@TriforceBun I noticed this as well. I was expecting a lot more little audio flourishes like that after I heard it the first time, but I haven't really noticed any...

Whenever you play your harp it automatically goes with the background music to sound good.

@anon_mastermind That is really awesome. It's almost like Wii Music except in a form I think is awesome haha.

@anon_mastermind
Really? I hate them. So unnecessary. I still think Mario 64 did it best.

Just beat the game.

It was at about 30 hours for me.

I really didn't explore that much in the overworld. I don't know why, it just wasn't gripping me like the overworld in TP or Wind Waker, and I finished Wind Waker in under 20 hours, yet for TP it was like 38 hours.

Skyward Sword was still fun though, I think I'll be making a review of it this week.

@carlosrox
*shudders*

Big post ahoy!

I finished it as well! Just about 53 hours (ugh I had no life this week...thankfully getting work this week). I was still missing two heart pieces but at this point I didn't really care to find which ones I was missing. We may have to make a user review thread for the game soon.

Regarding the ending:
I thought the buildup to the final fight was very satisfying. Throughout the game, Ghirahim talked about reviving his master, which made me start thinking that maybe Ganon was in the game after all. When you finally learn about Demise, after the 6th dungeon, it sets him up as the final boss, so thankfully the game never pulled a Final Fantasy. And thankfully, Demise looked pretty badass. I was a little disappointed that The Imprisoned and Tentalus wound up looking goofier than I expected them to, so it was very relieving to see that Demise was not some sort of giant muppet.

I liked Demise but was a little disappointed we never got to learn more about him. I suppose I'm happy to know that he's practically that world's version of the devil, haha. Apparently Ghirahim was just his sword the entire time? Pretty interesting (and negates a complaint earlier in the game I had about not knowing who he was). That sword was like, the anti-master sword. It had the Triforce on it, which almost made me feel like it was some sort of inverted, dark, devil Triforce haha. Ghirahim was almost like Link's version of Fi in a way. I liked the juxtaposition of Link and Demise. Opposite sides of the same coin. Christ vs. Anti-Christ.

Regarding the actual BATTLE? It took me a couple tries, but apparently the battle was much simpler than I realized. Basically you just had to block his sword attacks with your shield and whack him. The lightning bit was pretty cool, and I like how I kind of just stumbled upon it when attempting to do a skyward strike. It was a little anticlimactic, because I was hoping for Demise's "true form" to show. This game had some SPECTACULAR boss fights, so it was a little disappointing to see that the final fight didn't reach the highs that the previous fights did. After the boss of Ancient Cistern, Scaldera, Tentalus...man, I was kind of expecting Link and Demise to be battling with the fuckin' world ending around them. The final boss fight just felt like it ended as soon as it began.

The ending was about what I expected to happen. Peace returns again, and the people of Skyloft can now return to the surface. It was very sweet. Very cool to see Demise say that he would come back in a reincarnation.. I had assumed "granny" was Impa much earlier in the game, but it was nice to see that the game officially acknowledged that, instead of leaving message boards to bicker for the next several years. Was anyone actually shocked by that?

I am pretty confused at how this game handles time travel though. It's pretty inconsistent, but hey, what would a Zelda game be without some confusing time travel elements? Earlier on, the game establishes the idea that things in the past have already happened. Zelda goes back in time and goes to sleep in order to keep the seal on Demise. However, LINK also goes back in time to destroy Demise...but if that was the case, then him and Zelda never would've gone down to the surface to begin with, no? There wouldn't have been an "imprisoned" because Link eventually goes back in time to destroy Demise. It would've made more sense if Demise had been reborn in the present and Link vanquished him there.

The new Temple of Time is now built around the Master Sword and awaits for Ocarina of Time to happen, which is pretty cool. I suppose then, that either another Temple of Time is built near Hyrule Castle, or that Hyrule Castle is relocated some time after Ocarina of Time? It really doesn't matter, but it's always been a tad confusing to see The Temple of Time right outside Hyrule Castle in OoT, but is then miles away in the woods in TP (and later, in a Link to the Past).

Overall, the game was pretty amazing. The concepts buried within the game are some of the most creative that Nintendo has ever come up with. You arrive on the surface with a sense of wonder not typically found in a Zelda game, even though you're in a region that you've traversed many times before. The overworld was rich with obstacles to overcome, dungeons were devious at almost every turn (at least in my opinion), and the items were all used in clever ways. The art style was fantastic even on the Wii's dated hardware. The music was phenomenal throughout The end boss fight was a great buildup, with no plot points coming out of left field.

That being said, the game isn't perfect. The beginning IS pretty slow. I didn't mind it during this first playthrough because I was interested in the story, but I have to imagine that upon more playthroughs, it may start to bug me more.

I liked moments of the game where you weren't in a dungeon to collect a "doodad", but rather to simply follow Zelda. There was some serious mystery and intrigue going through the Mining Facility. I wish they could start putting that feeling into every dungeon. I was disappointed to see the game succumb to the typical Zelda trope of "finding 3 things before using the Master Sword." It all but assured to me that the plot wouldn't change at all for maybe another 10 hours of gameplay. Thankfully there was some sweet ass gameplay in there...minus the forgettable and underwhelming Fire Sanctuary (IMO). It was cool figuring out you could stab the water plants, but other than that, it was kind of a dumb level. Was another Fire Temple really necessary? Considering that there was another fire temple earlier in the game (which is called the Earth Temple for some reason), and that the entire region of Eldin basically WAS a fire dungeon?

When forming the three parts to the Song of the Hero...that's where the game started to sour a little bit on me. This section did not come close to breaking the game for me, but it did get to the point where I said to myself "Okay, I want to get through this part because I really don't enjoy doing this and I want to be done with it." I admire Nintendo's ability to think of new ways to explore these environments, but I feel like I had been there SO many times already. This is one of my only major gripes with the game. I wish that there was some more variety in the locations, and that Eldin and Faron yielded some more surprises. Lake Floria kind of felt like an afterthought, which is a shame because I loved the brief moments I spent there. I did like seeing Faron underwater from a visual standpoint, but overall it kind of felt like they were just trying to add something to the game using assets they already had, rather than give us new areas to explore. That could've been a perfect time in the game to stumble across some sort of Lost Woods, with some sort of puzzle to find the missing part of the song.

The Desert was amazing to explore, and I thought its approach to world design felt was LEAGUES beyond the other areas. Almost every time you went there, even at the end of the game, it felt like you were uncovering something new to see and do. It's also the only part of the game (minus the sky) where you can stretch your legs out a little bit and look at some large expanses of land. I think outside of Lanayru, Nintendo went a little overboard with the dungeons in the overworld, and that the other sections could've benefitted from having some larger areas to run around in. Seeing Lake Hylia in some form was such a tease, especially considering that there was practically nothing to do there.

I was almost expecting to see Kakariko Village teased in some way, or the Secret Village from Twilight Princess, but I don't want to fault the game for that, haha. Just a little fanboy hope of mine.

All in all, I think I may have to say that it's the best 3D Zelda, but time will tell. Moving around is more enjoyable. The items are less predictable and more versatile. The music is at a level of quality the series should've had for the last 10 years. The graphics look great despite looking a little rough around the edges. The story is the most engaging of any console Zelda (though that's up for argument I'm sure).

Regarding a "best Zelda ever" statement, I could ask the question that while each "part" of SS is phenomenal, as a whole, does the experience beat out the others? In terms of its pacing, progression, structure, etc? Is the "whole" equal to or greater than the sum of its parts? Or do its "parts" not necessarily add up to a better game than Ocarina of Time, Majora's Mask, or Twilight Princess? It's hard to answer that question in comparison to games that have been out for over 10 years.



If I had to give it a number out of 10, I'd probably give it around a 9.6. I had enough problems with the game where I couldn't give it a perfect score, but Nintendo has accomplished a hell of a lot with this game. I just hope that in the future, they continue to innovate with the series, and not settle on a specific template or skeleton as to what they believe makes Zelda "Zelda."

Edit: Also put me in the camp that didn't really like motion controls for flying or swimming. I didn't really see the point, aside from the fact that it bothered my wrist after a while. It didn't feel any more intuitive than an analog stick. Shaking the nunchuck is also kind of annoying to me as well, so that mechanic didn't really fly with me.

Speaking of flying...I still really feel that this game badly needs a warp mechanic as you approach the end of the game. Or at the very least, let you jump to the sky whenever you're outside. Maybe some sort of speed upgrade to your Loftwing (I'm super surprised that you couldn't do that by the way). When you're doing cleanup and looking for Goddess Cubes and chests...it's kind of a pain in the rear.

@anon_mastermind

Yup, the game froze in the desert area when I hit one of those time crystals with my sword. After that I made sure to save as often as I could!

PogueSquadron said:

Regarding the actual BATTLE? It took me a couple tries, but apparently the battle was much simpler than I realized. Basically you just had to block his sword attacks with your shield and whack him. The lightning bit was pretty cool, and I like how I kind of just stumbled upon it when attempting to do a skyward strike. It was a little anticlimactic, because I was hoping for Demise's "true form" to show. This game had some SPECTACULAR boss fights, so it was a little disappointing to see that the final fight didn't reach the highs that the previous fights did. After the boss of Ancient Cistern, Scaldera, Tentalus...man, I was kind of expecting Link and Demise to be battling with the fuckin' world ending around them. The final boss fight just felt like it ended as soon as it began.

Yeah, I fought him again immediately after beating the game, and it was a really quick fight. But hey, that's how it goes sometimes. I liked that it wasn't readily apparent right away what you had to do, though. That's where I thought the Ghirahim/Demise fights succeeded, because there wasn't this obvious weak point that you had to hit. Demise kicked my ass a couple of times first, mainly because I wasn't shield bashing and was trying to dodge, and then in his second phase, I didn't pick up on his pattern right away (also, for some reason I kept trying to physically hit him with my sword when I didn't have to). I really liked it though. I thought it was a better sword fight than WW and TP ended with, mainly because it felt like I had far more control of my actions here (those had more of a "Tap A to win" feel). The final boss encounter was a heck of a light show, too. Definitely the most gorgeous and spectacular moment of the game, as it should be. Overall, I thought the whole Ghirahim/Demise final encounter sequence was satisfying, and I preferred it to another trek up Ganon's tower. They really captured the whole epic feel to it all (such an overused word, but it fits here), and really ratcheted it up as the Demise fight went along.

PogueSquadron said:

I am pretty confused at how this game handles time travel though. It's pretty inconsistent, but hey, what would a Zelda game be without some confusing time travel elements? Earlier on, the game establishes the idea that things in the past have already happened. Zelda goes back in time and goes to sleep in order to keep the seal on Demise. However, LINK also goes back in time to destroy Demise...but if that was the case, then him and Zelda never would've gone down to the surface to begin with, no? There wouldn't have been an "imprisoned" because Link eventually goes back in time to destroy Demise. It would've made more sense if Demise had been reborn in the present and Link vanquished him there.

The new Temple of Time is now built around the Master Sword and awaits for Ocarina of Time to happen, which is pretty cool. I suppose then, that either another Temple of Time is built near Hyrule Castle, or that Hyrule Castle is relocated some time after Ocarina of Time? It really doesn't matter, but it's always been a tad confusing to see The Temple of Time right outside Hyrule Castle in OoT, but is then miles away in the woods in TP (and later, in a Link to the Past).

Yeah, it's weird. Either they overlooked something somewhere, which is entirely possible, or there's still some unexplained stuff going on. It's a little different than OoT's time travel, because that reverted Link to his younger/older self and replaced the Link in the time he was traveling to. Here, there were two Impas of different ages that existed in the same time.

The twist is that, when you first go to the Sealed Temple, you can see Zelda in her "shell" behind those doors. At least we think it's Zelda. And Demise is clearly imprisoned at this point, and this is all before Zelda goes back through the gate of time in the Lanayru desert. On top of this, supposedly old Impa is wearing the bracelet the entire game. Time is definitely not portrayed in a standard fashion here.

It's almost like the Gate of Time affects the future when the past is changed, but only in a linear fashion. The future that was already existing doesn't get reverted. Since Link/Zelda/etc. are the travelers through the gate, their future is more or less unchanged since they are the ones directly manipulating time. Their time would be construed as linear, from the present, back through to the past, and back to the present. Because, I think that there were multiple seals put on Demise that were necessary, but don't cancel each other out. Basically, they banish Demise in the present, but Ghirahim introduces a new event in the past that requires Demise to be sealed away again, this time in the Master sword. So, I think that the "first" sealing of Demise still occurs, but a second one had to happen as well. And both are reflected in the present, at the end.

But then there's the idea someone had (Zelda Informer website, I think) that the present time in the game is portrayed such that ANYTHING that changes in the past during the game, affects the present as its experienced by Link throughout the game. That this would explain Zelda being in sleep when you first get to the surface, Impa wearing the bracelet the entire game, etc. Even if Zelda hadn't gone back through the gate yet IN THE PRESENT, the changes that would eventually be made on the other side of the time gate still warp how the present is perceived. It's an interesting way to present the concept of time. On the other hand, there's instances where this falls short. For instance, by this rule, the tree that you planted in the past would always have been there in the present, and it isn't.

Maybe the best explanation, is that the portrayal of the present only reflects people/objects that traveled to the past (but are otherwise, from the present). Zelda, the bracelet, are things from the present that went back to the past. Link physically plants the sapling, but technically, the sapling is from the past and gets planted in the past -- in this case, you would see a change in the present that wasn't already there. And this would also cover Demise, since he wasn't from the future and the final battle was created in the past. This explains why Demise in "Ganondorf" form wasn't around in the present the entire game, and that the second seal at the end was required. This is really the only explanation of the strange time portrayal that really makes sense.

All this is making my head hurt, though. I thought everything seemed cleanly and nicely wrapped up when I beat the game. Then I come on to message boards and read about what people discovered, I start thinking about it again, and start becoming confused. If it's portrayal of time is as I speculated in the last paragraph, it's a pretty brilliant touch on Nintendo's part. Or it could just be a couple of oversights that we are all overthinking!


EDIT:

And to take this a step further, I think this rules out any "split timeline" occurring at the end of SS, like with OoT. Because in this case, time is shown to be continuous in the way the present is impacted. It's different with Ocarina, where Link is truly from the past. It's not like Older Link goes back through the door of time, and is still Older Link in the past (and Young Link is also there). It's different in that sense. With the door of time closed, actions of the past (at the end of OoT) no longer impact the future after Ganon's defeat. In Skyward Sword, you could argue that there may have been a split timeline if Zelda and Link decided to stay in the past for whatever reason. But everything is back where it belongs in the end (and remember that -- technically, Link is not where he belongs at the end of OoT -- the first "time travel" wasn't really time travel, Link was just asleep for 7 years). The final seal on Demise is the Master Sword, as shown in the present at the end of the game.

This sets up nicely for Ocarina of Time and beyond. Obviously, Demise is released when Link pulls the Master Sword later on, and is incarnated in Ganondorf. As for the location of the Temple of Time, it's a gray area. We know that it moved once, since it was originally in the desert in the distant past. It's probably in the same location as OoT at the end of Skyward Sword, only because it seems to make sense that that's where they'd start building a town.

TP takes place a heck of a long time after OoT, so it's unclear if the temple moved or Hyrule Castle moved. It's probably more likely that the temple was moved to a more secluded location after the events of OoT, and since there's a precedence set now for moving the Temple of Time around. Everything in TP is just so much bigger in scope, that it's tough to gauge how close stuff really is meant to be,

Wow I didn't realize I wrote that much last night.

I sat down for a while just to see how a normal faron bokoblin works. I'm not totally sure, but here is what I think I've observed so far:

Before I thought I could outsmart them before by holding my sword above their heads to induce openings elsewhere. Nah, I was either getting lucky they didn't block my hit, or they switched to attacking me and I didn't notice.

If you swing at the in one direction over and over, your strike will never get through if it didn't get through the first time, which happens like 10% of the time. If you swing one direction, then another right after that, you will get through about 25%. If you swing at them in three consecutive different directions, you'll hit them on the third strike 75% of the time. The only certain way to hit them is to stun them first or wait for them to attack you.

Wagglers have an easy time with bokoblins since eventually they will get a high chance of strike in a short amount of time, while people looking for an opening too hard will end up being attacked.

My strategy with the first 2 kinds of Bobokin you run across (red then green) has been to bait them one direction (hold the Wiimote to the left), then swing left to right followed immediately by reversing my strike and going right to left. It seems to work every time. Is that not working for other people, or am I accidentally waggling my way to success?

It's not unlike Zelda 2 where enemies seem to move their shields magically quickly to block your attacks. Where I think Zelda 2 compensates for this is by giving the player the Downward Thrust so that enemies can either be skipped or dispatched quickly. The powered up Master Sword is able to dispatch enemies more quickly at the end of the game, but perhaps not to the point that I would like to have seen. I think in general I would've liked an upgrade to let Link slash and run at the same time, so that by the end of the game you can just run through minor enemies you don't care about.

@Kal-El814 That's what I was saying, if you switch strikes it will eventually hit with a high chance. They seem to always block the first one, maybe the second, then almost always get hit by the third. They don't seem to have any Ghirahim type luring weaknesses.

Wagglers are less efficient because they'll swing the same direction twice sometimes.

I just got to the 2nd dungeon.

Yeah, I have no time to play this damn game.

@Renjaku
I swear they're weak against horizontal attacks. That always seems to work now.

Btw, I've noticed an alarming amount of "game is freezing on me", "GPU error is showing up now", or "slow disc reads". Is it the game or the Wiis?

Very odd how many of these issues pop up with THIS game though... Is there something else to this? Dunno if I can ignore all this.

@Renjaku

My second hit is the one that always connects. I'm holding left, so his shield is on his right side for the block. As I swing left to right, he always blocks the first hit. As I swing back, right to left, he hasn't compensated and my second hit always connects at which point I slash away. Dunno if that's the same thing you're talking about or not.

@Kal-El814 Yea, that's the same thing, only you are getting the second strike to connect more than me. Hm...I noticed if I approach a Bokoblin quickly and start striking right away, the second hit seemed to get more success.

@carlosrox

I just finished the Fire Sanctuary where I got Din's Flame and three times I've had a "Game Disc Cannot Be Read" kind of error. It only just started happening, and at no time before that has the game EVER froze on me. I'm not getting any pixel problems, though my Wii is a little warm on one side, but not any warmer than it normally gets with any other game. Really odd, but I guess I can take a break for now...though I have been saving a lot more often in the past hour just in case.

@Renjaku

FWIW, I think I've changed my swing cadence a bit. I'm having more success now than I was the first few times I fought them. I assumed what I'm doing is what you're "supposed" to do... bait and then take advantage of their block time.