The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom

[Nester the Lark]

In my thoughts on the final pre-release trailer for Tears of the Kingdom, I noted the absence of Teba, and the presence of his son, Tulin. Looking around social media, it turns out I'm not the only one who noticed. So, just for fun, I'm going to do a deeper dive on this because it carries slightly wider implications about the trailer as a whole.

This will include spoilers for Breath of the Wild and Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity.

So, in Breath of the Wild, Teba is the successor to Champion Revali, although their personalities couldn't be more different. Revali is arrogant and likes to show off, often while belittling others. Teba is usually serious and disciplined, but carries an undertone of warmth, like he sincerely believes in what he does and what he's fighting for. He's also a family man, having a wife, Saki, and son, Tulin.

Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity takes place 100 years before Breath of the Wild, but ultimately ends up being an alternate timeline, as the heroes are able to prevent the Calamity from happening in the first place. This includes the successors somehow traveling back through time, and meeting the Champions face to face. They all have fun, fan-servicey interactions with each other, except for Teba and Revali. Revali shows little interest in his successor, and Teba seems a bit taken aback by his attitude.

The DLC, however, adds a vignette that allows them to interact a bit more meaningfully. Tulin also inexplicably ends up back in time, and Teba and Revali have to rescue him from some enemies. Afterwards, this scene plays out.

There's been debate among fans as to whether Age of Calamity counts as canon. On one hand, it's an alternate timeline, so it doesn't really matter what happens in it. On the other hand, the successors eventually go back to the future of their own timeline (the events of Breath of the Wild), so there's still a chance for some amount of influence. The trailer for Tears of the Kingdom hints at the latter.

In the above scene, Tulin says he wants to be like Revali, and also master the Great Eagle Bow. In the trailer for TotK, he seems to be carrying the Great Eagle Bow with him. (In BotW, Teba mentions that it's too heavy for most Rito to use.) It'll be interesting to see if "Tulin's Tornado" is something he can do in TotK, as well.

Outside of that, in the scene where Link and Sidon are fighting side by side, Sidon is twirling his trident similarly to a move he does in Age of Calamity.

Aside from Teba's absence, Daruk's successor, Yunobo, is also missing from the trailer. However, a few eagle-eyed viewers have seen the tip of Daruk's weapon, the Boulder Breaker, for just a few frames in the trailer. (About 3:18-19, just before Tulin appears.) This might suggest the presence of Yunobo, although in Age of Calamity, he fights with his bare hands.

EDIT: Forgot to mention that official artwork as been revealed for Tulin, Riju and Sidon, but not for Teba or Yunobo so far.

All that just makes Teba's absence more conspicuous, and Tulin is likely taking his father's place as a Champion successor.

Tulin is still quite young, but seems to be at least a few years older than he was in BotW/AoC. Riju looks similarly older, so this suggests about how much time has passed between BotW and TotK. (Sidon looks the same, but Zora live for hundreds of years anyway.)

I also mentioned his English voice actor, Cristina Vee Valenzuela. He sounds quite young in the Age of Calamity clip above, but you can hear him with a deeper voice in the TotK trailer at about 3:06. It's likely that Valenzuela still voiced him if you compare it with her voicework for Merrin in Fire Emblem Engage.

Anyway, this is all just fun speculation. The game will be out in just four weeks from this post, anyway. As a fan of Teba, it'll be disappointing if he doesn't show up at all in TotK, but it'll still be interesting to see Tulin grow up into a Rito warrior, himself.

[Nester the Lark]

Here are the first two parts of a new "Ask the Developer" series for Tears of the Kingdom. Part three is due out soon.

Part 1: What to change, and what to keep

Part 2: Linking hands

So, in part one, they say that it was decided from the beginning that Tears of the Kingdom would use the same world from Breath of the Wild. This is what I've been concerned about. One of the main appeals to me in BotW was exploring a huge, unfamiliar world. I've replayed that game multiple times since then, and I'm so familiar with that world that I can look at a screenshot or see someone else's gameplay and recognize exactly where they are. So, I don't think Tears of the Kingdom will provide me with that same experience, no matter how much they've changed. It's all still built on the same foundation.

Not that it will necessarily ruin the game for me, but as of now, I don't expect TotK to hit me as hard as BotW.

The sky world (and also, potentially, an underworld) will certainly be a new place to explore, but I don't expect it to be as vast.

[Nester the Lark]

Part 3: A world connected all the way to the skies

This part confirms something that I and many other fans were hoping to hear: the return of traditional themed dungeons!

We've only discussed the skies, but this title has its dungeons too, right?

Fujibayashi: Yes, we haven't talked about the dungeons yet. They've changed from the previous game. For example, there is a dungeon that connects directly from Hyrule's surface. If you dive from the sky straight into the dungeon, you'll trigger an event. We think this will be a new experience that wasn't possible in the previous game.

Dohta: We’ve made dungeons unique to their respective environments, so we think you’ll be able to enjoy the wide variety of regional characteristics.

Takizawa: Making a "wide variety" was pretty challenging. The four Divine Beasts were the dungeons in the last game, and they shared similar designs. This time, the dungeons are huge and each carry their own regional look and feel, just like traditional The Legend of Zelda games. We think they will provide a satisfying challenge for players. They were certainly a challenge to develop! (Laughs)

This gives me reason to feel a little more excited about this game.

It feels weird to say that. The game is just two days away, but I've had trouble getting genuinely hyped up for it. I guess it's just me, as clearly most people are really excited for it. I'm sure my mental health plays a part, but also I just haven't heard too many things about this game that I'm enthused for.

On that note, is it just me, or has everything leading up to the release of Tears of the Kingdom been a bit of a mess?

I know we all assume the game will sell itself, and likely will, but that's kinda my point. This should've been the easiest slam dunk for Nintendo, but somehow, it seems like every little thing around it has been a bit off the rails: the price increase, the weird marketing, the extra early leak that drew a lot more attention to itself than usual, the poor relations with media outlets, and Nintendo's poor handling of it all (which, in turn, leads to it drawing more attention to itself).

[nocturnal YL]

I'd say the weirdest part is how little official gameplay has been shown. They probably want to push the game out and let it speak for itself, but that also means there's not much to talk about prior to release.

[Nester the Lark]

Oddly (again), there will be a Treehouse Live stream showing gameplay mere hours before the game is actually released.

I don't plan on watching because... well, what's the point? I should be playing it myself very soon anyway. It's a bit too late for me to be interested in something like this.

Additionally, it seems that some major retailers are already breaking street date, and people are already playing legit copies. As of now (two days before release), review embargos aren't even lifted, so there aren't even any "official" reviews available. Just "unofficial" YouTube videos based on pirated copies of the game. (And as for "official" reviews, Nintendo has apparently been really picky with who they sent review copies to.)

I mean, what is Nintendo even thinking? It's like they're trying to maintain some kind of strict control over the game, but in the process, have completely lost all control.

---

EDIT: Kit & Krysta made a short video discussing the abrupt reveal of dungeons and Nintendo's marketing:



In short, they still think it's the devs that are in control of the marketing but they don't really know what they're doing.

The awkward reveal of the dungeons so close to release has also upset some people that consider it a spoiler.

[Nester the Lark]

Here are the last two parts of the interview:

Part 4: What makes the game "The Legend of Zelda-like"

Part 5: If players think they can do it, they can!

I guess my takeaway from Part 4 is that I don't have to worry about being overwhelmed by the crafting aspect. I'm not good at things like that (I ran out of ideas for Mario Maker levels rather quickly, and actually making the levels was tedious), so it's nice to know I can just do the minimum if I want.

But then again, I might end up loving the crafting part, so who knows.

These interviews also basically confirm what many have suspected: that being able to create your own contraptions was inspired by all the videos fans posted of trying to create things in Breath of the Wild. Apparently, Hidemaro Fujibayashi also liked to do this, and wanted to have better tools for it.

[Nester the Lark]

I've been playing a whole lot of Tears of the Kingdom the last couple of days, so I've decided to write my first impressions.

So, yeah, Tears of the Kingdom is basically Breath of the Wild 2.0. That's not really a bad thing considering I was still playing BotW as recently as six months ago, so this is just more of that, except bigger and with new stuff.

I'll start with the negatives.

Unfortunately, my concerns about the crafting were warranted. A lot of the puzzles, especially in the new shrines, rely on crafting things, and I don't really enjoy that very much. As much as I ended up not caring for the shrines in BotW, I actually kinda hate them here. I fumble around trying to figure out how to solve the puzzles only to barely eek by, and I feel like I ended up cheesing my way through, which is neither fun nor satisfying.

As we knew, weapon durability is back. The devs' "solution" to the complaints was to add crafting to "fix" the weapons and increase their power and durability. At best, this is just a band-aid, but at worst, well, it's just makes things worse. The problem with the weapon durability was that it was an annoying extra thing to have to fiddle with, and adding crafting just doubles it. On top of that, the in-game explanation for why weapons still break is so weak and contrived that it almost feels like the devs are deliberately insulting people who complained about the weapon durability before.

Finally, I don't find the sky islands particularly interesting. Admittedly, though, I haven't gone back to them once I finished the tutorial area and made it down to the surface, so maybe there's more interesting things happening up there than I'm aware of.

On the positive side, however...

There is an underworld, and it's huge. I was wrong when I assumed that an underworld would not be vast. It's also super creepy, but also really compelling. Getting to it involves jumping down certain cavities in the surface, and it's almost as far below the surface as the sky islands are above it (EDIT: Ok, not that far, but it seems like a long way), so you're plummeting down a really ominous hole for several seconds. (Yeah, it's probably hiding the loading time, but it does a great job giving a feeling of depth.)

The enemy variety is much larger. This was an old complaint about BotW, and it's definitely been addressed.

I like how they've handled the towers this time. In BotW, you had to climb towers and activate them to fill in your map. Here, the towers are in different locations, but you don't have to climb them. You simply enter them, and a mechanism launches you really high into the air so that your "Purah Pad" (this game's version of the Sheikah Slate) can collect data to fill in the map. It's largely a cutscene (although you can use your descent to look for certain things), but soaring into the sky so quickly is fun and exhilarating, and it's the kind of thing that strikes me as very "Nintendo."

So, anyway, I have my positive and negatives thoughts. But I've barely scratched the surface of the game so far, so my opinions on things could change.

[Nester the Lark]

So, a few things...

Tears of the Kingdom has sold 10 millions units worldwide in three days, making it the fastest selling Zelda game ever.

Other things of note:

What happens when you give players an unprecedented amount of freedom in a Zelda game? They will:

- Crucify, burn, and otherwise cruelly torture Koroks
- Reign havoc over Hyrule by building tanks, mechs, and orbital strike laser cannons
- And of course, make giant "appendages" (NSFW)

Aside from all that, I mentioned that I was concerned about the absence of Teba in the pre-release trailers. As a fan of the character, I braced myself for the worst.

So, I finally made it to the Rito Village, and, well...

Spoilers:

SPOILER: Click to show

Teba is alive and well, and he's the new village elder!

Phew! That's a relief!

Also, Cristine Vee Valenzuela confirmed the she did, indeed, return to voice Tulin.

[Nester the Lark]

Looking over this post, maybe I went a bit overboard. But anyway, here are some of my thought on Tears of the Kingdom. I want to stress that this is just my opinion, and it disagrees with some popular opinions.

As of this post, I've spent at least 140 hours on Tears of the Kingdom. I've finished all main quests and completed the story. There's still plenty of side content left to do, but I think I've done more than 50 percent of it.

Because Tears of the Kingdom is a direct sequel to Breath of the Wild, and because the former builds on the world and gameplay of the latter, it's hard not to directly compare them. So, I'll organize my thoughts as such just because it's an easy frame of reference.

This will not contain any story spoilers, but will have some mild gameplay and content spoilers. Nothing major that isn't already being discussed openly online, but just a warning for anyone looking to go in completely blind.

Things that were improved over Breath of the Wild:

Narrative – I didn't mind BotW's simpler story considering the game was a “back to basics” approach to Zelda, but TotK is a definitive improvement. I wouldn't go so far as to say it transcends typical Zelda narratives (it's certainly no Xenoblade), but I found it engaging and has kind of a cool twist.

On that note, it was also refreshing to play a Zelda game in which most characters already know who Link is, and acknowledge his past accomplishments.

Dungeons – You could say that the “dungeons” in TotK are just slightly dressed up versions of the Divine Beasts from BotW, but the tweaks here go a long way towards giving them more personality. In the main four dungeons, you're accompanied by a party member with a special skill, which somewhat takes the place of finding and using special items in older Zelda games. The puzzles are built around a theme as opposed to manipulating the dungeon, itself. Also, each dungeon is preceded by a sequence in which you travel to it with your companion, which provides a good buildup.

Bosses – I found the Blights in BotW to be rather dull. The bosses in TotK, on the other hand, feel more like classic Zelda bosses. They stand more on their own, and are much more fun to battle.

Enemy variety – In BotW, it tended to feel like you were fighting the same handful of enemies over and over, just with different colors and amounts of HP. TotK vastly increases the types of enemies, from minor enemies to large mini-bosses, and they all have their own characteristics. There are even super bosses now.

Challenge – BotW was already considered more challenging than previous Zelda games, and at first, death came fast and easy. But once you got the hang of things, it became fairly easy. TotK ratchets it up a fair bit. Enemies are even more dangerous and take off bigger chunks of health. And I'm not sure if it's my imagination, but the timing for doing a Perfect Dodge seems a bit tighter. It's also more balanced in the late game as things still seem reasonably challenging, even with upgraded weapons and armor. I still find myself preparing extra meals and potions before a major fight.

Costumes – BotW gave you a lot of clothing options, but TotK has way more! A lot of the new armor also has useful properties. (Finally! There's something that helps you climb when it's raining!)

The legacy outfits that you could unlock with amiibo are also back, and they even added a new one for the Link's Awakening amiibo that came out later. But better yet, amiibo are no longer required, as now they can all also be found in-game! (It really caught me off guard when I first stumbled across the Cap of the Wind.)

There are a couple of things missing, however. One is the Switch t-shirt. The other is Rex's salvager suit from Xenoblade Chronicles 2. I can understand why these bits of cross promotion no longer make sense, but it's still a little disappointing. I'm hoping that maybe they'll patch the salvager suit back in when the Pyra & Mythra amiibo are released this summer.

Things that have gotten worse since Breath of the Wild:

Weapon durability – This may be a clichéd complaint at this point, but it's still an issue, and the devs did virtually nothing to address it. In some ways, fusing weapons with items makes matters even worse because now you're spending extra time customizing your weapons that will still break after using them a while.

Shrines – Upon repeat playthroughs of BotW, it became increasingly apparent to me that the shrines were a weak point for me. They're back in TotK, there are even more of them, and they're less fun to solve for various reasons.

Koroks – They're back, and somehow, the devs figured out a way to make them more annoying.

Well, they weren't really annoying in BotW. They just felt like padding, and a bare minimum reward for exploration. (Not to mention, the only purpose of their “seeds” is for expanding your inventory space, which is only necessary due to weapon durability, and you know how I feel about that.)

In TotK, there's a new type of Korok puzzle in which you have to reunite one with a another who is some distance away (and often in a really annoying location). These are all too common, and being rewarded with a whopping two Korok seeds still doesn't seem to be worth the effort. No wonder there are so many videos of people setting these guys on fire or launching them into space.

Sage abilities – Your reward for finishing a Divine Beast in BotW was a Champion ability. These were often extremely useful for exploration and combat. Well, I guess the devs thought they were too useful, because the Sage's abilities in TotK are nowhere near as good.

But the real issue is how they're implemented. In BotW, they were activated directly via controller input. In TotK, Link isn't given these abilities. Rather, an avatar of your companion follows you around, and you have to interact with them to use their ability. It's extremely clumsy, and it's too easy to activate an ability accidentally or not be able to use the one you need because your companion either decided to wander off or bunch up with the other avatars.

Other notes that didn't fit into the above categories:

Despite the poor implementation of the Sage's abilities, I do enjoy how you build a party over the course of the game. This is unique for a Zelda game, which are normally solo affairs. Your companions are otherwise pretty useful in that they are good in combat, and they even draw enemy agro. Seeing them run alongside Link on the overworld has a little bit of a Xenoblade feel.

However, the constant flashing effect for when they spawn and despawn as you navigate the terrain can be really annoying. Each Sage can be disabled in the options menu, but that means you also can't use their ability. There's room for improvement, but I still generally like what the devs were trying to do here.

Side note: You can no longer summon Wolf Link with the Wolf Link amiibo, and he isn't in the game at all. The Sages' avatars somewhat build upon the idea, though, which was something I wanted to see.

It has to be said, but I really dislike crafting. I know I'm in the vast minority on this, and admittedly, people have made some really clever things, but it's just not for me. I find it frustrating, and I get annoyed when the game forces it on me. Even doing the bare minimum is too much.

I have mixed thoughts about the exploration in TotK. It was one of the highlights of BotW, and TotK certainly tries to expand upon it, but there are some issues.

The world was extremely well designed in BotW. Everything felt perfectly placed. You could stand on nearly any plateau and see at least a couple of shrines or points of interest to go to. But in refashioning the same world for TotK, everything feels just ever so slightly off. Naturally, they've moved shrines and other things around so you're not just going to the same places and doing the same things, but their placement is less intuitive and often more obscure.

Also, after having played BotW so much, there's a sense of over-familiarity. I feel less compelled to get off the beaten trail, even if I know it will probably be different in some way or another. It just feels like ground I've covered before.

As for the sky, it's fairly sparse and oddly repetitive. It feels like I'm exploring the same small islands over and over. The underworld seemed a lot more exciting at first, but I quickly realized it's tedious to stumble around in pitch blackness. When you can see it, most of it is drab and gray anyway.

On the other hand, it's interesting to see the “progression” of the world, and how things have evolved since the previous game. It's suggested that about five or six years have passed since BotW (perhaps corresponding with the real life time between the releases of BotW and TotK). Characters have grown and formed new relationships. New settlements have formed, and some old settlements have been abandoned. It shows the world trying to rebuild after the events of BotW, and gives a strong sense of the passage of time.

It's interesting to note that Link is probably in his early-to-mid 20s at this point, making him the oldest playable version of the character in any Zelda game.

Finally, this might be an odd complaint, but TotK feels almost too big. There's so much of everything that it sometimes starts to feel like I'm being made to jump through hoops just to accomplish simple tasks. (Increasing the Energy Wells is a good example.) Yeah, you could argue that it's extra “gameplay,” but when there's too much, it's just tedious and exhausting. BotW was already a huge game. TotK can feel a little excessive.

Final thoughts:

I feel like I've spent a lot of time complaining, but I want to be clear that I've highly enjoyed Tears of the Kingdom, and I'll likely spend another few hundred hours on it. But given that it's a direct sequel and has been in development for a number of years, it's harder to overlook certain flaws.

I do appreciate, however, that the changes in Tears of the Kingdom help make it feel like its own distinct experience that stands on its own. Because of this, I don't feel like it's a replacement for Breath of the Wild.

I'm not sure yet how I'll ultimately feel about it once some time has passed. I think that'll come down to if I feel like replaying it in the future. Maybe some of my issues with it won't matter to me as much by then. Until then, I'm not comfortable with trying to rank it among other Zelda games. At this point, though, I can say that Breath of the Wild left a bigger impression on me, and still stands as my favorite in the series.

[nocturnal YL]

I'm under the impression that since BotW is big and people loved it, the logical conclusion would be that the sequel should be even bigger. That seems to be the principle TotK is designed upon.

Crafting is really dependent on whether one likes creating things in games. The general market says yes. And whether the Korok puzzles are fun is directly linked to this.

Similarly, whether one likes physics puzzles would determine whether Korok puzzles and shrines are fun. Again, the general market says yes. This is especially in today's environment of online videos showcasing all kinds of absurd setups.

I do think those videos showing Link driving a giant robot to take down enemies are fun. I don't know how practical they are, though. They do take a lot of parts, for one.

Generally speaking, reusing a game's parts and modifying it to make another game would leave some parts feeling off, as a result of the original game's parts not being built for the new game. I'd say the less intuitive geography of TotK is a result of that. They wanted to keep BotW's landscape but didn't want a total repeat, so they moved things around, but it's bound to be less than optimal since the original layout was already good.

I don't have much to say about this game since I don't have it (if I didn't like BotW due to it being too difficult and scary and TotK powered up those aspects…) and I'm unlikely going to have a chance to try it. It's fun to watch online, though.

[Nester the Lark]

Jun 10, 2023 1:25:20 GMT -5 nocturnal YL said:

Crafting is really dependent on whether one likes creating things in games. The general market says yes. And whether the Korok puzzles are fun is directly linked to this.

Similarly, whether one likes physics puzzles would determine whether Korok puzzles and shrines are fun. Again, the general market says yes. This is especially in today's environment of online videos showcasing all kinds of absurd setups.

I don't really mind the physics puzzles. It's the crafting that goes with them.

But there's another type of shrine I also don't like: the proving grounds. In these shrines, all of your equipment is taken away, and you have to start from scratch. (You do get to keep stamina and heart containers, at least.)  I understand why they do this -- to balance the challenge -- but then that also undermines why I built up my equipment in the first place.

A lot of shrines are treated as tutorials, and I guess that's fair enough. In BotW, there was a single shrine used as a combat tutorial, and the devs probably thought people would easily stumble upon it early in the game. But it turned out that not everyone did, so some people went through a majority of the game not knowing about Perfect Dodges or Flurry Rushes.

The best shrines, in my opinion, are the ones where simply getting to them is considered the challenge, and you're given your prize immediately upon entering. At least there are more of these in TotK than there were in BotW.

For me, the main use of the shrines is that they become warp points for fast travel. You don't even have to complete the shrines to use them this way; just activate them. But their less-intuitive placement in TotK can undermine this as well.

Jun 10, 2023 1:25:20 GMT -5 nocturnal YL said:

I do think those videos showing Link driving a giant robot to take down enemies are fun. I don't know how practical they are, though. They do take a lot of parts, for one.

Most of the more elaborate crafting you see online is just for fun. The more practical stuff is usually very simple. (This was a funny way to defeat a Gleeok, though.)

There's an ability where you can save the "blueprint" of your crafted work, and the game will automatically assemble it for you later if all the parts available. And if the parts are not available, it will create them at the expense of certain resources. You can also find "schema stones" with pre-made blueprints. I almost never use this ability, however.

Sometimes the game is nice enough to provide pre-made things for you, or only require you to fuse two halves together. So, that helps, too.

Personally, I find that if I try to get even remotely creative with the crafting, it ends up just being a waste of time, so I've learned to keep things as simple as possible. Put a fan on a piece of wood. Done.

[Nester the Lark]

I thought I’d share some of the funny, weird, and interesting things I’ve noted while playing Tears of the Kingdom:

With all the huge chunks of the sky ruins constantly falling out of the sky, I wonder how many innocent people have been killed by them.

In Tears of the Kingdom, it’s possible to get so high up in the air that you can actually see a curvature to the world. Interestingly, this was also in Breath of the Wild, but it wasn’t normally possible to get that high up without using glitches and exploits.

In Breath of the Wild, there’s a side quest where Link can buy a house and do some minor decorating. If you visit that house in Tears of the Kingdom, it seems that Zelda now lives there. I suppose it’s likely Link gave her the house because she started teaching at a local school, but it’s also funny to think that she just moved in and kicked him out.

There are separate minor NPCs named Rex and Pyra, like the protagonists of Xenoblade Chronicles 2. It’s probably just coincidence (or maybe a subtle reference by the localization team), as the “Pyra” NPC’s Japanese name is not Homura.

There are many details indicating about how much time has passed between games. One of the more amusing cases involves an alcoholic drink called a “Noble Pursuit” that’s sold at a bar in Gerudo Town. In Breath of the Wild, they refuse to serve it to Link due to him being too young, but in Tears of the Kingdom, he can order it no problem.

Despite not being the "real" versions of the characters, the Sages' avatars still have some tangibility and can be interacted with to a degree. This includes funny things like being blown away by bombs, headbutted by wild boars, and even eaten (and spat out) by Like Likes. (Sidon should stay away from cork puzzles.) The avatars don't take any damage, however.

In Breath of the wild, there are helmets based on the Divine Beasts that could be obtained via amiibo, and these have been carried over into Tears of the Kingdom. If Link wears one, then the corresponding Sage's avatar will also wear it. (e.g. If Link is wearing the Vah Medoh helmet, Tulin's avatar will also be wearing it.) I'm not aware of any gameplay benefits, but I’ve seen speculation that it gives them a buff to their attacks.

Kass, the accordion-playing Rito bard, was one of the most beloved side characters in Breath of the Wild, but he’s nowhere to be found in Tears of the Kingdom. His five children still live in Rito Village, and he’s alluded to once at the end of a certain side quest, but otherwise, he’s conspicuously absent with no explanation. I wonder if he’s being saved for DLC.

And here are a couple of other amusing things I posted on Twitter:

[Nester the Lark]

I wanted to share a couple of fan comics I found on Tumblr. They're both from the same artist.

Comic 1: Worst search party ever

I actually didn't find this as much of an issue in Tears of the Kingdom as the comic implies. Most of the important characters recognize Link. This happened more in Breath of the Wild, but it made more sense there considering everybody thought all of the original Champions were killed 100 years prior.

Comic 2: Link keeps a little too much to himself

Even with this, I'd say Link is more "talkative" than in previous Zelda games, but I like that by simply giving him dialog, it exposes a lot of absurdity.

[Fryguy64]

Hello all! What with social media in meltdown, I'm gradually looking for a new home. And Nester kindly reminded me that I already have a home here that I made myself years ago and have neglected badly!

I have thoughts about Tears of the Kingdom. As the credits rolled, I was overwhelmed with a sense of "it was fine I guess". And that simply didn't feel good enough. What follows includes a lot of spoilers about the story, endgame and some stuff that you might not want spoiled. So... proceed with caution I suppose!


Very little that I did amounted to much in the end

SPOILER: Click to show

There is a lot to do in this game. One of the reasons I felt so underwhelmed by the end was it became very clear how little of it mattered. I spent ages finding all the lightroots in the Depths, for example. Each one corresponds to a Shrine on the surface, which helped me find all the Shrines. And you want to find lots of Shrines, because that's how you get health and stamina upgrades.

Except health works differently in this game. If you get hit by an enemy in the Depths, then a heart is taken out of commission until you return to the surface, stand in a lightroot, or eat food with "Sunny" properties. You can't use health recovery items on it until it's been "un-gloomed".

The entire final battle takes place in the depths, far away from sunlight and lightroots. So you do a huge enemy gauntlet, followed by a 3-stage final boss fight. Any damage you take needs to be recovered twice. This amounts to preparing a bunch of Sunny Greens. That's all you need really. Sunny greens followed by a hearty truffle-based Mushroom Skewer and you're unstoppable. All other dishes are surplus to requirements in the final area.

So rather than exploring the depths to find shrines to boost your health... just cook a bunch of Sundelions and Hearty Truffles and you're sorted.

Outfits are the same. Complete a bunch of quests to find outfits, then collect a ton of hard-to-find collectables and trade these with Fairies to boost the armour. Except... the entire final boss fight relies on you defending and dodging. Ganon hits so hard that it doesn't really matter how buff you are.

In the end, the only outfits I wore for the final gauntlet were all ones that I traded for Bubbulgems, and I didn't (or couldn't) upgrade any of those.

Sage's Wills are hidden well in the sky and require mastery of your powers to find them all... but the Sages sit most of the final fight out. Great. Thanks for that.

So what did I achieve by completing quests, finding all the wells in the land, resolving the political situation in Hateno village, reporting on Zelda's whereabouts for the newspaper... speaking of which.

I broke the story. Very easily.

SPOILER: Click to show

I like exploring. The first thing I did was open up all the towers in Hyrule, then I tracked down all the memories, as they were really big, obvious landmarks to track down. I was only around 15 hours in by the time I found them all, and after that I knew exactly where Zelda had gone, what she'd done, and where she was now.

Then I had to spend the next 100+ hours pretending that I didn't learn that information. Everyone continues to ask about where Zelda could be, whether they've seen Zelda and... no, I know the answer to that question. It was a really early quest that was heavily signposted from the get-go.

The real issue after this is that the story is stretched suuuuuper thin! You find out what happened when the founders of Hyrule faced Ganon near the start of the game, then every time you complete one of the five Sage quests, you get that exact same story told to a Sage. Every. Single. Time.

We don't learn anything new at the end either. Not really. The memories are the plot. If you find them all, everything else is busy work.

There's no lore either

SPOILER: Click to show

The Sacred Realm was where the Goddesses hid the Triforce. Once Ganon took the Triforce for his own, his corrupting influence tainted the land and transformed it into the Dark World. Treasure hunters were lured there, where they trapped and transformed by Ganon's magic into creatures that reflected their heart.

The Twilight Realm was a world of shadows, where the Dark Interlopers who attempted to conquer the Sacred Realm were banished. Their descendants, some of whom are desperate to return to the world of light, made a pact with Ganon and are breaking through the cracks into Hyrule.

The Depths are a big cave. There's some Zonaite mines down there. Don't worry about the Bargainer Statues - they will never be explained either.

This was how I felt about the whole game. There are dozens of opportunities to explore the history of the Zonai. Do the depths have any relationship to other alternative Zelda worlds? Are the tear-shaped stones related to the Spiritual Stones we're familiar with? Or perhaps the Triforce (which goes unmentioned)? Is there any relationship between the sky ruins and Skyward Sword? Was the founding of Hyrule before or after Skyward Sword? Nothing is explored or even alluded to for us lore hunters. Stuff is just there. It's probably inconsistent. Deal with it.

Also... if the flashbacks take place well over 10,000 years ago, then that means mummified Ganon, the Light Dragon, the tear-shaped Stones... that's all been there for every game that's taken place in between.

So Ganon was fought and sealed away for 10,000 years, meanwhile Ganon, Ganon and Ganon all came and went before Ganon was strong enough to wake up again.

It seems clear to me that the Sheikah logo (an ornate eye with a single teardrop) is supposed to be explained by the tears of the light dragon in this game. They modelled their secret society after this, right? But that would suggest that the flashbacks take place before Skyward Sword, where the Sheikah were already well established. And that doesn't make sense in many other ways.

From a story standpoint, I was left unsatisfied. From a lore standpoint, I was left unsatisfied. From a gameplay standpoint, I was kept busy for a long time, but ultimately wasn't sure what it was for. It all added up to a sensation of being unsatisfied.

[Nester the Lark]

Jul 26, 2023 8:59:43 GMT -5 Fryguy64 said:

Hello all! What with social media in meltdown, I'm gradually looking for a new home. And Nester kindly reminded me that I already have a home here that I made myself years ago and have neglected badly!

This place has been my rock. I've been coming here since before Twitter even existed, and it's still here even as Twitter is fading away.

Anyway, in the thoughts I previously posted, I felt like maybe I was being a little nitpickey, but ultimately, I enjoyed the game overall. If BotW was a 10/10, I'd still say TotK is a 9/10. It sounds like your impressions were even harsher than mine.

After all the hours and years I spent on BotW, I learned that even though it's open-world and you can do things in whatever order you want, there is still a certain order in which you're encouraged to do things. (For example, you're expected to visit Kakariko early on, go to the Hateno tech lab to get your Sheikah Slate upgraded, visit certain shrines with tutorials, etc.) With that knowledge, I went into TotK with the intent that I would follow the prompts the game gave me, knowing that it would likely unfold in the most ideal manner. But I also took the time to do side activities and experience whatever the game had to offer as I went along. In short, I aimed for a "balanced" experience. As a result, opening up the full overworld map and finding all the tears was spread out more organically over several dozen hours, so that probably influenced my overall impression.

TotK is definitely superfluous in a lot of ways. But even then, as with BotW, I expected (and even wanted) a bit of busy work just because I enjoyed being the world. I've long since entered the phase of "piddling around while listening to music or a podcast."

On the other hand, I admit I was a little disappointed when TotK was originally announced as a sequel to BotW, because after having spent so much time on the previous game, I was ready to move on to something entirely new. The sky islands and underworld just don't quite cut it in that regard. When I'm up really high in the sky and able to look out to the north or west beyond Hyrule's borders, I really wish I could explore what's over there, or perhaps even go across (or under) the ocean. In fact, I felt this way in BotW as well.

I do find it a little funny that you went into a Zelda game expecting a lot of consistent lore. That's not exactly Zelda's strong point. (For lore you can really sink your teeth into, you'd want to look at something like Xenoblade, Falcom's Trails series, or even the Ys series.)

TotK almost seems like it's retconning every Zelda game except for BotW, and even its connection to that feels a little thin. I've seen theories that the flashbacks happen during the "Era of Prosperity," which is after Skyward Sword, but before everything else. I've also seen some suggestion that Hidemaro Fujibayashi is basically ignoring every Zelda game he didn't personally work on. (That is, everything except Skyward Sword, the Oracle games, The Minish Cap, and BotW.)  Either way, BotW/TotK generally feel like they're trying to build something entirely new.