deathofcows wrote:In experimental news: How did it take me so long to try Ruby/Sapphire/Topaz (I think?) as weapons? Even in the final trailer there's that shot of him drawing a ruby arrow. Turns out they're the most kabloomiest things in the game?! So fun to use!
For the record folks, obviously I meant this as direct throws/arrow fusions. Obviously I'd fused the stones to weapons/shields before! Anyway try it - the Ruby gives a helluva bang!
Captain Kinopio wrote:There's also the fact that Koroks hunting now just feels like box ticking whereas the 2 times I did it in BotW I always felt I was discovering new bits of landscape or amazing views. It just emphasises to me how much is lost by not having any interesting new land mass.
I think you rinsed BotW more than me which probably also affects the sense of (non) novelty in finding them? I really disliked Korok-ing in that but in this find it a (now pleasingly spaced out) neat beat of fun. I'm referring to the non-transport ones, as those are obviously more tick-boxy now that I've done a millions and have tried a million types of carriage/transport. Saying that, even yesterday evening I made a crappy horse-fan-cart thing to (slowly) do a Korok transport and it was fun!
I think the game won me over for all the reasons I've mentioned before - despite some patches of burnout/overwhelm which dissipated as I passed a critical threshold of Things Done - so now my exploration and light play is coloured by my general affection for it. It also helps that BotW I found slightly cool and flat in ways that TOTK resolves for me. Whereas it sounds like your initial excitement gave way to an overall disappointment that now colours your play?
Found my last shrine last night. Doubt I'll do all the side quests, but got a few interesting ones in my log that I'll still try and tackle. I had to look up a map to find the last few shrines in BotW, so really appreciated the lighting of the depths as a way to identify missing shrines on the surface. Overall I've really loved the subtle interconnected loop they've had between the three new play spaces (sky, caves, and depths) - felt like I was always been encouraged for never forced to move between them.
I've been chipping away at it over time and the realisation that I'm starting to run out of main stuff to do made me feel very melancholy. Wish they had added a bunch of extra islands as DLC as I'd be happy to keep exploring, but I also really respect them saying they're happy with what shipped.
I thought this was super interesting and kind of mindblowing:
For example, there is no dedicated wagon sound or paddle boat sound, these sounds are created by the wheels rolling or rotating on the water, with the quality changing based on the size, shape, and material. Osada said, "It's making sounds that I have no memory of creating! Even the director told us, 'This is basically a physics engine for sound, isn't it?'"
Got back into this and after doing all the stuff post 4 regional phenomenas but pre final battle, I decided to get back to exploring the world. Kicked about in the depths for a bit and then decided to fully complete everything in the air. And it's been great. I've just been bouncing around from island to island fully exploring everything. Now I have shrines to warp to and vehicles to get about it's much more enjoyable to explore when compared to my attempts in the early game.
Tomous wrote:Got back into this and after doing all the stuff post 4 regional phenomenas but pre final battle, I decided to get back to exploring the world. Kicked about in the depths for a bit and then decided to fully complete everything in the air. And it's been great. I've just been bouncing around from island to island fully exploring everything. Now I have shrines to warp to and vehicles to get about it's much more enjoyable to explore when compared to my attempts in the early game.
Loved that stage (I loved all of it).
Once you've beaten the final battle, I'd heartily recommend diving into a guide for some of the collectibles. Particularly the armour sets and unique weapons. Some of the locations (e.g. hidden caves) you will realistically never find but they are fun to explore and get the snazzy reward from.
Tomous wrote:Got back into this and after doing all the stuff post 4 regional phenomenas but pre final battle, I decided to get back to exploring the world. Kicked about in the depths for a bit and then decided to fully complete everything in the air. And it's been great. I've just been bouncing around from island to island fully exploring everything. Now I have shrines to warp to and vehicles to get about it's much more enjoyable to explore when compared to my attempts in the early game.
Loved that stage (I loved all of it).
Once you've beaten the final battle, I'd heartily recommend diving into a guide for some of the collectibles. Particularly the armour sets and unique weapons. Some of the locations (e.g. hidden caves) you will realistically never find but they are fun to explore and get the snazzy reward from.
Yeah, I think I will do that.
My current plan after finishing the sky is to then get down into the depths and clear that up (I've only done about half the lightroots and I have loads of treasure maps to follow up). After that, I'll see off the shrines I'm missing on the surface (30-40 I think) and then go see of Gannondorf. THEN I'm gonna tackle outstanding side quests and adventures. At which point I think I'll get round to doing what you describe.
And then finally I'll need to beat all the gleeoks in the game
I think I'm going to try and do everything bar korok seeds and upgrading all equipment to the max. Although I may drop doing all the caves depending on how I get on.
I had a break at around 110 hours. I should have probably finished the main quest before taking a break as it hasn't had quite the same impact going back in but otherwise it's been a joy to return to.
Yeah, I’d have loved a NG+ for this, I have also saved a lot of side stuff to come back to one day but I couldn’t imagine starting it again from scratch either
Jenuall wrote:Jurassic Park Trespasser did this 25 years ago, immersive sims once again leading the way for Nintendo to follow
I know you're having a laugh here, but it is very funny to see Nintendo who have always been about rigid gameplay suddenly discovering emergent gameplay and interconnected systems and being shocked at how fun it can be.
Jenuall wrote:Jurassic Park Trespasser did this 25 years ago, immersive sims once again leading the way for Nintendo to follow
I know you're having a laugh here, but it is very funny to see Nintendo who have always been about rigid gameplay suddenly discovering emergent gameplay and interconnected systems and being shocked at how fun it can be.
I mean I'm only half joking - Trespasser did have some cool emergent elements and systems but also in response to Tomous' link it also had a dynamic foley system for mixing sounds based on the game world physics simulation which is what that article was saying about Nintendo doing in this.
I'm nearing completion of the depths with 9 lightroots to go. I've been focusing on it for the last 20 or so hours of gameplay and have absolutely been loving it. I think if you go down later in the game when you have a) more surface shrines to guide you towards lightroots, b) bigger battery capacity and c) more hearts, it's a much more rewarding experience. I've had loads of fun bouncing around, following up on treasure maps found in the sky and also using the map myself to find possible mine/yiga hideout locations. It's been a very rewarding and addictive experience. My only slight criticism is they could have perhaps added a bit more variety to the landscape to make areas within the depths feel more distinct while still maintaining the depths look. But regardless, I've really enjoyed it and gameplay wise it's felt quite different to the rest of the game.
Should probably go and beat Ganondorf at some point too
And that's the main quest done! 2 side adventures (1 of which is the photo thing) and 21 side quests to go back for but all the shrines, lightroots completed and I think all the equipment (although I need to check that). 185+ hours on the clock. What a beast of a game
Well, all side adventures and quests are done so at 190 hours I'm clocking out. Probably my favourite game of the Switch era and if you dont allow for nostalgia (and therefore Ocarina of Time) my favourite Zelda.
So on that note, here's a list of everything I think Nintendo got wrong with this that I need to get off my chest:
1. Zelda's VA. Obviously a rollover of a BOTW mistake but she really is bad, and annoying. 2. The item menu systems. Just a mess isn't it? It's kinda nuts the decisions they made with this. Items could have easily been grouped to make scrolling through easier-something especially annoying when you use the dpad up button for quick access in the game. 3. Armour-why oh why can't I just equip a set with 1 button. They could also really do with a favourites wheel of some kind for quick access. 4. The execution of the story. Overall I really like the story but I think the execution could do with some work. First of all, the memories revealing themselves in whatever random order you find them is dumb. There is clearly an optimal order, they should just use that regardless of the order you find them. Second, the direction of the story becomes pretty clear to you (and therefore Link) pretty early on. But he doesn't tell anyone! It's really annoying listening to NPCs go on about Zelda doing this or that or whatever and you know it isn't her. 5. I've no idea why Nintendo don't tell you that using ZL with ultra hand flattens an objective horizontally but I'd have loved to find this out in hours 1 or 2 of my 190 play through rather than afterwards while watching some random YouTube video. 6. While I did love exploring both, the sky needed more space and the depths less, and both needed a bit more variety to both the look and also in things to do. I would say though that while the depths map is painfully big at times, I did enjoy the relationship to the surface a lot, it made the final shrine hunt very enjoyable. 7. Sage powers. I really hate how they implemented this. First of all, having to go into the menu to turn them on and off gets annoying fast. Not sure why they couldn't be added to the L wheel (yet Amiibo has a space there). Second of all, having them help you fight is kinda cool but also, they're not really that helpful and I don't like the design plus worst of all, it makes the screen very cluttered. Third of all, and most importantly as some of their powers are very useful, the way you activate them is way too fiddly especially in battle. Having to find them and run up to them is just not a smooth process. I'd far rather of just had a system where you could activate the power you needed at a press of a button rather than having to strawberry float trying to find them. 8. While I think weapon breaking is fine and works even better in this thanks to fuse, the length of time some of the zonai devices last is bullshit, you should get longer.
(I loved all of it).
