Breath of the Wild, Part 14: Leaving the Leaves Behind

I'm near the end of my time in Faron, at least for now. I had two things left to do: get to the dragon's jaws and find the Spring of Courage. Turns out, those are the same thing.

When I got to the dragon's jaws, what I found were Lizalfos. So many Lizalfos. Probably ten Lizalfos. They were on the ground, on ledges, on pillars. And they all had shock arrows. I managed to take them all out, but man, what trouble that was. It felt like playing one of the Arkham games, the way I had to sneak around and take out the bad guys one by one.

I got some sweet bows out of it, and several bunches of shock arrows out of it. But I wasn't done yet. There were two more Lizalfos guarding the dragon's mouth, and even past that, there was a pretty ferocious Moblin. In a normal game, this dragon head would be the entrance to a dungeon, and that's what I was expecting, but instead, all I got was the Hylia statue I mentioned recently. But it wasn't the same kind of Hylia statue I was expecting (one where I can trade in Spirit Orbs). This Hylia statue congratulated me for making it through the Spring of Courage - that's right, I was in the Spring of Courage the whole time and didn't realize it - and then it asked me for Farosh's Scale.

Farosh's Scale? What's that?

Whatever it was, I didn't have it, which means I couldn't enter the door behind the statue. My brother informed me Farosh is a dragon that's the spirit of Faron, so I spent an awful long time trying to find him. But I guess I haven't triggered whatever makes him appear yet because he definitely did not. So that was disappointing.

On the plus side, while I was hanging out on the Bridge of Hylia for him, I found a Korok puzzle I had missed. So it wasn't a total loss! It involved lighting a torch on the crenel of the bridge.

But not finding Farosh was the last straw for Faron, so I peaced out and headed to the nearest tower: the Dueling Peaks Tower.

Let's talk about Dueling Peaks for a second. The premise is cool. It's a mountain that's been cracked in half by something, so it's now essentially two mountains. But more than that, I'm almost positive it's a reference to the show Twin Peaks. It sounds crazy, but it wouldn't be the first time. The music playing at the tower also reminded me of music from the show, but I'm not sure if I just think that because my brain was already primed. I'll have to listen to it again. [Editor's Note: I did listen to it again and I'm not crazy, but it's the music for all towers, not just this one.]

Anyway, I now have the map for West Necluda, which is exciting, but instead of taking my time to explore it like I did with Faron, I'm going to beeline to Kakariko Village. I'm in desperate need of interpersonal interaction.

But wait: there was one final thing I did in Faron: I solved the Korok waterfall puzzle! Well, my brother solved it. But he only knew about it because I told him. Check it out:

Breath of the Wild, Part 13: Shock Treatment

Honestly, I can never tell how much I’ve done anymore. I write these recaps based on lists I make of notable things as I play, but it seems like no matter how little or how much is on the list, the recap ends up about the same length (I could be wrong about that, but it feels that way) [Editor's Note: I'm definitely wrong about that; Part 10 is twice the length of this one, and Part 1 is 4x the length]. But today it really feels like I didn’t do a whole lot.

What I did do was explore the rest of the woods. Well, actually, that’s wrong in two ways. For one thing, I didn’t finish exploring the woods, so I’ll still be doing that tomorrow. The other way it’s wrong is that I started by completing my survey of the area around the village ruins. I didn’t find anything of note except a whole that looks an awful lot like a Korok puzzle, but I didn’t find any boulder around to drop into it.

After that, I realized I had enough stamina to climb a tall pillar I discovered a while ago, so I did that and completed a Korok puzzle. 

Then I went into the woods. They’re beautiful as I mentioned before, with lots of ruins and different levels and lots of rain. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much to do here.

I did spot a weird spirit creature, but wasn’t able to get to it. I’m pretty sure I’ve seen it before somewhere, but I can’t remember if I wrote about it. Anyway, I want to know its story.

I also ran into some Electric Wizzrobes and got an Electric Rod from them, which definitely came in handy. One thing I don’t think I mentioned about the Wizzrobes before: they can make Keese appear of the same kind they are. So Fire Wizzrobes make Fire Keese, etc. It’s quite annoying, especially the Electric Keese I had to deal with.

Other than that, it was mostly just fighting a bunch of bokoblins and Lizalfos. One group of Lizalfos were in a lake, so I was able to shock them with the Rod, which also netted me some Hylian Bass. A group of bokoblins were standing among some metal boxes, so I Rodded the heck out of them. They didn’t stand a chance (except they did, because I died a lot).

I saw a Bokoblin fall to its death. I don’t know how it happened, only that I wasn’t involved. It just walked off a platform and died when it hit the ground. Not great AI, but good programming that it died instead of still walking around.

I also met yellow Chu Chus, which are electric but not all the time. Unlike other Chu Chus, they explode when you kill them, which will almost certainly make your fear go flying.

A lot of the rain came with lightning, which was scary and dangerous. I also ran into some Electric Lizalfos, which were in a gang of three, so they were tougher than the one I met a day or two ago. I did manage to take them, though, and got my new strongest sword for my trouble: the Royal Claymore, which is at a 52. (My current strongest sword is a 38.)

As my exploration continued, I found myself getting closer to where I needed to be than I would’ve liked. I did find another Hylia statue; I haven’t used it yet, but it’ll come in handy since it’s right next to a shrine. Currently I have to teleport to the Plateau Tower and then go to the Temple of Time, which is quite a distance.

But the last thing I did for the night is another matchy matchy Korok puzzle. There’s a giant dragon statue, and all that’s left of it is the head and two hands. The puzzle involves taking a metal box from one hand and transporting it to the other hand to complete the pattern. It’s a bit of a trek, but I dig it. I ended the night with 71 Korok Seeds. 71! Along with the ones I’ve found but haven’t completed, that’s about 75 across the two smallest regions, out of 15 total. I don’t know how many there are in this game, but it could easily be upwards of 1000. That’s nuts.

I gotta be honest with you guys: I’m ready for a new region. A few days ago I considered heading east and making Kakariko wait a little bit longer, but at this point, I’m craving some story. Until then, I’m not out of the woods yet.

Breath of the Wild, Part 12: Blue Oxen and Metal Boxin’

I started today with the Riding Challenge, and frankly, it was bullshit. You ride around a lake and have to jump over ten gates. You’re asked to do it in a minute 30, with the goal of doing it in a minute 15. But the jumping is very finicky and honestly I think the game might cheat, because the first time I did it, I was doing perfectly and then all of a sudden when I got to the second to last gate, Brunblitz wouldn’t jump. I still would’ve finished within 1:30, but then I couldn’t find where I was supposed to finish and that added another minute to my time. I gave it a couple more tries, but Brunblitz continued refusing to jump and even bucked me off a few times for no reason (we have 100% friendship so that shouldn’t happen, and indeed, it never has). I got fed up so I gave up.

I started to explore Damel Forest, but I got distracted by the area to the north of the woods, so I decided to explore that part first and make my way back to the woods. In the one area I did explore, however, I found a blue bull. I need to learn more about that. I also ran across an electric Lizalfos, which was not nearly as scary as that might sound, and the dragon statue bodies that match the dragon statue heads I met earlier.

I ran into SEVERAL interesting Korok puzzles today. The first one was in Lake Hylia. I saw some islands I hadn’t explored and sailed on over to them. There wasn’t much there, but as I was swimming from one to another, I found myself suddenly standing on a giant metal block. When I activated my Magnesis, I learned that one of the islands was completely surrounded by these metal blocks...but one was missing, so I had to pull it into position.

I found another one near a waterfall that feeds into Lake Hylia, but it’s one I can’t figure out. It’s one of the ones where you have to move the small metal box to repeat a pattern...only there’s no pattern to repeat. And where you find the box is pretty much the only place it can go. I marked my map and will come back to this later.

Around this point, my sensor started pinging a nearby shrine, and against my better judgment, I left Faron into uncharted territory to find it. The shrine’s challenge was called “The Wind Guides You”, and it was easy to figure out but difficult to execute. Actually, the only difficult part was getting the second chest. The rest of it was just riding fan-generated wind across gaps. It’s literally straightforward. But for the second chest, you had to glide the old fashioned way, and the platform was too high to land on safely. I was eventually able to scramble my way up there, but it was mostly by accident and I used up three fairies trying.

I made my way back to Faron posthaste and came upon the Deya Village Ruins, a flooded village with falling apart houses and wagons. Lots of treasures here, along with intrigue. Also a Stone Talus with a very inconveniently placed weak spot appeared, but I was able to make short work of it with my spiked moblin club.

At the other end of the village ruins was a giant felled tree that had been hollowed out. The stump (also hollow) was at the top of the hill and the trunk lay on the side of the hill. There also happened to be a boulder at the bottom of the log, and I’m 99% sure I’m supposed to make the boulder launch up the log and into the trunk to find another Korok. But my moblin club broke while I tried, so it didn’t go far enough. 

Another interesting Korok puzzle I found was at the top of a mountain. There were a bunch of clusters of flowers of a kind I’d never seen before, and as I walked through them to see if they were grabbable, one of them turned from yellow to pink. Then I realized what was going on. So I turned the group of two to pink, then three, four, and finally five, which is when the Korok appeared. Simple but easily missed.

Finally, I have one more Korok puzzle to tell you about. Near the mountain, above the village ruins, was a ledge. On the ledge, there was s bokoblin camp that was a real bear to defeat. It’s here I learned that land Octoroks can change their position by burrowing underground. That threw me for a loop. It took me several tries to defeat all of them, but once I did, I got to take a closer look at the area and found another one of this small metal box puzzles. But this one had the repeating pattern but no metal — oh.

Oh.

Do they really mean for me to lug that box all the way from the waterfall to this ledge? That’s diabolical! That’s so clever in a cruel way. But it seems like that’s what I was supposed to. So that’s what I did. It took a couple tries, but I finally did it.

And THAT is when I learned the metal box for this puzzle was up in a tree the whole time. So what the heck am I supposed to do with the waterfall box?!

Tomorrow: Damel Forest, for real this time.

Breath of the Wild, Part 11: Now We're Cooking

Today began with a shrine that I discovered in the middle of Lake Hylia. Although I still don’t have a Korok leaf, and therefore no raft access, the Lake Tower is tall enough that I could glide all the way there. This Shrine Challenge was called “Shatter the Heavens”, and inside was a giant stone block on a track, beneath which was a chute to drop a bomb into. Ok, I have to ride the block like an elevator, that’s easy enough...

...nope, I should’ve paid more attention to the challenge title. I hit a ceiling and died instantly. What I didn’t notice was that the ceiling is made of bombable blocks. I tried a few different things, but soon realized a bomb arrow would do the trick. I did not have any bomb arrows.

Instead, I decided to explore the island this shrine is on and the islands that surround it. Not much to report, I’m afraid, although I did discover a new kind of Octorok (they have a fake treasure chest on their head, which is the pits) and I met a Zora named Mei. Mei’s a fishmonger who’s collecting fish to sell at Zora’s Domain.

Let’s pause for a second. This is a Zora. Yesterday I met a Rito. Wind Waker says the Zora became the Rito after the Great Sea formed. There are no Zora in Wind Waker or any of its sequels, so what gives? The plot thickens on where this game falls in the timeline.

Anyway, I set out to get some bomb arrows and got distracted by finally trying my hand at cooking food. I didn’t do anything fancy, just cooked individual ingredients to see what they become. Turns out there are different categories of dishes that various items fall into. All mushrooms become mushroom skewers, all plants become mixed vegetables, etc. But different items can become different versions of a dish (a sneaky mushroom skewer vs a durable mushroom skewer, for instance), and even items that become the same dish might have different stars (a mushroom skewer worth 3 hearts vs a mushroom skewer worth 5 hearts). If you try to cook something that can’t be cooked, you get “dubious food”, which still provides a heart but may have side effects, I can’t really tell.

I figured the guy at the archery camp would have bomb arrows and I was right. I figured while I was there that I should try the archery game again. Mistake. I won’t even talk about it.

The shrine was easy and I got my fourth Spirit Orb, so I prayed to Hylia for more stamina. With this, plus some bonus stamina I got from a cooked endura carrot, I was able to mount and tame the Giant Horse, which I named Nightfury. 

Nightfury has max strength, 5 stars. I hear there are two other Giant Horses, so I imagine they’ll have max speed and max stamina, respectively. Brunblitz will still be my main steed for now, but I’m glad to have Nightfury, especially since it means I completed my first sidequest!

As I headed to the stable to register Nightfury, I ran into a guy named Chumin, who’s a salesman. He was on his way to Lurelin Village. I have no idea where that is, but I can’t wait to go there!

I wanted to close the night by doing the stable’s riding challenge, but the Switch died right as I was about to. Tomorrow then!

Breath of the Wild, Part 10: Red, Red Whine

I accomplished almost nothing today. Let me explain.

It started off fine. I was exploring the shore of Lake Hylia, discovered a raft, and even though I lost my Korok leaf a while, I learned that if you have a good enough tool, you can Magnesis it against the mast to push the raft forward. That's neat, but too much work to do the amount of exploring I wanted to do. So instead of traversing the lake, I went to finish exploring the area around the Lake Tower.

Much of this area I saw when originally trying to get to the Tower, so I've already discussed it. But in case you don't remember, it's basically a mountain with a lot of winding paths that all eventually lead to the Tower. All the paths are guarded by Bokoblins and Lizalfos in various numbers, and they're the only thing going on in this area, so "exploring" is basically just going around and killing all of them.

Along the way, I did manage to get several chests and a new kind of weapon, the Spiked Moblin Club, which is currently my post powerful at 45, or around there. I also learned that you can bomb trees without burning them, which lets you get all the items from them unscathed. And I saw a Bokoblin kick my bomb away before I could detonate it! The AI continues to impress.

Fighting all these monsters was tough, and I died just SO many times, you guys. Especially when I got to a part of the mountain I hadn't been to before. There was a clearing with two structures. Really, the remains of two structures that had been burned down by these weird-ass bearded guys in long white robes running around on the air. Once they started teleporting, I realized these scary-looking creepoids are this game's version of Wizzrobes.

Wizzrobes are generally bad news in any game, but these were shooting fire, and more importantly, if you get too close to them, they start raining fire down on you, to the point that it raises the local temperature and you can die from heat exhaustion even without being hit by a fireball. What I found works - with these particular Wizzrobes, at least - is to hit them with an arrow to knock them to the ground and then hit them with an ice arrow. That made them disappear in a puff of snow, and they left behind their wand, which turns out to be a Fire Rod.

The Fire Rod is a beast. And like a beast, it can't be tamed. It shoots balls of fire that bounce, igniting everything they touch. That means you too if you're not careful. Creating a flame-covered battlefield has its uses, but it can also be deadly. I thought it'd be a good way to take out all of the Bokoblins that were also hanging around this area, but it most certainly was not. I did, however, see a Bokoblin accidentally kill itself by picking up a flaming spear, accidentally light some grass on fire, and then get caught up in the blaze.

After all this sneaking and bombing and dying and arching and dying and sailing and flaming and dying, I finally - FINALLY - kill the last enemy on this Farore-saken rock. It was an Octorok. And do you know what happened after that?

A fucking Blood Moon.

Fuck you, Blood Moon. (That's assonance, and the Blood Moon is asinine.)

Everything I did was washed away, just like that. Sure, I still have the treasures and the weapons I found, but any more exploration I do in this area will have to involve killing these things again. So I was done for the night.

One last thing to mention is that I did discover there's a shrine in the middle of the lake. So I may do that tomorrow, or I may go back to the woods, or I may go see what's on the other side of those burned out structures. Perhaps all three!

Breath of the Wild, Part 9: Into the Woods

As I mentioned yesterday, the first thing I did today was get the chest I was about to get before my Switch so rudely decided to die. After that, I saw a ring of rocks nearby, and thanks to my brother mentioning it a few days ago, I knew it was a Korok puzzle. You throw a rock into the center. Pretty easy concept, but it was a little way into the water and there were no ledges nearby, so I had to bounce the rock off a Cryonis block I made.

Then I went exploring more, and decided to test how easy it is to catch a horse when you sneak up on them from above rather than behind. Turns out, pretty easy, because you can drop right onto them! This changes everything. Unfortunately, I can't find a horse with better stats than Brunblitz, even though I know they exist.

Shortly afterward, I managed to come across a fairy, but quickly used it up thanks to some stupid electric Keese. Unlike previous games, fairies are an item like any other, so you don't need to put them in a bottle or anything like that.

From here, I planned to go finish exploring the area around the Lake Tower, since I saw some of it getting there but quickly ditched it for the shrine a few days ago. But along the way, I was distracted by some concertina music. The concertina is not an instrument typically associated with forest settings, so I went exploring to learn whether this was just the ambient music for the Faron Woods or if someone in the area was playing a concertina.

I didn't get the answer to that question right away. I did, however, save a woman named Meeshy from a group of Bokoblins and she gave me a curry as thanks. I ran into Meeshy a couple more times over the course of the night, and she had interesting stuff to say. Like Totsuna, she wants to be an adventurer, but Meeshy is just starting out and gets frightened easily.

Turns out, the concertina was being played by a Rito named Kass. I feel the need to point out that Ritos in this game look a lot different than they did in Wind Waker. In that game, they look like humans with beaks. They don't even have wings, and can only fly if they have a scale from the dragon Valoo. In this game, they're straight up bird people. Wings, talons, the whole nine. I don't know what to make of that yet.

Anyway, he tells me the Forest Dragon lives close by (in Damel Forest) and that I should look for him. This unlocks a quest called The Serpent's Jaws, and I believe this is the dragon Totsuna was looking for. I'll have to tell her where to find it.

I keep on exploring the woods and notice a lot of ruins and statues of dragon heads. I can't tell if that's the whole statue or it's all that remains of a larger statue. Either way, I really like the woods. They have their fair share of monsters, but they're also really pretty and peaceful and have a lot of items to get.

It wasn't long until I ran into Meeshy again, and she told me a legend she heard about something called the Spring of Courage. No thanks, Meeshy. That sounds like some "Cave of Ordeals" shit and I'm not having it. 

I wasn't prepared for what I saw next, and I'm not sure you will be, either. Are you ready for this?

Stalhorses.

You heard me.

Stal.

Horses.

And you can ride them! At first I thought there was just a random herd of Stalhorses, so I mounted one and took it to see if I could register it (you can't; it disappears at dawn). But as a rode to the Highland Stable, I realized these horses were there to make it easier to face the Bokoblins who were also mounted on Stalhorses. I ignored them instead.

After the Stalhorse disappeared, I went back to explore more of the Woods. And, in the distance, I saw the life meters of two monsters being depleted. I'm all the way over here, so who's attacking those monsters? An NPC, that's who!

He's a good dude named Tye who killed a Bokoblin all by himself and then gave me a meal as thanks for killing the other one. He and his wife, Sorelia, are traveling across Hyrule to look for a flower called the Silent Princess. They hear that anyone who declares their love in front of that flower will stay together forever, or something like that. They have a tent nearby. It's really sweet. I don't know if you can tell, but I really dig the characters in this game. They don't have a ton of story to them (not yet anyway), but they have juuuust enough that they're compelling and you care for them. It's like Majora's Mask. All the characters in that game have personalities, so you really feel for them and WANT to save the world.

I got a game over shortly after this and when I went back to save Tye again, he didn't say all the dialogue he did the first time. He didn't give me a meal like he did the first time, either. It makes me wonder what other kind of dialogue I have or might miss out on.

I learned I could mount elk and deer, but haven't yet. They're too quick. You can't register them, but man, riding an elk through the forest would be majestic as hell.

Korok puzzles usually pass in these recaps undiscussed. For every one I mention, there's two or three I don't. When I do mention them, it's for one of two reasons: (1) they're a kind I haven't seen before, or (2) they're time consuming. This bitch right here is both, but it's also my favorite so far. You see, in a river that flows through the Woods, there are three rocks. Two of those rocks have boulders on top of them. One of those boulders has a chain attached to it, which told me to use my Magnesis, and when I did, I saw another boulder on the riverbed. Which is attached to the same chain. So you have to get all three boulders on all three rocks, but every time you move a boulder the chain's attached to, the other one moves to. After a lot of trial and error, and I mean A LOT, the solution I came to was to get a boulder on a rock, Stasis it in place, and then Magnesis the other boulder in place before the Stasis wears off. Tricky in description, even trickier in execution, but it was so, so satisfying when that Korok appeared.

And since I'm talking about Korok puzzles, I'll go ahead and mention that the last major thing I did today was get my 50th Korok Seed. Ten of those were just from today! I was a seed-getting fool. It makes a lot of sense they'd be more concentrated near wooded areas. I wonder if that'll continue to play out on other parts of the map.

Other things I noticed:

- People give you cooked items when you save them

- When you eat something, it animated Link bringing his hand to his mouth. When you eat things quickly, he uses both hands.

- Link is still right handed

I don't like this. Until Twilight Princess, Link was always left-handed. For that game, he was left-handed in the GameCube version but right-handed in the Wii version, to make it match the hand most players would be using their Wiimote in. This continued in Skyward Sword for the same reason. Meanwhile, in non-Wii games like A Link Between Worlds and TriForce Heroes, he was still left-handed. But suddenly in this game, he's right handed again! What gives? Breath of the Wild is available on Wii U and Switch, neither of which uses a Wiimote. Is this how it's going to be now? Right handed in home console games and left handed in portable games? I know it doesn't really matter in the long run, but it's the principle of the thing.

17 games can't be wrong.

Breath of the Wild, Part 8: Let Sleeping Giants Lie

If you recall in my last post, there was a Korok puzzle I couldn’t solve. I didn’t like that hanging over my head, so I made sure it was the first thing I completed today before I moved on to anything else. And this is a really good example of how it’s beneficial to be familiar with the terrain in this game, because it turns out that the trick is to walk down a low grade part of the cliff so that you’re closer to the ring of rocks before you drop the stone. This path can’t be seen from where you’re standing when you pick up the rock, so you pretty much have to know about it before you pick up the rock. 

With that out of the way, I did some more exploring and got a couple more Koroks, and then I crossed the wooden bridge over the River of the Horse God...and reached a dead end. But inside that dead end was a weirs bulb thing asking me for 1000 rupees. I did not have 1000 rupees, because all of my money is tied up in precious minerals. But once I got 1000 rupees, I came back and was introduced to Melanya, the Horse God.

Melanya is creepy, but in a fun way. But she’s very nice, and will resurrect your horse if it dies. So far that has not been a problem for me (Brunblitz did die once, but then so did I, so I got her back), but it’s nice to know in case it does become a problem.

I explored some more and found another Korok puzzle, and it made me feel so stupid. It was one of the ones where you have to set a stone down to complete the pattern, and it was this giant spiral. But I didn’t see a rock anywhere. So I went looking alllllllllll over the damn place and didn’t find the first rock. Turns out, there was a rock only a couple feet from the spiral. I’m just a dummy.

As I made my way back to the lowlands, I entered a wooded area (NOT the Woods; those’ll come later) and discovered a sleeping Hinox. I’m sure you remember the Stalnox; well, this is what it looks like when it’s alive.

Now, as it was sleeping, I wanted to see if I could take it out. So I climbed a nearby tree and shot a bunch of powerful arrows (bomb arrows and shock arrows) into its eye with my most powerful bow. It gave me a lot of treasures and weapons. And then I felt awful.

See, it’s one thing to kill monsters who are coming to attack you, or even ones that you know would attack you if they saw you. But this Hinox was sleeping! It wasn’t harming anybody. And since I’ve never come across one before, I don’t even know how they act unprovoked. I also hear there’s a way to get their treasures from them without hurting them, so from now on, no more killing Hinoxes unless I absolutely have to (Stalnoxes are fair game).

It was also in this area that I discovered Octoroks...on land??? Land Octoroks used to be the norm, but only came to 3D Zelda games recently. They weren’t like this, though. These are Deku Scrubs in all but name. Plant on head? Check. Popping up out of the ground? Check. Shooting rocks out of its mouth? Check. I don’t care what this game calls it, I know a Deku Scrub when I see one. 

But they’re another example of how this game twists things you think you know from previous Zelda games. Common wisdom would tell you that you defeat them by blocking the rock with your shield and ricocheting it back to hit the Octorok. And you absolutely can do that, at the risk of damaging your shield. Orrrrrr you can just wait until they’re in the ground, cut down their plant, and then attack them when they pop up confused. It’s up to you, I guess. 

Other than that, I didn’t do much. There were a lot of pillars in this area so I climbed them, but they didn’t result in much. I did get a couple more Koroks, however, and I found a chest in the middle of a lake. But my Switch died right as I was about to open it, so that’s where we’ll open tomorrow.

And let me tell you: A LOT goes down tomorrow.