The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

I just added up the hours my WiiU says Ive played this since it came out (so thats 2 yearsish now).

It appeared to be around the 500 hour mark :/

Granted, a chunk of that would be "put the controller down and go do the dishes with the game still running" but still... yikes.

i've been playing this for a while and yesterday discovered a stable and shrine just standing out in the middle of the map that i had somehow not stumbled upon yet

200 hours by the time I completed it, god knows how many more on Fucking Rohta Bastard Chigah DLC Bastard shrine

I thought I had unlocked all of the towers but I just found one more. So far the best money spent in this game has been on my winter gear, which makes me think there is a hot weather outfit to save up for as well. Question: does the game know what I am low on? For example, if I am running low on regular arrows, am I more likely to come across them in the game than I am other types of arrows I might have more of? Does the treasure and whatnot adjust to what I need, generally speaking, or is it all set or random?

Thus far I have spent all of my orb upgrades on stamina, because that seems more important, but it might be worth upping my hearts as well. Then again, like I said before, as far as I can tell there is no real cost to dying - you don't lose anything - so I'm not sure what advantage more hearts really offers except sheer endurance/tanking through adversity.

find ye a divine beast! they're not any harder than the rest of the game, just take a bit longer

Get as many hearts as you possibly can, you'll need them. Stamina vessels as well.

I've come across two divine beasts so far, one in the desert and one in the sky. In the case of the former I think I was told to meet some bird person on the flying range, where I wasted a lot of time trying to break all these targets for apparently no real purpose, but there was no one waiting there, so I moved on. The desert was pure happenstance while exploring. I know hours ago I was being coaxed into helping the fish people earlier, so I assume that was taking me to another divine beast.

Saw my first skeleton hinox (I think) the other day. Something big, at least. Seen a few lynels in the distance, but once I could have sworn one even killed me from there, so ... nope.

Oh, and I was able to upgrade my radar to radar+, but I don't have enough parts to do the better upgrades to bombs and stasis. I forget where I got a core before, probably in a shrine? I've been avoiding the strength tests shrines, but that basically seems like something to do when I have more weapons than I know what to do with.

i think there's only one skeleton hinox so well done there!

there are three levels of guardian shrines; you can surely beat the easiest of those now (are they called "minor"? I can't remember)

getting a second stamina wheel makes moving around the map a lot quicker but I'd go for hearts after that, getting to 13 is an important break point for reasons

Oh, beating the minor tests of strengths is easy. but I keep coming across major tests of strength lately.

Oh man, the most annoying part of the game the other day. I got stranded on that island with nothing but my underwear and wits, and the only way to get everything back was to do all this bullshit. Or, you know, die and just go back to the last save spot, because I could tell the reward was not worth the effort.

the effort is the reward

I bailed because (and this is another lingering effect of Dark Souls) I was worried if I didn't succeed I would be left with nothing. That seems like exactly what Dark Souls would do.

Speaking of work for the sake of work, I'm still not sold not the weapon system. I get that having weapons break makes you try different weapons, but honestly the flip for me is that having weapons break all the time means I don't care about weapons, since I'll just switch to another one for 5 or 10 whacks. Again, at least at this stage, it doesn't feel like anything is at stake, since it'll just be replaced by something else. That's fine, it's just one less thing to worry about.

So far the only work for the sake of work I truly enjoy in this game (which I am enjoying) is standing on a skull fort and tossing bombs through an eye again and again until everything is dead and, 10 minutes later, I get a bundle of 5 arrows or something.

Spears! Spears are great! I always breathed a sigh of relief when I found a spear.

I also carried a ton of wands for "just in case" that I never used.

Having a flaming weapon is great for setting campfires quickly.

there are too many two-handed weapons. i feel like all the powerful swords i find are two-handed and slow. i do like spears.

Oh man, the most annoying part of the game the other day. I got stranded on that island with nothing but my underwear and wits, and the only way to get everything back was to do all this bullshit. Or, you know, die and just go back to the last save spot, because I could tell the reward was not worth the effort.

― Josh in Chicago, Tuesday, March 5, 2019 9:42 AM (four hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I mentioned this upthread, but I did this part towards the end of the game and it was a fun nostalgic throwback challenge at that point.

I thought I had unlocked all of the towers but I just found one more. So far the best money spent in this game has been on my winter gear, which makes me think there is a hot weather outfit to save up for as well. Question: does the game know what I am low on? For example, if I am running low on regular arrows, am I more likely to come across them in the game than I am other types of arrows I might have more of? Does the treasure and whatnot adjust to what I need, generally speaking, or is it all set or random?

― Josh in Chicago

there is hot weather gear! several varieties of hot weather gear in fact! and you can and will easily go broke buying all that gear. at a certain point in the game i was just going around trying to get all my armor upgraded. that and looking for poop.

the game _does_ know what you're low on and certain things (fairies specifically) won't spawn if you have a certain number, and the shops won't sell arrows, but i think drops are mostly determined by enemy type. oh, and the farther along you are in the game the more phat the loot is - while at the beginning of the game the lizalfos will have lizal boomerangs, towards the end of the game they will all have tri-boomerangs. same thing with certain types of enemies - they get tougher the farther you are in the game, except for certain enemies which are locked to a specific difficulty level

I have read that weapon drop quality is a function of number of weapons you've broken in the game so far

there are two specific sets of hot weather gear you need to access big parts of the story and divine beasts

xpost lo and behold, I have traveled to the land of the leaf ewoks and now know why I need more hearts than I have.

the big guy that’s into poop should probably be around there somewhere.

Man, the encounters in this game are soooooo weird, from the lascivious fairies to ... pretty much everything around Gerardo Town. Crossdressing, amazonian ladies looking for men ...

…Gerardo Town?

you know, where gerardo hangs out. link's brother

there are two specific sets of hot weather gear you need to access big parts of the story and divine beasts

― na (NA)

and one set costs more than your goddamn house. oh, sure, live it up now, gorons, but what happens after you eat all of your goddamn precious stones? try charging two thousand dollars for a fucking hat then

stone munching wee fucks

i was gonna make a rico suave joke but the moment has passed

I set it up and everything ...

Its funny I'd forgot how terrifying trying to get to Goron city was pre-heat gear. Lava and beasties everywhere argh! Now its all "eh, strollin along a volcano no fux given". I love the little hot springs you can sit in.

https://i.imgur.com/MfEujKN.png

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3GyVeQgLUw

One of the reasons I kept postponing the Divine Bird is that I would get distracted en route and use up all my bomb arrows (which I knew I needed), then need to save up for more, then end up using those bomb arrows, too, and so on. So it was a nice surprise to finally tackle the Bird and find at the start the Bird Bro gifts you with 20 bomb arrows. Thanks, Bird Bro. I was able to take down the Divine Bird without looking up help until the last of the engines, because I missed the part about tilting the map. Once I learned how to do that it was pretty OK, and the baddie on the roof I got in maybe two tries, once I figured out what it did. Hilariously I didn't realize I still had to turn of the widget in the middle at the end and kept trying to fly back to Rito Village, to no avail. But yeah, Divine Bird is done, got my flying shoes. Oh, and I've unlocked all my magic+ powers, so there's that, too.

Next stop: Divine Waterworld beast? I should get more Ancient Arrows, too.

Oh, and I came this close the killing a skeleton hilox or whatever, but then at the last minute it hit 5am or whatever the witching hour end time is and it dug itself back underground. Oh well.

I never used any ancient arrows but maybe I should have?

All of the Divine Beasts give useful abilities. The bird & waters ones are particularly good for exploring.

I used my first batch of Ancient Arrows and yeah, they blow up guardians good.

I don't think a day has gone by yet where something in this game did not surprise me, which is awesome. There is just so much there to be discovered, so that it feels kind of special when you come across it, even if, obv., it has been programmed and is designed to be discovered. Like, I looked at the map and thought, huh, I've never been to that area, so climbed a mountain and found a spring and dragon to free. It was cool. Another time I went back to the Forgotten Ruins, which I had passed through but not explored, and found my way into a room filled with a bunch of stationary guardians, which I successfully destroyed for lots of parts, losing almost all my weapons in the process but justifying going on a kill spree in the countryside to find more weapons. Then today I spent too much time trying to ride a buck to fulfill a quest before realizing, well, it's optional and kind of dumb, so I'll just go off and do something else then come back some other time if I even remember to do so. Later I found a big waterfall and suspected there was something behind it, so jumped in and swam up and ... drowned. And then came back and realized there was another way into a shrine, one which did not kill me. Just lots of fun.

Ok now you’re getting it, I was worried you had some kinda problem

Its funny I'd forgot how terrifying trying to get to Goron city was pre-heat gear. Lava and beasties everywhere argh! Now its all "eh, strollin along a volcano no fux given". I love the little hot springs you can sit in.

― Stoop Crone (Trayce)

my spouse has been playing botw again lately and was just hanging out on death mountain chilling and a bird literally caught on fire, it was weird

they also figured out why some weapons sparkle, which was a new realization to me too - it's to show that you haven't used them yet. (this is different from the metal weapon indicator when there's lightning around)

flying shoes are the best. also not really much of a spoiler but all the divine beast puzzles are based around moving them using the map so get used to it :)

have you got the stealth armor yet? i love the stealth armor.

I guess you don't max out clothing inventory, right? I should go shopping!

yeah you can carry all your clothes with you whenever, and even though you can't change your weapon while you're falling off a cliff you totally _can_ change your clothes. stealth gear definitely worth it!

played while in my stealth gear but don't know how stealthy it made me. Because I'm also getting better at defending myself. how sneaky is sneaky? anyway, eventually made my way to waterworld, which was kind of a long trek and preamble for the payoff, but I suppose I'm about to do another Divine beast.

Heh, my first attempt at the water elephant beast was a disaster, since I misheard/misunderstood the instructions and thought I had to take out all the glowing circles in the water wheel, but of course my shock arrows did nothing. Then I realized I had to use my magic to break the ice, and even if I just let them hit me the fish man wouldn't bring me to the waterfalls. I kept trying to steer him, too, or use my gale force glider power to fly up, but, nope, need to break the ice first. Hopefully the inside of the elephant will be more obvious (to me).

On the plus side, I already had a bunch of shock arrows, so I didn't need to mess with the lynel. But maybe I'll do that anyway.

Water elephant down! So far the Divine Beast bosses have been easier than some of the more common enemies. At the very least figuring out what to do has posed a bigger challenge than the actual battle. I totally forgot that my freeze ray worked horizontally.

After I beat it I did mess with the nearby Lynel a bit to get more shock arrows. But rather than just die at its hands I simply teleported somewhere else when I noticed it was getting perturbed.

Glad to hear its all finally falling into place for you man! :)

https://i.imgur.com/663B3wD.jpg

― ciderpress, Saturday, May 19, 2018 1:55 PM (nine months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this is still my favorite thing in the game

I love reading various discussions about the game and people going "wait, theres other ways to do this!?" about a thing, a great example being the mining carts. I'd been kicking them into gear with stasis and a bash with a weapon. Turns out that little cage at the rear was designed to stick a bomb into and detonate it to make the cart move >_<

In the elephant beast there was this gate I had to get under. For some reason it didn't occur to me to use my magic ice power, so I just used stasis and hit it a bunch and then ran under it (and, later, ran out). Ice would have been better, but stasis worked. (And cost me a weapon, but whatever.)

the ice power is definitely the one i always forget about, i never internalized to look for ways to use it anytime there's water on the ground