Jeff's Gaming Blog

When I left off in The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, I was at Rito Village after completing the Wind Temple. After I finished speaking with everyone, I headed over to the Lucky Clover Gazette, where Penn and Traysi wanted me to work for the newspaper to uncover the latest news about Zelda. Penn, who reminds me a bit of Pete in Animal Crossing, is my new partner. 😛

After that, I wanted to return to Lookout Landing, but I didn’t want to teleport. I followed the path (more or less) south and then back east. Along the way, I found a horn-playing guy stuck in a hole! His name was Eustus, and I had to get him (and his wagon) out of a hole as a side quest. I mean, side adventure, as this one is called. (Edit: There are still side quests too, but more involved requests are called side adventures.)

Ultrahand alone couldn’t lift the wagon high enough. Fortunately, there were extra supplies in the hole too: Fans, hot air balloons, fire-breathing dragon heads…you know, the usual stuff you find in a hole. 😛

It was actually harder than it sounds. You need the wagon to soar up, but not too high or the landing would be hard. And you need it move forward too, not just straight up. I had several funny failed attempts, including one where it looked like I made it out…only to fall back in the hole at the last second. 😛

But I did eventually complete it, albeit with a bit of a rough landing. The guy lived to toot his horn another day. That was a really fun side adventure, though!

After I solved another side adventure (by finding some missing goats near Tabantha Bridge Stable), Penn dropped in. He said he saw how I helped, and he’s going to report it in the newspaper. He even gave me 50 rupees for solving the story of the missing goats. 😛

While exploring, I was slightly horrified when a tree started attacking me. I was not expecting that at all! But don’t worry, its bark is worse than its bite. 😉

Near New Serenne Stable, I ran into Lady Impa. It’s good to see she’s still alive, and she’s now investigating geoglyphs. I even got to take a hot air balloon ride to check one out! Pretty cool!

After stopping at another shrine or two, I eventually made my way back to Lookout Landing. Josha and Robbie were discussing “The Depths,” and Robbie asked me to join him for a mission underground. So I went south of town and jumped into a deep chasm.

It’s very dark in the Depths, and you need brightbloom seeds to light the way. But it’s a really cool place; it’s like a whole other world! Tears of the Kingdom really has three levels to its world: Sky islands, the surface, the Depths underground.

I activated a lightroot, which lights up part of the Depths. It functions like a tower on the surface, providing more coverage on the map, and also allowing you to teleport there.

Robbie found a statue underground, and he wanted me to take a photo of it for Josha. But to do that, he had to show me how to use the camera function on my Purah Pad. That also unlocked the Hyrule Compendium, so now I’ll be taking photos of everything (and everyone). 😛

Back in Lookout Landing, I found Hestu and I exchanged some Korok seeds for extra inventory slots. But believe it or not, I’ve been running out of bows more than weapons. I need to stock up on bows somewhere, if I can.

I went up to the Great Plateau and the Temple of Time, just for the memories of Breath of the Wild. But it’s not a place for beginners in this game. The enemies there were knocking me out, killing me in one hit. I’ll need to return here later, when I have more hearts and better armor.

I also encountered an enemy more horrifying than the guardians from Breath of the Wild. They had me running for my life up on the plateau! Yikes!🤚

Never Stop… Playing?

Before, I mentioned I was enjoying the game but I wasn’t quite “addicted” just yet…that has changed. I don’t want to stop playing now! There are so many things I want to do, and so many places to explore. I’ve played over 20 hours so far, and that number is going to continue to rise quickly. 😛 I hope you’re all enjoying the game as much as I am!

By the way, if you haven’t seen my first Tears of the Kingdom video, Early Game Fails, here it is:

I’ve also made a video combining TotK voice clips with Animal Crossing gameplay, which you can see here.

See you next time!

Want to buy Tears of the Kingdom at Amazon?

Now on the surface, I met up with Purah at Lookout Landing, and she gave me a completely unnecessary recap of what I already knew. 😛 She wanted me to go to Hyrule Castle to look for Zelda, but I wanted to explore a bit first! So I started looking around for shrines.

The first shrine on the surface required me to rotate some oddly-shaped items, and it didn’t take me long to clear it.

However, the next one gave me a lot of trouble. I had to build a contraption using various parts, but nothing was working. Eventually, I did complete it, but only after realizing I could merge one object to something else even though it didn’t let me “attach” it. Kinda sneaky. 😛

Back outside, I saw some large stones falling from the sky. So I climbed onto one of them and used the Recall ability to send it back up into the sky. It took me to a sky island with a treasure chest. But after grabbing the treasure, I realized that I couldn’t get down!

It was obviously too far to jump and survive, there was no body of water to dive into, I didn’t have the sailcloth yet, the stone I came up on was long gone, and none of my abilities were of any help! I was trying everything I could think of, including using a wing without a runway. Nothing worked.

After seven deaths, I remembered that I could teleport out of there. 😛 But at this point, I decided that I should get back to my quest…at least until I got a sailcloth. I didn’t want this to happen again. 😛

When I encountered a bunch of materials outside, including four wheels and a fan, I knew I just had to make my first car!

I “drove” it around for a bit, until it started rolling back downhill. I used the Ultrahand ability to pick it up…and I accidentally destroyed it a few seconds later. 😛

After that, I found another shrine. It was a combat shrine (not my favorite type), and it had tutorials on combat moves…most of which I already knew from Breath of the Wild. But it provided a good refresher course.

I then moved on to Hyrule Castle. It’s nice being able to walk through there without Guardians everywhere! (So far I have not seen any Guardians in the game.)

When I climbed to a certain point where some other characters were gathered, we all saw Zelda from a distance. But then she left in a surprising way that confused us all. It didn’t make sense!

I returned to Lookout Landing (which seems to be the base of operations for Hyrule). I told Purah what happened, and she gave me some suggested places to look for Zelda now. But first, Purah and Josha activated the towers…and gave me a paraglider! Yesss!!

Josha showed me how to use the towers, but it is a bit uncomfortable because these mechanical tentacle-like things (think of Guardians’ legs) reached out and…grabbed me.

It was kind of awkward. And then I got launched into the air to scan the ground to update my map of the area. So towers are a bit different from Breath of the Wild, even though they still result in you receiving a map of the area.

I cleared another shrine and activated another tower on my way to Rito Village, where a blizzard has buried the bird village in snow.

One interesting thing about this game is that the kids from Breath of the Wild are now older. So the sisters that recited the song in BotW now run some of the shops in TotK.

And Tulin, the boy who always used to go to the flight range for target practice, is now a young Rito warrior. (Even if he does sound like Slippy Toad now.) 😆 So apparently this game doesn’t take place immediately after Breath of the Wild, but it’s clearly several years later.

Speaking of Tulin, he went to go investigate the cause of the blizzard. It was suggested that I should join him to help out, so I headed up to Hebra Mountain.

At one point, I made the mistake of sleeping at an enemy camp after defeating the monsters. There was a blood moon as I slept, so the enemies were back and promptly knocked me halfway down the mountain (and draining almost all of my health). Mental note: Don’t do that again.

I eventually met up with Tulin, and I helped him recover his stolen bow. We realized we had to head up to the giant storm in the sky to see what was causing the blizzard. (Is it not the storm itself causing it? 😉) So I started climbing a series of floating islands that went wayyyy up into the sky. Tulin also helped out with his wind gust ability, which is useful for sailing across long gaps.

At the top, I found the Wind Temple…which is a giant ship.

My job (with Tulin’s help) is to unlock five locks to proceed. It reminded me of the terminals in BotW. For all that I’ve heard about Tears of the Kingdom’s “traditional” dungeons, this still seems more like a divine beast to me.

Some of the locks took me a while to figure out (or find), and I even had to return to Rito Village at one point (because I ran out of food that protected me from the cold). I sold some stuff to buy some winter clothes in the village before returning, and then I was able to clear all of the locks.

Opening the locks unleashed a giant boss. I won’t show a picture of it here (I don’t want to spoil everything for those of you who haven’t played yet), but it was a fun boss to battle. Once it was over, I earned a heart container, Tulin got a tear of the kingdom, and I learned a new ability.

The blizzard ended, and the snow melted from Rito Village. At this point, I stopped for now. But I’ll resume my game again soon. I hope you’re enjoying the game, and these entries. See you next time!

By the way, my first TotK video is coming soon!

Buy Tears of the Kingdom at Amazon

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom came out this month, and I’ve recently started my adventure. Much like I did with Breath of the Wild, I plan on posting updates on my progress. As you may know, I tend to take my time with Zelda games; I don’t rush through. Also, I’ve avoided spoilers as much as possible, including many of Nintendo’s own tweets about the game. So a lot of things that you may know, will be surprises to me. So follow along and you’ll see these things through my eyes. 👀

Story-wise, the game starts out after the end of Breath of the Wild. Link and Zelda are investigating under the castle. Even though I just defeated Ganon in BOTW and saved the world, Zelda panicked after I encountered three measly little bats. Give me at least a little credit, princess. 😛

But there was real danger lurking, and Link did get hurt a bit later on (after they made an interesting discovery). Link was injured, but fortunately, a mysterious stranger was around to lend a hand.

I ended up on a tutorial-like floating island (the Great Sky Island), where I eventually met Rauru, who is apparently a goat now. Well, a goat ghost, it seems. And I was surprised at his title… 😛

He told me about the shrines on the island, and I started seeking them out. Each one taught me a new ability.

Ultrahand

This is not to be confused with Nintendo’s Ultra Hand toy (which was also featured in its own Wii game). The Ultrahand ability lets me grab and move items, much like Magnesis in Breath of the Wild…but without needing the objects to be metallic.

But more importantly, Ultrahand lets you attach items together to make things. Combine logs to make a raft or a bridge, or use other items you find to make tools. By combining a hook with this plank of wood, you can slide on these railings to another sky island.

I also used the ability to help out my first Korok. His backpack looks like it weights about 50 times his own body weight. Not sure how he gets anywhere. (Or maybe he doesn’t; that’s why he needed my help.)

Fuse

The Fuse ability lets you attach objects to your weapons or shield to make them stronger. It may look silly to walk around with a boulder fused to your sword, but it is effective.

I’m just worried it may end up being tedious having to look for things to attach to your weapons throughout the whole game. This may be my least favorite of the new abilities so far.

Ascend

The third shrine took me a while to find, and I think I may have gone around the island in the wrong direction. 😛 Because when I finally made my across this wide river, I found a robot guy who was telling me I could use his rafts to get to the other side…the side I had just come from. Oops. So I backtracked and found what I missed.

In the third shrine, I learned the Ascend ability. It lets you pass through solid objects directly above you, and come out on top of them. It almost looks like you’re swimming through solid rock. 😛 But it certainly comes in handy, and it’ll really help out when exploring the world!

Recall

With three shrines complete, I headed to the Temple of Time to meet up with Zelda. She shook my hand and taught me the Recall ability, which can reverse an object’s movement through time! So if a log falls from a mountain, you can reverse its movement so it goes back up! Of course, it’ll eventually fall again, but you can use this ability in some helpful ways.

I didn’t have the strength to open a large door at the temple, but Rauru told me there is a 4th shrine on this island that I needed to complete. He marked it on my map, and I headed there and quickly completed it, using my new ability.

I then returned to the Temple of Time, where I saw a brief cut scene before diving down to the mainland…Hyrule Kingdom. I explored a bit, but I’ve barely scratched the surface. (Literally, since I’ve only just landed on the surface.) 😛

First Impressions

I’m still very early into the game (about five hours), so my journey is just beginning. With the abilities being different from those in Breath of the Wild, it’s going to be fun exploring the world in completely different ways.

The Ultrahand ability is probably the most significant change so far, because creating tool (or even vehicles?) with it is going to be a lot of fun. It’s going to let us be creative in the things we make, how we use them, and how we overcome various obstacles.

I’m already enjoying the game a lot, and I’m sure my interest level will grow more. I always seem to have a “warming up” period with any new game, before I reach a point that I don’t want to stop playing. So I’m not totally addicted just yet, but that may be coming soon. I’m looking forward to exploring, making some fun machines with Ultrahand, (hopefully) getting a sailcloth, and finding some proper dungeons.

I’ll probably be playing Tears of the Kingdom for many months to come, if not years. I hope you’ll return for future updates, and future videos as well. See you next time!

Buy Tears of the Kingdom at Amazon