Topic: The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword HD

I am still here, trucking along but I still dunno how I feel about this game. Like every time something seems bad, it is usually never actually the thing in question, but just because of the rancid controls. Like the sheer volumes of frustration the controls introduce, that otherwise wouldn’t ever be there, is honestly just kinda sad in a lot of ways. However, it’s also a testament I suppose to how strong of a game this is that they get arguably the most important thing wrong and yet I want to keep playing.

I am about 22 hours in now and feel like I have done so much since I last checked in, so here is a summary:

ICKY TOE BEANS.
Oh man a regenerating shield? That sounds awesome, because so far shields have been ***** useless! Here we go, a nice parry and… it broke. Welp, I give up on shields.
Sassy robot horny for my AI thing.
Into the thunderstorm and I am scared.
LET'S REUSE SOME LOCATIONS EVEN THOUGH THERE HAS ONLY BEEN FOUR.
Oh, I thought that trial would be hard, but it was actually surprisingly easy!
New enemies and mechanics!
Oh, please just accept my ***** circle drowning, this is the best you are going to get.
***** these water controls are awkward. *****, all of these controls are awkward.
Why do so many quests require me to have empty containers on hand? I've seriously never been given one, so I just have to keep wasting potions to make room.
Giving a dragon a bath.
Flame one down!

That about covers my experience from my last check in I think?

Oh and talking in detail about the ancient toilet dungeon, this might actually be my least favourite of all of the dungeons so far. I thought it had some terrific imagery, but almost everything about this was either held back by the rancid controls or just botched executionwise.

Like, that first boss? So damn hard. Why though? No idea. Had to basically clear my pouch, fill it with shields and play this tedious game of parry tennis until I eventually killed it. Really sucked.

Then the real boss was in some ways even worse. I genuinely don’t understand the first phase at all? It took so looooooooong for the boss to attack me and all you can do is just run around in circles waiting for him to do that? Like was I missing a step or something? This was so tedious, I genuinely almost died because I fell asleep. Then the next two phases were insanely easy and quick! Just a super botched design.

Then there was the general dungeon design, while I thought technically the previous dungeon was way more complicated than the last one, I just thought it was so intuitive. On this one, I almost never had a ***** clue where it wanted me to go, I basically needed a YouTube guide open all the time. Not to help me solve any puzzles really, which were actually a huge step down from the last dungeon, but just because I seemed to constantly hit dead ends and then it’d turn out I needed to go some way that I would have never thought of to get to the next area.

Then it came to the new mechanics, again, a big step down from the last area as they basically only introduce two new ones but both of them suck exclusively because of the controls. Water jumping is incredibly awkward and often sees you constantly bumping off of sides, having to swim really far back to turn around and try again.

And oh my God that whip, what do I even say about the whip, I think being hit by it would be less painful than trying to control it.

So I thought I was progression blocked by that second time you face a scorpion boss as you don’t respawn with full hearts nor do you respawn with potions used and you can’t leave to go get new ones. However, after four attempts, I dunno whether the game adapted the difficulty for how much I was struggling but then I beat them (by the skin of my teeth) and so the progression continues. ***** that mine cart mechanic on the rails thing where you have to rock it backwards and forwards though either way, so incredibly frustrating.

Skyward Sword is a special game. Divisive. Some love it, some hate it, while still others love it despite hating parts of it.

I'm glad it exists. I don't want to play another Zelda with motion controlled sword, but I'm glad we got one. It's unique. And I like unique.

I'm still in the sand area though. Just got sidetracked with all these other games.

I’m up to the pirate ship dungeon now on the quest for my second flame. This has had some very intuitive, satisfying, puzzles but a lot of seemingly going backwards and forwards and in circles as you hit the right things in the right sequence. I think because it is ultimately such a small and not particularly interesting space, it can feel a little convoluted and exhausting at times as you have to keep going in and out of the same rooms.

I was surprised by how easy that duel was with the skeleton pirate, too. The boss difficulty in this game is all over the place. Like with most things in this game, the more it relies on the controls, the worse it becomes, because the controls are just so ass. Like that second scorpion was mostly as hard as it was because you had to hit these exact swipes to do damage and it was so easy to be just off enough for them to auto block. Super frustrating. I will say the gyro on the first person bow is actually pretty nice, though.

This is only my second Zelda game and I dunno if I’m enjoying it more than BOTW. It always feels like SS is a more frustrating experience, to the point where I am sort of dreading turning it on sometimes. I definitely have to have a good head space.

But that is usually just because of the controls. And BOTW only seemed to have less frustration because a) it had way better controls but also because of all the filler, each new story progression required you to then traverse a lot of mostly empty space to get to the next one. SS cuts out all of the fat and filler of BOTW, you clear a dungeon, do a little of sigh relief but you’re basically straight back into another one. It doesn’t let up.

With that in mind, I would probably say SS is the better game. It has much more complex mechanics/dungeon designs and just generally feels like a more satisfying experience, overall. I like the themes of each areas and the way in which the game builds on, expands or introduces mechanics, it could be incredibly overwhelming but I think it speaks of the strength of the design that it never is.

I think that is what I kind of feel about SS in general, it gets arguably the most important thing wrong - the controls - and it adds so much frustration which would otherwise simply not be there had it used better, more conventional, controls (especially as they added button controls, I wish they had the button controls you get and then a second set which just played like a normal game, as most of the motion stuff ruins the experience rather than enhancing it) but even despite that, I just want to keep playing this and see what the game offers me next. Each new dungeon could practically be a whole game on it’s own, so the fact this game just keeps delivering such new and varied experiences just never fails to impress me. Especially when you compare it to BOTW which is open world, but has a fraction really of what SS offers.

First playthrough of Skyward Sword. I quit at 45 hours because, the game started requiring a lot of backtracking & it became a confusing mess for me. (not implying it's bad game design, but I got lost)

@TheJGG I noticed you have 40 hours, around where I'm at. Is this your first playthrough?

@WoomyNNYes No, I've played through the entire game on Wii before I decided to get it again for Switch. So obviously when playing through the whole game again I remembered most of the puzzle solutions and the general lay of the land. So me putting in 40 hours meant completing as many sidequests as I could, plus six hours of a new playthrough I started a few days ago.

As for the game being backtracky... you haven't played Final Fantasy XV, because the game has lots of backtracking sections. I agree to an extent, in some dungeons you'll end up doing the same rooms a few times, but for me it wasn't really a bad thing. It was like unfolding an origami sculpture.

@TheJGG honestly the dungeons where you backtrack are the best ones

@blindsquarel I agree, yeah. It gives a really strong sense of unravelling a giant puzzle. It can be seen as a slow burn and even difficult to gauge progress, but I think it's a great way to design puzzles. Having said that I feel like the Skyward Sword dungeons were a little too easy (rich coming from someone playing the game again), I really hope future games take inspiration from Twilight Princess and Ocarina of Time/Majora's Mask, because those were... tough in a good way.

Don't get me started on Breath of the Wild's dungeons. If they can even be called that.

Played the Pirate Ship Stronghold, liked the the Eldin Volcano Summit, got all three flames for the sword, I was having a good time with Skyward, only to discover that I'm at the Sealed Grounds boss fight, opening the gate of time. I'm not ready for the end, or the stress of a big boss fight. Not sure I have incentive to play on, if the game is mostly over.

@WoomyNNYes You've still got a bit longer to go

I really enjoyed both the Wii and the Switch HD remake.

The Imprisoned is such an awful boss fight. And they make us do it THREE times to boot.

@TheJGG the game would have been so much closer to an all-time great (for the era) without that boss

It's a bit more fun when you're doing it with the Groosenator at least. That first time without is just a painful slog though.

I didn't find the Imprisoned THAT bad, even though it is profoundly stupid that you have to fight it 3 times (more if you play the boss rush where I think all three fights can be done in it for some reason). I just find it to be another example of Skyward Sword being needlessly padded and long.

Landing on it from above instead of destroying the toes makes it a bit faster.

@NinChocolate @Matt_Barber Yeah, doing it with the Groosenator made it a lot more fun. The best part was during the final fight where you have to catapult onto its head as it's flying towards the temple. It's just so epic. The panic as you rush up to get to the Groosenator as the Imprisoned rises up and floats towards you will never not get me tense.

Having said that it's the only fun part of a needlessly tedious, long and unnecessary boss fight. At least the Blight Ganon bosses come in different elements.

@TheJGG
I've only played this on the Wii, and when it came to the bit with the groosenator, I didn't realise the wiimotion + was wofeully uncalibrated, which made everything impossible!

I don't like the Imprisoned because it's stressful. I hate anything that's on a timer.
But on the other hand I love Majora's Mask, oddly enough.

@TommyTendo Exact same for me, hate anything on a timer that results in death, I can't play Pikmin, Majora's Mask is also fine by me though strangely. The imprisoned is just a pain in the arse either way though, especially the first 2 fights.

Also I just came back to this game for a motion controls play-through (on switch, I did play it on Wii as well)

I played HD with button controls first and so far, I'd recommend button all the way, I will say I notice the improvement from the Wii though especially in skydiving. The main grievances I have with button-only controls are the slight takeaway from the immersion (although constant calibration also does that) and it's quite difficult to do fatal blows at first. I am having fun with it so far though, I just beat Moldarach(edit: lol it's real name is Scaldera oopsie) and the Earth Temple, I don't think I'll 100% this run-through but I plan on beating it again.