Ring Fit Adventure Fitness Log Week 26: The New-riginal General Store

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - The General Store can be lame because it's a monopoly. SAD!

I'm back this week, still playing Ring Fit Adventure, since I both want to be in a fighting fit shape for the Tokyo 2020 (2021) Olympics, and because it's good for me in general. ...Oh, and I legitimately like the game and think you should, too. ...Though I've already spoiled the whole story mode on KoopaTV in weeks (and months) prior. Now I'm in the post-game Extra Fitness mode, and last week I played through World 25.

With this week, we're in World 26: Extra Fitness Lv. 184. Immediately, Ring identifies it as the original location of the General Store (World 3: A Shining Jewel from the Heavens), but Honey, one of the store owners, overheard our conversation and says it's been renovated (with a new roof) and new items. Honey deems it “new-riginal” and says it's the 22nd Store. But to get there, we need to clear the Treasure Pass level. Unlike the original World 3, you can double jump on and over a boulder on the road to get to an empty upper path, as opposed to being forced to break the boulder. (That's because you get the double jump in World 9.) There's a treasure on a path with a Royal Green Smoothie. (We got the recipe to make those in the last world.)

Yeah, you really think this is clever, huh?

Now to visit Town!

While the General Store is new-riginal, the townsfolk dialogue is exactly the same as it was in World 3. (The game also recognises it's not new by not putting a “New” indicator by it.)

...IT'S A SCAM.

And what's new in the General Store? Not the ingredients or smoothies, but the clothing... there's the Basic Jogger II, the Crystal Dancer II, and the Savannah Athlete II. The Basic Jogger is the default outfit you get when you first start the game, while Crystal Dancer and Savannah Athlete were the first outfits on sale. ...In other words, the only new thing here is slapping a II to old clothes. They visually look the same. (And they also have higher stats than the best stuff in the first playthrough, but still.) That's disappointing. Between the three outfits, you need several thousand coins and three Citrine to acquire everything. (To be exact, three times as many coins as the original prices.) Even the flavour text in the catalogue is the same! I don't know if this reflects lack of effort on Nintendo's part, or on Honey's part. (Hubby is innocent because Honey is in charge of the clothes.)

I guess the fabric is a lot better?

I completed the General Factory side level to try to recoup some of the money I just spent (...got a long way to go). And that'll be it for Sunday.

I didn't play Ring Fit Adventure on Monday or Tuesday, because I was doing more than my fair share of exercise in real life. Removing pesky wet snow and all. Very tiring. Lots of squatting and lifting with legs. Took a break from everything on Wednesday to rest.

BUT I'M BACK ON THURSDAY NIGHT. I'm working out my STRESS from writing about BALAN WONDERWORLD, a terrible videogame. And... PROFESSOR DRAGAUX suddenly interjects as I'm about to enter the Bridge of Insight, demanding I complete it within 160 steps or else I won't be able to pass. (Note there are no enemy fights during this type of challenge.) He claims it'll be easy if I've been keeping up with my training. (By definition, I have not been.) To handle this, I'm putting on the Coral Snake outfit, which has the set bonus of slightly increasing my running speed. (Can't wait to have to get the Coral Snake II outfit in... lots of weeks from now!)

Dragaux is a professor now?
Well, he's better than Byleth, at least.

The strategy, as Dragaux points out after you've cleared the mission, is to run, then jump, double jump, and maintain a hover, still moving your legs the whole time. Keep doing that. You'll go farther the faster your speed is before jumping, and going down a slope is more helpful than going up one. I cleared it with 95 steps out of 160.

Shout-out to the guy in the comments section a week ago asking how to clear these minimum-step challenges.
YOU MUST HOVER.

This unlocked access to the overworld treasure chest containing the Dragon Fruit ingredient, as well as two Game Gyms: Gluting Gallery (Novice)—where you must Overhead Side Bend to dodge bombs and collect tokens with suspicious hit detection, which provided me a Citrine for achieving an A-rank; and Squat Goals (Novice)—where you need to squat on a trampoline to jump and collect tokens and also avoid bombs, which provided me 400 coins for achieving an A-rank. All the squats from removing snow prepared me well for achieving the A-rank.

The last level I did on Thursday (and the second-to-last thing you can do in World 26) was the filler level Hopskip Corridor. It had two weak enemy fights, leaving my work-out time today at a measly 7:53. Just to... bump that up to double-digit minutes, I went and repeated Bridge of Insight, but now it's a normal level with enemy fights instead of just hovering through it. I also want to make it clear: There was no sudden 160-step challenge on the original Bridge of Insight level in World 3.

On Friday, it's time to enter the Dragaux Stadium. Dragaux asks if I'm done warming up (...well...) and says this stadium features conveyor belts “to provide steady resistance against your lower body.” If I can't beat a conveyor belt, I won't be able to beat Dragaux. We managed to climb up the conveyor belts that went upward (even with some boxes falling on us), and Dragaux explained this HILARIOUS quip which made me laugh out loud immediately, and throughout the fight, thanks to the dialogue and the camera work:

There wasn't much to the actual fight against Dragaux. It was just him vs. me (and Ring), and he degenerated into throwing very slow, wooden boxes at me for his super attack, many of which contained hearts. They were so slow that Ring recommended, “Don't rush.” Afterwards, Dragaux was doing a double-armed smash attack that wiped out 1/3 of my health metre. ...He should just spam that, but he didn't, and lost.

If Dragaux had money, he'd be able to afford new clothes at the overpriced General Store.
(Though it's possible that he DID buy new clothes... it's just the II version of what he wore in the main story.)

Well, that concludes this week's fitness log. I'm actually really looking forward to World 27, which I'll be playing next week! (Look at the bottom of this article's footer after February 12, 2021 and you'll see a hyperlink leading you to the Week 27 Fitness Log.)

Not on this exercise log is how much work I put in on Monday and Tuesday out-of-game.

If it's not obvious, one can easily clear this world within a day of gameplay. Ludwig is just stretching out for the whole week so KoopaTV can have predictable features on Friday, and so the world number corresponds with the week number in the article title. He's happy that Dragaux is making unexpected and unpredictable appearances mid-world, which implies there's a greater level of effort put into Extra Fitness mode that you wouldn't expect upon seeing the lazy clothes catalogue.


Here is the promised Week 27 Fitness Log!
Fitness Master's General Store #43 isn't a scam and is quite legit. Check out the final iteration of Hubby and Honey's business here!