Topic: The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword

[BeautifulShy]

I'm stuck in the mines with the quicksand.

Where exactly are you in the mines?

[Ceric]

You'll hit it soon lolmonade.

[Killer_Man_Jaro]

I’m not having the same issues with tedium that other people here are, but maybe it’s because I haven’t gotten far enough into the game for it to be a problem, or that I don’t play enough games with gathering quests in general to aggravate me.

I'm with you there. Approximately 30 hours in, halfway through the sixth dungeon, I haven't felt anywhere near the aggravation that's been expressed in this thread.

I think there's a little bit of abuse of the term 'filler' going on, in that the word seems to have been redefined to mean 'any time you aren't in a dungeon', a sentiment I very much disagree with. I bet some of you have labelled the lead-up to the fifth dungeon as filler, which is not true, in my view. You visit a new area and make use of an item you recently got, then another new area with a neat sequence that uses motion control in a cool way, then yet another new area that's effectively a mini-dungeon, before getting to the dungeon proper. I found all of these steps fun to play through.

As far as I was aware, filler is the process of lengthening a game without having to design anything. One of those areas has controls unique to this one sequence, and the mini-dungeon has unique puzzles, and they all had new layouts. It's not like there's an absence of design here. To each his own, I suppose - if you don't like it, that's your experience, and it's a shame. But most of the stuff being referred to I wouldn't call filler.

[broodwars]

What I consider filler is when I play a sequence in the game, and I feel like the game has been wasting a considerable portion of my time (and often when it forces you to run through areas you've already done again).  The errands for the water dragon in the forest are by far the best example of this.

I did think the run-up to the 5th dungeon was irritating filler, but the reason why is that I could have skipped large sections of it from the beginning if the game had actually let me explore.  But whenever I strayed from the game's linear path, I got a slap on the wrist from Fi and the NPC I was with because I had to do it all in order.  And wonder of wonders, the place they wanted me to go turned out to be completely pointless!  The place I wanted to go was where I actually had to go all along!

Another example is when you have to fix the robot with an Ancient Flower.  That's pure filler if you didn't happen to have one of those on you (which I did) and hadn't used them already in upgrading your gear.  It makes you go back to an environment just for the sake of going back there.  There's nothing new to discover or new wrinkles to the gameplay.  The game just makes you go back there, and this isn't the only time in the game it does that.  This game is fond of re-using environments and characters, and it all comes off as spectacularly lazy.  It's like Nintendo is afraid to release a 25-hour Zelda with each hour being a new experience so they filled it with all this artificial B.S. that extends the game and makes it overstay its welcome.

[EvilMario]

Pacing might have been one issue with the game, but I found the world itself to be the largest set back (even over some of the questionable motion controls). Skyloft is the ultimate definition of a 'hub world', with only three areas below and the sky (unlike the sea in Wind Waker) is very empty. Not to mention that specific portions of the game Pirate Ship felt very empty and unfinished even and the worlds definitely felt like a 'video game level' instead of part of a large world to explore.


I definitely enjoyed the game. Storytelling, mostly because of the colorful and personable characters (even the minor ones) are top notch. But I'd probably rank the title more in the middle of the series, with the overall world design and some motion controls that felt more tacked on because it's on the Wii, and not because it actually makes the gameplay better, hold it back from top tier.

[GoldenPhoenix]

The odd thing is that I have yet to encounter any issues with the motion controls, even the harp works fine for me, not to say it is fun to play but the controls are not the issue. I've in fact been impressed by how well the controls are implemented.


I am really enjoying the game, but as I said before I have yet to get to the "reused asset" areas, which may change my mind. But hey I got through Wind Waker's scavenger hunt towards the end of the game fine, along with really having minimal issues with Twilight Princess's "padding".

[Stogi]

Just wanted to chime in here and say I picked up the game. I haven't played it yet though since I'm waiting for my tunic in the mail....

Seriously though, EC, let me borrow that sword of yours.

[broodwars]

Go figure.  I must have spent half an hour trying to get the Heart Piece from the "Fun Fun Island" mini-game the other day, and I couldn't do it.  I try it today on a whim, and I get it on my 3rd try.  I also got the heart piece from the Boss Rush mode, though I still have to go back in and do it again for the Shield.  I'm pretty sure I've hit all the Goddess Cubes now as well, as I'm not finding any more by dowsing in the 3 main areas.  I still have the Bug Island mini-game to complete to wrap-up the mini-games, too.

For all the unnecessary things you can "dowse" for in this game, it seems bizarre to me that apparently Heart Pieces aren't one of them.  Considering I've only found heart pieces in the 1st and 4th dungeons, I have a feeling I'm missing at least 3 in the dungeons I've already done.  But I'd rather not have to wander aimlessly in there looking for them if I already have a device that should, in theory, point me to them.

[Ceric]

I still haven't unlocked Fun Fun Island even though I've known where the stupid wheel is for a long time.

[BeautifulShy]

I still haven't unlocked Fun Fun Island even though I've known where the stupid wheel is for a long time.

You have to get Scrapper to bring the wheel up to the surface. It is that robot behind the Scrapshop owner. You have to first talk to the headmaster to move along the story a little. Then you have to use your new item on one of the windmills on the sky island. Then talk to Gondo the scrap shop owner. He should ask about an ancient flower and if you give him one he can repair the robot. Then you can find the propeller forone of the windmills and then you can use scrapper to pick up the wheel in the desert to return Fun Fun island to its former glory.

[Ceric]

I still haven't unlocked Fun Fun Island even though I've known where the stupid wheel is for a long time.

You have to get Scrapper to bring the wheel up to the surface. It is that robot behind the Scrapshop owner. You have to first talk to the headmaster to move along the story a little. Then you have to use your new item on one of the windmills on the sky island. Then talk to Gondo the scrap shop owner. He should ask about an ancient flower and if you give him one he can repair the robot. Then you can find the propeller forone of the windmills and then you can use scrapper to pick up the wheel in the desert to return Fun Fun island to its former glory.

I've done all that...  Except I went to get the Wheel before the Windmill and it wouldn't allow me to get Fi to tell Scrapper to do his job.  I'll just have to go back again.  This is an example of something that frustrates me about this game.  Let me use the ability since I have it.

[broodwars]

I still haven't unlocked Fun Fun Island even though I've known where the stupid wheel is for a long time.

You have to get Scrapper to bring the wheel up to the surface. It is that robot behind the Scrapshop owner. You have to first talk to the headmaster to move along the story a little. Then you have to use your new item on one of the windmills on the sky island. Then talk to Gondo the scrap shop owner. He should ask about an ancient flower and if you give him one he can repair the robot. Then you can find the propeller forone of the windmills and then you can use scrapper to pick up the wheel in the desert to return Fun Fun island to its former glory.

I've done all that...  Except I went to get the Wheel before the Windmill and it wouldn't allow me to get Fi to tell Scrapper to do his job.  I'll just have to go back again.  This is an example of something that frustrates me about this game.  Let me use the ability since I have it.

You have to talk to the Fun Fun Island guy when he has a "thought bubble" over his head to accept the quest to find the lost Wheel.  Then you can go down and pick it up.

Yes, once again Xenoblade is the superior game, because you can pick up quest items before you need them.  And once again, Xenoblade will get snubbed in Game of the Year awards in favor of Zelda because Reggie was too lazy to release it here.

BTW, is anyone finding the music in this game all that great outside a few tunes like the Ballad of the Goddess?  I'm finding the music surprisingly unmemorable, despite the great audio quality from being recorded by a symphony orchestra.  I guess that's another thing Xenoblade easily surpasses Zelda in.

I'm starting to think Koji Kondo needs a break from Zelda, because Twilight Princess was much the same way (and I can't think of any memorable tunes from Phantom Hourglass).  Maybe we give him a chance to work on some other games while someone else takes a crack at Zelda music?

[Ceric]

I still haven't unlocked Fun Fun Island even though I've known where the stupid wheel is for a long time.

You have to get Scrapper to bring the wheel up to the surface. It is that robot behind the Scrapshop owner. You have to first talk to the headmaster to move along the story a little. Then you have to use your new item on one of the windmills on the sky island. Then talk to Gondo the scrap shop owner. He should ask about an ancient flower and if you give him one he can repair the robot. Then you can find the propeller forone of the windmills and then you can use scrapper to pick up the wheel in the desert to return Fun Fun island to its former glory.

I've done all that...  Except I went to get the Wheel before the Windmill and it wouldn't allow me to get Fi to tell Scrapper to do his job.  I'll just have to go back again.  This is an example of something that frustrates me about this game.  Let me use the ability since I have it.

You have to talk to the Fun Fun Island guy when he has a "thought bubble" over his head to accept the quest to find the lost Wheel.  Then you can go down and pick it up.

Yes, once again Xenoblade is the superior game, because you can pick up quest items before you need them.  And once again, Xenoblade will get snubbed in Game of the Year awards in favor of Zelda because Reggie was too lazy to release it here.

The annoying part about that is that I've been to the island and he has lost his wheel and has moped for a long while.  Its like coming across a little girl whose lost here kitten.  I can see the kitten. I can touch the Kitten. Now that I want to pick up and return the kitten I can't.  They should have left him alone till you could do the quest.

[marty]

I think there's a little bit of abuse of the term 'filler' going on, in that the word seems to have been redefined to mean 'any time you aren't in a dungeon', a sentiment I very much disagree with. I bet some of you have labelled the lead-up to the fifth dungeon as filler, which is not true, in my view. You visit a new area and make use of an item you recently got, then another new area with a neat sequence that uses motion control in a cool way, then yet another new area that's effectively a mini-dungeon, before getting to the dungeon proper. I found all of these steps fun to play through.

As far as I was aware, filler is the process of lengthening a game without having to design anything. One of those areas has controls unique to this one sequence, and the mini-dungeon has unique puzzles, and they all had new layouts. It's not like there's an absence of design here. To each his own, I suppose - if you don't like it, that's your experience, and it's a shame. But most of the stuff being referred to I wouldn't call filler.

I think your definition of filler would qualify nothing as filler.

[GoldenPhoenix]

I still haven't unlocked Fun Fun Island even though I've known where the stupid wheel is for a long time.

You have to get Scrapper to bring the wheel up to the surface. It is that robot behind the Scrapshop owner. You have to first talk to the headmaster to move along the story a little. Then you have to use your new item on one of the windmills on the sky island. Then talk to Gondo the scrap shop owner. He should ask about an ancient flower and if you give him one he can repair the robot. Then you can find the propeller forone of the windmills and then you can use scrapper to pick up the wheel in the desert to return Fun Fun island to its former glory.

I've done all that...  Except I went to get the Wheel before the Windmill and it wouldn't allow me to get Fi to tell Scrapper to do his job.  I'll just have to go back again.  This is an example of something that frustrates me about this game.  Let me use the ability since I have it.

You have to talk to the Fun Fun Island guy when he has a "thought bubble" over his head to accept the quest to find the lost Wheel.  Then you can go down and pick it up.

Yes, once again Xenoblade is the superior game, because you can pick up quest items before you need them.  And once again, Xenoblade will get snubbed in Game of the Year awards in favor of Zelda because Reggie was too lazy to release it here.

BTW, is anyone finding the music in this game all that great outside a few tunes like the Ballad of the Goddess?  I'm finding the music surprisingly unmemorable, despite the great audio quality from being recorded by a symphony orchestra.  I guess that's another thing Xenoblade easily surpasses Zelda in.

I'm starting to think Koji Kondo needs a break from Zelda, because Twilight Princess was much the same way (and I can't think of any memorable tunes from Phantom Hourglass).  Maybe we give him a chance to work on some other games while someone else takes a crack at Zelda music?

Doubtful, Xenoblade while seemingly a great game isn't getting near the praise Zelda has been getting. Even if it did come out here, I doubt it would have a chance at winning game of the year. Also I have to say I agree with you about the music, while I love Twilight Princess, the music was, just, there, kind of like this game. Koji may be getting close to burn out, and they may need to bring in some new blood to add new life to the music.

[Stogi]

He only has one song in this game. It's the beginning intro.

[FZeroBoyo]

Finished it up moments ago.


Sure, there are some minor gripes, but I'm confident this is my Game of the Year.             

[Caterkiller]

I LOVE the music in this game! Hate hate hated it in TP, these are awesome happy tunes!

[ShyGuy]

I'm stuck in the mines with the quicksand.

Where exactly are you in the mines?

I got past it. Now I'm jumping through time to open the worlds most complex door to the mines. I enjoy bopping around Sky World more than the mainland. I wanna do the next gratitude quest!

[BeautifulShy]

I'm stuck in the mines with the quicksand.

Where exactly are you in the mines?

I got past it. Now I'm jumping through time to open the worlds most complex door to the mines. I enjoy bopping around Sky World more than the mainland. I wanna do the next gratitude quest!

Yeah I kinda got stuck in the mines before but that was because I didn't use all of Link's abilities with the items.

I actually should start playing again. Been a few days since I played.

[Mop it up]

Did anyone else experience freezing issues in the desert?

It happens when I hit one of the time stones, the one that's in the room with some barrels that you bomb open a crack to get into. The transformation scene starts getting all jittery, then the game freezes up when it shows a close up of one of those shell monsters reverting to the past form. Some of the other stones had this slowdown, but this is the only one that freezes up, and it's always at the exact same spot.

[Ceric]

I did not.

[UncleBob]

Did anyone else experience freezing issues in the desert?

It happens when I hit one of the time stones, the one that's in the room with some barrels that you bomb open a crack to get into. The transformation scene starts getting all jittery, then the game freezes up when it shows a close up of one of those shell monsters reverting to the past form. Some of the other stones had this slowdown, but this is the only one that freezes up, and it's always at the exact same spot.

Oddly enough, this is the *exact* same spot mine froze up on when I mentioned it awhile ago.  The room where you activate the lightening bolt part of the combination lock....

[alegoicoe]

My game has not frozen, but i have experienced some slow down when Fi Speaks, it happened in the thunder dragon quest, where you have to get him a fruit.

[Luigi Dude]

So yeah finished the game and am currently halfway through Hero Mode.  Definately up there with Twilight Princess and Majora's Mask as my favorites in the series.  Things I loved about it is the motion controls really did improve the combat so that it's way more exciting than any previous game in the series.  The overworlds were also the best any 3D Zelda has had.  I like that just getting to dungeons is more exciting now the overworld area's are basically dungeons themselves now with puzzles that need to be completed in order to get to the dungeons.  A huge step forward from the previous 3D Zelda's where the overworld leading to dungeons was pretty plain, straight forward paths with maybe an obstacle or two blocking the way.
 
On the issue of the so called fetch-quest, by god is the complaints about these some of the biggest hyperbole there is.  Most of the things people are calling fetch-quest are very small sections that when using Dowsing are very short and easy to complete.  Plus most of the complaints about reused assests are rather silly when these area's that are reused are usually changed in a way that makes people have to play them in a completly different way.  Yes the scenery might be similar but the actual gameplay is completely different.
 
 
The only real dissapointment I had with the game was actually the last two bosses at the very end.  After a lot of reviews said the final bosses were suppose to be very challanging, they're actually two of the easiest bosses in the whole game.  The final boss in particular is a total joke once you learn his weakness and is pretty lame since he basically does the same kind of attack over and over and the second part of the fight barely changes things up unlike every other boss in the game where the second part of the fight completely changes how the boss fights.
 
This really made me mad since the director of Skyward Sword is Hidemaro Fujibayashi, who did the Oracle games and Minish Cap and those games all had great final bosses.  Jesus christ did he drop the ball for the final boss in this game.  I was expecting something crazy like Vaati's fight that required players to use all items in the game and have three different forms that were all unique, but instead I got something that's just way too lame compared to what Fujibayashi has done in the past.  When compared to previous Zelda final boss fights it's not that bad but when compared to Fujibayashi's other Zelda's and the other bosses in Skyward Sword, it is a big step back.
 
Of course the fight before the final boss pisses me off just as much since you fight Ghirahim one last time but he's slow as f*ck now and barely does anything, unlike his amazing second fight where he's all over the place and launching energy attacks from all over.  This really made me angry since the second fight with Ghirahim is my favorite boss fight in the entire game and one of the best in Zelda history.  I was really anticipating the final fight with him since I was expecting the third Ghirahim boss fight to be even better than that since the second fight was a much more intense ramped up version of the first fight.  Instead the third fight is actually a downgraded version of the second fight, where he doesn't do anything close to the crazy sh!t he did in the second that made that fight so great.
 
 
So yeah, in conclusion Skyward Sword is one of the best Zelda's ever made that while had a few annoying issues (like Fi never shutting up), wasn't anything that stopped me from loving the game.  Except for the final two boss fights which still make me scratch my head about what happend after all the other great bosses in the game and compared to what Fujibayashi has done in the past.