This review contains spoilers
I think everyone had really high expectations for this one, but in my opinion, this game is not nearly as good as the first game is.
I believe it all comes down to repetition and the execution. This is by all accounts Breath of the Wild but bigger, longer and uncut.
I wasn't doubting that I would be playing in the same map again, but somehow I was expecting to do something at least slightly different than unlocking every single shrine in Hyrule yet again. AND THEN SOME, because you also have to do that in the depths and the sky islands, so there is double the busy work.
Speaking of, I believe that both the depths and the sky islands were kind of disappointing, for different reasons. The sky islands were the selling point of the game and yet, there are barely any of them in the sky and they barely have any relevance in the game outside of the few that are required to progress the story.
Most of the islands in the sky will be tiny pieces of land, where really nothing interesting is going on and there isn't much to do in them, other than to find one or two chests and do a single puzzle to unlock a shrine.
There was this one time when I was exploring a set of floating islands completely covered inside an infinite thunderstorm; I think I wasn't even supposed to be up there without clearing the storm first, since I couldn't see shit, but this was one of the only times I actually felt like these islands were giving me an actual challenge. I ended up getting to the end of those islands and found the beginning of a side quest that would lead me to unlock Mineru's construct, all by complete accident.
The depths on the other hand, I feel like suffer from the opposite problem...And also the same problem. The depths are absolutely MASSIVE and I'm so glad they kept it as a secret instead of revealing them in the trailers....However, once you jump down one chasm, it feels like you have jumped down every single one.
Yes, the depths are big and dark and scary, but once the novelty wears off, you notice that there really isn't much to do down there other than....Find light roots. I just feel like this was such a wasted opportunity; there isn't anything all that scary down there and at most, I only remember seeing one type of new enemy down there...The rest were just gloomy re-skins of the same enemies you encounter on Hyrule...
Maybe they should've kept the weird monster hands exclusive to the depths, or the Ganon clone...And just MAKE NEW THREATS! The depths as they are just feel like Hyrule 2.0 but with the lights off and far less things to interact outside of a few Yiga Clan hideouts and some ancient mines. For the most part you are just going to be walking...or flying on your flying bike...or riding a Zonai car...all just to get to the next light root.
I still like these inclusions, don't get me wrong; this game sure has more content than BotW...But is it really all that worth it...? When it is this barebones, all it does for me is just make this game way longer than it needs to be and doesn't make me want to replay it the same way I replayed BotW.
I also don't know what the fuck people is on about, saying that the temples here are better than in BotW. I skipped almost the entire fire temple just by abusing my flying bike (Except for the boss, obviously), and the water temple is a complete fucking joke.
I simply preferred the divine beasts and how each one did require you to use their respective gimmicks to get past certain sections of the temple or solve certain puzzles in order to get to the terminals. Here, except for maybe the air temple, all of these feel half cooked...And the fire temple relies heavily on you not upgrading your Zonai battery beforehand so you can just cheese through the entire thing the way I did.
The story also sucks but you already know about that...Uhh...I will say tho, just to say something positive about this game that I love lol. The Zonai abilities are pretty cool (Even if they got rid of bomb jumps), the construction aspect really changes the whole game, the shrines are better than in BotW and the way you get to Ganon is absolutely perfect...And that final fight?
I'm sorry, but the final fight against Ganon is the coolest shit this franchise has ever done. When you are in the middle of fighting him and then he shows his second form...And the health bar EXTENDS ALL THE WAY TO THE RIGHT SIDE OF THE SCREEN?! Rawest shit, chills every time.
The dragon part of the fight sucks tho. Just to balance it out with some negativity lol, I know I haven't been negative enough in this review.
Overall, I still loved this game and unlocked the entire map in Hyrule, the sky islands and the depths. I just feel like this game could've been more and they got really close...The ideas were there, they just didn't quite get there.
I still recommend it if you haven't played it, and you probably will enjoy it more if you didn't already play Breath of the Wild.
If nothing else...At least play it for Purah, my god is she hot.
I believe it all comes down to repetition and the execution. This is by all accounts Breath of the Wild but bigger, longer and uncut.
I wasn't doubting that I would be playing in the same map again, but somehow I was expecting to do something at least slightly different than unlocking every single shrine in Hyrule yet again. AND THEN SOME, because you also have to do that in the depths and the sky islands, so there is double the busy work.
Speaking of, I believe that both the depths and the sky islands were kind of disappointing, for different reasons. The sky islands were the selling point of the game and yet, there are barely any of them in the sky and they barely have any relevance in the game outside of the few that are required to progress the story.
Most of the islands in the sky will be tiny pieces of land, where really nothing interesting is going on and there isn't much to do in them, other than to find one or two chests and do a single puzzle to unlock a shrine.
There was this one time when I was exploring a set of floating islands completely covered inside an infinite thunderstorm; I think I wasn't even supposed to be up there without clearing the storm first, since I couldn't see shit, but this was one of the only times I actually felt like these islands were giving me an actual challenge. I ended up getting to the end of those islands and found the beginning of a side quest that would lead me to unlock Mineru's construct, all by complete accident.
The depths on the other hand, I feel like suffer from the opposite problem...And also the same problem. The depths are absolutely MASSIVE and I'm so glad they kept it as a secret instead of revealing them in the trailers....However, once you jump down one chasm, it feels like you have jumped down every single one.
Yes, the depths are big and dark and scary, but once the novelty wears off, you notice that there really isn't much to do down there other than....Find light roots. I just feel like this was such a wasted opportunity; there isn't anything all that scary down there and at most, I only remember seeing one type of new enemy down there...The rest were just gloomy re-skins of the same enemies you encounter on Hyrule...
Maybe they should've kept the weird monster hands exclusive to the depths, or the Ganon clone...And just MAKE NEW THREATS! The depths as they are just feel like Hyrule 2.0 but with the lights off and far less things to interact outside of a few Yiga Clan hideouts and some ancient mines. For the most part you are just going to be walking...or flying on your flying bike...or riding a Zonai car...all just to get to the next light root.
I still like these inclusions, don't get me wrong; this game sure has more content than BotW...But is it really all that worth it...? When it is this barebones, all it does for me is just make this game way longer than it needs to be and doesn't make me want to replay it the same way I replayed BotW.
I also don't know what the fuck people is on about, saying that the temples here are better than in BotW. I skipped almost the entire fire temple just by abusing my flying bike (Except for the boss, obviously), and the water temple is a complete fucking joke.
I simply preferred the divine beasts and how each one did require you to use their respective gimmicks to get past certain sections of the temple or solve certain puzzles in order to get to the terminals. Here, except for maybe the air temple, all of these feel half cooked...And the fire temple relies heavily on you not upgrading your Zonai battery beforehand so you can just cheese through the entire thing the way I did.
The story also sucks but you already know about that...Uhh...I will say tho, just to say something positive about this game that I love lol. The Zonai abilities are pretty cool (Even if they got rid of bomb jumps), the construction aspect really changes the whole game, the shrines are better than in BotW and the way you get to Ganon is absolutely perfect...And that final fight?
I'm sorry, but the final fight against Ganon is the coolest shit this franchise has ever done. When you are in the middle of fighting him and then he shows his second form...And the health bar EXTENDS ALL THE WAY TO THE RIGHT SIDE OF THE SCREEN?! Rawest shit, chills every time.
The dragon part of the fight sucks tho. Just to balance it out with some negativity lol, I know I haven't been negative enough in this review.
Overall, I still loved this game and unlocked the entire map in Hyrule, the sky islands and the depths. I just feel like this game could've been more and they got really close...The ideas were there, they just didn't quite get there.
I still recommend it if you haven't played it, and you probably will enjoy it more if you didn't already play Breath of the Wild.
If nothing else...At least play it for Purah, my god is she hot.