The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom

I started with looking for shrines near the Lookout, then Rito village by way of meandering through the west/northwest non-canyon parts of the map to stock up on shrine stuff and check out some caves and find rupees to buy the Snowquill hat (I think like 80% of that purchase was funded by helping Sign Guy). I did the first gloom/underworld quest, which blew my mind for managing to be both beautiful and sinister. I'm not sure I've encountered anything like it in any game. I'm on my way to Goron City now, then might see if there's anything going on in the Lost Woods. I'll leave the Gerudos til last if I can.

It's been a long time since my BOTW playthrough, but this game seems to give a bit more direction in the early phases..? like, it clearly wants you to go to Rito village first, and then lots of people you encounter talk about or are going to Woodland Stable/Goron City as a hint of your next stop. Nothing wrong with it given how expansive and frankly overwhelming this game is (god there is so much stuff, and so much stuff to do), or maybe I've just forgotten and BOTW had some early-on signposting too.

Fun/useful tip if you haven't stumbled upon it already: if you see block fall from the sky near you, climb on top of it and use rewind on it and it'll take you back up. It's handy for surveying the landscape or accessing floating sky stuff or falling/gliding to parts of the map that might be tedious to traverse on foot.

I never think about using rewind.

the game really doesn't let you loose as soon as you get to the surface because you don't have the paraglider and if you've seen a commercial you know there's a paraglider

so i did lookout landing, and then robbie tells you to go to hateno for purah pad stuff, i don't know what's in store there but if there are ability upgrades like in BOTW i want to get them asap. so i started heading in that direction but wanted to stop in kakariko first, and then i went into the great fairy chasm because i felt very confident that the way to access the 5th ring was to ascend past the barrier from the underground (turns out that was wrong), and i just ended up spending a ton of time underground. that's where i am now.

in both of the big underground areas so far, i find it really hard to stop. they're just massive, the darkness is really good at piquing my curiosity and there's always a fast travel flower in the distance to walk towards, and there's no natural stopping point because it's all the same biome. it just keeps going and going, there's no point where i think "oh this area is slightly different, i'll come back here later." i can see myself getting really burnt out on it.

Muddlebuds are great. Not tried a puffshroom yet.

― Hey Bob (Scik Mouthy), Tuesday, May 16, 2023 11:46 AM (seven hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

puffshrooms are a tasty treat you can take out of your pocket to basically reset combat. if you're surrounded by multiple enemies they just grind things to a halt. it's a really strong effect and it lasts a long time.

I wandered for a while not realising that I had to do at least the start of the main quest because thats how you get the parglide. Felt silly when I realised.

Since then I've also been wandering trying to hit shrines and towers, ocasionally pop back up to Great Sky Island and grab goodies there (those vending-machine bubble tool packs are v useful!).

The side quest I'm doing that I think will be useful is the newspaper one because it drives you to hit up all the stables, so you cover lot of map and find things on the way.

I spent 30 minutes last night trying to rescue that fucking horn player out of the hole and gave up. I think I was doing it right, it just didnt want to work! I feel like a bad engineer.

BTW am I the only one who

lucked out on the starting island and explored a few nooks and bits after the 4th shrine, thus stumbling on a cave with a chest containing the warm pants that meant I could do Rito without warm food?

haven't got to rito yet but got them yep

climb on top of it and use rewind on it and it'll take you back up

Yes this has proved to be v handy, just as a booster. It sucks not having revalis gale but in a way this is better, well between this and pine cones.

just had my first adventure below, so good!

So I havent properly tried puffshrooms are they like chucking a smoke bomb at the enemy so you can do a runner?

I spent 30 minutes last night trying to rescue that fucking horn player out of the hole and gave up. I think I was doing it right, it just didnt want to work! I feel like a bad engineer.

I eventually did it by sticking the balloon onto the wagon, standing above the crater at its edge, and ultrahanding the balloon + wagon + guy out.

Fun/useful tip if you haven't stumbled upon it already: if you see block fall from the sky near you, climb on top of it and use rewind on it and it'll take you back up

It works at least sometimes with ones you don't see fall too!

My most memorable moment so far - trying to get a Korok across a river to his pal, I place him on (not thinking to attach him to) a glider, attach a rocket, and blast us straight into a cliff face. The Korok falls into the river and gets swept downstream, I desperately pursue (I assume he'd have respawned, but I couldn't do that to the guy), eventually finding him miles away beached on a river bank. Slog my way back to his pal and cross the river more sensibly this time.

After the opening island I meandered for a while, went to the depths, then did the Rito trip since everything was pointing that way. I then decided to do a Hateno trip just for fun, and am somewhat regretting it as I repeatedly get my ass handed to me by tough monsters along the way.

My korok highlights have been strapping one directly to a rocket and dropping another down a long, rocky hill. A bit mean but got the job done

then might see if there's anything going on in the Lost Woods

:)

I threw a korok off a cliff.

I’m not proud.

They bounced.

My korok highlights have been strapping one directly to a rocket and dropping another down a long, rocky hill. A bit mean but got the job done

I also just destroyed a sentinel by grinding it between the big wheels of a makeshift truck

Who really is the monster here, hmmm

ventured off on my own a bit but am gonna double back and do the main quest mostly in order cause i ran into some enemies i’m not ready for yet. got obliterated by a stone talus, which reminded me i’m not playing botw anymore lol, and ran into some evil eyes monster that killed me pretty much instantly

one small thing that i like is that if you open a chest and get a weapon (for example) but your inventory is already full, it gives you the option to drop a weapon from your inventory and pick up the new weapon all in one move

def way better shouldve been in the first game

yes that's way better

shame they haven't added a customer sort for items tho

*custom

Yeah that’s bliss.

The horrible gloom eye hand monsters are horrific.

Man this game is like Godfather 2 and Empire Strikes Back. A sequel that not only lives up the the huge success and creative breakthrough of the original, but exceeds it on its own terms. Holy shit Nintendo. BotW was my favorite game of all time. This may become the new one

I am really confused by the Tumi gust power... thing. I click on him and he gusts me... sideways? How is that meant to help me get UP somewhere. I feel like I'm missing something. I ended up climbing to Hebra peak instead.

Tulin, I mean.

I don’t get it either

btw this game made me say “man, I love video games” out loud

This game is so huge, how the hell did they get it all on that little cartridge?

It’s nuts. The bookkeeping and memory management must be wild. Use the rewind on arbitrary objects and you’ll see they are persisting the trajectories forever (or what seems like it). Black magic stuff.

I am really confused by the Tumi gust power... thing. I click on him and he gusts me... sideways? How is that meant to help me get UP somewhere. I feel like I'm missing something. I ended up climbing to Hebra peak instead.

― Stoop Crone (Trayce), Wednesday, May 17, 2023 8:43 PM (ten minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

yeah its just sideways, helps you glide further/without descending as much, seems like they way youre intended to use it is once youre gliding hes just there asking if you want a lil gust

Thinking about something like RDR2 - maybe the maps are bigger (maybe?) but that game feels really sparse and empty compared to this game, and that came on two Blu Ray discs plus an additional approx 30 minutes of downloading!

tulin's power seems pretty useful for gliding around and trying to reach just barely out of reach places

i'm still holding out hope that the game will eventually give me a hookshroom or hookfruit that i can fuse to my weapon AND my shield so i can have not one but two hookshots

they took away the best durian farm and put a fucked up hand monster in its place, very rude

I'm now in the middle of the Tulin sky islands area and luckily thre's a shrine halfway up because omg I was noootttt prepared and need more pockets/weapons/arrows/meals.

Bow and arrow seems to be HEAPs more neccesary/useful in this than BOTW, on that note.

I don’t think durians exist anymore. And I’ve barely seen any radishes. Or truffles.

Truffles are def about! Ive found a few. I cant recall where now. In caves maybe?

The ones I’ve seen were in caves, aye. I definitely need more yellow hearts. One more shrine will take me to 7 red hearts and one and 3/5 stamina wheels.

Also sticky frog potions are a WINNER

i slayed the pirates and freed the village, bit of a hero nbd, black bokoblin horns are nice for fusing

I’m planning a fire spewing monster seeking tank for that.

oh good idea i need to get more into building stuff im kinda just playing it like the last game

Thinking about something like RDR2 - maybe the maps are bigger (maybe?) but that game feels really sparse and empty compared to this game, and that came on two Blu Ray discs plus an additional approx 30 minutes of downloading!

― nate woolls, Wednesday, May 17, 2023 9:14 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

RDR2 had detailed horse balls TOTK has some environment textures that wouldn't look out of place on the gamecube

i've tried to avoid a lot of videos of stuff like people building crazy contraptions but is there any way to actually steer the "cars" that you can build? i haven't done too much with it yet because it doesn't seem that practical in terms of getting around. it seems more like a fun creative minigame that is separate from the main game.

i guess instead of asking that i should play around with it

yeah there is a steering wheel attachment. haven't found any in the gacha machines yet but i've found a few laying around in the early game. there's one by the lake in the stable near lookout landing

i think things dont show up in the machines until you build with ones youve found, not 100% on that but it seems like it

i def got a couple of zonai devices from the machines that i hadn't yet encountered

I’m sure there are other examples of underground areas like this but it’s really hard not to think about the parallels with the underground areas in Elden Ring