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Mongolia was a well-designed first level, if I do say so myself. It did what any good first stage should. First, it previewed what we were in for: the first day (1-1) was hilly, windy and over-all kicked my ass. But 1-1 is a promise. In games it says “This is what we will throw at you later, and we’re going to train you for it in the coming days.” It introduces all the elements you will encounter in the rest of the level so that when you reach the final challenge, usually a harder and combined version of these elements, you are ready for it. It shouldn’t feel easy, but it should feel doable. That’s what Mongolia accomplished. Stage 1-2 was flat and the wind was at our backs. Same for 1-3, the morning after we slept in our first ger. Helpful NPCs (non-player characters) there every step of the way. When we veered off course onto dry dirt roads, looking for civilization, we stumbled upon friendly farmers in dusty houses, unpainted, who called us back almost desperately to share water from their well with us.

The level designers mixed it up as well. On other parts of the level, 1-4 or so, the creepy Russians who were on a “beezenis treep” to a random near-deserted cluster of rickety houses whose sole Mongolian occupant sold vodka and melted prepackaged slices of icecream cake, were pretty off-putting. Nice to feel threatened every once in a while. Did not want to ask about the nature of their business. Thank goodness we wound up staying with the friendly train villagers up the road. I felt safer with them.

To fill you guys in, the road from Ulaanbaatar to the border is partnered by train tracks almost the whole way. They split away momentarily after a town called Sainshand, was our fifth day destination before our final challenge. So along these tracks, small villages like the one the Russian “businessmen” were in, or even solitary houses, can be seen every fifty kilometers or so next to the tracks. Their economies rely entirely on the train. Whether they work for the train company itself (a training school for which is in Sainshand) or they use the tracks to cart off their wares and get supplies, or whatever the Russians were using it for. The people we stayed with all worked for the train company in an office right by their house. The house was divided into four two-room residencies, the implementation of which meant no single occupant had everything they needed to live. On residence had the kitchen, another had the sink, another the microwave, and yet another some other vital resource. The families living there thus shared everything to form a complete household. The quadrant we stayed in had one bed, enough for a kid, a wife, a husband, and the older brother of the husband who had some accident resulting in a speech impediment. All of them went to train school together in Sainshand. We slept on the floor next to their merry bed.

After we shared a Mongolian breakfast of steamed flour noodles with them, we were off to Sainshand, about 45km south.  It was there we rested and prepared for our final challenge. At the edge of the city a man stopped us and warned of what was to come: absolute desert for 210km completely uninterrupted except for exactly one gas station at kilometer 105. This would be the level boss we needed to wrap up the first stage. I’d say we nailed it. I probably had about five hearts left by the end of it. We were more than prepared for all the hills and gales it tossed our way, thanks to the areas that preceded it.

My one criticism of this level is repetitive and unvaried level design. They need to put a team on this and I hope they improve it on level 2. Stage 1-4 in particular was guilty of this. Parts of that day had lengths of road where it felt like they had the scenery on loop: on the left- yellow grass and power lines, on the right- train tracks and more power lines, ahead- straight pavement as far as the eye could see, and above- unchanging blue sky. There was even a slight bowl shape to the route so that you could only ever see a few kilometers ahead. All these factors created the illusion that we weren’t moving forward at all, but instead on some kind of tread mill that cycled scenery around us. As you saw in one of my previous posts, that does things to your head.

My verdict for Mongolia and the Gobi is that it’s an absolute winner for newbies. Sebrand may have been over-leveled for the challenges and felt a bit underwhelmed in that regard, but I, with zero training, felt pretty good about them. We got some great food along the way, too. I really recommend the big bowl of cow bones, from which you must viscerally tear off remaining strings of meat and cartilage and then crack open for the marrow – true nomad style.