he can't see you, and you can't target him. Except, he'll run
out far enough that you can. Hit him with your spells. It'll take a while
(if you didn't pick up magic replenishing gems) because your magic bar
refills slowly. Amazing! Why doesn't your health do that? If you can't
figure this boss out from here, even I can't help you.
******* Boss Done *******

The pile of rubble that fell down behind the boss has magically
disappeared and you can run on, wayward son. Also: save point. Also also,
you can't hop on Saphira to fly away from here. If you fly here on her
you'll have to run through the whole level just to exit.
And I went through the trouble to find out why. Turns out the bridge
from Daret to the Underground was demolished. You can't cross the bridge,
so it makes sense that you can't leave the cave system in that direction.
That makes sense, right? Right? 
******* Underground Done *******

********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* *********
Lake Isenstar
********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* *********
Now that you've proven yourself in the cave of challenges (not the actual name)
the game tells you Saphira can take you places you already visited. Why not
just go directly to saving the princess and destroying all evil in the world?
Because now you have to learn the traditions of the dragon riders by conquering
a dragon tower. Great.

This tower is fairly straightforward, but in my explorations, I was slightly
confused by the complicated model of the area. There are a few areas to run
around in, but they are side paths and don't go far or anywhere. 

Essentially, you want to go up.

"...For safety's sake, they contain obstacles that can only be crossed with
the aid of a dragon." Wait. "for safety's sake"? If it could only be crossed
with a dragon, that actually sounds opposite of safe. That sounds, in the
immortal words of Big Brother, "unsafe". I think this might be a 
mistranslation. I think what they meant to say was, for the safety of the
dragon riders, or indeed for the safety of the residents of the towers,
because dragon riders were a war machine, and I'm betting the towers were
under a rather persistent barrage from enemies requiring the towers to be a
constantly dangerous place for invader and inhabitant alike.

Here Brom stops to trade hits with a wolf. After that, you could head
straight for the tower which is symbolized as a little dog pixel statue on
the map. It'll be fairly well directly East. Or you could go toward the open
circle southeast from here. While your save point is in that direction, I
would suggest going into the tower first.

******* Unnamed Tower: keep going up, puzzles, learn a spell. Done. *******

The tower isn't so much a challenge as a reason to spend 10 minutes to learn
a new spell that you may not ever actually use. Truly the only useful spells
are Harden (petrify) and Energy Bolt (lightning). Repulsion (push) and 
Telekinesis (levitate) are used in some quests and puzzles, but don't lend
themselves well to very useful battle spells. 

Oh, why am I listing other names for the spells? Because in any other game,
that's what they'd be called.

Actually, I lied. Bone Break here is really powerful. It pretty well
destroys your enemies in one hit. They crumble, screaming, into a broken
mass, and die from the shock of the pain. Good job! 

So you did or didn't do the tower whatever you went south east and to the
circle. Why's it in the middle of a field? Because Ra'zac, that's why.
This guy seems tough. Don't sweat it, just hit him two or three times
quickly (YY) then Dodge around him. Spells don't seem to affect him, and
neither do arrows. I say don't sweat it because you only have to get him
down to half health. Got him? Good; he runs away like a coward. Chase
after him (the next circle).
This time you have help from a dragon. Your dragon. You can say that now
because she chose you and you two are bonded forever. Also, thanks to the
earlier beating, he seems way timid and won't even attack you (unless you
are standing next to him when he roars and throws his razor hands up)
instead doing crazy back flips to avoid your swings. Again, slings and
arrows are an outrageous concept here. Just get him to back into Saphira
and she'll do the rest.
******* Surprise Ra'zac Done *******
Yay for Saphira restoring your health. Now run on and get interrupted by
animated panels. Arya  (Stark) complains that you aren't fighting Durza to
the death yet. You're all, "Well gimme a sec," and she's all "You haven't
even saved me yet." Keep running. You haven't saved yet.

Run south and save.

Run east to the next ring (that's south then north). You'll fight a stronger
Ra'zac. Don't die or you have to start all the way from the save point from
a few minutes ago.
Race on again and finish him off.
******* Second Surprise Ra'zac Done *******

Now Brom shows up and asks if things are okay. Then he says y'all should
leave. What a great idea.
******* Lake Isenstar Done *******

********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* *********
Gil'ead Exterior
********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* *********
And now Brom says to not fight Durza. But Eragon, ever compelled to kill evil
and save the princess, refuses to be swayed from his noble quest. Brom storms
off in disgust.

Run on, call Saphira, then save game. It's important to save the game as save
points are poorly placed throughout.

For whatever reason, you're calling Saphira three times in a row, after being
forced to kill archers and warriors. Good Joeerb!

******* Gil'ead Exterior Done *******

********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* *********
Gil'ead Interior
********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* *********
This is probably the most well constructed map in the whole game. It has
several places that lock down until a trigger is activated, and then those
areas reset for continual leveling. Do enough leveling with the sword and you
can use both sword and dagger in attacks to do more murder death killing.

If you head north when the castle gives you a path option, a bedraggled man
will come down the hall and quests you to free the other prisoners in exchange
for having a door picked open for you to continue on. You, the gallant knight,
agree and from here are allowed to immediately do that or head south to bash
around for a while. Not much to the south. So north...
You are presented with an overly complex puzzle that could take all night to
figure out. Firstly, the prison is heavily guarded. Secondly, the way you open
the prisoner's doors requires you to go so far out of your way, it's almost
not worth the time and effort. It would be nice to have a save point, is what
I'm saying.
In actuality, that's all a complete lie. There are no guards and the levers
are within 20 virtual feet from each other. The area is set up symmetrically,
so the lever is in the same place on the mirror side of the area. There are
no tricks or traps, no silly jumping areas, no tiger pits. Nothing. Simply
put, the guy who had broken out could have, if he really wanted to, walked
between the two levers himself and freed all the prisoners. Super lame.

********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* *********
Gil'ead Fortress 2
********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* *********
Going up the ramp to the door, you are phased to a new area. Memory allocation
limitations. There's a room with pillars and locked gates. Surprise archers!
But not really because they're upset at seeing you and spend those precious
moments raging instead of shooting you. Which gives you enough time to run up
and stab them before they know what's happened.

Once done with these two archers, you can open the far gate and then you can
go left or right and either one will put you in the main room. The east path
leads to a room with two pillars and four buttons and two closed gates. Have
fun. The west path leads to a room with a whipping statue and bad guys. Have
fun. 

Save. Now do the other room. Save again. Now run back to the beginning then
back into the hall. Everyone has reset and you can fight again and again.
Have fun.

Heading south from the save point, there's a huge door that doesn't do
anything. Going down further, there are more useless doors. Where go? Check
your map. Yeah, go up the side corridor and

******* Fourth Boss *******
Rinse and repeat the previous "Bosses".
******* Boss Done *******

Continue on. Oh, a newly decorated room! And

******* Durza *******
Oh. It's a trap. Thanks for letting us know, Arya. 
Fighting Durza is a pain. He teleports all the time. Then he throws spears at
you. You can't keep a target lock on him, so you just have to run around
trying to hit him. It's best to wait until he's charging you with his sword
to actually hit him, instead of trying to catch him throwing spears at you.
This takes a few minutes.
******* Durza Done *******

Fly Saphira through some rings over a desert, then watch some pictures.
You just beat Durza, but he's saying student and teacher fall. Who's he
talking about? Oh. Brom. That's - wait, where? Why? How come Brom wasn't
fighting Durza? Well, he takes a spear to chest, which may put an end to his
adventuring.

Oh. Wait.
******* Gil'ead Done *******

********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* *********
Hadarac Desert
********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* *********
Looks like Brom took one injury too many. He really could have let you get hit
by that one spear. Really. You've got plenty of Herb left. Oh well.
Now you're in a desert. What do? What does a blood thirsty warrior-mage do when
he's dumped into a desert landscape filled with mindless aggressors? KILL
EVERYTHING. 
Why?
Because, that's why.
So get to it. Kill all things now. You merciless slaughterer you.
Don't die here. There is no save.
Blood-lust sated? Great. Good Job.
Some hooded guy (Murtagh) runs up to you saying some B.S. about friendship and
trust or whatever. You can't kill him, and he thinks you can only survive if
you follow him, but that's obviously not true.
******* some desert Done *******

********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* *********
Beor Valley
********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* *********
Search for the Varden? Okay. Really that means follow the path 'til you get
there. Before you go, there's a dragon tower with Mist waiting for you. Mist
is nice in that you can finally sneak past people. 
Don't forget to look for packages here. They're super important.

******* Uthilda's Gathering Quest *******
Lazy lady doesn't feel like gathering her own pears. Here's the funny bit:
once you've picked the last prickly pear, you can't just walk back to her and
ask for the reward. The last pear is at the bottom of a waterfall, on a ledge
above a pool, occupied by three Urgal, with no way to retrace your steps. Have
fun!
******* Quest Done *******
 
******* Hadarac Tower: climb up and get a spell. Done *******

When you finally get through the area and to a water fall, for whatever
reason, Arya has been moved there and Murtagh and she are surrounded by
dozens of enemies. Only you can be murderer supreme! Kill 'em all! 

******* Fifth Boss Done *******

And then the murder-fest stops and the waterfall opens and the Varden come
to the rescue. Yay.
******* Beor Valley Done *******

********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* *********
Tranjheim
********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* *********
Welcome to the underground city of the Varden. Ajihad claims leadership, and
Hrothgar is an actual name in the world, according to my android tablet. Some
guards grab Murtagh because he is the son of Morzan, whose sword you carry.
Apparently he has to answer for his father's crimes, but no one cares that you
are carrying the murder weapon. The twins want to see you, but in typical 
snooty twin fashion, will wait until you are ready.
"Scale doesn't fall far from the dragon"? Really? That analogued metaphor don't
hunt. Better leaf it alone.

******* Hals' Quickfind Quest *******
This one actually stumped me for a few minutes. I wasn't sure if I was being
shown where the item was or what. Then I thought back to most of the other
Quickfind Quests and realized the picture was taken from the perspective of the
location. Meaning if someone was standing on the prize and took a picture, then
based a quest on that picture, I should actually match that location in the
world to the picture to find the prize. Duh.
******* Quest Done *******

******* Ingerd's Gathering Quest *******
You heard right. Ingerd. Not Ingrid, like is normal. She misplaced some s-words
and can't bear for her students to do any actual hard labor.
******* Quest Done *******

******* Ory's Challenge Course *******
What a little jerk. Run north to get the first ring.
Then run east and up and up.
******* Quest Done *******

The only way to figure out where to go next is to explore every house. Or go to
the big one on the hill. Ajihad will quest you to be tested by the Twins. Save
the Twins for last. Unless you want to get the game over with. Once you finish
all your questing and test against the Twins and test with that one lady who
came from no where to defend you. I forgot her name. Sorry.

******* Twins' Quest *******
The Twins are jerks and just want to hurt you. Who knows why. They probably
work for Galbatorix.
The key to this one is the colored squiggles. If you've done both dragon
towers, and/or used all your spells a bunch, you'll recognize the colored
squiggles they launch in super slow-mo at you. Apparently in this universe,
like-spells dispel each other, so you have to match what they throw at you.
Not too hard, really. This will continue until they launch an odd spell
you've never seen and some lady you've never met comes out and dispels it,
while yelling foul.
******* Twin's Quest Done *******

So the lady takes you around a corner to have some alone time. She'll beat you
up a bit and then say you beat her. Whatever. At this point the Urgal attack
and you get to kill an almost unending stream of "bad" guys. After a while,
you're gonna get bored, and you won't be able to go anywhere. Or so it seems.
******* Sixth Boss Done *******
Turn away from where the Urgal are entering the area and go up the hill to
Ajihad's house. A new thingy will take over. The guards will yell to regroup.
Just go up the hill to Ajihad's house until you're suddenly flying Saphira.

******* Destroy Durza and the Beast *******
This is another annoying battle. I say annoying because it's hard to tell
where Durza's shots are heading to avoid them. I had success touching each of
the four corners of the screen in order to keep Saphira moving about and not
get hit. Firing on Durza is somewhat easy and assisted by the game so you
barely need to line up your shots to land a hit. Just keep doing that until
you're done. You're health is the green bar, Durza's is red. Another Star
Wars reference.
Oh, you missed the first and second one? The first one is your FARM and UNCLE
are destroyed by Imperial Guards in attempt to find YOU, the long lost
Messiah who will bring ORDER to the Force! The second one is, an OLD FRIEND
of the FAMILY who has been watching you for years, sends you on a quest to
learn about the ORDER so you can DESTROY THE EVIL EMPEROR. 
******* Durza actually Done *******

******* Game Done *******

Not really though. You are given the chance to wander around the game areas
again, but without any bosses to beat up. They say it's to complete any
quests you may have skipped, but really, it's because they revealed more art
boxes in each level. So yeah, just when you thought you had found them all...
Nope! Yeah, I'm not writing a location guide. Just go through the levels
again. It's not actually hard at all. 
Some other notes while going back through the game after having beaten it:
 - The Boss in Gil'ead Fortress is still there.
 - You can't leave Gil'ead Fortress from the throne room. You also cannot call
 Saphira from inside the Fortress.
 - You cannot return to the desert to visit Brom's grave site.
 - Dragon towers will not let you map them. You cannot call Saphira to fly
 you up a tower.

Good luck. Have fun! And GOOD JOOEEOROOEORB!

********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* *********
Niko =^.^= at msnfdm3b4 hotmail com
********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* ********* *********
I'm gonna end this with a short review/critique. The rendering engine did a</pre><pre id="faqspan-2">
great job. The animations are fairly clean and smooth, although there are times
when monsters animations are cut short and they are facing you without having
rotated properly. Eragon's animations are also good, but for the attack combos
and the actual targeting stance. He locks facing about 15 degrees to the left
of center so when you run toward or away from a targeted foe, your map heading
changes around a circle instead of running a straight line.

The levels are nicely rendered and the map edges are well defined and collision
-error free. Never did I have trouble on a map collision section, with falling
off a surface into infinity. While most of the areas aren't very detailed
(presumably to save space) the ones that are are adequately detailed and staged
in a way that makes sense. No area is difficult to navigate, nor do they
require extensive exploration to escape. 

Some more work could have been put into transitions between levels and into and
out of story panels. Also helpful would have been either a menu tutorial for
some of the more esoteric mini-games (like flying the dragon through rings), or
the actual exclusion of some esoteric mini-games (like flying the dragon
through rings).

The map was extremely helpful in finding quest items and locating enemies as
well as seeing the layout of the surrounding area. It would have been nice to
not need to reopen the map every few seconds because some message popped up, or
because of a spell or item cast.

Another point of confusion was Saphira's traveling ability. Why give me a map
to fly to five places when there are fourteen separate locations? It would
have been more fun to fly Saphira personally through the clouds to glowing
dots over a 2D map. Truly!

Again, flying Saphira could have been used more in a personal style too,
instead of impersonally from a distant camera angle. Sure let me call her, but
then let me interact with her and actually fly her around places.
I do like the openness of the levels. Being able to go to and fro between them
is a nice change. Except for the Underground level. I understand the initial
need to keep me moving forward, but that could have been solved with a simple
barricade. There was no need to make the starting point inaccessible
physically by putting a too high ledge there at the beginning.

I like the drawing and flinging spells bit, but the mechanic to slow time
isn't necessary. If something is too hard because the gesture recognition
algorithm can't recognize a scrawl, then slowing things down won't solve that
issue. A better solution would have been to make the spell glyphs into action
buttons that became flingable scribbles.

I've gone on long enough. Overall I'd rate this game from one to ten about a
four, due to some frustrating mechanics, pointless mini-games, and no
alternative to mindless bloodletting and button pounding.
******* Done *******