La-Mulana (Windows, 2005)

La-Mulana
Developer: Nigoro Publisher: Nigoro Platform: Windows Released in JP: May 27, 2005 This game has unused graphics. This game has unused text. This game has a prototype article This game has a bugs page

La-Mulana is a charming but hard Metroidvania-like indie game in an MSX style, released by Nigoro when they were still called GR3Project as an homage to the platform and the games released on it as well.

This page and its subpages may contain spoilers.

Sub-Pages

Prototype Info

Bugs

Scrapped Decoration

mapg03.bmp, the file with the Temple of the Sun's tileset sprites, has a chunk of tiles not seen anywhere in the game. It depicts the area's guardian Ellmac with two wolves besides it, and was later found to be a leftover from the first version of the area as seen here.

Stone Tablets

There are four images for stone tablets left unused in the game files. The first three are leftovers from the demo found in eveg00.bmp and eveg22.bmp, files with the Surface's object sprites.

This one depicts angels, one of them carrying a bag of sorts. The puzzle associated with it is in the final game, but since it was transmitted by an NPC and a skeleton (those don't use tablet images) instead, its image was scrapped.

Four stars around a ladder and many circles, likely the phases of the moon.

A crude drawing of an area's early version, pointing to somewhere with the presence of a fairy. The reason for it being scrapped is unknown.

The last one is in the file with the Chamber of Extinction's object sprites, eveg06.bmp, depicting a mural and the Pochette Key. Probably meant for a tablet that does mention said item, but the same tablet just uses the previous image in the file, rendering this one unused.

(Source: [1] La-Mulana Wiki)

Unused Text

There is one piece of stone tablet text in script.dat hinting at how to defeat a certain sub-boss. It was strangely not used, so players had to find out the way by brute force.

Original	Translation
人のてにより生みだされたいつわりの母であるジョカ。 うごけぬ体のねもとをたたけ。	Nüwa, the false Mother born of human hands. Strike the immobile part of her body.

(Source: La-Mulana Wiki)

Oddities

Pressing a number key from 0 to 6 in the Options menu sets the sound effects' volume to a specific number going down every 5 digits, from 100 to 60. This is not documented in the manual, but it is explained by one of the images used there. The full directory is manual/manual/img2/p05.gif.

Since the screen does not look like that in normal gameplay, it's likely a screenshot of an older version, notably with the absence of a second music option.
Other differences here are the distinction between keyboard and joypad (game controller) settings, MUSIC MODE and its choices SSCC and SC88 labeled MUSIC Device, Soft and Hard instead, and CONTINUE being misspelled CONITNUE.