Earlier this year, The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild was released to massive critical acclaim. With an expansive and content filled world, fantastic characters and fun gameplay mechanics galore, the game has become one of the highest rated titles in the entire Zelda franchise.
Like Zelda 1, A Link to the Past and Ocarina of Time before it, it’s become a modern classic.
And just like those other Nintendo classics, Breath of the Wild is filled with fun glitches to try out. From auto healing on a horse to clipping through walls and getting objects stuck in houses, the game is absolutely jam packed with interesting bugs for the bored player to mess around with.
So join us, as we go and look at some of the best glitches you can do in Zelda Breath of the Wild!
Blood Moon Clipping
Starting with an extremely interesting one based around the game’s Blood Moon mechanic. Basically, if you haven’t played Breath of the Wild, Blood Moons appear on random days and reset most of the game world to its default state. In other words, they cause enemies and weapons to respawn so players can fight/get them again.
It’s a clever mechanic, and a neat way to keep the open world lively once the player gets powerful enough to clear it out. However, Nintendo didn’t think of certain effects it might have on the game.
Like in this case, what happens if an enemy respawns on top of the player. So what happens?
Well, Link gets shoved through the floor, that’s what. And in Hyrule Castle (where Blood Moons can only be activated by a campfire), that has some… strange effects:
Such as being trapped under a Guardian Turret until you warp out or reload your save file. Or being forced into deadly Malice until Link keels over due to the poison.
But most interestingly of all is what happens when you try this on a Turret near the Sanctum. Why? Well, see for yourself:
Link goes straight through the castle! The results are absolutely spectacular.
Cause yep, you can see absolutely everything in the castle from one spot. Yet that’s not all that’s interesting here.
Oh no, the game’s physics for the castle… weren’t really built for you to come at this angle. So the game absolutely freaks out with things like water physics, with Link doing stuff like floating up 20 feet through invisible water or even being able to swim diagonally down a stream of water coming from a chamber at a higher elevation.
It’s quite a sight to behold, and definitely worth checking out if you’ve got the free time. But before you do that, I think it might be time to look at another bug in the game…
Kilton Lag Hell
One which exists because Nintendo forget a minor failsafe in Breath of the Wild. Namely, forgetting to check if an object was on the spot where Kilton’s shop appears before it loads in.
Okay, maybe that’s a little harsh. They do check that to some degree. If Link is sitting on the spot where the shop should be when night comes, it doesn’t appear. Instead, it waits until Link is a certain number of metres away and looking in the opposite direction first.
Unfortunately for Nintendo, that’s all they bothered to check for. So if a horse, giant metal crates or a Guardian happens to be on the spot where the shop should appear, it will appear like normal. And that’s when things go a little out of control:
That’s because the game’s engine is designed to push overlapping objects away from each other. But things like horses, boxes and Guardians are giant objects with lots of parts and various laws of physics applied to them.
The engine cannot cope with this at all, and the frame rate basically falls to about 3 FPS as a result. It doesn’t quite crash, but it’s clear the game is about to, and it’s possible a few more objects there would send it falling down like a house of cards.
Either way, that’s not all the bug does either. Oh no, when a box or object is inside Kilton’s shop, where do you think Kilton ends up?
Well, he gets pushed out of the shop, that’s where. So not only does the game lag to hell and back, but poor Kilton gets stuck wandering in circles outside the shop as well! It’s pretty cool really, especially given how he has animations you will never be able to see in normal gameplay.
Oh, and talking about overloading the game…
Permanently Lost Inventory
The developers of this game also overlooked what would happen if your inventory was full before being given a piece of armour by an NPC. Now, for those that don’t know, you can have a maximum of 5 pages of armour pieces in your inventory at any one time. You’ll never get there of course (since even with all Amiibo and DLC you won’t reach page 5), but that’s the limit.
This is fine when your next armour piece is from a store (you get told you can’t buy it), or a chest (it automatically closes itself back up again). Both situations have fallbacks to cope with this unlikely situation.
Talking to NPCs… usually doesn’t. So you’ll go and say, ask Riju for the Thunder Helm, and this will happen:
Yep, it’s just gone forever. No message or anything. Just whatever item you were going to get being permanently erased from existence.
It’s the kind of thing that’d usually be a pretty serious bug. However, that’s not really the case here.
Why? Well for one thing, 90% of armour handed to you by NPCs is optional. If you lose one of these:
- Thunder Helm
- Rubber Helm
- Champion’s Shirt
- Zora Greaves
It’s awkward, but you can live without it. And while the Zora Armour being lost can make part of the quest unwinnable, this situation will never happen in normal gameplay. You would have to be out of your mind to have filled five pages of armour before going after the Divine Beasts. It’s like running out of sand in Super Mario Bros 2. Or locking yourself out the Nautical Exhibit in Luigi’s Mansion 2.
It could happen, but if you’re not doing it deliberately, you are the worst player on the planet. Still, if you’ve got a file you want to screw up, it’s one to try out.
Horse Clipping
Still, back to less ‘dangerous’ bugs now. With a well known one called horse clipping that lets you bypass walls in the game.
How does it work?
Well to put it simply, if you jump off a horse, save in mid air and reload, the game puts you behind the horse when the game restarts.
What it doesn’t do however is check if there’s a wall there. So you can move a horse up to a wall, jump off, save in mid air and reload to clip inside it.
Normally the effects of this are pretty limited. You go up to a cliff, use the glitch and then realise that there’s another wall behind the first one. So you’re trapped in about 6 feet of empty space with no way out.
But this changes when buildings are involved. With a Sheikah Tower, Link can clip inside the tower itself and realise the light pillar isn’t solid. With a house, Link can actually end up standing on someone’s bed (maybe even with them in it!).
And in a few other cases, he can end up inside objects like rocks, dead Guardians and random obstacles. These also turn out to be completely hollow on the inside.
So yeah, go and experiment with it if you’re bored. Because depending where you are, absolutely anything could happen here…
Shrine Wrong Co-ordinate Warping
Which is also something you can say about this shrine glitch too. Basically, it lets you change where you enter the shrine from, allowing Link to end up out of bounds.
So how does it work?
Well to begin with, you’ll need to find a shrine and enter it. Once that’s done (and the auto save made), return to an older save file and go to a ledge you can jump down from.
Next, press A to jump down and pause at the same time. Save the game, and then reload the file with the shrine…
Voila. The cutscene goes all wrong and Link ends up starting miles away from where he should be. Usually this means a trip to the endless void (since he loads outside the shrine’s walls), but occasionally he can also appear in walls, on top of high ledges or even in the final room next to the Monk!
You just have to hope you get lucky punk!
On Top of a Shrine Roof
But hey, if you don’t want to rely on luck, there’s another way out of bounds in a shrine too. To use it, first pick the Kah Okeo Shrine on the South Tabantha region.
Once you’re there, make your way to the giant tower of blocks you destroy with bombs. Now here’s where it gets a bit nuts.
Basically, land on the platform, then blow it up with you nearby. You’ll plummet into the pit as the tower crumbles, and when the game reloads…
Link will be on top of the shrine’s roof. That’s because your destinated spawn point was the tower, which doesn’t exist.
So as a fallback, the game placed you at the same position on the nearest piece of ground available. Aka, the invisible roof.
Have fun gliding into the distance!
Horse in a House
Or maybe not, because there are a few more interesting glitches to look at next. For example, have you ever wanted to ride a horse inside a house?
No?
Eh, nor do most people. But thanks to a bug in Tarrey Town, you can!
To use it, start out by going to the town while its being constructed. You’ll notice at least one giant rock that hasn’t been removed to build a house yet.
Next, ride your horse onto the rock. It’s surprisingly easy to do if you hold L and carefully make the horse saunter up.
Finally, finish the sidequest and come back.
You’ll notice the rock is gone, but your horse is nowhere to be seen. So where is he?
Well, enter the house where the rock used to be, and you’ll find he’s trapped on the 1st floor (2nd floor to you American types). Yeah, good luck getting him down from there, since he’s too big to fit through the door.
But hey, at least you can ride him around someone’s attic! That’s interesting I guess?
Hot Spring Storage
Regardless, let’s move onto something new. Namely, a neat way to auto regenerate health in Zelda Breath of the Wild!
No, you’re not reading that wrong. There’s a way to auto regenerate health while riding a horse in this game. It all has to do with a glitch called ‘Hot Spring Storage’.
What do I mean by that?
Well in this game, there are hot springs you can heal Link by having him stand in them. Fair enough, that’s how they’ve worked in Zelda games for a while now.
But Breath of the Wild is no ordinary Zelda game. Oh no, the save system… is a tad broken.
Why? Because it doesn’t clear the game’s memory when you reload a save file. At least, not until Link touches the ground.
That’s fine if Link is on the ground when it reloads. But if he’s on a horse?
Then effects carry over from the previous save state. One of which is that hot spring healing effect mentioned earlier.
So what you want to do is to stand in a hot spring with the water up to about Link’s knees.
Next, reload a save file while you’re on a horse.
And then just watch. Link will start automatically healing there and then, and will continue auto healing until he gets off the horse! It’s a pretty cool trick for getting through dangerous places (like snow covered mountains), since the healing often overrides the weather damage!
Just don’t try and do this after standing in icy cold water…
Continue Reading…
As anyone who owns The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild (or has been watching Nintendo Directs) knows, the game is getting two DLC packs in the near future. One of these adds Hard Mode, the Trial of the Sword and other minor changes, and is planned for the summer. Whereas the other apparently adds a new storyline and dungeon on top of all that, with its release date being sometime in winter this year.
And so to promote said content… Nintendo has shown off more of the DLC in this year’s E3! Here’s their new trailer giving a bit more of a glimpse of what’s to come:
As well as the new artwork provided (god that Lynel looks awesome):
Continue Reading…
When it comes to sequence breaking and doing strange things, the development team for the latest Zelda game have covered most of their bases. They’ve added in a new cutscene in case you reach Zora’s Domain without meeting Prince Sidon:
They’ve set up roadblocks to stop you rescuing Yunobo early, entering the Yiga Clan Hideout early or boarding a Divine Beast without fighting it.
And pretty much every sidequest and shrine quest in the game is designed with the possibility you’ve beaten it before even knowing it exists. Heck, even reactions from Impa, Purah and the town elders differ based on stuff like if you’ve freed the Divine Beasts or gotten the Master Sword! The level of detail here is absolutely insane.
But unfortunately, it turns out there’s one situation they forgot to prepare for. Namely, you having a full inventory at the time an NPC gives you a piece of armour.
Admittedly, this is a very rare situation. It won’t happen with the Warm Doublet for sheer resource limitation related reasons, and the only other armour in the game given to you like this is the Zora Armour and the Thunder Helm. So unless you’ve collected five pages worth of junk, it’s unlikely this bug will affect you.
If you have though… well this video shows you the results:
As you can see, Riju appears to give you the Thunder Helm just fine. The box appears with the text and icon, and she says you’re a friend of the Gerudo like normal.
If you actually then go to your inventory however, it turns out the Thunder Helm just isn’t there. It’s gone. The helm has literally vanished forever.
No, asking Riju won’t get it back. She just acts like you already have it.
And don’t bother with Grante in Tarrey Town either. He never stocks this item, since you can’t normally sell it.
So the end result is that a useful piece of armour is just gone forever. But wait, it may get worse than that.
Why? Well, the Thunder Helm as a piece of equipment is not super important to the main story. It’s used as a key item sure. But as equipment? You only get given it after freeing Vah Nabooris/defeating Thunderblight Ganon and clearing all the sidequests in the town. As a result, while losing it is bad, it doesn’t break much of the game.
However, as I mentioned earlier, that’s not the only quest which has an NPC just hand you a piece of armour. No, Prince Sidon hands you the Zora Amour in a similar fashion back in Zora’s Domain. It’s needed to convince the elder that Mipha knew you, and to take down Vah Ruta/complete the first dungeon/free Mipha’s spirit.
This means that if the same glitch exists there too (which given the unlikeliness of running out of inventory space and the general mechanical similarities is likely), a really bored/dedicated player could find themselves locked out of the true ending, as well as unable to use Mipha’s Grace or get all Heart Containers.
Either way, it’s an oversight that I kind of expected Nintendo to have thought about, and one that genuinely needs to be patched in the foreseeable future.
Otherwise, Zelda Breath of the Wild can basically be made unwinnable by insanity.
Back before Breath of the Wild was released, Nintendo mentioned that they’d be releasing two DLC packs for the game. One would be in summer, and come with Hard mode. Whereas the other would be in winter and come with things like a new dungeon and story quest.
And now with summer just a month away, Nintendo has finally told everyone what the first DLC pack consists of. So here is everything added via the first DLC pack. The one that’ll be released this summer…
Hard Mode
Starting with the hard mode. As you can probably guess, it’s not just double damage. Otherwise you know, it wouldn’t have taken six months to release.
Instead, it’s an interesting mix of new features that may or may not catch anyone’s attention. First and foremost being, all enemies have been upgraded to the next rank.
What do I mean by next rank?
Well at the moment, Breath of the Wild has four ‘ranks’ for each enemy type. The basic one in red which is fairly weak with minimal health. The slightly harder one in blue that can survive a couple more hits. A difficulty version in either black or white (depending on the enemy type). And a super version in silver which drops jewels and other valuable items. It’s the same system that makes the Lynels tougher and tougher as you clear more of the world.
And so in the hard mode for the game, everyone’s rank has been upped by one to begin with. That means that harder enemies will be encountered early on, and the tougher ones (like Silver Lynels) will in turn be replaced by even tougher versions. Like say, a gold version with even more health than the already mighty silver one.
It’s a minor change, but one that I guess does increase the game’s difficulty by about a fraction of a percent. However, that’s not all hard mode adds. Oh no, it also adds regenerating health for enemies.
Yeah, you read that right. Now if you don’t defeat an enemy quickly enough, their health will start to regenerate over time. This means that staying a good distance away is not a sure fire victory any more, and means that getting close to a powerful monster (like a Lynel) is key to actually defeating it. Again, not a huge change, but one that could up the difficulty a bit none the less.
Another thing that’s changed here is stealth. Basically, enemies can now spot Link much better, which in turn makes it much harder to sneak up on them. No idea if this applies to the Yiga Clan Hideout, but I’m going to guess it does none the less. So yeah, stealth sections are now going to be a tad trickier than before.
Finally, there are floating planks in this game now. These planks (held up by the Octo Balloons you usually get from fighting Octoroks) hold enemies and treasure, with whoever can reach them being able to get it. Yeah, I don’t really see how this increases difficulty either.
So that’s what Hard Mode adds. Nothing massive (assuming Nintendo won’t announce even more features for it nearer the mode’s release date), but a little more than just double damage none the less. However, Hard Mode is only part of this DLC set. And that brings us to…
Trial of the Sword
Breath of the Wild’s equivalent to the Cave of Ordeals. Named Trial of the Sword, this mini dungeon is accessed by placing the Master Sword back in its pedestal, and has Link fight his way through 45 rooms of enemies. Here’s a picture showing the entrance to the area:
As well as a room before the enemies appear:
It’s a pretty standard setup that works like you’d expect, except with one small addition that’ll make it a tad harder.
Namely, you don’t get to start with any armour or weapons.
Yep, you heard me right. This mode works like Eventide Island, with your weapons being removed the minute you enter. As a result, you’ll need to scavenge for new equipment to stay alike, with things like runes and champion powers hence being key to even clearing the early rooms. It’s an interesting little setup really, and prevents Link coming in with level 4 armour and a full armoury of Savage Lynel equipment in order to sweep it with no challenge whatsoever.
But what do you get for beating it, you may ask? Well to put it bluntly, you get a fully upgraded Master Sword. In other words, it’ll then always be in its powered up state, aka the one it’s in when you’re exploring Hyrule Castle or fighting Guardians. Pretty basic reward, but I suspect the actual challenge matters a lot more than the prize here.
Hero’s Path
Also added to the game is the Hero’s Path mode. This mode basically tracks where you’ve been in Hyrule, complete with a nice green line showing the player’s last 200 hours of playtime. So if you need help finding the last few shrines or Korok Seeds, this could be a somewhat helpful tracker.
Travel Medallion
Which itself is made better by a new item called the Travel Medallion. This item basically acts like Farore’s Wind from Ocarina of Time, and can be used to register a temporary new travel point on the map. Admittedly only one can be used at a time, but it does let players quickly warp back to a location not easily served by a warp point none the less.
So yeah, if you want to trivialise the Blood Moon shrine quest (by setting the warp on the pedestal and teleporting back naked when the Blood Moon appears… you can do that now. Same with quickly getting good items (just set the warp to go to Hyrule Castle with the Royal Guard’s gear) or tracking a certain overworld boss you haven’t defeated yet.
Above: Though it probably won’t work to cheat Eventide Island…
Finally, the DLC adds some new armour/costume options to the game. Including…
New Costumes
Tingle’s infamous green getup from past Zelda games, and the Phantom armour from the DS games! So if you want to pretend you’re a ghost knight serving Bellum or a manchild that likes fairies… that’s now possible I guess.
[Phantom Armour]
As is cosplaying as Midna:
Or wearing Majora’s Mask. Hopefully the last one doesn’t cause the moon to start falling on Hyrule!
You also get a Korok Mast, which shakes when a Korok is nearby. As a result, it’s now a tad easier to find all the seeds without a map or walkthrough, which is pretty nice.
And so that’s everything in the first pack. But what do you think of it? Do you like the new content that’s been announced for the game? Does it make the Season Pass you paid for seem worth it?
Post your thoughts on the matter here or at the Gaming Latest forums today!
Source:
Expansion Pass DLC Pack 1 Detailed (Official Zelda Site)
Recently, The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild was released for the Nintendo Switch. An incredible game with a huge explorable worlds and tons of interesting things to do, it received universal acclaim from players and critics alike.
In other words? It became the Ocarina of Time for the Nintendo Switch era.
However, as great as the game is, that still leaves one ‘issue’ for Nintendo. Namely, how do you improve upon near perfection?
Because let’s face it, Ocarina of Time left Nintendo in the same daunting situation. And while their follow ups to it were all great games in their own right, they also all felt like they lacked something or another in general. Like Nintendo had kind of missed the point in regards to what made Zelda popular or beloved.
So to avoid repeating the mistakes of the past, here are my answers to that question. To how Nintendo can in fact improve upon Breath of the Wild with their next few Zelda titles…
1. Focus on a New Central Idea for a Direct Sequel
Or in other words, you’ve got a great engine now. Time to consider the Nintendo Switch equivalent to Majora’s Mask. Aka a game with the same engine and resources but a new main concept completely different to anything found in Breath of the Wild.
Heck, maybe even bring back the parallel universe gimmick. After all, there are lots of NPCs here that you could put into new roles, and plenty of neat twists you could make to the ideas found within the title in general.
So yeah, start with something simple first.
2. Expand upon the dungeons and bosses
But then move onto improving perhaps the only minor ‘downside’ Breath of the Wild has. Namely, that its dungeons aren’t as interesting or unique as those in past games.
Okay, don’t get me wrong here. The Divine Beasts being huge animal shaped mechs is amazing, and the idea of you fighting them in a boss battle before you can get inside is a really neat twist on the formula too.
So those aspects could easily be retained for one or two of the dungeons.
However, what’s less amazing is the actual inside of the dungeons themselves. Basically, they have too little variety in enemies or puzzle setups.
Seriously, look at the dungeons here and tell me what enemies you remember fighting there. I’m pretty sure the answer is ‘just Guardians and Corruption Eyes’.
And that’s a bit disappointing really. One of the best aspects of the older games was how each dungeon used to have a unique mini boss encounter in it, as well as how the dungeons and setups would be themed around the region they’re in. No, that doesn’t require the game to be linear or the dungeons to be bland item puzzle based setups either. Just look at Link Between Worlds if you need proof of that.
So another improvement they could make in a sequel is to bring back the themed dungeons and greater enemy variety inside, and add them to the amazing world presented in Breath of the Wild.
I also think the bosses could be improved here too. Yeah, they are brilliant in Breath of the Wild (especially in a mechanical sense). And I do like the idea of bosses that act more like a physical battle than a glorified item puzzle, where the player can choose how they take them down. That’s really appreciated too.
But the downside here in Breath of the Wild’s bosses is that design wise, they just don’t look very varied. They’re all Ganon Blights, no exceptions. Which in turn makes them all weird Phantom Ganon like ghosts with Guardian weapons attached.
Hence I feel that visual design thing should be improved upon in future Zelda games too. Make the bosses look as unique as they feel, while keeping the same ‘action’ based setup as in Breath of the Wild. Give us a ton of different looking bosses with the same battle strategies and AI skills as the Ganon Blights. Make the bosses in Zelda both visually interesting and difficult at the same time.
3. Reintroduce some Classic Items and Upgrades
Another thing I feel future Zelda games could do is bring back some of the items and upgrades from past games. For example, the Hookshot could be reimagined to let Link instantly shoot to any land or wall he can climb within a reasonable distance. Or to steal items away from enemies like the Grappling Hook in The Wind Waker.
And the same goes for many other items. Not all of them mind (since many have been rightfully replaced by the weapons system or runes), but enough of them to expand upon the formula a bit. You could bring back the Magic Cape and its invisibility effects. The Dominion Rod could be merged with the Command Melody to brainwash enemies (imagine how cool it’d be to turn a Bokoblin or Moblin against its friends!) The Mole Mitts… well, digging underground seems pretty useful in an open wide title like this one.
The list just goes on and on. But that’s not all that could come back either.
Oh no, upgrades could return to. For example, remember the Golden Gauntlets (or slightly weaker Silver ones) in Ocarina of Time?
Yeah, those let you pick up and move large objects. I think those could make for an interesting rune or magic spell in a Breath of the Wild like game too. After all, we can already fling metal objects with Magnesis or catapult heavy ones with Stasis, why not let us literally throw or swing around even bigger ones with this power too?
Similarly, the boots from Ocarina of Time could make a comeback as well. I mean, we’ve already got sand and snow shoes (to walk at full speed on sand and snow respectively). So why not add in Iron, Hover and Magnetic Boots too? These could let us go underwater/brave strong winds, hover in the air for a few seconds or even climb on metal walls/ceilings like in Twilight Princess’ Goron Mines!
Really, there are so many great possibilities here, and I hope Nintendo looks into some of them for the next Zelda title.
4. Allow for new methods of exploration
Finally, I think Nintendo should consider allowing new methods of exploration and new places to explore in the next game.
What do I mean by this?
Well, at the moment we can go anywhere we like on land via climbing. We can swim or sail anywhere we like providing our stamina holds up/we can find a raft. And with Stasis and some neat tricks, we can do a few more creative things there too.
But we cannot quite do everything just yet. We can’t actually go underwater, minus some recently found glitches. Flight is more like gliding, with no way to gain height in mid air. And while anywhere on the surface can be fully explored and enjoyed, going beneath that is limited to a few caves or Shrines.
So that’s the final thing I think Nintendo should work on in future Zelda games. A way to let us not only explore an open world environment on the surface, but to fly around, go underwater or even dig underground to drastically increase the number of possibilities for locations and mechanics. Take what you learned from Ocarina of Time, Minish Cap and Skyward Sword and implement it into the open world environments of Breath of the Wild.
That’s what Nintendo should do to build on Breath of the Wild’s success. Take what worked well, and add in the few things missing from Breath of the Wild to make an amazing new set of Zelda games for future generations.
But hey, what do you think? Do you feel Nintendo should do the above for the Zelda games post Breath of the Wild? Or is there another direction the series should be taken in now?
