I managed to defeat the Wall of Flesh with my trusty bee-bow, and brought on hardmode. I've mined enough to get myself a shiny set of Admantium armor. Still can't beat the Destroyer - kills me almost outright. Also, the world is quickly becoming a corrupted mess. I've put in about 130 hours and am finally sort of ready to give it up. Any suggestions on how to renew my love of this game?

ditto

BTW, any kind of good bow seems to be the best weapon for the Wall of Flesh.

Yes, a bow, and I built a bridge across the entire underworld. Just to be sure...

I hear you. I hated that guy. It got to the point that when I saw that message, I just dropped to the underworld and earned money until dawn.

I ended up doing the Twins first. Missed the message about terrible night or whatever it is, and happened to be on my old covered skybridge when they showed up. Did a running fight, and discovered that one stayed above the ceiling, and his shots wouldn't go through the hay, leaving me to deal with just the one. Still died but realized all I needed to do was put speedbumps every half screen or so. Three blocks on the floor, one centered on the three, and raise the ceiling just enough so I wouldn't have to slow down in either direction. This stops the shots, but doesn't impede movement. Place campfires and heart lanterns to give full coverage.

Next time they showed up, it was a running battle that took most of the night before I got the hang of timing and aiming my shots, but finished without using a single healing potion.

Encouraged and better armed, I built a new "arena" -- a "cargo net" of ropes a couple hundred tall and 8 or 10 wide. Died, but thought of ways to improve it. A ways to the side, a campfire and heart lantern, just close enough to give full coverage on the ropes. (Keep it to a minimum, and as far away as you can, because that wily critter will use those blocks to turn on you.) Then its just a matter of heading up or down as needed, looking for good opportunities to place the nimbus rod, and taking shots as they present themselves. Without blocks to turn himself, he goes in a straight line, so placing shots becomes a lot easier. After I got rid of enough probes, I took a summoning potion and summoned 2 imps. (Learned the hard way not to summon the imps too soon, because you end up with a gazillion laser-firing probes.) Between the imps' piercing and the nimbus piercing, the rest of the battle went pretty easily.

OK, so might be a bit cheesy, but I don't care. I don't enjoy the boss fights anyway. I'd have preferred no bosses and some tougher enemies, and more crafting options, to be honest.

The best suggestion I can give you is to quit for good, because Terraria sucks! :D

The second best suggestion is keep playing and craft a pair of wings, they are a huge help; then I'd get some better weapons, by crafting or drops.

When I beat the Destroyer I used this failed floating apartment building which I never bothered to complete. The solid walls block lasers and it was tall enough to force the worm to stand almost vertically, which means he doesn't do much damage and leaves his flank exposed. If you have a Nimbus Rod or similar cast it on top of the structure, it deals a decent chunk of damage. A good melee weapon is recommended (or at least something that can pierce multiple segments per hit) and of course you need full buffs.

I'd buy the wings, Leaf Wings are only a tiny step down from the Fire Wings, and don't involve getting Souls of Flight first. Just move the Witch Doctor to a jungle house. (If you built a jungle fishing hole close enough to your base, you can skip this step. ;) ) Just one platinum. Arguably the best bang for the buck in the whole game.

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Oh, except for the Extendo-Grip, Sickle, Net, and maybe the Piggy and Katana.
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Oh, hey, missed that the first time through. I don't think Adamantite Armor is that hot in most instances. Oricalchum is better, if you have it, Titanium is a huge step up for this fight particularly because of the damage immunity. Just fish for crates (use the Sonar potion so you don't go through bait as fast) until you get enough bars. I don't recall exactly, but I think I started hardmode last time with about 150 wooden crates, and by the time I'd opened them all, had enough of those bizarre ores that I didn't even bother breaking an altar until I was good and ready to start fighting bosses.

I don't know that you necessarily HAVE to break an altar, even. I think you can summon the bosses without, so you never have to deal with a boss when you aren't at your arena. Don't quote me on that. But obviously, fewer sources of corruption would be a plus, if corruption bothers you. Beenades are even better. They make mincemeat out of the Hungries. Particularly with a Hive Pack equipped.
You can drop WoF in just a few screens, which saves heaps on the amount of corruption he spawns.

Far out! Thanks. I always end up with a shitload of Beenades so that makes it all the better.

Titanium and Adamantite are alternate ores, so unless you do fish a lot (and save the crates for hardmode) you'll only ever get one of them in a single world. The summon items for the three mechanical bosses work without breaking an altar. I've also used them in non-hardmode worlds in previous patches, but not since 1.3 was released, not that I think the ability to do so has been patched away.

Anyway, to deal with the three mechanical bosses the very first time, you really should prepare an arena, a bunch of buff potions and the best weapon you can bring at the time. If you don't want to read a guide to the battles ([url=http://terraria.gamepedia.com/Guide:The_Twins_strategies]Twins[/url], [url=http://terraria.gamepedia.com/Guide:The_Destroyer_strategies]Destroyer[/url] and [url=http://terraria.gamepedia.com/Guide:Skeletron_Prime_strategies]Skeletron Prime[/url], then fighting them a couple of times to study their patterns is probably going to be a requirement.

Taking out the Destroyer will allow you to craft a Megashark, which will make fighting The Twins and Skeletron Prime much easier. Taking out The Twins will let you make an Optical Staff and/or a Magical Harp (depending on how many souls drop), both of which are useful against The Destroyer and Skeletron Prime. The Flamethrower is only really useful against The Destroyer, so defeating Skeletron Prime first is not as useful as defeating one of the other two first.

No. The choice between the three tiers of hardmode ores are made upon breaking an altar, which is only possible after defeating the Wall of Flesh.

So if I were to copy the world file and trigger hardmode in each copy, I wouldn't necessarily get the same ores?

You know, I have never used ropes at all. I can definitely see how a net like that could be useful as an arena. I think you're being a little hard on yourself with the cheesy talk! Whatever it takes, is my motto!

As far as I've checked, that is correct.

I guess I haven't bothered looking into wings because I thought that most of them, other than the ones you are talking about (which require souls of flight) would be akin to the rocket boots - in other words, only allowing one to fly for a little while before plummeting to the ground. If the leaf wings would actually keep me aloft, I might try them.

Right now, the weapons I have are a pirates cutlass (along with the accessory that adds fire damage) and a few magic rods that do various things - one is a meteor rod. Of course each of these only works in specific areas, strategies. I was hoping to get a rainbow rod which is controllable (very useful for destroying enemies while cowering behind walls), but found out I need those darn souls of flight.