The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom

[Hero-of-Time]

36 minutes ago, Dcubed said:

I know that this interview was posted a few days ago, but man... what a gut punch...

https://www.ign.com/articles/zelda-tears-of-the-kingdom-interview-nintendo-eiji-aonuma-hidemaro-fujibayashi

Aonuma has no understanding of why people might not like the open world direction the series has taken and no understanding of what made traditional Zelda games so enjoyable.

Zelda is truly dead

I don't think it's a lack of understanding but more of a lack of Nintendo not caring. Had the open world Zelda's sold the same as the traditional ones, they would possibly go back to that formula but because of how well BOTW and TOTK sold, we are unfortunately stuck with these types of Zelda games for the near future.

What annoys me even more is that they've also ditched the 2D games. This is one of the reasons why I prefer Nintendo having seperate systems. You'd have 3D games on a console and smaller (still amazing) Zelda games on a handheld. For those who like traditional Zelda games we've been left with sod all.

[Glen-i]

1 hour ago, Dcubed said:

I know that this interview was posted a few days ago, but man... what a gut punch...

https://www.ign.com/articles/zelda-tears-of-the-kingdom-interview-nintendo-eiji-aonuma-hidemaro-fujibayashi

Aonuma has no understanding of why people might not like the open world direction the series has taken and no understanding of what made traditional Zelda games so enjoyable.

Zelda is truly dead

I'm getting some real Pokémon style "If you don't want EXP Share, just have 1 Pokémon in your team" vibes from that. Completely dismissive of why people might enjoy a linear approach.

Mandated structure is not an inherently bad thing.

[Happenstance]

48 minutes ago, Glen-i said:

I'm getting some real Pokémon style "If you don't want EXP Share, just have 1 Pokémon in your team" vibes from that. Completely dismissive of why people might enjoy a linear approach.

Mandated structure is not an inherently bad thing.

I tend to prefer more linear games anyway. I find it works better for a tighter narrative. 

[MindFreak]

Finally almost done mapping the underground, helping me find the remaining Shrines. So will finally soon be able to finish the game! 

Or finish it... At least defeat the final boss. Have tried to find out which side adventures to focus on but there is just so much to do... 

Edited February 11 by MindFreak

[Julius]

Figma figures are coming for TotK Link, Ganondorf and Zelda! Look lovely (well, Zelda pending): 

 

[MindFreak]

Finally found all shrines and I at long last went on to find Ganondorf yesterday. 

Spoiler

But I had to reload an earlier save because he only deals gloom damage, and I had zero sunny meals. Come on... That wasnt fair. 

I got him to second form but I find it very hard to avoid (and flurry rush) his attacks. 

Will try again tonight. Now with better preparation. 

[nekunando]

20 hours ago, MindFreak said:

Finally found all shrines and I at long last went on to find Ganondorf yesterday. 

  Final boss fight (Hide contents)

But I had to reload an earlier save because he only deals gloom damage, and I had zero sunny meals. Come on... That wasnt fair. 

I got him to second form but I find it very hard to avoid (and flurry rush) his attacks. 

Will try again tonight. Now with better preparation. 

I somehow made it to the final battle completely unprepared but I had absolutely no desire to leave and have to make my way there again so I persevered until I eventually won the battle 😅

If anything, it made the fight with Ganondorf a fun challenge rather than relying on countless specialised meals to keep me alive!

Having ignored the depths throughout the game unless absolutely necessary, I had no resistance to gloom.. but the entire game was pretty much pure gloom for me, sadly.

I commend you on finding all the shrines, @MindFreak 🙂 I did the bare minimum and was glad when it was over!

Edited March 23 by nekunando

[Julius]

The GDC talk for the game, Tunes of the Kingdom: Evolving Physics and Sounds for 'The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom', is now available to watch from the GDC Vault 

[Julius]

Somehow, Tears of the Kingdom turns one year old today! To commemorate the occasion, Nintendo have released a stunning piece of artwork from one of my favourite moments of the game  (link for a phone wallpaper!)

And this follows the beautiful piece of art we got just a day before launch last year: 

Okay, so one year on – for those who have played TOTK, how are you feeling about it now? 

For me, I'll be honest, it does lack the freshness in the world and I was a bit letdown by the lack of story connectivity to BOTW and progression in Hyrule's various settlements, oh and, well, the UI/mountain of menus kind of suck. 

But, for me, just to ramble off some of my favourite aspects: there is a stronger emphasis in key moments on its music; I thought the bosses and temples were much improved (Colgera's theme and the Sky Temple hnnnnnnnng); the vertical expansion of the world offered so much more room for exploration; I much prefer the abilities to BOTW's for their accuracy and ambition allowing for a greater sense of sandbox-like creativity and more nuanced, individualised approaches; the treasure trove of secrets; I love the small army battles, the caves, the initial exploration of certain darker areas in the map, and oh...that ending. The final few fights and moments of TOTK's story, for me, are well up there with some of my favourites in gaming, period. It lives in my head rent-free. 

Spoiler

I'm an absolute lover of repeated actions turning up in finales in games, and that final dive...I was screaming how awesome it was at the end. 

Losing hearts to Ganondorf who I wouldn't allow myself to beat until I managed to perfectly dodge all of his attacks. The fight with the Sages at your side. How deep The Depths truly went. 

It was my GOTY last year, sneaking in there at the last second, and of the Zelda games that I have played to completion - which isn't a lot; it's Breath of the Wild, Ocarina of Time, Tears of the Kingdom and Link's Awakening - it is, by far and away, while not a perfect experience, my favourite Zelda experience. 

(and yes I need to play more Zelda games don't @ me we'll get to those others in due course)

Edited May 12 by Julius

[drahkon]

5 minutes ago, Julius said:

for those who have played TOTK, how are you feeling about it now? 

[Hero-of-Time]

Crazy to think that a Zelda game released, been out for a year and I've still not even purchased it. Sad times.

[Happenstance]

I never finished it, got very bored and dropped it.

[Glen-i]

23 minutes ago, Hero-of-Time said:

Crazy to think that a Zelda game released, been out for a year and I've still not even purchased it. Sad times.

I can't wait until I get hit by this feeling when the next mainline Pokémon comes along!

That one's gonna really sting for me...

[killthenet]

I thought it was great for the most part, don't think it had as lasting an impact as Breath of the Wild but it's still a masterpiece. It isn't as consistently brilliant as BOTW but I think the narrative and thematic highs are higher in TOTK, particularly reaching the temple for the first regional phenomena quest (I tackled Rito first, which I think it the intended route) was such a jaw dropping sequence of gameplay, the way it builds and builds, the atmosphere literally gave me goosebumps - it was pure Zelda, one of the greatest moments I've ever had from the franchise. I get the complaints from some people that the open air formula doesn't really feel like Zelda, that you need more structure and focus on a linear narrative, but the way they turn reaching the dungeons into part of the puzzle in TOTK feels like such a natural evolution of the traditional Zelda formula that I'm excited to see how they iterate and improve upon that concept in the next game - I would have loved the dungeons to be more involved as well but the way they extended the sense of discovery and atmosphere out into the overworld really is fantastic.

Ultrahand and being able to build things felt so novel at first, even if it took a few minutes to get the hang of it, it seemed like the possibilities for complex and creative puzzle solving were going to be endless, but eventually I just stuck to the same old standbys so it just became a bit of an inconvenience for me by the end. I think they needed to strike more a balance, limiting options often breeds more creative solutions and I feel like the fact that you can pretty much build anything stifles the core experience somewhat. Obviously people have built utterly insane, batshit things but they don't have much actual utility in the game, they just help steamroll your way through enemies and puzzles which sort of saps the fun out of the game really - when the solution for everything is just to use brute force it gets tried fast. 

So yeah, there are definitely a lot of problems with the game but it has so many spectacular, unforgettable moments that are more than enough to outweigh the frustrations. 

[darksnowman]

7 hours ago, Hero-of-Time said:

Crazy to think that a Zelda game released, been out for a year and I've still not even purchased it. Sad times.

Same. Never thought I'd see the day but it came and I've made my peace with it because I know if I bought TotK, I wouldn't "get" it and, ultimately, I'd just regret it massively as I should have known better. The building and swimming up-through-ground mechanics look like they could be fun in a smaller, more restrained game. Make it a third of the size of BotW and I'll take a punt on it. It'd still be humungous. 

Because I know I can enjoy smaller, more organised open-world games from having played the likes of Immortals: Fenyx Rising, Burnout Paradise and Lego City Undercover this past year or so. 

I'd like to eventually go back on BotW after looking up some pointers to actually direct me to something to do in that game. If I ever get around to that and successfully come away enjoying it, I could consider moving on to TotK at some time way beyond that.

For the time being though, Zelda has sadly joined a list of Nintendo games I'm just not into.

[bob]

I have the game, but haven't started it yet. Want to get through more of my backlog first. 

I'm a bit worried that I'll struggle to finish it though, as I'm at the stage in my life where I need more direction in order to finish games, but I am looking forward to starting it as I enjoyed BOTW. 

[Cube]

Tears of the Kingdom is really strange in that on paper, it's a better game than Breath of the Wild. However, it lacks the main thing that made BotW so special: a sense of wonder. 

It's not just a case of the game world either, we were discovering Link's toolset and how to use that to navigate the world and to solve (and cheat puzzles). But now we know what to expect, and the new stuff doesn't have the same impact. I have lots of strong memories with BotW, but the main thing I remember from TotK is the limited house building. 

 

I was really looking forward to Ultrahand, but the way it's implemented put me off using it. I really hate the "single use, can't put in inventory" nature of the parts, with lots of grinding needed if you want to experiment. When the game is designed in a way that you can do everything with the simplest tools, it seems odd to put the game's greatest potential for discoveries behind such an annoying way to use it. 

[nekunando]

On 12/05/2024 at 12:51 PM, Julius said:

Okay, so one year on – for those who have played TOTK, how are you feeling about it now? 

For the first 10 hours or so, I was impressed by the scale of everything and the seamless transitions from the sky to the surface. There were so many ways to go and so many things to do.. so many boring ways to go.. so many.. tedious things to do..

I cleared it, somehow, but I barely remember any of the good stuff. The more I think about the experience, the more I hate it.

The main thing I remember, apart from the 'relief' that it was over, was spending ages building stuff only to lose hold of it and have it fall into oblivion or somewhere irretrievable.

When you have no interest in even entering a major part of the world, that's a big problem!

Thinking about it, apart from a few insanely high highs, the Zelda series has very few games I actually really like..

[Julius]

The GDC talk for the game, Tunes of the Kingdom: Evolving Physics and Sounds for The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, has finally been added to the GDC YouTube channel:

Quote

At GDC 2024, developers of The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom discuss structuring an expanded Hyrule around physics-based gameplay and evolved sound design! Join the game's Technical Director Takuhiro Dohta, Lead Physics Programmer Takahiro Takayama, and Lead Sound Engineer Junya Osada as they explore challenges their teams faced when approaching this sequel.

Definitely going to need to give this a watch over the weekend!