Topic: Nintendo Switch (was NX)

[Redcap]

Errrr... any tips? I got myself a Switch for Christmas and have since played through Breath of the Wild (including both DLCs) and Animal Crossing (achieved a five star island, bred blue roses, put lots of hours into terraforming). Now I'm not sure what to play next that would be equally engaging. Is this a common complaint within the Nintendo community that the Switch lacks these sort of must-have/tentpole games? Or am I blind?

I play a lot of non-Switch exclusives it's the only console I have (I prefer to play games on the TV if possible because I have a fairly nice TV).

If you're in a similar position, the following are excellent and run well on Switch:

* Witcher 3
* Bioshock series
* XCOM2
* Hades
* Dead Cells
* Hollow Knight

I reckon I'd have played 50+ hours on each of the above. All just pure excellence.

If you're looking for more Switch exclusives, you may enjoy (aside from the ones that always get recommended):

* Fire Emblem: Three Houses
* Bayonetta 2
* Super Mario 3D World + Bowsers Fury

[Broad Spectrum]

Been playing Hades last couple days, wow it's insanely difficult! Good fun though, although I'll be lucky to compete this inside 50 runs I've just got past the first boss on my 10th run.

[Zlen]

Hate to inform you, but ‘completing’ the run is literally just the beginning of the game.

[Hazell]

Hate to inform you, but ‘completing’ the run is literally just the beginning of the game.

Don't say that, I've had countless runs and still can't get past Elysium   

[Zlen]

Try reading/youtubing on synergies and boons, what to aim for to get most bang for your buck.
Some runs are just doomed, though seldom boring or useless in the end.
Also, obviously, build up the trinkets, well useful ones.

[Hazell]

Thanks, I probably need to read up/watch what to do but I've been trying to avoid it.

Yeah, a lot of the times I go on runs just to collect specific stuff and sometimes I think, ok, I'm gonna try and get as far as I can now (but I'm a bit rubbish at it so invariably fail).

[Hazell]

Been playing Hades last couple days, wow it's insanely difficult! Good fun though, although I'll be lucky to compete this inside 50 runs I've just got past the first boss on my 10th run.

Keep at it Yeah it took me ages to get past Meg as well, now it's pretty simple. Plus I don't mind dying as I look forward to taking a break chatting to everyone

[UntouchableLuis]

Started Zelda BOTW today. Enjoying it so far (not done a massive amount) but the weapon breaking is bloody annoying! Do you get to repair them at some point?

[Zlen]

Nope.
Some special ones you can rebuld.
Master sword recharges.
Rest are gone when they break.

[UntouchableLuis]

Nope.
Some special ones you can rebuld.
Master sword recharges.
Rest are gone when they break.

Ah right. You get about 6 swipes with a sword then it breaks! Most enemies so far seem to die fairly quickly though. I'm guessing as you get further in they become more difficult?

[Zlen]

Yeah, enemies get more difficult but alse weapons you find are more durable and there is an abundance of them. It’s annoying, but further along you go it’s less of an issue.

[PaulF]

I'm looking to get overcooked 2, and the Russian site seems a lot cheaper. Any recommendations on where to get ruble based estore cards (Is this the best \ only way to do it).

[Redcap]

Started Zelda BOTW today. Enjoying it so far (not done a massive amount) but the weapon breaking is bloody annoying! Do you get to repair them at some point?

It's annoying at the start but really it's not as annoying as all that because there are heaps of weapons/shields which respawn every blood moon. You can get to the next blood moon just by resting until you get there - every few days. I don't know if there are that many items that don't respawn with the blood moon.

It definitely ceases to be an issue.

Thanks, I probably need to read up/watch what to do but I've been trying to avoid it.

Yeah, a lot of the times I go on runs just to collect specific stuff and sometimes I think, ok, I'm gonna try and get as far as I can now (but I'm a bit rubbish at it so invariably fail).

Can I make a few general suggestions. I've beat it about 25 times (out of total 70), albeit only up to around 7 heat - so not exactly an expert, but I can hold my own.

1. Get nectar and give it to every god and every NPC once. This will get you their keepsakes, and in the case of many gods, allow you some level of control over which weapons you start with. Very important for most situations.

2. Unlock all of the mirror upgrades - grind as much as you need, but it shouldn't take too many runs to get all but the last set. Put your points into the extra starting health, death defiance, the extra dash and the one where you get health every time you get darkness crystals to begin with. Starting with 100 health, 3 death defiances (4 with the lucky tooth keepsake) and will make it a lot easier for you to get to the last boss, no trouble. Once you have all those, 3 cast stones also makes a very big difference and opens up some new options for builds. There's also one which can increase your damage by up to 40 per cent if enemies have two status effects - again - huge, but less of an issue for now.

3. Particularly at the start, get divine dash as often as you can. It will save you way more than you know.

4. Getting a high damaging call is always helpful. I'm sure others have their uses, but the best for me are Poseidon and Aphrodite, followed by Ares. The good thing about each of these is they more or less guarantee huge damage to a boss - somewhere over the 2,000-3,000 damage mark depending on how leveled up your boons are. Poseidon and Ares also make you invulnerable for a little bit, which has its uses as well. I can't overstate how important this is when you're getting a boss's health down but you're running out yourself. For context, 2,000 damage takes the hydra's health down to zero from the start of its final phase, or about 50% (!!) of Meg's health. The absolutely key thing here is to charge up your call bar all the way to the max, because anything less is fairly pointless.

5. Cast stones are useless at the start when you only have one, but once you have 3, some of them are very helpful for cleaning out a room. Specifically, Dionysus's cast is an excellent crowd control option. They also become very much viable as a focus for a build - won't get into it here though.

Builds

Having unlocked all the keepsakes (1), use one of the really easy builds.

My suggestion is:

Rail gun special build.

With the rail gun (aspect doesn't matter, but Eris is best), get cluster bomb, triple bomb or hazard bomb, and if you can, rocket bomb and just let loose with your special. I can't overstate how overpowered this weapon is. You can clear whole rooms incredibly quickly with minimal risk. I got to the last boss the first time on my 14th run without even really knowing what I was doing. If I knew I would have beat him too.

For boons, go with ones which increase the damage percentage of your special. Aphrodite is best, but Demeter is a good second option. Divine dash or Tidal Dash to protect yourself. Where you can choose to get pomegranates (for your Aphrodite special) or centaur hearts (to increase survivability).

Tidal dash build.

Once you're a little bit more confident, I reckon this is the simplest build to pull off. The heart of it is that tidal dash does a heap of damage and protects you very well. It also synthesises incredibly well with some other Poseidon boons and Zeus boons. With the Sea Storm duo boon, your tidal dashes will also hit enemies with lightning. The damage is huge - first time I used this I knocked about 10 minutes off my best time (finished in about 25 minutes)

Weapon: Anything that involves a lot of rapid attacking. Fist, rail gun and spear are best.
God:

* To begin with, Poseidon for tidal dash obviously. The other key ones are, in order of importance, Wave Pounding, Razor Shoals, Poseidon's Aid and Flood Shot (the latter isn't that important until you get 3 cast stones via the mirror)
* To synthesise with Poseidon, get from Zeus: Thunder strike, and static discharge. There are a few others which multiply the lightning effects which are nice to have but not must haves.

At this point, you should be able to get Sea Storm, a duo boon which makes enemies hit by your tidal dash also get hit by lightning.

Exploding Spear

This could be build 2 to be honest because it's so simple. But it's also very overpowered and you can beat the game almost with your eyes closed. But you do need the right pieces to it.

Like the Rail Gun bomb build, this has a minimal reliance on complex boon combinations or aspects. What it does rely on is a very specific combination of hammers, those being:

1. Charged skewer
2. Exploding launcher.

The combination of these two should be a solid base on which your special will do huge damage to anything in front of you. Get the Aphrodite special once again for the same reasons. Get divine dash to protect yourself. That's pretty much literally all you need.

[UntouchableLuis]

Yeah, enemies get more difficult but alse weapons you find are more durable and there is an abundance of them. It’s annoying, but further along you go it’s less of an issue.

I'm starting to pick up some decent weapons but there's still the odd thing that springs up that just wipes me out instantly. Some stone thing came to life before and just knocked me out.

Do people recommend completing as many shrines as possible to build up hearts/stamina before moving along the main story?

[Redcap]

I'm starting to pick up some decent weapons but there's still the odd thing that springs up that just wipes me out instantly. Some stone thing came to life before and just knocked me out.

Do people recommend completing as many shrines as possible to build up hearts/stamina before moving along the main story?

It does make it easier, obviously. But you don't need to go nuts.

I'd say the order in which you want to do the divine beasts is:

1. Water
2. Fire
3. Air
4. Thunder

If you have 5 hearts per divine beast it should be enough.

I would do the shrines more because they're incredibly fun and well designed.

[Drinks Sangria]

Got given a Ł20 Amazon Voucher by work - might be time to get the Switch Lite. Anyone think it will come down in price in the next 6 months or, like most Nintendo hardware, is it more likely to hold it's price/ sell out?

The grey one is cheaper for some reason so I'll probably go for that with BotW and then wait for the Diamond Pearl remakes.

[Snail]

It does make it easier, obviously. But you don't need to go nuts.

I'd say the order in which you want to do the divine beasts is:

1. Water
2. Fire
3. Air
4. Thunder

If you have 5 hearts per divine beast it should be enough.

I would do the shrines more because they're incredibly fun and well designed.

I did Water, Air, Fire and Thunder in that order - Thunder was a bit tricky (compared to the rest of the game), but...

Spoiler

if you get the rubber armour set beforehand it'll help loads. Having the Master Sword will help with all of them too, it's not the most powerful but it doesn't run out of charge when you're fighting the Divine Beasts and cba with weapons breaking when you're doing them. You need 13 hearts to be able to get it so you'll need to do loads of shrines, but shrines are good! We like shrines!

[close]

That's the way I did it anyway, messed about for like 150 hours doing shrines and exploring and getting my hearts and stamina up, and it made the actual story a piece of piss. If the sequel ever happens (please!), I do hope the story's a bit stronger, but as I've posted in here before it's still probably my favourite game of all time and I've now got 300+ hours in it from just messing about on it when I'm bored or need to relax. Tempted to do another playthrough but my backlog is actually pretty ridiculous at this point and going back to replay a game I've spent that much time on isn't going to help

[Redcap]

I did Water, Air, Fire and Thunder in that order - Thunder was a bit tricky (compared to the rest of the game), but...

Yeah I'd say Fire and Air are probably fairly interchangeable.  guess the benefit of doing Air first is you get Revali's Gale a bit earlier. Come to think of it the boss is also pretty easy, so you could even argue that it's worth doing first, except the area is a little bit further down the 'normal' path.

Spoiler

if you get the rubber armour set beforehand it'll help loads. Having the Master Sword will help with all of them too, it's not the most powerful but it doesn't run out of charge when you're fighting the Divine Beasts and cba with weapons breaking when you're doing them. You need 13 hearts to be able to get it so you'll need to do loads of shrines, but shrines are good! We like shrines!

[close]

Yeah realistically that weapon isn't going to be available for a while. By the time you get to it, the game's actually a lot more straightforward and it's more or less 'all down hill from here'.

That's the way I did it anyway, messed about for like 150 hours doing shrines and exploring and getting my hearts and stamina up, and it made the actual story a piece of piss. If the sequel ever happens (please!), I do hope the story's a bit stronger, but as I've posted in here before it's still probably my favourite game of all time and I've now got 300+ hours in it from just messing about on it when I'm bored or need to relax. Tempted to do another playthrough but my backlog is actually pretty ridiculous at this point and going back to replay a game I've spent that much time on isn't going to help

I dunno. I haven't played a lot of Zelda - BotW is the only one I've played from start to finish although I'd probably give some of the re-masters a red hot go when they come out later this year. But I really liked the story. It's fairly impressionistic - there was a catastrophe and you've woken up 100 years later and need to set things right. I as I get older that I'm don't need games to have dense writing for every sub-quest as much as I liked before. So much of the story just tells itself through how the world now looks. In a way Age of Calamity was almost a step backwards in that it said a lot that didn't need to be said.

[Zlen]

After I kinda finished and got bored with BOTW it was later picked up by my 10yo daughter, who never played a similar game. As she couldn't give a single fuck about doing quests or anything similar, and she had lot of money and weapons - she ignored Link completely, put on some horrendeous purple rabbit mask and started playing as a new character Bunny. Bunny is no hero. He's into stealing stuff, destroying crops, running away from conflict and hunting a very specific type of horse - all of which have the same name. She clocked at least 80+ hours now doing this weird alter ego gameplay. Just goes to show what a great game BOTW is.

[Hazell]

It's annoying at the start but really it's not as annoying as all that because there are heaps of weapons/shields which respawn every blood moon. You can get to the next blood moon just by resting until you get there - every few days. I don't know if there are that many items that don't respawn with the blood moon.

It definitely ceases to be an issue.
Can I make a few general suggestions. I've beat it about 25 times (out of total 70), albeit only up to around 7 heat - so not exactly an expert, but I can hold my own.

1. Get nectar and give it to every god and every NPC once. This will get you their keepsakes, and in the case of many gods, allow you some level of control over which weapons you start with. Very important for most situations.

2. Unlock all of the mirror upgrades - grind as much as you need, but it shouldn't take too many runs to get all but the last set. Put your points into the extra starting health, death defiance, the extra dash and the one where you get health every time you get darkness crystals to begin with. Starting with 100 health, 3 death defiances (4 with the lucky tooth keepsake) and will make it a lot easier for you to get to the last boss, no trouble. Once you have all those, 3 cast stones also makes a very big difference and opens up some new options for builds. There's also one which can increase your damage by up to 40 per cent if enemies have two status effects - again - huge, but less of an issue for now.

3. Particularly at the start, get divine dash as often as you can. It will save you way more than you know.

4. Getting a high damaging call is always helpful. I'm sure others have their uses, but the best for me are Poseidon and Aphrodite, followed by Ares. The good thing about each of these is they more or less guarantee huge damage to a boss - somewhere over the 2,000-3,000 damage mark depending on how leveled up your boons are. Poseidon and Ares also make you invulnerable for a little bit, which has its uses as well. I can't overstate how important this is when you're getting a boss's health down but you're running out yourself. For context, 2,000 damage takes the hydra's health down to zero from the start of its final phase, or about 50% (!!) of Meg's health. The absolutely key thing here is to charge up your call bar all the way to the max, because anything less is fairly pointless.

5. Cast stones are useless at the start when you only have one, but once you have 3, some of them are very helpful for cleaning out a room. Specifically, Dionysus's cast is an excellent crowd control option. They also become very much viable as a focus for a build - won't get into it here though.

Builds

Having unlocked all the keepsakes (1), use one of the really easy builds.

My suggestion is:

Rail gun special build.

With the rail gun (aspect doesn't matter, but Eris is best), get cluster bomb, triple bomb or hazard bomb, and if you can, rocket bomb and just let loose with your special. I can't overstate how overpowered this weapon is. You can clear whole rooms incredibly quickly with minimal risk. I got to the last boss the first time on my 14th run without even really knowing what I was doing. If I knew I would have beat him too.

For boons, go with ones which increase the damage percentage of your special. Aphrodite is best, but Demeter is a good second option. Divine dash or Tidal Dash to protect yourself. Where you can choose to get pomegranates (for your Aphrodite special) or centaur hearts (to increase survivability).

Tidal dash build.

Once you're a little bit more confident, I reckon this is the simplest build to pull off. The heart of it is that tidal dash does a heap of damage and protects you very well. It also synthesises incredibly well with some other Poseidon boons and Zeus boons. With the Sea Storm duo boon, your tidal dashes will also hit enemies with lightning. The damage is huge - first time I used this I knocked about 10 minutes off my best time (finished in about 25 minutes)

Weapon: Anything that involves a lot of rapid attacking. Fist, rail gun and spear are best.
God:

* To begin with, Poseidon for tidal dash obviously. The other key ones are, in order of importance, Wave Pounding, Razor Shoals, Poseidon's Aid and Flood Shot (the latter isn't that important until you get 3 cast stones via the mirror)
* To synthesise with Poseidon, get from Zeus: Thunder strike, and static discharge. There are a few others which multiply the lightning effects which are nice to have but not must haves.

At this point, you should be able to get Sea Storm, a duo boon which makes enemies hit by your tidal dash also get hit by lightning.

Exploding Spear

This could be build 2 to be honest because it's so simple. But it's also very overpowered and you can beat the game almost with your eyes closed. But you do need the right pieces to it.

Like the Rail Gun bomb build, this has a minimal reliance on complex boon combinations or aspects. What it does rely on is a very specific combination of hammers, those being:

1. Charged skewer
2. Exploding launcher.

The combination of these two should be a solid base on which your special will do huge damage to anything in front of you. Get the Aphrodite special once again for the same reasons. Get divine dash to protect yourself. That's pretty much literally all you need.

Thanks mate, I deliberately avoided this thread this week as I didn't want to play until this weekend. I've pretty much covered most of points 1 - 5 and can relatively easily get to the bosses on Elysium, I just keep losing to them. I think it's my fault though, I deliberately use weapons with a lot range to stay out of trouble but get impatient so start attacking enemies a lot more, getting more damage in the process.

I did play yesterday and thought I'd try on God Mode - I did make it through Elysium but still had to use all Death Defiances.

I do think I need to concentrate more on using calls, if I do get them, I often forget to use them. Also think I need to start upgrading my weapons and stuff, I have some Titan Blood and Diamonds that I should trade.

The weapons info is really useful, thanks

[PaulF]

After I kinda finished and got bored with BOTW it was later picked up by my 10yo daughter, who never played a similar game. As she couldn't give a single fuck about doing quests or anything similar, and she had lot of money and weapons - she ignored Link completely, put on some horrendeous purple rabbit mask and started playing as a new character Bunny. Bunny is no hero. He's into stealing stuff, destroying crops, running away from conflict and hunting a very specific type of horse - all of which have the same name. She clocked at least 80+ hours now doing this weird alter ego gameplay. Just goes to show what a great game BOTW is.

I know a good psychiatrist mate.

On the flip side, it's that wonderful kind of creativity (from your girl) that gives us greats like Zelda.
I kind of don't like the open ended nature of it.  Though I guess other Zelda's were edging towards it.  I think I will have to pick it up and complete it.  I think I'll have to start from the beginning though as I've totally forgotten how everything works!

[Snail]

I know a good psychiatrist mate.

On the flip side, it's that wonderful kind of creativity (from your girl) that gives us greats like Zelda.
I kind of don't like the open ended nature of it.  Though I guess other Zelda's were edging towards it.  I think I will have to pick it up and complete it.  I think I'll have to start from the beginning though as I've totally forgotten how everything works!

Best thing you can do sometimes is just sack it off and start over. I had like 50 hours in BoTW and it wasn’t clicking, so I just started over. Same happened with Witcher 3.

[UntouchableLuis]

About 12 hours in to BOTW now.

Still finding some things frustrating- although I'm getting better weapons and armour etc I find rupees hard to attain and then things cost a lot of rupees so you have to use them sparingly. I've just got to the boss of the first Divine Beast (Elephant) and it's bloody tough! Keep dying quite quickly, 2 hits with his spear and you're dead. I have 6 hearts at this stage.

[Zee_26]

About 12 hours in to BOTW now.

Still finding some things frustrating- although I'm getting better weapons and armour etc I find rupees hard to attain and then things cost a lot of rupees so you have to use them sparingly. I've just got to the boss of the first Divine Beast (Elephant) and it's bloody tough! Keep dying quite quickly, 2 hits with his spear and you're dead. I have 6 hearts at this stage.

Did you do the temple near Kakariko Village, there's a tutorial on dodging and rush attacks which you once you get a bit of the hang of it becomes essential in beating the Divine Beasts. Also, there's a deer hunting game in Hateno Village (there's a guy in the stable on the farm just below the Lab). It only costs you some arrows but you can hunt deer and keep the prime meat. If you cook meat skewers from five pieces of prime meat, you can sell it for 200 odd rupees. I found that a quick way to make money early on before doing some of the mini games.

[UntouchableLuis]

Did you do the temple near Kakariko Village, there's a tutorial on dodging and rush attacks which you once you get a bit of the hang of it becomes essential in beating the Divine Beasts. Also, there's a deer hunting game in Hateno Village (there's a guy in the stable on the farm just below the Lab). It only costs you some arrows but you can hunt deer and keep the prime meat. If you cook meat skewers from five pieces of prime meat, you can sell it for 200 odd rupees. I found that a quick way to make money early on before doing some of the mini games.

Nice one, cheers. Not done that temple yet so will head there next.

I was going to leave the boss and come back to it - I need a better bow anyway as it appears the only way to bring that water Ganon down is to shoot him in the eye but my bow keeps breaking.

[Snail]

About 12 hours in to BOTW now.

Still finding some things frustrating- although I'm getting better weapons and armour etc I find rupees hard to attain and then things cost a lot of rupees so you have to use them sparingly. I've just got to the boss of the first Divine Beast (Elephant) and it's bloody tough! Keep dying quite quickly, 2 hits with his spear and you're dead. I have 6 hearts at this stage.

Yeah it's too early to be attempting the bosses imo.

[PaulF]

Yeah it's too early to be attempting the bosses imo.

So I remember the elephant, but I can't remember if I defeated it.   I think I did, it was a pretty cool challenge.  I should definitely start over.
Now, do I sell my Wii U disc and get it on switch , or do I just plug the Wii u in away from the kids... Now that's a daft question.

[UntouchableLuis]

Yeah it's too early to be attempting the bosses imo.

Yeah I'm learning to stay away from things I know will be easier later on in the game. For instance I sailed to this remote island today and once I got there I had to give up all my items to pass this test. Quickly realised I didn't have the skill yet to do it - I was running around eating some bananas then this thing came out the ground and killed me instantly. Got out of there!

I really don't like the strength shrines where you just have to defeat the robot things - coming back to those. Give me a shrine with a puzzle over them any day.

[Snail]

Yeah I'm learning to stay away from things I know will be easier later on in the game. For instance I sailed to this remote island today and once I got there I had to give up all my items to pass this test. Quickly realised I didn't have the skill yet to do it - I was running around eating some bananas then this thing came out the ground and killed me instantly. Got out of there!

I really don't like the strength shrines where you just have to defeat the robot things - coming back to those. Give me a shrine with a puzzle over them any day.

Cook up some mighty bananas to boost your attack before you do the Guardian shrines and stock up on bomb arrows, when they do the spinny laser thing you can use your paraglider to get in the air and get off a few shots. Biggest thing is perfect parry, if you parry the split second their eye glows a brighter blue (just before they fire) it'll fuck them up good and proper. Takes a bit of practice and you need to be the right distance away (also Guardian shields help, you can get good ones from the labs if you've got that far) but I got the hang of it in five minutes and never had trouble with them again.

[Redcap]

About 12 hours in to BOTW now.

Still finding some things frustrating- although I'm getting better weapons and armour etc I find rupees hard to attain and then things cost a lot of rupees so you have to use them sparingly. I've just got to the boss of the first Divine Beast (Elephant) and it's bloody tough! Keep dying quite quickly, 2 hits with his spear and you're dead. I have 6 hearts at this stage.

Some suggest Waterblight Ganon is actually the second hardest divine beast in the game, so you're in good company.

I don't recall it being that hard - I had maybe 8 hearts? But I think how you approach the fight is important and can get you there.

What you need:

* Decent bow and arrows - ideally the more thunder arrows you have, the better. I think what I did was to collect a bunch of these from the Lizalfos in the area before Zora. If you have about 30-40 of these he'll go down real quick.
* Cryonis - I imagine you would have used this getting into Vah Ruta, but it's equally useful here. In a watery boss-fight it helps you to both erect barriers against projectiles and destroy Ganon's ice blocks. I believe (memory fails me) if he throws a spear at one of your ice blocks it can actually stun him and give you an opportunity to get a few hits in.

Strategy

The key thing is just to make sure you're relying on your bow and arrows - using your sword is too risky and will get you killed quick unless you're quite a bit better at dodging/blocking. He's pretty slow and you've got lots of time to take a couple of shots and then roll behind one of the barriers in the first phase.

Stay patient and you'll whittle his HP down until he's down to about half a bar.

Then  in phase 2, he'll raise the water levels and your manoeuvrability won't be as high - it'll be harder for you to get around behind cover.

The key thing here is to use cryonis to break the ice blocks he throws at you and/or to create barriers in the water to hide behind.

Rinse/repeat until dead. Worthwhile beating him because it feels like real progress in both the story and the actual reward. You get a full heart container out of it, plus Mipha's Grace, which basically gives you a whole extra life plus extra health. I won't say it makes the rest of the game easy but it certainly makes it a lot easier.

[UntouchableLuis]

Some suggest Waterblight Ganon is actually the second hardest divine beast in the game, so you're in good company.

I don't recall it being that hard - I had maybe 8 hearts? But I think how you approach the fight is important and can get you there.

What you need:

* Decent bow and arrows - ideally the more thunder arrows you have, the better. I think what I did was to collect a bunch of these from the Lizalfos in the area before Zora. If you have about 30-40 of these he'll go down real quick.
* Cryonis - I imagine you would have used this getting into Vah Ruta, but it's equally useful here. In a watery boss-fight it helps you to both erect barriers against projectiles and destroy Ganon's ice blocks. I believe (memory fails me) if he throws a spear at one of your ice blocks it can actually stun him and give you an opportunity to get a few hits in.

Strategy

The key thing is just to make sure you're relying on your bow and arrows - using your sword is too risky and will get you killed quick unless you're quite a bit better at dodging/blocking. He's pretty slow and you've got lots of time to take a couple of shots and then roll behind one of the barriers in the first phase.

Stay patient and you'll whittle his HP down until he's down to about half a bar.

Then  in phase 2, he'll raise the water levels and your manoeuvrability won't be as high - it'll be harder for you to get around behind cover.

The key thing here is to use cryonis to break the ice blocks he throws at you and/or to create barriers in the water to hide behind.

Rinse/repeat until dead. Worthwhile beating him because it feels like real progress in both the story and the actual reward. You get a full heart container out of it, plus Mipha's Grace, which basically gives you a whole extra life plus extra health. I won't say it makes the rest of the game easy but it certainly makes it a lot easier.

Cheers. I beat him the other day - used bomb arrows mainly then finished him off with a sword.

Now onto the Gerudo Town quest, went to the secret hideout in the desert but will come back to kill all those ninja things.

[emergency exit]

Anyone played the new Monter Hunter yet? I never tried any of the old ones but from skimming over a few headlines I get the impression that this something Switch players have been greatly anticipating?

[emergency exit]

Cheers. I beat him the other day - used bomb arrows mainly then finished him off with a sword.

Now onto the Gerudo Town quest, went to the secret hideout in the desert but will come back to kill all those ninja things.

God, that first playthrough of BOTW is something else. Best game I've ever played. I was out of a job at the time so I went through it much too fast. I completed all 120 shrines, beat Ganon, and then completed both sets of DLCs within one month. I might start over and do it all again in master mode, that's how much I love this game.

UntouchableLuis: I can highly recommend doing the sidequest that involves getting your own house in Hateno village («Hylian Homeowner»). I loved having a base that I could return to, store some of my more precious weapons, and get a good night's rest between quests.

As for the divine beasts, I did the bird one up in the north west first as that gives you Revali's gale which is extremely OP. I activated all towers with it immediately after and from then onwards it was way easier to plan out my next moves (I don't like going into things blindly, which is also a perfectly acceptable way to play BOTW).

Also, once you have 13 hearts, go get the Master Sword. It's great because its a strong one-handed weapon (which means you can still use your shield) and because it doesn't break (instead, it "recharges"). You can also double the damage it does with one of the DLCs.

Once you've beaten a couple of the beasts, start challenging Lynels. It takes a bit of practice, but this is where you get the really powerful weapons from. Plus: This is the most rewarding part of the game.

If you need rupees, it's quite easy to farm them by collecting dragon horns. Let me know if you need some pointers there.

Honestly, just typing this out makes me want to revisit this beautiful game.

[SamAteTheRedAcid]

Anyone played the new Monter Hunter yet? I never tried any of the old ones but from skimming over a few headlines I get the impression that this something Switch players have been greatly anticipating?

I played a bit of the 3DS one and enjoyed it years ago. I played the demo of this new one and it seemed pretty decent. Don't have the time to get into a game like it but impressions were good. My lad had a go and he loved it. Probably above his age group though.

Eurogamer said it was possibly the best game on Switch after BOTW, and I trust their reviews.

[UntouchableLuis]

God, that first playthrough of BOTW is something else. Best game I've ever played. I was out of a job at the time so I went through it much too fast. I completed all 120 shrines, beat Ganon, and then completed both sets of DLCs within one month. I might start over and do it all again in master mode, that's how much I love this game.

UntouchableLuis: I can highly recommend doing the sidequest that involves getting your own house in Hateno village («Hylian Homeowner»). I loved having a base that I could return to, store some of my more precious weapons, and get a good night's rest between quests.

As for the divine beasts, I did the bird one up in the north west first as that gives you Revali's gale which is extremely OP. I activated all towers with it immediately after and from then onwards it was way easier to plan out my next moves (I don't like going into things blindly, which is also a perfectly acceptable way to play BOTW).

Also, once you have 13 hearts, go get the Master Sword. It's great because its a strong one-handed weapon (which means you can still use your shield) and because it doesn't break (instead, it "recharges"). You can also double the damage it does with one of the DLCs.

Once you've beaten a couple of the beasts, start challenging Lynels. It takes a bit of practice, but this is where you get the really powerful weapons from. Plus: This is the most rewarding part of the game.

If you need rupees, it's quite easy to farm them by collecting dragon horns. Let me know if you need some pointers there.

Honestly, just typing this out makes me want to revisit this beautiful game.

Cheers, not done the Hatano house thing yet so will do that on my next play.

I completed the Yiga Clan hideout quest the other day but admittedly used an online walk through for a lot of it as I was trying to fight them and it was impossible. Never knew you could throw the bananas! That's why I'm not the best gamer - there's certain things I just never would have guessed.

[emergency exit]

So you're on your way to completing Vah Naboris? Will that be your second divine beast? The champion's power you get from completing it is amazing for combat.

I would also recommend that you unlock all four fairies as that will let you upgrade your armor sets to the maximum (which you really should, at least the Champion's tunic and the soldier's armor). Upgraded armor makes a huge difference (especially as each level increases your defence almost exponentially.)

Also, whenever you see Beadle at any new stable you reach, buy up all his arrows.

Also: Follow A.xk_ on Youtube for the most insane BOTW combat videos (he's probably the best in the world at it). You'd think he's playing a different game entirely:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWauA5H4uxY

[Redcap]

You can also double the damage it does with one of the DLCs.

To be clear, this is literally the hardest challenge the game offers up (other than Master Mode), and something that definitely benefits from getting every heart container in the game

Master sword is good though. It's a good default weapon to use when you just want to kill some moblins, but which you probably wouldn't use for the tougher fights.

[OsirisMVZ]

So... who has had a go at New Pokemon Snap yet? It came on Friday but I've been too bogged down with work... at the same time I'd love to start and finish a game before Mass Effect is re-released soon.

[emergency exit]

To be clear, this is literally the hardest challenge the game offers up (other than Master Mode), and something that definitely benefits from getting every heart container in the game

Yes – unless you clip through the wall in the first room and go straight to the last room ;-)

Finished all three parts like this within one hour.

[Rush 82]

Bought the Switch 3 years ago on a whim (BotW edition) and it's been lying dormant ever since.

Finally loaded BotW yesterday and have just started playing.

Enjoying it so far - only thing is the text on screen is too bloody small for me to read without specs on.