Gaming Zelda Fans Come Hither...

Ah, so there's a more subtle feature to that, thanks.

 

Today's antics include:

Did the Akkala lab furnace quest and damn, using the lanterns was practically mandatory on that one - lost count of how many enemies I took out - including one lot by tormenting them with bombs. I now also have upgraded bombs and sensor, not yet done the stasis upgrade but that'll come, just need one more Ancient Core.

Done a couple of hidden shrines so now done 32 of them, have 11 hearts.

 

Got to Zora's domain, also got second armour level upgrades due to unlocking the second fairy and decked much Lizalfos arse because I was used to dealing their bigger, 120HP brothers. Zora city is a neat bit of design as is Vua Ruta, and yes the Divine Beasts are indeed massive.

Tormenting a Lizalfos - or a group of - to death via bombs is a guilty pleasure.

Also decked a Lynel, who was a bit of a cheating **** at times, but if I'm pulling off Flurry Rushes, well only a matter of time before his ass was grass. And so it proved. Went through 2.5 weapons in the process too, have a really good Shock Arrow arsenal now. He was a heavy hitter, but due to upgrades, wasn't able to one-hit kill me.

 

Remember that 30th Anniversary Legend of Zelda concert CD/DVD? I had ordered a copy and it is pretty good. I wished they had a few more tracks on there like the Majora's Mask and Link's Awakening movement but they do have A Link Between Worlds/TriForce Heroes one which sounds good. I thought the DVD would have the concert itself but they just have the gameplay footage to the music instead.

EDIT: Just checked my play activity on the Switch and I've spent "160 hours or more" on Breath of the Wild

 

I suppose it was inevitable, as opposed to never happening. Yea, even Zelda ended up deploying an epic sequence of Total Arse.

One of the enduring failures of current video games for me is the ambitions of the plot are rarely achieved by the gameplay sequences created to service them. The ambition will be for a climatic, epic action sequence, the reality? A pain-in-the-arse process you just want to get through that is nowhere near as much fun as its designers thought.

So this one? You have to shoot these blocks of ice, allowing for your arrows curvature of flight and speed but, due to how the movement works, the ****ers practically curve in mid-flight so screwing up any physics calculation you try. In this sequence the limited durability of the bows actively works against the fun, they really should have suspended the mechanic for it - have a special one-off superbow you have to return if need be - anything but the ones you have because I went through 3 of 5 on this sequence. I had 140 arrows, that was down to 70 by the time it was done.

Oh and just to add insult to injury, one time Sidon takes me up the wrong side, where I had already taken out the orbs - ****in' poser moron. Then, thinking that this is a game that rewards creativity, I figure I can glide onto it instead and take out the last orb that way, right? Wrong, it has an invisible force field that repels you as you land! Yes, the only way is the way the game wants you to do it.

So, got inside the Divine Beast and I find? A load of puzzles only the kind of person who enjoys cryptic crosswords would enjoy. No clues, no indications of what you can and can't interact with, got the map then found it had decided to commit the cardinal sin of placing an unkillable enemy spawner. (Worse in some ways was the lack of shadow for the enemies it spawned, as you couldn't tell where they were in 3D terms, which is a strange error for them to make given their background in pioneering 3D platforming which relies on that shadow indicator.) Went with the 'bugger this for a lark option', warped out, went on a kill-spree, restocked my bows and arrows then went to Hateno and finished the Hylian Homeowner quest, for which there was a very good reward. Oh and inbetween went and bombed a load of Lizalfos again.

 

So it happens you can use the ice power to shatter the blocks instead, which would have helped to a degree but not the camera feckery - the amount of times an ice block immediately hit me off-camera was bloody irritating - nor Sidon being a moron.

 

To be honest, I didn't have much trouble with that sequence.

Spoiler

Granted, would have been handy to remember that shatter move but I had alternated between melee to whack the flying ones away and the arrows for the water ones. As with the launching aerial part, I just glided over to the right on if at the wrong position and arrow.

Those spawners and certain corruption elements can be taken out by removing the 'eye' that is nearby.

Do not forget that each beast has a function that can be controlled on the map.

 

The "face the lynel part" was more annoying to me, considering how ridiculously powerful it is (fast, hits hard, shoots arrows and can shoot over objects if you manage to escape and break line of sight). The funny thing is that while I was wandering around Hyrule I had gone for another tower that was surrounded by lightning wizards and lizalfos wielding shock arrows, so I already had all the shock arrows I needed. Well, I guess I should have loaded up on stealth instead, but the autosave kept placing me too close to the lynel after I died.

Yeah, only afterward I found out that the ice rune could have dealt with those ice blocks easily. I used up a bunch of (regular) arrows to knock away the ice blocks (and a lance to knock away a few, though I had to chug down a lot of food to recover, but not like food is hard to get).

Spoiler

I like the Mipha backstory at least, I doubt she'll get much screentime after the zora part, but I find her cute. Ship tease is common in Zelda (and the shipping wars aren't anything new), but rare to have it said directly that she had intended to marry Link, if it weren't for the whole end of the world as they know it. Its hard to tell how Link feels (being mostly amnesiac and still mostly being a heroic mime), not to mention all those cutscenes with Zelda.

 

So Vah Ruta dungeon on Zelda - how in the name of all the gaming hells did this pass quality testing? Because it was ****.

I did the first terminal OK, the second was more irritating, the third was a pain-in-the-arse, the fourth? Took 2 so-called guides, both ****ing useless at actually explaining what was needed and 2 youtube videos because the first of those was crap too. Even with the solution, it took another 3-4 goes of utter tedium - the joy had long been leached out by the sheer crappiness, then got it. The fifth terminal? That was actually quite neat and smart, but I couldn't really appreciate it as I was feeling too hacked off.

I have a suspicion now anything main quest will be *****, that you'll go from the open-ended, experiment encouraging gameworld to the bad old days of you suddenly only having the abilities the game decides to allow you - for instance, on this one the climbing mechanic is suspended. You might have become used to looking to climb and be creative, but not here - no, here there is the one way the game accepts and you will do it the one way.
How will I find Ganon? No idea, but I'm generally far better at violence than puzzles in games.

 

Had a rather excellent Zelda session tonight.

First, duffed up Waterblight Ganon and was rewarded with a surprisingly bloody death sequence for the bastard, didn't expect that from Ninty at all but it was very satisfying. Also surprising was the story sequence afterwards - until now, they'd been quite standard but this one was very touching and then became quite awesome as

Spoiler

the Divine Beast turned its firepower on Calamity Ganon at Hyrule Castle! I did not expect that to happen so fast, that's the sort of move you expect at the endgame, not a quest reward.

It has gone up several notches.

I now have the Lightscale Trident and a resurrection power that'll come in very handy.

I finished off by nabbing Ridgeland Tower - the one guarded by a trio of Electric Wizzrobes - killed two of them with Ice Arrows, which they really did not like! - plus a small army of high-level 288HP Lizalfos also armed with Electric weaponry, with the tower in a pool of water, with only a handful of islands. Yep, getting this one was very satisfying. Four towers remain.

The only minor flaw was this flight experiment from the top of the tower. The guy asks for help, asks for 20 rupees, tells you to glide then got all pissy because it was "only" 400 metres. No guidance, no indication of what he was after, nothing - wanted to throw him off the tower!

 

Had a very mixed go on Zelda tonight.

Started off with irritating shrines, ones that started off OK and then did dumb crap at the end or even from the start in one where it turns out Stasis suddenly had this massive range that I've pretty certain it didn't have before.

Did Tabantha Tower, after it let me shoot the Ganon eye goop, that opened the door there. Ridgeland Tower was irritating as whichever direction you go, the wind is against which seems a total cheat. Turns out you can blow up a pillar and use that to climb the tower combined with ice block bridges. What irks on some of these is its not always clear as to what you can and cannot change in the game environment - most times bombs do not change rocks, so its only in specific instances.

Things improved due to getting Yellow ChuChu jelly to upgrade some clothing, but turns out Gerudo desert has a section that screws your map completely, up to and including blocking fast travel - so legged it out of there. Did do a quite cool (and scary as ****) bridge section up a cliffside on the way to Ridgeland Tower, it was quite brilliant but also vertigo-inducing.

Also managed to get Hebra Tower, which is in a cold environment and then found the Rito Village, which meant I could get cold armour, which has been upgraded to Level 1. Next will be Level 2. Also have Stasis upgraded and am up to 13 hearts, which opens the door to the Master Sword quest, if I can but get to it.

So, it ended very positively despite less than great beginnings. (One shrine towards the end was actually logical, that was a big shock.) Think I've one tower left to get, if I can.

 

I'm certain whenever a game has "optional" stuff the quality control goes out the window.

I have not the words for how **** the Mt Lanaryu dragon fight was. In the end I just loaded an old save and didn't bother with it. Yes, they took what should have been an epic fight with a dragon and completely ****ed it up.

How? I had 52 arrows, by the time I decided it was too **** to complete I was down to 30 and only had 2 hits out of over 20. Why? Because it ****s with your sense of distance, you'd think you have a good shot - nope, out of range. This one? No, dragon moves too fast. The first hit is easy because its not flying around but after that? And every damn time it flies off somewhere else and you can't get to it.

Whatever ****wit came up with this ought to hang their head in shame forever.

Combined with a hidden shrine that renders your shrine sensor completely ****ing useless, tonight's go has been utter crap from start to finish.

Well, not quite, did get Gerudo Tower and completed the Hyrule map but after that it was all down to ****edom.

Also blocks any means of upgrading some armour as it requires you shooting pieces off dragons and I'm unlikely to be doing that now. ****ing idiots.

 

I wasn't sure I would bother getting BotW for a while, but I did. I've beaten the main Ganon quest, so I've played a good amount. If anything, I'd say BotW makes some considerable steps forward for the Zelda franchise. It's definitely bigger, more difficult, and less hand-holding. Kudos to Nintendo for listening to their fans... even if it took them like three consoles to do so.

That said, I don't think it's a 10/10 game. There are quibbles, like the frame rates issues, and things that are just difficult and frustrating because that's just the game (rain, stamina, weapons breaking, not having the right tools to do certain things at certain points)., and fixable irritable stuff (button customization limit, motion controls being necessary to solve a puzzle...).

But besides all that... I like a good story and interesting characters, and though there are some stand-outs here and there, BotW is lacking in this field. Characters seem too robotic, and I think a certain charm is missing in the game.

Still, as someone who's not into open-world games or used to them, I think BotW's gameplay is pretty addictive, and it's obvious that's where the developers put in the most effort. I just wish Nintendo would make a Zelda game in that spirit, with effort put in for the story and characters as well. And some fixes to at least some of the stuff I listed above.

Overall I'd probably score BotW at 8/10. Not the best game ever, but better than I thought, and I'm still playing it..

 

Just had a far, far better session than last night's, including doing the dragon!

Belated thanks for this - not that I was in the right state of mind to appreciate it last night - just over 24 hours later, as, feeling quite a lot calmer and deciding to adopt a different tack of treating it as training level rather bastard boss battle, I gave it another go.

The updraft effect is quite weird, it's been described as infinite stamina which isn't quite accurate - I can see why the term is used but it doesn't quite fit. Nonetheless, I did get my head around it and restore the dragon, which was quite cool. It was quite odd that a huge bastard dragon can disappear on you, but once I found it for the last hit was actually able to do it.

Did a handful more shrines and both were actually quite smart, one being electricity based and the other wind based - no, not Blazing Saddles style! One was also one I tried to find the other day but couldn't due to a sandstorm so nailing that one was quite satisfying.

Got an expanded inventory due to finding Hestu again and got Climbing Boots upgraded.

So, as the Daily Log informs me that in under a month I've racked up 49 hours 10 minutes - yeah, I've got my money's worth here all right, overall?

Overall, it's very good indeed. Negatives? I'd class them as eclipses, why? Well, consider the nature of an eclipse - the Moon blocks the Sun, a body many, many times its size, but in an eclipse all you see **is** the Moon. They are, in comparative terms, very small but seem far bigger at the time.

In terms of world design, it's quite superb because they actually made the regions distinct, the woods and forests of one part of Hyrule will be distinctly different from another, while possessing a measure of design consistency. The soundtrack remains wonderfully subtle too.

The strangest thing about it is that it's easily the hardest game I've played in ages, with more deaths than I can count, yet I'm still playing it.

 

I had an awesome few hours on Zelda today.

It started out with the intent of dragon-hunting, but turns out when you want them, you can't find them them! Yes indeed, a big bastard dragon is a no-show. Oh well, another time for that then.

First, did a number of shrines and every single one was actually a smart puzzle where you could observe and work out the solution.

Second, I got into Gerudo Town! I'm surprised it hasn't been slagged by the anti-SJW brigade for it requires Link be cross-dresser! Oh yes. Quite funny, utterly useless as armour, but for getting into and out of town it works.

Third, got some new gear and upgraded some clothing.

Finally and best of all - I killed a Guardian. A real one, one that has legs and chases you while intent on barbecuing you to death by laser. Got targeted, saw it was mobile, well ****, then remembered I was in a forest. So went for it. I used a couple of trees to block its laser hits while taking out its legs one by one! Once it was immobilised, a tree acted as shield for me to pepper it to death.

A short while later - another one turned up, so legged it for some nearby trees, started on ripping its legs off. Got it immobilised and it still has about 50% health so: Hey, what happens if I hit it with an Ancient Arrow? In a word: BOOM. Quite, quite excellent.

They're still absolute bastards, they still can kill me in 2-3 hits if I'm not careful, but they can now die too.

 

Guardians are child's play once you have the Master Sword. That first feeling of finally defeating one, as the kids say, gave me all the feels. Those Lynels are expletives deleted though. LOL. They are tough. If I can learn the timing of the shield deflection, I may change my tune but right now they are still VERY difficult to defeat.

I'm 30% complete according to the map. I've beaten the game and I'm just doing side quests, shrine quests, and the like. It's still very enjoyable. I play about 1-2 hours every night when I can.

This is the first game where I actually WANT a bug net. Is there one? Is there a trick other than sneaking around to catch insects and lizards and fairies?

 

Found this. Going to try it the techniques when I play.

 

Huh, how about that? 66 shrines done, a good few more found but not done, oh and I killed about 5 Hinox for 1 more set of Hinox Guts.

Gits, oh well, got 2 of 3 of the soldier armour upgraded, will get the other eventually.

Just climbed a mountain, found a new and done the shrine that took me to 66 and looking out over a stunning vista.

 

I had a rather excellent session on Zelda tonight.

This go started off as a kill session for armour upgrades, with Electric Lizalfos as enemy no. 1. Got enough so decided to follow the road out of Gerudo Desert.

That led me to a new stables and a sidequest to save some guy's friends, which turns out to be on this quite mad but equally brilliant high bridge structure that spans an entire canyon. Now high-level fighting can be a pain so the better solution? Bombs. Blow them off, let them go splat, pick up the spoils - yes, this works very well and is very funny. The design of the bridges was a masterpiece while being, due to the graphic effects, hellishly vertiginous.

Got the lot, got the reward - 300 rupees, a very fun quest indeed.

Got the armour upgrades I was after and noticed I now have Unshockable set bonus on the electric armour and Unfreezable on the cold armour, which is very cool. At some point I'm going to have to get into Goron territory but haven't got the food prepared for flame resist.

 

Not to worry, an NPC at the stable leading to Death Mountain (Foothill Stable I think it is?) sells a set of three Fireproof Elixirs that give you more than enough time to make it to Goron City where you can then buy a full fireproof armor set.

 

Oh, I've since gained access to Death Mountain, got fireproof armour at Southern Mine, then the rest at Goron City, have it up to level 2 Fireproof status too.

 

Recent activity:

Part 1:

So Zelda... Another 'board the beast' mission.

This wasn't as bad as its predecessors but that's not saying much. No, the great sin of Vah Neboris is that the game cheats. Before I tried this, I equipped electric armour, went out in a thunderstorm, thunder came down and, due to the set bonus, did no harm. So, Vah Neboris uses lightning? Should be the same result, right? Wrong! Because Vah Neboris' lightning is "special" and gets to ignore that set bonus! Only got one hit, was in Riju's shield circle for the other times, still felt like total bull****.

Still, got on board, so it'll get better right? Got the map and groan, yeah, it's the usual crap. Map that bears no resemblance to reality? Check. Far worse was this: It has these instructions saying 'rotate the beast 90 degrees'. Ok, 90 degrees yeah? Ok, let's go. It rotates all right, but 180 degrees! Vah Neboris fails basic maths.

So, deciding I can't be arsed with this tonight, I save and call it a day. The solution will be the same as for others, grab walkthrough and do five probably crap puzzles, get to the Ganon infestation and find his attacks magically bypass any thunder protection because his is "special" but that won't stop his arse from being kicked. Tick off another pain in the arse divine beast.

It's so very strange - these sections are just the polar opposite of the rest of the game which says: "Go here, or there! Try this and that! Experiment!" Nah, these sections are all:

• No, you can't climb. Yes, we know we let you climb everywhere ****ing else but not here.
• Yes, outside there were multiple solutions, you're not ****ing outside, you're in here and the only way accepted is what we ****ing tell you.

I'm past getting pissed off over these now, instead being at weary, worn down into acceptance stage.

Part 2:

Well, did Naboris, as expected, it was a pain in the arse but lightened somewhat by occasional moments of cleverness, but often followed by moments of equal stupidity.
Got the five terminals, started the boss fight. Yeah, I can see why people are hacked off by this one, here's my list:

• The arena - you're a curved space which wrecks the hit box for you - the boss has no such restriction.
• When I managed to whack him, he had this tendency to fly to the floor, by the time I catch up? Oh look, he's recovered.
• The bit with the pillars? Some time after this battle I had a huge amount of fun shrugging off multiple lightning strikes and even using a couple of them on enemies - yeah, the Unshockable set bonus is that good, except, in this fight, the game decides this lightning is different so you get hurt even if you have that armour on. Yes, it is as crap as it sounds. Not to mention, unlike the Kolga fight, it's bloody murder to tell where the boss is to drag a pillar up to him. Magnesis is useful but it's not a combat power for me, given how they've configured it.
• Got past that and killed him, outside of the cheating pillar section, he wasn't able to do that much damage due to armour upgrades, but it just didn't feel like a good fight.

After that? Well, let's see:

• Got Fairy 4 - really hate the whole sandstorm takes out your Sheikah slate mechanic, feels very arbitrary, but made it through. Realised a bit later this was one of the skeletons for a side quest so went back and snapped it.
• Found a new area filled with sunshrooms, which I've been after for ages.
• Found the Eldin great skeleton which also looks to be Dinraal's spawn area too. Also took out a host of strong enemies - 2x 720HP goblin, 4x 240HP goblin, 1x 288HP Lizafos, 1x 360HP Moblin via bombing them from atop the skeleton.
• Got a ton of armour upgrades - the animation sequence for the Level 4 upgrades is so very dubious.
• Killed a Lynel, they remain a pain in the arse - I wish the whole ZL lock-on did not have to be manually maintained the whole time in these type of fights.
• Killed a Hinox and stealth whacked it with Urbosa's Fury, the fight started with it about 66% of its health gone!
• Have encountered the Yiga Clan heavies, but they look to lack their infamous hideout enhancements fortunately.
• Up to 76 shrines done now, probably found about 80.
• Tormented a load of 240HP goblins with bombs having taken out the lookouts from atop their hideout then, treasure.
• Had forgotten how good the Champion's Tunic was, seeing enemy number level helps hugely.

 

Today I spent an solid hour on a raft traveling down the Regencia River from around the Giant's Forest to the Digdogg Suspension Bridge. I stopped along the way to collect Korok seeds that I could see near the shore. I think it was about a half dozen of them. The river moves pretty slow. I turned off Urbosa's Fury and charged up my leaf to make it go a little faster. I tried the "motor" boat method with a metal chest and magnesis, but it's more trouble than it's worth.

Side note: My raft was pretty stationary when I left the "screen" to climb up a giant hill to search the Dalite Forest. When I came back to the river my raft was gone.

 

Well, just over 2 months and 132 hours or so later, I just did the endgame of Zelda. And when I say 'just' I do mean just!

Spoiler

Although, if you have the Perfect Guard (parry) technique mastered, it'll be a cakewalk. I, however, do not have that but did pull off one. The rest of the time? Daruk's Protection was very handy!

It was very satisfying watching the four Guardians blast the unholy hell out of Calamity Ganon! And the creature itself? Well, Predator is the perfect source for this: He's one ugly mother****er.

For the first part of the fight I thought the game had finally given me a boss with some balls. Hits hard, but can be blocked and evaded, plus a 3-bomb arrow shot once he was on the walls brought him back to earth. So whacked him a bit, ate some food - I had plenty and then Phase 2 starts.

This is where he conjures an invincible shield, yeah, really - this is where the fight went into the realm of Total Arse. (Besides, if he had that ability, why not use it from the start?) Turns out you can only hurt him by deflecting his attacks or getting a perfect dodge. Well,I pulled off one Perfect Guard and one Perfect Dodge, the rest of the time? The game decided it didn't qualify. It also threw a fireball at me, now I knew the solution to that was ice arrow, but the game decided it was too high an angle to be shot! You what? ****er. Fortunately Daruk had recharged by this point and 3 uses of that was enough to give me just enough of a window to take him out. Had it not been for that I might have opted for the '**** this for a lark' option and switched off.

Cue massively gory destruction sequence which was sort of satisfying, except I really wanted to crucify the ****er immersed in a bacta vat hooked up to the mains!

So, all done, right? Ah, not exactly....

Spoiler

Turns out there's a second boss but which rather than being a cheating ponce is just crap. It starts off promisingly, big bastard super-pig Ganon and you get the Bow of Light. Which is where it starts to go off the rails, instead of just giving it to you Zelda drops it so you have to pick it up first.

You then end up riding around this screen filling boss waiting for the game to prompt you. When it does, it's hit these large golden circles - that's easy. What isn't is the way your horse controls relative to Ganon, doesn't work anywhere near what you might expect. Still, you hit 6-7 circles and you're told to go round to the front of Ganon. It isn't very clear that you have to jump off your horse, into the updraft, until you have the last weak spot in sight, cue aerial shot. It was a crappy end to a game.

The ending sequences? They were well done, quite satisfying, the image of the spirit of the King and the Guardians looking down on Zelda and Link was very neat. As was the use of the main theme.

So, overall?

It's a strange game, it's near enough two games put together because the main quest plays so differently to the rest of the game. The rest of the game is far more open and free-form, the main quest, especially the Divine Beasts, both the boarding and take back control missions, feel very prescriptive. Corridor gameplay in an open-world as it were. I can't say I enjoyed the main quests, as evidenced by the sheer number of rants from me on that very topic!

Outside of that, however, it is superb. After watching the endgame sequences I reloaded, found myself back outside the boss chamber, so decided to climb to the very top of Hyrule Castle. It was an epic ascent. Found a Korok at the top. I then jumped off the top and did an epic glide out of the entire area! The paragilder never gets old. I love rolling bombs to kill enemies at range too. Works well on wolves too. Taking out enemy hideouts remains great, just the holocaust you set off inside one with either bomb or arrow is superb.

I still think they should not have nerfed the Master Sword in the way they did, especially given what's involved in getting it. I took on a full-power Lynel in Hyrule Castle and the game still decided to drain it of energy, which didn't feel at all right. Outside, in the wide world, Ok, but this is the core of Ganon's powerbase.

I don't mind the weapon durability, except for how it works with stasis, as there you'll have to lose a weapon or two.

The environmental interaction tends to be very good, though there are times when the signposting as to what you can and cannot do is lacking. There's places where you have to do X but you have no reason to consider that you can actually do that.

A relief indicator combined with a customisable map sounds small but has significant impact. If you want loads of icons a la your usual open-world game, you can do it or just have a few key ones.

I really liked the armour upgrades and even came to enjoy working out how to get the dragon pieces for the Champion's Tunic upgrades. The Level 4 sequence with the fairies remains incredibly dubious.

The gameworld is huge and exceptionally well-designed - after a while you pick up on the regional differences. The one big flaw is the frequency of rain - it rained 3 times in my endgame infiltration of Hyrule Castle, which in turn screws over your ability to climb. In contrast, wearing lightning-proof armour, renders thunderstorms very fun and I did a fight with a Super-Moblin (1080HP) in one, where I whacked him with two lightning strikes!

Of the various sub-bosses, I've still to find Stalnox. Hinox is pretty easy, especially if you do a stealthstrike + Urbosa's fury. Talus can be trickier, especially the molten variety. Molduga is just a pain in the arse. None of them though get anywhere near Lynels for being complete ********s. (Though, I haven't yet taken on one using the Fireproof armour, that might be fun.)

Cooking I enjoy quite a bit, though I tend to stick to a set of proven recipes.

Are there things still to do? Yep, all the more fun stuff:

• Gerudo sidequests including the Thunder Helm
• Getting the Guardian Armour
• Finishing off the other armour upgrades
• Doing the remaining shrines

Which I'll get to, on and off.

So, do I recommend it? Overall, yes. Even the powers from the main quest sections do come in very useful later on, so those do sort of make doing that worthwhile, though I still consider the end bosses irredeemable.