Spirit Tracks high playthrough comments, part 4

Decided to go do more of the side content before finishing the game... there's actually a lot of cool stuff you could miss easily.

There's some mini dungeons including Disorientation Station, Ends of the Earth Station, Lost at Sea Temple... there's also a fun sidequest where you search for rabbits in the scenery while riding the train... most of the sidequests reward you with materials for train parts, and those can be used to make various different looking trains with different stats... I managed to get the gold train after beating all the sidequests and minidungeons, and doing some grinding to get some rare materials...

I really like how Zelda mostly just complements you on figuring things out, she doesn't point out where you need to go as much as Navi or other Zelda game companions do.

The top floors of the Spirit Tower is the coolest part of the game yet.. the atmosphere is insane, as you have to avoid phantoms and explore in pitch darkness... the Bow of Light can get through the darkness... and the compass of light leads to the demon train. All of the puzzles here require Link and Zelda to use teamwork in unique ways.

That whole final boss sequence was incredibly epic... chasing down the demon train, and then using both Link and Zelda to fight Malladus... and that Duet song... I was like in tears from this ending, the feels were just too powerful...



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Part 3

Spirit Tracks high playthrough comments, part 3

Sand Temple... this is the most "Zelda 1" looking dungeon in the game yet so far. It's much more non-linear right from the beginning... I don't even know if I'm going the right way or not at first.

Pirate Stalfos! Sand Wand! epic...

Did the temple shift around after I got the sand wand? or am I just way too high?
These puzzles are really something... need to get sand onto the floor... took me a while to realize I could walk on those rolling spike things... sand boulder catapult thing...
oh cool, got a pirate necklace... the trading items from WW return in this..
wow, I like how this uses 3d height perspectives in a mostly 2d game..

This game has some messages on the wall with cryptic hints, similar to Link's awakening or the old man hints in Zelda 1... it doesn't spell it out for you at all.

and the puzzles involving marking stuff on the map with the touch screen, something that Phantom Hourglass did really well, are expanded upon further in this game too...

Spirit Tracks high playthrough comments, part 2

This game actually makes you literally TALK to the game characters using the DS's microphone... how embarrassing...
That moblin pirate battle was some epic stuff... I wasn't expecting that at all.
Locomo... I wonder if they're related to the old Hyrule somehow...

Wait, so the land of Spirit Tracks is divided into 4 regions.. Forest, Snow, Ocean, and Canyon... that sounds very similar to the 4 regions of Termina.

oh wow... in the Ocean section the train tracks actually go beneath the ocean... there are underwater octoroks shooting at you and stuff... this is amazing...
running backwards away from a demon train to get to the temple...
woah, the Ocean Temple looks like a giant crystal switch... like the ones from LttP... that's really neat.
The inside of this Ocean temple looks a lot like OoT's Water Temple.

Back to the Spirit Tower... the next floor ramps up in difficulty a bit... this actually feels comparable to the early game of LttP or LA.

I love the puzzles in this dungeon... using Phantom Zelda to lure the other phantoms away from Link with her cuteness...

Spirit Tracks high playthrough comments, part 1

This was my first playthrough of Spirit Tracks. I played through it mostly entirely while high and wrote some notes on it. I was surprised at how good this game was after Phantom Hourglass being a bit of a disappointment.

From wind conductor to train conductor... the next incarnation of Link is the hero of... trains!

This New Hyrule looks sweet, kinda gives me classic LttP vibes.
Princess Zelda calling Link up to her room... giggity

I noticed there's no moat at this new Hyrule Castle... I guess this continent is very dry...

The tower of the Spirit Tracks... an entrance to the Spirit Realm... this is interesting... it's like there's a world of darkness looming over Hyrule in the sky... the environment around this Spirit Tower area is incredibly powerful... reminds me of OoT kinda.

Niko is this Link's grandfather... so he's not blood related to WW Link, but instead is related to one of the pirate characters in WW... and Tetra is this Zelda's grandmother...

Zelda entered the Spirit Realm and became a ghost... she's now this game's navi. I'm okay with this...

Wow, I'm having a ton of fun with this game and I haven't even picked up a sword yet... o_O