Been a while since I checked in, I just finished dungeon #5. So dungeon #4 yeah it was good, maybe even great. But #5? Now that was an extremely well put together sequence. Blended very well in to the overworld with a unique setting. I love it when games mix it up a bit. It reminds of getting the Bombs from the Pirates on Windfall and heading back to Outlook to get the last pearl in Wind Waker. Dungeon #5 may go down as one of my favorite dungeons in the series. Everything about it was excellent.

I beat the game today. And... what a super awesome game, and I feel lucky to have played this game.

Though I do have this to say about the final battle, it was surprisingly short... though I had some potions help, I was expecting more from Demise. Though, I wont complain cause honestly, final battles I like to be satisfying but not super challenging or something because well, I don't like the stress at the end of a game. This was a fantastic game all around and finding each heart piece or gratitude crystal and such was a treat. I loved the story and even was surprised by the Impa/Grannie surprise at the end of the game. I'm glad I've finished it now... cause in 48 hours I'll be kicking all sorts of Mario Kart 7 ass!

@stephen08
Hey, you and I are at the same part! I really enjoyed the dungeon as well, probably my favorite in the game so far. Pretty non-traditional and memorable.

Only complaint: Fi spoiled the puzzle with shooting through the grate! It looked like a fun thing to figure out too.

Got stuck on the part where you have to lower the boat with the arrow to proceed. Man, that took me like 20 minutes of running around the ship, but was really satisfying to discover. Without Fi!

The mini-boss was exciting and challenging. I thought the mini-arena that you fought him on gave a nice sense of urgency to the fight.

And of course, the boss was nuts. Tearing things up then nearly killing me. Great fight, in the rain no less.

@TriforceBun

Haha I got stuck there too! I was trying to jump off the boat with the time crystal off and land on the platform below to climb up the ladder to cross the barrier where that electric fence was. The actual solution was far easier than I initially thought.

Only real complaint about that dungeon is the running back and forth so often to that grate to turn the time on/off.

The mini-boss was great. I liked how the fight was more about momentum than actually damaging him enough to defeat him.

I'm up to dungeon #6 now and will probably play through it tonight or tomorrow.

Got to 5th real dungeon. I think it was Tbun who said SS seems to slow down a bit after/around 4th dungeon. I agree. Area before 5th dungeon has been pretty damn good though.

Yeah, for me it was a lot of the stuff between the 3rd and 4th dungeons (the dungeons themselves were great). But yeah, I loved from the 4th through the end of the 5th (where I am now). Some of the best stuff in the game!

@TriforceBun
I remember noticing the light coming through, thinking, "I can probably shoot my arr..." then BAM! She said what I was thinking. What a way to ruin the discovery.

@DrFinkelstein
Haha, you didn't notice they both had the same "hair hangy?" hehe, I really liked Impa's character design in this game.

Finished. Good game.

Guess we just have 3-5 years of waiting for another.

Random thought that I just remembered of some of the little details that were put in the game.

When you fight the Stalfos-like skeleton enemies with the swords, you can actually kill them with bombs, too. In fact, you can shatter them to pieces with the bombs and it certainly harkens back to beating up the Stalfos in ALttP in the same manner.

@Hinph
Waiting another five years is the only thing that would push me away from Zelda at this point.

I completed the 6th dungeon...I'm really digging the story. The bond between Link and Zelda in this game definitely feels deeper than any previous Zelda game. Their interaction always seems "heartfelt". I almost don't want this game to end!

5th dungeon down.

Little disappointed by the boss. You see when I had to leave the 'boss room' and go back through the ship chopping tentacles, I was thinking 'whoa cool, they're going to make the entire *ship* the arena. I'm going to have to go from area to area taking this leviathan out in stages'. That lasted for all of what, 3 rooms? Then I got into the standard arena fight . It wasn't a terrible boss but I just feel a little let down that they seemed to be going a cool direction with it...then they didn't

Alright, so I started replaying the game in Hero Mode last night. I got just past the first dungeon.

Thoughts so far:

* I didn't exactly waggle my way through the first game, but there were some enemies where I got a little nonchalant. Not here, though. You are consciously a lot less aggressive, making sure you don't get hit -- period. A lot like the tension of the Silent Realm throughout the entire game. It's so much different when hearts don't appear all over the place -- it's a totally different game.

* Maybe I didn't notice this as much on my first playthrough, but damn, the opening of this game is brutally slow. Some characters act differently in Hero Mode, but there is still way too much hand-holding. I already beat the game, Fi should just go away. The first 5 hours or so has very little gameplay -- a lot of dialogue and cutscenes, and Fi. In Hero Mode, you should not have Fi popping up after everything, you shouldn't need to be prompted when you pick up a treasure or bug. Way too many annoying disruptions in the gameplay, which I guess is more noticeable on replay. If there's 3 things I need to find, and I find 1, I shouldn't need Fi popping up and telling me that I need 2 more. Nintendo, give me a quest log in the next game, and get rid of companions (Navi, Tatl, Midna, Fi, etc.). I never liked any of them, and they were all annoying. I thought the whole "85%, 25%" stuff was cute at first, but it gets so old.

* I'm also hoping that we get a Zelda game in the near future where Link has already become the hero (maybe another direct sequel ala MM). I'm tired of a 3-5 hour tutorial mode starting every Zelda game. Put an optional tutorial mode on the Start menu for n00bs, I already know how to play Zelda. It's painful, and it certainly has no place in "Hero Mode".

* I'm playing the game very differently this time around. I'm glad that at least you got to keep your treasures and bugs in your new save. In my first playthrough, I stuck pretty much rigidly to the story mode. I usually stayed on the ground through each dungeon, and only returned to the sky usually about once after every dungeon or so. This time around, I'm constantly going between the sky and ground, and this time I'm taking advantage of the upgrade system (which makes more sense here because the game is much more challenging). I've also done a handful of side missions and explored Skyloft at night for the first time. There's no urgency for me to know the story anymore, so I can play through the game at my leisure. Ultimately, this is going to be my save where I complete everything and collect everything.

It's quite a different experience so far; I'm liking it.

A major post-game reward should be kept spoiler-tagged, at least for a few more weeks I'd say. - BBbot

@Scrawnton

Well, at least the 3DS Zelda will no doubt come out a lot sooner than the one on Wii U... so hopefully it's decent.

@TheBigG753

Yeah, fans have been complaining about all of that annoying stuff for how long? It's extremely insulting. Do I really need to be told 500 times what a particular treasure or bug is? Isn't Nintendo listening? That stuff drives me crazy.

@TheBigG753
Haha you just completely gave away the post game content... "Lucky" for me I already had it spoiled for me.

I don't know about you guys, but I got from the beginning of the game to the end of dungeon 1 in 90 minutes.

Now I'm at dungeon 5, 15 hours in. Slowed down a lot to complete the side quests/secrets I missed the first time.

@carlosrox

I'm surprised that's what considered a spoiler these days, but eh, whatever. If anything, it's not something worth keeping a surprise because it's more of a post-game penalty than a reward the way its handled. We should be educating and warning people to not overwrite their saves.

But I guess I'll be a good boy, though I certainly disagree with the terminology.

@TheBigG753

I see what Carlos is saying though. It's an "unlockable". Something not available at the start of the game that you earn for completing it. Why not keep that a surprise for people? To me, I'd rather just stick a spoiler tag on such a thing which takes a mere two seconds than spoil something someone else might want to discover on their own (even if I thought it wasn't a spoiler). You might think too that now less people will read about it, but the people who have earned it as well will still read it as long as it's pre-tagged properly which you kinda did by saying how you replayed the game and thus that lets people know that if they've beaten it, to read it.

In a forum of hundreds, it can't hurt to be over protective a little bit.

Though as you said, it being more of a penalty, lol, I kinda agree. It didn't make me want to replay the game again, not right now anyway. But then again, I know others are into that sort of thing so they'll eat it right up.