Anti Frustration Features / The Legend of Zelda

• The Legend of Zelda:
  • Nintendo of America was well aware that new players would be lost and confused, so the original game box came bundled with a map to help guide players through the game. None of the ports or rereleases kept this, since internet guides have made such a map superfluous.
  • Due to how open the world is, it's possible to run out of keys, so the game allows you to buy them at shops so your quest doesn't become unwinnable.
  • The battery-backed save feature on the original NES cartridge can be seen as an anti-frustration feature due to being released at a time when saving your progress to continue later was practically unheard of. Had this feature not been present, this game would have been made much more frustrating to complete due to the sheer length compared to most other games of the time.
  • The second quest may be almost merciless, but it does throw the player one bone. The screen where Level 5-1 was in the first quest has been replaced with a Fairy Pond, and after getting the Whistle (in Level 2-2) and beating Level 4-2, the player can use the whistle to get from anywhere in the Overworld to the Fairy Pond instantly.
  • The Classic NES Series games on the Game Boy Advance are just emulation "ports" with virtually nothing changed from the originals. However, they also only support one player, and thus one controller. This game's "bring up the Continue/Save/Retry screen without dying" command requires using a controller plugged into the player 2 slot, but in the Classic NES version, the command can be performed by pressing Up and Select on your GBA.
• Zelda II: The Adventure of Link:
  • Whenever you die in The Very Definitely Final Dungeon, you start at the beginning of the dungeon, saving a trek through Death Valley. Also, if you die to Shadow Link, and have therefore already beaten Thunderbird, you don't have to fight Thunderbird again. This isn't done for the sake of kindness but for a technical reason: The original version on the Famicom Disk System had the Great Palace on Side 1 of the disk while the majority of the game was on the second side, so the checkpoint was implemented to avoid forcing a disk swap when you ran out of lives.
  • While stronger enemies like Iron Knuckles do not respawn in caves or the palaces unless you run out of lives, weaker ones do, meaning each palace, even the Great Palace, has at least one area where you can relatively safely farm for blue potions to restore your magic (which in turn would let you restore your health once you get the healing spell). Plus every palace except the First Palace, Fifth Palace and Great Palace has a statue at the entrance you can strike to get a red potion, letting you heal up before you go inside. Sometimes you will get an Iron Knuckle instead, but all you have to do is exit the palace completely and try again.
• The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past:
  • Trinexx, the boss of Turtle Rock, can initially only be hurt by attacking his fire-and-ice-spewing heads with their opposite elements by using the Fire Rod and the Ice Rod. If you run out of magic power, Trinexx's elemental breath attacks will have a chance of leaving a small magic container behind.
  • When you first encounter the falling rocks on Death Mountain, you just happen to be right next to the home of a hermit that can refill your heart meter for free.
  • If you try to upgrade your bomb or arrow capacity while they are fully maxed out, the fairy will return the 100 rupees you spent.
• The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time:
  • Enemy item drops are usually semi-fixed, but most enemies have a 1/16 chance to give a "flexible drop" in which the item given is dependent on if you are low on a resource. It prioritises fairies if you are close to death, then hearts, magic, slingshot or bow ammo, bombs and rupees.
  • The boss in the Shadow Temple drops arrows and magic jars every time you shoot its hands, since you need the Bow and Arrows and the Lens of Truth during the fight. If you happen to run out of magic and arrows at the same time, you can still use your Hookshot to attack the hands; this doesn't deal damage, but it does cause the items to drop.
  • Bomb Flowers grow in King Dodongo's lair, which is convenient because you need them to make him vulnerable to your sword.
  • Shields are affordable if a bit pricey, and each tunic requires its own wallet upgrade to actually buy, so they're at least pretty expensive. However, in almost every instance where it's possible to lose your shield and sometimes your tunic, it's possible to find a new one right next to you. If you haven't lost either, you'll know the chest that would've contained one because it will instead house a blue rupee.
  • The Sun's Song cuts down the long length of time it takes for day to change to night and vice versa, and it lets you change time without having to go out into an adventure area. Though this can be frustrating as, in time freeze areas, playing the Sun's Song will advance the game clock to either noon or midnight, depending on which time of day you play it at.
  • In the future, getting Epona and learning the warp songs from Sheik considerably cuts down on the amount of backtracking you have to do. The songs still work when you're a kid, too.
  • Finding and using Farore's Wind makes backtracking in the dungeons quicker and easier, especially in the Water Temple. It's particularly useful if you need to save and quit in the middle of the dungeon; you can create a warp point before you save, and then return right to it when you load the game the next time, instead of starting from the dungeon entrance again.
  • Almost anywhere that requires a magic bean sprout to go can be reached by summoning Pierre instead. He also allows you to bypass the nerve-wracking and frustrating experience with the Moblins in the Sacred Meadow and some hellish backtracking in the Water Temple... provided you visited Bonooru at Lake Hylia to record the notes you want to use immediately after getting the Ocarina Of Time, and went back after arriving in the Future to activate the song.
  • In Ganon's Castle, underneath the bridge you can't reach in the main area, there's a secret room. Inside, there are several fairies in pots, as well as business scrubs that sell you bombs, arrows, shields, etc. just in case you run out and need to get more, so that you don't have to go all the way to Kakariko to buy and stock up.
  • After throwing a Cucco, it will be flustered and hop in place for a few seconds, allowing you time to reach it and pick it up again without it walking off a surface you wanted it to stay on.
  • The only rupee requirement to complete the game is forty Rupees, and that is only the beginning of the game for the Deku Shield to bypass Mido. Every other required or highly recommended item in the game (i.e. Hylian shield and tunics) do not require rupees or can be retrieved by alternative means such as a treasure or a task.
  • There is a frozen eye-switch in the Forest Temple that requires you to stand on a rotating platform and shoot an arrow through a torch so it catches fire and then hits the switch, both thawing and activating it. As this is a somewhat tricky shot, this one switch is coded to always activate when the ice thaws, so even if you miss the eye as long as you hit reasonably close enough to melt the ice it will still count. Also, and while this part might be unintentional owing to the way the switch activates any time the ice melts, Din's Fire will also activate the switch.
  • Dampé's Heart-Pounding Grave-Digging Tour normally sucks the big one, as every time you pay him 10 rupees over a patch of dirt there is a 40% chance of a green rupee, a 30% chance of a blue rupee, a 20% chance of a red rupee, and only a 10% chance of a heartpiece. You can expect to play this one for quite a while if you get unlucky, but at least the developers realized this could theoretically go on forever without ever winning the heartpiece. To guarantee it inevitably will be won, it's coded so that once you've dug up 8 green rupees, 4 blue rupees, and 2 red rupees, (without leaving the graveyard in-between) you are guaranteed to get the heartpiece.
• The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask:
  • If you fail the Beaver Brothers race a certain number of times, you will end up on an alternate course that is much easier to finish.
  • Each temple has a Majora's Mask platform at the entrance that can warp you straight to the boss room as long as you've beaten them before. In the 3DS version, you only need to have visited the room to unlock the warp. If you need to trigger a post-boss event again (or run out of time the first time in the 3DS version), you don't need to go through the temple again.
  • Odolwa's boss arena has plants that drop arrows and hearts, and they regrow.
  • The Doomsday Clock pauses after you defeat a dungeon's boss, allowing you to gather yourself and recoup before moving on.
  • Falling into a pit or sinking after hopping as Deku Link doesn't do any damage to Link. The worst that happens is respawning at the last safe spot.
  • The 3DS remake adds more of these features:
    • There are more Save Points, adjusted warp locations, and putting the bank next to the Clock Tower owl. Removing the Suspend Save in favor of proper save points, as well as the addition of extra statues, makes the game a lot less of a marathon.
    • Furthermore, you only have to encounter the bosses, not beat them, to unlock the teleport plates; reaching the Boss Room in the last minutes of Day 3 means your effort is not wasted. You can also decide how far ahead you want to skip with the Song of Double Time in specific hours (instead of just to the next sunrise or sunset). An exact time is given for the clock; while not exactly necessary, this is useful for meeting certain events that happen at specific times without having to guesstimate.
    • The Ocarina/pipes/drums/guitar now has a permanent spot in the touch screen, reducing the visits to the item screen and all but giving you an extra equipping space, so the game has an extra empty bottle to fill out the space in the item screen left by the instrument.
    • The rewards for getting all the Stray Fairies in Woodfall (the upgraded Spin Attack) and Snowhead (the upgraded magic bar) are switched around. As the upgraded magic bar makes the usage of the Goron and Zora forms' magical abilities much more practical, especially since the Zora's swimming was heavily Nerfed and now requires magic power for dashing (a free action in the original game), this means players can get access to it much earlier and at an easier time than in the original game.
  • All of the mechanics that disregard the logic of the time loop serve as this. For one, all quest items (masks, weapons, dungeon tools, bottles) can be taken back in time with you — even milk bottles will stay on you to let you keep the bottle — you just lose the milk inside. Then there's the bank, which will always recognize you and have your money, even though a bank stamp should not equal recognition in a new time loop, and you deposited your money in a time loop that no longer exists. Also, Epona will not have to be obtained from Romani Ranch after you learn Epona's Song and get her back once. When you play it, she'll come running in any subsequent time loop, even though she would be in a pen and the ranch would still be blocked off without you repeating the long sequence to open up the road.
  • You only need to obtain Goron Powder Keg certification (basically a tutorial with the item before you can buy more) once, and in subsequent time loops, you can buy them with no problem, despite not being tested and approved to use them in that cycle.
  • You can have your special items stolen by Takkuri birds in Termina Field. However, rather than making you rewind time and reobtain the items the long way through their various quests, the Curiosity Shop in Clock Town will sell your stolen items back to you — they're the store's only product, provided by the Takkuri!
  • One you probably didn't even notice: the first time loop where you're stuck as a Deku Scrub moves faster than normal (27 seconds an hour instead of the normal 45). This leaves you enough time to complete all the tasks you need to do without forcing you to do a lot of waiting around for time-sensitive events to start.
  • Items and abilities for use in later dungeons can be used to make bosses from earlier dungeons much easier, in case you need to do something in an area post-boss and don't want to waste precious time on the full fight.
• The 3DS remakes of Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask add giant Gossip Stone-like objects that can give the player hints on finding certain items or solving certain puzzles, avoiding the need to use a guide when the player is stuck.
• Appearing in many of the 3D Zelda games are "courtesy falls" when traversing specific difficult terrains. Normally when you fall, you either land at a lower part of the level or fall into a pit and respawn at the door or entrance to the area. In these "courtesy fall" areas, you fade out and respawn near the beginning of the segment, even if there's safe land below. One specific example is when you first enter the Forbidden Woods in The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker: if you fall into the ocean below you'll courtesy fall and respawn back on the ledge to try again. Once you've beaten the dungeon, you just splash into the ocean and begin swimming.
• The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker:
  • The auction house is designed so that if you bid on an item but fail, either by running out of rupees or simply getting outbid at the last second, that item is guaranteed to appear again next time you enter instead of being one randomly selected from the pool of available items.
  • The boss Gohdan can only be defeated with the use of arrows and bombs; if you run out of either, Gohdan will "sneeze" out a few extras to compensate. This particular boss is not malevolent and is merely testing your ability to be a hero, which has nothing to do with how much you can carry.
  • The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker HD:
    • The sail and Wind Waker are now quest items as opposed to regular items, meaning you don't have to sacrifice two items slots when you're sailing. Additionally, the small animation that plays when Link conducts a Wind Waker song only plays once in a given session; every time you use the same song after that, its effects occur automatically.
    • The Auction house offers a new, optional quest item in the form of the Swift Sail, which the player can switch between with the regular sail at the press of the A button. In addition to increasing your top speed, the Swift Sail automatically adjusts the wind to flow in the same cardinal/diagonal direction the player is facing, eliminating the need to use the Wind Waker every few minutes to change course.
    • Still on the topic of sailing, you don't need to equip the bombs or the grappling hook to use the boat's cannon and crane; they're always available when you're sailing regardless of what items you're equipped with at the moment.
    • The Nintendo Gallery sidequest has been greatly changed to reduce frustration from the Gamecube version: you can get the Deluxe Picto Box as soon as you first enter Windfall Island, you can save twelve pictographs as opposed to only three, a golden icon appears on pics that can be turned into figurines, and Carlov accepts up to twelve pictures a day as opposed to one. This makes completing the gallery much faster and less tedious. Tingle Bottles can also help in collecting some photos that can otherwise be Permanently Missable, as pictographs can be saved from those messages to the Picto Box; it's not always reliable, but it's still a welcome help and safety net in case you do miss the pictographs.
    • The Triforce sidequest has been revamped, with most of the charts leading to the shards getting the shaft; instead, you get most of said shards directly. Only three shards need a chart to be deciphered. Also, the standard wallet carries up to 500 Rupees, meaning a Wallet upgrade isn't necessary to afford Tingle's deciphering prices anymore.
    • Most of the times that Link takes damage while sailing, he isn't knocked off his boat anymore. Select attacks and obstacles (like explosive barrels) can still knock him off, though.
    • When you're swinging on a rope, you can actually turn while you're swinging, without needing to stop.
    • An aiming reticle is shown when using the cannon at sea, making aiming far easier and less of a guessing game.
    • Sailing has received several additions and tweaks to make traversing the Great Sea a more streamlined experience.
• The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures: If you don't have enough Force Gems to power up the Four Sword and break the seals at the end of the level, you have the option of travelling back in time to the beginning of the level. Once you power up the Four Sword, you're automatically sent back to the end of the level, now able to complete it.
• The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap: Fusing Kinstones result in a variety of new things, like treasure chests, gold enemies, opened passageways, etc., and there are 100 fusions to keep track of. Since you can't always drop what you're currently doing to run off and claim whatever new prize has been revealed (or you might not be able to reach it yet), the game places a marker on your map to remind you that it's there.
• The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess:
  • While escorting Telma and Ilia to Kakariko you fight King Bulbin for the second time. You will need arrows for this round; every time you run out of them (or didn't have any to begin with) Telma will give you some.
  • During the second half of the battle against Argorok, the hitbox on his glowing back gem is incredibly lenient. You can completely miss your mark, even hitting him on the wings in some cases, and the game will count it as a hit and seamlessly shift your clawshot's anchor-point to dead center between camera shots out of the player's sight.
  • When climbing Hyrule Castle, falling in one of the half-dozen flights of staircases will restart you at the staircase you fell in, rather than the beginning of the (single large) room.
  • The HD version adds some extra such features:
    • Link swims and climbs on vines much faster than in the original.
    • Only twelve Tears of Light must be collected in Twilight segments, as opposed to the original sixteen.
    • A new item called the Ghost Lantern lights up when a Poe is nearby, even during the day when they are not physically present. The map also shows how many Poes are in a general region, and how many you've killed.
    • The map in general shows more info, like where you last started your game, minigames, horse grasses and sidequests.
    • The sword doesn't clash against walls anymore, making combat in narrow areas much easier.
• The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks:
  • Your train will magically flip in the direction you want to go when exiting a station or a portal.
  • All characters with side quests available will yell at you from a distance (displayed with a text box moving to the top screen), meaning that the player doesn't have to talk to every NPC in the game unless they feel so inclined.
  • In all boss fights, the knockback the bosses inflict on Link after they're stunned does not cause damage.
  • If a passenger leaves the train early due to bad driving skills on Link's behalf, Zelda offers you to retry, which will warp you back to the original train station, saving you the hassle to backtrack all the way there.
  • When Link is riding Phantom Zelda's shield, you can double-tap the ground to make Link jump down. If this action would cause Link to jump in lava, he will automatically cancel the jump.
  • If you failed too often in the Anouki village puzzle, Zelda will conclude every Anouki's preferences, stating who they want to pair up with, in addition to the statements of the Anoukis, who only tell Link their dislikes.
• The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword: If there's any area that requires the use of bombs to continue, you can bet that there will be a bomb flower or two nearby so you can replace the bombs you lose.
• The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds:
  • All items in the game either (A) run off your Energy Gauge, which refills upon being left alone for a while, or (B) have no depletable source whatsoever. This stands in contrast to earlier games, where items such as bombs and arrows are finite resources that can be easily depleted through overuse.
  • The Lost Maimai quest gives you a map so you can know exactly how many of them are in each area. One hundred percenting the game without resorting to a guide suddenly became much less impossible. This mechanic was recycled for Jovani's quest in Twilight Princess HD.
  • Certain tasks in the game become easier if you fail them the first time. For example, if the thief girl gets caught during the Escort Mission, fewer enemies will spawn when you retry, and the ones you already beat don't come back.
  • If you fail the ghost chase in The Lost Woods, you will start out with fewer ghosts up to two times.
  • If a Wallmaster homes in on you, it will go through a lengthy attack animation to gives you time to flee or counterattack. If you merge with a wall to escape it, it will instead instantly slam its palm down immediately and miss because you're 2D, saving you the wait.
• The Legend of Zelda: Tri Force Heroes:
  • If you get disconnected while playing, you at the very least get a few "sympathy rupees". In online play you can also blacklist "false heroes" (griefers) so that you don't get teamed up with them again.
  • The Dec. 2nd update enabled Friendly Tokens to be purchased in the town shop, whereas previously they had only been available as a Socialization Bonus.^note Originally, the coins were only given by an NPC as a reward for playing with others via wireless connection. Playing online via internet did NOT count. Also, you only got one coin for each different 3DS you linked with. That's one coin per 3DS period, NOT one per 3DS per playing session (unless the other 3DS's were reformatted back to factory default). Although expensive, at least now most players weren't completely locked out of getting the outfits that require them for materials.
• The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild:
  • Stables can be used to retrieve horses that are already out on the overworld. If your horse gets stuck or you just don't want to deal with walking it back at the moment, you can warp to any shrine near a stable and ask for the horse at the stable. Somehow, the crew will retrieve the horse for you, creating an indirect but very helpful way to essentially warp your horse, and if you want to put the horse away, you're right at the stable.
  • You can buy the photo for an entry in a specific category of the Hyrule Compendium for a small fee, in case you're having trouble registering something or, as it the case with certain Lynel weapons, didn't get a picture before the enemies' leveling up removed them from the game world. Upon beating the game, this includes the bosses, preventing them from being permanently missable.
  • If you struggle with a shrine, you can teleport out of it at any time and come back later; simply unlocking its entrance with the Sheikah Slate is sufficient to make it a functional warp point, so you aren't forced to backtrack to it again. Likewise, if you complete a shrine without full hearts (for example, you get hurt during one of the Tests of Strength, or took damage from hazards in the shrine), your health will be completely restored upon receiving the Spirit Orb for that shrine.
  • Spending time in one of the game's three extreme temperatures (cold, hot, burning) will damage Link over time, making it difficult to explore large portions of the map. The game likes to push you toward the new cooking feature, which can make Link temperature-resistant, but gathering items for a limited-time effect can be inconvenient. Equipment is a more reliable option, and the game readily offers it to you. You can earn a Warm Doublet for first-level cold weather from the Old Man on the Great Plateau — optional, but difficult to miss. The Gerudo Set, for first-level hot weather, must be purchased at Kara Kara Bazaar for the Vah Naboris quest. The equipment mentioned above will take care of all the main quest-required cold and hot areas. As for burning temperatures, an NPC at the Foothill Stable will give you enough fireproof elixirs to make it to the Southern Mine, where you can easily earn the Flamebreaker Armor by collecting fireproof lizards. That isn't enough fireproof equipment to make it to Vah Rudania, but now you have the necessary ingredients for more fireproof elixirs. In the event you don't have the proper clothes yet, you can also equip a hot or cold weapon (e.g. a lit torch in a snowy area) to add to your resistance.
  • Speaking of the Gerudo Set, you normally need the full set to enter Gerudo Town, and mix-and-matching any of it will make the guards recognize Link as a man no matter how effeminate Link looks. The exception is the Sand Boots, which make Link run at normal speed in the sand: they can be worn in lieu of the Gerudo Sirwal and Link will still pass for a woman. This means you don't need to keep constantly switching pants every time you enter and leave town (though be warned, as you won't get the heat protection Set Bonus so pack an Ice Rod or Heat Elixir).
  • The developers also made a point of only having two levels of protection against environmental hazards, which means you only need two of the three pieces of a set of gear gear to offer full protection. While you'll miss out on set bonuses like being unfreezable, this also means you don't lose the full effects of your preferred gear and can keep one piece of another piece of armor on to enjoy at least some of its boosted defense, climbing ability, or attack increases.
  • The game includes a hidden mechanic that protects players at full hearts or better from getting One-Hit-Killed, leaving them instead on their last quarter-heart. This is in addition to the Auto Revives of Mipha's Grace and carrying a fairy in your pocket. However, it's only effective at full hearts, will not save you from damage that surpasses its threshold (meaning that you still will get one-shotted by damage that would be sufficient to kill you several times over), abrasion or fall damage may well wipe out your last hit point anyway, and Guardian lasers ignore it to enforce their status as The Dreaded. This mechanic is also absent in the Downloadable Content's Master Mode.
  • As long as you have a few hearts full, bottomless pits, lava, water (when you run out of stamina), bogs, and the like are not instant-death hazards. Instead, you'll be put back where you were last standing and lose a small amount of health.
  • When scaling a vertical surface you can either climb, which is slow and steadily drains your stamina, or leap upward at the cost of a good chunk of your stamina meter. You can always leap, though, no matter how low your stamina meter has dropped, and even if it's fallen well below the amount of stamina you consume while leaping. This means if you're just not going to have enough energy to make the ledge, you can make one final leap of desperation to reach it. You also get a little bit of a "grace" period where if you're just about to the top and you run out, as the game will let you finish climbing. Additionally, scaling vertical surfaces becomes extremely difficult in rainy conditions, as Link will constantly lose his grip and slide downward. This doesn't apply to the Sheikah Towers, since they have a mesh-like structure that Link can still hold onto.
  • Using the Paraglider takes up stamina. However, should your stamina run out, you get one quick, final "mercy chance" to take the Paraglider back out, which can be done to avoid taking fall damage.
  • If a cutscene (such as unearthing a shrine) occurs while Link is swimming or gliding, his stamina will be fully refilled at the end, to prevent him from falling to his death or drowning because the player got distracted.
  • Every single major landmark, from major towns to stables to fairy fountains, will always have a shrine out in the open very near to it to give you a fast travel location so you're not forced into excessive backtracking. The shrines added in the DLC also close a few gaps in the fast-travel by adding a few new points to warp to.
  • If Link is attacked while he's ragdolling, during which you lose control of him, he will not take damage from enemy attacks until he actually gets up to prevent a Cycle of Hurting. However, he will take continuous damage from rolling along the ground.
  • Even though Master Mode upgrades virtually all enemies one level, weak Red enemies are in specific places in the game, and certain Red bosses like the Red Hinox brother and Lynel on Ploymus Mountain aren't scaled up. This allows you to complete the Hyrule Compendium without having to pay Symin and Purah to auto-unlock all of them.
  • Octoroks can snipe Link with alarming accuracy and are a major nuisance. However, because of this, an alerted Octorok's first two shots are made to always miss, making sure the player knows it's there without immediately hitting them out of nowhere with a cheap shot.
  • You can fast travel out of any battle except for those with the Blight Ganons and Calamity Ganon himself. Notably, this includes other boss battles like the one against Master Kohga.
  • During the assault on Vah Medoh to destroy its cannons, opening the paraglider will completely recharge Link's stamina wheel, since there's no way to land to regain stamina and the player would have to cook lots of stamina-boosting food otherwise.
  • In Master Mode, bosses take longer to start recovering health than regular enemies. It's especially vital for the main story bosses, most of whom exploit Villain Teleportation that would otherwise give them lengthy periods to recover health.
  • The Champions' Ballad DLC adds rematch fights with the Blight Ganons, and both they and the new boss at the end can be fought as many times as the player wants, making it easy to get pictures of them for the Compendium if you didn't the first time. With the DLC, the only boss you can't rematch at all is Master Kohga, making him the only boss photo you'd have to buy if you missed the chance.
  • During the Final Battle, regardless of the bond you have, your horse will never refuse your commands, so you don't have to worry about the horse suddenly not wanting to sprint or steer.
  • Braziers and the like and raft sails are not physical objects that your weapons can hit, sparing you the possibility of your torches and Korok Leaves breaking by physically striking the objects on accident when you're swinging them around to use their fire or wind.
  • If you aren't equipped with a bow or melee weapon and you pick one up, you'll automatically equip them for use right away, rather than having to enter the pause menu to equip them. Very handy for moments when your weapon breaks and you salvage another one quickly or if you had dropped your gear from being electrocuted.
  • Zigzagged when using flammable weapons as makeshift torches, such as when you have to carry Blue Flames to power the Ancient Tech Labs. These weapons being on fire alone will actually not affect its durability at all, but if the weapon is continually on fire for a certain duration, it will burn away completely and disappear. However, should you happen to snuff it at any time before this time limit, the weapon's durability will remain unaffected from being set on fire.
  • While equipping an ice weapon will cool Link off in hot biomes and vice-versa for fire weapons in cold areas, neither of them will amplify damage or negate your food or gear-based resistance if you have the same type of weapon as the temperature.
  • Reflecting an attack with Perfect Parry will not damage the shield. This can be seen when parrying a Guardian's laser — normally, it destroys most shields in one hit. Since the game encourages using tactics such as dodging and parrying, it's more forgiving about shield durability so the player doesn't eat up a bunch of shields using Perfect Parry on enemies.
  • If Link drops his gear near the edge of an elevated piece of land, intentionally or not, they will placed away from the edge to prevent them from falling off. This also goes for rafts in the middle of the sea, but you're out of luck if it's moving at full speed when the weapon/shield/bow is dropped.
  • If you miss an enemy with an Ancient Arrow, it will almost always bounce off whatever surface it hits or become embedded in it for you to pick up later, preventing you from wasting a valuable item even if you're a terrible shot.
  • The Champions' weapons can be reforged in the event that they are severely damaged or broken to prevent them from being Too Awesome to Use. One of the characters involved with each gift will tell you what sort of material you need to make a new one. This does require the use of diamonds, but only one per reforge, and there's a Zora who trades them for ten easily-located Luminous Stones and a young Goron who sells a diamond for 2,000 easily acquired Rupees. It also includes a tier 1 version of it which can typically be found lying around the town every blood moon.
  • While the Master Sword will temporarily run out of energy if you use it too much, it unleashes its full potential and restores its durability in the presence of Ganon or something corrupted by him (which includes all major story bosses and all major dungeons). This ensures that once you have it, you'll always have a weapon available during climactic encounters.
  • Even though Hestu the inventory-expanding NPC is literally right next to the Master Sword, you don't need to buy a slot from him to obtain it — you get a bonus slot for it automatically. As such, if your weapon stash is full, you don't have to throw anything away or go hunting for Korok Seeds.
  • One shrine quest requires you to stand on a pedestal while riding a deer to make the shrine emerge. Normally, deer only spawn in ones, twos or threes, their herds don't typically appear in close proximity to each other, and they're very easy to spook and send running for the hills. Consequently, tracking down a deer and successfully saddling it has the potential to be very frustrating; to counteract this, the area where this shrine is found has the highest deer spawn rate of the game and is always filled with small herds.
  • A side quest has an NPC in the Southern Mine ask you to collect three fireproof lizards for him. Small animals like lizards spawn somewhat unreliably, are rarely found in large numbers close to each other, are easy to miss due to their small size and, in these lizards' case, cryptic coloring, and will run away and quickly despawn if spooked. To offset this, the Southern Mine is absolutely crawling with lizards, which can be found in ones and twos every couple meters and under every liftable rock.
  • Before being usable, the two tech labs require you to complete a quest where you carry a blue flame from a furnace over to the labs, but there are long paths and, in the case of the Akkala lab, several enemies in the way. Since you'll probably have to put away your torch to do something else, the game provides several stone lanterns along the way that can be lit with the blue flame to bring it closer to the lab. Once the player is done, they can pull out the torch and relight it from the last lantern and keep going. The lanterns are also rainproof as well, keeping the fire lit even if it starts pouring, allowing you to safely wait it out and continue without going back to the source.
  • Several Korok Seed puzzles require to you to get a rock on a bridge or shore into a ring of rock spires in the water, either with good Stasis-launching or strategic usage of Cryonis or Octorok balloons. Since this can be difficult and the rocks can't be retrieved if they miss and fall in the water, each of these puzzles is accompanied by a large amount of rocks nearby, and all of the rocks will respawn as soon as the puzzle area is put a few steps offscreen, keeping the player from having to warp away to reload the area.
  • While it's entirely possible, if unlikely, to be hit by a random bolt of lightning during a thunderstorm (as opposed to the ones attracted by metal weapons), these bolts do minimal damage compared to their metal-attracted counterparts, making it unlikely that Link will be outright killed by one.
  • Thunderstorms never occur over towns, giving you a safe area to warp or escape to during a storm. Rain is the worst weather a town will ever have.
  • Any merchant, traveling or in shops, will buy any kind of item off of you even if it's not something they sell, and they all pay the exact same rates, so you don't have to run around to multiple shops in order to make all the transactions needed to afford a new piece of gear.
  • Remote bombs, by virtue of being an unlimited and free rune power, mean that you're never truly defenseless once you have the rune (though they are not recommended for combat if you have equipment), and they can fell trees and break metal boxes, crates, and barrels, which means you usually don't need to wear down your weapons to break them. However, the contents will be blasted away a little, making weapons (or Magnesis dropping for metal boxes) the better choice on small ledges.
  • The Blood Moon has all enemies you've defeated respawn so that you'll always have a source of weapons and materials you can get from them. The Blood Moon also makes all naturally growing items like fruits and ore deposits respawn as well so you aren't boned if you took a lot of things before.
• Shrines in The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom will generally have blocks, platforms, and devices that you need to use and manipulate in order to progress. Should you lose these items by dropping them into a pit or a lava pool, they'll respawn so you don't get stuck. Zonai devices in shrines also have infinite power to make experimenting with different contraptions more convenient.
• The Switch remake of The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening contains many quality-of-life features over the original version:
  • The Sword, Shield, Power Bracelet, and Pegasus Boots are always equipped on different buttons, similarly to The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, meaning significantly less time spent switching between items.
  • Warp points can now be selected manually via a fast-travel menu, rather than jumping into warp holes one after another until you land at the one you want. Furthermore, there are more of them on the island, and Manbo's Mambo lets you travel to any visited warp point in addition to Manbo's Pond.
  • Playing Manbo's Mambo inside a dungeon warps you to the entrance. In the remake, you're asked for confirmation before it warps you, preventing you from accidentally sending yourself further back in the dungeon by pressing the wrong button.
  • In the Game Boy releases, horse head-shaped objects in dungeons have to land upright after being thrown to solve puzzles, with both members of a pair having to land upright, but doing so can be time-consuming as it mostly comes down to luck. In the Switch remake, they have been turned into knight chess pieces. Their movement upon being thrown mimics knights in chess (moving in an L-shaped path), and their puzzles now involve manipulating their movement so they land on specific tiles.
  • For players who have trouble discerning color, the Color Dungeon has a few quality-of-life upgrades made to it. The skeletons at the entrance no longer ask what color they are, instead simply letting Link in after they're spoken to (and serving as a shop for items necessary in the dungeon). Unique geometric patterns appear on all the puzzle elements and enemies that make use of the color gimmick, and the bouncy floor tiles now display noticeable cracks as they're used more. The end boss of the dungeon also uses cracks as well as colour to show damage.
  • In the Game Boy versions, Blaino's uppercut sends Link back to the beginning of the dungeon. In the Switch remake, it only sends Link back one room.
• Hyrule Warriors: Young Link's main mechanic revolves around staying in Focus Spirit mode for as long as possible, as his regular attacks are rather underwhelming outside of it. Thankfully, in a mechanic unique to him, his Magic Meter stops draining when he's executing a Weak Point Smash preventing it from eating up precious time, and if he runs out of magic in the middle of a combo move he will finish it before ending Focus Spirit, potentially killing enough enemies to refill his magic gauge and thus not end Focus Spirit. The Magic Meter also stops draining when using his special move which refills it from the SP bar, preventing him from wasting more time than he would gain.

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