Hyrule Warriros Legends: Exclusive My Fairy Costumes

Not only the characters can have costumes in Hyrule Warriors: Legends, but also the fairies. These are even gameplay relevant, because the costumes can increase the damage and decrease the cost of the Fairy Magic. Each outfit only supports a certain element, which is why you want as many of them as possible to create a fairy to your liking. They are a really good reward on the Adventure Maps, but there were also four sets of costumes that only are available via DLC codes and not part of the Adventure Maps.

They were handed out as pre-order bonuses in Europe and Japan, as well as for some promotions in Japan. Here is what they look like and how they were gotten.


Classic Set:

I got this one as a pre-order bonus from Amazon Germany. I don't like it that much, but it was bundled with the Classic Costume for Link that originally was introduced in version 1.7.0 of the Wii U game last June. It's the only character costume that you can't unlock in Adventure Mode in Legends.


Twilight Set (Light):

This also came as a pre-order bonus in certain regions, I got it from Amazon Germany as well. And it's one of my favorites, currently decorating my Light Fairy. The game does offer Darkness and Lightning variants of this outfit, both found on the Twilight Map.


Demon Lord Set (Black):

You could only get this in Japan and Europe as well. There was a code in the Famitsu magazine that would give you this costume. It's just a black version of the already available Ghirahim outfit. Update: In Europe this was available in the Nintendo Zones of GAME in early May 2016.


Royal Set (Red):

You had to visit a 7-Eleven outlet in Japan until February 29th to get this. It's a red version of the Zelda and Hilda dresses that are already available in the game. It's for the Fire Element and it could be an amazing fit for the blonde Fire Fairy on the Termina Map.


As far as I know, none of them were available in North America so far. But like the Ocarina of Time, Twilight Princess, Skyward Sword and Demon King pre-order costume sets that were available on the Wii U, I suppose that all of these costumes also will be purchasable for a small price at a later time.

Cia's Master Wind Waker Costume

Glorious! Color me a fan. Not only does Cia now have one costume for each of Link's typical colors, with the blonde hair it's also a reference to Pirate Aryll, which goes hand in hand with Lana's new recolor costume, which is based on Outset Aryll. That's very fitting, both cosplaying as Link's sister.

The Master Wind Waker Map offers a total of 16 recolor costumes. That's the same number of costumes that the DLC Adventure Maps on the Wii U had and I suppose that Koei Tecmo is simply keeping the same value up. It's still a shame that certain characters got left out. The ones, who apparently didn't get a new costume are Impa, Ganondorf, Agitha, Zant, Wizzro, Young Link, Linkle, Skull Kid and Medli.

Especially the last four seem disappointing, because the DLC and Legends characters only have gotten one costume so far, on the Great Sea Map. Medli doesn't even have a single costume yet and at least the adorable bird girl should have gotten one costume here, though it still might be that the Rewards Map has one for her.

They might have dodged a bullet, though. Those recolor costumes can be a mixed bag. Some of them look great, others are just absolutely hideous. Especially Twili Midna got blemished twice now. There's no value in these costumes, if they look bad. (You can find pictures of all new costumes in Koei Wiki, if you want to take a look.)

But I'm quite happy with Cia's collection so far. The only one that I don't like is her Master Quest costume in Link's colors. I get the idea, but it doesn't look good. But I really liked the blue Lana and the green Manhandla recolors. And in Legends I finally got my red recolor costume for her, as well as the nice blonde / purple Aryll one. The only other Cia recolor that I would like to see is some white Fierce Deity costume. And with the Link's Awakening Pack a Marin recolor for both Lana and Cia would be lovely, since she's basically one of Link's oldest love interests. And now that I think about it, they should also get a Zelda recolor at some point...

Hyrule Warriors: Medli Impressions

Medli means a lot to me, since she's the center of my favorite part in the Wind Waker: the Earth Temple. She's just so adorable and I enjoy the team-up action between her and Link. I'm always sad to let her go at the end of the temple and of all the controllable characters besides Link in the Zelda series, she's certainly my favorite.

Therefore, I was quite happy about the announcement that she's finally going to be playable again, as part of the Hyrule Warriors roster. But the outcome doesn't make me as happy. Like the other Wind Waker characters, she's somewhat underwhelming and she sounds more squeaky than she used to, even though they apparently got her old voice actress back (Chiaki Takahashi). It's not as bad as Tetra, but it could have been better.

Anyway, her moveset is alright, but certainly not outstanding. I'm not a fan of tornado moves and she has two of them, her C5 and near the end of the attack string. The latter gets followed by a beam of light and while it seems like a good combination (the enemies inside the tornado get illuminated), I wish that the beam move was somewhat more accessible, because I enjoy using them with characters like Skull Kid and Wizzro. The Lyra was used like a Mirror Shield most of the time in The Wind Waker, so that functionality should have been a little bit more prominent. Her C3 seems quite useless to me and I would trade that without a second thought for more light beam action.

She also got a unique mechanic, where you can fill a bar with her Strong Attack or her C6 and then attack in the air with dodging during certain combos. It's somewhat similar to Tingle's Strong Attack mechanic, but different in execution, because you actually attack using the dodge button. However, to my experience this only seems to work with her C2 and C4.

Quite some of her attacks end with getting dizzy or clumsily dropping on the ground, which makes her even more adorable, but it's also an issue with her safety. She seems to be a very unsafe character. Especially her glorious C6 leaves her open for attacks, which takes away quite a lot potential. Some more dodge cancels and invincibility frames would make her a lot better. She also doesn't seem to do well against Giant Bosses. The C6 does take a way a good amount of the Weak Point Gauge, but it's not enough and you might have to throw in a Special to break the gauge in one go.

But I do like how she flies over the battlefield as her running animation. That looks really great and I had something similar in mind for Marin, who could transform into a seagull to fly around. But even if she doesn't, Medli gives me already my dose of fly-running.

I also like the design of the third tier of her weapon. It looks absolutely amazing and is certainly one of the best looking weapons in the game. Great job there. The fact that she actually uses a "Rito Harp" as the weapon type next to Sheik's Harp also opens some doors. For example a Hilda really could get a "Triforce Scepter" next to Cia's Scepter or a potential Nabooru could get "Gerudo Scimitars" next to Zant's Scimitars.

If Medli ever gets a second weapon type, I suppose the Grappling Hook would be the best fit, since it's a tool of the Rito and Medli originally gave it to Link. So, maybe that won't be Toon Link's weapon in the DLC, but something else, e.g. something with Phantoms. We'll see. Toon Link has more than enough possibilities for additional weapons and I hope that he won't take away from other characters.

Material-wise Medli seems to be a Ganon fangirl. She needs some Ganondorf stuff and a lot of Phantom Ganon materials, where I don't have all that many yet. I know that the new Reward Map battle has three of them, but I have yet to unlock this mission. Luckily, the new Master Wind Waker Map seems to have a large portion of red and blue zones, where getting better materials from the new enemies could become easier.

On the Wii U she needs a lot of King Dodongo crystals and she's actually the third new character to do so, where she's the first new DLC character, where I couldn't afford all her badges right away. Luckily, the Master Material Potion on the Wii U does a great job. I used it on the first Boss Challenge Battle with the ten King Dodongos and got nine gold materials out of it. They actually fixed the same potion with the current update for Legends, so it should work equally now, but it still costs way too much. 20 Silver Materials is nothing that I want to afford at this point. The Wii U version made much better use of the bronze materials, so you're not constantly stuck with 999 rubbish. And it seems like you can't get lots of silver materials from the "Divisive plan" battles anymore, which makes the whole situation on the 3DS even worse.

It's the similar with the Experience Potion. On the Wii U I used it together with Experience+ on the bottom left Master Quest square ("Rack up your K.O. count!" Lvl 12) and got Medli from Level 4 to to 37 in one go. Of course, it's still a long way to the 255 maximum with her... Which I probably won't do, because the real fun is on the 3DS with the new map and with less grinding. The Wii U version really lost all appeal to me at the moment and I probably will only use it to try out the new characters in full glory. 

Fun fact: "Medli" is actually spelled "Medoly" in other languages as a spin on "Melody". 

Hyrule Warriors Legends: 1st SpotPass Gift

Today Koei Tecmo hands out the following via SpotPass to celebrate the release of the first DLC:

• 500,000 Rupees
• 10 Golden/Delicious Weird Eggs
• 10 Golden/Delicious Odd Mushrooms

This is great timing! My Darkness Fairy is at Level 99 and I wasn't going to refresh her, until I have enough food to get me the Double Shade ability back. And this should help A LOT. Thanks, Koei!

Hyrule Warriors Legends: Master Quest Map Impressions

Just in time for the upcoming Master Wind Waker Map, I'm about to be finished with the Master Quest Map. I unlocked all squares, got all weapons and costumes, as well as all fairy rewards. There are only a few Heart Containers missing, as well as some Golden Skulltulas. The latter I will get while unlocking the first seal on the Master Sword at the same time, which freshly got uncovered after I got all Level 3 weapons.

Some time before that (when I got the Level 3 Great Fairy) the game also started to give me Legendary Seals, which are still locked. Seals for Augment Skills started appearing right after collecting all Level 2 weapons, where I finally got "Hasty Attacks" for Cia, my main character. And you really can "main" someone in this version of the game, because it often lets you chose a second or third character, even for some of the Level 3 weapon missions, where normally you're locked to the corresponding weapon type. But e.g. "Artillery Fire" with Zant was always an awful mission, but here I could just breeze through with Cia. In addition, she got many missions for herself on the Master Quest Map, so I was able to play with her quite a lot. She's Level 90 right now, way ahead of Link, who's at Level 75. All other characters are between Level 30 and 50, which means that some of them are heavily under-leveled, but you can usually compensate this with Shade Fairy Magic.

When the Master Quest Map was first released for Wii U, I really enjoyed it, because it introduced the nice "Rack up your K.O. count" missions. Especially the bottom left corner of the MQ Map is very nice for leveling your characters, but here they increased the difficulty somewhat. On the Wii U even with a Level 1 character you could easily kill the Giant Bosses in one go, which now requires some more levels for the same mission. But it was my first goal to get there, where I faced little resistance on the path.

Anyway, what makes the Master Quest Map special are the Master Rules on each mission. Most of them can be easily ignored or even make the game easier. "No Healing" doesn't matter, because you want to have the A Rank anyway. It's the same with "Speed Run", where you now have 20 minutes on the clock. Again, that rule never really matters, because the A Rank turns all battles into "Speed Runs", in fact it's even handy to have a clock on the screen for that. And "No Blocking" makes the game even easier, because it takes away the damage requirement for A Ranks. I heavily enjoy these missions.

"No Item Attacks" usually doesn't prove to be a big issue, they even removed some more unfair scenarios with this on the 3DS. Only "Don't Get Hit" is a real problem and that one luckily is rare. I still hate it, but luckily there's now the "Water Wall" Rental Skill, which allows you to get hit a couple of times. It doesn't work with the "All Attacks are devastating!" missions, but the only real problem are the "Don't Get Hit" Adventure Battles anyway. Thanks to the Fairy Magic it became a lot easier on the 3DS, though.

They also added Owl Statues to some missions, which they curiously didn't do at all on the first Adventure Map. They are very scarce on the Master Quest Map, but still a welcome addition. Especially Owl Statues near Skulltulas and your base can be a huge help. In general, everything feels "fresh" enough that I don't mind replaying Adventure Mode that much. It took a long time on the Wii U, but thanks to the changed rewards and character requirements and the more balanced difficulty I don't feel like dragging myself through the exact same thing again. I'm also making progress at a much faster rate.

Still, what really annoyed me on the Master Quest Map were the Item Cards... again. They were well done on the Great Sea Map, but here you constantly have to repeat missions to get the necessary item cards for rewards and making enemies appear. You especially need a lot of Bombs and the Compass is required more often than usual. On the other maps the Compass is rarely useful, but here the hidden spots are often in the middle of nothing. Though, with the Recorder you can't actually use it on a wrong spot, so you can essentially just try until you find the right place. Bombs can be misplaced, however, and there are two spots right above the two screens at Death Mountain with rows of Armos next to each (where you would find the Power Bracelet in the NES game), where the cave entrances are one field next to where they originally were on the NES. That oversight was already there on the Wii U version and if you're using a map with all secrets from the original game, it might mislead you. And you're not getting enough bombs on your way, which is why you have to repeat the same missions over and over again.

The map also didn't feel as rewarding, which is weird. It has the Level 3 weapons and those are beautiful to have. One the Wii U those were the most important unlocks and here you have them all on one single map. This should feel like an amazing achievement to get it all, but they added the superior "Plus" versions to the game. They look the same, but offer more power, so you're not done with upgrading your weapons and can't get started building good weapons just yet. They are just another intermediate step before the real deal. Also, the Fairy Clothing for the most part was just Skyloft stuff, which got boring pretty quickly. I still need Fire head gear and Darkness make-up, where the Master Quest Map didn't provide anything... It was just differently colored Skyloft Shirts and Pants everywhere. Yikes.

Well, both the Termina and Twilight Maps got unlocked next, but I will go for the Master Wind Waker Map first. Hopefully, it will still be easy enough and not require all the Level 4 weapons already. But since the original Master Quest DLC map was also quite easy, I don't think that this will be the case. I just want something new, before I go at the dreadful Twilight and Termina Maps again.

Hyrule Warriors Legends: 30th Character? Lorule Trio?

The current roster of Hyrule Warriors and Hyrule Warriors Legends has exactly 24 characters and leaves an open spot in the lower right corner:

Back in January this already bugged me and at the time I suggested that Koei Tecmo will add one final character to fill the roster screen. And as it turned out, this character is going to be Medli, who will be available for free this Thursday. She fits this spot very nicely in a set of four The Wind Waker characters, which are all in the same column.

However, she's not going to be the last character to be added. We will get four more in the DLC: Marin in the Link's Awakening Pack, most likely Linebeck in the Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks Pack and two more characters from A Link Between Worlds. And with that we're back to having this ugly little open corner in the character menu again. 29 is a prime number, so there's no way that they could evenly re-arrange the roster. And we're back at the question, if Koei Tecmo might add "one final character" to make it an even 30.

Now, I've already mentioned the possibility in my DLC predictions, but after a similar discussion on GameFAQs I'm even more convinced that we're going to get the full Lorule trio at the end of the DLC:

Ravio, Hilda AND Yuga. Two of them will be paid DLC, one of them a freebie. The freebie characters so far always have been tied to the newly released Adventure Mode Maps. Cia, Volga and Wizzro all were available for free, but their hearts and weapon upgrades were locked on the Master Quest DLC Map. The same happens this week with Medli. You can get her for free, but if you want her stuff in Legends, you will need to buy the Master Wind Waker Map.

On the Wii U all DLC characters are autonomous by now, so she will be a real freebie there. But I suppose that the upcoming DLC for Legends will handle all paid DLC characters the same way as Medli. This time the characters won't be sold separately in Japan, so there's no reason to unlock all their weapons right away and tie all their hearts to levels. Koei Tecmo heavily listened to feedback so far and many people didn't like the autonomous DLC characters. You also want to unlock stuff with them, make real progress other than just leveling. Or else these DLC characters are not fully worth it.

Now, if they really decide to add another character as a free gift and as a "thank you" to the fans, then it will probably happen at the end and that's in November, where the A Link Between Worlds Pack will be released. And since the freebie characters are usually tied thematically to the simultaneously released Adventure Mode Maps, it makes sense to get another character from that game. And here it makes fully sense to complete the Lorule trio of Ravio, Hilda and Yuga. One of them will be free DLC. And the other two will be part of the DLC pack.

So, you might ask, why they simply didn't announce three characters for the A Link Between Worlds Pack, then. All upcoming DLC packs are evenly balanced. The Master Wind Waker Pack is the cheap one, which only has a new Adventure Mode Map. The following packs all give you a new Adventure Mode Map and two new movesets. They all also cost the same price. That's a good system and by releasing a third character for free alongside the last pack, it will make them look good, but at the same time it will be a huge incentive to buy the DLC for everyone, who hasn't bought it already. You suddenly have the pretty Hilda in your roster, but she looks so lonely... And you can add Ravio and Yuga to keep her company for just a small price! It's a good strategy and win-win for everyone. But of course they haven't announced a 30th character yet, because they want to keep it as a surprise for then.

If they want to keep the order of "Ravio, Hilda, Yuga" in the roster screen, the free character will probably be Ravio, while Hilda and Yuga are added to the end. But it really could be any of the three, though I personally believe that Yuga will be part of the paid DLC, because he has the most extraordinary moveset potential. He was also one of the first fan requests that Koei Tecmo has publicly addressed on Twitter around the time, when the first game was released. The other one was Linkle and we all know, how she turned out...

We'll see, but right now I'm convinced that we will get the full Lorule trio in the current Hyrule Warriors games. It would be awesome.

Zelda Movie a Possibility

Nintendo's new president Kimishima spoke to Asahi Shimbun about Nintendo's smartphone and movie plans. See all the details on Perfectly Nintendo.

With the NES and SNES eras Nintendo used to be absolutely everywhere. Yes, there was the bad Super Mario Bros. movie, but they also had TV shows, lots of commercials, even Super Mario cereals. The point is to get attention for Nintendo's actual products: their video game systems and games. It certainly worked for me as a kid. And today smartphones have become an important medium and Nintendo is using this to get attention back to their core systems by releasing free software on Smartphones to lure people back into the real fun. And movies and shows will always be popular, where it could be a good move to do something with their franchises in order to advertise. "Seen this amazing new Zelda movie? Liked it? You have to play the game, then!"

Now, Kimishima doesn't confirm that any Zelda movie is in the talks, but he acknowledges that The Legend of Zelda is in popular demand for such a thing. He also acknowledges that a live action movie didn't really work out so well, which essentially points in the direction of an anime (or animated movie). And this takes away my concerns. I couldn't picture a live action movie for Zelda. Even if it would have Lord of the Rings quality, they won't ever be able to get actors that are a perfect fit for the roles. It would just feel wrong.

An anime in the beautiful style of the new game, however, that is something I could easily picture:

I wouldn't be overly excited, but I certainly wouldn't be worried. It's not the 90s anymore and the Zelda Animated Series from that time is long in the past (though it can be a lot of fun and I might go through all episodes on this blog sometime). An anime worked really well for Bayonetta and if Nintendo can find the right studio (Ghibli may come to mind), a Zelda anime could become a great thing.

This was even something I considered for possible 30th Anniversary surprises, though right now it seems like I was too early with that. The 30th Anniversary might be off the table and all they do at E3 is doing an unscripted live show of the new game. No Zelda Direct or anything, where they could announce something like a Zelda anime in big fashion. But it's still possible that they might reveal something during this year. We'll see and this will certainly be an interesting topic in the future.