Tips and Tricks for Blossom Tales

[Entercoven]

Now, I haven't as of yet beaten the game (writing this before finishing the final dungeon), so if any additional information comes into play, then I'll share it.

It should be noted, that I do not have all of the items yet, I'm missing 3, but will update this when I get them.

(I know this is just item descriptions, telling you what I think of each item. The game itself is easy, it hands you money left and right, hearts aplenty. Just chuck bombs and boomerangs at everything till you get the Bee/Fireball medalions, or the dash shoes. Thats really all you need)



01_) First things first, realize that the sword you have isnt great. It has a delay, and cant be button mashed. It also deals very low damage. The Spin Attack and Dive Attack do better though.
02_) Bombs are your friend, they one shot all enemies, save for the larger beefier enemies.You can also spam throwing bombs by holding the direction, and just draining your stamina away. Sure it takes a while to recoop, but you'll have done a LOT of damage to the enemy. (I think 1 bomb is about 3-4 sword swings, and you can launch 4-6 bombs at a time depending on your stamina meter.) This truly is your go-to weapon of choice
03_) The shield can block projectiles, but eats away at your stamina when it takes a hit. Sadly, the shield also doesnt always work well. While holding the shield, moving forward and back leaves you protected, but numerous times moving side to side, even with my trusty shield out, I took damage. You failed me shield...
04_) The shovel. It actually has two uses, both of them are quite vital to an easy playthrough. See dark spots on the ground? Dig it up for a lot of gold. And I'm sure you've noticed they are plentiful. (They also give heart and stamina containers too). The other use is for later in the Snow area. Slipping on ice? Traveling across a narrow ice bridge, afraid you'll fall? Simply dig the ground. You'll hear a *tink* sound as you cant dig the ground, but come to a complete stop. This makes the Snow area a joke.
05_) Potions. Always keep a few of each on hand, you'll never know when you need to give them to strangers. Chances are, you'll only use up 3-5 Red Potions for yourself the entire game, specifically during/after bullet-hell areas. The rest of the game is very generous with giving away tons of hearts and gold.
06_) Blossom Spirit. I used it twice, just to see what it did. Turns out you summon a butterfly that will occasionally shoot a blue energy ball at enemies. Its neat, it can be useful, but its slow, only targets one at a time, so you'll never feel like you SHOULD use it other than because you can.
07_) Boomerang, it travels through enemies, hits them every time it touches them (So can hit twice), picks up items, but most importantly, also kills most enemies in a single hit. This and the Bomb are going to be great allies early on.
08_) The bow is neat, it can be upgraded to shoot three arrows. but its not really fast, or destructive, or spammable like the bombs are, or hit as many as the boomerang does. Its just there for the specific arrow puzzles and very long range enemies.
09_) Rose medaleon thing. I think it brings you back from the dead if you die, but unless there is a New Game+ feature where enemies hit you twice as hard, or you arent careful, you will probably never use this.
10_) Speed shoes. You dash forward swinging your sword, it has the same damage as the boomerang/arrow/bomb and it propels you forward. That being said, it pushes your squishy body forward into enemies. Just use it as a "dash" feature to move around quicker instead, leave the damage to the boomerang or bombs.




The Medalions are very fun and very handy to use.
01_) Ground Stomp. Doesnt activate switches, but one shots all enemies in the area, great for fending off hordes of enemies for certain minigames.
02_) BEES! BEEES EVERYWHERE! Spawn 3 bees, they home in on the closest attackable target, move around corners, through trees, on higher and lower ledges. Each suicidal bee deals the same as 1 sword swing, but depending on your stamina, you can summon 3-4 sets of bees! 9-12 homing bee damage to the face! (Fantastic for taking care of the fast moving dragon-headed, fire or ice snake monster. They move around sparadically. The bees home in on the face and stunlock them into submission and death.)
03_) Wall of Flame. Melts ice, burns enemies, its a good shield against ice/snow.
04_) The Fireball. Hands down, best weapon in the game. Shoots the same distance as the arrow, with the explosive power of the bomb, but has the power of fire. It is probably the most handy item in the game that you'll only get late game. Sad.




Shops sell 3 items at a time. Typically sold for 100, 250, or 500. (There is one time you can buy 20 feathers for 20g, and you can sell the 20 feathers for more than that, so... win?) That being said, I never really felt like I ever had to stop and grind for money. The game throws it at you by the chestful, the ground is littered in gold. Having more than 1000g is not uncommon.

Never feel like you should save your money in case you need it. By the time you get to the next area and need money, the game will have provided you an additional 300-600g for that exact purpose.

If you REALLY feel like you need money, and feel like you should sell items for money (Which realistically, you shouldnt ever need to more than the first time for the item)
01_) Mushrooms arent super common early game. Sure you see the enemy around every so often, but nothing that makes it grindworthy. They come out in droves later on in the game north of the castle. THATS where you farm for them.
02_) Druid Feathers/Griffon Feathers. Its the same thing, but the game calls them by two different names, without any reason. They arent HARD to get, but there really arent many areas where there are lots of enemies to farm them, so just get what you need.
03_) Brains. Zombies are so ridiculously plentiful in the Snow area, you'll get hundreds in no time at all, and every 20 gives you about 50g, a nice chunk of change, and probably the best you're likely to get.
04_) Souls. Ghosts cant be hit when you're looking at them, but drop souls often. Its not hard to get them, but the annoying way you have to kill them just makes it more troublesome than easy.
05_) Honeycomb, by destroying beenests. Not the bees, the nests, and they dont always appear. They are only in one area, and are guarded by SO MANY BEES. The item you get is the Bee Medalion, so that is worth it, but dont farm the bees.
06_) Skulls. I assume you get these in the catacombs during the final dungeon. Again, I'm procrastinating finishing this dungeon so I dont have any yet, but by this time you'll have two sword powerups, and can get the fireball spell. You should be fine.

[Shawndroid]

Thank you! I used bombs against the rock creatures, I don't know why I didn't think about using them against other enemies, like the Pirate Queen. Took me forever to beat her.

[Estragon]

This is pretty good. I've summarized all the items in my guides, but this goes into some additional details I either never really got into or only mentioned in the walkthrough narrative. Some additional comments:

Sword/button mashing: What type of controls are you using? The sword doesn't do all that much damage initially, but I've found mashing the button quickly I could whirl around and do pretty effective crowd control when needed. Wired MS XB360 controller here (non-clone).

Shield: I found out a bit too late but this can be highly effective in the final area where there are giant heads on the wall shooting energy bolts. The lowly shield can bat them back, one-shotting the heads and making the area safe (until you leave the room). I think you'll know what I'm talking about when you get there, but it's shown in the game's main trailer video.

"Rose Medallion": It's referred to in game as a resurrection flower. There's not really a NG+ mode that has an increased difficulty, but you can continue exploring the world and collecting anything you missed after winning. Nothing is permanently missable so you can finish the main story and still get 100% achievements on the same save file. You will need to use one eventually if you want all the achievements, and the sooner you can do it the better.

Mushrooms: I don't recall if you get a cash bonus on the 5th trade (5x20 mushrooms to the chef) but you'll always get a bottle of mushroom soup for the trade. Mushrooms are the one trade item not profitable for money grinding, just to clarify.

Souls: If you hang around the summoners they'll spawn tons of the spirits. Face them so they hide and make sure there are lots of them around. Equip the stomp medallion, then turn away from them and stomp when they get near. They'll get obliterated and you can collect the drops. Note that it might take a little practice to herd them together in order to destroy them efficiently.

Skulls: Correct, you'll find them in the last area of the world, nearly as plentiful as zombie brains. You can trade them in for goodies, but keep in mind that a couple NPCs have additional uses for them.

[Entercoven]

I've long since completed the game. Had considered going and doing a Lets Play tutorial of the game, but I have to admit that my fun for the game really mellowed pretty much right after writing this.

I've found several exploits, such as those maze runner areas where you have to get to the end to get the prize? There are certain areas in the wall that arent actually walled off and you can walk through, run up, grab the item, and walk out without ever paying, without ever needing to run.

The shield itself I've found has a lesser hitbox than your own body, thats why straifing caused me to get hit.

I still preferred brains to souls. The stomp medallion is certainly very handy, and you're right, if you need the souls, this is the best way to get them, even more so if you can lure 2-3 summoners in the same area.

Probably the one item I'm most disappointed in is the final ability you get, to rain lightning down and one shot mobs, even behind you. Its very powerful, but it actually does have a range, and it is sadly not as far as I'd like, and uses sooo much stamina.

I ended up buying the game for my switch (I never actually finished the game on steam, I got side tracked and only ever beat it on my switch) Its a fun game, and there is a lot to do, but in retrospect it is also somewhat empty

[Estragon]

Ah, I didn't think to look at the original date so I didn't realize this was just an old post that got necro'd. And now that I think about it, your username seems familiar. At least all the info is still relevant and useful.

One last thought to add, I'm kind of mixed on the lightning medallion. I found it annoying that when it can't find a target nothing happens,not even a *bzzzzt* sound. It's easy to be confused at first and assume the thing is broken. Though when it does hit, something about it feels incredibly satisfying. Having a modest area of effect would be a nice improvement.

Since you got it on the Switch, maybe you could answer a question on something I've been wondering about for a while. How are achievements handled? Does Nintendo even offer an achievement system, are they implemented just within the game, or are they completely non-existent?

[Entercoven]

Its been quite a while since I loaded up the game. Sadly once you complete the game, there isnt really much of a draw to come back to it just for fun, like other games. As for achievements, I just loaded it up, and do not see an option to view achievements, so if there ARE achievements for the Switch, I am unsure how to view them.

I decided to test the damage of the weapons against the large charging enemies in the snow area, as they require a great many hits to kill. Also, I know its Stamina in this game, but MP is just an easier shorthand for it.

20 Sword slashes (Used without sword beam for a more accurate reading)
With this as our control, we can, mostly, accurately figure out how strong each weapon is.

2 Lightning Bolt uses (Each use uses 50% of your MP) Equal to 10 Sword Slashes
2 Flame Wall uses (Each use uses 50% of your MP) Equal to 10 Sword Slashes
3 Dash Boot uses (Each use uses 25% of your MP) Equal to 7 Sword Slashes
3 Fireball uses (Each use uses 25% of your MP) Equal to 7 Sword Slashes
4 Bomb+ uses (Each use uses 25% of your MP) Equal to 5 Sword Slashes
4 Boomerang uses (Each use uses approximately 20-23% of your MP) Each use hits twice, each hit Equals 3 Sword Slashes
7 Butterfly blasts (Each Butterfly shooting 5 per use) Equal to 3 Sword Slashes
7 Bow and Arrow+ uses (Each use uses 25% of your MP) Equal to 3 Sword Slashes
7 Beehive uses (Each use uses 25% of your MP) Each use spawns three bees, Each Bee equals 1 Sword Slash
20 Stomp uses (Each use uses 25% of your MP) Equal to 1 Sword Slash

If I had to guess, Lightning Bolt has a 25% radius. Divide the screen into quarters, thats how large of an area it affects, with Blossom being the center of the blast. It is certainly the most damaging AoE attack, and the most damaging, but its short radius and high MP cost, I feel are not worth it.

I was honestly surprised the Flame Wall was that strong. Aside from a sword spin, it is the shortest range AoE, and costly.

Dash Boots are tricky, in a sense. They propel you forward, presumably into an enemy, and deal a decent bit of damage, but does not provide invicibility frames, it relies on you hitting and damaging, which in turn either kills or pushes the enemy back. Not exactly the safest option.

Fireball has the second longest reach (Only the Bees, with their ability to also move diagonally and over hills, rocks, and trees trumps this). It deals more than half the damage the Lightning Bolt does, for half the cost, and is also an AoE ability, able to damage multiple enemies close together. Due to its lower cost, and speedy usage, you can spam this to deal excessive damage very quickly,

The Bomb is almost as good. Its range isnt as long, and its damage isnt as high, but it is just as spammable, allowing you to kill large enemies quickly.

The Boomerang is the cheapest item to use. It doesnt quite use as much MP as most other abilities, and due to your recovery time, it will refill half of the MP used by the time the boomerang returns. It can go through enemies, bring back items, and hit through hills, rocks, and trees. You can also control its trajectory by straifing. However, it is very slow.

Butterfly is very slow and inaccurate, largely a waste.

Bow and Arrow has very long range, and can hit up to 3 targets, however whether you hit a target with 1 arrow or all 3, it does not deal additional damage per additional arrow landing a hit. It also has a slow draw time.

The Beehive is probably one of the more strategic items, able to attack things at ranges nothing else can. They home in on targets, last for a very reasonable amount of time, and while they dont do much damage per bee, They can also target multiple enemies in the area as well. This makes the Beehive much better than the other items requiring 7 uses.

Stomp has roughly the same radius as the Lightning Bolt (Though I think Latitude is shorter, its Longitude should be roughly the same) though it only deals 1 damage per stomp. However it is an AoE originating from the user, making this a cheap and valuable item.

I think that should be a decent break down of the attacking items, at least from my perspective.

[Estragon]

I pretty much agree with the lack of replayability, and I found that a bit disappointing. The last playthrough I did was specifically to write and verify the walkthrough and I haven't touched it since. I still check in on the forum once in a while to see if anyone's in need of help.

As for achievements, if there's no apparent way to view them and if there wasn't any obvious indicator that you were earning them as you played, there's a good chance they don't exist on the Switch version. I won't draw any conclusions just yet.

Interesting breakdown. So the lightning medallion does have an AoE? Whenever I used it, I could swear it just killed the enemy directly struck and never noticed nearby enemies taking damage or getting killed as well.

[Entercoven]

The Lightning Medallion does technically have an AoE, as it will strike all enemies within its field, however, each bolt does not deal additional AoE damage.