I wasn't sure how Nintendo would find a way to top their work in Breath of the Wild back when it came out, but I feel they have here – with years of more polish applied and refined exploration. [Issue #66 – July/August 2023, p. 71]
Tears of the Kingdom is a remarkable sequel. Not only does it improve on every single aspect of Breath of the Wild, but it expands the characters, locations, and setting in new and exciting ways. It provides the most ridiculous toolset imaginable that at every turn has left me astonished at what I’m able to achieve.
This is peak gaming. The graphics are impeccable, weapon durability was fixed from botw, heart containers are easier to get, and they added both the depths and the sky islands. Not even mentioning the abilities. Anybody who gives this a bad review is just a botw stan. Seriously, look at the negative reviews. They all compare it to botw in some way.
The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom to przygodowa gra akcji z 2023 roku opracowana i opublikowana przez Nintendo na Nintendo Switch. Gracz kontroluje Linka, który szuka Księżniczki Zeldy i walczy, aby uniemożliwić Ganondorfowi zniszczenie Hyrule.
Ultimately, the lore isn’t the main attraction, and isn’t the reason the Zelda series has endured for almost half a century. What’s more compelling is the game’s nod to the collective story of how human imagination pushes us through our toughest challenges, and sometimes sends us soaring to heights unseen.
Tears of the Kingdom handily exceeds the sky-high expectations surrounding it. It’s an instant classic — and a testament to the unmatched ingenuity of Nintendo’s game design.
Building off the foundation of Breath of the Wild, Tears of the Kingdom improves upon its predecessor in nearly every way. It's filled with wonder and discovery throughout, constantly rewarding your curiosity. New mechanics like Fuse, Ascend, and Ultrahand transform how you interact with the world and give you even more opportunities to think differently about traversal and problem solving. Temples are a good upgrade and feel more clever and fleshed out, and the new sky and underground areas are excellent and serve as stark contrasts to the surface. Some technical aspects can get in the way at times, but not nearly enough to diminish the experience. It's been a long time coming for Tears of the Kingdom, but Nintendo has once again delivered a fantastic adventure that shouldn't be missed.
Outstanding, outrageously big action-adventure that builds on the strengths of its predecessor and puts playful freedom above everything else. It offers a good mix of the familiar and the fresh and just barely misses the perfect rating.
If you’ve yet to step foot into the open world of Hyrule, Tears of the Kingdom is the best way to experience it, with just enough new ground to keep things interesting. But if you didn’t gel with the 2017 release, the story alone might not be worth the second attempt.
Hiya folks, welcome to this week's episode of "way too late reviews", where I'll be reviewing The Legend of Zelda : Tears of the Kingdom, the sequel to the legally distinct 2017 game, Breath of the Wild. There are rocks in the sky now! Seriously though, it does feel different. There are improvements, for sure. New monster types are cool, bokoblins wearing armour is cool, fusing stuff is cool, ultrahand is cool, coolcoolcool. I have some minor gripes about these things, but for the most part, the game builds on BotW with success. But there's a lot of stuff that annoys me. The intro ****. BotW's Great Plateau was a great tutorial section, it gave players a shocking amount of freedom while teaching the basics, and I just don't think the Great Sky Island works nearly as well. The sky islands don't allow that kind of freedom, and it feels restrictive. At some point I was kinda stuck, and figured I should just warp back to a different point to take a different path, but the warp ability is locked until later. Why? It's harder to navigate the islands than the plateau, and BotW has the teleport ability available eariler. Finally, I leave the islands, get back to the ground below, and I got no map. Clearly there's going to be towers, but I don't see them. Sure, Purah will tell me, but I have to spend another 10 minutes walking around talking to people before I get to check it out. Now Purah gives me the paraglider so I can be shot up into the sky from a tower to get the local map info, which is cool. But at the same time, the game doesn't really incentivize the type of exploration that made the first game so fun. The shrines are harder to see, instead of glowing a bright orange they're surrounded by this greenish mist that doesn't pop at all. I used to spend a few minutes at the top of a tower scoping the area for bright spots. Now, I jump into the air and try to pick a destination within a few seconds. Once I've hit one of these targets, I would usually end up teleporting back to the tower to start the cycle over again. I don't have a sensor, I can't see any shrines, I don't have any armour worth mentioning, I'm low on weapons, just going off isn't viable. I never felt like walking aimlessly like I did in BotW. Walking aimlessly sounds bad, but BotW actually made it good. Now, the loop of catapulting high into the sky and paragliding over to a shrine doesn't promote that relaxing, interesting, secret-discovering walking that was central to BotW. And I get it, it can't be the same as in BotW, but this new paradigm of travel rarely produces that feeling of wonder that BotW seemed to be able to dole out with such consistency: seeing a Divine Beast for the first time; catching my first glimpse of a dragon; climbing the Akkala citadel; seeing a goddamn bear. That's a hard act to follow, and I don't want to be disingenuous. But I gotta callz'em like I seez'em, and I kept seeing a game that prevented me from doing what I wanted to do. Where's my shrine sensor? I got to this tower, and it didn't work. Gotta make some porridge before buying stealth armour. A Hyrule-sized map of the Typhlo ruins (the Depths) isn't my idea of fun. Caves almost all feel and look the same. The memories don't force me discover the world like they did in BotW. Spears are OP now with fusion, and 2-handed weapons kinda ****. I don't care about Bubbulfrogs. The sky islands look cool until you've seen the same one five times. Shrine rewards are garbage, I don't want a large battery. Speaking of armour, I'm 50 hours in, where are my upgrades? I had to check a guide to activate a fairy fountain, and I needed to do 4 (FOUR!) quests to see 1 (ONE!) fairy. AND THEN I GET CHARGED TO UPGRADE!? Preposterous! Scandalous! Ignominious! In a game where random exploration should be enjoyable, why would I want to get bogged down with these restrictive quests? Why do I have to do THIS specific Main Quest event to get access to fairies? Why am I being punished for doing them out of order? BotW didn't have this, this, this video game equivalent of c*ckblocking. Why are there so many item types? Why do I need 75 pieces of armour if I only use like 5 different sets? Why can't I just put on a whole set at a time yet? Why does enemy damage seem way out of whack? Why do I need colour-specific enemy drops for upgrade when I have 75 armour parts to upgrade? I haven't seen a red Lynel in about 40 hours, how am I supposed to find its specific parts? Why are enemy horns in the codex but not fangs? Why can't I fuse items to my weapons or shields in the menu? Why can't I scroll through the menu with the right stick anymore? Why do the avatars ****? WHY WHY WHY WHYYYYY I just don't really want to return to it. I'm done with it. It's obviously not a bad game, but ultimately I gotta tell Mari Kondo that BotW sparks joy, and TotK does not.
The building system offers a very novel experience and, theoretically, can be played for a long time. However, due to the difficulty in resource acquisition (no sandbox mode), it can be quite tiring to play. Nevertheless, I've still played for over 100 hours.
I was very much looking forward to this game. But the switch in focus from the first to the sequel turned me off. I get that combat needed to be harder but I loved the more exploration focused nature of the first game. It seemed like this sequel was all about the combat system and nothing else. Sure smashing stuff together to build things is fun at first, but when you get one shot by pretty much every enemy you find it gets pretty old fast. Also stop breaking the weapons, or at least give some way to repair them. I hate feeling like I can't use a weapon because I don't want it to break yet. The original was in all way better.
TOTK is just a much worse version of BOTW but with cooler mechanics.
Story is terrible, maybe even the worst in any game I've ever played. In BOTW, the story, environments, and various vibes were what kept the gameplay repetitiveness in check. In TOTK, the story feels like nothing but repetitiveness (and insult to the player's intelligence).
Even the repetitive gameplay itself is more repetitive in TOTK, with much less effort going into creating a unique experience for each location -- despite already having the locations set up. What variety there is feels novel for about 1 or 2 minutes before it becomes clear it is going to be the same gimmick for the rest of the experience.
SummaryAn epic adventure across the land and skies of Hyrule awaits in The Legend of Zelda™: Tears of the Kingdom for Nintendo Switch™. The adventure is yours to create in a world fueled by your imagination. In this sequel to The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, you’ll decide your own path through the sprawling landscapes of Hyrule and the ...