Red Rope

Jul

2021

Red Rope: Don’t Fall Behind+ Walkthrough 7 – House of Fire

The Intermediate Beasties

We’re close to getting through all of the intermediate houses, so let’s review what monsters we find in them. Each house had two new enemies apiece (with the exception of the House of Wind), excluding the mini-bosses.

**Cotton Ball (Spore) – Wind:** These puff balls float aimlessly about the stage and will home slightly toward you when you near it. Passing your rope over them will kill them. They don’t add anything to your rope length.

**Flame Guy (Magma Soldier) – Fire:** Like all other spear guys, these enemies will lunge at you with their weapons. Additionally, when they glow orange, they can burn through your rope. Wait until they cool off and change color; then swing in for the kill.

**Frog (Water Monster) – Water:** When the water level is high, these monsters will look like shadows in the water. They will chase after you if you enter their line of sight in the water, dragging you below the surface. On dry land or when the water level is lowered, they’ll look like tiny frogs and can be killed by stepping on them.

**Guard (Terracotta Soldier) – Earth:** They’re spear guys, so they’ll try to poke you. Wrap around them to kill them like the rest. However, you need to stay wrapped around them for a few seconds, allowing them to glow before they finally disappear. Go for the kill after they lunge at you.

**Merman (Triton) – Water:** Our last spear guys aren’t that special. They are faster than their brethren but will only lunge at you. Show them no mercy, and avoid getting them in the water.

**Sand Worm – Earth:** These worms hide in the sand, and a bullseye shadow will only chase after you once you enter their territory. Once the shadow is under you, the sand worm will raise up to snatch you. They’ll stay above ground for a few seconds, allowing you to wrap around them.

**Witch (Burning Lady) – Fire:** Burn the witch by passing your rope over her. After that, she’s on fire and will chase after you, presumably for lighting her on fire. She’ll burn your rope if you stop running from her, and she’ll naturally burn to death if you manage to escape her for four or five seconds.

Jul

2021

Red Rope: Don’t Fall Behind+ Walkthrough 6 – House of Earth

Intermission Time, But Not Really

We’re officially done with half of the houses in Red Rope, and now we’re face with the following question: are we half-full kind of people or half-empty? Put more relevantly, are we the people who look at the halfway marker and think we’re inching ever nearer to the end? Or are we the people who think about all the work they had to do to get to the midway point and gripe about having to do the same amount of work again?

Player 2 sits in the former camp, and I dwell in the latter. This video series has been fun to make, but some of these videos have drained the life out of me (i.e. the previous house). I’m also a curmudgeon who thinks life is about the end and not the journey. With the Brain School, I recall how writing the middle portion was such a slog. I was already envisioning the ending, but the whole lead up to that point still felt like a desert with no determinable end.

Part of the pressure has been the self-imposed deadline. Player 2 and I want to host a contest related to Red Rope in November, so we want all the videos out by then. You’d think four months would be more than enough, but my motivation runs on solar power in the dark winter. I’ve got to publish a review by then as well, and I don’t know if this slow-and-steady thing is going to let me beat the hare.

We’ll see. We’re at our “hump video,” and I’ll be damned if I call it anything else.

Jun

2021

Red Rope: Don’t Fall Behind+ Walkthrough 5 – House of Water

Just Not Feeling It

I don’t particularly feel like writing anything today. Here is the House of Water after a long hiatus. More content will follow on a to-be-determined timeline.

Best,

Solomon

Apr

2021

Red Rope: Don’t Fall Behind+ Walkthrough 4 – House of Winter

Diamond in the Rough

I’ve searched for hidden games on the eShop since I bought the Switch, hoping to pull a golden nugget from the trash dump of shovelware now plaguing the system. This process has not been very fruitful at all, pairing me with the likes of Headsnatchers, Concept Destruction, World for Two, and the Town of Light. Admittedly, I made my search more painful by the rigid rules I set for what constituted a “hidden gem.” Because I’ve been an indie afficionado for some time, simply being a lesser-known indie release is not enough to qualify a game as a hidden gem. No, a hidden gem needs less than four reviews on Metacritic and fewer than 100 reviews on Steam.

Am I arbitrary? Absolutely.

Red Rope: Don’t Fall Behind+, however, met these parameters, becoming my one and only hidden game on the Switch. That’s not to say I found something that will appeal to everyone. It’s not even close to being a perfect game, with its quality hovering around the 7.5/8 scores. It has some absurdly frustrating sections, as we’ll see with the fifth video. Player 2 hasn’t played a more difficult game, and the two of us have bickered a fair share in learning how to cooperate. Despite all this, we look forward to recording it each week.

My hope is that these videos will bring more recognition to a game that deserves it. Considering I have only a fraction of the following Red Rope has, it is a bit of a pipe dream to do this, but Player 2 and I will try our darn hardest. We may put together a promotion of sorts in the future, but we have to finish this walkthrough first. We’re four videos in, and we have at least nine to go.

Wish us luck.

Apr

2021

Red Rope: Don’t Fall Behind+ Walkthrough 3 – House of Autumn

The Beasties After Your Blood

Now that we have covered three houses, you have seen almost every single enemy in the initial four houses, of which there are only six. Here, I’ll provide an overview of all of them for easy reference.

**Blue Fire (Ignis Fatuus):** Blue fire follows a set path above water. Like regular fire in the game, you can put it out by quickly running your rope through it. However, if your rope remains on it for too long, the fire will singe through it as well. When taking out blue fire, make sure both you and your partner are on dry land as you run past it. If you walk through the water, you’ll be too slow to survive.

**Ghosts (the Damned) and the Tombstones:** These ghosts come in male and female forms but die all the same. Simply pass your rope over them, and they disappear. However, these ghosts will continue to respawn from tombstones until you destroy them. Ghosts will most often shamble their way toward you, so you can bait them until they are far enough away from the tombstones. Once you do this, weave your way around them and encircle the tombstones to destroy them. From there, you can take out the ghosts permanently. Ghosts can lunge at you, but if you keep your distances, you should be fine. You can also farm ghosts if you want to increase the length of your rope.

**Hands:** These only appear in the House of Summer and are unkillable. They hide in the sand and are only visible when you walk within a square patch of them, at which point they will reach up in the air. You must avoid these, and I have marked them in my video for the house. If one of you falls into their grasp, the other player must run away from the hands in order to pull the trapped player out. The shorter your rope, the less you have to run away. If both of you get stuck, you’re dead.

**Harpy:** In the first four houses, the harpy only appears in one room in the House of Winter. It will fly in a set path above the stage, making you unable to reach it. Once it sees you, it will swing down toward you, a little faster that the other monsters you’ve encountered thus far. If your partner and you dodge to either side of it as it attacks, you will have a brief opportunity to circle around it and kill it. If you don’t, it will fly back up to safety until it attacks you again.

**Shades (Ghosts):** This enemy is confusing because I call them “shades,” but the developers call them “ghosts,” which is the name I use for the “Damned.” Anyway, these monsters (both female and male variants) have two forms. In their starting form, they are translucent and can kill you. You must pass your rope over them like you would the ghosts. This makes the monsters appear darker, and in this temporary form, they cannot hurt you and will actively run from you. If you double back just as you pass over them, it will be easier to wrap around them and kill them.

**Zombies:** As with the ghosts and shades, you have male and female variants of these, the latter of which I call “banshees” in the videos. Zombies will follow a set path until you engage them. They will lunge at you, allowing you to juke to the side and wrap around them. They can change directions if you are not quick enough, but they are generally easy to take out.

See my video journal article for the first house for information on skeletons, keys, and shadows.

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