Have you guys tried thrusting at pumpkins? It's neat, I was watching my sister play and she speared one! Haha, this game is great.

Also, Gerudo Valley on the music cd is fucking fantastic, such a wonderfully original take on the song. I eargasm'd...twice (every time I listen to it).

@Marsh

OH YEAH! I was going to mention the whole pumpkin spearing thing! When I impaled one by accident I nearly burst out laughing and had fun chucking them around for a few minutes. I LOVE little things like that in games...makes them so much better!

Second boss was just incredible in every way. Music, graphics, gameplay, wow. Already one of my favorite game bosses ever. Only the second boss too, can't believe the game's just getting warmed up.

@Renjaku
No, I can't pin point it. It's not similar to the music from the bazaar, is it?

It's official. My roommates are really sick of this game. Bwhaha...

4th dungeon = complete.

By far my favorite boss fight so far, and I loved the sequence afterwards :)

Now to break for some quick dinner, then diving right back into it, heh.

My copy got into Fargo this morning. It should be delivered tomorrow afternoon. The wait is killing me.

@Hinph

Why exactly? Just playing it way too much in front of them?

Well, this game just went from "very good game, but nothing really standing out" to "exceptional, mind-blowing, incredible" in a few short dungeons.

Spoilers through Dungeon #5:

Completed the 5th dungeon (Sand Ship) tonight, and a little bit further (did the Eldin Silent Realm before turning it off).

FINALLY got to the fourth dungeon (Cistern) after a lot of fluff I complained about earlier, but this was the first truly great dungeon of the game. Part Water Temple, part Shadow Temple, this one was pretty cool. I loved how you had a pretty bright looking area for most of the dungeon, and once you went underneath the main statue, everything got very dark and ominous. A lot of cool light/dark dynamics in this game. In the past, you might have a dungeon that fit a certain theme throughout, but they are mixing it up quite a bit here. The funniest part was that I got stuck early on in the dungeon, trying to figure out the main puzzle -- took me forever to finally realize that you could slash at the first locked door in a certain pattern. Here I was, trying to shoot the symbols on the main statue. I don't know what it is about Water Temples and me overlooking something completely obvious and getting stuck. Same thing happened in Twilight Princess in Lakeview. I love the water temples, but I always manage to get stuck somehow. Anyways, great boss fight at the end as well.

Much better job of pacing between the 4th and 5th dungeons. I was worried at first, when the Goron shows you the door and it's locked. My first impression: "NO, NO, NOOOOOO, DON'T MAKE ME GO FIND THE FUCKING KEY!!!!" Thankfully, he just gave me the key, and I was relieved. Everything set in the Lanayru wasteland was top-notch. I thought the concept of sailing through the desert was really neat. Each objective en route was fun, challenging, and perfectly set the stage for the next dungeon. The hookshot level to the top of Skipper's was fun, as was the "roller coaster" stage, but the best part was the Pirate's Hideout. This almost could have passed for a dungeon itself, and the puzzles that utilized carrying the time stone around were brilliant. If there's one thing in Skyward Sword that Nintendo has nailed perfectly, it's the present/past dynamic utilized in the desert areas. Just about every part of it is phenomenally executed.

Okay, now to the Sand Ship. Let me just get this out of the way:

* Best dungeon in the game so far.
* One of the best dungeons in the series.
* One of the best boss encounters in the series.

I cannot stop gushing about how awesome this dungeon was. This was basically two of my favorite dungeons in the series combined, Snowpeak meets Stone Tower. Snowpeak in the sense that it's not your traditional temple, and Stone Tower in the sense that you are constantly changing the environment of the dungeon. This is probably one of the least traditional Zelda dungeons, and it's part of the reason why it's already one of my all time favorites. This is one of the first dungeons where, as opposed to you feeling isolated, you feel a part of something that is constantly in action. The battle with the pirate captain was something completely different from a mini-boss. You go from a ghost ship to a living, breathing ship under attack by pirates, back and forth with a single toggle. It's brilliant.

The best part was for last, though. Rather than just having a monster appear behind the boss door, you're thrown into a full-blown escape sequence from the flooding ship that ends up being really cinematic and reinforces just how much of an anti-Zelda dungeon it was. The boss fight delivered as well, though it was a little easier than some of the other ones, it was hardly run-of-the-mill. None of the boss fights have been typical at all, really. They've really stepped it up in that department as well.

Not as much story over the past couple of dungeons. Ghirahim is still trying to summon his "master" -- I guess that's the giant blob in the forest, the "Imprisoned?" Or so we're led to believe. And I know it doesn't make sense that his master is Ganon as it was for Zant in TP, and Ganondorf doesn't come around for a long time, but......I don't know, somehow I still think they'll tie this to Ganon. I hope not though, I'm all for something different and I hope Ghirahim doesn't end up being another lackey villain like Zant was.

Oh, and Link has TWO triangles on his hand now. Is he going to get the entire Triforce?


Sadly, that's where I stop for Thanksgiving. I was able to get pretty far in 3 days, though. Clocking in at about 28.5 hours right now, and 99% of that is main story, aside from a few heart pieces/treasure chests that I couldn't resist going after. Most of the sky is pretty much uncharted territory for me right now, and I haven't interacted a whole lot with the Skyloft residents. Hopefully the side missions are more plentiful than in Twilight Princess.

Football and good food to keep me occupied for the next few days, maybe some Black Friday shopping, not sure. I want to keep playing so bad right now, hahaha.

@Abdooooo

Yup. I had offered to take my Wii into my room until I was finished, but then there wouldn't be any Netflix out there... so I think they are reluctantly dealing with it. haha. Anybody else feel like a tv hog?

Didn't read any of that, haha.

Just got to the fourth dungeon. The whole segment before where I am now felt a little...drawn out? I mean, I thought it was kind of cool going back into Skyview, because I liked that temple a lot, but I feel like I should've just been in and out. The Isle of Songs puzzle made me want to blow my brains out at first. Loved going into the big tree. I hope I wind up going back there. I thought the whole thing with the robot and the propeller was COMPLETELY unecessary. I blew my Ancient Flower on an upgrade a while back so I had to go all the way back and get a new one (thankfully I remembered where it was). I really, really love the game so far, but I can't help but feel that it feels a little...overworked in some areas. Some parts definitely could've been condensed or cut out entirely. Also not sure what I think of the Silent Realm stuff. It looks really fuckin' cool, that's for sure.

This is the first Zelda in a long time that I'm actually looking forward to playing through a second time. I usually don't say that, but I was playing through the first chunk of it going "Man...I actually can't wait to play this again, and I haven't even beaten it yet."

Shields were brought up in another thread, but I figured I'd post this here:

Has anyone else not really needed a shield so far in the game?

I mean, I've been buying the new shields/upgrading as the game progresses, but honestly I hardly ever use the thing. I've used it to repel projectile attacks, and against one type of enemy, but that's it. And neither of those have caused my shield to become damaged at all.

It just had me curious since there are potions to repair your shield, and the scrap guy repairs too, yet I haven't had a reason for that at all upon completing the 4th dungeon.

I'm entering the fourth, and I haven't come close to mine breaking. The only times my shield has taken damage has been when I accidentally raised it because I'm not used to the nunchuck raising the shield when I move it. I basically only raise it intentionally when there's an octorok shooting at me.

Though, I DID use it to block some arrows from some SUPER annoying archers between the third and fourth dungeon. They freakin killed me the first time. I really should start carrying around potions or something.

@kgtennispro

I too have hardly used my shield, I am just about to head out for the 4th dungeon. I do think I will be using it more, I just noticed that if you have your shield up it will hide your swords movements making it hard for an enemy to parry.

As a side note, I absolutely love the controls, I havent had any mishaps at all. I don't really like controlling the camera without IR, and thats just because I am so used to using IR that when I bring up first person view, and then point my remote at the tv it will go all wonky. But I am trying not to point at the screen. I love this game.

@kgtennispro
Yeah, shield seems useless so far. Probably more due to it being tedious to use/juggle with the new motion controlled sword they've given us.

@Hinph

Tell your roommates to suck your ass. You've waited 5 years for this game. So, its either they put up with it, or the Wii goes in your room permanently and they never get to watch netflix again.


Just tell em...if I hear one more word about if, no more netflix!

My roommate took his TV and Wii into his room so he could play TP spoiler free when it came out, haha. I wasn't upset because I think I was busy at the time, but as long as the TV was available for us to play Smash, that's all that really mattered.

So, this game was directed by the guy who directed the Oracle games and Minish Cap (and co-director of Phantom Hourglass)... Hidemaro Fujibayashi, former employee of Capcom's defunct Flagship studio.

Doesn't that make a lot of sense? The game reeks of his style, mixed with that of Aonuma, of course.

I hate to sound cruel, as he seems like a really sweet man, but I've never been a huge fan of Aonuma in the director's role. His games are good but so heavily flawed and unfocused when compared to those of Miyamoto and Tezuka (my personal favorite director). I honestly feel that this Fujibayashi has already proven himself a more competent director, and I'd like to see less and less of Aonuma's influence on this series.

It will be very interesting to see how this all pans out with future Zelda games. Miyamoto recently said he wants to have a much more involved role with Zelda on Wii U, but could that really mean as a director? He's a busy guy.

Oh man. I forgot about that quote. It better be true.

SS blows my mind thinking about the next Zelda. I can already feel the steps this game is taking towards it in terms of music, visuals, style, presentation, and gameplay. I swear, a lot of me playing this game is fantasizing about the HD one. It makes me enjoy it more.

People are blown away by this game on an outdated, dying console, I can only imagine how much ass Nintendo is gonna kick next gen. Nintendo's games this gen have been amazing, I have trouble imagining better. The HD alone will blow our little minds. This game blows my mind already lol... Almost a scary thought.

Beat the second temple tonight and made some progress getting towards the third. At this point the biggest thing bothering me is the fighting difficulty. It's not even hard but just...frustrating. The bokoblins and Lizalfos in the second dungeon get way too much leeway with the blocking. It's to a point where I feel that waiting for the right moment and aligning your strike is a worse strategy than to just spam them with hits. I swear there have been times where I clearly made contact with the targets body and yet the game treats it like it was a block for the computer. It just feels sloppy. That's not to say it's a constant problem though but it's an issue that pops up. In the first dungeon Stalfos was a much better and more satisfying fight same with the main boss of that temple.