I've been working on a speedrun of Oracle of Ages for the past few days. Those who were wondering what happened to my Kirby's Dreamland run - let's just say I'm not terribly suited to running platform games... Anyway, I'm trying to get most of the biggest potential problems out of the way first before actually going through from start to finish and planning it. Four things I'm working on:
Where to get the Shield
For all I know, it could be skippable entirely! I'm playing through at the moment and I've just arrived at Moonlit Grotto (I have completed this before btw). The only place so far I've needed the Shield is the second room in Level 2 with the spiny enemies you need to flip over. You can do this with the Shovel too though (which is a compulsory item, you can't skip it as far as I know) so it's all good. In the event that I do need the Shield (and I probably will, I can't really remember... I haven't played this for literally years), I've gathered some different places you can get the Shield. Along with the obvious choice of the shop in Lynna City, several Deku Scrubs also sell them. You can also get one from the trading post on Tokay Island for 10 Scent Seeds after reclaiming all your items. More news as it comes.
Essential purchases
In practically every Zelda game, you need to spend Rupees at some point. I'm working through the game at the moment making a list of all the stuff you need to buy. So far I've got that you need to spend 10 Rupees on the Tokay Challenge to get the Scent Seedling (although I'll probably get 20 or 30 just in case I screw up the mini-game, which is easily done). This leads us to our next point:
Rupee route(s)
Once I've made a list of essential purchases, I'm going to start from scratch and do a mass overworld investigation, searching for chests and so on containing Rupees. I'll then pick out the most efficient places to get Rupees (based on how much time I'll lose by getting the Rupees). And finally -
Which animal?
Dimitri, Ricky or Moosh? I've got to take several factors into account here. First of all, whose flute is easiest to get? I dunno about the last one but two ways is to do nothing at all, or buy from the shop for 150 Rupees. Doing nothing is clearly the fastest way, but there are two other things to think about - how the path to Symmetry City will be affected (which version takes the shortest amount of time to scale) and also, in the long term, would any of the animals allow faster travel in general? I can imagine there are a few animal-specific sequence breaks as well.
Discuss, people.
Where to get the Shield
For all I know, it could be skippable entirely! I'm playing through at the moment and I've just arrived at Moonlit Grotto (I have completed this before btw). The only place so far I've needed the Shield is the second room in Level 2 with the spiny enemies you need to flip over. You can do this with the Shovel too though (which is a compulsory item, you can't skip it as far as I know) so it's all good. In the event that I do need the Shield (and I probably will, I can't really remember... I haven't played this for literally years), I've gathered some different places you can get the Shield. Along with the obvious choice of the shop in Lynna City, several Deku Scrubs also sell them. You can also get one from the trading post on Tokay Island for 10 Scent Seeds after reclaiming all your items. More news as it comes.
Essential purchases
In practically every Zelda game, you need to spend Rupees at some point. I'm working through the game at the moment making a list of all the stuff you need to buy. So far I've got that you need to spend 10 Rupees on the Tokay Challenge to get the Scent Seedling (although I'll probably get 20 or 30 just in case I screw up the mini-game, which is easily done). This leads us to our next point:
Rupee route(s)
Once I've made a list of essential purchases, I'm going to start from scratch and do a mass overworld investigation, searching for chests and so on containing Rupees. I'll then pick out the most efficient places to get Rupees (based on how much time I'll lose by getting the Rupees). And finally -
Which animal?
Dimitri, Ricky or Moosh? I've got to take several factors into account here. First of all, whose flute is easiest to get? I dunno about the last one but two ways is to do nothing at all, or buy from the shop for 150 Rupees. Doing nothing is clearly the fastest way, but there are two other things to think about - how the path to Symmetry City will be affected (which version takes the shortest amount of time to scale) and also, in the long term, would any of the animals allow faster travel in general? I can imagine there are a few animal-specific sequence breaks as well.
Discuss, people.
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