Board 8 > The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is out so let's talk about it maybe.

(+) Yeah! (+)

Yep, Major Test was cakewalk the second time, using the weapons he gave me the first time and better prep.

5x banana dish
Guardian Ax++
Stasis+

Easy way to keep the inventory stocked with great weapons.
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27 Shrines
27 Koroks
1 Dungeon
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91 Shrines (was 88 before Friday if you want to get technical)
85ish Korok Seeds (argh why is inventory expansion tied to this) (was like 74 likewise)
2 Dungeons (Gerudo and Rito) (was just 1 before)

Finished collecting the memories from the pictures too. There was an NPC that basically gives you 8 of them but then he vanished so I did the rest myself. Was both fun and frustrating. Fun working out the general locations, occasionally frustrating trying to to get the exact location the game wanted.

And yeah, there are multiples of each difficulty level combat trials. Actually ran into two minors last time, both in the same general location: Kind of close to Hyrule Castle Town, which made me laugh because they're jokes compared to the Guardians roaming the overworld near the shrines.
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Looks like I'm the only one going hard into finding all the koroks seeds
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If I summoned Epona on the Great Plateau, is there any way to get her down below after I jump down?
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As far as I know, no.

She's not a one time thing though, I summoned her when I wasn't near a stable and lost her, then got her again from the amiibo a few days later.

You can just save scum to resummon her. It's just not guaranteed after the first time.
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Anyone do the Trial of Thunder in the Hyrule Ridge? The one with some hill in the center and you have to bring coloured balls in but you can't just carry them normally since there's no point walkable entrance to it...

I'm not sure how you're supposed to do it but I just held up the balls close to the ledge, quickly Stasis'd them in the air, and bombed them up over the ledges. I feel like that wasn't how you're supposed to do it at all but it was fun.
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GuessMyUserName posted...

Anyone do the Trial of Thunder in the Hyrule Ridge? The one with some hill in the center and you have to bring coloured balls in but you can't just carry them normally since there's no point walkable entrance to it...

I'm not sure how you're supposed to do it but I just held up the balls close to the ledge, quickly Stasis'd them in the air, and bombed them up over the ledges. I feel like that wasn't how you're supposed to do it at all but it was fun.

I found a piece of land that allowed me to stasis them on an even surface, then shoot over. It was a neat challenge.
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ninkendo posted...

Looks like I'm the only one going hard into finding all the koroks seeds

I'm not really into them. Not enough variation in the puzzles, and I feel my inventory is wide enough at this point.
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I like Korok seeds as a passive find, not exactly to hunt them out intentionally. Doing something or going somewhere and just finding a Korok by chance is a great feeling which is only really possible by having an ungodly amount of them. I'm at a point where I'm pretty satisfied with my inventory now too but hey I'll always be happy to stumble upon another increase.
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I just realized how much easier fishing is with bombs.
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right now I'm using bombs to catch frogs

also love dropping bombs while gliding
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So I have not played much at all, I just got off the grand plateu and have only done one shrine so far. but I was just looking around and uh, am I crazy or is there a giant fortress in the sky that just kind of flies around?
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I need an active post.

Weapon breaking and inventory space is kinda annoying, but I've been having fun exploring so far.
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This is great https://gfycat.com/BestFrequentHyracotherium

From https://youtu.be/9EvbqxBUG_c
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SgtSphynx posted...

This is great https://gfycat.com/BestFrequentHyracotherium

From https://youtu.be/9EvbqxBUG_c

holy s*** that's incredible omg
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I spent 3000 rupees to buy a house

goodbye rupees
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good ol' dunkey
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Hudson......
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dis guy

dis guy is the most killedest guy
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I only today found out you can change your horse's mane

aww yeah my black horse ganondorf can now how shining or red/orange hair to match
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Oh, also, apparently if an octorock swallows a rusty sword, it spits out a new sword. I'm going to assume this works with all rusty weapons

https://twitter.com/TristanACooper/status/840262818251317249
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I'm not sure how much time I've put in the past week (30 hours?), but I've barely scratched the surface and it seems like people are discovering new secrets every day. The work that went into this game is just something to behold.
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I've played 27 hours and 26 minutes, which is time I should have been using to do my coursework for my classes.
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My son started the other night. He's currently in the bomb shrine and likes wearing the Switch shirt. Also he made a pretty good show of fighting one of the stationary Guardians outside - blinded it with fire arrows he got from an amiibo and got in close enough that it was having a hard time targeting him.
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Can we actually see our playtime?
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Hey I got Ganondorf's sword from the amiibo! Now to hang it in my house and never use it.
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CaptainOfCrush posted...

Can we actually see our playtime?

Don't know about on Switch, but on the WiiU there is the daily log that if you change it to the month, it gives you total playtime. Obviously it's gonna be a little off, but whatever.
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CaptainOfCrush posted...

Can we actually see our playtime?

two ways for switch

if you planned ahead of time and downloaded the parental controls app to your phone it'll tell you your total playtime of that game since that app was installed

the other is after owning the switch for awhile it eventually tells you how many hours you play the game in your profile instead of "started game x amount of days ago"
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Got the Biggoron's Sword today!

https://d3esbfg30x759i.cloudfront.net/ss/WVW69kJK8pIhzYlHXt

All I need now is 8-bit Link's sword (don't have a Toon Zelda Amiibo through)
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Can this game be played without the GamePad?

Just remembered my pad is busted
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pjbasis posted...

Can this game be played without the GamePad?

Just remembered my pad is busted

Yeah it works with Classic Controller + Wii U Pro Controller (And I think Wii + Nunchuck though I haven't tried that)
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I've been playing on a third party Wii U pro controller with only one problem - some Shrines require the gamepad (only two of the ~32 I've seen so far, so I'm guessing fewer than 10% overall). I disagree with Nintendo's decision to have them in the game at all, but whatever.
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I don't think I'm even halfway through the game but I gotta say I've never had this much fun playing a game, ever. As it stands this will probably go down as my favorite game of all time, barring a major epic letdown in the 2nd half of my playthrough. All the negatives that people have with this game (stamina, weapon breaks, etc.) I'm totally OK with and understand that it's all part of this system that Nintendo has put in place to make this world work with it's set rules. BotW is a masterpiece.
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The game is absolutely spellbinding right now. This, Xenoblade Chronicles, and the Mass Effect series are the only games that have given me that sense of wonderment in... at least the past decade. I particularly love when my gf is watching me play and reacts with the same excitement that I do.

A couple nights ago, I was dicking around in teh Faron region when all of a sudden, we saw the long, winding body of an enormous green dragon flying majestically under a bridge, and we both flipped out s***. There's just magic in this game.

That said, I have been wondering how it will be regarded over the years. I haven't seen the dungeons or experienced much of the story yet, but from what I'm hearing, they are "sparse." It leads me to think that this might be a game where the first playthrough is breathtaking, but there may not be as big an incentive for replays. Of course, I'll have to see the whole game myself before I can really form that opinion.
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SwiftyDC posted...

I don't think I'm even halfway through the game but I gotta say I've never had this much fun playing a game, ever. As it stands this will probably go down as my favorite game of all time, barring a major epic letdown in the 2nd half of my playthrough. All the negatives that people have with this game (stamina, weapon breaks, etc.) I'm totally OK with and understand that it's all part of this system that Nintendo has put in place to make this world work with it's set rules. BotW is a masterpiece.

I'm definitely not this sploogy about it but I'm getting to like this game quite a bit. Will probably end up being my second favorite Zelda behind Majora's Mask. (This game could stand to take some notes from MM on how to do sidequests IMO. If any of the towns had 1/100th the life of Clock Town this would probably be the best Zelda, but towns and sidequests are both kind of "whatever" in a world otherwise so well designed.)
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Finished the Zora Dungeon and man some of the things I got from the Rito and Zora storylines makes me kinda wish I did them earlier. Lots of utility value for exploring there. Would have been nice to have had that back when I was doing serious shrine hunting. Oh well!
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Finished fully exploring the zoras domain region

Might end up going south from here and exploring the map along the coast since there's no dungeons there anyway

Alternatively head north from Hyrule Castle which is where I'm assuming the Lost Woods are as well as the master sword
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Finished my second dungeon, the Rito one (Vah Medoh). I can see what people mean when they say this may be the weakest one. The lead-up felt shorter than the Zora section, and I feel like the Rito characters introduced have a lot less time than Sidon and Mipha. The dungeon itself was still fun though.
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Yeah, Rito dungeon is easily the shortest and not much leading into it. Really great rewards for it, though, so totally worth doing early.
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Hit 50 shrines tonight. About to tackle my 2nd divine beast.
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Is there a recommended order for the dungeons?
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I would say Rito first simply due to the reward, after that I don't know since I've only done that one and the Zora dungeon
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Is there any money making 'trick' in this game that people have found? I still always seem to have no rupees and the gear in shops is super expensive.
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In Hateno village there is a gambling game you can do, and you can savescum it so you can win 200 rupees every time but it can take some patience to do so. Also, whenever you find a bunch of mineable rocks mark it on your map because they will respawn so you can go back to them over and over.
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Actually it's Lurelin village that has the gambling in it, not hateno
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The icey mountain area in the northwest has a lot of great animals for raw prime meat and gourmet meat. The wolves, foxes, deer, and buffalo all drop them, sometimes up to 3 at a time.

Cooking 5 raw prime meat makes a meat skewer that sells for 210 rupees, and cooking 5 gourmet meat makes a meat skewer that sells for 490 rupees. Really easy to just run through with a horse, hop off and fire an arrow, pick up the meat, and make some big money while exploring a bit.
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Well, against my better judgment I decided to activate the Center Tower much earlier than I really should.

Yeesh. What a ride. Had to kill a mobile Guardian. I was wayyyyy unprepared for it. I essentially ate a meal after every single hit. Not sure if worth it, but at least I can return there easily now.
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To get to that one I had to find a really high hill and glide all the way to the tower

Anyway, finally cleared my first dungeon (Zora)
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okay done with korokville and all the sidequests and shrine quest located within.

that'll be a good stopping point before work today

47 shrines and 151 korok seeds
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