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The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild Wii U / Switch

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Yeah you're best off playing the game blind. Resist the urge to use guides even for small things.

The hints at loading screens change throughout the game if I'm not mistaken so it's unlikely you'll miss out on anything too major.

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3 hours ago, Fused King said:

So having recently gotten my hands on a Switch and exploring the wonderful world of Hyrule destroyed by Calamity Ganon 100 years ago, I am now at the first horse stable heading towards Kakariko Village.

I am just amazed at how different it feels from previous big Zelda titles and the openness of it all really has me excited to come back home and dive right back into the wild. So much to sniff out, explore and collect, and discovering the various ways you can use items is really engaging and fun. 

The added difficulty also comes as a welcome departure from the older games. I can't really remember dying in Skyward Sword, and I've already died several times due to some miscalculations or just straight up thinking I can charge enemies bigger than myself with a rusty blade and hope for the best.

I'm looking forward to meeting new characters and acquiring new skills!

Just a question to my fellow Nyurpers: Any crucial things you guys think I might have missed on my way to that first horse stable? Perhaps tell me with a cryptic hint if so.

As others have said it's literally your own adventure, make it as you wish, that's the beauty of the game :) One suggestion I do have though would be to not rush unlocking all the towers, take it one region at a time. Tower > explore fully > move on, repeat. That way there's always the mystery of what the rest of the world looks like and you don't experience the whole map in one sitting. But then again that's just personal preference so feel free to completely go against that!

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52 minutes ago, Ronnie said:

As others have said it's literally your own adventure, make it as you wish, that's the beauty of the game :) One suggestion I do have though would be to not rush unlocking all the towers, take it one region at a time. Tower > explore fully > move on, repeat. That way there's always the mystery of what the rest of the world looks like and you don't experience the whole map in one sitting. But then again that's just personal preference so feel free to completely go against that!

Yeah, that's exactly my play style. 

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I personally found it really fun trying to "unlock" all the towers as soon as I could. There were a couple I really struggled with, I hadn't completed enough shrines so I was too weak really, but having the quick travel capability made the map feel a lot more accessible. I love the challenge of plotting a route to get up the harder towers without getting destroyed by the tougher enemies in the environment. I remember one tower I was being chased all the way up by a flying enemy.... I had very few hearts left and it was a real struggle, if I recall correctly I think I ended up throwing a bomb at the enemy which sent them plummeting and they seemed to leave me alone then (not sure if they were dead of just suffered amnesia :D)
Great game :) My wife prefers Hyrule Warriors though :s

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3 minutes ago, Pestneb said:

I personally found it really fun trying to "unlock" all the towers as soon as I could. There were a couple I really struggled with, I hadn't completed enough shrines so I was too weak really, but having the quick travel capability made the map feel a lot more accessible. I love the challenge of plotting a route to get up the harder towers without getting destroyed by the tougher enemies in the environment. I remember one tower I was being chased all the way up by a flying enemy.... I had very few hearts left and it was a real struggle, if I recall correctly I think I ended up throwing a bomb at the enemy which sent them plummeting and they seemed to leave me alone then (not sure if they were dead of just suffered amnesia :D)
Great game :) My wife prefers Hyrule Warriors though :s

Yeah, there is a sense of challenge when playing it this way. One of the towers that I really struggled with was the one that is surrounded by water, Lizalfos and Electric Wizrobes. Trying to get through the water without being electrocuted was a nightmare. Once I reached the base of the tower I would then have to try and sneak up as far as I could before the Wizrobe found me. Good times. :D  

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1 minute ago, Hero-of-Time said:

Yeah, there is a sense of challenge when playing it this way. One of the towers that I really struggled with was the one that is surrounded by water, Lizalfos and Electric Wizrobes. Trying to get through the water without being electrocuted was a nightmare. Once I reached the base of the tower I would then have to try and sneak up as far as I could before the Wizrobe found me. Good times. :D  

That's the one! My Wii U was set to French at the time so I don't know the names of all the enemies in English, but that is the tower, I got about half way up and one more hit from the Wiz robe would finish me off, so I got a bomb, lobbed it in the general direction of the Wizrobe and detonated it when it looked in range. I only expected it to buy me some time, but the Wizrobe never returned. Not a very relaxing experience!  There are still areas on the map that are no go areas, I never finished the game because I wasn't using a guide and wanted to find most of the shrines, I think I was going to call it at about 116 shrines, think I got to 108 from memory. Anyway, Wedding came round and since getting back I haven't played much, last time I played I'd forgotten most of the controls!! Still great game, I was sure it was going to be the first Zelda I ever completed (got close in windwaker but got bored by one of the treasure hunts and then a new game came...) but tbh I doubt I'll ever venture into the Castle. Though I think I found a shrine right up close to the castle last time I played, so who knows.. I may venture in if I get enough time to brush up my skills!

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40 minutes ago, Hero-of-Time said:

Yeah, there is a sense of challenge when playing it this way. One of the towers that I really struggled with was the one that is surrounded by water, Lizalfos and Electric Wizrobes. Trying to get through the water without being electrocuted was a nightmare. Once I reached the base of the tower I would then have to try and sneak up as far as I could before the Wizrobe found me. Good times. :D  

Yeah, that one was a challenge to climb.  I saved when i got to the 2nd rest point, died from the Wizrobe and reloaded at that rest point with no Wizrobe bothering me.  I had trouble with 2 others as well, again one had a Wizrobe (it was in the old battle area east of Death Mountain).  The other was down to me not being prepared for the harsh environment.

Never really played a lot of Breath of the Wild on the WiiU.  The PS4 took all my gaming time, so it was negleted a lot.  When i got my Switch, i re-bought this game.  And have managed many hours of play.  Thanks mostly to being portable, i can play on my commute to work.  Similar to @Pestneb, i found myself trying to open the map via the towers before doing much else.  Did complete or simply unlock shrines along the way, which helped if i died (easy fast travel point).  Have managed to get many of the memories, pretty interesting watching the cutscenes to go along with them.

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well, unexpectedly, I finished the game! well.. kinda. I didn't have all the memories (missing 2, one of which I was trying to find in the castle!) and I was also trying to open up the hyrule castle shrine to finish off my 120th shrine... I accidentally triggered the final battle. I understand some of what people were saying about it... I'm of the impression that there are more challenging enemies in the overworld.

My wife has started playing it properly, the main thing she didn't like was how weak her link is, but with a very little guidance she's started to build up confidence and is stretching herself. She's still only done 7 shrines, but I'm enjoying (kinda :D) watching her play and the differences in gameplay between her (early link) and me (developed link with strong armour,  the 4 abilities, strong weapons etc and pretty much no worries in the overworld!)

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55 minutes ago, Pestneb said:

well, unexpectedly, I finished the game! well.. kinda. I didn't have all the memories (missing 2, one of which I was trying to find in the castle!) and I was also trying to open up the hyrule castle shrine to finish off my 120th shrine... I accidentally triggered the final battle. I understand some of what people were saying about it... I'm of the impression that there are more challenging enemies in the overworld.

My wife has started playing it properly, the main thing she didn't like was how weak her link is, but with a very little guidance she's started to build up confidence and is stretching herself. She's still only done 7 shrines, but I'm enjoying (kinda :D) watching her play and the differences in gameplay between her (early link) and me (developed link with strong armour,  the 4 abilities, strong weapons etc and pretty much no worries in the overworld!)

You should try and track down those last two memories, they add an extra scene in the ending and a bit more narrative closure to the whole game.

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18 minutes ago, Ronnie said:

You should try and track down those last two memories, they add an extra scene in the ending and a bit more narrative closure to the whole game.

I've already got them, going to stretch things out a bit, I have 7 shrines to finish (I only opened them up, having done the trials yet) and a load of mini quests to complete, I want to upgrade my 3 main armours (swimming, climbing and ancient... although ancient is already fully upgraded) and maybe find a few more koroks (though I'm completely happy with the inventory slots I already have so... I'll just do any I stumble upon!!) After that I'll head back to Ganon for a final time :)


Anyway... for me the game is complete now so it is what I will call the first LoZ I ever completed :)

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2 hours ago, Pestneb said:

I've already got them, going to stretch things out a bit, I have 7 shrines to finish (I only opened them up, having done the trials yet) and a load of mini quests to complete, I want to upgrade my 3 main armours (swimming, climbing and ancient... although ancient is already fully upgraded) and maybe find a few more koroks (though I'm completely happy with the inventory slots I already have so... I'll just do any I stumble upon!!) After that I'll head back to Ganon for a final time :)


Anyway... for me the game is complete now so it is what I will call the first LoZ I ever completed :)

Sounds like you're being quite thorough!

I wish I could erase my memory of playing BOTW and play it for the first time all over again. That, Ocarina of Time and the original LOZ are the only games that made me feel this way.

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Well I'm looking at the switch right now, along with my circumstances, and come to the conclusion I'll probably not be getting one after all. I'll hopefully grab the successor when that eventually comes out, hopefully with mario kart 9, splatoon 3, mario... botw2 etc. But for now I'm just enjoying mk8 and botw :)

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I must say, I have been slightly disappointed by the music in this game so far. 

I know it must have been a conscious choice to make the music more atmospheric rather than more pronounced melodies, but with this being a Zelda game it's hard to not notice the lack of memorable tunes. Mind you, I'm nowhere near finished so I am looking forward to hearing more tunes in villages and whatnot, but I get the feeling the game is just not going to come close to a Windwaker score or a Majora's Mask score.

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22 minutes ago, Fused King said:

I must say, I have been slightly disappointed by the music in this game so far. 

I know it must have been a conscious choice to make the music more atmospheric rather than more pronounced melodies, but with this being a Zelda game it's hard to not notice the lack of memorable tunes. Mind you, I'm nowhere near finished so I am looking forward to hearing more tunes in villages and whatnot, but I get the feeling the game is just not going to come close to a Windwaker score or a Majora's Mask score.

I definitely agree with you on that.

I can only really remember 2 of the tracks. While those two are nice, they don't really resonate with me as well as the average Zelda soundtrack.

It says a lot when the best music this game has to offer can't actually be heard in the game itself.

Edited by Glen-i

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23 hours ago, Glen-i said:

I definitely agree with you on that.

I can only really remember 2 of the tracks. While those two are nice, they don't really resonate with me as well as the average Zelda soundtrack.

It says a lot when the best music this game has to offer can't actually be heard in the game itself.

They should offer free music DLC which let's you play memorable tracks in certain areas.

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On 7/17/2018 at 4:50 PM, Pestneb said:

well, unexpectedly, I finished the game! well.. kinda. I didn't have all the memories (missing 2, one of which I was trying to find in the castle!) and I was also trying to open up the hyrule castle shrine to finish off my 120th shrine... I accidentally triggered the final battle. I understand some of what people were saying about it... I'm of the impression that there are more challenging enemies in the overworld.

 

Bwahahaha...Thats exactly how I "finished" BOTW. I was really trying to conquer the castle with the thought that I'll head out with all the treasure and come back for Ganon once I've done everything... But just stumbled in that room and set off the sequence. I didnt really expect to beat Ganon, but used the very last bit of food to power through... Good times.

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On 7/28/2018 at 4:14 AM, Fused King said:

I must say, I have been slightly disappointed by the music in this game so far. 

I know it must have been a conscious choice to make the music more atmospheric rather than more pronounced melodies, but with this being a Zelda game it's hard to not notice the lack of memorable tunes. Mind you, I'm nowhere near finished so I am looking forward to hearing more tunes in villages and whatnot, but I get the feeling the game is just not going to come close to a Windwaker score or a Majora's Mask score.

I loved the music... Stand outs include: Gerudo Town, the divine beasts on the different phases (esp Vah Nabooris...that theme was sexy), Guardian music, Shrine Tower and Shrines....Man I loved the Shrine music even though it gets reptitive and there are even subtle differences between the proper shrines and 'gift' shrines... God damn I love this game.

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I sat and watched this last night. There were a couple of things that I didn't know about and the messages that were hidden in the Sheik language were fantastic.

 

 

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We are now about 40 Shrines in having mainly focused on the Eastern half of the map. Saved the Zora's from some terrible weather, killed ourselves trying to pull out the Sword That Seals Evil, and are now trying to integrate in Goron "City" (hardly a city). Getting up that mountain was quite something with multiple guardians and a limited amount of anti-heat potions. We finally were able to slay a Guardian, but without the proper preparation and healing items it's still near impossible. Watching it sink into the lava felt good though.

I gotto say Iam loving the interconnectedness between the different races who seem to be traveling throughout the land. However, I am still not too sure how I feel about every reward in the wild being either a weapon, rupee or Korok, but I am struggling to think at what else they could offer. Perhaps some interesting clothing or whatnot, but I suppose those are locked behind more substantial quests or difficult to reach places.

It's fun to experiment with the cooking, but I also would have liked to have a recipe book instead of only being able to see the recipes when you click on the dish.

Having played roughly 100 hours now, I am already developing my wishlisy for the next installment where I hope they maybe cut down the map in size somewhat, but really focus on more on-goings amongst the world's inhabitants as we saw in the OoT to MM transition. It would be really great to discover more cities and bigger settlements after having gotten a sense of the Big Wild in this game. Perhaps a theme could be of rebuilding Hyrule.

Anyways, at the pace we are playing now this looks to be a 200+ hour game not including the DLC.

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55 minutes ago, Fused King said:

We are now about 40 Shrines in having mainly focused on the Eastern half of the map. Saved the Zora's from some terrible weather, killed ourselves trying to pull out the Sword That Seals Evil, and are now trying to integrate in Goron "City" (hardly a city). Getting up that mountain was quite something with multiple guardians and a limited amount of anti-heat potions. We finally were able to slay a Guardian, but without the proper preparation and healing items it's still near impossible. Watching it sink into the lava felt good though.

I gotto say Iam loving the interconnectedness between the different races who seem to be traveling throughout the land. However, I am still not too sure how I feel about every reward in the wild being either a weapon, rupee or Korok, but I am struggling to think at what else they could offer. Perhaps some interesting clothing or whatnot, but I suppose those are locked behind more substantial quests or difficult to reach places.

It's fun to experiment with the cooking, but I also would have liked to have a recipe book instead of only being able to see the recipes when you click on the dish.

Having played roughly 100 hours now, I am already developing my wishlisy for the next installment where I hope they maybe cut down the map in size somewhat, but really focus on more on-goings amongst the world's inhabitants as we saw in the OoT to MM transition. It would be really great to discover more cities and bigger settlements after having gotten a sense of the Big Wild in this game. Perhaps a theme could be of rebuilding Hyrule.

Anyways, at the pace we are playing now this looks to be a 200+ hour game not including the DLC.

Wow that's some serious time investment! I think I finished the game and all the shrines in 120 or so hours (and took my time doing it!). Glad you seem to be enjoying it. 

I have to say thoigh Goron City was a huge disappointment for me. Compared to the other three major towns, Zora and Getudo especially, it felt a bit hastily designed and boring. 

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considering the effort to get there, I agree goron city was dull. I would have loved if they had a tarry town style of gameplay, where you could build up the villages into towns, then into large towns, then eventually cities. With Goron city I would have loved to have found more of a city, going into the volcano itself. More fleshed out characters would have been nice too. Even if the "expanded" settlements were dlc, I would have been more inclined to have bought it. Goron city expansion 1 with several inhabitants, maybe a few shrines, and then you bring materials (obviously not wood!) to expand the city to be more city like. Anyway, I guess it is fair to assume BotW is done now for development time, I guess the sequel will be switch based... maybe on the successor console too, looking how zeldas have gone for the last few generations (ww on gc and wii, botw on wii u and switch... although I guess with that sequence switch will probably get an exclusive zelda...)

 

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9 hours ago, Fused King said:

Having played roughly 100 hours now, I am already developing my wishlisy for the next installment where I hope they maybe cut down the map in size somewhat, but really focus on more on-goings amongst the world's inhabitants as we saw in the OoT to MM transition. It would be really great to discover more cities and bigger settlements after having gotten a sense of the Big Wild in this game. Perhaps a theme could be of rebuilding Hyrule.

 

I completely agree with this, and would also like to see more events that happen in the environment, as though a story is actually progressing as you play the game.  There could be a canyon where Ganon's army ambushed you, for instance, like how there was a bridge duel in Twilight Princess.

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On 8/15/2018 at 1:16 AM, Grazza said:

 

I completely agree with this, and would also like to see more events that happen in the environment, as though a story is actually progressing as you play the game.  There could be a canyon where Ganon's army ambushed you, for instance, like how there was a bridge duel in Twilight Princess.

Yeah, that was a great battle sequence! Recently I have been watching retrospectives on the 3D Zeldas and it's ironic how for me everytime a new 3D Zelda pops up, I start to appreciate the previous one more. I would've never considered it posibble with Skyward Sword, which I thought was fun at the time but extremely linear, but after having seen it's retrospective I am reminded of its fun battle system and very unique dungeons. I was however also reminded by the coma-inducing AI who has been established to reside in the master sword in pretty much all of the games. If there's ever a voice talking probabilities Link might hear in a future Zelda game when he's near the Master Sword I will gladly sprint the other way and try to take out the main baddies with an empty bottle. Actually, I am kind of saddened by the lack of a cool sidekick character in BotW, but I guess the champions kind of make up for that.

I still hope the development team will have the balls to take a departure from Hyrule once again, and I get the feeling they might just seeing as Breath of the Wild kind of feels like a love letter in its grandest form to the land of recognisable Zelda lore. 

Another dream Zelda game for me would be a revival of Toon Link in a game set between Wind Waker and Phantom Hourglass where you get into all kinds of shennanigens with Tetra and her crew.

And yes, Ol' Fusedy is a playing a Zelda game so all my build up love for the franchise over the years will finds its way to the forum in multiple forms. Stay tuned, haha

 

 

Edited by Fused King

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8 hours ago, Fused King said:

Yeah, that was a great battle sequence! Recently I have been watching retrospectives on the 3D Zeldas and it's ironic how for me everytime a new 3D Zelda pops up, I start to appreciate the previous one more. I would've never considered it posibble with Skyward Sword, which I thought was fun at the time but extremely linear, but after having seen it's retrospective I am reminded of its fun battle system and very unique dungeons. I was however also reminded by the coma-inducing AI who has been established to reside in the master sword in pretty much all of the games. If there's ever a voice talking probabilities Link might hear in a future Zelda game when he's near the Master Sword I will gladly sprint the other way and try to take out the main baddies with an empty bottle. Actually, I am kind of saddened by the lack of a cool sidekick character in BotW, but I guess the champions kind of make up for that.

 

I think it's because you never know what they're going to drop in the next game - the magic meter in Twilight Princess, a linked-up overworld in Skyward Sword and general dungeon/plot progression formula in Breath of the Wild.  I think Twilight Princess was the most overreacted-to Zelda, mainly because expectations were so high at the time.  It was a good game, but the wolf bits were unnecessary and the move to Wii tarnished it.

 

Whilst I don't find myself longing to play Skyward Sword, it did at least achieve what it aimed to in the way of motion controls.  I remember the multi-armed boss being great fun, with you being able to pick up its giant swords.

 

Breath of the Wild impressed me more, and it did finally have a fluid, linked-up overworld.  However, it does lose that sense of plot progression as you move through a landscape.  It is also a case of Nintendo being overly influenced by a popular genre - open world - rather than setting the agenda themselves.  Breath of the Wild isn't just big - it has all the trappings of the open world genre, such as cooking, hundreds of (minor) sidequests etc, so much so that it lost the thrill of getting a significant, permanent item halfway through a dungeon such as a Mirror Shield or Flame-resistant tunic.  If the game doesn't know you are going to take a certain route (ie. eight dungeons), it can't structure anything very interesting or worthwhile.

 

Quote

I still hope the development team will have the balls to take a departure from Hyrule once again, and I get the feeling they might just seeing as Breath of the Wild kind of feels like a love letter in its grandest form to the land of recognisable Zelda lore.

 

That's a good point.  They can't really do a grander Hyrule, so are going to have to think alternatively for a bit.

Edited by Grazza

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33 minutes ago, Grazza said:

That's a good point.  They can't really do a grander Hyrule, so are going to have to think alternatively for a bit.

Back to Termina it is!

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