I am starting the game this weekend, and I am wondering if I can get away without using the strategy guide or looking for hints online (at least right away). I would rather play the game without “help”, but I don’t want to pass up any secrets or anything that I wouldn’t be able to go back and get later if I found out about them.
So, is this the kind of game where I could screw up my game if I didn’t do things early in playing? Are there things I will only have a chance to do or pick up at certain points in the game? Or, will I be able to go back and take care of secrets at any point in the game, once I decide to look for “help”?
I don’t think so. I haven’t used a strategy guide yet and I think I’m about to enter the final battle.
I’ve just collected all the Tri-force fragments and need to head back to Hyrule.
I have not used a strategy guide at all and have been able to breeze through the game. Actually it seems kind of easy. Either that or I’m a hell of a lot better at these games than I thought.
I finished the game using the internet a couple of times, but I think I would have gotten past the places I was stuck without cheating, I’m just a little too impatient sometimes.
If you have the Game Boy Advance, I found that to be pretty helpful in some places. I’m not sure if you consider that cheating or not, but I thought the way they integrated the GBA into the game was a pretty cool feature.
It’s pretty much a straight line game & so you can play it anyway you want & if you get to a point where you don’t have something you need, you can go back & get it.
I think of all the games ever made, Zelda games are the ‘safest’ in this regard. They go out of their way to make sure you get what you need at the right time, or to keep it available throughout the game. Making it possible to miss something and permanently screw up your game, forcing you to start over, would be a huge no-no.
I finished it without looking at anything, though I did make a point of keeping fairly specific notes (about obstacles I encountered but needed some item I didn’t have yet to get past, for example). That helped a lot. As long as you pay attention to what the fish guys in each sector of the map tell you, you shouldn’t need a strategy guide.
Don’t worry–none of the dungeons in WW are nearly as evil as, say, Ocarina of Time’s Water Temple. I still have nightmares about that place…
I love WindWaker, it’s beautiful and fun, but I consider it to be an easy game compared to the Ocarina Master Quest.
Game progress spoiler:
I’ve got two more chunks of TriForce out of the eight to collect, and I haven’t played in about three weeks.
It’s a linear game, and if you need hints you will get them in abundance. Don’t bother with the walkthrough guide, just enjoy the cute characters and fantastic cel shading.
I don’t agree on this point. There were 2 instances where I thought “Hmmm, what do I have to do here. Perhaps I need another item to get past this?” and then after trying other stuff for hours, I finally gave up and looked up a walkthrough on the net. In both cases it turned out that I was already on the right track and that the problem could be solved in the room I was in, without endless backtracking and looking for items.
So far (Ok, I am not too far into the game) every puzzle could be solved without searching in other locations. If there is a problem, odds are it can be solved in that room.
Pay close attention to what the swordmaster on the island you start out tells you in the beginning. I didn’t really listen and therefore I couldn’t solve one of the puzzles and had to get help from the internet. Spare yourself the grey hair and listen to the swordmaster!
This is mostly true for the linear dungeons, with the exception for puzzles that require that dungeons item (that’s Zelda tradition, of course). However, for the side quests (which account for what, at least 60% of the game?) this is not true, since it’s quite frequent to see things you want but require an item you don’t have to access.
Also, access to the dungeons themselves almost always require an item that you’ll have to go fetch somewhere else, although not quite to the degree of OOT.
I’m actually disappointed at the simplicity of the dungeons in this game compared to OOT. I loved the water temple!
Have you done the Earth Temple yet(in Wind Waker)? It’s my favorite dungeon in all of Zelda. Not as hard as the water temple of OoT, but still amazing.
Yeah, that one’s pretty good. Probably the best of them.
I mean, don’t get me wrong, I love the game. It’s a step up from OOT in most ways, and not enough good can be said about it. My problem is that I really really like Zelda dungeons, and Windwaker has fewer than OOT (even if you count the Forbidden Fortress twice) and they’re shorter and easier. I’d forgive that if they were better in terms of design, but I’m not really sure that they are, since a lot of the puzzles are more or less enhanced versions of OOT puzzles without a lot added. Let’s face it, most of the dungeons (if not all) can be done in one sitting easily, whereas in OOT most of them had me coming back for a couple days straight. Windwaker seems more focused on side quests, which I think is a little unfortunate, because the sailing does get tedious, even with the shortcut item.
The best two dungeons, and most difficult, so far were the Earth and Wind Temples. But they are all really easy. I was doing one a day and was amazed how I breezed through them.
I’ve been playing for a wekk now, and find the game amazing. I like sailing around, thinking about the puzzles, looking at stuff and trying to figure out how the hell I’m supposed to do this or that.
Without Internet on a guide, It would be a good idea to have pen and paper handy. You get all the clues you need in the game, but there is so much info you’ll need to write it down: “This guy saif that I can get that item, on that Island, but only at night and only if it’s a full moon, and if I have this item, which I can get on another island, but only during day.”
There is a dry sense of humour in the game which I love. The best guy, so far, is the one on Windfall Island, where you play the game of sinking monsters. “Ba-Booom”. I made it in 14. Anybody beat that?
Another detail, which I noticed today - If I hit “L” for targetting, when I can’t (as in one of the shops), Link’s evebrows go up and down, as if he’s frowning at me.
Oh, and while I liked OoT, Majora’s Mask is by far the best game in the Franchise. Mostly puzzles and not so much tedious swordfighting.
The guys I hate the most are the little imps/mini-devils, that are chittering and re-spawning. Gah. They were so annoying at one point I was ready to smash the handcontroll.
I finished about a week ago. It was a team effort with me and my girlfriend. I controlled Link and she kept a notepad and a map. Though we used the GBA link for a little while, she developed a great distaste for Tingle, so we stopped using it.
There were a few places where we checked the gamefaqs, but they were for the most part side-quests, not the main quest, which was quite easy. There was only one point where I had to consult the faq for the main quest, and that was just to confirm that what I was trying was the correct action. It still took about 20 tries, which was far more than anything else in the game took.
Basically, the way the game is written, you really can’t get into a situation that you’re not prepared for. If there’s something blocking the way, you’ll get an item later on that will let you deal with it easily.
Oh, and “Splooooosh” has become part of my everyday vocabulary. Nobody at work gets it.
One of my favorite features is the new fighting mode where you can counter attack when your blade turns green. You can usually wipe out an iron nuckle without ever taking a blow.