I’ve played Windwaker, Skyward Sword, Breath of the Wild, and now I’m starting Tears of the Kingdom. I’ve played over 100 hours of BoTW, and I liked the game, but always had trouble navigating around in the world. I would joke with my wife about needing a guided GPS to help get me places. I really thought after 7 years that Tears would be different. I thought at least the map would be easier to read. Instead it’s harder and with floating terrain more complex. Now there are sky islands and looking at the map it’s nearly impossible understand the topology. I can’ t easily tell what is above or below another land mass.

My biggest struggle with the game is knowing where to go or how to get there. It’s not fun trying to figure this out, it’s draining. I understand that it’s an open world and it’s designed to be an adventure and exploration, but it’s exhausting, and frustrating. Right now I’m still in the beginning part of the game, I have fuse for both weapons and other items. I was making some progress, I found one of the floating squares and attached a few fans and floated to another sky island. After exploring it, I could not take the square back down to the previous island and I couldn’t find anything on the island that would make me progress. I attached the fans pointing down this time and quickly realized that the squares do not float down even with 4 fans pointing down. I ended up throwing myself off onto the starting island. I couldn’t find water, so I jumped knowing I would die, I landed on the ground and died. At least I was moving on. I quickly realized that I had no idea what to do next, and didn’t know where to go. I’ve never been good at direction, and couldn’t remember what I had done and where I had been. This became a big frustration after running around and not finding the next thing to progress the game.

Had there been a path showing my previous steps, I could have looked and seen where I’d been and followed my previous path or go somewhere new. I ran around for a long while as my left thumb started to hurt, and just got more frustrated. I finally gave up and took our dog on a walk.

When I run around looking for the next thing to do, I’m burning physical energy. I get physically tired and feel emotionally burnt out.

Skyward Sword had Fi, and the guidance stones. (Or maybe the stones were in Windwaker?) They gave direction and I could choose to ask and they told me the next thing to do. It was a huge relief. Even if I could not find the thing they told me to do, I knew I was at least doing the thing to move the game forward. I don’t remember Windwaker much, I know I loved that game and didn’t have the kind of frustration I’m having with ToTK or BoTW.

I don’t think Tears of the Kingdom was made for someone that has a bad sense of direction.

This may be a big ask, but I know there are three things that would have helped. A map that better illustrates the topology. Maybe something like color coding for different elevations. As the map goes, it’s quite hard to read and It seems vague. Two, something in the game that helps advise on the next thing to do or a physical direction to go. It doesn’t have to be a Fi like character that I believe frustrated people, but something that I could turn to for direction. Something to cater to people that need help, and could be ignored for those that don’t need or want help. Finally, an option for a path history. Lines or tracks on the map that show where you’d been. I think this would have helped a lot.

I know I could look things up outside the game. To be honest I don’t even know what I’d search, but I didn’t want to leave the game to figure out how to get around in the game.

There is so much that I’ve enjoyed so far, exploring caves, finding cool items and learning to fuse. Shooting enemies from a far with arrows, finding cool new weapons. I want to continue to experience this, but struggling with navigation is huge stumbling block. I’m not far into the game and really feeling discouraged.

*Easy so I thought. I figured, I have the box, this should be easy!! I have no idea why I thought this. It was not easy at all. However maybe my process or choice of parts may make your project easier. Enjoy

I’ll start with the final product. This is the end result and it works quite well and is very noise dampening. I do not know which IKEA thing this is, if it’s a mini bookcase or a stand. I got it a long time ago. The box came with a shelf, so I added rubber feet to the shelf and put the printer on top of it. I was trying to make it quiet and uncouple it from the box and table below. You can see the shelf and the gap below it. The knobs are from Home Depot and make of wood. In the back corner I drilled a hole and added an eyelet screw. I tied a rope from the eyelet around the hose to hold it up as strain relief for the fan connector.

Back side photo. I realized rather quickly that my IKEA box was not deep enough since the cable for the bed temperature sensor would hit the back of the box. I had to extend it a bit. The simplest thing was to cut up a 2×4 and glue it together and glue it in place. I was way too lazy to drill and screw all that together. The glue I used was Liquid nails Fuze*It. It’s super strong and worked well. It just so happened that the wood was the same thickness as the walls of the box.

I used a Noctua NF-A6x25 PWM, Premium Quiet Fan, 4-Pin with a Noctua NA-FC1, 4-Pin PWM Fan Controller (Black) speed controller, and Coolerguys 12V Fan Power Supply The black part is a 3D printed adapter I designed to fit onto the fan. The hose I used was 2-1/2 inch Diameter by 10 foot Long PVC Dust it came with the clamps. I used these rubber grommet things that came with a different Noctura fan to hold the fan and hose adapter to the back. Screws would have been better because the rubber grommets flexed a bit and could create an air gap.

Below is the fan speed controller. I used 4 pin parts for everything so it was an easy fit. I can just turn the dial and adjust the fan speed. You can see the rope tied to the eyelet that holds the hose.

This is the box with the 1/4″ plexiglass cut to size. I used a plexiglass scoring tool to cut it down to size. It was a bit of a pain. I wanted precise cuts so I used the factory cut side for where the doors meet since it was a better edge. The hinges are from Home Depot. They are inexpensive and they hold themselves closed with a built in spring mechanism . To prevent air gaps, I mounted the hinges in front of the doors so they would sit flush against the cabinet face. It’s not how they are designed to be used, so I had to add spaces to make thing work. I used a steel ruler and clamps to score the plex and clamped it to a work bench. I scored and snapped the plexiglass.

Here you can see looking from bottom the hinge sitting crooked. I used a paint stick cut down to size as a shim, but it was not enough. I had to add few screws as spacers.

Here you can see the hing with the wood paint stir stick and the washers I needed to add to get the door spacing correct. I only used 2 screws to hold the doors on because they didn’t need more and I’m lazy.

This is how the hose vents outdoors. I designed a bracket to take it from a round shape to an oval so the window would only have to open a small amount. I cut some wood and tapered it to fill the remainder of the gap using a bandsaw. The windowsill has an angle on the outside so I had to cut the wood and design the part to fit without gaps.

This is the part I originally made to adapt the hose to the window. It’s wide so that the volume is the same going from a circular opening to an oval. This part didn’t quite fit, so I designed the other one you see with the hose connected. I don’t need to move a lot of air. I just need less air pressure in the enclosure than in the room to vent. The hose is 2.5″ diameter more than enough to move air.

Here is what the front of the adapter looks like. It fits the bottom of the window and when the window closes it creates the tight seal.

I use an LED motion activated light since I already had one. Lucky when the printer moves up it does not trigger the light to turn off or on.

Here’s a quick video tour

Wrap up

Airflow

The box has a fairly tight seal, but there are some gaps in the front corners by the doors and a small one in the back. There is a hole drilled in the back plastic (center bottom) for the power cords. When I print I leave one door slightly ajar or sometimes just close the doors. The doors meet and sit so tight that I can just close one door and leave the other door resting on the edge of the other door. It leaves about a .25″ gap. Either way with the doors open or closed, it draws enough air that I never smell the melting plastic.

Plexiglass thickness and experience cutting and drilling

Drilling and cutting was a bit of a pain. Drilling the large hole for the fan was a bit scary because the holesaw bit would catch and yank the drill. Drilling the holes was also tedious because plexiglass can fracture. I started with small drill bits and worked progressively larger. Scoring and snapping the plexiglass was kinda fun. The thickness for the doors was 1/4″ thick and the back was thinner, but I don’t remember the thickness.

Cost

I also thought this would be cheaper since I had the box, and I was wrong. Here’s the price break down.

$33.78 plexiglass for front
$33.96 plexiglass for back
$15.00 fan
$24.00 fan speed controller
$ 8.00 power adapter
$24.00 hose
$2.20 door knobs
$1.34 washers
$1.98 wood for window
$7.78 acrylic cutting tool
$5.47 foam tape
$7.96 hinge
$49.97 hole saw cutting toolset

$215.44 Total

I decided to change things up and made a video review of the Toad titanium slider. It has a titanium body and zirconium plates.

Spoiler: I like it a lot. It keeps my hands busy when I’m reading, concentrating or stuck waiting somewhere. In the future, I’d like to try his Crab design.