Breath of fresh air
(This
review contains minor spoilers!)
The
Legend of Zelda is a series that truly means a lot to many people in the
gaming industry. The games have inspired generations of players with their
captivating stories, worlds and gameplay, and the major releases have
occasionally even changed the way we look at gaming as a whole.
With that being said, every new entry
in the series needs to perform the near impossible task of doing the previous
releases one better, while also being a good enough game to be enjoyable on its
own without just being another part of the series pantheon.
Breath
of the Wild has honestly been given kind of a lucky break, being the first
major 3D Zelda since Skyward Sword received
an extremely mixed reception from fans. The developers decided to go the
complete opposite way in making Wild than
when they made Skyward, emphasising
freedom and player choice over strictly following paths and handholding.
The expectations for this game were
through the roof, with this game being delayed two whole years and being the
one and only headliner of the Nintendo Switch’s launch lineup. So with
everyone’s hopes and dreams depending on this game being a huge success, was it
worth the wait?
Most definitley. Breath of the Wild is a beautiful and incredible reimagining of the
Zelda series, being one of the most
unique open world experiences on the market right now, while at the same time
keeping the delightful charm of past installments intact. Despite this, there
are a few notable annoyances that really get in the way of the game from truly
being a legend worthy of its namesake.
The biggest feature Nintendo’s been
touting about for Wild is the
enormous open world. Is it truly one of, if not the best open world ever made? Well, that’s actually very difficult
to say. Because I played through them both at the same time I found myself
comparing this game to another recent fantastic open-world game, that being Horizon: Zero Dawn. What makes Zelda’s world unique and different from Horizon’s is that while Horizon uses its open world to create a
gorgeously fluid atmosphere throughout your adventure, Breath of the Wild uses its giant map as an incentive to explore
and discover new secrets.
The distractions in this game go way
beyond the usual sidequests you see in most games. Everywhere you go there are
mini-dungeons known as shrines to explore, stables to visit, mountains to
climb, and more and more. No matter where you are in the world there always seems
to be something new just around the corner. Gone are the days of Wind Waker and Twilight Princess with pretty big overworlds but only bits and
pieces of content sprinkles here or there. Just travelling in one direction in Breath of the Wild is guaranteed to find
you an adventure of some description.
While you’re questing, you can’t help
but notice how beautiful the game looks. It’s hard to describe how the game
looks overall, but I’d say that while it’s similar to Skyward Sword it makes that game looks horrifically ugly by
comparison. I’ve always admired Nintendo’s logic of trading in graphical
prowess for using what they have to create games with gorgeous art styles, and Breath of the Wild may be their best
looking game yet. It’s one of the most colourful games in recent memory,
popping with plenty of bright reds, blues, greens and yellows, making it just
as fun to look at as it is to play.
The music is good, but I think that’s
about as much I can say about it. Basically the entire soundtrack is composed
on piano, and unlike previous Zeldas
there really isn’t a new theme that truly sticks with the player like in other
games. Plenty of Zelda leitmotifs worm their way into the tunes, including
Epona’s Song, the Song of Time, the Hyrule Castle theme, and of course Zelda’s
Lullaby and the Zelda theme, but
there’s really no original song that stayed with me. Think about past 3D Zelda games and how many of them had an
iconic song that stayed with you throughout the game, like Wind Waker’s Great Sea theme or Skyward
Sword’s Ballad of the Goddess. Don’t get me wrong, the soundtrack is still
incredibly stellar and it really suits the tone of the game, but I honestly
found myself not remembering most of the music by the end of my playthrough.
On the plus side, I’d argue that this
game has the best story of any Zelda thus
far. It’s pretty short compared to the other games, but it is well worth the
time spent on it. The cast of characters you interact with is delightfully
memorable, and I looked forward to learning more about each of them. The best
is, of course, the bold and charming Zora prince Sidon, who accompanies you on
your adventures throughout Zora’s Domain. While you aren’t accompanied by a
Navi or Midna style partner character this time around, the friends you make
along the way make up for that loss. There’s also voice acting in this game, a
first for the series. It’s only used exclusively for important scenes, and way
more of the dialogue is delivered in the traditional text boxes, but it’s a
welcome addition whenever it pops up. Each of the actors did a great job
bringing their characters to life, with many of them perfectly embodying what I
thought a Goron or the Great Deku Tree would sound like in previous games. Don’t
ask me where this game falls in the Zelda
Timeline though, because I honestly have no idea. It’s definitely after Ocarina of Time, but which of the three
branches after that game it lies in will likely be up for debate for a long,
long time.
I’ve honestly never seen a game so
freeing as Breath of the Wild. You’re
at first confined to an area where you are given literally every single tool
you need to finish the game and taught how to use them. These are installed in
Link’s new Sheikah Slate, a tablet that looks remarkably like a Nintendo Switch
that doubles as a map, an encyclopedia and a tool for solving puzzles. The
Slate gives Link a few of his old powers, such as bombs (of which you are in
infinite supply this time around) and the camera from Wind Waker, as well as new magnetic and time-stopping powers.
These are put to use in the many
shrines dotted around the maps. While traditional Zelda dungeons are somewhat in the game, there are only a handful
of them and they behave very differently from past examples. They’re fun to
explore, but don’t expect them to top Twilight
Princess’s brilliant designs. But anyways, back to the shrines. There are
one hundred and twenty total shrines in the game, and each acts as a puzzle
room or combat challenge of sorts. Think of them as cut up parts of one massive
dungeon divided across the map. They’re all very fun to explore and solve, and
defeating each of them earns you a Spirit Orb. When you collect four of said
Orbs you can exchange them for a Heart Container or an improvement to your
stamina meter.
But the shrines and dungeons are
actually optional. If you want, as soon as you’ve finished the tutorial and are
armed with nothing but a tree branch and your underwear you can walk straight
up to Ganon’s doorstep and challenge him right there and then. But while you
can try this, having scaled Hyrule Castle twice myself I can honestly say that
it’s extremely unlikely that you’ll even make it to the giant evil warthog without
the proper gear, weapons and abilities given to you by completing the
storyline, and even if you do manage to beat the odds and come face to face
with Ganon, he’ll make quick work of you. While it’s something I’m not sure is
possible, just the fact that it’s an option makes the player feel like they’re
even more in control.
So how to you get prepared to save
Hyrule? Well, one of the main new features of the game to keep Link in fighting
shape is cooking. Gone are the days of potions and collectible hearts, replaced
by nutritious meals. Cooking is honestly one of my favourite parts about the
entire experience. What you do is collect ingredients from across Hyrule, toss
them into a pot and see what comes out. That’s basically it, and holy crap is
it ever fun. Everything turns out a different meal, and it’s so much fun to
combine different ingredients to see what happens. As the game goes on you’re
given access to more stuff that you can use to boost your stats, such as your
defense, resistance to electricity and more. The more ingredients used, the
more effective the buff will be.
You can also collect new and stronger
weapons to equip Link with, but this is unfortunately where Breath of the Wild’s biggest problem
comes into play: the weapon durability system is just one of many awful
meters that constantly get in your way of your good time.
For the first time ever, Link isn’t
limited to just a sword and bow as his main weapons. He can also use spears,
scimitars, axes, clubs and more, adding variety. The big problem here is that
every single weapon feels like it was made from plastic and glued together with
peanut butter. Diamond-infused tridents last only slightly stronger than wooden
clubs you scavenge off of enemies, up to a point where I actively avoided
fighting stuff just so I could save my best weapons for when I actually
needed them. Bosses especially tax you, as often entering with a full weapon
inventory of six or seven saw me exiting with only one or two remaining. Only
the Master Sword is exempt from this pain, but even the hero’s legendary weapon
comes with a few caveats that keep you from using it all the time.
Skyward
Sword’s infamous stamina meter also makes its grand return, and it’s just
as laughably bad here. In this game everything Link does that would require a
little bit of effort, like running, climbing, swimming and even gliding with
the paraglider takes up stamina, and he barely has any to start. I actually
tested if I could sprint for longer than the legendary Hero of Hyrule, and
guess who lasted longer? Me, the guy who doesn’t run across massive fields all
day and night and instead sits around reviewing video games! You can improve
your stamina meter by completing four shrines, but trust me when I say you’ll
usually want an extra Heart Container instead, because this game is hard.
I’m not kidding, this is the hardest
Zelda game since the original two. Even the easiest of enemies can one-hit kill
you if they catch you off guard, and there are so many unique ways to kill Link
that you could make a “Dumb Ways to Die” song about it. You can drown, fall off
a cliff, get struck by lightning, freeze to death, burn to death, get killed by
a monster, get kicked by your horse, the list goes on and on. And that’s not
even mentioning what the major bosses can do. One of them took me two days to
beat, and no, he wasn’t the final boss. Trust me when I say only true Zelda gods will be able to finish the
game without dying, and that’s with a lot of luck on their side.
So is Breath of the Wild the greatest Zelda
game ever made? No, at least not in my opinion. The weapon durability and
stamina really gets in the way more often than it should, and the difficulty at
times can be really frustrating. But that’s really all the complaints I have
about the game. The open world is incredibly engaging to explore and find
secrets in, the story is one of Zelda’s
best to date, the new cooking mechanic and shrines are excellent additions, and
the graphics really made me excited to see what else the Switch can do. So
while Twilight Princess remains the Zelda to beat for me, Breath of the Wild fits comfortably at
second place. It’s an adventure that you absolutely shouldn’t miss out on.
FINAL SCORE
9/10
Amazing
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