Zelda: Skyward Sword - GAMESPOT 7.5 / 1UP B+ / GIANTBOMB 4!!

[Megaman]

Yeah, so this is a game, for Wii or maybe Wii U or the 3DS, I'm not sure really.

Discuss.

[Vzzzbx]

It has an elf.

[Megaman]

Look guys I did some original research, here's some info:

As some of you may be aware, Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword includes the abilty to customise and upgrade items. Below is the first footage showing how it works -

There is also new gameplay footage from Nintendo's conference in Tokyo (footage starts at 6:15) -

Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword will be released this year (November) and there will be a limited edition bundle which includes a gold Wii Remote Plus and a sountrack containing tracks from the Legend of Zelda Orchestra worldwide concert.









About Overworld/Underworld traversal

- statues are scattered about dungeons and the overworld
- statues are save points and portals to the world above the clouds
- you're only required to return to Skyloft between dungeons and at certain plot points
- Skyloft's map resembles that of Wind Waker
- bird flight is much faster than boat speed in Wind Waker
- you'll come across enemies and tornados while flying
- dungeon maps automatically fill in treasure and boss locations
- developers are treating the overworld as a big dungeon itself
- between dungeon segments now feature combat and puzzle solving that would normally be in dungeons
- no worries about controlling wind patterns while flying
- beams of light shoot up from the clouds to indicate locations
- green beam above the forest, red beam above the volcano
- set your own blue beacon to guide yourself during flight
- treasure hunting system
- while on ground, find hidden rune-encrusted boxes
- raise your sword to build up power and slash the boxes to teleport them to the clouds
- this unlocks treasure chests above the clouds
- chests are glowing points on your map
- Link can jump off his bird above any island or beacon
- between dungeon segments now feature combat and puzzle solving that would normally be in dungeons
- it took the Game Informer staffer 3 hours of overworld action before he could enter the dungeon
-Other modes of transportation that have been shown include boat riding and minecart riding
- A sky whale has been shown as a type of enemy you will encounter while traversing the Sky
-minigame also shown that require you to hit targets while flying on the bird


About the new Stamina meter

- grab a refreshing fruit to refill your stamina meter, or let it slowly refill on its own
- if it empties all the way you'll be immobilized for a few seconds
- dash up steep hills
- dash into a wall to climb up a short distance
- climbing puzzles have you figuring out where to go so you can rest and climb more, or find a spot to eat a fruit and continue on
-Can be used to climb over large enemies


About the 2nd dungeon and it's enemies and surrounding locales

- Eldin Volcano is where the a race of Mogma live
- Mogma are muscular creatures that have unique hair styles, and only pop their upper body above the ground to talk
- Mogma are accompanied by upbeat, jazzy music that features snapping fingers
- The Mogma warn link about a group of shady 'guys in red' as he heads deeper into the volcano
- orange slime monsters split into smaller enemies when you hit them
- these smaller bits grow in size if you don't destroy them quickly enough
- some Pyrups drop Eldin Ore
- slimes may drop collectible goo
- seal-like enemy called a 'Pyrup' hides beneaths rocks and inside walls
- the Pyrup will climb into walls and spout fire that blocks you
- run up a hill while bokoblins throw bounders from above
- you have to use certain types of swings to take out this enemy, and when you do they'll hit the hill below and roll down to the bottom before they disappear
- Bokoblins will also stomp on your hands when you're climbing up ledges and swing at you with their maces
- some Bokoblins have horns that allow them to call in reinforcements
- some Bokoblins hide in wooden towers that you have to blow up with bombs
- Fire Temple is the second dungeon
- Lizalfos can block all sword attacks at first
- dodge his move to make him taunt and then you can attack
- the volcano has a fish enemy that pops out of the lava and shoots fireballs at you
- defeat the enemy by tossing a bomb in its mouth
- Fire Temple boss battle takes place on a narrow ramp with a pit of lava at the bottom and bombs/hearts at the top
- the boss' name is Scaldera, which looks like a giant bolder with legs


About items

- Bomb Bag returns, which allows you to store bomb flowers
- depending on how you hold the Wiimote, you can perform an overhead bomb, or roll one
- you can put spin on bombs as well by twisting your wrist
- if you get set on fire and pull out a bomb, it will explode
- use the Digging Mitts to find rupees, hearts and other secrets
- Whip can grab onto certain elements of the environment, and also stun enemies
- gain a new musical item that uses the MotionPlus to play
-collect materials and rupees to upgrade a slingshot to utilize a spread shot
-Fludd like device shown that shoots water
-Dual clawshot confirmed
- Parachute item that appears to function like the Deku Leaf
- Bug Net also shown
-bugs can be used to create/alter potions
- You can also run and drink potions
-Amber Relic, Monster Claw, and Jelly Blob are some examples of collectables you can acquire to upgrade your items.
- You can upgrade your Wooden Shield to a Banded Shield
- Mirror Shield was also shown ,very briefly, to absorb and reflect back attacks.


About Dowsing ability

- Skyward Sword has the power of dowsing
- to use the dowsing ability, you hold the sword out in front of you and the game goes into first person
- the sword makes a noise when pointed in the direction you need to go
- use this ability to find keys, hearts and even Zelda herself
- no compass in this version of the game, as it's replaced by the dowsing ability
- The Skyward Sword can also be used to draw hearts on special tablets to get extra health


More info on Ghirahim

- Ghirahim shows up in the Forest and Fire temples
- Ghirahim calls Zelda a 'precious oracle' and a 'female servant of the Goddess'
- Ghirahim summons the Fire Temple boss, tells you you'll never find Zelda and then flees


About the Silent Realm

- The Silent Realm lets you take on 'spiritual tests that Link must go through in an alternate world'
- return to twisted versions of previous areas
- this Silent Realm location involves the overworld area that surrounded the Forest Temple
- mixes tear collecting of Twilight Princess and stealth of Phantom Hourglass
- shove the Skyward Sword into the ground to access these areas, and enter with no weapons
- fill a spiritual vessel with tears, all while Guardians try to block you
- these Guardians can knock you out with one hit
- you enter the Silent Realm in a circle of safety, but the Guardians activate as soon as you leave that circle
- this is when the Guardians raise their arms/swords and the industrial music begins
- Guardians deactivate as you pick up tears
- you get 90 seconds after grabbing a tear to get the next, or the Guardians wake up
- lantern-wielding ghosts float by, and if you are hit with their light the Guardians activate no matter how much time has passed
- collect light seeds to make the remaining tears shoot a beam of light into the sky for 30 seconds


About music

- Guardians of the Silent Realm are accompanied by industrial music akin to something in Silent Hill
- this new approach to music comes as Aonuma's goal to 'break down some of the typical patterns you see in Zelda games'
- other musical cues in the game that long-time fans will appreciate
- includes a surprising use of the overworld theme from the original Legend of Zelda
- Aonuma reveals details behind the main theme for Skyward Sword, which is Zelda's Lullaby reversed


Miyamoto also confirmed a second play-through and boss challenge mode for Skyward Sword, and the game will have 50-100 hours of gameplay, one of Nintendo's largest projects ever.

[Jasper]

Shouldn't you have made an official thread about Spyro The Dragon or Crash Bandicoot on Xbox 360, considering that's what you are paying money to play?????

You have even removed your Gamertag details from your profile, because you're so embarrassed by it.

[Cardsy]

Thank God we finally have an official thread for Zelda SS, I'll happily post in this one.

[Vzzzbx]

I'm a bit worried about the stamina meter thing that Megaman mentioned but otherwise I'm quite looking forward to this game. You'd think Twilight Princess would have turned me off Zelda games for life. Apparently not.

[t0mby]

Really looking forward to playing Skyward Sword. Has there been a release date announced?

Can a mod or admin delete Roccos post please as it's cluttering up the official thread. If he wants to talk about Spyro and Crash then he is free to create his own thread.

Thanks, your pal,
t0mby.

[Vzzzbx]

I read something about Nov-Dec on GameSpot.

[GameHED]

When WiiU comes out, I hope nintendo does a port of this game in HD.

They could probably double dip in the same way many third parties do by releasing versions of everything on every platform that exists. I don't think fans would mind it much since this is a game that could be good enough as a launch title to keep them busy while nintendo make more wiiu titles.

It would be no different to how they released Zelda on gameboy and then later did a Zelda DX on the gameboy colour adding extra things to the same game.

What do you guys think?

Should they do that? These epics take 4-5 years to create. I wouldn't mind the option of playing it on upgraded system to be honest. Let the next nintendo system have support for wii 1 controllers or add some new control scheme for that version.

[Vzzzbx]

They will anyway so

[guttermouth]

I read something about Nov-Dec on GameSpot.

Is that the US or Japan release date, I guess we will get it here in 6-8 months later, going on Nintendo's primitive release schedule...

Also Nintendo Australia still can not confirm if we are getting the Collectors Edition here in Australia...

Seriously is there any other gaming company that treats their customers/fans like shit....

[Vzzzbx]

Import the fucker, or just dolphin it.

[Megaman]

Yeah I'm pretty sure the Wii U port is well underway, not to mention the remake for the Nintendo 4DS.

[Megaman]

You have even removed your Gamertag details from your profile, because you're so embarrassed by it.

Pretty sure it's in my sig in the above post. As you can see the last game I played was Dragon Age II, that's a game that's popular with the kids on the internet, right?

[t0mby]

You have even removed your Gamertag details from your profile, because you're so embarrassed by it.

Pretty sure it's in my sig in the above post. As you can see the last game I played was Dragon Age II, that's a game that's popular with the kids on the internet, right?

And what's funny is all the games in your 'recently played' are exclusively not on Nintendo.


Anyway, back on topic as to not derail the thread a Nov-Dec release sounds good. Only thing I'm concerned about is whether this game will work on future consoles with the Wiimote, otherwise the gold edition doesn't really sound the appealing.

[GameHED]

I'm happy with the look of this game. I personally don't like the southpark/ren and stimpy style of wind waker over the more serious look.

To me link will always be the one we saw in the illustrations in manuals where he is somewhere between a fully adult man, and a teen with a skinny frame. Not some fat chunky little guy who was only drawn that way becaue of the limitations of technology.

Mario I am totally fine with being that way though. I want him to stay as something similar to the simple cartoon-like little men you see in those game and watch games. Don't make his legs longer like sega did with sonic the hedgehog. That's just stupid.

Unless nintendo make a special zelda game where you travel alternate universes and visit different versions of link from these different dimensions. (maybe the player can customise how he looks and name his universe and that is "his" Link) I'd be ok with this. You could be like that guy in the tv show "quantum leap" and be all the Links from different timelines/places/dimensions sort of like how you can choose to be any of the gundams from the different gundam universes in the dynasty warrior gundam games.

Probably would take 20 years to make that game though.

[Twiztid Elf]

It has an elf.

Link isn't an elf. He's Hylian.

[Vzzzbx]

http://au.gamespot.com/news/6334066.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Nintendo Australia is back on the prowl and teasing Aussie gamers with news that a limited-edition bundle for The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword is Australia-bound. Inside of the pack, fans will find a copy of the game, a music CD featuring selected songs from The Legend of Zelda 25th Anniversary Symphony, and a special Wii Remote Plus that has the Hylian Crest on it.

If you miss out on the limited edition, the standard game will also come packaged with the same music CD for a limited time.

While this is all good news for Australian Zelda fans, Nintendo is yet to announce two critical details: a local date and pricing.

There you go. Just import it.

[selfish]

I can't remember if twilight princess was any good. I mean, I finished it, but it was just kind of meh.

[Vzzzbx]

It was boring. Went on way too long, had a ridiculously large overworld and didn't advance the franchise in any significant way. I don't think I ever finished it.

Oh, and the contrived Saturday morning cartoon American-yoof subtitles were horrible even by Nintendo's standards. "Gee, swell! Say, go speak to the princess and I'll go fix you a potion!" Properly awful.

[selfish]

I'm glad we're talking about these things in the official thread, it just wouldn't do to use a non-official thread.

I'm about to finish OOT, and I can't really see what the fuss was about. I mean, there's a lot to *do* in the game, but none of it is particularly great. Much more excited for starfox.

[Vzzzbx]

It was incredible at the time. I think it's just dated, being 12 years old.

[Seraph]

Ocarina of Time was the birth of the new type of Zelda. In the new Zelda, the overworld is large for the sake of being large, text is interminably long, combat is dumbed down, and there's a lot more hand-holding when it comes to progressing through the game.

[Vzzzbx]

Yeah, it's like they went "this game needs to be BIGGAR" without really considering what that meant. Also, yeah, hand-holding. Too much of the game was just enforced tutorials.

[GameHED]

I like big expansive environments. But I believe that you need to make it interesting by populating the big areas with lots of interesting things too.

OOT's problem was that the design of the overworld was a bit basic. You had the hub world and then things branched out from that.

I want the world to be more varied so that you have to get to one place by going through another place which might involved being attacked by things that are dangerous just to get to the place you need to go. (think super metroid - sometimes you got to get damaged before you can earn the right to see the new area)

In a game I should be able to climb up a mountain and explore a mysterious cave but while I am scaling it or searching the cave I see a lot of dangerous things preventing me from just getting there for free. This is what adventure should be: you are going to travel from place to place, see many different things, interact with many different items, and then put your life on the line to obtain the quest related treasures needed to kill the bad guy.
But only if you apply skills properly and can earn your way past the dangers.

If it's just a big world with nothing cool to do anything in or items to play around with there is no incentive to explore it.
Plus the game needs fast travel and waiting around for X hours options of some kind these days. This is for those who want to skip past boring parts of a game (ie shenmue's waiting around for people to come home to talk to npcs) to keep the pace of a game quick.

When you were were a kid you liked wasting time doing stupid shit to see what would happen, and experimentation with different things to find loads of secret things that you would not have found out about if you didn't think outside the box, but as the environments get bigger in modern games, the total amount of places to explore mean the games will demand more deovtion to that world. This is fine for most "I only buy 1 game per year" guys. But I think they need to make games faster-paced for the "main quest only" crowd, whilst making the game still fun for devoted hardcore fanatics of zelda games (the "100% completion" archealogist crowd) if they want to appeal to people of today.

I think people complaining about big worlds being boring are just people who have less overall time to devote to a game than before. I used to think Super Metroid was a big game, (because you did loads of backtracking) and then when Metroid Fusion came out, I hated how streamlined the experience was, because it felt like an action adventure game with the emphasis on action and not adventure/exploration/puzzles. This is what I fear could happen if nintendo just cater to the "I have no time for this game" group. I want just the right balance.

Populate your games with loads of interesting shit and the guys who complain about the world being so huge won't notice as much. Make it big, but make fill it up with lots of interactivity. That was my problem with OOT. Hyrule Fields was just the place you went to for riding the horse with. Still beats the shit out of other clones like legacy of kain or whatever else was out at the time. That's why it gets its classic status. People forget to compare old games with whatever else was around with it at the time to put things into perspective.