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The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild |OT2| It's 98 All Over Again
- Thread starter vehn
- Start date
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Same, just finished it and I wouldn't have expected it, but I was honestly touched by it.
I even put on my best looking armor and jewelry before attending the wedding - wouldn't have thought that a game could make me care about such trivial things, but it did :')
QuixoticNeutral
Member
So with 109 shrines and 377 Koroks in hand, I finally bit the bullet and spent last night clearing all of the Divine Beasts in quick succession.
With one notable exception, I liked them a lot more than I expected, given how attached I am to the TP/SS school of dungeon design and how much advance warning I had picked up not to expect the same sort of thing here. While anyone would be right to miss the scale, ambition, and distinct aesthetic unity of older 3D dungeons that made them the cerebral showstoppers they were, in BotW I can see a unique and coherent design philosophy that fulfils what some of those earlier dungeons were striving to do.
If I have one big reservation about them, it's that (like the shrines as well) the BotW dungeons feel cut off and isolated from the main game in one noticeable respect: the surfaces can't be climbed. And while the shrines were clear and consistent about this aestheticallyhere is all this smooth, dark, polished masonry too slippery and strictly vertical to be scaledI don't think the Beasts present a similar excuse when the surfaces resemble climbable stonework elsewhere in the game. They can't be climbed because they can't, and it's a little jarring to be thrown out of BotW into the older rule set.
I had already guessed, coming in, that (apart from the question of development resources) one of the reasons we didn't get natural-looking dungeon environments was that in the context of BotW, theses surfaces would signal to the player that they could be scaled at will, and if the dungeon design was unable to follow through with that, dissonance would ensue. In other words, the "natural/artificial" divide (with the overworld in one and the shrines/dungeons in the other) is actually an analogue for "climbable/not climbable". And after seeing all of the Beasts, I think it's very clear that they never really did figure out how to make the climb-anywhere mechanic compatible with the concept of a Zelda puzzle-room.
But there is one respect in which the dungeons are vividly BotW-like in design, and that is in their seamlessness. There is a concerted effort here to throw out the whole idea of a "dungeon room", even though you do have spaces here and there that are gated off by puzzle switches. But what you don't see are Small Keys (those are in the shrines but not the Beasts), a set order of unlocking one room after the next, or a floor-by-floor room-based dungeon map (still a fixture in the most vertical of the older 3D dungeons, where figuring out how and where floors overlapped each other was part of the puzzle). True to their in-game reason for being, the environments are single contiguous mechanisms that you can tackle in just about any order, and while you can't climb, you still have a lot of freedom of traversal, inside and outside, with the use of the paraglider. If Sky Keep in SS was the final word for now on what you can do with room-based dungeon design, where the concept of a dungeon room swallowed itself, the Beasts are like Sky Keep without the grid or the walls. Your surroundings are the puzzle box.
*
Two of the trends in 3D Zelda design from OoT up to now were (a) designing environments/puzzles that were more fluidly three-dimensional, and (b) unifying form and function such that the layouts make sense on their own terms.
With respect to the first, the designers have repeatedly pushed the players (and themselves) to try to think outside the constraints of "floors", as in TP's City in the Sky. And if you go back to OoT's Forest Temple or MM's Stone Tower you see various attempts to get the player to think rotationally, effectively using the illusion of a single dungeon room to disguise what are actually multiple, distinct rooms providing contextual clues for each other. BotW throws out floors entirely, and transformations like rotation happen in real-time with more degrees of freedom and interaction with the physics systemkind of like dropping blocks from the ceiling in Stone Tower but with granularity, and a continuous sense of interacting with the room as it happens, without the magic trick that made two rooms appear as one room with two states (again, throwing out the notion of the room).
The second, I think, is what bothers people about the uniform artifice of the Beasts, distinguishable from each other via their central concepts and exterior surroundings, but not their overall tone, as though they were four rooms of a single mega-dungeon spread out across the continent. And it does limit these dungeons for them to function as "one-act plays" without a defined midpoint or a self-contained sequence of teaching you a unique mechanic, then elaborating on it with ever more sophisticated tests. I miss thatand while some of the better shrines try to capture that puzzle flow, many of the multi-segment ones feel disconnected. But, accepting that that Beasts are what they are, I still see the same commitment to making them make sense. Some of the puzzles and switch placements are rather visibly abstract"look at me, I'm a puzzle"but the Beasts act and control like devices in their position should act and control, and the mechanisms and puzzles follow from it. The design philosophy is not a far cry from overtly artificial/mechanical environments elsewhere in the series like TP's Lakebed Temple or SS's Lanayru Mining Facility (though nothing here is as ingenious as the Timeshift mechanics in LMF, a dungeon on the shortlist for the best in the series).
*
Specific comments, in the order I approached the Beasts:
- Vah Medoh:
- Vah Naboris:
- Vah Ruta:
- Vah Rudania:
In writing all of this down, one thing that has become clear is that, as with ALBW, in a game where every dungeon is potentially somebody's first, you don't get much of a difficulty/complexity curve from one dungeon to the next, though there is still some variance in the level of complexity here (with Naboris, easily the best of the four and better than anything you'll see in MM or early-game WW/TP, standing tall as more sophisticated and less introductory as the others). Ultimately the "dungeons" to take away from this game, the ones that fully capitalize on BotW's freedom of traversal and mechanical experimentation while also providing plenty of opportunities to play with the best combat system in the series, are not the Beasts but
The Divine Beasts have a unique design identity in their own right, something more than a shrine or a puzzle room, something less than a "dungeon" as we know it from the mid-to-late-game masterpieces of the past, but a distinct conceptual experience all the same. They form their own new category of Zelda stage, and in the long run we'll have a more sensible conversation if we evaluate them in that light. And I certainly look forward to where the dungeon in the Holiday 2017 DLC goes: critically, whether it can take the fully three-dimensional puzzle mechanisms of the Beasts and the traversal/combat of BotW's overworld and make them feel like part of the same game, not experiences compartmentalized from one another.
With one notable exception, I liked them a lot more than I expected, given how attached I am to the TP/SS school of dungeon design and how much advance warning I had picked up not to expect the same sort of thing here. While anyone would be right to miss the scale, ambition, and distinct aesthetic unity of older 3D dungeons that made them the cerebral showstoppers they were, in BotW I can see a unique and coherent design philosophy that fulfils what some of those earlier dungeons were striving to do.
If I have one big reservation about them, it's that (like the shrines as well) the BotW dungeons feel cut off and isolated from the main game in one noticeable respect: the surfaces can't be climbed. And while the shrines were clear and consistent about this aestheticallyhere is all this smooth, dark, polished masonry too slippery and strictly vertical to be scaledI don't think the Beasts present a similar excuse when the surfaces resemble climbable stonework elsewhere in the game. They can't be climbed because they can't, and it's a little jarring to be thrown out of BotW into the older rule set.
I had already guessed, coming in, that (apart from the question of development resources) one of the reasons we didn't get natural-looking dungeon environments was that in the context of BotW, theses surfaces would signal to the player that they could be scaled at will, and if the dungeon design was unable to follow through with that, dissonance would ensue. In other words, the "natural/artificial" divide (with the overworld in one and the shrines/dungeons in the other) is actually an analogue for "climbable/not climbable". And after seeing all of the Beasts, I think it's very clear that they never really did figure out how to make the climb-anywhere mechanic compatible with the concept of a Zelda puzzle-room.
But there is one respect in which the dungeons are vividly BotW-like in design, and that is in their seamlessness. There is a concerted effort here to throw out the whole idea of a "dungeon room", even though you do have spaces here and there that are gated off by puzzle switches. But what you don't see are Small Keys (those are in the shrines but not the Beasts), a set order of unlocking one room after the next, or a floor-by-floor room-based dungeon map (still a fixture in the most vertical of the older 3D dungeons, where figuring out how and where floors overlapped each other was part of the puzzle). True to their in-game reason for being, the environments are single contiguous mechanisms that you can tackle in just about any order, and while you can't climb, you still have a lot of freedom of traversal, inside and outside, with the use of the paraglider. If Sky Keep in SS was the final word for now on what you can do with room-based dungeon design, where the concept of a dungeon room swallowed itself, the Beasts are like Sky Keep without the grid or the walls. Your surroundings are the puzzle box.
*
Two of the trends in 3D Zelda design from OoT up to now were (a) designing environments/puzzles that were more fluidly three-dimensional, and (b) unifying form and function such that the layouts make sense on their own terms.
With respect to the first, the designers have repeatedly pushed the players (and themselves) to try to think outside the constraints of "floors", as in TP's City in the Sky. And if you go back to OoT's Forest Temple or MM's Stone Tower you see various attempts to get the player to think rotationally, effectively using the illusion of a single dungeon room to disguise what are actually multiple, distinct rooms providing contextual clues for each other. BotW throws out floors entirely, and transformations like rotation happen in real-time with more degrees of freedom and interaction with the physics systemkind of like dropping blocks from the ceiling in Stone Tower but with granularity, and a continuous sense of interacting with the room as it happens, without the magic trick that made two rooms appear as one room with two states (again, throwing out the notion of the room).
The second, I think, is what bothers people about the uniform artifice of the Beasts, distinguishable from each other via their central concepts and exterior surroundings, but not their overall tone, as though they were four rooms of a single mega-dungeon spread out across the continent. And it does limit these dungeons for them to function as "one-act plays" without a defined midpoint or a self-contained sequence of teaching you a unique mechanic, then elaborating on it with ever more sophisticated tests. I miss thatand while some of the better shrines try to capture that puzzle flow, many of the multi-segment ones feel disconnected. But, accepting that that Beasts are what they are, I still see the same commitment to making them make sense. Some of the puzzles and switch placements are rather visibly abstract"look at me, I'm a puzzle"but the Beasts act and control like devices in their position should act and control, and the mechanisms and puzzles follow from it. The design philosophy is not a far cry from overtly artificial/mechanical environments elsewhere in the series like TP's Lakebed Temple or SS's Lanayru Mining Facility (though nothing here is as ingenious as the Timeshift mechanics in LMF, a dungeon on the shortlist for the best in the series).
*
Specific comments, in the order I approached the Beasts:
- Vah Medoh:
Kind of a letdown, actually, and an initial confirmation of my fears about what the dungeon design would be likea few shrine-like puzzles spread out over the layout without much of a central idea to hold them together. If anything, it's a little too flexible to traverse just by getting on the back and gliding anywhere, and as I discovered, it's quite possible to hit every control switch without ever bothering with the tilt, which is superfluous for everything apart from a single treasure chest. You don't even need to get the map (and I didn't until I was four switches in). For some reason, breaking this place didn't carry the same kind of satisfaction as breaking things elsewhere in BotW; it felt like I was exploiting design oversights rather than options, though as many of the shrines can attest, there is a very fine line dividing the two.
- Vah Naboris:
After a tepid experience with Vah Medoh, this took me by surprise: it's a darn good 3D Zelda dungeon by any standard. The cylindrical mechanism and its effect on the electrical grid throughout the entire dungeon don't really have a precedent or equivalent in the series, and there is a lot of flexibility to the puzzle-solving that makes use of the BotW skill setfigure out how to get from A to B by gaining height and gliding, observe the surroundings, understand how everything fits together. The optional diversion of heading up the inside of the neck was also clever; I didn't expect to activate the beams. The boss was also the most exhilarating of the four. This was one of my high points in all of BotW, though I took much longer than I would care to admit to spot the second power orb, and traversed the whole area multiple times in search of it.
- Vah Ruta:
Not bad either, if also straightforward. Given its placement on the map (along the suggested post-tutorial eastward route that makes Zora's Domain more readily accessible than the other hubs), and also the placement of the power you get at the end at the top of the list in the UI once you collect them all, it's clear to me that this was set up as a presumptive first dungeon for many players, even in a game designed to be played in any order. So it does have a certain first-dungeon simplicity to it, but one that makes use of the granularity of positioning the trunk mechanism in interesting ways, like controlling the direction of the water wheel.
- Vah Rudania:
The most visually appealing of the lot just from the setting alone, from the initial descent into the darkness all the way to the dungeon boss. There is also something very satisfying about activating the rotation while you are on the surface of the Beast and watching it reposition itself in real-time, shuffling its legs into place. For the orb that you drop into the slot, I solved that quite by accident just as a consequence of interacting with things, lighting this, moving that, so I'm not sure how well it was ever signalled that the orb was even there. I don't think I saw it until it conveniently dropped into place.
In writing all of this down, one thing that has become clear is that, as with ALBW, in a game where every dungeon is potentially somebody's first, you don't get much of a difficulty/complexity curve from one dungeon to the next, though there is still some variance in the level of complexity here (with Naboris, easily the best of the four and better than anything you'll see in MM or early-game WW/TP, standing tall as more sophisticated and less introductory as the others). Ultimately the "dungeons" to take away from this game, the ones that fully capitalize on BotW's freedom of traversal and mechanical experimentation while also providing plenty of opportunities to play with the best combat system in the series, are not the Beasts but
Hyrule Castle and Eventide Island.
The Divine Beasts have a unique design identity in their own right, something more than a shrine or a puzzle room, something less than a "dungeon" as we know it from the mid-to-late-game masterpieces of the past, but a distinct conceptual experience all the same. They form their own new category of Zelda stage, and in the long run we'll have a more sensible conversation if we evaluate them in that light. And I certainly look forward to where the dungeon in the Holiday 2017 DLC goes: critically, whether it can take the fully three-dimensional puzzle mechanisms of the Beasts and the traversal/combat of BotW's overworld and make them feel like part of the same game, not experiences compartmentalized from one another.
SciencePilot
Member
I thought the "nondescript forest" memory would be impossible to find without a guide or stumbling upon it randomly, but it's actually doable with some clever thinking. Hint:
Notice that the memories are in chronological order, and think about what direction they would have headed after the previous memory. Then find the nearby Pikango and he'll give you the specifics.
Yeah, I had to look up a few things too. Like I had to look up the location of, like, two memories--
one was just... a forest that really didn't have anything descriptive to go by, and the other was in the Eldin region somewhere
I imagine this will also be the case with a few of the shrine quests I didn't figure out, though I haven't actually looked them up yet.
I mean, I'm no completionist and never plan on completing it though, so I'm not too bothered by the fact that I've only found half of the shines and like 50 Korok seeds and I'm probably going to wrap it up soon
Doing that tower without that ability was... quite the challenge. :<
Neoleo2143
Member
That's mostly my feeling on it. Everything had set up and payoff (people underestimate Zelda's final lines tbh and how they close her arc). Nothing seemed out of place. And the attention to detail was well considered and convincing. And the villages are filled with convincing NPCs who live their lives part from you which supports the adventure.
I certainly enjoyed it more than FFXV or MGSV which were lacking in proper set up and payoff and charisma respectively.
It wasn't Witcher 3 in terms of satisfying narrative density, but what was there was good.
And because of that, this is easily the most satisfying Open World game of the generation for me.
DecoReturns
Member
Hudson for me.
It's hilarious to me how Link, of all people, is trying to prolong a conversation.
HF2014
Member
The fruit of my labor using amiibo powersaves.
Didnt really have the patience to get biggoron's sword but all this stuff is good too.
From left to right, Twilight Bow, Sword of the Sages, Goddess Sword, Fierce Diety Sword and Hero's Shield.
Nice showing! I hope snd cross my finger than nintendo will provide, even if its with a quest or dlc, the ability to buy a stash for your house so you can keep some weapons you love.
You have a good point.
I did come to the conclusion it was near Hyrule Castle, but I couldn't for the life of me figure out which forest because I didn't know there was a stable nearby, lol. I only found the stable after looking up where the memory was and heading towards it.
CharminUltra
Member
Kass
Had to look it up in the end. I had been around that location but didn't happen to stumble into the right spot. Wouldn't have occurred to me to search there more.
Neoleo2143
Member
Kass is easily my favorite character. The motivation for his journey, meeting his family, the final song. Dat Accordion. Great and fun character.
Reposting for top the page as it's pretty damn sweet but if you transfer your wiiu save to pc (I did it to see how easy it would be for cemu), you get full clean images that you took with the camera (and the cropped compendium shots).
So no more vertical lines, fullsize, and not having to deal with the 48 shot limit. All there in a folder with jpgs.
I used ddd to transfer it to my PC. Need homebrew on wiiu (very easy - website based hack is available).
download ddd, run it through the homebrew channel, set your local pc IP and then press X, run the title dumper program on pc using command prompt at the folder with the exe, type:
Launch zelda, it will pause at the intro screen with the zelda pattern until it's done.
I'm not that far in with Hudson but the one thing that stuck out with me is how Link started asking about Hudson gone when you were at the fireplace near
.
Like ... who? I've got to save the kingdom! I think they might have mentioned his name like once, if that and Link's suddenly asking about his whereabouts.
So no more vertical lines, fullsize, and not having to deal with the 48 shot limit. All there in a folder with jpgs.
I used ddd to transfer it to my PC. Need homebrew on wiiu (very easy - website based hack is available).
download ddd, run it through the homebrew channel, set your local pc IP and then press X, run the title dumper program on pc using command prompt at the folder with the exe, type:
Launch zelda, it will pause at the intro screen with the zelda pattern until it's done.
I'm not that far in with Hudson but the one thing that stuck out with me is how Link started asking about Hudson gone when you were at the fireplace near
your house
Like ... who? I've got to save the kingdom! I think they might have mentioned his name like once, if that and Link's suddenly asking about his whereabouts.
Pottypotsworth
Member
Fairy Fountain Question:
Thanks
Does the third and forth upgrade increase the two star set bonus stat? Or is it only defence that gets upgraded? E.g If i upgrade each article of Shieka clothing past the two set bonus, do i get more stealth each upgrade?
Thanks
So I finally found all 120 shrines and finished the game, Some mild spoiler thoughts on the way the end-game/rewards panned out -
Clocked in around 85 hours. I played blind until the end - then without guides I'd have never have found the last 15 shrines, there's some super hidden ones! I had to use like 5 different guides because so many were missing the few I needed. Still an amazing experience - day 1 for story DLC!
1. Glad I felt the castle to the end as its the only region left in the game I find exciting/challenging and with worthwhile rewards. It's quite surprising how much there is to do there.
2. The reward for the shrines is such an anti-climax. Complete the last shrine expecting clothing there and then > "oh I have to return to that place? Sure I guess there's some good reason/event/cutscene to justify it > nope just generic chests from nowhere, no fanfare + they need upgrading all over so everything you have is better at this point. So disappointing! Seems like it was an afterthought.
3. The pre-credits scene ended so abruptly. The last 3 mainline Zeldas have all had excellent endings - the boss was fun enough but this was just weird. If I hadn't unlocked the post-credits scene I'd have thought the world was left in apocalyptic ruin!
2. The reward for the shrines is such an anti-climax. Complete the last shrine expecting clothing there and then > "oh I have to return to that place? Sure I guess there's some good reason/event/cutscene to justify it > nope just generic chests from nowhere, no fanfare + they need upgrading all over so everything you have is better at this point. So disappointing! Seems like it was an afterthought.
3. The pre-credits scene ended so abruptly. The last 3 mainline Zeldas have all had excellent endings - the boss was fun enough but this was just weird. If I hadn't unlocked the post-credits scene I'd have thought the world was left in apocalyptic ruin!
Clocked in around 85 hours. I played blind until the end - then without guides I'd have never have found the last 15 shrines, there's some super hidden ones! I had to use like 5 different guides because so many were missing the few I needed. Still an amazing experience - day 1 for story DLC!
The Main Event
Member
Story of my life.
But the aimless wandering is the best part! I reaaaally try to avoid looking anything up for this game, even try to avoid this thread as there's a few too many unmarked spoilers for my taste. The sense of discovery is so amazing. And it seems no matter where I start exploring I stumble upon cool stuff, so I never get that feeling of "where am I supposed to go" that I get from other open worlds. I've played about the same as you, 85-90 hours, have about 50 shrines, cleared 3 divine beasts and have about 130 korok seeds. The only thing that I feel I might be slow on progressing because of playing mostly "blind" is some of the more intricate/hidden sidequests. I skim through this thread and I see a lot of talk about sidequests or sideactivities that I still have not encountered. But it's very cool finding them on your own.
Dang, I had no idea you could follow up and kill them when they jumped back, I thought they had some mercy invincibility. You learn something new everyday about this game! I know that they were bad, I was just super surprised they'd let you kill em. but I guess that's the name of the game.
I'm surprised to be honest, they never left me alone! Had to go finish them off or they kept teleporting in to attack... maybe it's when they get low health that they try and vanish for good and I just didn't give them the chance as they're pretty vulnerable while teleporting. Not sure. Haven't seen one for a while but might give them a chance to flee next time
Dear god I've got 1 bit of flint left, please let the next campfire I make take me into a day with a Blood Moon so I can get this goddamned shrine quest over and done with.
Please.
EDIT: And I go right into a storm so I have to wait until it subsides for the damn guy to tell me whether there's a Blood Moon or not. Just brilliant!
Please.
EDIT: And I go right into a storm so I have to wait until it subsides for the damn guy to tell me whether there's a Blood Moon or not. Just brilliant!
Grab a fire sword and use that to make a camp? Go to dueling peaks stable and wait by the cooking pot? Ask the moon dude at dueling peaks whether it's a blood moon each morning? Stand by shrine quest spot and leave your switch/Wii U running alone for a few hours until the quest triggers on its own?
...I didn't know you could use a fire sword and I completely forgot that you could sit down by cooking pots! Thanks for reminding me! I'll get some flint later.
I was camping out by the Dueling Peaks dude; though it's a misnomer saying Blood Moons only happen on "unlucky nights" when I'm having the worst luck in the world getting one to happen right now!
I'm immensely proud of myself for discovering this immediately. lol
I credit this to the fact that fire arrows in-game look like just regular arrows with torch tips instead of some fancy looking thing. Gives a nice clue.
d00d3n
Member
Gambling in Lurelin Village is pretty fast, but annoying due to the substantial amount of time you will spend looking at loading screens.
perfectchaos007
Member
How many hearts do I need to pull the
master sword in Koroks hideout?
13
Same here, I tried experimenting a lot after people started saying "think it and you can do it" and it mostly still holds up 60 hours in.
usp84
Member
snowbowling at the cabin near hebra tower
Snowling is the fastest way to make rupees. Google the video of how to get a strike every time.
perfectchaos007
Member
Can some of them be yellow hearts or do they have to be all red?
ninjaboyjohn
Member
I remember reading a post here about a shrine that needed fire arrows and how he had to teleport out and get some more before coming back to finish it...
^ walk near it with your normal arrows
Also, you don't need fire arrows to complete this shrine.
CharminUltra
Member
All red.
You can find a shrine
that will allow you to swap stamina for hearts for 20 rupees each. And then can swap them back
Hateno village
your house.
Even if the flame goes out due to the water? Didn't see any other fire source.
Took me a while to figure out the control of the cube, was just slamming it randomly for a while lol.
Majukun
Member
finished the game finally
also didn't help that i discovered that there was an entire castle to explore AFTER the ending, since i managed to skip a good portion of it the first time.
the ending was a bit disappointing..both the final boss and the ending itself..nothing to compare to the emotional goodbye of ocarina of time or majora's mask
also didn't help that i discovered that there was an entire castle to explore AFTER the ending, since i managed to skip a good portion of it the first time.
Silent_Ocarina
Member
My memory might be hazy but I don't remember needing arrows for this at all.I remember reading a post here about a shrine that needed fire arrows and how he had to teleport out and get some more before coming back to finish it...
^ walk near it with your normal arrows
victreeb3l
Member
Same here. I got mad at my self when I discovered you can feed dogs at stables some food! Stuff like that is so simple yet mindblowing. I feel left out
Ive been so conditioned to not try things because games are rarely this interactive. BoTW has ruined games for me.
It's definitely possible if you don't mess up the cube at all (and actually look at things before smacking them
) as there's fire there but it can go out.
This is a great articulation of my general feelings towards the dungeons as well. I find myself struck by the organic nature of everything in this world, and that lends to the feeling of immersion I have whenever I return.
victreeb3l
Member
Squad goals
UpDownLeftRight
Banned
Finished it. Kinda disappointing story to be honest. Just felt a lot like an afterthought if anything. Still really enjoyed it but if I had to level any criticism against it then it would be the world taking too much priority.
I hope in the next one they marry the story and world together a lot better. It's actually quite strange since quests and characters in towns can be pretty good. Now they have the blueprint down, hopefully next time they can start at the story and build a world around it.
I hope in the next one they marry the story and world together a lot better. It's actually quite strange since quests and characters in towns can be pretty good. Now they have the blueprint down, hopefully next time they can start at the story and build a world around it.
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