Hard Mode

[lemonslut]

Hard Mode

OOT is great, but I want it to be harder. I want to work for it, Ya know? I want it to be more difficult, but also i don't want that difficulty to be in the form of big time investments — i want it to be faster paced. i don't want to add something like equipment durability (UGH) or make it take longer to get places -- i just want the fights to be harder and more fast paced. And I want the existing mechanics that are under-utilized to be meaningful to the overall progression -- e.g. health potions! no reason to use them over fairies in vanilla, but that's fixable!

(yes i know about master quest, this is a little different and i want to apply it to master quest as well, eventually)

Here's what I'm thinking:

additional challenge

• hyper bosses & enemies
  • they move & act twice as fast as normal
  • they deal 2x damage as a child
  • they deal 4x damage as an adult
  • they have 2x health (maybe)
  • maybe they deal progressively more damage as game-time increases instead of a flat 2x/4x (incentive to hurry the f up)
  • why
    • shielding and timing is more important and more difficult
    • health management requires more effort
    • fights are paced faster
    • this is more fun
• bottled fairies revive, but only give 3 hearts
  • i.e. if you die with a bottled fairy in inventory, it will revive you, but when you come back, you'll only have 3 hearts
  • when used directly, they still only give 3 hearts
  • is this how they behave in master quest or am i tripping? it's been a while since i've gone through mq
  • why
    • makes fairies distinct from health potions & milk, requiring the player to strategize about what they need before entering a fight
      • do you need 2 health potions and a fairy? or two fairies and a health potion?
      • do you want to carry those bugs through this boss battle? u sure?
    • makes having more bottles vital to success
    • makes fairies more like a 2nd chance and less like a universal health solution
• inflation
  • everything is 2x as expensive as an adult
  • it's been 7 years and hyrule is now war-torn, supply chains have been disrupted, the economy is a mess
  • why
    • you wind up burning a lot more ammo with hyper bosses & enemies and stocking up at stores becomes the easiest way to refill, but with how plentiful rupees are there's no real economy management challenge; this adds difficulty to economy management
    • makes the wallet upgrades useful / vital to success
• make double defense weaker
  • it's op
  • maybe zelda gives it to you when she zaps you right before ganon? since you can't get health potions/fairies between ganondorf & ganon. idk
• make deku scrub prices vary randomly over time
  • sometimes you get a killer deal, sometimes it's a rip off, but at least now you have a reason to visit
• maybe fewer/no heart drops (still placements, still fairies)
  • makes the gossip stones (fairy releases) a lot more important

perks

• everything in SoH Enhanced, and/but specifically:
• bunny hood gives faster run & longer jump; wearable as adult
  • makes the child trading quest vital to success through the rest of the game
  • ooh if the bunny hood is available in inventory, the timed legs of the trading quest should be adjusted down proportional to the increase in running speed
  • i fucking love the bunny hood run/jump bonus
• super tunic -- no more swapping -- makes the tunics purely cosmetic which is actually great
• song of time changes age
  • but maybe only after prelude is unlocked? -- this would maintain the original shiek-blocking-your-way before you beat the forest temple thing, but imo that's kind of annoying
  • or after the door of time is opened? -- definitely at least this; it's pretty core to the game
  • this is pure travel-time-save though, and already implemented (aside from the constraints)
• shield w/ 2 handed weapons
  • you're going to need it, or at least i do
• 100 skulltulla reward is infinite rupees
  • this lets the player shed the economy management mechanic and fully restock in preparation to finish the game -- you can't even get this (glitchless) until you have the gold gauntlets
• farore's wind everywhere
  • pure time-save, still a strategic element
• make adult wallet 400 & giant's wallet 800

i'd also maybe like

• ways to screw up so badly you can't win and have to restart
• death counter always increases, regardless of whether or not you save/continue -- or maybe save is always no and continue is always yes on the game-over screen, so it just does that
  • also, a certain number of deaths and your file just deletes (file copying is now an important game mechanic!)
• health potions only restore X hearts
  • gives you a reason to visit great fairies more than once lol
    • but also where are there 5 great fairies in the whole game and 2 of them are like 10 feet from each other on death mountain?
      • also in my head-canon, those two death mountain great fairies actually live together in the space between between their fountains & they're sapphic lovers

[lemonslut]

• skeletons always spawn (hyrule field is too peaceful as an adult)
• skulltullas are always out
• time moves half as fast (you've got the sun's song; deal with it)