It was almost impossible to hit the expectations of the sequel to Breath of the Wild, but this game did it. Tears of the Kingdom hit so many highs as BotW did, and delivered on pretty much everything I hoped for. Exploring the depths, creating weapon combinations, and rediscovering Hyrule, this game is pretty much the best I've ever played - while still having some shortcomings, in my opinion. Most of my gripes boiled down to wishing it did more as a direct sequel and referenced more of the events of BotW and AoC, but the team decided to focus more on telling a wholly different story. Which after accepting that, fine. (But still, I miss Kass so much). Still ended up 100%'ing it, looking up the last 150 or so Koroks as well as some of the last few map locations I missed. Still a masterpiece.

Starting at the introduction, the opening scene with Zelda was fun, and definitely made me wish we had more time to interact with Zelda. (And of course, it was great re-treading this area at the very end). The Great Sky Island was and felt much more linear than the Great Plateau, though I feel like it's a bit overblown - there are extra passages and areas to explore and get some hidden Koroks and treasures, and there's the completely optional Flux Construct to fight, which was extremely fun for me.

The new mechanics and moveset took some getting used to, but by the end of the Great Sky Island it felt very natural to use them all, though Ultrahand still took a bit to learn how to rotate the way you want. The menu-ing for fuse was also a bit cumbersome, though I also got used to that. I do miss Stasis and the bombs, but there's no doubt these abilities are refined siblings of BotW's.

One qualm is that TotK did introduce more meta game menu-pausing with Fuse. Though I don't mind the mechanics of it, I was already pausing to eat a full-course hearty meal every time I got walloped in BotW, and that did take me out of the action. I don't know how TotK would solve this "issue", since it is just a base mechanic of the game, but adding Fuse to menu through and find the right thing to fuse, especially if it's one of the first times I'm fusing it, continued to take me out of the action. Eventually, as most people did, I ended up just having a staple rotation of the few things I constantly fused to, like the Brightbloom seeds, fire fruits, bomb flowers, and muddle buds, as well as the elemental fruits/jellies and some horns for weapons. Though the game has an endless breadth of creative options, the paths I defaulted to hit no resistance or challenge, besides specific cases like the disadvantages of using Gloom weapons in the Depths.

Anyways, another good evolution was of the shrines. Gone were the monotonous Test of Strengths, replaced by interesting combat training shrines. Some of the overworld shrine quests did get a little monotonous, but for the most part, finding these shrines were pretty rewarding. And after I realized they all lay over Lightroots, figuring out shrines via Lightroot locations, and vice versa, was both fun and thematically cohesive! Besides one infuriating instance where I had to really delve into some long tunnels just to figure out the shrine was several meters underneath me.

About the world itself, I really liked how there were more people on paths that you could help, and much more interesting side quests (besides Tarrey Town). Though the world was the same, the lonely melancholic vibe was largely replaced by new settlements, the more mechanical looking Skyview towers, atmospheric wells and caves, and terrifying Gloom hands.

The sky islands were beautiful, and I did spend minutes just watching the clouds go by and looking at the landscapes, though I still wish there were more of them. Also wish there were more quests to do up there besides the shrines and the stone slabs. Some more of the unique things like the forge island chain and the three ring gliding challenges would've been nice. Getting the sage's wills from exploration felt sometimes rewarding, after beating a King Gleeok, but other times lame, in an obscure chest on an island chain. Coolest thing by far were the three Zonai labyrinths though, basically creating a cohesive set of three mini-dungeons with an overworld section, a low-grav sky section, and a final depths section with a Flux Construct fight.

On the depths: I managed to make my way down the depths via the first chasm I ran into, even before going to Lookout Landing and getting the paraglider - my Hero's Path will show the ten or so deaths I took while spawning a wing, rewinding to jump on top of it, and trying to sail down Hyrule Field Chasm.
(Yes, that's a log fused to a stick as my weapon.)
The shock and fear of all the gloom and monsters chasing me was quelled from the relief after hitting my first Lightroot. Then I promptly teleported back out - back to the Great Skyland, since I hadn't even done any shrine on the surface yet.

In general, the Depths were a great addition and basically was "hard mode", though besides fighting the bosses, there wasn't much incentive to explore. When finishing up my map percentage post-game, I had like 8 groves and forests to list out that I just didn't traipse through, even though I had lit up all of the darkness. Still though, throughout early and mid game, the depths were a fun break from the rest of the game, and I didn't ever really tire of collecting Zonaite and crystallized charges. I made it a point to complete chunks of the Depths in between the dungeons, and seeing boss platforms in certain spot before having even beaten those dungeon bosses gave me a exhilarating sense of anticipation.

Seeing my horses from my BotW save was sick. Loved that. Although after getting the golden horse, I basically stuck to that the rest of the game, making many vegan meals for Malanya to upgrade to perfection.

My path through the game (or my own Hero's Path)

After grabbing the glider, my path took me first through Gerudo while trying to reach a sky island, and I landed in the oasis town. After meeting up with Riju, though, I decided to go back to Central Hyrule to do more exploring. Ended up somehow following the path up to Goron City, curious about what the heck was up with the Gorons. And after breaking through with Yunobo, I progressed through the rest of that entire region.

I poetically beat the Moragia fight while on a plane ride myself (very cinematic rising out of the volcano, but anticlimactic only taking three hits - oh well). Though I was lightly spoiled on learning dungeons were back, I still enjoyed them all - though it got a bit tiresome learning they all followed the same formula of go to five points, use the sage's ability, music progresses, continue.

Made my way down to Lurelin and saved the town, hopped over to Eventide and cleared the coliseum in the depths (that Midna's Helmet kept me safe for a long portion of the mid game).

Though Purah was yelling at me to go to Rito Village, I went to see fish boyfriend and cleared up the sludge at Zora's Domain. Though shooting the King's Scale through the teardrop and bounding up to the dungeon was sick, the dungeon and boss itself were not as fun.

After completing some neat side adventures with the Great Plateau and the Stable Trotters (reuniting theme was nice but still I miss you Kass), finished the Gerudo area and the Lightning Temple, which was quite fun. I'll give a rating of these four dungeons afterwards.

Then I sequence broke hard, blindly wandering through the Thunderhead Isles and making my way to the fifth sage Mineru. Probably the stand-out of the story for me - I found this whole sequence exhilarating, discovering it all unprompted and seeing those Main Quests populate my Purah Pad. I had already run into and discovered all the four depots earlier, and realizing what they were meant for as I rode that platform down from made me fistpump in excitement. The mech boxing was very fun, though kind of sad they repeated that with the last Kohga fight.

On the dragon tears: a common complaint was that since these were so linear, finding them out of order spoiled the story heavily. I think I was fortunate enough to find the majority of them in order, but I also feel like that complaint is a bit overblown - completing one temple basically gave the full story anyways. The two that would suck to get out of order are definitely 9 and 10 though, where Sonia is killed and then the subsequent is immediately after of Ganondorf becoming the Demon King. I lucked out in finding those back to back, running around Lurelin and then traipsing up past the Ice Gleeok in Tabantha. Besides that, I found them to be very neat vignettes and also pretty engaging to find, some locations more challenging than others. And the culmination at the end of Zelda and the Light Dragon - again, the story's pretty obvious, but it still hit with that final tear.

Continuing to willfully ignore Purah, I grabbed my Master Sword from my girlfriend's head and explored every sky island along the way. When I finally made it to Rito Village, I had....30 hearts. Still got blasted a bit by Colgera though, what an amazing boss. I can see why they push you to go there first - that whole experience is an incredible showcase of TotK, and should definitely be the spot to go to.

Overall thoughts on the dungeon storylines: despite being repetitive and formulaic, the sequences themselves were incredibly engaging and cinematic. I still think these dungeons fall closer to the Divine Beasts than traditional 3D dungeons like from a Twilight Princess, but the differing atmospheres and puzzle solving was captivating all the same. Of the four dungeons, I'd give the following rankings:

- The build up / questline up to each dungeon: Zora, Rito, Goron, Gerudo
Getting up to the Great Wellspring via the waterfall was sick, followed closely by the Stormwind Ark journey jumping up the ships. Running up Death Mountain was still pretty fun, but having the Lightning Temple just be on the overworld instead of in the Depths was a missed opportunity, in my opinion. I also didn't do Gerudo justice by finding Riju and then fucking off for 100 hours.

- The dungeon itself: Goron, Rito, Gerudo, Zora
I'll have a soft spot for Lost Gorondia, it being my first, but those mine carts are quite fun. Rito is a solid second, with the different layers of the ships. Gerudo takes third here with a fun pyramid structure, but I felt like the Zora dungeon was a bit too cramped for all its grandiosity.

- The boss: Rito, Goron, Gerudo, Zora
Colgera takes it easy. A completely different fighting style in the air, diving through the beast itself (I only learned afterwards you can bomb arrow it too), ultra cinematic. Marbled Gohma takes solid second, using Yunobo to take out its legs and knock it down from the ceiling. Queen Gibdo is a creepy menace but I just felt like using Riju's ability wasn't the most thrilling. Mucktorok stinks - floppy guy keeps running away.

Now for the story itself. After getting over the disappointment of not having more interconnectivity with BotW, I found this story to be...solid. Predictable but still fun and didn't take away from the main theme of these last two games - exploration. Delving into the history of the Zonai and learning more about them through the slabs and legends was, just like for the Sheikah in the previous game, more rewarding than the story told directly, in my opinion.

And that final boss fight/sequence. Jaw dropping, obviously. Not much more I can add to that discourse. Incredible from start to finish.

(Nintendo I know you said you're not making DLC but pleaaase. Dream DLC that'll never happen: Kass comes back, gives answer for connection between Sheikah and Zonai. All I want.)