YMMV / Lost Ruins

• Cheese Strategy:
  • Heroine: Best in Hardcore Mode so there's no penalty for opening chests. None of these need any consumables, nor dodge rolling. Zweihander uses after Rosie may be swappable with the Flame Sword, since that deals the same amount of base damage.
    • Lami: Swinging the Zweihander while attacking mid-air with the Winged Shoes allows dodging all the attacks of her first phase and the first attacks of her second phase. Then, School Swimsuit and the lightning spell allows taking down the rest of her HP if the whole Mana Meter is used, no consumables needed.
    • Yuki Onna: Don't fight her immediately, instead get all the way to Soarvi and buy her Gauntlet. Using that and the Gladiator's Helmet allows defeating her first two phases by just swinging the Zweihander as fast as possible when standing on the left platform. The third phase is made damage-proof by equipping the purchasable Hot Pack from Astarte.
    • Rosie: Use the HP Absorption Orb and Orbs of Ice from beating Yuki-Onna with Mage's Orb and the Ice Cream Scoop, which costs 200, but is unnecessary, because nothing can boost its 15 ticks of damage to be stronger, and the Orbiting Particle Shield that also freezes keeps Rosie from moving quickly. The important part is to "wield" Best Friend for the first phase, therefore dealing long-range damage and also getting consistent Mana recovery from Best Friend getting hit by Rosie's lunges, and Best Friend will block thrown meat as well. When she's tired, wield Zweihander with all the booster items right before launching the attack, then replacing them after the hit for maximum flexibility and damage, since attack damage is calculated when initiated, not on contact. Jumping with some practice will net a 0 damage victory against the first phase. Against the second phase, this game doesn't have Collision Damage, so jumping to land inside her sprite after the damage has been done by her attacks is safe. Third phase, going back to getting distance and draining her is good.
    • Mimic: Anything that's not Winged Shoes, Gauntlet, Best Friend, fully-buffed Cursed Scythe, and HP Absorption Orb. First phase is easy, she just Dash Attack-s to the left, so run left immediately, jump and slash to both avoid and deal damage, then just mash to stun lock her into the next phase. Winged Shoes is bad because the Scythe doesn't keep attacking during the drop so it's basically a guaranteed miss. Second phase is a bit more chaotic, but the gem rains mainly miss the sides, and using HP Absorption will likely regenerate any damage taken, along with Best Friend to restore MP to keep allowing regeneration casts. When MP is full, use something like Summon Ice Orb to make use of Best Friend's near-constant MP recovery.
    • Yuri: Best Friend, maximize Scythe damage with Magical Gloves and Saint's Skull, get Recast Velocity. 1st phase: Hit her with the Scythe 3-4 times to send to 2nd phase. Jump over the skulls, Best Friend should get them to discharge harmlessly, and hitting her immediately after she appears cancels her pentagram Energy Ball generation attack. 2nd phase: Get up close immediately and launch Recast Velocity. Getting close forces a Bullet Hell pattern that's too slowed to damage. Hit Scythe 3 times to get her to phase out and summon skeletons to fight for her. Take out the bottom, the one of the ones on the platform. Time the death of the last one so you end up close to her again so you can triple hit her again ASAP to get to not do 6 lasers and instead phase out immediately again. Fight more skeletons, doesn't matter the order. A Max Scythe has a quick enough swing that the final blow can be a jump slash from below the floating Yuri.
    • Jun: Some form of Mana Regen, you're going to be hitting enough that even Magical Gloves are fine if paired with Yuri's Wand, otherwise Mage's Orb, precise weapon doesn't matter much, as long as it's fast enough. Spells: Recast Velocity and Chain Lightning: Face away from the tree a little bit away from the cutscene trigger, a.k.a the last bit where the grey floor turns brown, and/or maybe hit it a few times to get it even closer to Jun's spawn. Use Best Friend while facing the entrance to get a floating shield positioned right in front of the Heroine. Get a Fast weapon, although a Normal one with +1 speed from something like the Leather Gloves works too. Cast Recast Velocity to slow the arrows, then fire Chain Lightnings through Best Friend to hit Jun. Will work into 2nd phase a bit. Stack Recasts Velocity if you want. The Jump attack needs to move though, but the poison geysers don't travel that far. After she jumps, just stick to a side for a few seconds then move to the opposite side, so you aren't trapped between her and a wall.
    • Kana: Saint's Skull, Gauntlets, Magical Gloves on Zweihander. Fire off a slice at her back right before the transformation finishes, then be aware that her Dash Attack has Collision Damage when starting, so instead run in the other direction and jump slash to hit her on the recovery. Do that a few times, and then prep to do slashes while she's turning into Phase 2. Hit her 4-5 times and she'll go down. Blades are pretty slow, jump a lot to throw off their aim, and getting inside the spinning blades attack instead of outside means Kana's totally open to being finished off.
  • Another Side, Another Story mode: Ice Cream Scoop is good, and using these strategies just means knowing where to find items, not buy them.
    • Lami: Freeze the water, then dodge well and use the other magic attack to keep up the pressure.
    • Rosie: Mage's Orb: Freeze her and make sure to hit Best Friend to get Mana back to do it repeatedly, stunlocking her. Or grab the Ice Cream Scoop to freeze better.
    • Yuki Onna: Unlike what might be expected, specializing in Lightning boosters for the Fire Beam is best. Beam with Thunder Hammer + Battery kills the ninjas in one hit, despite visually doing only 33 to the Flame Sword + Battery's 40+. Either combo will take out the Samurai in two hits and a little wait, though. Tanking one set of icicles is enough because only 5 beams are needed to go to Phase 3.
    • Yuri: Aerial Attack Triple Shot with Thunder Hammer and Magic Bow, first hit should be from jumping off the upper platform to get her in the back, then just shoot safely. Use the second phase's summoning to heal up with the Amulet of Life. It's possible to two-cycle the second phase, somehow.
    • Jun: Rune Stone-d Fire Beam because she'll always just fire a single shot most of the time, and it can be jumped over easily, giving time to do anything you want.
    • Sadora: Freeze stunlock her.
• Critical Dissonance: The game got fairly average, middle of the road reviews from critics in contrast to fan reception which was far more positive.
• Funny Moments: The third phase of the fight against Rosie is her, after having just been knocked out of her goblin form, running around the stage swinging her weapons around while bawling her eyes out. It is so out of left field, especially after the rather gruesome first two phases, that it is downright hilarious.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: The Mimic boss is a massive catgirl who is dancing with the beat of the music, and also very sexualized. The theme itself is a bit similar to "Camel by Camel." The boss came before the Ankha Dance meme became viral.
• Les Yay: Kana x Heroine due to the final ending image being Kana doing a Wall Pin of Love-esque pose to the blushing Heroine, but given that the Hardcore Mode ending shows the Heroine's original body has Blush Stickers in general, it's a bit ambiguous.
• Minimalist Run: Enforced in the game itself by Sadora the Ascetic and her "Way of the Ascetic" quest, which instantly fails if the player opens up any of the game's golden chests (which hold useful tools for the Heroine, such as spells and weapons). Successfully reach the end of the game without failing the challenge, and Sadora rewards the player with the Holy Sword, which is required for the best ending. From that point, the restrictions are also lifted and you can go back and open all the other chests.
• Scrappy Mechanic: A big point of criticism is how slow your attacks are compared to the enemies', while your fastest weapons are offset by poor range that forces you to get up close and personal. You do find items that can offset this flaw, but gathering the gold to make the purchase can be very tedious.

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