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Gaming break:

I loved Breath of the Wild, but have to admit that I have no attachment to Tears of the Kingdom whatsoever.

The sequel feels like the same game, with all of the same basic functions and enemies, and the entire “building and connecting things” mechanic is terrible, imo. I have zero desire to use it ever, and they have these stupid piles of stuff to build a cart with all over the place like it’s something useful, but it’s so annoying to build them, and then you can’t steer worth crap and it almost never gets you anywhere far enough to justify trying to put it together. It seems completely useless other than there are little quests or puzzles that purposefully add elements where you need it to complete a task… but even that feels forced and arbitrary.

And the “sky world” element just kinda feels like somebody said “man we should do something different this time… what if we had a bunch of floating islands in the sky!” And then that was it. Theres no reason for it. It doesn’t matter to the story. It doesn’t seem attached to anything of consequence or have even a mystery around it to solve… it just… is.

Also, despite trying to start it back up multiple times in my “spare time” (as if I have any of that), and still in this moment I have no idea what the story is. There’s literally no hook, or engrossing question to answer, so every element just feels like something arbitrary that I’m watching without even knowing why any of it matters.

Just really sad considering BoTW felt like a revival of the Zelda franchise, and I think they spent too much time wondering how they could capitalize on it as quick as possible, rather than thinking about how to make another really engaging story & game for the sequel.

Important caveat: had the game and all the mechanics been the same still, but the story had been super engrossing, none of that other stuff would’ve mattered.

Anyway, that’s my 2 sats on why the new Zelda game hasn’t been able to convince me to charge my Nintendo Switch for like 6 months.

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Discussion

Nic ⛄ 1y ago

I haven't playing BoTW, but I'm almost done ToTK. Been slowly progressing through the game, since it first came out.

To be honest, I barely build anything. I just run everywhere I go. The story isn't mind blowing, but it's pretty chill. I like finding new years around the map, to unlock new chapters of the story-line.

I think my biggest negative of the game, which was also present in BoTW, is the weapon breaking system. I'm just not a fan of that at all.

Guy Swann 1y ago

Yeah you should be able to repair every weapon. I’m actually ok with them degrading over time, but then they should also be repairable. If they are going for realistic, that’s far closer to how it actually works.

It would also reinforce the basic idea of taking care of your stuff. It’s not a bad element to add, but I agree the *way* they added it kinda sucked in some ways.

Nic ⛄ 1y ago

That's exactly what I was thinking. Repairing the weapons would be much better than the current system, imo. I just don't like getting new stronger weapons, and not wanting to use them ever.

If I remember correctly, the first Dark Souls had a system close to that.

Guy Swann 1y ago

Yeah and it could also be another element of skill vs cost thing. Where you have skills for repairing that you could build up and it would make you able to repair them yourself at your home or something. Might be getting too complicated, but anything that lets you level up a stat and the cost drops, would be a super rewarding metric in gameplay. I think that should happen for recipes and cooking too, then more you do it, the more likely you are to get good results or something.

At this point I’m just inventing a bunch of game mechanics when really all that’s needed is a great story, but considering it against what they added, I think something like that would’ve been way more fun. It also would’ve allowed you to buy stuff for your home/property that wasn’t pointless. You could save up to buy a forge and repair your own swords for free, buy a kitchen to cook recipes more potent, etc.

It would’ve improved known elements to be more engaging and rewarding, instead of adding that stupid “stick stuff together!” which was completely unrewarding, basically useless, and honestly just irritating.

Guy Swann 1y ago

The other thing that always bothered me was that the house had no real purpose, it was just kind of a place to sleep and then amounted to a “skin” for your character in a way. Little function, lots of costs and pretend.

Everything should’ve helped you in the game.

- Like a wardrobe literally let you store away tons of extra armor and outfits with specific attributes, so depending on where you are adventuring, you go back and swap out your outfits.

- Again a forge to repair swords and shields and stuff

- A storage container/closet that let you store materials and bugs, etc.

- A kitchen/oven to cook more potent recipes.

- An icebox to store extra food

- a garden or animal pen to literally harvest plants and ingredients, or farm the animals (they just replicate if you leave them basically)

- A stable for your horses

Etc etc

Then you could add slightly stricter limits to what you could carry, and it would make the game strategy more important and purposeful.

Nic ⛄ 1y ago

My favorite part of the house, is how no one from the town remembers Link 😂

Hamlin 1y ago

Fighting friends get in the way.

D'joey 1y ago

Doode! I had the same issue. The first thing I did was grab the towers again cause I didn't want to slowly drip feed myself the same map.

I'll tell you when the game finally "Clicked" with me though. Hopefully this might help you.

It wasn't the sky world, but the underground one that got me. My suggestion is to jump to the Goron City and work the main quest there. That and look for a video guide to get AutoBuild as early as you can afterwards.

The game is great, but the truth is you can only play Breath of the Wild for the first time once. While the new features are great for Sandbox play they feel very extra and bit unnecessary.

nostrils 1y ago

Same, the cartridge is catching dust. I had some fun with it initially but have zero desire to go and finish it. Might also be the age, cannot get myself to game a lot anymore anyway. I get hyped about a new title of a big franchise I used to play in my youth… but usually after a couple of hours I need to drag myself to start and play it again.

Guy Swann 1y ago

I would’ve thought it was simply age as well, except that I loved BoTW and I hadn’t gotten into a game in like 7 years.

I was kinda thinking I was “over it,” but a good game still drew me in and I had a lot of fun. I think the sequel is just… meh

Enki 1y ago

Genuinely loved Breath of the Wild, I have not played the sequel, and I don't necessarily plan to.

Spark 1y ago

thanks for saving me the time with the review!

Martin 1y ago

Hard disagree.

Nintendo did the impossible: They took a masterpiece game and somehow made it bigger and better and produced another masterpiece game.

Insane feat of creativity and innovation.

Noderunner 1y ago

Thanks to this review, I will avoid this game, purposely. Not purposefully, because that's not an actual word.

Jay Stratton 1y ago

I dont game as much as I used to, but when I do I enjoy Stardew Valley or playing Minecraft with my kids. I just don't have the time/attention span for giant open world RPG type games anymore.

HardRich 1y ago

Agreed. I keep going back to BoW since Tears is just not engaging to me. The build thing and being on same map is less than fun.