Day 51 of Breath of the Wild (9/09/17)
Here is the second in couple of posts that will come quickly in the next couple of days to fill in what my last play sessions from two weeks ago contained. I promise I won’t get behind again. There is at least one post, probably two, coming in the next day or two but in the mean time…
The last time I checked in with a proper report on my game progress I was heading back to the Korok forest to try and pull the master sword from the stone (very King Arthur no?) and finish the Korok trials. I am happy to say that I was able to accomplish both of these things. There is a stealth trial where you have to follow a small Korok to a shrine where you can then collect a spirit orb (if he doesn’t detect you as he travels along) and another where you have to fight your way forward (against low level enemies) to a shrine in under five minutes. The enemies are entry level, but you have a limited number of weapons and you have to be really aware of how you are clearing enemies. If your weapon breaks during the trial ends which creates a difficult conflict between speed and efficiency which is where the game has been pushing me during my last couple sessions. The enemies are now significantly leveled up, but your weapons are only marginally better than those you picked up about six or seven hours into the game. So the hacking that was effective for the first twenty or twenty five hours has become less and less effective. This also isn’t a bad thing though because seventy hours into the game play I am still learning/developing how I play this game and the difficulty hasn’t dropped. The master sword trials seem to be the sort of synthesis of this development, where if you want to be good at this game or complete the trials your approach has to develop and you have to be smarter. And maybe the real accomplishment is that they have developed a game where seventy hours into it, I still want to.
After finishing in the Korok forest I was headed to the northeast corner of the map to find Kilton and his monster shop. I decided to go all the way north and then head east as you have to be sure to get all the way around death mountain. I think I might devote an upcoming entry to the edges of the map of Hyrule because I have been traveling around the edges lately and the world is different out there. Totally inhospitable, filled with stronger enemies who all want you dead. I’ve run into a couple lynels in these wilder places and I have been unable to go through and have been forced up. There is a white lynel guarding the labyrinth northwest of Hyrule castle. I couldn’t get past him and was forced onto the mountainside to continue on my path. That’s extremely unsatisfying though, seventy plus hours into this game and I am still running from enemies. After skirting the North edge of death mountain and coming out of the snow, I dropped down into Zora’s Domain to fight the lynel there that I had avoided when I took on my first divine beast. It’s high up on a hill that overlooks the domain and where previously I stole his electric arrows and got out of there I presented myself. Now I have to be totally honest I did watch some YouTube videos to see how people were handling lynels and what the strategy is. It seems that there is one thing you have to be able to do, and that is the perfectly timed dodge and flurry attach which all enemies are defenseless against. Comparing this to a quick time event is unfair, there are no initial buttons prompts to dodge, but you have to keep yourself in front of the lynel and be able to hit the buttons fast enough. About five attempts, three or four weapons, and a lot of meals later I was able to take down my first red lynel. It’s not easy and I have to work on the timing, but when you get the perfect dodge (especially the one where you do a back flip) and the subsequent flurry attack is so satisfying. Like the slow-mo arrow time the game has these extremely satisfying combat elements which just keep me wanting to come back and get better.
After defeating the lynel I headed to the Akala region to find Kilton. You find him at night on a rock in the middle of a small lake that has three stones jutting out of the water so the stones and water combine to form the relief of a skull. My goal is to eventually get the Dark Link armor he sells, but in that initial meeting (if you haven’t activated the divine beasts) he doesn’t have much to sell. Now I have cleared two divine beasts, but I haven’t chosen to activate them after clearing them and from what I have read you need to activate the beast to unlock purchase options with Kilton. I am not worried about getting the dark armor immediately as I still have a lot of shrines to clear and hours to play. I think I will head back to Zora’s Domain and Rito village to activate the beast and also get down to Gerudo town to clear that Divine beast. I don’t have any idea where the final beast is, but I ran across some Goron’s as I dropped down into the Akala region (picked up some sweet guardian weapons from the tech lab there) and that seems to be the fourth group of persons (Rito, Gerudo, Zora, Goron) so I assume there must be a village with a divine beast in the area just northeast of Hyrule Castle ( will have to check it out later).
I am looking for shrines, keeping on the lookout for Kilton, Using my new set of anti-guardian weapons, and am heading to the Southwest corner of the map to Gerudo town to face my third divine beast. I have the new guardian weapons, but my weapon replenishment has been slow (as I mentioned earlier) and that situation is being monitored.
Comicsly 