A while ago, a multiplayer mod was announced for the Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild. This mod was created by a user on the REGNR8 Discord, and showed all manner of interesting new features and tweaks. Like dialogue for trying to ride someone else’s horse:
Or a battle against Dark Link in a shrine:
It looked utterly amazing, and seemed to show just how far video game modding had moved on recently. However, there was just one problem.
It wasn’t real. All those screenshots you see above… are just mock-ups. They’re basically mere concept art for the mod and what it might actually offer.
The mod itself isn’t actually in development yet.
And we know this because the REGNR8 YouTube channel actually interviewed the mod’s creator. Here’s their video where they talk to Fooni and go over his plans for the mod in general:
As you can clearly tell, it’s not exactly at the state shown in the pictures. Forget horse boarding messages or Dark Link fights in shrines, this one hasn’t even really been started yet!
What’s more, we should have known this already. Why?
Because journalists are supposed to research their stories. They’re meant to contact all parties involved and try and get their views on the matter before putting the thing live.
And if they’d done that here (By actually asking Fooni about the mod he was working on), they would have learnt the images were mock-ups there and then. Remember, he wasn’t promoting these images online that much. Nor was he going around claiming they were ‘exclusive’ previews of the mod as it stood there and then.
As the video itself says, just one person could have cleared all this up by getting an interview with the guy. One journalist who went out of his or her way to truly ‘research’ the story. One source who really gave a damn about good journalism.
But no one did. So because of this, everyone from Gamespot to IGN to Forbes and even the Daily Express are posting about these pictures as if they’re real. Yep, now even the UK papers are talking about this mod based on the fake pictures!
It’s a great case study in how good journalism practices have basically died out in the digital age.
Still, as bad as these examples are, it’s really me who should be disappointed here. Why?
Because interviews are our bread and butter on Gaming Reinvented! We’re known as the people who interview fan game and mod creators! And I’m the only who usually conducts them. So to realise I was completely fooled by a bunch of fake screenshots… ones I could have identified had I bothered to set up a proper interview… is almost heart-breaking really.
The one time I decided not to interview a mod creator. The one time I thought I’d just let other people write about the story as is.
That was the one time where my interview could have changed the entire narrative.
So I’d like to apologise to everyone here. I failed you all with my previous coverage of this mod. My standards slipped, and I paid the price.
I will not make the same mistake again.
But hey, what do you think? Are you disappointed the pictures weren’t real?
Or did you secretly hope this mod really was just round the corner?
Post your thoughts on the matter here or on social media today!
As every Nintendo fan knows, Nintendo has been really pushing the whole amiibo concept in the last generation or two. A series of toys that can be used to unlock content in games, these things are tied to pretty much every major game possible. Super Smash Bros uses them. Splatoon uses them. Zelda Breath of the Wild uses them…
Heck, even the upcoming Super Mario Odyssey will use them. Isn’t that awesome?
Well, no it is. In fact, amiibo may be one of the worst ideas Nintendo has ever had.
Why?
Because they’re literally just on disc DLC done worse.
For starters, they quite literally are the same thing. Remember, amiibo don’t have much space to store data.
Seriously, look it up. The total amount of space an amiibo holds is a whopping 8KB. Yes, KB. It’s barely enough to store your average text file.
So most games don’t actually use it. Instead, they merely connect the amiibo scanning system to data that’s already on the disc. All those armour sets you got from Breath of the Wild? On the disc already. The cards in Mario & Luigi Paper Jam? On the disc already.
And that’s the case for pretty much every major amiibo focused game in history. You’re paying money for figurines that merely unlock data you already own. It’s no better than paying for an unlock code on the eShop.
Indeed, it’s actually far worse than buying an unlock code. Think about it. What do you have to do to buy an unlock code for on disc DLC?
Simple. Go to the eShop equivalent, spend some money and unlock the DLC. It’s easy, it’s quick and there’s absolutely no chance they’ll ever run out of DLC to distribute.
But amiibo don’t work like that. Because they’re physical toys, you have to go out in the real world and hope you can find the bloody things on the shelf somewhere.
However, that’s unlikely to be the case cause every scalper on the planet is buying them up to resell on eBay. And Nintendo don’t like producing more than the bare minimum of each figure.
So you’re off to eBay (or the internet reselling site of your choice) looking for toys to unlock that one level or character you already owned to begin with. Don’t you see the problem with this? It’s worse than just buying the DLC through the eShop.
Which wouldn’t be so bad if amiibo functionality was kept to a minimum. If only a few games used amiibo, who cares if you can find easily?
No one. But that’s not the case. In fact, Nintendo is getting more and more brazen with this stuff. What do I mean by this?
Well, look at it this way. In Super Smash Bros for Wii U, it was all optional character building stuff. In Super Mario Maker, you can alternatively unlock the costumes through 100 Mario Challenge. That’s fine and good. It’s treating amiibo as a nice extra.
Yet that’s not how it works in modern Nintendo games. Instead, whole features are locked behind them. These include the likes of:
Amiibo Party in Mario Party 10
Almost all of the best battles in Mario & Luigi Paper Jam
A whole bonus dungeon in Twilight Princess HD
As well as the entire game of Mini Mario & Friends Amiibo Challenge
What’s worse, this is even at the expense of other DLC as well. For example, look at the Fierce Deity Link armour from The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild.
Not only does it look cool, it’s objectively better than the alternatives you get elsewhere. It looks better than the Barbarian Armour. It upgrades more easily than said armour. There’s a cool weapon included you cannot get elsewhere.
And unlike the Phantom Armour from the DLC, you can actually upgrade it to boost its stats. So not only does it look good, it’s objectively better than the stuff they’re giving us in the DLC packs!
Which is a bit of a running theme here really. Despite DLC existing and the core game going for $50 or so, the best content nowadays is being locked behind the amiibo pay wall. It’s like Nintendo has started prioritised toy buyers over gamers.
What’s more, the recent Metroid Samus Returns amiibo functionality makes this game even clearer. Why?
Are being used as an excuse to sell toys. That’s what Nintendo has come to now. On disc DLC for features that were free in previous games. It’s absolutely pathetic, and clearly shows Nintendo are trying to gouge you for every cent they can.
You’d think people would be furious about all this.
But no, they’re not. They would be if EA/Activision/Konami/Capcom had been responsible, but because Nintendo’s involved everything’s fine and dandy to them. Like there’s one rule for Nintendo, one rule for the rest of the industry.
It’s absolutely ridiculous, and needs to stop now. Stop defending everything Nintendo does like they’re some kind uncle you’ve known since childhood. They’re a business like any other, and needed to be treated as such here.
Otherwise we’ll see even more of their games cordoned off behind $20 figures. Time to stop supporting this ‘pay to win’ behaviour, before Nintendo’s games become the same sort of exploitative crap as so much of the rest of the industry is now. Amiibo are no better than any other on disc DLC is.
As anyone who’s ever played The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild knows, the Sheikah Slate is a massive part of Link’s adventure. It holds the world map, as well as a way to warp between areas. It’s used for runes, like remote bombs and stasis. And with everything from cutscenes to Divine Beast manipulation and photography requiring it, it’s basically the most important item in the entire adventure.
But did you know you can skip it entirely?
Yep, thanks to an interesting new bug, you can actually escape the Shrine of Resurrection without even getting the Sheikah Slate! Here’s a video showing how it works:
As well as some quick instructions:
Open a save file where you’re outside the Great Plateau (or in a shrine), and go to a ledge.
Press A to climb down and pause on the same frame
Once this is done, head back to the title via the menu and start a new game
If done correctly, Link should collapse the second he wakes up in the Shrine of Resurrection
And voila, he’s now outside the Shrine minus Sheikah Slate!
This works because the game has a really bad way of handling save data. Put simply, it doesn’t quite clear your state between save files or new games.
So if you’re sneaky, effects can be carried between them. Did this bug with a normal shrine instead of the Shrine of Resurrection?
You’re now outside of the shrine’s boundaries in the void. Or stuck in a wall somewhere.
Saved the game while in some dangerous substances and reverted to a file where you’re on a horse?
The effects have carried over, and you’ve either got auto healing or just dropped dead on sight. The list goes on and on. Cause the game just doesn’t clear save data correctly.
Either way though, doing the bug mentioned lets you skip the most important item in the entire game. But what effects does it have?
Does it break the game wide open?
Not quite. For one thing, the game does act like you have the slate where cutscenes, shrines, towers and Divine Beasts are so concerned. So if you ever need to scan a terminal (or are planning to upgrade it at the Hateno Tech Lab), don’t worry. That still works fine in this game state.
You can also use runes like normal, since the L button’s quick select menu works as it usually does. So unless you’re one of the 1% of players who actually open the slate to switch runes (apparently that’s actually possible?), you won’t see anything different there either.
However, there are still other effects the lack of Sheikah Slate has on the game. For instance, without the slate, time never progresses. What do I mean by this?
Well apparently the cutscene that plays when you first enter the Great Plateau also starts the in game clock. It’s what kicks off the whole day and night cycle thing.
So without it, time remains frozen at the time you started the game. This in turn means that the Blood Moon never happens.
In other words? You can pretty much permanently kill every monster in the world while this state is active, turning Zelda into a game with (NPC only) final death.
It also completely disables the map in the game. As a result, not only can you not view it by press – (since the Sheikah Slate doesn’t exist), it doesn’t appear as a mini map either. So if you want to do a full blind run of the game… well this could be just the ticket.
Same goes for teleporting too, since without access to the map you can’t warp anywhere. That’s brutal for a new player, but certainly makes things a tad… more interesting for those who consider warping a bit out of a cop out.
Finally, it’s not permanent either. Don’t like not having a Sheikah Slate? Simply go back to the Great Plateau and get it, since you’re able to pick it up at any time. Because of that, while some aspects of the game aren’t possible (like manipulating the Divine Beasts), you can simply go back and get the slate if you want to complete them further down the line.
So give it a go if you’re interested. It’s an interesting way to play the game, and provides a nice bit of extra difficulty for those people finding Master Mode just a tad too easy.
In The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild, you can go anywhere at any time. You can fight the final boss the minute you get off the Plateau. You can take on the Divine Beasts and story quests in any order. Heck, even stables of the Zelda series like the Master Sword can be skipped altogether.
And that makes it quite tough to really mess up too. I mean, how can you mess up? Everything you can do in the game can be worked around or ignored when necessary.
There’s no way to make the game unwinnable.
Or is there?
Because as I found out earlier, there are indeed three ways to completely destroy a save file in Breath of the Wild. They’re absolutely batshit insane ways yes, and they’re never going to occur to 99% of people playing the game.
But for those who are curious (or want to screw over a friend, family member or video game store), well here you go. Here are three ways to render your Breath of the Wild save files completely unusable.
1. Escape the Final Boss Battle Then Save on a Divine Beast
Starting with the first of two tricky sequence breaks involving the final boss glitch. How does it work?
Well, basically, you can escape the battle with Dark Beast Ganon by taking a horse to the wall of light outside the arena and getting off while the horse is trotting along. This puts Link outside the barrier with no easy way to get back inside.
However, this state also has a severe problem.
To put it simply, you can’t save or teleport at will. Instead, you have to go to Lurelin Village, attempt to open one of the treasure chests in the gambling mini game, then end the mini game to reenable saving and teleporting.
And that’s key to the glitch here.
You can’t exit a Divine Beast dungeon without teleporting or going through a cutscene.
So if you use this ‘final boss escape’ glitch, go to an uncompleted Divine Beast and save the game…
You have pretty much bricked the save file. That’s because the teleport option (and the leave button) do not work when you reload the game. You need to get to Lurelin Village to reactivate the features.
As you cannot escape the Divine Beast to reach Lurelin Village though…
You’re screwed. Your save file is now virtually unusable, since you have no way of leaving the Divine Beast.
And to add insult of injury, that even applies to the boss terminal and entry pad too. Because thanks to another glitchy effect of the ‘final boss world’ state, neither are loaded when the glitch is active.
Now admittedly, you could revert to an older backup. That’s certainly possible if you’re not careful.
But if you were ‘smart’ enough to overwrite them with auto saves taken on the Divine Beast, then you’ve absolutely wrecked the save file with no way to recover it. How frustrating!
2. Escape the Final Boss Battle Then Save Out of Bounds
Still, what if you don’t have at least one Divine Beast not completed? Is there a way to screw up your save file with the same glitch then?
Yes there is. And it’s ludicrously simple too.
Just save the game while out of bounds in said state. If you do, you won’t be teleport out when you reload the save file, permanently ruining it and requiring the file to be deleted and started over. It’s that simple.
However, it’s not just tricks with the final boss battle that can wreck your save file.
3. Fill Up Your Whole Inventory With Wild Outfits Via the Dupe Glitch
Nope, it’s also possible to screw up your file with the new item duplication glitch as well.
But… there’s a catch.
You need all 120 shrines first, to unlock the ‘Wild’ set.
That’s because in Breath of the Wild, you cannot sell certain armour or clothing pieces. These pieces are:
The Wild set (Cap, Tunic and Trousers of the Wild)
The Thunder Helm
Champion’s Shirt
All of the Zora set (Helm, Armour and Greaves)
To do the trick mentioned though, you need an armour set/piece that respawns with the duplication glitch. The only valid option there is the Wild set.
So here’s how it all works.
First of all, make sure you haven’t entered the Divine Beast Vah Ruta yet. Yes, you can get all 120 shrines before that point, don’t worry.
Then, activate the item duplication glitch. If you can’t remember how to do that, you activate it by entering the Trial of the Sword, warping to a Divine Beast then leaving.
Now head to the Forgotten Temple. If you’ve beaten all 120 shrines, you’ll see three treasure chests with pieces of the Wild set in.
Get them, set the Travel Medallion and warp back. Eventually, you’ll fill all spaces in your inventory.
Go to any shop in the game and sell every piece of armour/clothing that can be sold. Return to the Forgotten Temple. Keep collecting the Wild set.
Once you’ve filled all 100 slots with unsellable armour, you’ve done it. You have absolutely and utterly broken your save file.
That’s because to enter Vah Ruta, you need the Zora Armour. However, you don’t have room for the Zora Armour, and the King won’t give it to you.
Problem is, because the Wild set can’t be sold, you can’t sell any of it to make room for the Zora Armour, so you have pretty much hard locked yourself out of the Divine Beast Vah Ruta main quest altogether.
In addition to this, you’ve also potentially made Divine Beast Vah Rudania virtually impossible, since you have no room for fireproof armour in your inventory. Good luck there. Especially given how even stepping into the North Mine will require chugging fireproof elixirs like a man possessed.
Finally, while you’ve already cleared Vah Medoh and Vah Nabooris for this (since said shrine quests need them cleared), you now have no way back into Gerudo Town either. Cause hey, you can’t buy the necessary Gerudo clothes to get in, and have no way to get the Sand or Snow Boots either.
Admittedly it’s not a complete write off, since Hyrule Castle and Ganon are accessible at any time. But the good ending is lost forever, 100% completion is lost forever, many sidequests are lost forever and every other piece of clothing in the game is lost forever as well.
In other words, your options are drastically limited at best. Talk about making a dog’s dinner of your whole adventure!
And that’s how to make the Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild completely unwinnable. Is it likely to happen? No, especially not by accident. You have to be really trying to mess up the game via the methods mentioned above.
But it is possible, and it’s interesting to think about none the less.
So if you’re totally bored with Breath of the Wild (or have an annoying friend or family member to screw over), give ‘em a shot. It’ll at least be a bit more interesting than aimlessly helping the same NPCs all day. Or whatever else you do with a completed save file.
Here at Gaming Reinvented, we’ve seen quite a few interesting video game mods over the years. We’ve seen characters from other games added into titles like Super Mario Sunshine. We’ve seen ROM hacks that add orchestrated music to games via the MSU-1 chip or redesign every level completely to make a new experience.
And with Kaze Emanuar… well there’s basically a newsworthy mod being released every week. Like his Super Mario Odyssey 64 one. Or his interesting attempt to add 3D World characters to Super Mario 64.
However, there’s usually a pattern here. Namely, the mods are of old games. Ones people have owned for years like Super Mario World, Super Mario 64 and The Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time.
But that’s not the case with today’s one! Oh no, it’s a mod that adds multiplayer to The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild! In other words, it’s Mario 3D World style co-op multiplayer in The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild!
Here are some pictures showing it in action:
As you can tell, it looks great so far. You’ve got unique dialogue for ‘creative’ uses of the engine. You’ve got a nice split screen view which takes the other player into account. Heck, you’ve even apparently got the possibility of Netplay here. In case you want to play the game online.
It’s a really well done mod. However, there’s just one problem with it.
Namely, its really resource intensive. Like, to the point it could probably crash your computer resource intensive. That’s because Breath of the Wild has a complicated engine with tons of physics and mechanics to run at all times, and this mod means adding even more on top of that.
And given the poor state of Wii U emulators at the moment, that means the mod isn’t viable to release just yet. It works, it’s just not going to run well for 99.9% who’d download.
So until those bugs are fixed, it’ll remain in development for the time being.
Still, what do you think about it? Are you impressed that such a thing is already possible? How much do you want to play the Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild as a multiplayer game?
Post your opinions on the matter (and more) here or on the Gaming Latest forums today!
