428 replies to this topic

[Rambly]

For puzzles, I took a little bit of inspiration from The Lost Vikings, though my style is fairly different.

omgggg i was just thinking about how some of the splitting puzzles gave me kind of a Lost Vikings vibe; nice to know that wasn't all in my head

 

anyway... i haven't finished this yet; i just wanted to say (while the thoughts are still fresh in my mind) that i am enjoying this very, very much so far and i think it's going to end up being one of my favorite quests and a stronnggggg contender for favorite.  i know people have said this already, but the way you managed to get all these things from all these disparate games to fit together and to use them in puzzles in TONNNNS of clever and interesting ways is kind of genius.  it's like you have an entire ecosystem of items you can combine together in a bajillion ways.  the possibilities feel endless.

 

i think, beyond that, i really really really appreciate the attention to detail it has; the eye for the original games' mechanics' finer details and the way they all fit together.  i feel like a lot of quests take mechanics from official games and just kinda just rush to include them in super barebones, unsatisfying-feeling ways, but everything in this quest just feels fun.  the downstab feels as fun to pogostick with (even in top-down!) as it does in Z2, just jumping around with the roc's cape feels super fun, the pegasus boots (or their replacement, rather) feel just like LA's in a way that's kind of... amazing.  (speaking of the pegasus boots, i REALLY appreciated that there's an "Ancient Stone Tablets" item that lets you turn dashes.  having a reference to a little change in game mechanics that was in a spinoff game on the satellaview genuinely fills me with joy)  i think it is that attention to detail and that ability to use the mechanics in clever ways that holds the quest together.  it's honestly the same sort of feeling i get from Nintendo's best games, that combination of game mechanics that feel fun to control and the joy of discovery, both of secrets and the potential uses of said mechanics.

 

(also i liked the instruction manual too, it was cute and felt super authentic)

 

i'll probably have more stuff to say (and maybe some bugs to point out? sorry if the idea of having more stuff to fix on your plate is daunting @_@) later once i finish the quest

[Anthus]

Finally got around to playing this. It's a great quest so far. I really can't complain at all. Like I said in my comment, it might very well pass Search for Elise as my favorite quest. I forget I'm even playing a ZC game sometimes, and this really does feel like it could have been, in another universe, a Zelda 3 prototype, or even a real game.

 

From what I gathered about the story, I'm around half way done? I finished three palaces, and have not needed help yet, but I am stuck in Miyahon, and have been wandering around for a while, and it seems there is nowhere to go. I just got the boss key, and I think I need to find a regular key to pass this block her circled in green.

 

 

Thanks for sharing this awesome game with us, Mitsukara. It is seriously like the greatest thing ever, pretty much made in ZC, except if blueknight would have finished his 3D thing.

 

EDIT: Also, it's hella amusing to watch Zelda go absolutely nuts with her bow. Thanks for that. And you made a legit manual?? And these options.. oh man, this is just.. the Octorok's knees.

[C-Dawg]

I'm finally playing through myself, and I found a bug!

 

I was riding Epona around in the water and came to the screen in the far north of Calatia where I can see a little chain chomp surrounded by mountains and a pit with a line drawn through it whose use I have not yet determined. I rode into the bombable wall with Epona at charge and was taken into a sidescrolling screen where I could see a magic container underwater, but not reach it. When I emerged, I was warped out on the opposite side of the island I had come in on. This was a problem, because I did not have the Red Key at the time, so... stuck!

[Deedee]

From what I gathered about the story, I'm around half way done? I finished three palaces, and have not needed help yet, but I am stuck in Miyahon, and have been wandering around for a while, and it seems there is nowhere to go. I just got the boss key, and I think I need to find a regular key to pass this block her circled in green.

 

 

Spoiler

That square in the bottom right is a superball trigger. Have you got that yet? It required pushing a suspicious block in the first room (also, you may have difficulty hitting using the cardinal shooter. You'll want the diagonal one Zelda uses).

 

I'm finally playing through myself, and I found a bug!

 

I was riding Epona around in the water and came to the screen in the far north of Calatia where I can see a little chain chomp surrounded by mountains and a pit with a line drawn through it whose use I have not yet determined. I rode into the bombable wall with Epona at charge and was taken into a sidescrolling screen where I could see a magic container underwater, but not reach it. When I emerged, I was warped out on the opposite side of the island I had come in on. This was a problem, because I did not have the Red Key at the time, so... stuck!

Welp, I thought I reported that during testing. I think it happens because Epona's dash turns the warp into tile warp A when it's supposed to bomb into tile warp B. 

[C-Dawg]

 

Welp, I thought I reported that during testing. I think it happens because Epona's dash turns the warp into tile warp A when it's supposed to bomb into tile warp B. 

 

Yeah, I confirmed that this occurs when you hit the bombable wall near the maze dungeon in Calaita too. (over on the right side, what looks like Maze Island from AOL.) Basically, Epona turns bombable walls into waterfalls. Logical!

 

Six dungeons completed now -- and very well done, designer. They were incredibly dense and really puzzle-intensive. Items got a workout. Nothing felt useless, getting through always required an "aha" or sometimes just realizing what the graphics were trying to show. One limitation of your graphic style is that it's sometimes really not obvious what is high ground versus low ground... but that's a small issue. Anyway, I'm currently searching high and low for dungeon 7, so wish me luck!

 

EDIT: I was just scanning this thread, and... am I supposed to have the Magnet or the Spinner at this point? I've cleared six dungeons and I don't have either one, but some of the comments here are suggesting to me that somehow I got past the puzzles without ever needing them.

Edited by C-Dawg, 24 July 2017 - 09:10 PM.

[Deedee]

EDIT: I was just scanning this thread, and... am I supposed to have the Magnet or the Spinner at this point? I've cleared six dungeons and I don't have either one, but some of the comments here are suggesting to me that somehow I got past the puzzles without ever needing them.

Spoiler

Have you completedor entered Terui yet? They're both found in that dungeon. Protip: try to go through the dungeon as if you never got any other item in the other nearby dungeons of that set. People almost always miss the magnet glove due to it being easily skipped by a certain jumping item found in a desert dungeon.

[C-Dawg]

I finally found Terui and finished it. Pretty easy compared to some of the others. 

 

I don't think I got into Terui correctly, though.  I could not figure out how to remove that wall in the way of the stairs leading up to it, so eventually I just starting screwing around with the hookshot / switchhook based on some comments in this thread and glitched through. I can't imagine that's intentional! 

[Deedee]

I finally found Terui and finished it. Pretty easy compared to some of the others. 

 

I don't think I got into Terui correctly, though.  I could not figure out how to remove that wall in the way of the stairs leading up to it, so eventually I just starting screwing around with the hookshot / switchhook based on some comments in this thread and glitched through. I can't imagine that's intentional! 

Spoiler

You aren't supposed to remove it. That dirt in front of it hides something...

[C-Dawg]

Finished Selene and, basically, the first game in this two-game pack. I've dipped my toe into the North Palace, and at least so far, it feels like a sequel pushed into the same cartridge. Different mechanics, different tilesets, both from Z2, and a much more combat-oriented experience, at least so far. Two games for the price of none!

[Anthus]

I don't think I had the superball when I was in that room the first time, but I ended up buying a key since I had like 600 rupees

 

Something odd happened today though. I started my save, and it went to the title screen, and brought up the rule select screen. Thankfully, it was fine, and after going through the rule page thing, it put me where I was. I started on this screen. This screen also showed up for a split second before going to the title screen.

 

 

I also completely forget where

Spoiler

the house that has the red, green, and blue keys. I've been there before but forget where it is.

[Deedee]

I don't think I had the superball when I was in that room the first time, but I ended up buying a key since I had like 600 rupees

 

Something odd happened today though. I started my save, and it went to the title screen, and brought up the rule select screen. Thankfully, it was fine, and after going through the rule page thing, it put me where I was. I started on this screen. This screen also showed up for a split second before going to the title screen.

 

 

I also completely forget where

Spoiler

the house that has the red, green, and blue keys. I've been there before but forget where it is.

The save thing is intentional. Restarting the quest while on the overworld brings up the rules menu, allowing you to change the rules midgame.

Also the keys are in the ship on that same screen.

[Anthus]

The save thing is intentional. Restarting the quest while on the overworld brings up the rules menu, allowing you to change the rules midgame.

 

That's good to know. Come to think of it, I usually save and quit in dungeons, but yeah.

 

(And yep, prolly favorite quest of all time.)

[C-Dawg]

So as I continue playing what I'll call the "Second Quest" after Selene, I find that this is probably the weakest part of the quest. The first part was amazing, both in terms of consistently good puzzles and gameplay. Wandering around the Z2 overwold and Z2 side-scrolling screens feels much weaker. I know why the screens are so bland and uninteresting: that's how Nintendo made Z2, for better or worse. The cracks in the game mechanics also really start to show when you're wandering around an exact clone of Z2 because Link and Zelda don't QUITE move quite as crisply as Link does in AOL for that environment. The jump is a bit too low, the down thrust is a little bit off, and so on. Minor things that only become apparent when you're doing combat-intensive sidescrolling all the time.

 

Re-making the whole environment for this game is a nostalgia bomb, but I get the impression that if someone was approaching this game without really knowing a lot about Z2, they would be shocked at the overall drop in quality. 

 

I'm not stopping, of course, because from the Let's Plays I know that the Palaces will be a return to form for this quest. But, it's interesting to realize how badly designed the Z2 overworld, towns, and caves really were when they're thrown into relief like this.

 

 

And yep, prolly favorite quest of all time.)

 

I'm coming to the same conclusion; I like Zodiac quite a bit, don't get me wrong. But, for a Zelda Classic quest, this one is clearly in a league of its own. The overworld is dense and quirky, and reminds me of the Oracle series. The choice to go with A MILLION ITEMS works fantastically well since the dungeons are so puzzle-dense and interesting. All the items seem to get used all the time, and the author put a ton of thought into making sure nothing was ever truly obsolete. Even the Compass gets new life in being required for the maze paths in each dungeon. Speaking of puzzles, they're consistently the best among any quest I've ever played, including the professional games. The graphics are basic but get the job done and combine different games effortlessly. All of this alone makes it a great game.

 

But what makes it the best ZELDA CLASSIC game ever made is that on top of all of this, the author made it all one massive nostalgia grenade. Basically every quest in the 8 and 16-bit era is represented somehow, and much of Orciana of time seems to be in there, too. Z2 and Z1 are practically all included as parts of this larger game. This is the Zelda fan game to end all Zelda games. I'd compare it to Megaman Unlimited in terms of capturing the feeling of the source material, improving upon it, and weaving new elements into the game that feel like natural extensions.

 

I'll do a more thorough review on the Quest Database once I've finally finished the game, but so far, it's really amazing.

Edited by C-Dawg, 27 July 2017 - 10:28 AM.

[studkid]

Re-making the whole environment for this game is a nostalgia bomb, but I get the impression that if someone was approaching this game without really knowing a lot about Z2, they would be shocked at the overall drop in quality. 

I would have to agree with this statement.  I felt that after finishing up Calatia and moving onto Hyrule, at first I was pretty excited when I saw that the whole Z2 map was remade here but that kind of wore off fast once I started to tackle the palaces.  I felt a lot of the palaces were a bit tedious imo.  I had the first seashell reward at this point so I could breeze through most rooms easily with the patra power.  Plus not knowing the full Z2 layout due to my lack of experience with Z2 hurt me a bit (like that weird black monster thing you need to pickup with the power bracelet and throw it to get it out of the way).  I didn't have a good idea of where things were either which wasn't as big of a deal due to the shrines telling you where the palace you opened was and the standard ZC map also helped quite a bit.

Spoiler

Anyways, the "Old Hyrule" part was pretty cool.  At first I thought it was going to be a whole big area to explore and finish dungeons but clearly that was not the case.  I never really saw the point of having it since I didn't find really anything useful there except for the potion shop.  Also I couldn't figure out where you were meant to get the keys to enter the Tower of Ganon so I ended up buying them all.  

 

I'm almost done with the game now, only have to beat Ganon which is a really cool fight but I feel it takes too much time especially with thunder using pretty much all of your mana just to get rid of the barriers.  When I first tried it I already used all of my mana for healing and defense ups so I just had to dodge until the barriers went down again.  Also that lava rising attack seems to me like total bs.  How are you supposed to dodge that?  Either way I can't wait to finish off this quest and get to the post game (which I might wait a few weeks to do since I am pretty busy next week and I want to take a bit of a break from it).

Edited by studkid, 27 July 2017 - 06:03 PM.

[Deedee]

Spoiler

Anyways, the "Old Hyrule" part was pretty cool.  At first I thought it was going to be a whole big area to explore and finish dungeons but clearly that was not the case.  I never really saw the point of having it since I didn't find really anything useful there except for the potion shop.  Also I couldn't figure out where you were meant to get the keys to enter the Tower of Ganon so I ended up buying them all.  

 

I'm almost done with the game now, only have to beat Ganon which is a really cool fight but I feel it takes too much time especially with thunder using pretty much all of your mana just to get rid of the barriers.  When I first tried it I already used all of my mana for healing and defense ups so I just had to dodge until the barriers went down again.  Also that lava rising attack seems to me like total bs.  How are you supposed to dodge that?  Either way I can't wait to finish off this quest and get to the post game (which I might wait a few weeks to do since I am pretty busy next week and I want to take a bit of a break from it).

Spoiler

You were supposed to find the keys scattered around Old Hyrule. Most are fairly obvious (such as the key in the sword cave), but there's some hidden ones such as a key hidden in the corner of the hidden topright screen.

The lava attack you're supposed to use an item from the final dungeon to dodge. Since the magic key and the glove are both passive, there's really only one other item you get there that could help you dodge...