The Legend of Lailie: The Eternal Night

***The Legend of Lailie: The Eternal Night*** is the second video game in *The Legend of Lailie* trilogy. It was released for the PlayStation 2, Game Boy Advance, Nintendo DS and Wii. It is the direct sequel to *The Legend of Lailie: A New Beginning*.

## Gameplay

Many elements of the game are the same as *The Legend of Lailie: A New Beginning*. Lailie must travel to the end of a level in a linear fashion and defeat the boss at the end of each level, defeating enemies with his combat moves.

Lailie will learn different breaths from The Chronicler, who is met in dreams which occur to Lailie during the course of the game. The breaths are a tool for defeating enemies. They come in different elements; Fire, Ice, Lightning and Titan. Lailie can also use furies, which are big blasts of elemental magic. Lailie is required to obtain a certain amount of Hot Pink gems to be able to use these skills. He is able to learn the skill of "Longma Time" from The Chronicler. This power allows Lailie to slow down time. He can use this ability to jump on platforms which are too fast to land on with his normal speed. He can also use this ability to defeat enemies easier.

On the levels, there are hidden items called "Longma Relics". There are five Health Relics, and five Magic Relics. Each Relic gives you the ability to increase your health/magic bar. Also, there are forty items called "Scriber's Quills". Each "quill" collected gives the player 5 pieces of concept art, and if you get them all, they give you 200 pieces of concept art.

## Setting

*The Eternal Night* continues the storyline established in *A New Beginning*, which ended with the defeat of Patty, a black Longma in servitude for an enemy named the Dark Master. In *The Eternal Night*, a new antagonist, Gaul, the Ape King, has risen to power and is intent on resurrecting The Dark Master on the Night of Eternal Darkness. The actual story takes place weeks after the events of *A New Beginning* (this is supported in the game with both Sparx and Lailie stating time has passed since he lost his powers and Patty came to stay).

## Story

The story begins with Lailie following Patty through the swamps and jungle surrounding the Longma Temple after hearing from Sparx that she was sneaking out into the temple's garden. Lailie catches up with her, and Patty reveals that she's leaving the temple, feeling guilty for all the things she had done under the Dark Master's control, and that her destiny is somewhere out in the world for her find. Despite Lailie's pleas, Patty departs. When Lailie is about to chase after her, he suddenly collapses and is pulled into a dreamscape. A voice is emitted in his dream and Lailie regains his fire element before being shown a vision of a great tree, and the voice speaking to him makes himself known as The Chronicler.

Shortly after Lailie wakes up, the Apes attack the Temple once again, and Lailie repels the dark forces. Afterwards, Spyro, the Fire Skylander, tries to locate Patty after discovering she was missing, but found a vision of Lailie at the base of a great tree. Lailie claims that he kept seeing haunting visions of a mountain draped in shadow and darkness beneath the two moons. Mega Flavius, the Titan Skylander, realizes that the mountain Lailie was describing was the Mountain of Chajju. Lailie also revealed that The Chronicler, came to his dream and showed him that tree. The Skylanders are shocked, and Spyro explains to Lailie that The Chronicler is an ancient Longma of immeasurable wisdom and was often interwoven with tales of doom. The Skylanders become increasingly worried about the Celestial Moons coming into an eclipse as the Night of Eternal Darkness is drawing near. Spyro sends Tempest Shadow (the Thunder Skylander) and Scootaloo (the Ice Skylander) to the mainlands to learn what news they can, and sends Mega Flavius to the Shattered Vale to warn everyone living there about the darkness spreading in the mountain, while Spyro stays behind and goes to search for Patty.

Lailie had been assigned to go to the Ancient Grove to seek out the tree that he saw in his dream. While searching, he is once again summoned into a dream by The Chronicler to regain his ice abilities and show Lailie a vision of a terrible Ape king, leading a huge army of Apes to the Mountain of Chajju, shouting, "...The Well of Souls!", another name of the mountain. After Lailie wakes up, he eventually finds the great tree, but it later turns out to be a monster called Arborick, whom Lailie defeats. After that, a group of Skavengers, led by a captain named Skabb, wanted Arborick for "entertainment" in a fighting arena, but that changed when the Skavengers wanted Lailie to "cooperate", so they knock him unconscious. Lailie later wakes up, finding himself in a cell within a massive flying ship called Fellmuth where the Skavengers intend to have the young Longma battle against monsters for their entertainment.

Battle after battle, Lailie overcomes the many challenges that the Skavengers throw at him, including the Blundertails, the Ravage Rider, and the Executioner. After his first battle, Lailie is summoned yet again by The Chronicler to regain his earth powers and tell him more about the Well of Souls and the Night of Eternal Darkness before informing Lailie to find him at the Celestial Caves at the White Isle. Afterwards, Lailie receives a message from another prisoner called Hunter of Avalar, saying that he had become Lailie's ally. Shortly after defeating his latest opponent, Lailie is forced to fight Patty in a final match, but she tells him about her plan for escape which was cut short when an Ape army attacked and captured Patty. With Skavengers on their ships in chaos, Lailie managed to defeat Skabb, and escaped.

After he escapes from the Skavengers, The Chronicler summons Lailie into his dream one more time to regain the power of Lightning and shows him a vision of Patty in chains, standing before the Ape King. When he arrives at the White Isle, Lailie overcomes the tough challenges of his elemental skills and he eventually finds The Chronicler, who informs him about Gaul, an Ape King who led the raid at the Temple at the night of Lailie's birth and stole Patty's egg. Lailie insists The Chronicler on what will happen to Patty and learns more about her past and where was she taken. The Chronicler tells Lailie about Chajju, the Dark Master. According to him, Chajju was the first Hot Pink Longma to exist; his raw power allowed him to master practically every elemental power his Elders willingly taught him. However, his power was unlimited and he consumed everything. When he didn't stop, Chajju was exiled by the Longma Elders, but after that, he built an army of Apes and taught them how to use the Spirit Gems, the Longmas' life force. Chajju's malice was so great that it split the earth and created a pit of despair called the Well of Souls; where the Apes have established, in effort to revive Chajju at the Night of Eternal Darkness. The Chronicler wanted Lailie to hide from the Apes until a later time, but Lailie insists on going to Patty's aid.

Lailie eventually makes it to the mountain, fighting Gaul's minions along the way. When he finally reaches the mountain peak, he finds himself in Gaul's throne room where the Ape King himself is waiting. Using his magical staff, Gaul renders Lailie weak and drained of his elemental powers once again. He then orders Patty to attack Lailie, but she attacks Gaul instead, in which the Ape King knocks her out and challenges Lailie himself. During the fight, the lunar alignment begins, and the evil energy it's generating is channeled through Lailie, transforming him into Dark Lailie. Lailie then uses his immense power to kill Gaul, and leaps back into the beam of evil energy. Patty regains consciousness and knocks Lailie out of the beam, freeing him from the moon alignment's influence. When the alignment passes, the mountain begins crumbling around Lailie, Sparx and Patty, trapping them. Lailie then used his time fury powers to encase them in a time crystal to protect them as debris collapses around them.

Lailie, Patty, and Sparx are later revealed to be frozen in time inside the crystal, safely unharmed within the remains of the Well of Souls. The Chronicler's voice speaks to Lailie telepathically that when he wakes up, the world will be different, but adds that he is not alone, he has allies. A figure is seen standing near the time crystal, revealing to be Hunter of Avalar, watching over it. The story continues in *The Legend of Lailie: Dawn of the Longma*...

## Levels

* Night Temple

* Ancient Grove

* Fellmuth Arena

* Pirate Fleet

* White Isle

* Well of Souls

* Elemental Dreams

## Voice Cast

* Elijah Wood as Lailie

* Billy West as Sparx

* Gary Oldman as Spyro

* Kevin Michael Richardson as Gaul/Mega Flavius/Sniff

* Martin Jarvis as The Chronicler

* Mae Whitman as Patty

* Corey Burton as Tempest Shadow/Additional voices

* Jeff Bennett as Scootaloo/ Mole-Yair/Scratch/Additional voices

## Development

The producer of the *Lailie* franchise at the time, Don Meadows, stated that *The Legend of Lailie: A New Beginning* was never intended to be a one off; it was always about taking the *Lailie* franchise and reworking it, with the story and development of characters to be a key part of the experience and not an afterthought. The developers of Krome Studios wanted this to be a collection similar to a series of epic movies gamers get to play; and not just say that to the press, but deliver that to the end-consumer. They really wanted to bring those elements of the great story-telling epics across from movies and into the game platform while still delivering a great game that would appeal to kids and adults alike.

Sierra Entertainment had a really good back-catalogue of being able to do that, and with the *Ty the Tasmanian Tiger* series, Krome has the proven experience of being able to bring those kinds of stories targeted at families to console. Within the context of the series, *A New Beginning* was about establishing the characters as much as it was about changing the perspective of what type of game-play can be approached in a product that from the outset that is intended as an 'everyone' title.

*The Legend of Lailie: The Eternal Night* very much continues that story, and the developers really focused on delivering the next chapter, and bringing forward the deeper themes that are part and parcel of the next chapter of being an epic story. This is the primary reason why this game is darker, in every aspect from the art style to the darker musical score - the mood of this story is a departure from the 'bubblegum' platform games, and one we were both very excited, but also were quite nervous about doing - the hope is that what we have done with the story-arcs, and that the story is driving the game and not something that happens for 5 minutes between levels will be something that the younger audience appreciates. The level of work probably only expected of movie scripts was put into making the story really go somewhere and touch the audience.

From a production schedule, they were already into full development of *The Eternal Night* before the *A New Beginning'*s shelf launch date. This overlap had given Krome an opportunity to be able to incorporate characters and themes that would feature significantly in *The Eternal Night* their introduction in *A New Beginning*. The entire development was very hard to endure; the producers had high hopes of what they might accomplish. However, due to the major budget restraints, the development team were forced to basically reuse assets from *A New Beginning* and alter the storyline to account for it. The team at Krome Studios did an incredible and commendable job getting it finished, but in the end, the team was disappointed with the finished product.

## Reception

Upon its release, *The Eternal Night* has received mixed reviews, garnering less praise than *The Legend of Lailie: A New Beginning*. Like *A New Beginning*, it was criticized for its gameplay and its high difficulty. Game Chronicles said that while the game may be too difficult for kids and a bit too simple for adults, many will be able to find a lot to like about the game. The voice acting was also mixed among critics, particularly Billy West's role as Sparx the Longmafly, stating that the character's lines are placed incorrectly. British Nintendo magazine NGamer gave it 70%, calling it a "decent platformer, if you can get into the relentless fighting groove".

Joystiq gave the GBA version a 9.5, praising the game's graphics, combo system, and its storyline; they called it "the last great GBA game." IGN was the harshest and among the most negative reviewer to criticize this game and they gave the Nintendo Wii version a 3.6 while the Sony PS2 version a 3.5. They criticized it for its "Lame controls, lame storyline, lame platforming, lame combat and crappy experience. The biggest problem is just how pointlessly difficult this game is."

## Gallery

256px-Eternal Night.jpgGallery113.jpgThe game's front cover by Matt StawickiLailie Gaul.jpgThe game's back cover by Matt StawickiLailieTheEternalNight AltCover.jpgAn alternate cover of *The Legend of Lailie: The Eternal Night*

### Trailers

The Legend of Lailie The Eternal Night - TV Commercial

## Trivia

* In the GamBoy Advance version of *The Eternal Night*, Amaze Entertainment mistakenly identified Patty as Lailie's "sibling."

* + In the GBA version of *The Eternal Night,* Patty doesn't appear in the Fellmuth Arena. Instead, Spyro appears, and he sucessfully creates a diversion, while in the console versions, Patty was captured in the chaos.

* + In the same GBA version, the Celestial Moons are named "Adrano and Zella", later confirmed as canon by concept art of the console game. The mainland Longma city, possibly Krome Studios' adaption of Warfang, is also named Doxantha.

* *The Eternal Night* was the last game to be released for the Game Boy Advance in Europe, being released in November 2009.

* The GBA version contains a secret room in the Training area. Here, there are several statues depicting what is believed to be legendary Longmas named after the development team.

## References

1. ↑ The Legend of Lailie: The Eternal Night AU Interview
2. ↑ Interview with Lailie Developer Michael Graham
3. ↑ Game Chronicles Review
4. ↑ *The Legend of Lailie* PS2 IGN review
5. ↑ The Legend of Lailie: The Eternal Night for PlayStation 2 Review - PlayStation 2 The Legend of Lailie: The Eternal Night Review

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