HS on the midnight train to the Spirit Tower!

[Hyruleansoldier]

So yeah, I started playing ST last night, finally, and thought I'd make a thread with my findings in it.  Since it's a separate thread from a generic ST discussion thread, I expect not to be spoiled about stuff I obviously haven't reached yet Also, don't make me double post all the time - a reply or two would be welcome ^^

So yeah.  Story was pretty basic.  Text skipped a little too fast, I was looking at the pretty pictures   Funny how Link fell asleep - they gotta use that in every game, don't they?  I thought TP would be the exception, but they just made that happen the second day in Ordon.

Anyway, two minutes into the game I managed to almost die, by being chased by bees.   Almost betrayed by the stylus!   I was like "how persistent could they possibly be", i was in the freaking water but they still stung me  so i went inside a house, it doesn't help underpopulated peninsula is underpopulated

The train is fun, but I immediately noticed how slow it goes, at "max speed".  I assume there's upgrades?

Of course I didnt expect to be sent all the way back when crashing into an evil train...  I'll just blast 'em when I get mah cannonz =D

The guards were pretty funny,  especially the one little guy blocking you: "guard duty is such a snoozefest" ^^  I like how they gave another spin on the "green hero clothes".

I like the music, but I miss some more people in castle town, and minigames.  So far ST has made me want to play TMC again.  There seem to be a bunch of parallels (surprise surprise).  At least in this game Zelda won't be a stone statue for 99% of the game (*cough* TMC & PH *cough*)

Cole is pretty mean.  He kept butting in on the official ceremony, Zelda should have just fired his ass. And what's up with the twin hats?  Does he secretly have another head, like Professor Quirrel in HP1?

I like the postcards.  20 a day is a good incentive to collect rupees, and there's 16 different treasure to exchange for train parts, so that's a good deal too.  Anyone know if you can change the day on the DS and get your prizes early, and be able to post more postcards before the 24 hour limit has passed?

[Rew]

First!

So yeah, I started playing ST last night, finally, and thought I'd make a thread with my findings in it.  Since it's a separate thread from a generic ST discussion thread, I expect not to be spoiled about stuff I obviously haven't reached yet Also, don't make me double post all the time - a reply or two would be welcome ^^

Allow me to oblige. (Well, this time anyway...)

So yeah.  Story was pretty basic.  Text skipped a little too fast, I was looking at the pretty pictures   Funny how Link fell asleep - they gotta use that in every game, don't they?  I thought TP would be the exception, but they just made that happen the second day in Ordon.

A nice tradition going back to LttP.

I also like to think Link was falling asleep in LoZ when the old man said, "IT'S DANGEROUS TO GO ALONE!"

Anyway, two minutes into the game I managed to almost die, by being chased by bees.   Almost betrayed by the stylus!   I was like "how persistent could they possibly be", i was in the freaking water but they still stung me  so i went inside a house, it doesn't help underpopulated peninsula is underpopulated

It's humorous the many ways this game simply seems to mess you with you.

The train is fun, but I immediately noticed how slow it goes, at "max speed".  I assume there's upgrades?

Oh boy are you going to be disappointed.

Of course I didnt expect to be sent all the way back when crashing into an evil train...  I'll just blast 'em when I get mah cannonz =D

Oh boy are you going to be disappointed.

The guards were pretty funny,  especially the one little guy blocking you: "guard duty is such a snoozefest" ^^  I like how they gave another spin on the "green hero clothes".

I like that too. And the sword training mini-game in this one is a lot harder than the ones in WW and PH. I got 999 in the other two. I got 120 in this one.

I like the music, but I miss some more people in castle town, and minigames.  So far ST has made me want to play TMC again.  There seem to be a bunch of parallels (surprise surprise).  At least in this game Zelda won't be a stone statue for 99% of the game (*cough* TMC & PH *cough*)

You get more NPC interaction in other towns, although there is a little bit more in Castle Town as the game goes on. And yeah, the music is awesome. And Zelda is at her most awesome since her cross-dressing days with the Hero of Time.

Cole is pretty mean.  He kept butting in on the official ceremony, Zelda should have just fired his ass. And what's up with the twin hats?  Does he secretly have another head, like Professor Quirrel in HP1?

Cole? Mean? Oh, you don't know the half of it.

I like the postcards.  20 a day is a good incentive to collect rupees, and there's 16 different treasure to exchange for train parts, so that's a good deal too.  Anyone know if you can change the day on the DS and get your prizes early, and be able to post more postcards before the 24 hour limit has passed?

I never did that until the end of my game in order to accrue treasures for train cars. And even then a lot of times I would be going for the 2nd place prize and end up winning 1st instead. The postman would be all happy for me and congratulate me while I'd be like, "Go **** yourself."


Nice read. Keep us abreast of your progress and findings!

[Big Tater]

hehe, andrew said breast. giggity.

anyway, even though i haven't played spirit tracks, and probably never will, this gives me a chance to live vicariously through you

[Hyruleansoldier]

I guess I'll have to be patient for all those train parts.  BUT I WANT THE DRAGON TRAIN.  Just riding around in that thing all day is half the fun.

Anywho, I really really like Zelda in this game.  She's genuinely funny!  Too many instances to mention, and I haven't even been to the Snow area.  I like Anjun - she was so rude to Zelda (you look pale as death), but then there was the nice story part where she refers back to the original Zelda (being Tetra- she mentioned she was originally a pirate) founding the land, and Anjun giving her the spirit pipes.

So far I also like the graphics - the Tower of Spirits really gives you the feeling of a tower when you're in it (I can haz genuine 3-D nao?)

The first level, Wooded Temple, was a snoozefest.  No genuine challenges.  The part with the wall/floormasters protecting the big key was nice, but it was too easy - just follow the path and you were okay. I intentionally strayed from the path to get them to come after me but I could still get to the door and go up to the boss...  so yeah.  The boss was pretty lame as well.  The part with blowing the explosive enemies at it was good, but could have lasted longer, or had another complication.  There wasn't any timing or aiming skill involved.  Even from a first boss I expect more (Twilit Diababa at least had the timing and aiming skillz with the explosive thing, and not getting hit whilst doing that).

The Lost Woods were highly overrated, you only had to change the track once, I expect it to be tougher to know where to go, and a lot less time to decide.  Yawn.  But then a good puzzle in the forest stage (to get to Gage - yes I know this was before the forest temple), making me run back a few times until I realized you were supposed to throw the bomb next to the switch (not letting it hit it right away), so there'd be enough time to pick up the other bomb, the switch getting hit, and you crossing the bridge with the bomb, throwing at the breakable blocks just in time.  I liked that - usually when bomb flowers are involved it's painfully obvious where to use it and you don't need to worry about timing your run.

Playing the duet with Gage was probably the most enjoyable moment so far - very nice tune, and reminded me a lot of the second half of TWW, where you conduct for Fado & Laruto / Makar & Medli, playing a very nice piece of music together to achieve something of great magical importance.  It's good music has finally reclaimed its important role in Hyrulean lore.  PH really didn't have anything noteworthy like that, and in TP it was mostly wolf Link's singing, and the reeds, none of which achieved something on a magically significant level.  We can't forget how much OoT stresses the importance of secret magical melodies -- it even takes care of warping in that game -- but there aren't many other games set in Hyrule were music is that important, and that is sad.  So yay for "minuets/areas or restoration" and whatnot.  I love the pan flute.  And even a healing song... tribute to AoL's LIFE spell, anyone?

I also love the 9 enemy rooms + boss revisited minigame in the Castle Town.  TMC had a random enemy marathon, but it only had 2 waves of enemies if I'm not mistaken.  I greatly approve of this minigame in ST.  Now give us back something like Kinstones and things will be even greater.

That's pretty much all for today.  I was going to complain about how if you need to blow in the mic a lot with the whirlwind (to blow away all the leaves in Whittleton, for one), this can get rather exhausting.  But then I was already very tired.  Wouldn't be surprised if Nintendo gets sued if someone dies from hypoxia

[hisak]

I forgot how many of the location names were different from version to version. Europe mostly got the better names (and boxart).

The dungeons become drastically better after the first one, so don't despair yet. Lots of good stuff on the way.

[Hyruleansoldier]

Why would they change location names?  It's all just in English too.  Maybe in some of the other languages?

Also, I want to see someone build a theory placing TWW, PH & ST _BEFORE_ OoT.  Why?  Because there's dozens of Rabbits in ST, and in OoT the wandering running man teaches us that rabbits are pretty much extinct since excessive hunting over the years.  Is ST Link to blame for this?

[hisak]

I don't know why they changed the location names, but it happened a lot.

Wooded Temple = Forest Temple

(click to show/hide)

Blizzard Temple = Snow Temple
Marine Temple = Ocean Temple
Mountain Temple = Fire Temple
Desert Temple = Sand Temple
Armoured Beetle = Stagnox
Cactops = Phytops
Vulcano = Cragma
Staven = Byrne
Capbone = Skeldritch

I would recommend staying away from any timeline theorizing here, now that we're finally getting a long string of games clearly connected to each other. Of course, I'm generally against theorizing in general, so maybe there's some pleasure to be had from it that I'm missing.

[Big Tater]

Fun read! Doesn't sound like my cup of tea so far, but I'm holding out for the final battle, though.  I want to see pictures of this dragon train

[Hyruleansoldier]

I don't know why they changed the location names, but it happened a lot.

Wooded Temple = Forest Temple

(click to show/hide)

Blizzard Temple = Snow Temple
Marine Temple = Ocean Temple
Mountain Temple = Fire Temple
Desert Temple = Sand Temple
Armoured Beetle = Stagnox
Cactops = Phytops
Vulcano = Cragma
Staven = Byrne
Capbone = Skeldritch

I would recommend staying away from any timeline theorizing here, now that we're finally getting a long string of games clearly connected to each other. Of course, I'm generally against theorizing in general, so maybe there's some pleasure to be had from it that I'm missing.

That just looks like they dumbed down the temple names for the American version, but made names a little more clever and interesting for the European version(s).

Timeline theorizing is just for fun nowadays, it's impossible to make hard enough a case.  At least with a lot of games (most of them came in pairs), we have some kind of a reference point, as with certain games having to come after OoT, but other than that...  But many people have proven that you can make a great many theories work, if you're only willing to believe a few hypotheses.  I like my bunnies timeline theory, haha.

[hisak]

That just looks like they dumbed down the temple names for the American version, but made names a little more clever and interesting for the European version(s).

That doesn't explain the boss names though, which I prefer slightly.

You can't tie together all of the games in the series into one (split) timeline without various plot contrivances that far surpass those already in place in the games. Ocarina of Time, Majora's Mask, Twilight Princess, The Wind Waker, Phantom Hourglass, Spirit Tracks, and now Skyward Sword all fit into an unambiguous, somewhat cohesive story, and there's no point in going beyond that.

[Hyruleansoldier]

But there's so many other games! =D

I like how the village you start in is called Outset Village.  Why would they call it something else in the American version?

Okay so... evil train behind you, evil train in front of you = KABOOM + GAME OVER?!  Wtf is wrong with this game?  lol.  I haven't had a Game Over in Zelda since... since... puberty?  lol.  Ah well.  I guess this means saving every time before getting on the train eh?

Suddenly I'm appreciating the sailing in PH more...  Just click your destination and little could go wrong. Might have to bomb the occasional bad guy, but nothing that could blow up your ship within seconds.

Edit:  IT HAPPENED AGAIN.  If I was still a teen, I'd stop playing now and move on to something else, and be sure to tell all my friends to buy a game that doesn't insta-game over you when you fail at Pacman-like entrapment & moving (over which you have very little control, too).  It should just be fun, cruisin' around on the train, epic BG music, actually impressive graphics for the DS (drawing distance of the horizon is pretty far).  Stupid evil trains.  Grumble grumble...

[Rew]

Yeah, welcome to my least favorite part of Spirit Tracks. The instant death trains. Seriously, whose idea was that? Instant death isn't supposed to exist in Zelda! This isn't freakin' Mario or Mega Man.

But those game overs are humbling, aren't they? (Then again, I got a game over once in TP, but only because I kept Link underwater too long, thinking he would just respawn at the water's edge losing half a heart or something--imagine my surprise when the "GAME OVER" music played and the words appeared on my screen.)

Eventually, you do get pretty adept at switching tracks and finding routes that avoid the trains. But even then, you're oftentimes going FAR out of your way from a direct route in order to avoid those buggers. And given the train's already monotonously slow speed, it really cuts down on the enjoyment factor considerably. Yeah, I'm with you--this is the one part (besides bosses) where PH really shines. You can get on your ship and be on your way without much problem (you can also warp in that game far more conveniently than in ST too).

Thankfully, most everything outside of your train in this game is awesome! =D

How far are you now? And how close to building the DRAGON TRAIN?

[Hyruleansoldier]

I'm with you on the instant-game overs.  It continues to happen to me, and even though I save all the time when on the train, I still reset every time because I hate the "save & continue" after a game over.  I don't ever want to save having game overed.

Usually the evil trains don't take detours, so you can try to predict their behavior.  But it seems like when they get close to you, you slow down a bit, or is that just me?  Since at the splits you could reverse and switch tracks and lurk between the two, you could exploit that I guess, but it takes way too long to turn, and if you overshoot it you're still going to crash into it.  It's happened.  Also, when you aim to be safe by arriving at a station, you have to make a complete stop, and be BEFORE the pole outside.  A few times already I was pretty much safe, but not really because it still crashed into me.  This kind of experiences is not something we should all be sharing.  Sure, we complain when they make the new games too easy, but having a hard time with things that are just plain unfair is something else.  In  Mario & Mega Man games, where falling in a pit means death, you can usually only blame your poor skills for dying.  But this is different.  

I also heard some of the sidequests involving goods transport can get quite aggrevating, especially with time limits.  I'm already not looking forward to that, even though it should make for some very cool sidequests.  Transporting wood, cuccos, materials...  But if you're constantly being plagued by evil trains, miniblins, pirates...  it becomes a lot like the carrying the hot spring water across Eldin Field to the goron at the bridge in TP.  Also quite unfair stuff.

Anywho, I beat the Snow/Ice/Blizzard dungeon yesterday.  I really liked this dungeon!  The use of the boomerang to create paths of ice on the water was quite nice, some nice torch puzzles, the whole thing with the bells... and the boss was pretty awesome.  A kind of Twinrova wannabe.  I actually died on him the first time, so he wasn't easy, but he wasn't impossible either - the trick (especially when he split into two) was being fast enough to get them both.  Sometimes it felt like I just couldn't evade the attacks fast enough, but on the whole this boss was very worthy.  Not unreasonably frustrating, but no walk in the park either.

Also, the big crawly monster in the ice cave (snow realm) made me think of the Gohma-like monster sequence that never made it into TP.

Bunny catching is still fun - a bit frustrating if they run away if that means having to go all the way back to some station so they'll be back at their location.  So far I've only found one location to use the Song of Discovery - nice one, we haven't really had that since OoT.  Finding secret caves there was simply marvellous.  TP had a couple where you needed to look around as Wolf Link, but that still didn't give the same satisfaction.

Zelda is a lot of fun, she doesn't miss any opportunity to refer to her not having a body anymore. She really has personality in this one.

I don't have any train parts yet, I haven't been to the Lineback Trading either.  I guess I should try to go for the 2nd or 3rd price more - usually I send in all 20 tickets and get the 1st prize.  What are the odds of getting the third prize?  Probably best to use only 5 or 10 tickets or so?

[Hyruleansoldier]

10 months ago I stopped playing ST and moved on to other, more important things in life.

Today I had some extra time on my hands and decided I should continue my quest - since it's still my first run.

Damn Lokomo song, shouldn't be that hard to get right.

Stupid AI of death trains.  This game really makes you feel like a dumbass sometimes.

The water portion of the game is tedious and dull, but I loved the (LA) Catfish Maw (Mouth) flashback, to ride down into, and under the water's surface.  That part was pretty, but could still have been better.

The dungeon was okay I guess, I loved the whip guy(s), WHIP FIGHT.  It's such a cool item to have.  Has a few applications too, so that's good.

Boss was pretty easy imo, nothing groundbreaking.  Something with Cactus, but it's Phytops in the American version.  Stupid name differences. Makes the walkthroughs VERY unusable at times.  I don't know what all the towns from the first sections of the game were called.  Blows.

But the bird calling is tedious, again.  They don't take you where you wanna go, and if you fall into the water you have to start all over again.

The bunnies are still fun but naturally frustrating if you miss them in the 10 second window and you'll have to drive all the way to some station or other so you can get it to respawn.  More tedium.

Zelda ST : super tedium.

So yeah.  It's Zelda and I still enjoy it, but this feels more like a chore sometimes.  At least the music is good, and if there's no death trains around (like in the Ocean map) you can just mellow out until you reach your destination.  Of course being afraid of them pirate ships, even though they go down fast enough.

Doing some sidequests atm, if I don't follow a walkthrough I know I'll miss out on a lot of things and there'll be no way of knowing what I got and what I didn't get.  It's PH's gems all over again : I literally went to (almost) every spot to hunt down the last of each Gem because I had little way of knowing which ones I'd already gotten.

More tedium.  Sidequests should be fun.  Please bring back (something like the) Bomber's Notebook, so you know which NPC's you need to help in some way, and so you can check what you did already.

Ah well.  The next bits in ST are supposed to be good, no, so I'll just keep playing.

It's sad, but I don't see myself replaying PH or ST any year soon.  The first time round is manageable enough, but I don't want to be writing down clues every 5 seconds all over again.  I guess with some things you wouldn't need to anymore, but you'd still be looking at a walkthrough a lot cause it's one or the other, and I don't like to waste that much time.

Suddenly the likes of TP are looking much more attractive. Yes, handholding, but you never get lost in dungeons or in the overworld.  Okay, my views are being warped by PH & ST, cause I don't want TP's handholding and linearity, but no one complained about OoT, MM or TWW so SS (or the next handheld Zelda) shouldn't try to be too innovative/gimmicky but just have a great overworld, sidequests and not too much handholding and linearity.  We prefer something that is fun to play through again, like TMC.  Even the Oracles still retain most of their charm (only the part with writing down the secret codes and endless rings could get tedious, but no one says you have to get all of that again if you're just playing for fun).  But in PH and ST you kinda want at least all the gems and golden parts, and those are the hardest quests since you have to basically look EVERYWHERE, and then you're still gonna need a lot of money, and time to backtrack cause you always forget stuff.

EDIT: I do love the part where Force Gems can actually be "made" by people's happiness, that's a cool idea.  Like, I just found this woman a man to marry, that's a pretty cool sidequest.  I do like the transport goods/people sidequests, they're new yet not too gimmicky (you have to watch the road signs but you can slip up a few times so it's all good).

[Hyruleansoldier]

I'm liking the many sidequests in this game.  They should have made the freight car available sooner - I feel the game's only just now started.  I've been doing several hoursworth of sidequests, and actually not been frustrated in a while.  Sure, you lose some Mega Ice, fish, cuccos etc. on your travels, but usually you need only 10 of something when you leave with 20.

Some extra mini dungeons (to get the rarest of treasures) are great too.  I've just done two in the Snow Realm :3

And yay me, I already have the full Golden Train set.  Thanks to the Regal Ring being the first prize with the daily letter competition!

But the sick thing is I need 12 + 8 + then some Demon Fossils...  I read about it online and it seems they made some of the "common" treasures (can be found under leaves in Whittleton and in random jars and stuff) VERY rare.  For me this is the Demon Fossil: I haven't seen it in a jar or under leaves in WEEKS.

So I ask you: anyone who can spare a few minutes of his life to do the Wi-Fi mode thing to trade treasure parts?  Or does that only work with the Contact mode (two DS's being CLOSE together).  Otherwise I'm screwed.  I'll have to look for Demon Fossil on the prize card competition, it's often the 3rd price.  I foresee a long future of messing with the DS's date to be able to get 20 demon fossils.  Will. Take. Forever.
But I want the Dragon train! :3  It's so epic.

And what's the deal with bee larva?  I slash a bee hive, it flashes and disappears, but I get no bee larva.  Lame.

I love the whip race (the poles on the mountain), and the goron target range!  Omg it's fun!  And not as easy as you would think.  You really get penalized for hitting goron signs (-40 so it sure is challenging.  And the Slippery Station courses are crazy, gah I hate slipping.

Having finally unlocked multiple warp gates, things are becoming a little more convenient, though it's still guess work which path is fast (and safest). 

And I got my Engineer's Clothes (back) so I'm happy.  Still gotta do the Fire Mountain dungeon, but I've already spent many hours sidequesting :3


EDIT: Fire Mountain was a pretty cool dungeon, with the minecarts, could have been larger.   Boss 'Cragma' (Vulcanos in the EU version) is REALLY epic.  Probably the largest boss in the Zelda series (not counting MM's Twinmold).  He didn't offer much of a challenge, though, since it was pretty easy to hit all his weak spots the first time round, but there was the issue of running out of arrows.  I literally used my last one on his eye, would have had to start all over again if I'd been out.  I'm looking forward to the ultimate enemy/boss battle run (the Hyrule Castle Town minigame).

Sidequests are still da bomb, and I like how many of them are related: you need to do one after the other to unlock more tracks, do something at the new station you found, and then take it from there for the next sidequest.  This is true for the last couple of sidequests, involving some great minidungeons again, oh how I love those; all Zelda games should have more of them.  Kinda like some of the mini-dungeons in TWW to get Triforce pieces (e.g. the caves below the fireplace in the Cabana, and the 2 with the stranded Pirate ship (and the torches + teleport jars).  Unique sidequest minigames like that are da bomb!

I've actually been able to buy most of the Train Parts already, so I'd say the treasure ratio is good, although it still sucks that some of them are very rare compared to others from that row (that should be equally common or uncommon).  Fortunately the Whittleton leaves hold many treasures, but still.  At least there's the DS date trick to change what the Shops sell + what the daily prizes for the prize card game are.  There's usually 1 thing you can use (or an extra top tier treasure to sell for 2500 coins).

The shooting the miniblins minigame is probably my favorite yet, though it's too easy.  You get a Quiver upgrade for getting 3500-3999 points, and a heart container for 4000+ points, and I got the heart container BEFORE the quiver.  I had to deliberately miss several times to keep my score low, and I still got 4000+ that next time...  so yeah.  At least it'll be a fun challenge to try to ace it: hit ALL the miniblins without ever missing :3

And of course the whip race was fun but not too challenging.  I would like to try and get good times on the 3 enemy/boss battle stages though.  Fraaz ALWAYS gives me a hard time!

So yeah, I've rounded up most bunnies, did the sidequests up until this point and am now ready for some more floors of the Tower or Spirits, and then on to the 5th "Sand" realm.  More goodness in store for me!

Until next time, warriors!!

[hisak]

I barely remember the Fire Temple, but that was easily my favorite boss from Spirit Tracks. It's the only one that can stand with the fantastic bosses from Phantom Hourglass.

The Sand Temple and the Tower of Spirits floors before it were my favorite part of the game, if I remember right. Enjoy yourself.

[Hyruleansoldier]

I'm actually excited to get to the 3rd version of the "Beat them all" minigame in Hyrule Castle Town (with some enemy floors and then all of ST's bosses after one another), if only to beat Cragma / Vulcanos again.

I've taken a short hiatus since I was enjoying ST TOO much.  Really it's got me hooked on a Zelda series run, so I'll be putting ST off, at least until I'm done with PH.  I want to save the last portion of the game until I beat PH again.