August 10, 2008 at 7:38 pm (Adventure of Link)
Tags: endgame, Game play, triforce
It took me another hour, but I beat Thunderbird. Landing that final blow and seeing the boss disintegrate was so fulfilling. I screamed “Yes” loud enough to make the neighbors uncomfortable. It was pure joy, even though I knew I had another boss yet to beat.
After Thunderbird, Shadow Link seemed downright easy. I think I beat him on the second try. The old jump-and-attack method that you use with the Iron Knuckles works equally well with Shadow Link.
I would sooner stab myself in the face
The ending is about what you’d expect for an NES title. Nothing fantastic, but that doesn’t matter. I’m done. I can move on to the games I’ve really been looking forward to. I grabbed a couple screen shots to prove my monumental victory.
Time played: 1 hour
Total time to beat game: about 20 hours
Next title: A Link to the Past
The sweet little triforce icon means I beat it
2 Comments
August 10, 2008 at 5:02 pm (Adventure of Link)
Tags: boss, Game play, hard, thunderbird
Thunderbird is so hard!
I took another 5 or 6 cracks at defeating Thunderbird, but I did not prevail. I once got Thunderbird down to 2 bars on the life meter, but then I died. I still think my approach of using Thunder/Reflect is the right one. I’m beginning to get a bit of a pattern down, but I need to perfect it.
I really wanted to beat this game this weekend, so I will likely try again later tonight. For now, I need a break though.
Note: The image is not my screen grab. My magic is only at level 6. Perhaps if my level or attack were at 8 I’d have better success. There’s just no way I’m venturing out of the palace at this point though.
Time played: 45 minutes
Leave a Comment
August 10, 2008 at 1:06 pm (Adventure of Link)
Tags: boss, Game play, jump, reflect, shield, thunder, thunderbird
I fired up the Wii today and was dismayed to find out that I started from the beginning of the map again, despite having been in the final palace last game. Apparently if you choose “Save” instead of “Continue” you don’t respawn in the final palace, grr. The good news is I made it to the final palace in only two tries.
I have played this palace enough times now that I can reach Thunderbird usually on my first life, and usually with enough magic left to cast “Thunder”. However, I died after several attempts at beating this needlessly difficult boss. In desperation, I tried casting Thunder, Reflect instead of my typical Thunder, Shield, Jump combo. With reflect cast the fireballs Thunderbird spits out hit you far less frequently. In fact, unless you jump into one I don’t think they harm you. Even without shield I was able to get far more hits in on Thunderbird than with Shield/Jump.
I’m confident that when I come back tonight I should be able to beat Thunderbird in a few more attempts. Right now, I’m going to head out and pick up A Link to the Past for GBA. I am optimistic that I will be on to that game by tomorrow and I want to be ready.
Time played: 45 minutes
Leave a Comment
August 9, 2008 at 9:02 pm (Adventure of Link)
Tags: boss, Game play
Despite my earlier frustration, I decided to take another crack at reaching the final palace. It took me another try or two, but I made it. As I remembered, once you reach the final palace, if you die you start at the palace entrance. This saves SO MUCH frustration.
The final palace is quite hard. My general approach in this palace is to avoid enemies instead of trying to defeat them. There are a bunch of these armored birds that jump and throw swords and take about 10 hits to defeat. I’ve gotten down the timing when to run under them, so that’s a relief.
This palace is very expansive too, with plenty of dead ends. I explored for a while and eventually found the first boss “Thunderbird.” It took me about 3 or 4 tries before realizing that you have to use Thunder before doing anything else. I got the strategy down, but it is still quite hard. I probably tried 10 or 11 times before giving up for the night. With a fresh start tomorrow, I’m confident I can beat Thunderbird, and maybe even the game.
Either way, I’m going to pick up “A Link to the Past” for GBA tomorrow to be prepared for the next portion of my quest.
Time played: 45 minutes
Leave a Comment
August 9, 2008 at 11:56 am (Adventure of Link)
Tags: frustration, Game play
My gaming session today started out on such an optimistic note. I was in the Hidden Palace, and I found the boss within 5 minutes. I beat the boss on my first try. I was thinking, “This game isn’t as hard or frustrating as people make it out to be.” How quickly my thoughts changed.
My next mission was the final palace and I had a pretty good idea where it was. The problem is, it is a fairly long path to get there, with tons of tough enemies and roadblocks along the way. Almost every battle involves those swarming eye creatures known as “Moas”.
Moa: the root of all evil
They are pure evil, especially when mixed with lava pits you have to jump over. One swoop as your jumping and your dead in the lava pit. Couple this with the fact that dying 3 times takes you all the way back to the BEGINNING and you can feel my frustration. After about 4 restarts I had to pull the plug and keep my blood pressure from getting any higher.
I may come back today with a vodka lemonade or something. The only good news is that once you reach the final palace, if you die you restart from that palace.
Time played today: 30 minutes
Leave a Comment
August 8, 2008 at 11:04 pm (Adventure of Link)
Tags: Game play
Not a whole lot to report tonight. I spent some time in the forest killing orange lizard men and leveled my magic up to 7. I was going to level up my life as well, but I couldn’t take the suspense and headed for the Hidden Palace.
This palace seems larger than previous ones, but it’s not particularly difficult. I explored quite a few rooms and encountered my first “sub boss.” This boss was the horse-mounted blue iron knuckle that I beat as a main boss from a previous palace. There were no curtains like a normal boss room, but there was the familiar music and life gauge, and I couldn’t leave. I beat him fairly easily, and was rewarded with the final item, the cross.
After dying in the palace, I ventured back to haunted Kasuto, and now that I had the cross I could see the invisible creatures. I explored around a bit, but didn’t really find anything of interest. I died before I could fully explore the town, so I’ll check it out again tomorrow. Hopefully I can find the boss in the Hidden Palace tomorrow as well and wrap that up.
Time played: 30 minutes
Leave a Comment
August 7, 2008 at 10:29 pm (Adventure of Link)
Tags: Game play, hints
What a productive night it was! I started out just aimlessly wandering around, not sure where to go next. The only town I could see was full of invisible creatures killing me and only one lone guy with a vague hint about looking east in the woods. I headed east and found a small patch of woods with seemingly nothing in it. The enemies in this forest were the easy orange lizard men worth 150 points a piece. I needed 2500 points to level up life, so I figured I’d go for it. While I was wandering around this small patch of forest, I was randomly chopping down trees and found Hidden Kasuto. This must be what I was supposed to find to the east.
This town was amazing. I got a magic container (I have them all now), the magic key, a new spell called “Spell” and a bunch of hints. I jotted down the hints so I wouldn’t forget any:
- east of triple eye rock at seashore (turned out I found a heart container here – have all those now too)
- the old man who remains has magic (went back and talked to the lone man in haunted kasuto and he gave me the final spell “Thunder”)
- there is a secret at edge of town (using the “Spell” spell at the dead end in this town revealed a building containing the magic key – opens all doors)
- the hole in palace is endless loop (i assume i’ll use this hint later)
- remember the magic word (not sure about this one)
- call for help at the three eye rocks (using the flute in the middle of the rock formation revealed the hidden palace)
The hidden palace revealed!
To recap, I leveled up life to 7, got the magic key, the last two spells, the last magic container and heart container, and found the next palace. Not a bad haul at all. Next time I play I will be conquering the hidden palace. I’m not sure if there’s anything more to do in haunted Kasuto, but I’ll give it another go after the palace.
One final thought: Why on earth are the easier orange lizard men worth 150 points, but the harder red lizard men with maces only 100 points? Makes no sense.
Time played today: 40 minutes
Leave a Comment
August 6, 2008 at 5:46 pm (Adventure of Link)
Tags: Game play, photo
Gooma - the fifth boss
I had cleared everything in the Ocean palace except the final boss prior to today. That made it fairly easy to knock off the boss quickly. Of course, I had to start ALL the way from the beginning of the map (lame) and work my way back to the palace, then all the way through the palace to the boss (maybe 10 minutes total). I had tried this boss a few times before today, but failed. I had come up with a strategy in the meantime, which turned out to be a success. Cast the jump spell and the shield spell, go in for body hits, and time the exit jumps just right to avoid his ball and chain. I beat him on my first attempt today!
Upon clearing the palace, I was given an option to level up my Life from 6 to 7. However, my attack was still at 5, so I didn’t feel right about having them that far out of balance. Instead I “passed” on the upgrade and went out into the wild to earn the extra 500 experience points needed to level up my Attack.
Annoying lizard men (death from above)
I only had a short span of time to play, but I wanted to put the flute I picked up in the Ocean palace to good use, so I went down to the spider, played the flute and watched him vanish. Beyond that, I started down the newly opened path. I hit a few roadblocks with these really annoying lizard men hiding behind a fence. I attemped to capture the image with my iPhone, but the results are less than stellar. I need to get a better capture system in place (that doesn’t involve playing on a computer with emulation, lame). I died on the second of these roadblocks, and called it quits for today.
On a final note, after taking the expected heat regarding my walkthrough/map consultation, I’ve decided to finish this game without any further external help. It will undoubtedly slow me down a bit, but I am pretty close to the end so it shouldn’t matter too much. Maybe I can regain a small amount of dignity.
Time played today: 20 minutes
Leave a Comment
August 5, 2008 at 9:13 pm (Adventure of Link)
Tags: Game play, Zelda II
Adventure of Link box art
A few months went by before I picked up the next game in my quest: Adventure of Link, aka Zelda II. In all honesty, I wasn’t much looking forward to playing this game. Several people even tried to convince me it was worth skipping. However, my OCD would not allow me to leave it unplayed.
I decided to buy it on Wii Virtual Console for sake of convenience. However, after buying it and playing it for about 20 minutes, I let it sit idle another few weeks. I just wasn’t “feeling it.”
I think my main complaint with the game was having to start over at the beginning after losing all your lives. I know this really isn’t any different than Legend of Zelda, but it just felt so much more tedious for some reason.
Once I got into it, I quickly beat the first 2 palaces. Also, the nostalgia of the game started to wash over me. Seeing the various creatures that I hadn’t thought about in twenty years made it all come alive again. I found myself carving out more time each week to play, and really enjoying the game. Don’t get me wrong, this game can still be seriously frustrating (getting the hammer in Death Mountain, for example), but I was also having fun.
With this renewed zeal, I made my way through the Island Palace (#3) and the Maze Palace (#4). In the interest of journalistic integrity, I should confess that I consulted a map and a walkthrough occasionally. I don’t really feel bad about this, since I had already beaten it before and I wanted to get on to some new games. Once I finish this game though, no more hints, maps or walkthroughs for me. I want to enjoy the full experience.
Time played so far: about 15 hours
Time covered: April – June 2008
Leave a Comment
