First of all, if you are here because you Googled a question, this is a long rambling blog. Use the "find" feature and paste your question there. Your browser will ferret out the answer from this mass of information. I use Chrome, and "Find" is under the wrench-shaped icon. If you don't use Chrome, you can probably find "Find" under "Tools"
Miyamoto said he chose the name Zelda for the wife of F. Scott Fitzgerald, but coincidentally it is the nick name or diminutive of the old German name Griselda which means "Dark (or Grey) Battle" Some also say it means heroine of that battle. Zelda is Yiddish (a variation on German, basically) for blessed. He may say he chose it because Zelda F. was glamorous, but he struck upon a very appropriate name, don't you think?
Insect Locations:
***"Hey guys, anyone know a good place to get a Skyloft Mantis? Thanks.
They sometimes pop out of the pots outside the knights academy
On the right side of the Goddess statue are a couple of trees and a few bushes. One of the bushes has the Mantis." (http://www.gamespot.com/the-legend-of-zelda-skyward-sword/forum/messages/platform/wii?topic_id=m-1-61142966&pid=960633)***
This is true. Check all the bushes near those trees, as there are sometimes more than one. Also, if you don't know where to look for the pots, they are under and to the left of the two balconies that are to the left of the main outside entrance. You may remember you had to use those balconies to get to the roof to rescue the cat-lemur pet that pays you back by attacking you every night.
I also found SL Mantis in the Waterfall Cave. One sometimes spawns near the pond where the Firefly spawns, one spawns at the top of the vines. There are 3 pots on your right at the top and the SL Mantis will be under the third pot in. No need to break pot, just lift. I have seen him on top of another platform in that cave, but I can't remember where. (reference: me!)
"The eastern Lanayru desert has a switch that will open a shortcut back to the starting area in the south. Before heading in the door by the Bird Statue, look for the Sand Cicada on the rear side of the structure." (http://www.ign.com/wikis/the-legend-of-zelda-skyward-sword/The_Generator)
The bird statue is just out side the door to the Stone Cache. At the other end of this building, the end without an entrance, I found two Sand Cicadas on the wall. Also, I saw one on the wall just to the left of the entrance to the temple of time. When I went back it wasn't there, so I tried re-entering the mining facility sentry just inside the temple to the right. When I came out, there were two SC on the wall out side the Temple of Time. The very first time I head and saw a SC was at the very first bird statue of Lanayru. I just went back there and heard it again, but the electric chu chu attacked and the commotion must have scared it off.
Inside the temple under the dust I found Lanayru Ants. I found them under the dust in the northeast corner, but this may change. Within the first mine, LA were in a small room through a crawl space behind a bombketball door, just at your first encounter with sink sank, under the pots there are LA as well.
Gerudo Dragon fly can be found in the Lanayru mines, between the time stone you had to bowl a bomb across sink sand to uncover and to activate, and a chest that was inaccessible from the last room because it is up on a plateau. They are also in the same valley as the Temple of Time. Some are very close to the bird statue of that area, and there are a couple near the valley wall at the end of the area completely opposite the Temple of Time. You have to use mine carts and take the whole trip around, so you have to really need or want them.
To find Eldin Roller, fly to Volcano East in Eldin. As you are facing the bird statue, to your left is the path to the drop down into the depths, where you had to fly to the tops of pillars to reach treasures and a Goddess Cube. Half way down this path on your left is a little hole to crawl through. The bugs are in there. Eldin Roller are also in a Bokoblin camp, but not the one near the temple entrance, the one half way up (or down!) the mountain. There is dig space in the center of one of the huts. Dig and get you net out.
I didn't follow a walkthrough for Skyward Sword. I did check a couple for boss help, though. When I got to the final boss, ZD recommended using my shield, but even though I had the top upgraded shield, it quickly broke. Then I realized that they had told me earlier in the walkthrough how to get the Hylian shield, which is unbreakable. So if you have won the Hylian Shield from the Desert Dragon by defeating 8 bosses in a row, then, yes, using your shield is a good strategy. For some reason, it didn't occur to me to use a Guardian Plus potion when I fought the final bosses. But what the heck, why not? I did use a Stamina Plus and the Potion Medal to fight the hordes of Ghirahim, though. Also for the 2nd and 3rd Imprisoned battles.
Now that I am done with Skyward Sword, I am playing Twilight Princess at last. To get the 3rd bottle you have to find the fishing hole in Upper Zora's River. Go in the door. You don't go to the Lure fishing yet. You walk long the west side of the pond until you see a sign near a bridge. It tells you not to litter, throw BOTTLES into the pond. Zelda Dungeon says merely to fish there to get the bottle, but eHow says to fish off the WEST SIDE of the bridge. That is what worked for me. Bobber fishing only.
I was having trouble finding a poe soul that I missed on Snow Peak, the very first one. Turns out I had it already, but because of this I discovered there is no good description of where to find it. Once you are past the ice floe blocks and climbing the mountain proper, the reekfish scent will take you through a VERY NARROW pass. The right side of this tight squeeze is a boulder. Just after that boulder on the right is the 1st poe of the area. Thank you to this guy for the video her posted that set me straight.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkyYsizZFYA
Oh, the little things that walk throughers don't think to mention. I could not claw shot Argorok's tail. I stood there for five minutes shooting, z-targeting, attempting to hit while hanging from the posts. I Googled "Help! I can't hit Argorok's tail!" and " Can't z-target Argorok's tail" Nothing. When I reread the ZD walkthrough, it said, "Use the iron boots to keep from being swept away by his wing gusts." But he was just hovering there and I was having no trouble keeping my footing. Then it said, "Once you catch his tail, if you haven't already, equip the boots to tug him down." So I thought, stand in the same place, use the same shooting, just put the iron boots on first. And that is what did the trick. No matter where I was, no matter z-target or aim and shoot, without the iron boots equipped, I could not catch his tail to start the battle.
Spirit Tracks is so vast and complicated, I could not manage it without a walkthrough, especially since, because I am a mom, I have to take long breaks, sometimes months long. I was stumped how to get the chests on the roof of castle town because, since I had taken such a long break, I FORGOT I had a song that could summon birds. Duh. Once you have a cucco, it is easy to jump to TWO of the chests, but the northwestern most one was a stumper. I found this advice:
"Take your Cucco up the ramparts one final time and go to the top right corner. Jump onto the building there, then to the one to the left of you. Now for the really tricky part. You should be near one of the Lion Statues that adorn the main path to Hyrule Castle. What you're going to do...is jump off the building you're on and land on that statue. After which you will leap over to the second statue and finally, onto the roof of the building with the final chest. This one has a super-rare treasure in it, which makes it worth the effort. Still, this will most likely take you a few tries. The best tip that I can give you is to make the statue jumps in one motion. If you overthink it, you'll fall off and have to try again."
One: I DID NOT get a super rare treasure. I got Goron Amber. I have freaking 5 now. I think I have a glitch because it seems whenever I find a treasure in a chest it is a freaking Goron Amber. Grr! (What kind of treasure did YOU get? You can answer in the comments section.) Two: His advice for lion jumping didn't work for me. I went slow and once on the first one, lined my self up directly to the left before jumping again. Was it my imagination, or did tapping on the lion's head while I was in the air help direct my landing? It felt that way. If I wasn't told landing on the lions was possible, I never would have gotten this. I am a lousy platform gamer, which means I miss a lot, AND I will only try and fail at something so many times before I assume I am missing because it is programmed that way.
Except one time in Twilight Princess. Early in the game I saw a rupee on a hillside in Ordon near where you can call a hawk that will fetch for you. One such bird fetched a whole cradle, so I thought it a fair assumption that it would fetch the rupee. I needed that rupee to get the sling shot so the game would progress, so I tried 50 times to get that rupee, assuming the problem was me. At the beginning of Skyward Sword it took me 27 times to land with the sailcloth in the circle at the bottom of the Goddess statue because I didn't under stand the controls. To be fair, the icon that guides you at the bottom of the screen shows a remote being tipped side to side, not being pointed downward and upward, which is what you NEED to do. So once I was in Ordon, I figured that I must be controlling the hawk wrong. FINALLY I checked a walkthrough and read "Catch a cucco with the Hawk. Then glide over to the hill with the cucco." From real life I know this is an awful idea because a hawk would severely WOUND any chicken you send it after, rendering it useless for any type of flying or floating, but this is what my kids like to call "Zelda Logic"
So rule one of Zelda Logic, if there is something out of your reach, and their are cuccos around, odds are the cucco is the answer, try the cucco first.
I wanted to collect as many heart containers before looking for the Demon Train, so I fought the guards at the castle at last. The trick for me was NOT what Zelda Dungeon suggested, "Stay to the right and if you see a guard attempt to hit you, quickly turn and hit him first." I am not fast enough apparently. Big failure. But, if I just hit until I saw a guard preparing to strike, then ran away, then came back and hit a few more times, then dodge, hit dodge hit dodge, nothing bad ass, strike and flee like a coward, with THAT strategy, I won on my first try.
"How do you solve the block puzzles at Ends of the Earth Station?"
Then I went to the Ends of the Earth Station. In the western cavern there are 3 block puzzles. Zelda Dungeon was great with the first puzzle, but offered nothing about the 2nd. Obviously soooooo easy for this master gamer, not even worth mentioning, but for me still tricky. I found a video that shows that the answer to the 2nd puzzle is:
Bottom block: up right down left up left
Top block: down right down left up right. I also found that the completed bottom block (ends on the right) sort of got in the way of moving the top block. I moved the bottom (right finishing) block up one until the top (left finishing) block was complete.
Geez, they don't tell you how to do the 3rd one, either. I worked this out from watching that same video:
Left block: (move bottom block right first) down right up (move bottom block left and right block down) left up left (Move bottom block left and left block up to return them to starting point)
Right block: (move bottom block up) down (bottom block left) left up (bottom block down) right up right
Bottom block: (from where you left it working left block) up right down right up left down down
WTF!?! I just went to do the easy puzzles, in the middle cavern, which even *I* didn't need help with, to collect some (allegedly) random treasure and I got ANOTHER FRIGGIN' GORON AMBER! That makes six in a row, now.
