The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (Wii-U, Switch) 2017

[JezMM]

20 minutes ago, Diogenes said:

I was agreeing with his list for a bit, but past the halfway point a lot of his suggestions started turning into annoyances rather than things that made the game meaningfully harder. Limiting when/where you can save (especially in a game that can be played portably), extra darkness, severely limiting arrow capacity (only 30 normal arrows, seriously? one tough korok target shooting puzzle could run you dry)...things like the food systems and champion powers could definitely use some nerfs, but hard mode shouldn't make the game less fun.

Yeah agree with some here, arrows feel too much.  I'd say 100 is a reasonable limit for regular and maybe like, 50 for elemental, 30 for bomb, 10 for ancient.

The others though... I like the idea of night being not completely but closer to real life night time - distant light sources are still 100% visible but it's only easy to see on spots that are directly hit by moonlight.

Saving I'm mixed on - I like the idea of keeping myself alive having more weight attached to it, though at the same time when I DO die to a vicious fight, it really doesn't matter if it plonks me at the last shrine I warped to OR on the outskirts of the encounter, 9 times out of 10 I will turn away and reprepare myself unless I died from a stupid mistake.  So in that context, where I reload wouldn't make a huge difference.

[RLS Legacy]

So I was listening to the BOTW soundtrack and came across a pretty... interesting track.

Skip to 0:42 and tell me if the little piano melody in the background sounds familiar. If you're any Sonic fan worth your salt, it'll click immediately.

What the hell, Nintendo?

[Heckboy]

59 minutes ago, MorphAndBiscuits said:

So I was listening to the BOTW soundtrack and came across a pretty... interesting track.

Skip to 0:42 and tell me if the little piano melody in the background sounds familiar. If you're any Sonic fan worth your salt, it'll click immediately.

What the hell, Nintendo?

That part actually reminded me of the theme from Super Mario Galaxy

 

[Blue Blood]

So, who bothers with horses in this game? I find that if I'm exploring or just want to run around Hyrule, horses are really limiting because you they can't reach at sizeable proportion of the map, and you'll usually just end up leaving them behind. They're a real waste of time. On my first playthrough, I abandoned a horse on my way up to the Zora's and the Gorons because I got a dead end with both. They're not fun. 

[JezMM]

21 hours ago, MorphAndBiscuits said:

So I was listening to the BOTW soundtrack and came across a pretty... interesting track.

Skip to 0:42 and tell me if the little piano melody in the background sounds familiar. If you're any Sonic fan worth your salt, it'll click immediately.

What the hell, Nintendo?

I can't recognise a Sonic melody here, that part of the tune at 0:42 actually always sounds like it's going into the Famicom startup song then abandons it halfway through:

 

[Mando-Whirl-Wind]

2 minutes ago, Blue Blood said:

So, who bothers with horses in this game? I find that if I'm exploring or just want to run around Hyrule, horses are really limiting because you they can't reach at sizeable proportion of the map, and you'll usually just end up leaving them behind. They're a real waste of time. On my first playthrough, I abandoned a horse on my way up to the Zora's and the Gorons because I got a dead end with both. They're not fun. 

Quickest way to move around the southern half of the map, and I'm pretty sure they'd be life savers during Guardian encounters

Also got all 4 divine beasts, found all fountains, the master sword, and got 2 memories left

Spoiler

I am having absolutely no luck with the tree one... I think I know where the castle one is though

Then it's time to face Ganon

[Blue Blood]

1 minute ago, JezMM said:

I can't recognise a Sonic melody here, that part of the tune at 0:42 actually always sounds like it's going into the Famicom startup song then abandons it halfway through:

 

It's pretty loose at best. 

[JezMM]

4 minutes ago, Blue Blood said:

So, who bothers with horses in this game? I find that if I'm exploring or just want to run around Hyrule, horses are really limiting because you they can't reach at sizeable proportion of the map, and you'll usually just end up leaving them behind. They're a real waste of time. On my first playthrough, I abandoned a horse on my way up to the Zora's and the Gorons because I got a dead end with both. They're not fun. 

On my entire playthrough to the ending, I only used one right near the start where the game sort of implies you to learn how to get one (at Duelling Peaks stable).  I used it almost all the way to Hateno where I managed to accidentally make it fall down into the river, where it swam to the tiniest portion of shore and wouldn't let me mount it due to the lack of space.  There it remained for the majority of the rest of my playthrough, it's icon remaining on the map to remind me of my sins.  About 20 hours of game later I realised you can board a horse without having it present and I saved the poor bugger.

I've been mostly exploring by foot still, but since I got the two rare horses due to their side quests, which are significantly faster than any regular ones, I've been using them to scout flat areas faster than walking would take me (such as Tabantha canyon mentioned in my last post).  I find myself dismounting them plenty to explore difficult terrain, but it's still overall faster than running from point to point, even with a speed elixir on the go, plus I you can horseride one-handed when on a path which is convenient for eating/drinking between explores without pausing the game lol.

1 minute ago, Blue Blood said:

It's pretty loose at best. 

Ah yeah I thought it might've been this but found it way too loose.

2 minutes ago, Mando-Whirl-Wind said:

Quickest way to move around the southern half of the map, and I'm pretty sure they'd be life savers during Guardian encounters

Also got all 4 divine beasts, found all fountains, the master sword, and got 2 memories left

  Hide contents

I am having absolutely no luck with the tree one... I think I know where the castle one is though

Then it's time to face Ganon

The tree one is definitely the hardest.  I needed a hint for it, though thankfully all that hint confirmed was that I was already looking in the right general area for it at least.

[Mando-Whirl-Wind]

1 minute ago, JezMM said:

On my entire playthrough to the ending, I only used one right near the start where the game sort of implies you to learn how to get one (at Duelling Peaks stable).  I used it almost all the way to Hateno where I managed to accidentally make it fall down into the river, where it swam to the tiniest portion of shore and wouldn't let me mount it due to the lack of space.  There it remained for the majority of the rest of my playthrough, it's icon remaining on the map to remind me of my sins.  About 20 hours of game later I realised you can board a horse without having it present and I saved the poor bugger.

I've been mostly exploring by foot still, but since I got the two rare horses due to their side quests, which are significantly faster than any regular ones, I've been using them to scout flat areas faster than walking would take me (such as Tabantha canyon mentioned in my last post).  I find myself dismounting them plenty to explore difficult terrain, but it's still overall faster than running from point to point, even with a speed elixir on the go, plus I you can horseride one-handed when on a path which is convenient for eating/drinking between explores without pausing the game lol.

Ah yeah I thought it might've been this but found it way too loose.

The tree one is definitely the hardest.  I needed a hint for it, though thankfully all that hint confirmed was that I was already looking in the right general area for it at least.

I'll take the hint if you don't mind. I thought I knew the general area, but at this point I'm just repeatedly visiting every non-tropical forest

[Wraith]

I used a horse for the first few hours. right up until I saw some huge ruins across a river that I wanted to explore. Lead to the usual BOTW sequence of events where as soon as you get done looking at one thing you get distracted by another and by the time I remembered I had a horse I had walked most of the way to my destination. 

I only used a horse after that if there's a large stretch of flat land I need to cross and there HAPPENS to be a stable nearby...so, rarely ever. Your time shall come some day, Butt.

[Blue Blood]

You called your horse "Butt"? Way to miss an opportunity.

 

Also, can't explain my rage right now. I just made it to to the base of the hardest tower in the game on my 3-heart challenge file. No armour, no upgrades, just the absolute basics. I'm even keeping a fire rod with me for warmth. So what happens as I take out the last Black Bokoblin in the area right on his spawn point? Blood fucking Moon.

 

ASFSAGHDAWSFGAAS!

[JezMM]

3 hours ago, Mando-Whirl-Wind said:

I'll take the hint if you don't mind. I thought I knew the general area, but at this point I'm just repeatedly visiting every non-tropical forest

The most bare-bones hint would be to continue seeking out stables to find Pikango (the painter).  They're always on roads marked on the map so try and investigate ones you don't recall visiting (and of course consider revisiting ones since it can be possible to miss Pikango if you visited the stable at a point where he was moving inside to sleep for the night etc).

The rough location of the stable you're after in particular is:

 

The eastern side of Hyrule Field, not too distant from Hyrule Castle.

 

 

The sad thing about my figuring out of this one is (spoilers of the contents of said memory so read this part later Mando lol):

 

Once I realised all the footage of cut-scenes we'd seen in the trailer was memories, and the forest one was one of the last ones left, I figured out that was the memory in which Zelda and Link were roughed up and running away/Zelda cries from the trailer.  Putting together knowledge of the other memories I uncovered, I realised surely this scene must have been them fleeing from Hyrule Castle after Ganon was unleashed, so I started searching all the forests around Hyrule Field - as said I needed a hint to confirm I had the right idea, but yeah, I did.

Made me kind of annoyed they included those scenes as moneyshots in the trailer, since not only is it the most emotionally charged one in the game (thus it was harder to get invested in the scene because I was constantly thinking about how I knew what was about to happen) and it actually ended up influencing my play.

[Wraith]

http://zelda.com/breath-of-the-wild/news/expansion-pass-dlc-pack-1-detailed/

First DLC pack detalied. Honestly pretty underwhelming?

Like..this is all there is to hard mode? Was hoping for way more.

Quote

Hard Mode
In Hard Mode, enemies gradually regain health, so take them out as quickly as possible. All enemies are also powered up by one level. For example, Red Bokoblins in Normal mode are now Blue Bokoblins. Enemies can also have higher maximum levels than they would in Normal mode. Look up, and you may also find enemies and treasure chests in the sky!

 

[Celestia]

In other news: dual audio support is now a thing, for anyone who couldn't stand the English voice acting but still wants to, y'know, understand text in the game.

[Nepenthe]

I need to run around as Tingle.

Also, gonna download the audio tracks; see how well the Japanese voices hold up, (especially since I honestly prefer Zelda's English voice to what I heard in the trailer.)

[JaidynReiman]

41 minutes ago, Josh said:

http://zelda.com/breath-of-the-wild/news/expansion-pass-dlc-pack-1-detailed/

First DLC pack detalied. Honestly pretty underwhelming?

Like..this is all there is to hard mode? Was hoping for way more.

 

Tbh I mostly wanted this, greater enemy density, and some way to nerf food. More types of enemies would be nice as well but I was 50/50 on.

[Blue Blood]

Sounds alright. Hard mode is pretty underwhelming and the path tracking feature really ought to be issued as an update instead of DLC, but I can dig all this. Fuck those Silver Lynes now though. 

[Radiant Hero Ike]

Oh wow. Love the new armor. That travel medallion thing is great too.

The game is already hard enough for me so I'll probably not play on Hard Mode.

Also, Trial of the Sword, huh? Sounds fun. I wonder what it means by Awakening the true power of the Master Sword.

[Diogenes]

56 minutes ago, Radiant Hero Ike said:

Also, Trial of the Sword, huh? Sounds fun. I wonder what it means by Awakening the true power of the Master Sword.

According to this it sounds like it just makes it permanently in its powered-up mode.

[MegasonicZX]

Disappointed that hard mode is just inflation (with a health regen mechanic that admittedly sounds like it might make things more interesting) though I guess expecting revamped dungeon designs and other things to affect the game besides just the enemies was a bit much even though Nintendo decided to make this dlc for some reason. Every thing else sounds promising though so looking forward to all of that.

[JezMM]

Man the Hero's Path thing sounds really cool and I REALLY hope it's retroactive and just needs to be "activated" in-game.  I would love to rewatch the path I took on my first time through for old time's sake, so I have a personal momento of my first ever journey through BotW's Hyrule and the route I took when unprompted with foreknowledge of the game world.

 

But yeah hard mode is a big bummer and honestly enough of one that I'm not sure I'll bother with it?

[Mystwalker]

I feel I'm the only one around that is imagining people tearing their hair apart at the eventual brutality of Hard mode early on in the game. It really depends on the health regeneration mechanic, but it looks to me that facing Blue Bokoblins with nothing but rusty equipment or the basic clubs is going to be quite a weapon investment already (they are like what, 5 to 6 times more durable than a Red Bokoblin?). It's one of those changes that seem underwhelming but definitely can make your starting experience all the more harder.

Besides that yeah, once you get some good equipment going and some hearts/stamina upgrades it becomes more underwhelming.... that is, unless the newer tiers of enemies are truly something else. Some silver enemies are pretty tough when unprepared though, makes me wonder how they will go beyond that...

Edited May 2, 2017 by Mystwalker
Fixety fix fix

[Vulpix of the Everstone]

I recently started playing this game with a few self imposed restrictions.

It was basically an Archer run, Bows as the only attacking weapon with excpetions like Woodcutter axes to chop trees and Deku Leafs to move boats. Also only the basic Hylian armour was allowed and Great Fairy upgardes were offlimits, As were Fast Travel.

It really made the game tough, Can't wait to try it all again in hard mode.

[Salamander]

20 hours ago, JezMM said:

Man the Hero's Path thing sounds really cool and I REALLY hope it's retroactive and just needs to be "activated" in-game.  I would love to rewatch the path I took on my first time through for old time's sake, so I have a personal momento of my first ever journey through BotW's Hyrule and the route I took when unprompted with foreknowledge of the game world.

The press release confirms that it's retroactive.

[JezMM]

3 hours ago, FFWF said:

The press release confirms that it's retroactive.

Awesome, I'm glad, though it DOES make me shift my opinion slightly that this should've been a free update rather than locked behind DLC, if the game was already tracking my path the entire time and just arbitrarily not showing me.

The Korok finding thing is also an appreciated bonus that makes a part of the base game more reasonable, and should also be free I feel.