When I played and finished Breath of the Wild, I had never understood or related to those who say its world felt empty. I found plenty to do in that game and have hundreds of hours towards it. However, Tears of the Kingdom makes Breath of the Wild feel like a tech demo, in comparison.

There’s so much to love about this game, and so little to criticize. It takes what made Breath of the Wild so special compared to previous open-world games, and amplifies those characteristics. Yet, it doesn’t hold back on tweaking or even replacing what needing fixing. What I’ve found is the best way to explain this game as a sequel is, “Nintendo didn’t see the need to change the formula, so they change how you approach the formula with new items, abilities, an underworld, etc.” On the surface, you can say this game plays exactly the same as Breath of the Wild. First section that teaches you simple mechanics then lets you explore the world after, completing shrines to get more hearts and stamina, 4 sectors with their own dungeons, collecting towers to complete your map. Yet, once you take that first dive off the Great Sky Island, you know this game isn’t anywhere near the same.

The abilities that come with Link’s new arm in Tears of the Kingdom are the staple of what makes gameplay so unique, by comparison. Ultrahand, Ascend, Fuse, and Recall are truly special as they not only provide you with means to solve puzzles in fun ways, they completely change how you explore Hyrule. Building different contraptions or vehicles was surprisingly fun and never took extra resources when required for a quest. The developers always had resources available to you, yet with the Zonai capsule devices, you’re able to take those resources anywhere in the map. Granted it’s through random lotteries, so there is some trial and error involved with acquiring those resources, but still. Ascend takes the exploration of Hyrule from a horizontal perspective, and makes it vertical. During the first few hours after landing on the overworld, I felt stumped on how to proceed while exploring. There weren’t any open paths and I couldn’t see anything that would involve a puzzle. Then I would remember the Ascend ability and either exit whatever cave I was in, or get atop something high and get a new perspective. Once I had engraved this into my gameplay, the world opened up infinitely. The height limit can be frustrating at times but it’s entirely understandable to prevent you from just getting atop every structure imaginable. Fuse was something shown off plenty before the games release, and yet I still used it in ways I hadn’t expected. It makes materials so much more viable for any situation. In BotW, I found myself with tons of leftover materials with zero reason to use them at the end of every playthrough. But with fusing, I’m constantly using materials, both to apply status effects, and simply just gain extra strength with weapons. Recall is probably my favorite of the new abilities. It allows for the physics manipulation of Stasis with a completely new twist. I often found myself using this to understand why my puzzle solutions in shrines didn’t work, especially momentum-based puzzles. Very creative addition on Nintendo’s part.

Next, Hyrule does not even feel the same compared to last game. Yes, there’s still the places we loved to explore, but they’re so much different now. I was worried that the overworld would get stale, even with the addition of sky islands and an underground, but that never happened. Even places I had been to 100 times, gave me a new chance to explore and have fun again. I had so much fun riding a horse around Hyrule and visiting my favorite places from BotW to see how they had changed. On the subject, saves carrying over, even if just the smallest things like horses, is such a nice touch. I was so happy to see my horse from my latest BotW save again.

The Depths are something I am absolutely going to spend more time in. At the time of writing, I rarely had the chance to explore them, as I was always caught up doing shrines above ground or the main story. However, from the bit I did explore, I can tell they took their time creating this underground abyss for Hyrule. Comparable to places like the Dark World or Lorule, it’s sort of a weird feeling to explore this place. There’s danger around every turn, yet you feel like it’s nothing you haven’t seen before. Mobs like Bokoblins and Horriblins populate much of the depths. The twist, however, is that they’ve all been affected by gloom. This new status effect is a nightmare for those unprepared. During my first few hours, I thought of this as annoying and questioned how the devs thought it was a fair addition. Then, I dealt with it after gaining more hearts and stamina and understood why. Gloom is meant to discourage you from exploring places you’re unprepared for, as the depths require you to go for long periods without any type of shelter or home base to return to. I think this is very genius as a way to check you, preventing you from running to high level places, extremely early on.

While I’m on the subject, there seems to be more stamina and vitality checks this game than BotW. Which I love, to be clear. I think it provides a clear sense of progression as you traverse the world and check off main quests. Not only things like heart containers or stamina wheels, but like I said, it forces you to prepare before entering certain areas. I love that in a game, provided I get to learn it by dying and having to rethink my approach, instead of a message box telling me and sending me the opposite direction.


From this point on, this review will have SPOILERS. While I could have tagged this as a spoiler from the start, I wanted those who haven’t finished the game to be able to read a chunk of it without worry. But don’t say you weren’t warned now.

To start, the temples in this game are a huge step up from BotW’s divine beasts. The beasts were disappointing and just unsatisfactory, but Nintendo clearly got the hint. They made actual dungeon areas, which their own distinct feel, while keeping the open-ended format of divine beasts. There’s no centralized puzzle this time, so you’re required to think differently for each one to clear the temple. The sages (Tulin, Yunobo, Sidon, Riju, Mineru) are vastly better than the Champions in BotW, in my opinion. While I still love those characters, the sages are directly tied to the plot, both past and present, and provide you with extremely good character moments as you progress their temple questlines. Tulin was my favorite, along with the whole of the Wind Temple. I didn’t choose it first because the game recommends it, I just loved Rito Village in BotW. So naturally, that’s where I wanted to explore. However, it’s good they recommend it because wow, it is the best dungeon in the game. The music, puzzles, and boss fight were all extremely enjoyable, and Tulin is such a lovable character. While I would love to talk about each temple, I’ll just leave it at that and how much I enjoyed them. Some felt a little weaker than others, but all of them were fun regardless.

BotW’s story (or lack of it) was definitely the most disappointing part of the game for me. Like I said prior, the story had a huge gap between past and present that left the plot feeling disconnected. While the Champions did their part during the present, it’s not satisfying when you only get to hear from them during their dungeons. Now, we get new sages, as well as cutscenes and visuals from the old. Zelda setting up these events for thousands of years, and guiding the past sages to lead their successors, helps the story feel all tied together properly. I loved how important the sages felt to the plot, as if Link wouldn’t be able to progress without their help. He is the hero of Hyrule, but against a foe as strong as Ganon, and the circumstances he was in, there was no way he could have done this alone.

This reincarnation of Zelda is my absolute favorite over the games. She has a real presence in the story and despite being whisked away in the initial cutscene, she does not feel distant in any way. Her journey to become the sage of time, as well as repair the Master Sword, is just excellent writing overall. She feels integral to the defeat of Ganon, and doesn’t come through last minute to provide overpowered magic like the previous game. Her actions are planned out, and she even threw away her life to make sure Ganon would be defeated in the future. Her sacrifice of swallowing the secret stone and turning into an eternal dragon provided two of my favorite cutscenes in recent memory.

Ganon has far more of a role in this story, compared to ANY previous Zelda game. The game is constantly reminding you of his presence, through memories, enemies, and bosses. It no longer feels like he’s simply waiting for you to arrive at Hyrule Castle, he’s actively trying to prevent you from reaching it. The Phantom Ganon fight during your first trip to Hyrule Castle was one of my favorite bosses in the series. Good taste of what the final boss would feel like, without giving too much away. And if you had fought gloom hands before, then you understood what a threat a singular Phantom Ganon was. So, five? It had the pressure it needed to feel like a great boss fight. Now the real final boss, that’s something special. Ganon reviving, the first time he uses flurry rush against you, his constant build-up in power, all of these made the fight just amazing. Simply the best final boss in the series, no argument. He feels like a real threat versus somebody that’s held down with simple light magic. I loved how during the human phases, there was no tricks, no auto-attacks that stunned him. You had to be good with your combat mechanics to beat him, and it felt amazing.

The last section of the story, riding on dragon Zelda while chasing down Ganon was simply beautiful. Nothing insanely difficult but it was more about the spectacle than the fight. One last stand from Ganon while the heroes made their final attack. I loved this section with my entire heart. There’s not much I have to say because it would be incoherent, it’s just something you feel when you play something you love that much. Once you have officially defeated Ganon, gliding down to Zelda, catching her and landing back on Hyrule makes this game feel like a drawn-out love story. There’s a real bond between Zelda and Link here, and while I did appreciate it in BotW, they hammered it in tenfold. The connection they have is unlike any reincarnation prior. I love the writers at Nintendo for things like this, and they just made my appreciation of this series grow, which I didn’t think was possible. “Oh, Link… I’m home!”

All in all, I love this game with my whole heart. Majora’s Mask has been my favorite game in general for close to 15 years now, ever since I first played it. But there’s something incredibly special about Tears of the Kingdom that makes me not scared to let it take MM’s spot. I hope you can understand even a fraction of the love I felt through these words. I can’t wait to see where Aonuma and the team take this series next, whether it be DLC or a new installment.