Between Elden Ring, GOW ragnarok, and now Totk, I’m getting pretty tired of AAA sequels that refuse to fix the mistakes of its predecessors and/or offer a more focused experience in favor of more meaningless content.
BOTW was a revolutionary game because it showed everyone that making an open world where every little corner of the map was not only purposeful and unique, but made with player interaction in mind, was a far better and more engaging experience than the hyper realistic storefronts (“very beautiful but try not to touch anything” design mentality) that many games were and still are.
This could be better appreciated if you read or watched any of the many articles that explained the way the map was designed, with mountains and hills located and shaped in such a way that would incentivize wanderlust and make you wonder what was behind them, along with constant landmarks positioned along the way that made you stray from the main path.
This design marvel caused inadvertedly one of the main problems of the game, which is that at the end of every quest, landmark or curiosity that incentivized said exploration there was ALWAYS either some kind or weapon, a trinket, or a shrine (and very rarely bit-sized, inconsequential stories called memories), and therefore, the moment the player realizes this, most of their wanderlust can disappear because there is no wondering if you know what’s the surprise at the end. This was most likely caused because Nintendo felt that a more relevant story along with better written and more relevant side-quests could make the player feel constricted and less free, but, at least in my experience in, say, Fallout New Vegas, more interesting stories make me want to engage more profoundly with the word and provide with a more rewarding satisfaction than any material in-game reward.
But then again, this, along with the exceedingly simple breakable weapons system, the horrid combat and the dumb-as-bricks shrine puzzles were the imperfect solutions nintendo arrived to while trying to make exploration feel great. And, in my opinion? They absolutely succeeded. Despite my many complaints about it, I can’t deny that I enjoyed every single one of the +200 hours I spent between two different playthroughs of BOTW.
I think it’s precisely because of my enjoyment of BOTW that I have found TOTK to be so unappealing to me, and why I have struggled to finish it despite having “only” played 45 hours, far less than any of my BOTW playthroughs.
My disappointment with TOTK could be reduced to the fact that it not only has refused to learn from the mistakes of its predecesor, but has actively worsened in some aspects.
Why implement Fuse if you are gonna keep the combat as orthopedic as in the first game, and most people won’t take advantage of the synergies between certain materials and will simple fuse two weapons for higher damage?
Why implement Ultrahand (an admittedly quite impressive ability, and, according to the game designers in my timeline, an absolute marvel of programming) if you are gonna keep puzzles both in and outside of shrines as simple and open as the first game, making brute-forcing your way through like an idiot an option.
Why implement Recall if you are barely gonna find situations where it’s useful (at least in my experience)
Why implement Ascend if you are going to trademark it FUCK YOU NINTENDO.
(I won’t talk about Autobuild because I forgot I had one power left to acquire and I couldn’t be bothered to explore the depths more)
I won’t say these abilities are bad, only that they bring to the surface problems the game carried over from BOTW and that it has not tried to fix in the at least six (6!!!!) years it’s been in development.
Now, I will absolutely say that the sage abilities and the world design have worsened enormously from the previous game.
In BOTW, each champion ability you acquired, regardless of the order you got them, made you feel much more powerful and competent than before. In TOTK you have two absolutely useless abilities, one that is a severely handicapped version of urbosa’s fury, and a wind burst that is pretty useful but still feels somewhat limited; and you better get the wind one first if you don’t want to get your time wasted.
And now, the cardinal sin of TOTK, the world design.
Hyrule has been butchered, not only by ganondorf but by the designers too. You are no longer required to interact and engage with the world, you no longer need to arduously cross the landscape to reach a new goal, confronting not only the dangers on the way, but the hostility of nature too.
Hyrule has been stripped of agency and reduced to a land whose only purpose is to endure the whims of the player. Whereas in BOTW hyrule was a dangerous place you had to explore on its own terms, aided by things like revali’s gale or the towers, in TOTK you can ignore everything, get yeeted to the sky by a tower and simply fly wherever you want.
It also doesn’t help that most of the map is the same as in BOTW with some minor variations and that the new zones, the sky islands and the depths, are so visually samey and, to me, kinda boring that they feel more like an addition for content’s sake than an worthwhile incorporation. In fact, I explored so little of the depths because I found them visually boring, and the gloom and absolute darkness such a pain in the ass, that I won’t say definitively that it’s filler.
Every Zelda game I can think of has tried to change and distinguish itself from other entries in an effort to be unique and worth playing. I didn’t finish Majora’s Mask (a mistake I will soon fix), but from the ten hours or so I played I could tell Nintendo didn’t try to simply replicate the success of Ocarina of Time, instead choosing a far darker tone and more unique design philosophy, making an independent experience from OoT.
TOTK biggest mistake is that it tries to one-up BOTW in every aspect, opening itself to far more criticism and comparisons in the process and making it an experience that, at least in my opinion, is not worth your time if you have already played BOTW.
Finally, Tears of a Kingdom, I thank you for making me appreciate more everything groundbreaking Breath of the wild did, and I damn you for making me be so much more conscious about its many problems that I can no longer consider it one of my favorite games ever.
BOTW was a revolutionary game because it showed everyone that making an open world where every little corner of the map was not only purposeful and unique, but made with player interaction in mind, was a far better and more engaging experience than the hyper realistic storefronts (“very beautiful but try not to touch anything” design mentality) that many games were and still are.
This could be better appreciated if you read or watched any of the many articles that explained the way the map was designed, with mountains and hills located and shaped in such a way that would incentivize wanderlust and make you wonder what was behind them, along with constant landmarks positioned along the way that made you stray from the main path.
This design marvel caused inadvertedly one of the main problems of the game, which is that at the end of every quest, landmark or curiosity that incentivized said exploration there was ALWAYS either some kind or weapon, a trinket, or a shrine (and very rarely bit-sized, inconsequential stories called memories), and therefore, the moment the player realizes this, most of their wanderlust can disappear because there is no wondering if you know what’s the surprise at the end. This was most likely caused because Nintendo felt that a more relevant story along with better written and more relevant side-quests could make the player feel constricted and less free, but, at least in my experience in, say, Fallout New Vegas, more interesting stories make me want to engage more profoundly with the word and provide with a more rewarding satisfaction than any material in-game reward.
But then again, this, along with the exceedingly simple breakable weapons system, the horrid combat and the dumb-as-bricks shrine puzzles were the imperfect solutions nintendo arrived to while trying to make exploration feel great. And, in my opinion? They absolutely succeeded. Despite my many complaints about it, I can’t deny that I enjoyed every single one of the +200 hours I spent between two different playthroughs of BOTW.
I think it’s precisely because of my enjoyment of BOTW that I have found TOTK to be so unappealing to me, and why I have struggled to finish it despite having “only” played 45 hours, far less than any of my BOTW playthroughs.
My disappointment with TOTK could be reduced to the fact that it not only has refused to learn from the mistakes of its predecesor, but has actively worsened in some aspects.
Why implement Fuse if you are gonna keep the combat as orthopedic as in the first game, and most people won’t take advantage of the synergies between certain materials and will simple fuse two weapons for higher damage?
Why implement Ultrahand (an admittedly quite impressive ability, and, according to the game designers in my timeline, an absolute marvel of programming) if you are gonna keep puzzles both in and outside of shrines as simple and open as the first game, making brute-forcing your way through like an idiot an option.
Why implement Recall if you are barely gonna find situations where it’s useful (at least in my experience)
Why implement Ascend if you are going to trademark it FUCK YOU NINTENDO.
(I won’t talk about Autobuild because I forgot I had one power left to acquire and I couldn’t be bothered to explore the depths more)
I won’t say these abilities are bad, only that they bring to the surface problems the game carried over from BOTW and that it has not tried to fix in the at least six (6!!!!) years it’s been in development.
Now, I will absolutely say that the sage abilities and the world design have worsened enormously from the previous game.
In BOTW, each champion ability you acquired, regardless of the order you got them, made you feel much more powerful and competent than before. In TOTK you have two absolutely useless abilities, one that is a severely handicapped version of urbosa’s fury, and a wind burst that is pretty useful but still feels somewhat limited; and you better get the wind one first if you don’t want to get your time wasted.
And now, the cardinal sin of TOTK, the world design.
Hyrule has been butchered, not only by ganondorf but by the designers too. You are no longer required to interact and engage with the world, you no longer need to arduously cross the landscape to reach a new goal, confronting not only the dangers on the way, but the hostility of nature too.
Hyrule has been stripped of agency and reduced to a land whose only purpose is to endure the whims of the player. Whereas in BOTW hyrule was a dangerous place you had to explore on its own terms, aided by things like revali’s gale or the towers, in TOTK you can ignore everything, get yeeted to the sky by a tower and simply fly wherever you want.
It also doesn’t help that most of the map is the same as in BOTW with some minor variations and that the new zones, the sky islands and the depths, are so visually samey and, to me, kinda boring that they feel more like an addition for content’s sake than an worthwhile incorporation. In fact, I explored so little of the depths because I found them visually boring, and the gloom and absolute darkness such a pain in the ass, that I won’t say definitively that it’s filler.
Every Zelda game I can think of has tried to change and distinguish itself from other entries in an effort to be unique and worth playing. I didn’t finish Majora’s Mask (a mistake I will soon fix), but from the ten hours or so I played I could tell Nintendo didn’t try to simply replicate the success of Ocarina of Time, instead choosing a far darker tone and more unique design philosophy, making an independent experience from OoT.
TOTK biggest mistake is that it tries to one-up BOTW in every aspect, opening itself to far more criticism and comparisons in the process and making it an experience that, at least in my opinion, is not worth your time if you have already played BOTW.
Finally, Tears of a Kingdom, I thank you for making me appreciate more everything groundbreaking Breath of the wild did, and I damn you for making me be so much more conscious about its many problems that I can no longer consider it one of my favorite games ever.