We’ve said it before, we’ll say it again (and likely won’t remember having done so): Breath of the Wild is enthralling in its wealth of methods of play, neat tricks to learn, undiscovered areas to stumble upon. Your game won’t be the same as ours. Ours won’t be the same as ours, in fact, in a subsequent playthrough. You can go this way or that way at the crossroads. You can climb that mountain – or not. You can visit this Great Fairy first, free that Divine Beast last. It’s all up to you.
The game offers plenty of in-game advice, whether it’s directions from Impa or a scolding from some other NPC; even the helpful tips that fill the screen whenever you save are worth reading. But still. It’s all up to you.
As we explored Hyrule, we discovered things we thought no one else had noticed before, only to find a video or a post in which another player had chronicled our “discovery”. . . three years earlier.
Nevertheless, we delighted even when we learned from some other, earlier gamer about “one weird trick,” not to be confused with those dreadful memes involving displeased dentists and dermatologists who don’t want you to know that a housewife in Kansas has apparently discovered something that will make their professions obsolete.
Like the fact that you can ride the bears in Hyrule? Who in the programming department at Nintendo came up with that? Or – we saw this on Twitter just the other day – if you want to even up the fruit on a tree to find a Korok, you can stasis the fruit you need to stay put, then chop down the tree before the stasis wears off. Sigh. We can but admire.
Then there are the so-called glitches that (mostly younger) gamers come up with, whether it’s to avoid something frustrating like tiptoeing through the Yiga Clan Hideout or to get the Giant Ancient Core at Mirro Shaz shrine without having to do it the “right” way. These glitches amaze us. The ingenuity and dexterity involved! (Regrettably, we found that the precise timing of shield-surfing through a wall while executing a perfect flurry rush on a Moblin was, shall we say, just outside our skill level. Only just.) But as amazed as we are with these tidbits discovered by others, we also wanted to find our own.
And then one day, we did.
Now, we don’t know definitively that we’re the first. With so many players, over so many years, and not everyone advertising their exploits on the ‘net, how to tell? But this we do know: After our breakthrough, Demelza searched the interwebs far and wide to see if someone else, anywhere, had already found it. But the hunt came up empty.
As far as we can tell, we’re the first to discover the recipe for the Noble Pursuit cocktail.
(Simmer down, folks, we’re not talking about the tropical-juice mocktail in Age of Calamity, but rather the Real Thing, from Breath of the Wild.)
Experienced BOTW players will be familiar with the Perfect Drink and Noble Pursuit Quest, which involves the canteen in Gerudo Town and the Misae Suma Shrine. As a refresher: you meet Pokki at the shrine, who sends you back to Gerudo, where Furosa sends you on a quest for a block of ice, required for a specialty drink apparently to end all specialty drinks. You secure the ice, complete the quest, AND YET YOU NEVER LEARN WHAT GOES INTO THE COCKTAIL BESIDES ICE.
Because of our, erm, interest in the appropriate cocktail pairings with BOTW play, we wanted to know what went into Hyrule’s Perfect Drink!
Of course Demelza found recipes on the Internet for Noble Pursuits suitable for humans (that is, not Hyruleans) and offers a couple here by way of example: Here’s the first and here’s the second. (This would be a good time for a shameless plug of our own cocktail recipes page.) But we wanted to know what Furosa was drinking! What mix of herbs, animal parts, or ancient metallic detritus was she stirring up behind the canteen bar?!
Well, there is a recipe – and like so many game-advancing devices in BOTW, you find it by reading a secret diary. But you must go through two (2) secret steps to get there.
Secret Step 1: While you are chatting with Furosa, she (rather rudely) answers Link’s (rather innocent) question about milk. Ordinarily, that automatic dialogue ends with her terseness. However, if you are holding a bottle of Fresh Milk from the East Wind in Hateno Village, Furosa confides that, in addition to ice, the Noble Pursuit cocktail requires the “bitters” of Naydra’s Tears. Her statement opens a quest to find the dragon Naydra at the East Lanayru Gate and paraglide onto her back. AT NO OTHER TIME CAN YOU RIDE NAYDRA OR ANY OTHER DRAGON, unless this quest is open. But, if you visit Naydra after the exchange with Furosa, you can land on the dragon’s back and it will “drop” tears, which you collect just like scales, fangs, or horns. Take the tears back to Furosa. Furosa will be excited, and will gladly accept your tears, but she’ll still be cagey about her recipe, doing little more than insulting Link some more and mumbling about the tallest green bottle on the shelf behind her bar. It’s a hidden clue!
Secret Step 2: Shoot the tallest green bar with an arrow, and a diary will fall from its hiding place to the bar. With the listed ingredients you can then mix a Noble Pursuit in a cooking pot. (Pro Tip: Even if you can’t get the tears by flying atop Naydra, you can still shoot the tallest green bottle and open the diary, but you won’t be able to make the drink without the tears.)
Enjoy the secret quest! And, if you can’t make it work, you can find a list of the diary’s secret ingredients here. You’ll still have to go through the steps of collecting them, though, so don’t think you can cheat this Easter Egg altogether!