We’ve never had a Zelda game like The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom before, so getting to grips with all of its unique characteristics can be a little daunting. You need to learn how our he🏅roine controls and what sort of abilities she has at her disposal, alongside how they will develop throughout the extensive campaign.

Not only can the Princess summon myriad echoes from the ether to solve puzzꦺles and fight enemies, but she also has 𝐆access to a swordfighter form that unleashes sword strikes, piercing arrows, and explosive bombs into the world. There’s a lot to uncover as you step into a new vision of Hyrule for the first time, so let’s get into it.

Learn Every Single Echo You Find

There are over 120 echoes to be found across Hyruleﷺ, and each of them can be summoned whenever you see🅠 fit. Most of them are applicable in a variety of situations, so it will benefit to keep your arsenal as up to date as possible.

Echoes can often be hidden away i🍌n random buildings and caves, so whenever you’re visiting a ne𝔍w area make sure to leave no stone unturned.

If you defeat an enemy for the first time, approach it to claim it as an echo. If you discover an item for the first time, approach it to do the very same. Unclaimed echoes are normally clear from a glowing gold glow surrounding them.

Don’t Be Afraid To Experiment

Much like Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom before it, Echoes of Wisdom offers a bedrock of mechanics that are built for experimentation. But once you settle into a handful of reliable echoes for combat and platforming, it can be temp🌞ting to use them and little else.

Your inventory will also sort Echoes b🗹y type, most used, most recently discovered, and so on.💎 This can be a great way to measure what echoes you are and aren't using at any given time.

But try and make your playthrough more exciting by applying new and existing echoes all the time, even if it’s just to complete the same simple task of climbing a cliffside or killing the same pesky group of enemies. It’s fun and rewarding to scope out all the different ways in whic𒁏h this 🔯game can be played.

Use Swordfighter Form Whenever You Need It

When you first obtain Zelda’s swordfighter form it is presented as an ultimate ability that you should only use as a last resort. Like the energy reserves will run down in mere seconds, and you’ll b♑e left in a lurch. This is true, but you earn so much additional energy from all the enemies you defeat and objects you destroy that honestly, it doesn’t matter.

Instead, treat it like another normal part of your loadout. If you’re surrounded by enemies or need to clear a room within seconds, switching to the swordfighter form to swing your sword or throw a bomb is far less frustrating than spamming echoes with little success. It will also be hugely beneficial to regularly upgrade abilities and keep an eye out for power crystals.

Speaking of...

Don’t Forget To Upgrade Your Abilities

You first gain the ability to upgrade swordfighter form after completing the first big dungeon, with Lueberry’s Hut just south of Castle Town being a regular port of call for the whole game. Here you can exchange power crystals to upgrade your sword, bow, bombs, and energy. But it can fall to the wayside pretty quickl🐻y if you aren’t exploring the open world all the time.

Not to mention, you earn new abilities at a gradual cadence, all of which start at Level 1 and will need to be upgraded again and again in order to have matching power with your sword. So try to revisit Lueberry’s Hut after every major dungeon and spend all of your crystals. It’ll guarantee you’re powerful enough for whatever comes next, and won’t leave you ಞwith a hole burning in your pocket.

Smoothies Are Your Best Friend

Echoes of Wisdom doesn’t really pick a specific point to introduce smoothies to the game. It just lets you stumble across a smoothie making merchant and ♌🍸connect the dots yourself. To be fair, it isn’t that complicated, but this also means you risk overlooking them entirely.

You shouldn’t, because much like cooking in Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom, smoothies can be the difference between life and death. By combining two ingredients, you can concoct smoothies that heal your entire roster of hearts, protect you from ice, fire, and lightning, or even speed up how you 💝perform certain actions.

If you don’t go into dungeons without a selection of smoothies - you can hold plenty - then you are entirely reliant on sleeping on bed echoes or fin꧃ding hearts🌄 in the environment when it comes to staying alive.

Do Every Side Quest You See

Zelda can find plenty of quests around Hyrule, especially after she abandons her disguise and is free to wear an assortment of fabulous outfits. Some side missions will offer rewards you shouldn’t pass up, such🅰 as a costume that lets you talk to cats or an accessory that is designed to detect power crystals, while others merely offer up a few scant rupees.

But all of them are worth doing because of the stories they have to tell. New quests will be unlocked as you progress thr🅘ough the main narrative, giving you ample reasons to explore Hyrule and revisit places you’d previously picked clean. There are plenty of surprises to be found, while the game is much more fun if you adopt this attitude from the very beginning.

Upgrade Your Accessory Slots

You can only equip a single accessory in Echoes of Wisdom at the start of the game, and it isn’t much of a loadout when you have to switch between buffs whenever you find any new items. So you’ll want some extraꦐ slots, and these can be earned easily with a few rup🌃ees.

Additional accessory slots can be purchased from the Great Fairy Fountain located in the middle of Lake Hylia. You will need to handle a small rift to gain access to i🅷t, but after that, this becomes a permanent location you can travel to and spend rupees. Zelda can have a maximum of five slots, which we recommend getting sooner rather than later, so your skills are best applied to as many dungeons as possible.