One fan found out that Tears of the Kingdom’s hover platform has a hidden use that makes it unique among Zonai devices – and exceptionally useful for exploring the open world. Twitter user yukino_san_14 posted a short video that showed them attaching a hover platform to an arrow, firing it a short distance, and seeing it suddenly manifest intact.
That’s pretty unusual for Zonai devices in Tears of the Kingdom. Fuse a flame emitter to an arrow and fire it? You just launched a flame emitter 100 meters away. The same is true for most other Zonai devices in the Zelda game – mirrors, lights, springs, and wheels all disappear on impact without causing any effect. Cannons explode, sure, and time bombs do what they’re supposed to, but your arrow device fusion options are pretty limited in most cases.
Forget stabilizers and footholds. Hover platforms are the way to go.
The handy thing about firing hover platforms into place is that it saves time, which is essential if you’re working with limited battery cells or need multiple active devices at once. Hover platforms are active and drain energy the moment you take them out of the capsule, so the usual method of plunking one down and using Ultrahand to position it is essentially a waste of energy.
浮遊石は矢に付けるのもオススメですよ！ #TearsOfTheKingdom pic.twitter.com/1lBtvNbBbU
— ゆきのさん (@yukino_san_14) May 31, 2023
You can have as many hover platforms out at once as you have energy to sustain them, which opens quite a few possibilities. You could build a platform staircase to reach a sky island if you don’t have a wing or other flying device handy; use them to scale cliffs when there’s no cave to Ascend through nearby; or make a walkway in midair for Link to cover just a bit more ground with before gliding off to reach a far-flung destination.
The best part is something I discovered after seeing yukino_san_14’s video: The maximum distance Link fires the hover platforms is roughly the maximum distance Ascend can reach. Granted, Link can’t quite fire the platforms directly overhead. You need to get a bit creative to make sure he can actually reach them, but it’s an easy way to scale the heights quickly and without having to cook a dozen stamina meals.
If you want to try it yourself, drop Zonai Charges in the device dispensers in the Lanayru, Tabantha, and Akkala sky archipelagos to get some hover platforms.
The hover platform trick and the cooking pot joint might not be as visually impressive as some of the most creative engineering Tears of the Kingdom fans have engaged in – or the most deranged torture devices they’ve made – but it’s pretty astounding how many unexpected uses these seemingly simple devices actually have.
Written by Josh Broadwell on behalf of GLHF
