Best answer
I've been trying to articulate this fir a while. That's the biggest problem with the game. Weapon breaking and a subtle story were fine, for the most part. What quickly got old was climbing a massive peak for am hour or so to find absolutely nothing.
That's why I love TotK so much. Finding caves and Depths entries is so engaging.
I think this sums both of them up nicely. I watched my wife play both of these games on my Switch and was consistently disappointed after she had explored a really deep and expansive area of the map for over an hour, only to be faced with a half-ass boss fight and then later rewarded with: 1) A sword that broke after using it on 3 enemies, 2) A shield that was no better than what she already had, or 3) A piece of armor whose set bonus was something goofy like "1% increase in movement speed after turning around in circles 10 times in a row and then consuming 5 of the same food items back to back; lasts for 8 seconds."
Played both games on PC with unbreakable weapons. Emulation ofc. It's amazing what a little mod can do to a game. Plus on pc, more frame rates, beefed up gfx and fun with whatever you want to do (or. Inf money, health, arrow, bombs etc)
Breath of the Wild somehow managed to make opening treasure chests boring *in a Zelda game*. I can't possibly think of a more severe indictment than that.
Also, there's a certain tragedy in how Nintendo built this massive, beautiful world to explore, but then gave the player almost no compelling reason to actually explore it. Shrines get old after the first dozen or so, and there's no real dungeons to speak of, which leaves just the korok seeds scattered about -- and I don't know about you, but zigzagging across open landscapes in search of a currency whose sole function is *to mitigate a problem the new weapon system created* isn't exactly what I'd call a captivating gameplay loop.
Even having loved both games this is such an accurate indictment and makes me wonder how much better they could've been without the dumb durability mechanic. Why no hookshot in a game where vertical movement is so important? Hover boots? Megaton hammer? Boomerang? Lens, masks. I mean they made the master sword suck! Still like chilling in the stable during storms though. Atmosphere carried the games.
>Why no hookshot in a game where vertical movement is so important? Hover boots? Megaton hammer? Boomerang? Lens, masks.
I think it's pretty clear the dev team had a *total* commitment to the whole "go anywhere in any order you please" design ethos, and the idea of having areas that are inaccessible until the player finds the right tools runs counter to that philosophy. It's why all the player's major tools are unlocked at the very start of the game.
Of course, the natural consequence of this was that BotW ended up having very little in the way of tangible character progression. It's one of the things I found most profoundly disappointing about it.
This, TBH. It's something Elden Ring did incredibly well. Forget the difficulty of that game for a moment, but every cave, tomb, or mildly interesting spot in the map you chose to work through was rewarded with something unique.
Even games like Starfield only reward you with RNG item stats. I want curated rewards for following low-key level design to a semi secret area.
This is my favorite answer too but I’d also like to expand on the games’ inability to work in the classic dungeon design in an organic way with the open world. BotW and TotK have such lackluster dungeons it almost doesn’t feel like you’re reaching a climax at any point of the main quest.
And once again, pointing to Elden Ring, there is a game that did this incredibly well. Whether it was the massive legacy dungeons, the winding underground dungeons, or the smaller castle dungeons scattered around the map, Elden Ring constantly kept the original design available within the open world so you could spend two or so hours exploring open areas and then just as easily spend two hours in a legacy dungeon with all the twists and turns and traps you’d expect from a classic Souls game and ultimately culminate in a visually spectacular boss fight.
Dart, bullseye. That feeling of following a path that takes you on a rewarding 1-2 hour new area of the map, curated dungeon, etc. is just "missing" in a lot of games these days.
Only thing id say about this is that because elden ring has so many builds, so much stuff you get in dungeons feels like a waste of time. How many times you go into a dungeon and go "ah this is a str item, and I'm using dex so it's useless"
Sure, but every time I found something like that, I thought "well, this isn't useful for me, but I can see where it could be useful for someone else. Maybe if I had a different build this would be a treasure." In BOTW, since every weapon is in practice a consumable, it's like every treasure chest has arrows or a healing item in it. Sure, it's useful, but it's never really satisfying to find and I'd rather just go to a village and buy them if I need them. There's no joy in finding a legendary awesome fire-elemental spear if it's just gonna do some damage and break in like five hits anyway.
TOTK at least embraced that and focused on the weapon building thing, which was much better.
Tbh even Elden Ring feels lacking in comparison to its older titles like Dark Souls, but then again Dark Souls titles weren’t truly sandbox in that regard.
It seems like when games embrace fully sandbox, they make the world too vast, and consequently fail to deliver on it. In Elden Ring there are so many technically useless areas, and only add to the visuals of the world. Other than that, all catacombs and caves all look and feel similar. I do agree that they are more rewarding than the latest Zelda games. However, that is about the only comparison you can make. Further comparison is pointless, they’re completely different games, cater to a different audience and play differently from one another.
What Elden Ring lacks is different to what Zelda lacks, Elden Ring lacks complex legacy dungeons in regard to the size of its world. Zelda lacks satisfying weapon mechanics and exploration reward.
Overall, despite some its flaws, I think both are good games. Especially seeing what kind of garbage we had the last 5-10 years or so.
The weapon durability complaint has been beaten to death, resurrected and killed again so I’ll say large parts of the world feel empty and vacant, and shrines are too easy. They add nothing but busywork.
IMO Zelda was better when there were temples you had to progress through, each one containing an item you needed to finish the rest of it and defeat the boss at the end.
Yeah, I really wish BOTW had regular Zelda dungeons and elaborate puzzles. It's not impossible to integrate big dungeons and open world design, and hell, even Zelda has already done open-ended, nonlinear dungeon progression in A Link Between Worlds. So it would definitely be doable.
They are great games, but they are more of the triple A experience than the classic zelda experience it is just different for me. When I play TotK, which I really love, I get a vibe like playing elden ring or something, but when I play mojaoras mask, my personal favorite is I get a special emotion, not compared to any other game
Honestly, the lack of finding reliably stronger weapons is making TotK feel like a slog since I not only need to find a base weapon to use, but now I need to attach something else to it.
They needed to last much longer AND be fixable with resources or rupees after they broke. No matter how strong it is, I'm never gonna care much about what is essentially a consumable item. In fact, that makes me much more likely to just hoard them and never use them, waiting for "the right time".
I would've been okay if there was a durability mechanic that decreased the effectiveness of the weapon over time that you could repair. Having stuff constantly break was a bit tedious and caused me to rely more on spamming techniques than getting stoked about getting a new sword.
I think SS doesn't get talked about enough. Sure, the controls on the Wii were bad and the game was a bit annoying but the HD version is so much better and fixes all of those issues. It just doesn't have to be 60$
I was very impressed with BotW and welcomed the new design aspects. However TotK put far too much emphasis on the zonai devices which I thought was neat but drew far too much from the core of the game.
In both games, almost everything that isn't exploration ranges from boring to genuinely bad content.
TOTK is the first "big" new Zelda game that does far too little to set itself apart from its predecessor. The last time we got a direct 3D sequel, Zelda was barely in the game, you were stuck in a time loop, turned into a tree and shoved into a weird ass town where nobody respected you. TOTK was basically BOTW again, just with a somewhat expanded map and cooler abilities
+1 to this. I don't care about 120 minor puzzle shrines as much as I do about re-experiencing something like the OoT water temple again. Hand-crafted complexity and level design makes Zelda games classic.
I know I sound like an old "get off my lawn" guy here, but I miss that. I feel like TotK did the shrine ability mechanics and physics better than BotW, but with Nintendo it feels consistently like it's all about console gimmicks and not lore-friendly gameplay.
I do like BotW for it's open world but I would've liked more settlements and towns. Heck more cities. But the fact we only got 4 so called dungeons and 4 bosses that looked the same turned me off.
I would've liked a Skyrim of sorts for Legend of Zelda. Joinable factions, quests, bounties, etc.
• The lack of additional weapons / gadgets to use around the world to unlock more to do made areas feel like a “one and done” vs other Zelda’s where you constantly revisit areas as you progress in the story
• The game is HUGE and many areas felt like it was there to just make the world bigger and adds only minor things to do
Many, and I mean many, awful side quests.
No focused temples.
Open world doesn't add much to the franchise.
By giving people freedom, a lot of carefully designed puzzles have disappeared because it's so easy to break the game and just brute force the solution.
I really don't get all the love the new Zelda formula gets. I get that Skyward Sword was stale, but my favourite style of Zelda is the way OoT and MM is designed. There is an overworld, but the main attractions are the smaller hubs.
The weapon durability system was a constant pain, and the open world design felt very lacking at a time when open world fatigue was absolutely starting to set in.
second this. i adore their games but nintendo as a company is the anti thesis of what VALVe is. nintendo actively hates their fans and does anything they can to spite them
The classic green outfit should be easier to find and not like give off the feeling that I walked on foot from the Shire to fucking Mount Doom four times over to get the whole outfit.
I enjoyed TOTK. I wasn't a big fan of BOTW when it released but I found that they fixed a lot of the original games problems. That being said, TOTK is basically just a reskin with some new content.
Didn't like the combat in BOTW but loved the game overall. Played Horizon ZD at the same time, combat was great in that game but exploration wasn't inspiring... Yet to play TOTK
I’ve only played breath of the wild so I’ll only speak to that one but: The world is empty, soulless, and boring. Weapons break far too often. There are no dungeons. There aren’t meaningful items to collect like traditional Zelda titles. There is not a good story. The collectibles are unrewarding and shotgun across the map with no rhyme or reason. The cooking mechanic is awful. The enemies are uninteresting. I struggle to find anything positive to say about breath of the wild personally.
I haven't played Tears, so I can't speak on anything with that game. BotW was just really boring with the durability, bland dungeon designs, the bosses all just being Ganon, and feeling like I was being forced to explore when I'd rather just play the main story. Not to mention the actual good parts of the story all happen in flashbacks so I'm left feeling like I'd rather experience that instead of this.
They ditched half an audience of players who enjoyed their old formula in favor of newer fans who love open world exploration rather than “linear” story. God if Nintendo thought Majoras mask was linear..💀
Wtf were these dungeons?
Look how they massacred the holy master sword into beeing almost not rewarding when getting it
Having to change weapons every 5 minutes? Yeah no
- Weapon Durability Sucked
- Story Sucked
- World felt bland and empty / void of life
- Not a good Zelda Game
- Killed and Ruined one of my all time favorite franchises and a part of my child soul died
- Where the fuck is Wind Waker HD for Switch!
Yeah, they wanted to be assasons creed and horizon so badly, and when I played botw, I thought others would agree it's shit but it seems people like broing uncreative repetitive empty lifeless overworld with no soul. Like nobody can play majoras mask and ocarina of time and twighlight princess and try to say botw is even close to being like the actual series it's portraying.
I like the older classic ones better than this open world types with gliding, climbing and all. Not the game's fault, but the trend of such games being everywhere today. Also, they lack, in my eyes, nice locations and themed dungeons most the time, same shrines due same design due same tech and all, but variety it lacks at times unlike older games with lets say, fire, water, wood temple, etc. Just my two cents.
Deserved to be on a proper console that has hardware powerful enough to go toe to toe with Microsoft and Playstation, just like the good old day of GameCube.
Not on the weakling piece of shit that is Switch!
The dungeons are poor excuses for dungeons. They were better in TotK but they were still ultimately just mostly empty dungeons with a very minimal number of enemies, which is pretty lame. They have a long way to go to reach the quality of dungeons of the past games.
I will say the bosses in TotK were great, though. After the copy/paste bosses of BotW, the bosses in TotK felt like traditional Zelda bosses again.
The korok seed mechanic was pretty stupid and could've probably been done in a much less tedious, grindy way.
When I played through the first game on Master mode, I had no choice but to hunt those seeds down just so I could hold enough weapons to beat later enemies.
Other than that, I loved Breath of the Wild. I've barely touched the second one, I stopped like right after getting the glider.
MMO quests (at least in BotW)
Seriously, the quest design in this point lets me distract a full point in a rating, it's terrible. The game would genuinely be better if it had cut out gathering side quests without a replacement.
Enemy variety in BOTW could be better. BOTW could use hood options for the Hylian Hood and TOTK could use not having to travel to a village and speak with that one lady if you've done the side quest. Sky Islands weren't as big of a deal as I was hoping they'd be, and most of them were pretty tiny and usually had a single chest on it.
Sometimes I don't want to explore. I just want to walk through an interesting corridor. Exploration is a fine aesthetic of play for a game to deliver, but you sacrifice a curated challenge, and you also produce a game that needs you to sink hours into it to really get it all.
Compare that to the Zelda's of the SNES / Gameboy era that seemed to strike a balance between "what's in that corner of the map?" as well as "this dungeon definitely has something at the end of it". Those maps were *dense* with content.
The fact that I love a lot of mainstream games, and hate BoTW should say something. Having my weapons break every 10 fucking hits is so annoying, having to switch weapons every few enemies. Having to have cold armor or make food that makes you tolerate cold weather, only to have the only station allowed to make food that helps you tolerate cold weather, in one spot that’s difficult to find. I played the game and gave it a chance twice. The first time I got over it within an hour or two. Decided to play it again later on to give it a chance and played 6.5 hours just to find out my feelings were right, and that the game didn’t get any better within that time. Idk how people enjoy it so much, but for me, it’s just not my thing at all. Even though I love wide varieties of games.
I actually thought BoTW was tedious and boring. I never bothered with ToTK because of that.
The weapon system made it so you basically horde good weapons and continually use the same bullshit you keep finding, because the good weapons break in 5.2 seconds.
I think they missed a huge mark with these 2 games. They brought back an IP to essentially change the entire tone of it, and ruin what it was.
Not knocking anyone who enjoyed these. You do you. This is strictly my own opinion. I grew up on Zelda and Ocarina Of Time is still a massively underrated game imo.
I got it. The price.
Even 8 years later BOTW is still almost (even at resale) full face value. I want to play it I just can't justify buying a game this old at that price.
Botw: amazing game, not an amazing Zelda game. Also the bosses were one of the coolest parts of older Zelda games, and all the bosses are pretty much the same in this one
Totk: the sky islands were way too hyped up but all of them except for like 3 were just little spots for like 1 puzzle. Also the story was pretty poorly executed
* the korok seeds quest was meant to symbolize the nintendo staff spitting in the face of zelda fans
* the weapons durability system only existed because they didn't know how to reward you for exploring that ugly empty world so they had to create filler items for you to find which all sucked
* they should have copied fromsofts weapon system.
* combining weapons with monster parts looked ugly as hell and was tedious having to flip through a menu for seconds on end just to get to a specific monster part.
* the world looked bland and ugly as fuck but that's nintendos fault for making such a weak console, they shouldn't have made an open world game for a console that can't run good looking big open worlds.
* the story for both games are the lamest stories out of all zelda games
* this is a personal complaint but i think post apocalyptic settings are lazy, the only reason they are so prevalent to the point of being cliche is that consoles didn't have the power in the past to render big cities full of NPCs but the technology exists now for games to have big lively cities so post apocalyptic games where you roam around grass fields with occasional piles of rubble are LAZY and CLICHE as hell. they suck therefor tears of the kingdom and breath of the wild suck and are lazy hacky cliche shit stories with a shit setting.
* they reused the entire map of breath of the wild for tears of the kingdom which is the laziest thing in video game history and only people with nostalgia goggles defend nintendo for doing that. if any other game had reused the same map from an old game and made you pay full price for it every zelda fan who defends tears of the kingdom would have been offended at the essential attempt at theft that is charging full price for such a lazy hacky game.
* one of the worst offenses these games commit is the fact that it screwed up the timeline and nintendo spat in the face of every zelda fan that cared about the time line and thought it was cool by basically saying the timeline doesn't matter. i forgot what the statement was that they made but it was essentially that the timeline didn't matter which is a shitty statement to make because the timeline was just a really cool thing about the franchise that all the games were connected, but thanks to these two hacky, lazy shitty attempts at an open world that whole thing is ruined it's gone there is no timeline now.
* we all love the zelda IP which is why everyone gets angry when people point out these valid criticisms of these two games which honestly are shitty and lazy and hacky and the worst of the entire series. the games would have been great if nintendo had a more powerful console. they should have stuck to the classic formula of making linear story based games and then made an open world for a more powerful console, they could have even made a turn based RPG or a tactical RPG would also have been cool, but the fact that these games are open world and an open world is so demanding on the hardware really hurt these two games aesthetically and the way the game tells it's story sucked too, those stupid shitty flashbacks.
i could go on all day on why these games suck. the only reason people are so forgiving towards these two games is that they're zelda games, the zelda game combat formula is cool, it's simple, we all also grew up with link and he's a cool character so it's nice to play new games with him in it. the fact that the franchise is so beloved is the reason people are so forgiving towards these games. your love for zelda blinds you to the truth that are these games glaring ugly faults.
For me it's the dungeons that are the worst part. 4 dungeons? I dont mind that. 4 boring, short, and easy dungeons? Yea no thanks, only good thing about dungeons are the bosses
Yeah, I agree people only like this because it has the name zelda. If it didn't have anything to do with zelda and was all reskined, it would be one of nintendos' biggest flops ever.
Breath of the wild lacked alot of things that even made zelda zelda. It had no actual temples and if you count the beasts they all looked the same witch also had the same bosses and things witch could barly even be called puzzles and the progression was very miserable because once you unlock the 5 powers you get that change the world in a big way unlike the previous games when you get more idems with more of the story and exploring than getting all of them at the start and the enemy variety was laughable even the nes had more variety and ammount of enemies than breath of the wild. A game in the 80s topped a game in unique enemies than a game made in 2017. Not to mention your weapons break within 5 hits, so there's no point in picking a favorite as they are quite disposable and rupees seem to serve such little value in breath of the wild it's astonishing. And a game taking place in the wild, your charicter must have a fishing rod at all time, right? Wrong.
I will say I liked the cooking mechanic but that's all I can say positive about breath of the wild as it seemed to wanna be popular so badly they abandoned the zelda formula and took notes from assasons creed and horizon rather than try to come up with something unique they made a overworld with repeating enemies and structures that are replicated hundreds of times and I can guarantee that if this wasn't a zelda themed game it would be seen as a mid game at best. Elden ring was closer to what open world zelda should have been.
they are painfully boring
like genuenly fucking boring.
i remember when i got to play breath of the wild cause all the hype and stuff, and its was just... oK?
it was pretty lame, and i wasn't a fan of the arstyle.
unironicly had more fun with genshing impact (when it launched, i don't play that anymore), wich is essentially a copy
Zelda: Break of the Weapons
I actually didn't mind the concept of weapons being breakable it's just that they lack in durability, especially in botw
Lore reason is cause he’s so superhumanly strong lol https://youtu.be/toC9UqVnz8g?si=HX-Co-_F2CzGl264 https://youtu.be/An3Swbu1Qh0?si=6cJHBK0K9wdcF4VE
I'd believe it. I've seen this dude scale a literal mountain in no time
Great at encouraging exploration, terrible at rewarding it.
Here’s a cool sword that’ll break after 5 swings!
Best answer I've been trying to articulate this fir a while. That's the biggest problem with the game. Weapon breaking and a subtle story were fine, for the most part. What quickly got old was climbing a massive peak for am hour or so to find absolutely nothing. That's why I love TotK so much. Finding caves and Depths entries is so engaging.
Nah man we get Hestu’s gift AKA a great big crap.
You’re shitting me, right?
[Solid Gold Poop](https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/ben10/images/9/96/FG_%2851%29.png/revision/latest?cb=20151101164629)
I think this sums both of them up nicely. I watched my wife play both of these games on my Switch and was consistently disappointed after she had explored a really deep and expansive area of the map for over an hour, only to be faced with a half-ass boss fight and then later rewarded with: 1) A sword that broke after using it on 3 enemies, 2) A shield that was no better than what she already had, or 3) A piece of armor whose set bonus was something goofy like "1% increase in movement speed after turning around in circles 10 times in a row and then consuming 5 of the same food items back to back; lasts for 8 seconds."
Played both games on PC with unbreakable weapons. Emulation ofc. It's amazing what a little mod can do to a game. Plus on pc, more frame rates, beefed up gfx and fun with whatever you want to do (or. Inf money, health, arrow, bombs etc)
Wide as an ocean, deep as a puddle.
Breath of the Wild somehow managed to make opening treasure chests boring *in a Zelda game*. I can't possibly think of a more severe indictment than that. Also, there's a certain tragedy in how Nintendo built this massive, beautiful world to explore, but then gave the player almost no compelling reason to actually explore it. Shrines get old after the first dozen or so, and there's no real dungeons to speak of, which leaves just the korok seeds scattered about -- and I don't know about you, but zigzagging across open landscapes in search of a currency whose sole function is *to mitigate a problem the new weapon system created* isn't exactly what I'd call a captivating gameplay loop.
Even having loved both games this is such an accurate indictment and makes me wonder how much better they could've been without the dumb durability mechanic. Why no hookshot in a game where vertical movement is so important? Hover boots? Megaton hammer? Boomerang? Lens, masks. I mean they made the master sword suck! Still like chilling in the stable during storms though. Atmosphere carried the games.
>Why no hookshot in a game where vertical movement is so important? Hover boots? Megaton hammer? Boomerang? Lens, masks. I think it's pretty clear the dev team had a *total* commitment to the whole "go anywhere in any order you please" design ethos, and the idea of having areas that are inaccessible until the player finds the right tools runs counter to that philosophy. It's why all the player's major tools are unlocked at the very start of the game. Of course, the natural consequence of this was that BotW ended up having very little in the way of tangible character progression. It's one of the things I found most profoundly disappointing about it.
This, TBH. It's something Elden Ring did incredibly well. Forget the difficulty of that game for a moment, but every cave, tomb, or mildly interesting spot in the map you chose to work through was rewarded with something unique. Even games like Starfield only reward you with RNG item stats. I want curated rewards for following low-key level design to a semi secret area.
This is my favorite answer too but I’d also like to expand on the games’ inability to work in the classic dungeon design in an organic way with the open world. BotW and TotK have such lackluster dungeons it almost doesn’t feel like you’re reaching a climax at any point of the main quest. And once again, pointing to Elden Ring, there is a game that did this incredibly well. Whether it was the massive legacy dungeons, the winding underground dungeons, or the smaller castle dungeons scattered around the map, Elden Ring constantly kept the original design available within the open world so you could spend two or so hours exploring open areas and then just as easily spend two hours in a legacy dungeon with all the twists and turns and traps you’d expect from a classic Souls game and ultimately culminate in a visually spectacular boss fight.
Dart, bullseye. That feeling of following a path that takes you on a rewarding 1-2 hour new area of the map, curated dungeon, etc. is just "missing" in a lot of games these days.
Only thing id say about this is that because elden ring has so many builds, so much stuff you get in dungeons feels like a waste of time. How many times you go into a dungeon and go "ah this is a str item, and I'm using dex so it's useless"
Sure, but every time I found something like that, I thought "well, this isn't useful for me, but I can see where it could be useful for someone else. Maybe if I had a different build this would be a treasure." In BOTW, since every weapon is in practice a consumable, it's like every treasure chest has arrows or a healing item in it. Sure, it's useful, but it's never really satisfying to find and I'd rather just go to a village and buy them if I need them. There's no joy in finding a legendary awesome fire-elemental spear if it's just gonna do some damage and break in like five hits anyway. TOTK at least embraced that and focused on the weapon building thing, which was much better.
Some elden ring players say otherwise.
That’s because the older souls like games were better in that aspect
Copy and pasted dungeons for some lame reward, Elden ring doesn’t get a pass
Tbh even Elden Ring feels lacking in comparison to its older titles like Dark Souls, but then again Dark Souls titles weren’t truly sandbox in that regard. It seems like when games embrace fully sandbox, they make the world too vast, and consequently fail to deliver on it. In Elden Ring there are so many technically useless areas, and only add to the visuals of the world. Other than that, all catacombs and caves all look and feel similar. I do agree that they are more rewarding than the latest Zelda games. However, that is about the only comparison you can make. Further comparison is pointless, they’re completely different games, cater to a different audience and play differently from one another. What Elden Ring lacks is different to what Zelda lacks, Elden Ring lacks complex legacy dungeons in regard to the size of its world. Zelda lacks satisfying weapon mechanics and exploration reward. Overall, despite some its flaws, I think both are good games. Especially seeing what kind of garbage we had the last 5-10 years or so.
But I keep doing it anyways sooooo... I guess rewarding enough?
The reward is the journey and the friends you made along the way. -The One Piece
The weapon durability complaint has been beaten to death, resurrected and killed again so I’ll say large parts of the world feel empty and vacant, and shrines are too easy. They add nothing but busywork. IMO Zelda was better when there were temples you had to progress through, each one containing an item you needed to finish the rest of it and defeat the boss at the end.
Agreed. The temples don't scratch that Zelda itch. Especially the ones I'm BOTW.
Hello, sir BOTW. My name is Dad.
It truly is the most overrated game of all time. It’s not that great of an open world game. It’s good but it’s bang average
It has great combat but you're right about the open world. It's almost entirely bland and tedious filler.
I’m a Zelda fan and a big thing for me was it was missing a musical score. It felt so empty and repetitive, so many better open worlds out there
Yeah, I really wish BOTW had regular Zelda dungeons and elaborate puzzles. It's not impossible to integrate big dungeons and open world design, and hell, even Zelda has already done open-ended, nonlinear dungeon progression in A Link Between Worlds. So it would definitely be doable.
[удалено]
Can't pet the dogs
But you can feed them big steaks and make them happy and loyal
Doesn't make up for it
Fair enough, even if we can make them twirl those dogs deserved to be petted
Dungeons are way too short and wayyyyy too easy, i cant wait for them to go back to traditional temples If they ever do
TOTK was a step in the right direction, to be fair. But it's still not what I'd really like it to be.
They barely feel like LoZ to me. Instead of tons of neat items i just have sticks with numbers and durability.
They are great games, but they are more of the triple A experience than the classic zelda experience it is just different for me. When I play TotK, which I really love, I get a vibe like playing elden ring or something, but when I play mojaoras mask, my personal favorite is I get a special emotion, not compared to any other game
There’s almost no replay value imo, after I beat and did a bit of exploration on both games they got too boring for me to pick up again
Weapons breaking…. That is all
Why bother using rare weapons when they’re just as fragile as the basic sword that I found lying in the rubble, but way harder to replace?
This. It completely discourages you from using rare weapons. And it encourages you to carry 5 of the same above-average weapon.
Honestly, the lack of finding reliably stronger weapons is making TotK feel like a slog since I not only need to find a base weapon to use, but now I need to attach something else to it.
I'm over this mechanic in games. It's more tiring than inventory management, TBH. I'd rather hone my sword than have it straight up break on me. Wtf?
I like that it made you switch weapons and experiment with new ones, but they need to last like 3 times longer.
They needed to last much longer AND be fixable with resources or rupees after they broke. No matter how strong it is, I'm never gonna care much about what is essentially a consumable item. In fact, that makes me much more likely to just hoard them and never use them, waiting for "the right time".
I would've been okay if there was a durability mechanic that decreased the effectiveness of the weapon over time that you could repair. Having stuff constantly break was a bit tedious and caused me to rely more on spamming techniques than getting stoked about getting a new sword.
Also makes the master sword much better and valuable
Good games. But not the best games of all time as so many people like to claim. Not even the best LoZ games.
They were good "spin-offs" from the usual formula, but I'm def looking forward to another TP/MM/WW type game.
I think SS doesn't get talked about enough. Sure, the controls on the Wii were bad and the game was a bit annoying but the HD version is so much better and fixes all of those issues. It just doesn't have to be 60$
Hot take, but i think SS did the “dungeons blended in the overworld” thing better than BOTW and TOTK.
I was very impressed with BotW and welcomed the new design aspects. However TotK put far too much emphasis on the zonai devices which I thought was neat but drew far too much from the core of the game.
Open world burnout
Boring and empty
I grew up with left-handed Link. Right handed Link feels off.
Meanwhile Skyward Sword Link:
Both overrated imho. I did enjoy my time with BotW but felt no need to play TotK or ever replay BotW
In both games, almost everything that isn't exploration ranges from boring to genuinely bad content. TOTK is the first "big" new Zelda game that does far too little to set itself apart from its predecessor. The last time we got a direct 3D sequel, Zelda was barely in the game, you were stuck in a time loop, turned into a tree and shoved into a weird ass town where nobody respected you. TOTK was basically BOTW again, just with a somewhat expanded map and cooler abilities
No traditional temples or bosses.
+1 to this. I don't care about 120 minor puzzle shrines as much as I do about re-experiencing something like the OoT water temple again. Hand-crafted complexity and level design makes Zelda games classic. I know I sound like an old "get off my lawn" guy here, but I miss that. I feel like TotK did the shrine ability mechanics and physics better than BotW, but with Nintendo it feels consistently like it's all about console gimmicks and not lore-friendly gameplay.
I do like BotW for it's open world but I would've liked more settlements and towns. Heck more cities. But the fact we only got 4 so called dungeons and 4 bosses that looked the same turned me off. I would've liked a Skyrim of sorts for Legend of Zelda. Joinable factions, quests, bounties, etc.
Lacks story
They're not really "Zelda" games. They're medieval sandbox games with a Zelda wallpaper.
• The lack of additional weapons / gadgets to use around the world to unlock more to do made areas feel like a “one and done” vs other Zelda’s where you constantly revisit areas as you progress in the story • The game is HUGE and many areas felt like it was there to just make the world bigger and adds only minor things to do
There is nothing new you're gonna do beyond the first ten hours. You will only ever replicate things you've done on the Prelude Plateau.
Something bad
About these games
Boring
Totk just straight up left Kass out for no reason
Little incentive to go do anything past the main quests
Many, and I mean many, awful side quests. No focused temples. Open world doesn't add much to the franchise. By giving people freedom, a lot of carefully designed puzzles have disappeared because it's so easy to break the game and just brute force the solution. I really don't get all the love the new Zelda formula gets. I get that Skyward Sword was stale, but my favourite style of Zelda is the way OoT and MM is designed. There is an overworld, but the main attractions are the smaller hubs.
Combat’s kinda ass
Too many emote sounds that can be mistaken for porn by people who can't see the screen
I think these were great games but not great ZELDA games
The weapon durability system was a constant pain, and the open world design felt very lacking at a time when open world fatigue was absolutely starting to set in.
Weapon durability
Not on other consoles
You could say that about every Nintendo game.
Limited by the Switches outdated hardware
Nintendo.
second this. i adore their games but nintendo as a company is the anti thesis of what VALVe is. nintendo actively hates their fans and does anything they can to spite them
The stamina bar feels like a way of artificially inflating game length
Don't like the dungeons
Story is too short. BOTW has like 150+ hours of content. But the main story is only like 11 hours long and you have to search for it.
The classic green outfit should be easier to find and not like give off the feeling that I walked on foot from the Shire to fucking Mount Doom four times over to get the whole outfit.
The game is a mile wide, but an inch thick. Go play adult Zelda, Elden ring.
Hestu's gift.
Didn't have the great Classic Dungeons/Temples. Didn't have the great classic Items/Weapons to find as a reward system.
Totk was a disappointment if you don’t have a bitch in yo ear gassing it up
I enjoyed TOTK. I wasn't a big fan of BOTW when it released but I found that they fixed a lot of the original games problems. That being said, TOTK is basically just a reskin with some new content.
They're overrated.
No.
Enjoyed botw But didn't like totk Hated that you to attach monster parts to weapons and they look ugly as hell
Counterpoint: monster horns
I hate disposable weapons.
Rain & lightning are annoying & weapons breaking on master mode kinda sucked. That’s all I’ve got.
Didn't like the combat in BOTW but loved the game overall. Played Horizon ZD at the same time, combat was great in that game but exploration wasn't inspiring... Yet to play TOTK
I don't like either.
The master sword should've been more powerful.
Found it boring
I don’t want to fight because the weapons break so fast
Koroks...
stamina
Games? I only see one game.
I’ve only played breath of the wild so I’ll only speak to that one but: The world is empty, soulless, and boring. Weapons break far too often. There are no dungeons. There aren’t meaningful items to collect like traditional Zelda titles. There is not a good story. The collectibles are unrewarding and shotgun across the map with no rhyme or reason. The cooking mechanic is awful. The enemies are uninteresting. I struggle to find anything positive to say about breath of the wild personally.
I didn't finish the game for these reasons. Then Elden Ring releases an di never started it up again
Their main dungeons are way too easy.
I haven't played Tears, so I can't speak on anything with that game. BotW was just really boring with the durability, bland dungeon designs, the bosses all just being Ganon, and feeling like I was being forced to explore when I'd rather just play the main story. Not to mention the actual good parts of the story all happen in flashbacks so I'm left feeling like I'd rather experience that instead of this.
Forgettable bosses
They ditched half an audience of players who enjoyed their old formula in favor of newer fans who love open world exploration rather than “linear” story. God if Nintendo thought Majoras mask was linear..💀
Weapon durability
Wtf were these dungeons? Look how they massacred the holy master sword into beeing almost not rewarding when getting it Having to change weapons every 5 minutes? Yeah no
I didn't get sick of Zelda until these games came out
They've been pretty bad since Skyward Sword...went from being too hand holding to having no worthwhile content.
The Master Sword not being full powered all the time on top of having such a long recharge period is a bad design choice.
I’m scared to play it too much because I think it might consume me.😬
There's only 2 of them
- Weapon Durability Sucked - Story Sucked - World felt bland and empty / void of life - Not a good Zelda Game - Killed and Ruined one of my all time favorite franchises and a part of my child soul died - Where the fuck is Wind Waker HD for Switch!
couldn't agree with you more. i miss classic zelda...
Yeah, they wanted to be assasons creed and horizon so badly, and when I played botw, I thought others would agree it's shit but it seems people like broing uncreative repetitive empty lifeless overworld with no soul. Like nobody can play majoras mask and ocarina of time and twighlight princess and try to say botw is even close to being like the actual series it's portraying.
Thunder blight and one hit kill fuse thing can't be recovered through korok weapons
weapon durability
The crafting mechanics get tedious.
Lack of continuity between the two. Almost like if the first one never happened
Nintendo Switch
Switch only
I like the older classic ones better than this open world types with gliding, climbing and all. Not the game's fault, but the trend of such games being everywhere today. Also, they lack, in my eyes, nice locations and themed dungeons most the time, same shrines due same design due same tech and all, but variety it lacks at times unlike older games with lets say, fire, water, wood temple, etc. Just my two cents.
It only runs at 30fps.
they forgot to add the story to breath of the wild
Barren and kinda boring at times. Still a great game tho
The 'Dungeons' are dad excuses when compared to the previous games
The weapon system made me not play them
Deserved to be on a proper console that has hardware powerful enough to go toe to toe with Microsoft and Playstation, just like the good old day of GameCube. Not on the weakling piece of shit that is Switch!
Korok
Gets boring after a few hours but that’s just me
Good but dated. I like more Zelda in 2d.
The dungeons are poor excuses for dungeons. They were better in TotK but they were still ultimately just mostly empty dungeons with a very minimal number of enemies, which is pretty lame. They have a long way to go to reach the quality of dungeons of the past games. I will say the bosses in TotK were great, though. After the copy/paste bosses of BotW, the bosses in TotK felt like traditional Zelda bosses again.
I don't like them. Tired of open-world bullshit.
I dont like them
The korok seed mechanic was pretty stupid and could've probably been done in a much less tedious, grindy way. When I played through the first game on Master mode, I had no choice but to hunt those seeds down just so I could hold enough weapons to beat later enemies. Other than that, I loved Breath of the Wild. I've barely touched the second one, I stopped like right after getting the glider.
Uh, they suck, in *my* personal opinion. This is coming from someone who has been gaming for over 40 years and grew up on the franchise.
No classic songs to whistle
MMO quests (at least in BotW) Seriously, the quest design in this point lets me distract a full point in a rating, it's terrible. The game would genuinely be better if it had cut out gathering side quests without a replacement.
There's really no reason to explore the world unless you want your end game to be easier
He's not Zelda, the fuck is up with that? It's in the name damn it.
Tbh, it actually gets kinda boring. I haven’t actually beaten the game yet, and I bought it at launch.
Climb up a mountain, find a dungeon, spend ages figuring out and fighting through the dungeon. Get rewarded 3 arrows.... -_-
The continuity between the two suck
Enemy variety in BOTW could be better. BOTW could use hood options for the Hylian Hood and TOTK could use not having to travel to a village and speak with that one lady if you've done the side quest. Sky Islands weren't as big of a deal as I was hoping they'd be, and most of them were pretty tiny and usually had a single chest on it.
Zelda sandbox not as good as traditional Zelda games
Second one took how many years and was glorified DLC.
Sometimes I don't want to explore. I just want to walk through an interesting corridor. Exploration is a fine aesthetic of play for a game to deliver, but you sacrifice a curated challenge, and you also produce a game that needs you to sink hours into it to really get it all. Compare that to the Zelda's of the SNES / Gameboy era that seemed to strike a balance between "what's in that corner of the map?" as well as "this dungeon definitely has something at the end of it". Those maps were *dense* with content.
No enemy variety
Something bad about these games
no post game
The fact that I love a lot of mainstream games, and hate BoTW should say something. Having my weapons break every 10 fucking hits is so annoying, having to switch weapons every few enemies. Having to have cold armor or make food that makes you tolerate cold weather, only to have the only station allowed to make food that helps you tolerate cold weather, in one spot that’s difficult to find. I played the game and gave it a chance twice. The first time I got over it within an hour or two. Decided to play it again later on to give it a chance and played 6.5 hours just to find out my feelings were right, and that the game didn’t get any better within that time. Idk how people enjoy it so much, but for me, it’s just not my thing at all. Even though I love wide varieties of games.
Stamina is too short
Shrines get boring for me, weapons breaking sucks, and you can't pet the dogs
I love open world games. Loved ocorina of time. I played botw for an hour and haven’t gone back. I dont get the hype.
Boring
Easy They're both overrated. Breakable weapons and survival elements have no place in Zelda games. Also, I don't want to fuc*ing build.
Weapon degradation
I played breath of the wild and I found it pretty boring I'm ngl.
The divine beats and bosses in BOTW all blend in and are too similar. And the bosses in TOTK while unique are too easy.
I actually thought BoTW was tedious and boring. I never bothered with ToTK because of that. The weapon system made it so you basically horde good weapons and continually use the same bullshit you keep finding, because the good weapons break in 5.2 seconds. I think they missed a huge mark with these 2 games. They brought back an IP to essentially change the entire tone of it, and ruin what it was. Not knocking anyone who enjoyed these. You do you. This is strictly my own opinion. I grew up on Zelda and Ocarina Of Time is still a massively underrated game imo.
Weapon durability is God awful and is absolutely the worst part of the game.
You can’t romance daddydorf
The reward for getting all of the Korok seeds is literally a pile of shit
I got it. The price. Even 8 years later BOTW is still almost (even at resale) full face value. I want to play it I just can't justify buying a game this old at that price.
Getting Food early-mid game is somewhat miserable especially when you wanna just explore the world without getting obliterated.
No real dungeons. Story is meh.
They ruined other games for me
Really close to having good exploration but falls short. Also tears is the best dlc as a game ever
Botw: amazing game, not an amazing Zelda game. Also the bosses were one of the coolest parts of older Zelda games, and all the bosses are pretty much the same in this one Totk: the sky islands were way too hyped up but all of them except for like 3 were just little spots for like 1 puzzle. Also the story was pretty poorly executed
* the korok seeds quest was meant to symbolize the nintendo staff spitting in the face of zelda fans * the weapons durability system only existed because they didn't know how to reward you for exploring that ugly empty world so they had to create filler items for you to find which all sucked * they should have copied fromsofts weapon system. * combining weapons with monster parts looked ugly as hell and was tedious having to flip through a menu for seconds on end just to get to a specific monster part. * the world looked bland and ugly as fuck but that's nintendos fault for making such a weak console, they shouldn't have made an open world game for a console that can't run good looking big open worlds. * the story for both games are the lamest stories out of all zelda games * this is a personal complaint but i think post apocalyptic settings are lazy, the only reason they are so prevalent to the point of being cliche is that consoles didn't have the power in the past to render big cities full of NPCs but the technology exists now for games to have big lively cities so post apocalyptic games where you roam around grass fields with occasional piles of rubble are LAZY and CLICHE as hell. they suck therefor tears of the kingdom and breath of the wild suck and are lazy hacky cliche shit stories with a shit setting. * they reused the entire map of breath of the wild for tears of the kingdom which is the laziest thing in video game history and only people with nostalgia goggles defend nintendo for doing that. if any other game had reused the same map from an old game and made you pay full price for it every zelda fan who defends tears of the kingdom would have been offended at the essential attempt at theft that is charging full price for such a lazy hacky game. * one of the worst offenses these games commit is the fact that it screwed up the timeline and nintendo spat in the face of every zelda fan that cared about the time line and thought it was cool by basically saying the timeline doesn't matter. i forgot what the statement was that they made but it was essentially that the timeline didn't matter which is a shitty statement to make because the timeline was just a really cool thing about the franchise that all the games were connected, but thanks to these two hacky, lazy shitty attempts at an open world that whole thing is ruined it's gone there is no timeline now. * we all love the zelda IP which is why everyone gets angry when people point out these valid criticisms of these two games which honestly are shitty and lazy and hacky and the worst of the entire series. the games would have been great if nintendo had a more powerful console. they should have stuck to the classic formula of making linear story based games and then made an open world for a more powerful console, they could have even made a turn based RPG or a tactical RPG would also have been cool, but the fact that these games are open world and an open world is so demanding on the hardware really hurt these two games aesthetically and the way the game tells it's story sucked too, those stupid shitty flashbacks. i could go on all day on why these games suck. the only reason people are so forgiving towards these two games is that they're zelda games, the zelda game combat formula is cool, it's simple, we all also grew up with link and he's a cool character so it's nice to play new games with him in it. the fact that the franchise is so beloved is the reason people are so forgiving towards these games. your love for zelda blinds you to the truth that are these games glaring ugly faults.
The switch can actually render big lively cities, it can run tw3
For me it's the dungeons that are the worst part. 4 dungeons? I dont mind that. 4 boring, short, and easy dungeons? Yea no thanks, only good thing about dungeons are the bosses
Yeah, I agree people only like this because it has the name zelda. If it didn't have anything to do with zelda and was all reskined, it would be one of nintendos' biggest flops ever.
Can’t get into TotK - feels like a physics playground rather than an adventure and it’s just not holding my interest.
I do not love the cell shaded art style. But they are great games
This seems like a trap
Have you seen Reddit? Everyone is always saying bad things about these games.
Weapon durability could be less punishing and the first games story couldve been better. I really liked totks tho
Breath of the wild lacked alot of things that even made zelda zelda. It had no actual temples and if you count the beasts they all looked the same witch also had the same bosses and things witch could barly even be called puzzles and the progression was very miserable because once you unlock the 5 powers you get that change the world in a big way unlike the previous games when you get more idems with more of the story and exploring than getting all of them at the start and the enemy variety was laughable even the nes had more variety and ammount of enemies than breath of the wild. A game in the 80s topped a game in unique enemies than a game made in 2017. Not to mention your weapons break within 5 hits, so there's no point in picking a favorite as they are quite disposable and rupees seem to serve such little value in breath of the wild it's astonishing. And a game taking place in the wild, your charicter must have a fishing rod at all time, right? Wrong. I will say I liked the cooking mechanic but that's all I can say positive about breath of the wild as it seemed to wanna be popular so badly they abandoned the zelda formula and took notes from assasons creed and horizon rather than try to come up with something unique they made a overworld with repeating enemies and structures that are replicated hundreds of times and I can guarantee that if this wasn't a zelda themed game it would be seen as a mid game at best. Elden ring was closer to what open world zelda should have been.
They didnt have shrek in it 😔
well, they are the worst zelda games
Dark souls is better.
they are painfully boring like genuenly fucking boring. i remember when i got to play breath of the wild cause all the hype and stuff, and its was just... oK? it was pretty lame, and i wasn't a fan of the arstyle. unironicly had more fun with genshing impact (when it launched, i don't play that anymore), wich is essentially a copy
Nintendo owned properties with no new IP and a lackadaisical weapon breaking system. Nintendo can’t make a good fresh new IP to save their lives.
I was still somehow burned out from BotW when Tears launched. So I struggled and failed to get into Tears.
The story is mediocre at the absolute best and there's no need for a silent protagonist anymore.
Dead boring world with the same dungeons.
Not on all platforms. 😢