So, Metroidvania is one of my favorite (if not the favorite) genres, and I had to play this to feel the roots (although I played a bit of it when a kid, wasn't enough to say that I have played the game). Playing this game you can clearly see where all Metroidvanias drink from, the map sections and mechanics to access them are very well built, the monster's design divided per area are really awesome, and the inverted castle thing blew my mind, that is actually incredible for a game to have. But the best point in this game for me (and what makes it different from every other Metroidvania I played) is the character progression, which has a lot of different strands: Character Level, HP and Heart increase, Tons of Equips, relics, spells (the way they work is weird but really cool, like a fighting game ability you have to discover) and consumable items. That characteristic is what I loved in this game, the mix of Metroidvania with RPG. Another aspect that is incredible is the Art and Soundtrack of the game (except for the credits song, what the hell was that song lol), both build really well the environment feeling of a gothic magical castle. The plot of the game is kinda bad written but the characters are cool enough to carry the game story-wise. But, the most important thing is that I had tons of fun. Great game!

Iwata’s dead, Shiggy’s checked out, and there’s no one to tell Aonuma no.

What the fuck is this.

I really shouldn’t be surprised, but I still am. This is the same game. It's the same people who made Breath of the Wild. I loved the first game, but still didn’t pay attention to the hype cycle of this one at all. I guess all the paraphernaleous cultural impact still seeped in somehow.

Remember when people thought there’d be playable Zelda? Fucking lol.

This review is only based on the five (5!) hours it took to get the paraglider, and I gotta say, it only kept making me appreciate the Great Plateau in Breath of the Wild more. The thematic cohesion. The mystery. The framing of how that whole game was going to work in miniature. What my abilities would be, what my relationship to game information would be like, what kinds of emotions I could expect to experience playing that game.

Maybe Tears of the Kingdom is a fine game. Maybe it is every bit as fun to exist in as Breath of the Wild, in theory. But in practice, it won’t be, can’t be. It didn’t start in the wilderness, letting me discover its game essence on my own terms. It started with a prestige-game walking-sim lore dump. A lore dump that ended with a bunch of Hot Anime Nonsense™.

Zelda and Link confronting mummy Ganon was like walking into the mid-season finale of a show that’s already on its second or third season. Except I’ve already played the previous season, and that context did not help me at all! Ganon’s no longer a miasma, but a dude with a voice? And there’s a goat dragon that’s Zelda’s great-great-grand-furry? And the Master Sword’s just useless?

Here’s my beef. All of this is great for trailers and generating “hype” because “hype” is fueled on speculation and curiosity. But the elements that generate hype are not the same as the elements that fuel a sincere emotional connection with a character, story, or world. I’m frustrated because Breath of the Wild knew this so well.

The old man on the Great Plateau was mysterious, but allowed to be goofy. He was generous, but mischievous. You could see him in different contexts, learn about him by exploring his house when he wasn’t around. There was a fun little emotional connection built up by being around him. The twist of his true identity, and the further twist of his ultimate fate, made me feel little pings of emotion. Nothing fancy, but he was the tutorial NPC. He primed me to think, “Oh, this is a game and a game world where it’ll be fun to get invested in people.” And he was the perfect segway into telling me what my mission was, what the stakes were, and why I, the player, should care.

The goat dragon great-great-grand-furry is none of this. We know he’s dead when we first meet him. His dialog makes no sense. There are a ton of slave robots on his little island that he comments with surprise are still running. Did he not program them? Can he not de-program them? Am I supposed to feel something about how he made a race of robot slaves? Are they sentient? I would have rather had signs in the ground Super Mario Style telling me all the tutorial things I needed to know. Because it feels weird for a robot to jovially say “Hey, there are some robots that’ll try to kill you, so, like, don’t feel bad about killing them. Here are some combat tips for killing them!”

And then his sequence at the end of his tutorial level practically screamed to me, “Hey, remember when you felt something at the end of your time with the Old Man in Breath of the Wild? We’re doing the same thing here! Don’t you feel something? Don’t you remember loving that?” And like yeah, I do remember that. And now I’m mad you’re trying to copy your own damn homework without understanding why it worked the first time. I have not built up a relationship with great-great-grand-furry goat dragon. I do not know why he is chill with Zelda. Honestly, all the statues with him and Zelda holding hands at the end of every shrine is weirding me out! Is Link a cuck now?

I want to say this is all superficial, but it’s really not, because everything about my time with Tears of the Kingdom so far felt like it was being led around by the tail. This is a re-skin of Breath of the Wild, but it doesn’t even have the decency to be honest with me. If we’re gonna have shrines, and they’re gonna function exactly the same way, why did you go through the bother of giving them new, thematically incoherent designs. Why do the upgrade orbs need new names, new lore. Changing the shrines’ glowy color from blue/orange to green is a downgrade, actually! Those other colors were a lot easier to see at a distance in a game world that has lots of green!

Jumping ahead of myself for a moment, I knew I was done when I unlocked the first new Shiekah Tower. (You can’t even call them Sheikah Towers anymore, these days!) The emergence of the Sheikah Towers in Breath of the Wild was iconic, cinematic, promising adventure in a changing world. The equivalent cutscene in Tears of the Kingdom felt like getting a homework assignment. Hey, someone you know has already explored the world, had time to build fantastic structures in every corner, and just needs a cable guy to come by and make sure the wiring is up to code! You know, that person who was a 100-year old loli in the last game! Well, now she’s been aged up to guilt-free fuckable waifu status! And she’s super plot relevant! You’ll get to talk to her more than Zelda over the course of the game, probably!

Seriously, that loli was my least favorite part of Breath of the Wild, and Tears of the Kingdom felt it important to put her loli portrait on her encyclopedia page?? When she will never look like that in this game??? She has the gall to rename Zelda’s magic iPad after herself! I was thinking about her (and taking internal bets as to whether she’d be a waifu or had somehow de-aged even more) hours before I saw her.

ANYWAY. None of what I said so far really matters more than the gameplay. And a Great Plateau 2 this was not.

I was so disappointed with how linear this was. In theory, I understand the concept that led to it existing the way it does. Tears of the Kingdom is a Lego game. It purposefully had sections of little Lego kits structured in a way where pieces from one would not mix with pieces of another and confuse people who have never touched Legos before. But giving kids Lego kits can change the way they interact with Legos. Hell, I remember I thought it was sacrilege when my sisters disassembled my Bionicle to make their own Voltron-esque monstrosities. But to them, who had not, could not, would not read the instructions, their style of play was more intuitive, more pure than mine.

Fundamentally, Tears of the Kingdom was not encouraging me to think for myself, to become resourceful, to seek my own path through things. It was priming me to expect that for any task that needed to be accomplished, the tools and materials would be provided for me. And without the spark of original creativity, putting the Lego pieces together was the dull monotony of fulfilling someone else’s factory work blueprint.

When I saw the jumble of lumber next to a korok in an adorable backpack, I immediately mentally put together what needed to be done, and thought, “What kind of Nintendo Labo bullshit is this?” The tediousness of rotating wood, sticking it to a hook, waiting for the korok to go down the slide - this was minutes of gameplay execution from the seconds of intuition I had of what the game wanted from me. And the reward was a measly two gold turds. I felt like I deserved five.

I feel like Aonuma has gone off the deep end. He’s spent so long in this game engine that he’s forgotten what made the original Breath of the Wild experience so special. He’s made a game for speedrunners without designing a game for the common folk first. In Breath of the Wild, the myriad systems, the freedom of choice, the hidden depth of the game’s chemistry and physics mechanics - all of those were introduced slowly in juxtaposition to a Link who had nothing but a shirt and a stick to his name. Everything felt special because the game beat you down and dead early on to make you appreciate and critically examine anything that could provide the slightest advantage to survival.

In Tears of the Kingdom, you gain the ability to Ascend through ceilings, (without stamina cost!!!), before you get the option to increase your stamina. Before you have even found anywhere worth climbing, any heights out of reach. There is nothing to instill that feeling of “I can’t climb there now, but some day, I will!” This is so wild to me. That emotion will never blossom when you’re given a cheat code at Level 1. It will cause people to look for places they can exploit their cheat code instead of… engaging with what was the entire foundation of the freedom of exploration in the first game!

Cannot overstate how much I felt something thematically crack inside of me when Tears of the Kingdom did not even suggest the possibility that I could upgrade my stamina wheel with my first blessing, locking me into more health. For a cutscene.

For a god-awful cutscene where Zelda fucks off before we chase down some NPCs to chase down some other NPCs to watch her fuck off again.

Does this all sound nit-picky? Do I sound insane? I sound petty to myself! But I have to be honest, this game failed to ignite my curiosity! And I gave Breath of the Wild 5 stars! It really does make me wonder how much of a game experience is built on the expectations built by its opening hours. In a way, if the only difference between Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom is the introduction and framing, that would be a valuable lesson on how important those beginning elements are.

I know that’s not the only difference. Tears of the Kingdom is anime as fuck. It’s tacky as hell. I lost it when Zelda’s magic iPad made the real-world iPad camera shutter sound.

Tears of the Kingdom is not a new game. It’s a jerry-rigged retrofitting of an existing game by an old man who saw Fortnite once since 2017, approved by a company who has no idea what he’s doing or why the old game sold so many millions of copies. Of course they’d be up for a direct sequel asset reuse that sounded vaguely like Minecraft! I’m just disappointed that the same team who showed they were capable of creating such a fully realized thematic throughline of a game were content to corrupt something beautiful just for the sake of convenience.

Maybe Link’s awful haircut and corrupted hand are a perfect visual metaphor for this game’s soul. A bunch of concepts grafted onto something great with no regard for how inelegantly they clash, while also showing a lack of maintenance to keep what came before presentable.

I’m so glad I didn’t pay $70 ($70!) for this game, or else I would have felt obligated to stick around long enough to understand the gacha mechanics enough to get mad at them.

——

June 28th 2023 Edit: wish different reviews could have different play statuses. Oh well. “Completed” the game with more words,, but in my heart this review should stay Abandoned.

There are some games that completly changed the landscape of the gaming industry and upend what people think a video game should be. Super Mario 64 did it for Mario revolutionizing 3D gaming, Ocarina of Time did it for Zelda showing us what a 3D Zelda game would look like, and Castlevania: Symphony of the Night did it for Castlevania, a game that sparked a genre that we know today as Metroidvania. Otherwise known as Igavania, the term generally refers to a non-linear 2D platformer with RPG elements as a second side of the Metroidvania spectrum.

For the game itself, it's a sequel to Rondo of Blood, starting us off at the top of Dracula's Castle with Richter Belmont, following up with one of the most meme-worthy dialogues of all time. A few years passed after another victory for the Belmont clan, taking down Dracula once again, but Richter has strangely vanished without a trace. Alucard has awakened from his long slumber and decides to investigate the castle once more. First off, Alucard has been given a major redesign by artist Ayami Kojima, sporting a black colored jacket, a long overcoat with a decorative pattern, a cape, and his signature Alucard Sword in hand while also having some long white hair. This design is iconic when describing Alucard, as it carries over to numerous games and the animated Netflix show with little to no changes, while the design in Castlevania III looks like he was trying to impress his father on picture day. Bringing back this character is a stroke of genius; not only has he been given an overhaul in design, but was granted maximum potential by how he looks, feels, and control. No longer we're restricted to a whip, as Alucard can carry numerous weapons (including some broken ones) and items at his disposal. I also love spamming the triangle button to back dash, it's really fun to do. I'm gonna get this out of the way by saying the visuals and 2D sprites look absolutely gorgeous even to this day.

This game is four times massive in length as most of your focus is exploring Dracula's Castle to your heart's content, killing enemies, getting EXP and HP, and retrieving his stolen weapons by Death himself. Not only that, but he can also collect magic cards and spells along the way; whether it's activating the correct command input to unleash fireballs out of his cape or transforming into a bat, there is so much to find in this mammoth of a castle. There are certain roadblocks here and there that you have to access with certain transformations and items, but you can freely explore the castle at your own pace.

Unsurprisingly, the music is phenomenal. Michiru Yamane returns as a composer to Symphony of the Night, and goddamn she did not disappoint in the slightest. The soundtrack consists of symphonic metal with jamming tunes while also consisting of beautiful, eerie, atmospheric tunes, something that I love in Super Castlevania IV. Dracula Castle is a perfect theme for storming inside the castle, getting you all hype for what's in store as you progress. Departed Way gives off that uneasy and atmospheric vibe that fits in a setting such as an underground mine. Dance of Gold, Wood Carving Partita, and Dance of Pearls are euphonious with their perfect use of classical orchestrated instruments that sets the mood of each room every time you enter. Rainbow Cemetery makes the underground of Dracula's castle feel a bit chilling, but at the same time so groovy, like goddamn, they didn't have to go that hard. I can go on, but you get my point about why this soundtrack is fantastic, and this is a top 3 for me when it comes to Castlevania soundtracks.

For being the first of its kind in the series, it does have a few flaws that I want to point out. There are multiple endings in this game, and in order to proceed with obtaining the good ending, you have to find the appropriate upgrades to restore Richter to normal after being possessed by Shaft, the same guy who resurrects Dracula from Rondo of Blood. This can be kind of baffling for first-timers, including me, but it's not a huge issue. The difficulty curve is like a valley. It starts off a bit challenging if you're not careful, but once you progress further into the game, it starts to feel easy after leveling up Alucard and obtaining more powerful weapons. Then the curve starts to rise again around the same level as in the beginning once you reach the Inverted Castle. The Inverted Castle will appear if you save Richter from Shaft, and experience the whole castle upside down. This may seem daunting and some may say it just stretches out the game, and while that may be true, I didn't mind exploring more since I grew accustomed to the gameplay. Then it will start to decrease again if you obtain the most broken weapon in the game, the Crissaegrim. Once equipped, you can plow down through almost everything that stands in your way, including bosses. I don't want to say much more because I want to keep the spoilers as minor as possible.

Castlevania: Symphony of the Night is a video game that everyone should try at least once. This is an important game to me as this is the first Metroidvania game I truly got to fully experience from start to finish, and once I grew accustomed to the gameplay, I was hooked, as I wanted to explore every inch of the castle and obtain the best ending possible. With its innovative game design, beautiful presentation, and a kick-ass soundtrack, this is a top 3 Castlevania game for me that I'm glad I got to experience. It truly deserves a spot in gaming history, and I can't wait to play more Castlevania games similar to Symphony of the Night, as well as try out more Metroidvania games in the near future.