177 pokémon picross - banned from earning picrites until tomorrow

Dear Readers,

Well this game sucks in a way I've just discovered. At the time of writing it's April and I set the clock forward on the 3DS. The game picked it up and banned me from earning Picrites until tomorrow. A game should not do something like that. I don't care if it's free-to-play.

329 zelda breath of the wild - exploring the hebra mountains

Dear Readers,

After I left Hyrule Castle, I sought reinforcements, collecting fairies, cooking dishes etc. until I got back tot he weapon connoisseur quest. Nebb wanted to see a Frostspear. I took the notion to go find one in the Hebra Mountains, since the compendium told me it was there.

I rode until the terrain got too steep in Hebra and I continued on foot. I was well equipped for the hike and swapped out various masks when I needed to.

I found Koroks, climbed some peaks and found several shrines, but didn't complete any. I also found a lodge of a shield surfer. I'll come back to that someday. I found hot springs and more shrines, but couldn't find any frostspears yet. My radar didn't even pick any up. I'll keep exploring.

328 zelda breath of the wild - storming hyrule castle

Dear Readers

I completely forgot I had Magnesis and climbed over the metal door of Hyrule Castle instead of opening it, so I was off to a great start!

I faced all the Guardians I found head on, bouncing their beams back and arrowing them whenever possible. There was a road going around the place and I went through as much as I could until I was stopped by the big purple eyeball blockades. I cleared as much of them as I could.

There are so many entrances and exits to the castle! It's just a big maze of a place. I explored hallways, bombed some walls, found rooms like the dining hall and library. I found a passage from the library that led to a shrine popping up when I lit a big torch! I must remember one of the quests wanted recipes from the castle too. I fought with so many enemies and did fairly well against most of them.

I even fought two Lynels! For the first time I finally fought Lynels head on to the death and eventually won against them. I like when I get a chance to mount them and attack them while they're trying to kick me off. I'm becoming more confident with them now!

Eventually I reached the place where Ganon was. I saved before it and went inside, watching the dramatic cutscene of the champion spirits firing the divine beast lasers right at Ganon. This resulted in half his health being zapped. It seemed underwhelming somehow.

I knew for sure that I definitely wasn't ready to fight him, so I just tested what I could do at all. It wasn't very far and I was so depleted of resources I knew I had to come back fully stocked and stronger. I reloaded the save I just made and warped out of the castle. This made for good reconnaissance and I'll be back!

327 zelda breath of the wild - heading straight for hyrule castle town

Dear Readers,

I rode all the way back to Hateno Village and displayed the sword Urbosa gave me. I forgot to mention she gave me one but she did, just like all the other champions. I don't know if I'll ever use it!

My next stop was to to go to Hyrule Castle. It was finally time to go and explore more of the place for myself. I've been there before to get the memory in Zelda's Study, but it was a very brief sneak in and sneak out kind of mission I set for myself. This time I want to go right to the front gates and take it head on. It's a very scary place with all the guardians around but I've been putting it off for too long. I gotta go.

I rode Spotty as far as the Wetland Stable and hiked the rest of the way to Hyrule Castle. I marched right into the castle town ruins from the east and had my first encounters with guardians, chopping their legs off and destroying them as I went. I fought my way to the front gate and this is where I began to storm the castle.

326 zelda breath of the wild - happy times in gerudo town at last

Dear Readers,

After beating Thunderblight Ganon, I hung around in Gerudo Town for a while.

Riju promised to give me a loan of the heirloom if I did some favours for the ladies that lived here.

One little girl wanted to grow fruits, but her water was contaminated with melon rind that kept flowing down from the rooftops. I chatted with the lady who was behind it and she finally agreed to stop.

Everyone was relieved. The soldiers were all happy too. Some other quests popped up and I'll try them out in due time.

325 zelda breath of the wild - conquering vah naboris

Dear Readers,

Time to finally take on the last of the divine beasts! I warped back on board and went straight to exploring this huge machine shaped like a Bactrian camel. I started on the underside and climbed up inside the torso of the mechanical creature, beating up some guardian scouts and shooting eyeballs as I went along.

I navigated the torso until I got to the navigation terminal. This time I was able to turn the three cylinders that make up the torso, which helped me reach higher places whenever I wanted to shift a platform. There were power circuits on these cylinders and I was able to line them up to power other parts of the beast, such as the neck and tail.

I felt my way along, opening treasure chests and switching on terminals as I went. Some chests seemed unnaturally out of reach.

I got a bit stuck at one point. There were eyeball barriers and I could only clear them by shooting the eyes inside the humps, but I couldn't reach the humps very well. I climbed right on top of the camel's head and glided to the top of the humps. It didn't seem like something I could do naturally and I felt like I was breaking the game.

Anyway I now had access to the humps and I cleared them out too eventually, activating the final terminal in the centre (after getting all the treasure chests of course). Just like before, this central terminal made the boss appear. This time it was called Thunderblight Ganon. Urbosa gave me a warning about him being really fast.

She wasn't kidding. He was extremely fast and I got hit a lot. He had a sword and shield and lightning attacks so he was tricky to reach as well. I had mostly heavy slower weapons and I eventually stopped using them so I could get some hits in.

Eventually he started driving lightning posts in the ground. I had to use Magnesis to pick them up and carry them over to him so he would hit himself with lightning. After this I kept on hitting him until he was defeated.

Urbosa's spirit appeared before me, congratulating me and granting me her ability to use Urbosa's Fury, a lightning spell that can make for a very powerful attack. She had very high regard for me and for Zelda and asked me to take care of her, and Hyrule too.

After I left, she took Vah Naboris, climbed to higher ground and aimed its head at Hyrule Castle to fire a laser, just like the other Divine Beasts. She said it was going to be so delicious when she can hit Ganon with this beam. She said she liked that she can take this matter personally, since Ganon once took the form of a Gerudo. I love how angry and vengeful she is! It's going to be a good moment indeed!

324 zelda breath of the wild - yigas attack in random places now

Dear Readers,

Ever since I beat up Master Kohga, Yigas will randomly appear when I'm roaming around. It's not just the case of them pretending to be Hylians and catching me out on the road. They'll just appear out of thin air.

They have more difficult attacks now too. They'll float in the air and shoot arrows from a distance. It's annoying but they're still beatable in an easy enough way.

The big Yigas will appear now too and they've got this move that burrows under the ground and chases you around. They take a small while to beat but they're manageable too. They also drop windcleavers, which is nice. I took one to Hateno Village for the weapon connoisseur quest.

It kinda reminds me of Grand Theft Auto III when you get too good at the game and you get randomly shot at when you enter certain areas.