The Legend Of Zelda: Skyward Sword - 24-Hour Liveblog, Part 2

Hello and welcome back to the Skyward Sword 24-hour liveblog! If you missed it, Part 1 which covered hours 07:00am-3:00pm, can be read again here. Part 2, which should take us from now until 11:00pm, starts at the Sealed Temple, the first one you encounter in the game. A number of people have suggested that I'm aiming to finish the game within the space of a day, which I don't think will happen, and was never the intention of this liveblog - after waiting five years for this it would be a shame to race through it!. Plus, it takes time to write and play in conjunction with each other, and I'm having way too much fun savouring the world and exploring every little avenue I find. But it will be interesting to see how far I manage to get...



15:07pm - Remember you can get involved, by sending any questions/thoughts/rants to moonwitchcartridge@gmail.com, or via Twitter @mwcartridge, or even by leaving a comment below!

15:38pm - SPOILER!
It turns out that the Sealed Temple was in fact a red herring. When you enter it's ghostly quiet, the sole activity a bearded man sitting atop a small staircase. He explains that Zelda - the spirit maiden - did indeed fall into the Temple, but then took the path through to Faron Woods, which the wise sage handily marks on our map. We also gain the ability to place beacons on the map, their thin shafts of light acting as a neat homing marker in the real world should you get lost. Link keeps being referred to as a "child of fate".

15:50pm - In all our clamour over Skyward Sword it's strange to think that we almost missed the fact that a brand new Mario game, something that we would normally be eager to get our hands on straight away, was also released today. To make up for this, and to neatly tie in with Zelda November, here's a video that show Super Mario 3D Land's own unique celebration of Zelda's 25th anniversary.

16:04pm - First appearance of a Goron! Who also has the best line so far: "Amazing, right? WRONG! IT IS BEYOND AMAZING!"

16:06pm - SPOILER!
As expected, the bird statues on the surface level not only allow for the usual save functions but also give Link the option of returning to the sky, meaning travel between the two worlds is not only possible but almost certainly mandatory. The location of each bird statue on the surface level is memorised so you can return to the correct area almost immediately.

16:45pm - To get further information on Zelda's location I need to find three lost Kikwis for the Kikwi Elder Bucha. If all that doesn't make sense then here is a picture of what this new race of forest-dwelling animals look like, thanks to the Zelda Wiki. They're very cute, and often use the expression "koo-kwee" in speech.

17:30pm - One of the great joys of the Zelda series has of course been it's childlike encouragement of exploration, and Skyward Sword is no different. In fact the Faron Woods location is almost a perfect example of this playground approach to design. Ropes are there to climb, tunnels exist to crawl into, and there are numerous grassy slopes you find yourself constantly running up and down as if you were six-years old again and back in your local park. The mission, to find the three missing Kikwis, in this context feels like just a neat excuse in which to allow Link a bit of a clamber around the environment. Anyway, we've now found the three missing Kikwis using Fi's dowsing technique, so we're off to see what treats Bucha has in store for us.

17:33pm - We have an email! Hannah writes: "What feels like 24 hours continuous data-entry has finally come to an end! Phew…Your blog got me through." The life of an office administrator eh?

17:58pm - And the treat was a slingshot! We're now in Deep Woods, where the bees are fierce. We've taken to knocking their hives from their spot with a well placed Deku Seed which, along with our rampant sword slashing of flowers, doesn't make for such an environmentally-friendly portrayal of Link.

18:33pm - Back in Skyloft at the moment, having taken a detour via one of the surface bird statues. Popped into The Lumpy Pumpkin, destroyed their chandelier, and now I have to deliver some Hot Pumpkin Soup to one of the Knights on Skyloft within five minutes, otherwise it'll get cold. These are the sort of things that happen in the world of Zelda.

19:07pm - And just as we reach the halfway(!) point of this Skyward Sword liveblog we step into our first proper temple, the Skyview Temple. Before we venture further, a quick word on the lovely visuals. Taking a step back from the harder-edged Twilight Princess, everything in Skyward Sword has a softened, painterly tone to it - the world and characters are colourful without being gaudy, and have strong personalities despite their softened features. I'd go so far as saying that it's the best looking Zelda game yet - Wind Waker had a more defined aesthetic, but this feels more natural and organic. Some people have claimed that the art design was heavily inspired by the Impressionism movement (Monet, Cezanne, Degas) but I wouldn't know about that.

19:23pm - Quick break time. We don't have a cat, but if we did it would look like this.

20:02pm - SPOILER!
There's a puzzle early on in the Skyview Temple in which you need to open a door guarded by a large roving eye. You're told that the eye follows the tip of sharp objects, and sure enough as you slowly move your sword around the eye also follows. The solution is to move the sword around in quick circles until the eye gets dazed and falls off, thereby unlocking the door. It's brilliant.

20:33pm - I just cut a large spider loose from it's web and because I couldn't see where it had gone I had to run straight from the room (this is in the game, I wouldn't be brave enough to tackle a spider in real life). Still, there are few things as satisfying in videogames as the rhythms of a Zelda dungeon, all the pieces slowly fitting into place. We've found the map, and our slingshot is coming in very handy. Zelda's Aura is marked tantalisingly at the top of the map...

21:05pm - Just fought a skeleton in a scene that Nintendo have previously used to showcase the motion controls (this is the battle I remember the first time I got my hands on the game, back in August). Having learnt to read the posture of enemies and waiting for opportunities to strike, coupled with the great use of MotionPlus, combat is extremely satisfying - it rewards patient swordplay, so may seem unwieldy to those used to blindly hacking away. It's a very intelligent use of the Wii's hardware.

21:48pm - There's a neat twist (literally) on the conventional dungeon Boss Key.

21:52pm - SPOILER!
The first appearance of this guy, and the first boss fight. The preceding cut-scene is suitably unsettling (especially the tongue), the score adding a sense of off-kilter macabre to proceedings.

22:27pm - Maybe it's the tiredness kicking in, but this guy's a little tricky.

22:40pm - No he's not! In your face, evil man!

22:41pm - But guess what? Our princess is in another castle (in the world of Eldin, apparently). Which is where we're off to next. But first, to celebrate the conquest of the first temple: the most beautiful girl I ever did see.

22:56pm - Okay, pizza and beer time! Part 3 is up next.

Part 2 has now closed! Part 3 continues here.