Ronnie

In terms of level design it was a pretty ballsy move for them to give us all the tools we needed and set free on the world. Being able to solve any puzzle from the get go is pretty impressive. Yes I love the item progression from previous games too but with 19 games that do it that way, I'm happy to have one that tries things a little differently (two if you count A Link Between Worlds). It's tough, if not impossible to provide a good story/inventory progression yet at the same time have an open ended adventure where you can do anything at any time.

I wouldn't be surprised to see another one in the next couple of months

That article could be written for every single succesful video game. Every critically acclaimed game can be torn apart if you look closely enough. Again it hunts down negatives, ignoring what the game has done to breath life into an over-saturated genre. It has a progression system, it's just integrated into the gameplay more and doesn't rely on the tired arbitrary levelling up mechanic present in most other games. As Peer on NVC put it a while back the whole game is a quest for confidence, you're roaming the world making yourself stronger in an effort to take Ganon on.

I may double dip for Severed, great game, not quite as much fun as Guacamelee but close.

People moan about Nintendo now. The shitstorm if they did this would be off the scale.

What does it matter what title the game has. The game is the game, one that's gotten perfect scores pretty much everywhere and will walk the GOTY awards later this year. "plot progression" would have ruined the open ended nature of the game. There was plenty of plot, you just had to look for it.

I'm surprised to see so little credit being given on here to how Nintendo reinvented the openworld game, not sure why people seem to fixate on the negatives instead of celebrating the genre shifting positives. So there aren't lots of cut scenes, it's not that kind of game and shouldn't be played as one.

I couldn't disagree more. 1. It was an adventure game that allowed you to create your own plot, with plenty of backstory thrown in for good measure. 2. Very little sense of progression? Did you want "You've reached Level 37!" type messages that pop up at arbitrary points? The progression was tied to how much stronger you were becoming, be it through the weapons you were finding, the Champion spells you were learning and the amount of hearts/stamina you were collecting. Not sure what you mean by a poor balance of linearity v exploration. The whole point is you could do whatever you want, that's what made the game so special. If you want narrative based, cutscene-heavy linear experience, there are a dozen other Zelda games like that and the vast majority of AAA release out there.

Completely agree. Mass Effect 3 at least felt much more focused, this is a bit all over the place and I really don't think the openworld formula was necessary.

Good news!

I've 100%'d a couple of planets and I'm starting to wish this game was never made openworld. Do the side missions ever go beyond fetch quests and "go to these five locations and press triangle"? That seems to literally be all I've done apart from the monolith/vault stuff. I seem to recall there were loads of optional side missions in ME3 that had cutscenes, base assaults, storylines etc. The side quests here just seem so boring so far. Do they get better?

Artwork for an as yet unannounced Kingdom....

That same Samus amiibo must unlock things in about two dozen games by now. That's what separates them from the rest of microtransactions.

Unless I'm mistaken, Overcooked seemed to come out of nowhere (out tomorrow), maybe Stardew Valley will be similar

Wow didn't expect ARMS to break a million so soon. Big numbers for BOTW considering that doesn't take into account Wii U sales.

A 30 second demonstration why motion control aiming is better

Very nice! I've got level 5 relationships with both FSD engineers, it took a lot of wake scanning and mineral collecting from planets but was worth it. My Asp now has a 30 LY jump range, very handy. I tend to prioritise fuel scoops, 6A. Let's me refuel each jump in ten seconds

Traveling through 1:1 scale systems gives an incredible sense of scale, I love it. Bounty hunting in a planet's rings is great fun like you say. Funny how modern hand-holding games with lots of check boxes have ruined more open ended, challenging ones. Some nights I don't "accomplish" much of anything but I have a blast nevertheless.

If you expect this game to hold your hand for every little thing then you picked the wrong game. It's supposed to be challenging, and unlike 90% of big games these days doesn't hold your hand. There's no dotted line leading you straight to your quest goal like in Witcher and the like. It's a simulator type experience, if you expected a simple, shallow arcadey style shooter or a NMS-like game then you might want to try getting your money back. It shouldn't take ten minutes to dock into a station, there's a steep learning curve but after a few days of getting better you fly in, dock. Easy. 500 credits is nothing, there are rules in place. If you don't want a fine, don't look to land in a docking space that isn't yours.

This game is so good. Feels so much more polished than the original as well. Loving Salmon Run!

Great video on how BOTW's openworld design, ignore the title, which has nothing to do with the points being made.

Getting really great reviews, 84 on Metacritic

No it translates as: "We're focusing on the two platforms already announced thus far, and we'll think about other platforms once development on those is complete."

I might have to show my 8 yo nephew the trailers now, he loves Mario Kart 8 but that's his only Nintendo experience. Did the issue reveal any new tidbits?

Started playing this a few days ago and sunk about 20 hours into it so far (taking my time, only done one vault so far). Anyway, I'm really loving it. I've only played ME3 so maybe the Mass Effect gameplay formula is still fresh enough that I'm impressed with everything, but yeah, loving it. The vault was a little uninspired in terms of gameplay though, basically walk up to this console, hold triangle, walk up to the next console hold triangle etc, but at least it looked impressive visually. The writing is a little bland and the character animations are as godawful as reported (wtf happened!) but otherwise I'm having a great time.