Though each entry in the series has shaken up the formula a bit, The Legend of Zelda franchise hasn’t strayed too far from its roots. And while that’s not a bad thing, our grounded expectations make this games innovations such a breath of fresh air. It singlehandedly has reinvented both the franchise and open world game design. Gone are the endless markers that typically litter open world maps, making things feel like a tick box exercise. Instead in BOTW you are free to explore the world however you want. After a well-crafted tutorial which introduces you to the gameplay loop and mechanics, you are free to do as you please as you are given every tool you need for the rest of the game right from the get-go. You can follow the recommended quest line to prepare yourself for Ganon, march to Hyrule Castle and fight him straight away or simply just explore to see what the open world has in store for you. This freedom and curiosity that the game encourages makes everything feel that bit more special, as you craft the experiences you have in the game.
However, there would be no impetus to explore the world if it wasn’t as impeccably designed as it is. There are plenty of high points around the map to get a view of your surroundings and identify anything that looks interesting. Almost always when you go to these points of interest there is something useful you will find, promoting curiosity by rewarding you. This exploration loop is incredibly fun and addicting. The world itself is so diverse with every area being distinct from the rest. There are great variations in environmental design between areas and within each area there are plenty of natural and manmade landmarks to soak in. The attention to detail is astounding, making you want to explore every inch of the map, with the simple yet clever marking system ensuring you never get lost. My only minor gripe is that there are some bare spaces in the map which could’ve been removed to improve the pacing of exploration in certain areas.
There is no denying that BOTW is simply gorgeous. The art direction, colour palette and lighting combine perfectly to create some stunning spectacles. The sunrises and sunsets are simply breath-taking, while when necessary the aesthetics can create an eerie vibe as the world is consumed by the blood moon. What's more, the audio design really enhances the tone the visuals set. Additionally, the environmental and character designs are impeccable. The contrast between the futuristic guardians and the wilder enemies and locations is fantastic. The guardians have such a distinct style which feels so fresh while the more traditional elements which have been modernised fit so perfectly. What’s so impressive is that the game looks this good on a console not known for its high performance. Load times are quick and other than some slowdown when lots is on in the screen at once, such as in the Lost Woods, it’s a smooth experience with a solid framerate.
Story is one of this game’s shortcomings. It’s pretty basic and while there are some standout moments and the recoverable memories are a nice touch to fill in the blanks of Link and Zelda’s relationship, I wasn’t really that engaged with what was going. The characters themselves are a bit of a mixed bag, with some being quite charming and interesting, while others are a bit more generic and forgettable. However, the animations and subsequent personality these animations convey is fantastic. All the characters can convey so many emotion and charisma. It really helps with the immersion even if the story falters.
The game has three main gameplay pillars. The first is the previously discussed exploration. Elements such as having fast travel points near all major landmarks, a glider which enables you to quickly get down from high points and horses ensure that traversal is not painfully slow, and that you can quickly get to the desired destination. I just wish my horse had a few more brain cells and wouldn’t constantly run into things and that it’d approach me no matter where I am on the map. Climbing is also a big part of traversal, and the stamina system is a good way to make you consider how to get to the world’s high points with balancing stamina and speed being a constant see-saw. However, I did find not being able to climb effectively in the rain an unnecessary touch, just making it frustrating if you can’t reach the desired destination because of the weather.
The physics which make traversal so good, are also what make the second gameplay pillar of the puzzles in this game so good. The way you can combine abilities with your environment and traversal is so much fun. The abilities you have are each very unique and have been honed to perfection so that you always feel in control and know that you have the tools to solve any puzzle. The puzzles themselves find that great balance between challenge and frustration. And between the shrines, Korok seeds and divine beasts there is great variety to the type of puzzles you face. The only puzzles that sometimes felt unfair were locating some of the hidden shrines with the cryptic clues given to you. A few of these were frustrating to find without looking for help online.
The final gameplay pillar is combat, and god damn the combat is good. There are such a range of weapons to use, each feeling unique and satisfying to wield and the weapon degradation system encourages experimentation with your arsenal. Depending on the situation, you can tailor your weapons and armour to your benefit and take advantage of abilities dependent on your surroundings. What’s more, cooking the resources you find enables you to prepare for fights by rustling up potions and meals that can give you that extra edge. The combat itself is easy to grasp but takes skill to master. Countering enemies feels so rewarding and nailing those critical hit bowshots is similarly satisfying. Enemies have distinct attack patterns and weaknesses to identify, with great AI design meaning you can rarely cheese your way through encounters. What’s more, as you kill more and more enemies, they level up to ensure that encounters, even in previously explored areas, never get easy, and the blood moon respawning all previously defeated enemies ensures there are always combat encounters to be had. The enemies themselves are very well designed, but I just wish there were more types of enemies. After getting only a quarter of the way through my playthrough, I’d seen pretty much every enemy there was in the game, so fighting these enemies over and over again gradually got less interesting.
With that all out of the way, what is there to actually do in the game? Well, the main quests involve taking on the four divine beasts to weaken Ganon’s control and then going to Hyrule Castle to try and rid the world of him. The divine beast quests are excellent. After performing tasks to get to know the characters of the tribe you are working with to go toe to toe with a particular beast, taking on the beast themselves is quite a spectacle. How dungeons are literally incorporated into the design of the beasts is very clever, I just wish there were more of these larger dungeons we’ve become used to in the franchise in the game. Making your way through Hyrule Castle to Ganon is another highlight, but I’ll skim over that to avoid spoilers.
Outside of the main quests there are a tonne of side quests, and these were a bit of a mixed bag for me. There are too many basic fetch quests and simple go here and kill this quests. I wish there were more interesting quest lines, with greater character development and more engaging activities to do. For example, my favourite side quest in the game involved you going to an island, losing everything your character has, and having to survive and complete the quest objectives to regain your belongings and get the reward. Quests this good were too few and far between.
Shrines are another big part of the game. They are essentially mini dungeons with puzzles or enemies to complete to get rewards you can use to upgrade your stamina and health. The puzzle shrines, which make up the majority of shrines, are fantastic, with so much variety between them. However, the combat shrines, though fun the first few times, quickly get repetitive as you are just fighting a slight variant of the same enemy over and over again. I could’ve down with less of these or them being redesigned to be more distinct from one another.
The world is littered with Korok seeds, which are mini puzzles which contribute to being able to increase your inventory size as you complete more and more of them. These are a great idea and it never stopped being rewarding when you spotted something that looked odd in the environment, only to find out it’s a Korok puzzle. However, having 900 Korok seeds is just excessive, and I wish inventory slots opened up quicker as I threw away far too many weapons over the course of my playthrough. Moreover, it can be quite difficult to find what you want in your inventory, with there being no filter or quick search function. However, other than this and the lack of accessibility options, the menu and UI design is superb, giving you all of the information that you need in a clear and concise manor. The Hyrule compendium is also a great touch, where you can take pictures of anything you see and log it, giving you more information about the subject in question and even an ability to track certain items if you want to collect more of them.
Breath of the Wild is simply outstanding. It innovates in so many areas and is incredibly polished. It’s set a new high bar in aspects such as open world design, physics-based systems and non-linear quest design. It has its shortcoming, but these are dwarfed by its triumphs. I had so much fun getting lost in this truly special experience and can’t wait to see what the sequel has in store for us.
2017 Ranked
Ranked Open World Recommendations
However, there would be no impetus to explore the world if it wasn’t as impeccably designed as it is. There are plenty of high points around the map to get a view of your surroundings and identify anything that looks interesting. Almost always when you go to these points of interest there is something useful you will find, promoting curiosity by rewarding you. This exploration loop is incredibly fun and addicting. The world itself is so diverse with every area being distinct from the rest. There are great variations in environmental design between areas and within each area there are plenty of natural and manmade landmarks to soak in. The attention to detail is astounding, making you want to explore every inch of the map, with the simple yet clever marking system ensuring you never get lost. My only minor gripe is that there are some bare spaces in the map which could’ve been removed to improve the pacing of exploration in certain areas.
There is no denying that BOTW is simply gorgeous. The art direction, colour palette and lighting combine perfectly to create some stunning spectacles. The sunrises and sunsets are simply breath-taking, while when necessary the aesthetics can create an eerie vibe as the world is consumed by the blood moon. What's more, the audio design really enhances the tone the visuals set. Additionally, the environmental and character designs are impeccable. The contrast between the futuristic guardians and the wilder enemies and locations is fantastic. The guardians have such a distinct style which feels so fresh while the more traditional elements which have been modernised fit so perfectly. What’s so impressive is that the game looks this good on a console not known for its high performance. Load times are quick and other than some slowdown when lots is on in the screen at once, such as in the Lost Woods, it’s a smooth experience with a solid framerate.
Story is one of this game’s shortcomings. It’s pretty basic and while there are some standout moments and the recoverable memories are a nice touch to fill in the blanks of Link and Zelda’s relationship, I wasn’t really that engaged with what was going. The characters themselves are a bit of a mixed bag, with some being quite charming and interesting, while others are a bit more generic and forgettable. However, the animations and subsequent personality these animations convey is fantastic. All the characters can convey so many emotion and charisma. It really helps with the immersion even if the story falters.
The game has three main gameplay pillars. The first is the previously discussed exploration. Elements such as having fast travel points near all major landmarks, a glider which enables you to quickly get down from high points and horses ensure that traversal is not painfully slow, and that you can quickly get to the desired destination. I just wish my horse had a few more brain cells and wouldn’t constantly run into things and that it’d approach me no matter where I am on the map. Climbing is also a big part of traversal, and the stamina system is a good way to make you consider how to get to the world’s high points with balancing stamina and speed being a constant see-saw. However, I did find not being able to climb effectively in the rain an unnecessary touch, just making it frustrating if you can’t reach the desired destination because of the weather.
The physics which make traversal so good, are also what make the second gameplay pillar of the puzzles in this game so good. The way you can combine abilities with your environment and traversal is so much fun. The abilities you have are each very unique and have been honed to perfection so that you always feel in control and know that you have the tools to solve any puzzle. The puzzles themselves find that great balance between challenge and frustration. And between the shrines, Korok seeds and divine beasts there is great variety to the type of puzzles you face. The only puzzles that sometimes felt unfair were locating some of the hidden shrines with the cryptic clues given to you. A few of these were frustrating to find without looking for help online.
The final gameplay pillar is combat, and god damn the combat is good. There are such a range of weapons to use, each feeling unique and satisfying to wield and the weapon degradation system encourages experimentation with your arsenal. Depending on the situation, you can tailor your weapons and armour to your benefit and take advantage of abilities dependent on your surroundings. What’s more, cooking the resources you find enables you to prepare for fights by rustling up potions and meals that can give you that extra edge. The combat itself is easy to grasp but takes skill to master. Countering enemies feels so rewarding and nailing those critical hit bowshots is similarly satisfying. Enemies have distinct attack patterns and weaknesses to identify, with great AI design meaning you can rarely cheese your way through encounters. What’s more, as you kill more and more enemies, they level up to ensure that encounters, even in previously explored areas, never get easy, and the blood moon respawning all previously defeated enemies ensures there are always combat encounters to be had. The enemies themselves are very well designed, but I just wish there were more types of enemies. After getting only a quarter of the way through my playthrough, I’d seen pretty much every enemy there was in the game, so fighting these enemies over and over again gradually got less interesting.
With that all out of the way, what is there to actually do in the game? Well, the main quests involve taking on the four divine beasts to weaken Ganon’s control and then going to Hyrule Castle to try and rid the world of him. The divine beast quests are excellent. After performing tasks to get to know the characters of the tribe you are working with to go toe to toe with a particular beast, taking on the beast themselves is quite a spectacle. How dungeons are literally incorporated into the design of the beasts is very clever, I just wish there were more of these larger dungeons we’ve become used to in the franchise in the game. Making your way through Hyrule Castle to Ganon is another highlight, but I’ll skim over that to avoid spoilers.
Outside of the main quests there are a tonne of side quests, and these were a bit of a mixed bag for me. There are too many basic fetch quests and simple go here and kill this quests. I wish there were more interesting quest lines, with greater character development and more engaging activities to do. For example, my favourite side quest in the game involved you going to an island, losing everything your character has, and having to survive and complete the quest objectives to regain your belongings and get the reward. Quests this good were too few and far between.
Shrines are another big part of the game. They are essentially mini dungeons with puzzles or enemies to complete to get rewards you can use to upgrade your stamina and health. The puzzle shrines, which make up the majority of shrines, are fantastic, with so much variety between them. However, the combat shrines, though fun the first few times, quickly get repetitive as you are just fighting a slight variant of the same enemy over and over again. I could’ve down with less of these or them being redesigned to be more distinct from one another.
The world is littered with Korok seeds, which are mini puzzles which contribute to being able to increase your inventory size as you complete more and more of them. These are a great idea and it never stopped being rewarding when you spotted something that looked odd in the environment, only to find out it’s a Korok puzzle. However, having 900 Korok seeds is just excessive, and I wish inventory slots opened up quicker as I threw away far too many weapons over the course of my playthrough. Moreover, it can be quite difficult to find what you want in your inventory, with there being no filter or quick search function. However, other than this and the lack of accessibility options, the menu and UI design is superb, giving you all of the information that you need in a clear and concise manor. The Hyrule compendium is also a great touch, where you can take pictures of anything you see and log it, giving you more information about the subject in question and even an ability to track certain items if you want to collect more of them.
Breath of the Wild is simply outstanding. It innovates in so many areas and is incredibly polished. It’s set a new high bar in aspects such as open world design, physics-based systems and non-linear quest design. It has its shortcoming, but these are dwarfed by its triumphs. I had so much fun getting lost in this truly special experience and can’t wait to see what the sequel has in store for us.
2017 Ranked
Ranked Open World Recommendations