my first impressions of legend of zelda: echoes of wisdom

2024-9-28

alright let's try something new! i just got the latest zelda game, echoes of wisdom, and i'm super excited to check it out!

i decided i'm not going to live stream or do youtube videos for my first playthrough, but i thought a first impressions liveblog would be fun!

let's boot up the game!

oh shit! we get to play as link at the beginning!

we have 500 rupees, 20 hearts, a sword, a shield, a bow, and bombs. also there is what looks like a spot for heart pieces to go! i'm so goddamn happy about heart pieces returning by the way! spirit orbs just aren't the same!

oh looks like there's a hero mode too! that's exciting!

also link can jump too i'm noticing, not just zelda

aw hell yeah! cutting grass!

it's fascinating that we're starting this game with link combat! i'm not complaining, but considering we weren't even sure if there would be any swordfighting at first, it seems to imply to me that using the swordfighting form is gonna be more integral than I had thought

i never expected there to ever be this much platforming in a 2d zelda game... i don't hate it though!!

i'm gonna take this box to the end of the game

where did my box go!?!?!?

anyways, are we actually gonna get to fight gannon here? will it be a cutscene? or maybe just much easier than it is in most zelda games?

tennis time!!!!!

mwahaha i did it!

he laughed and then exploded!!!

oh shit here comes the rift thing!!!

oh my goodness that's so cool! i'm being prompted to wiggle the joystick to break out of the crystal!!

of course the first thing i do is try to fall in the rift but it's an invisible wall!!

okay i picked up link's cloak

hahaha!!! the rift spread and i was like "nah i don't gotta run" and i fell in! no game over screen just put me back before it spread!!!

that was honestly a super cool escape sequence!! reminds me of the end of oot a little

hell yeah!!!

lol these guards protecting zelda are so cute!!!

and the rift continues to spread!!!

i'm so excited for this game ahshagdgshahhdhsha

hyrule castle town! our objective is to speak with the king! the music is so good!!!!

honestly that's probably the thing i'm most excited for in this game. a catchy soundtrack a la previous zelda games instead of the, admittedly gorgeous, ambient tracks of botw and totk. i really missed the classic catchy tunes of old!!

time to go into everyone's houses, and throw pots at them!!!!

ooh a shop!

looks like i can't hear what the wares are before seeing the king, that's alright, i don't have any rupees anyway!

looks like they have a health potion, some apples, and i'm not sure what the other wares could be yet

awww it's a little kitty!!!!

lady impa is in this game, cool!

it's a doggy!!!!!

this hole is too high to jump into but just wait until i can make echoes!!! mark my words there's a secret down there!!

this poor couple, their home has been consumed by the rift!

oh lol i went under the barracks and ended up in that well hole... there's still gonna be a secret down here!!!

hey look it's a warp point lol!

aww this dog is following me!!!

alright let's enter the castle!

oh my goodness!!! i accidentally jumped on a pot and went inside!!!!! hahahaha

aye it's impa!!

why go to the throne room when there are still open doors!!!

oh cool it's zelda's room!

awwww zelda has a cat!!!!!

lol!! general wright (right) and minister lefte (left)!! very silly! in japanese that must have been a play on migi (right) and hidari (left).

huh, apparently rifts have been appearing for "a long time"! i expected it to be a recent phenomenon

okay so before, children disappeared sometimes, but now it's taking adults too and more frequently. presumably gannon dying and whatever he did with his staff caused it to increase all at once? or maybe something he did before he died?

rift monsters!!! oh no!!!

"suthorn village" lmao, let me guess, it's in the north?

oh fuck! this is really bad!! the king, the general, and the minister all got stolen away by the rift!!! i guess that means it's all up to zelda now...

oh goodness! dark versions of them appeared!!?!?? we did see that dark version of link in the trailer....

noo zelda is getting locked up! this is bad!! (presumably this is where that fairy comes in and helps us break out)

hey there tri! i fucking love this theme by the way!!! i'm excited for the ost to get uploaded online so i can reverse it. it's not ballad of the goddess, but the main three note motif is reminiscent of zelda's lullaby's reversed

aye our first item! the tri rod!!

the table echo! i'm super excited to play with this power!!!

okay i understand how this works! you basically get three echoes out at a time, and you've gotta erase one to make another! i wonder if that ever gets upgraded?? i'm gonna say "probably"

stealth section!

aye it's a box echo!! total echoes: 2

hyrule-castle-pot echo! total echoes: 3

at least impa seems to be on our side!!

hahaha!! zelda changes into the cloak behind the statue and impa turns away!! i like that so much more than "press + to go to the menu, and equip the cloak right here in front of me"!

woah impa you badass!! you just knocked out three guards on your own!!

cool she gave us a log! we got a map and the ability to keep track of quests! i love it when games make things like that an actual item like a log.

wow! look at all this little regions! there are so many!!

okay, a simplified botw/totk pins system, i like it a lot!

a decorative-shrub echo! total echoes: 4

an old-bed echo! total echoes: 5

these beds sure are stacked weirdly. why would they be stored like this? other than for tutorial purposes?

i really like the spin honestly

aye i got my first rupee!!

ooh sidescrolling section! the ability to swim off the bat just with a breath meter is really cool. this is such a unique 2d zelda game!!

a boulder echo! total echoes: 6

oh shit another rift is spreading! let's run!

uhh i jumped into the water to get away but the currents were so strong! it seems like i've washed up somewhere...

a rock echo! total echoes: 7

oh wow we wound up quite far away from the castle!

also it seems like each of those dotted areas are screens, that makes sense! also no towers or anything the map gets revealed as i explore. fine by me!!

aye my first monster echo!! a zol echo! total echoes: 8

hahahaha!! watching zols fight zols is so funny! it's literally just a matter of who sees who first! but two zol echoes will take on any one zol easy!

found some rupees in the water! am i really playing the game if i don't go everywhere but progress first?

ooh a chest!

easy peasy! thanks for the 20 bucks!

a sea urchin echo!! total echoes: 9

heart piece!!! i want!!!!

hahahaha!!! it's mine!!!

a keese echo! total echoes: 10

another heart piece ehh? i got this

sea urchins are good at breaking crates! heart piece collected!

made it to suthorn village!

oh this villager knows about link! he must have came through here on his way to save me!

it seems a rift is blocking the way to hyrule castle then. that's okay, i don't really wanna go back there yet anyways! they'd lock me up again!

hahaha i learned the meat echo! total echoes: 11

mwahahha! i almost missed this chest! (ignore my health)

50 rupees!! hell yeah!!

aye the regular pot echo! total echoes: 12

ooh a trampoline echo!! total echoes: 13

okay well time!

woah i found some "floral nectar" down here! what's that for??

ahh, pressing 'a' answered my question lol. it recovers hearts like a food item but it's better in a smoothie. i forgot about the smoothies for a moment! i'm so excited to make some smoothies honestly!!

i have six whole jars of floral nectar now!!

hahaha cool!! you can recover hearts just lying in a bed!!! that's super helpful! obviously i imagine monsters can hit you even in bed so you have to do that away from danger

oh dude!!! you have a heart piece for sale!! how much??

okay this place has:

• floral nectar (30 rupees)
• heart piece (80 rupees)
• red potion (30 rupees)
• space for an item that's out of stock

well i just started and the red potion heals 5 hearts, and i have 6 floral nectars already... i've got 125 rupees so i'm just gonna get the heart piece

aye a sign echo! total echoes: 14

lmao!! the echoed signs all say different things!!!

the suthorn prairie is blocked by the rift! let's check out the forest then!

oh nevermind earlier, this is a waypoint! the bird thing just reminded me of a link between worlds!

keese are very good at taking out zols!

ooh electro apples? what do these do?

also just says recover hearts. maybe these have additional effects only discoverable when you make them into a smoothie!

this looks like a special spot...

aha! a trampoline! now i can get this chest! this is really fun...

i'm gonna pass this cave in case it's progress and come back...

oh it's the rope echo! total echoes: 15

it looks like this path heads straight to the dot on the map! let's go back for the cave!

ropes are my new favorite echo for zols! they can attack faster than zols so even the ignizol in the cave got destroyed by a rope!

also, ignizol echo! total echoes: 16

aye rock salt!

hmm... an unlit torch. how can i light this...

with boxes!! lmao!!!

woah!! a bottle!?!? this early!?!? hell yeah!!

haha it said fairies love these bottles and will jump inside! i can't seem to equip them so that's a funny detail! they're like "ooh a bottle!! yeah!"

alright there's another cave over here!

ahh! a heart piece! if i get that i'll have a new heart container!!

i know this isn't the way to do it but i was so close!!!!! if only i could place a table under me!!

aha a caromadillo echo! total echoes: 17

oh! we have our first echo that takes two charges!

aye i got some grapes!!

heart piece acquired! 4 hearts baby!!

aye a spear moblin echo! total echoes: 18

ooh a monster stone! what could this be for? maybe similar to monster parts?

ayye i found a fairy for my bottle!! yeah!!

oh no! the rift is blocking where we're supposed to go!!

okay so i guess we're going to find an entry point... i'm super excited to play around inside these rifts!!

a monster fang!!

haha it's a monster camp! straight out of botw/totk!! the chest even unlocks when they all die!!

more grapes!

woah!! what's that!?!?

that was scary! i almost died!!

oh it's a peahat! of course! total echoes: 19

a cool thing i'm noticing about these monster echoes: the reward for this cave and for defeating the peahat was the peahat echo! that's really neat!

alright, entering the rift!!!

whoop i fell off the ledge lol

this place looks so cool!!

oh no this must be that lady!!

it doesn't seem like there's a way to save her right now....

this feels like a dungeon!!! hell yeah!!!

is this the minister?

so apparently we can save everyone in here if we close the rift. cool!

oh my goodness now we're in the dungeon!

this is very promising! the one concern i have is them relying too heavily on the still world and not having enough variety in the dungeon designs! i want to see a water themed dungeon in the still world! and a fire themed dungeon! etc! if the dungeons are too similar it's gonna feel like the same problem as the divine beasts imo

ayye it's the bind ability!

a strandtula echo!! total echoes: 20

i got a dungeon map!!!!!!! afsgahsjdsjsj!!! i really missed this kind of zelda!!!!

ooh radiant butter!

woah these strandtulas are cool!!! presumably the catch is they need a ceiling to work, so they work in dungeons and caves, but not in the overworld. excited to test that!

ayye!!! a darknut echo!! total echoes: 21

there he is!!! evil link!!!! i thought as much! beating him will probably let me use the swordfighter mode thing

mwahahaha i win! and there's the sword!!!

a heart pin?

oh it's equipment! that's so cool! this makes hearts appear more often!!! not amazing but great when you have no other

ayye a deku baba echo! total echoes: 22

had to go for a bit but i started playing more at my friend's house!

finished the dungeon! that was a lot of fun! the boss was interesting! at first i used a peahat to quickly damage the sensitive spot on the ground, then a barrage of keese to get the shoulder one, and only on the last one on his head did i think to jump on him in swordfighter mode to hit it!

glad the area got unrifted! i presume it'll open up more, and we'll be able to go to areas in whichever order? it's okay if not, in fact maybe i'd prefer it not to. i miss getting items from each dungeon and having my arsenal grow throughout the game. that will kind of happen with the echoes, but like it's not the same! it's alright though i think i'll like this game anyway

oh cool! level 2! we haven't had an actual zelda game with a level up system since zelda 2!

so tri has 4 echo charges now! that really changes things actually! that puzzle i tried to cheese earlier i'd actually be able to do with 4!

woah! 5 unusual crystals?? it looks kinda like bismuth! my first thought was like a spiritual stone/pendant/crystal/medallion/whatever, but how come there are 5?? what could this be for?

i like how you have the choice to pass up the heart container! it's possible to do a three heart run in this so, one of these days!

so why is lefte way over here??

interesting that lefte and lueburry can can see tri but impa couldn't (and presumably none of the townsfolk could either)

okay! so here's what i'm getting out of this explanation. gannon somehow was the leader of these rift creatures, and link found and killed him in an effort to stop the rift. but when he died, instead of the rifts closing, they started growing like crazy, perhaps in some final effort. so the rifts need to be closed manually by zelda and tri!!

yeah i literally asked why left was over here. things connect differently...wtf does that mean?

gerudo desert and jabul waters?

honestly i'm kinda surprised it's only two! there's no way this game is that short!

oh shit wait these are the next two i get to choose from and then more will open up either after one or both of these so that there's ability progression and player freedom??? i hope!!! that's my wishful prediction. either way i can't be slightly less than a third of the way through the story.

lefte says that "right now" there are large rifts in those places, which absolutely means at different points in the game there will be different ones!! that's so cool honestly!!

of course jabul waters is where the zora live! i'm getting my water themed dungeon!!!!

oh yeah i'm super excited for the river/sea zora conflict! that's gonna be fun!

it's interesting that they went with zora and gerudo for the first races instead of zora and goron! man the trailer has me so excited for all the races in this!! the deku?? are you kidding me???

also it'll be really interesting to see the gerudo area as zelda instead of link, since, well, zelda fits in better! well, it's another story if link's wearing that botw outfit...

i presume the sword upgrades are going to be for duration and power yeah? oh and prediction: i'm also going to somehow unlock bow and bombs in that mode too! why? because they programmed it in for the intro section!

oh oh cool! those crystals i got upgrade the sword!!! that's so neat!!!! i get more than one because different powers cost different amounts, right??

lmao!! link actually lost the ability to speak!!! hahahaha!!!

that's such cool link backstory!

okay, so i can enhance my sword for 10, or my energy for 5. i only have 5, and the duration is pretty short, so i'm gonna upgrade the energy this time, and then save up for the sword next time!

neat animation haha!

so after that, upgrading energy costs more! it'll be 10 next time! i imagine this will happen for the sword upgrades too, so are different rifts going to be worth different amounts of crystals??? i'm curious how this'll play out...

i think this is good for a first impressions post! i'll probably keep noting down thoughts as i play, but subsequent posts will likely be much less detailed. i'm enjoying the game a lot!

honestly, i am someone who isn't the biggest fan of breath of the wild and tears of the kingdom. i've played them both, beaten them both, and even enjoyed them both. but those games are missing the "zelda" feel that i fell in love with! they are good games, but in my opinion they missed the mark that i had set for the zelda series personally. majora's mask is, and probably always will be, my favorite zelda game (although i certainly hope it'll be surpassed eventually). i love the type of adventure the earlier zelda games portrayed: the fairy tale story about a kid from a village being the legendary hero who embarks on a quest full of monsters and puzzles to vanquish the incarnation of evil threatening the world. that storyline is surface level there in botw/totk, but the feel is different.

maybe i'm not getting this across right, i'm not really sure how to share what i mean. but whatever it is, this game has it! the dungeon i played felt like a zelda dungeon. the heart pieces are satisfying to collect. echoes are a fun way your arsenal can expand throughout the game, allowing you to do more things and visit more areas, which is an element missing from botw/totk. maybe i'll make a more thorough video on the subject one of these days.

my point is this game has restored my faith in the future of the zelda series. i really, really hope that this means that regardless of the direction the "3d" zelda games going forward, new "2d" zelda games, like this one, will continue to exist between them, bringing more of the zelda i hold so dearly.

so i'd say my first impressions are pretty good! super excited to play the rest of this game and discuss it further!

thanks for reading! all my love to you fellow people!