The Legend of Zelda: Tears of The Kingdomis one of Nintendo’s most innovative titles, which is saying a lot considering the amount of genre-defining titles that the company has under its belt. Theimaginative approach to exploration, construction, and puzzle solving allows people to approach any obstacle in this massive open world from almost any angle.
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Lots of comparisons have been made between the latest Zelda titleswhich focus on surviving huge open areaswith the freedom to approach challenges in any order. There are undoubtedly a lot of improvements that Tears has made over its predecessor, but there are still many reasons to go back to Breath of The Wild, here are some of the best features exclusive to Link’s iconic first outing in an open-world Hyrule.
6Divine Beasts
One of the biggest changes Breath of The Wild made to the Zelda formula was the inclusion of huge, interconnected, mechanical buildings with various manipulative parts that Link can use to solve environmental puzzles. This replaced the long-standing dungeon, which contained difficult puzzles and boss fights that were used to split up the games into distinct sections.
The main difference, gameplay-wise, is that,in comparison to prior and former games' dungeons, divine beasts are smaller but feel larger in scope. Dungeons separate puzzles between rooms to guide attention to a particular task, whereas beasts are designed to feel like an overarching puzzle with different parts intrinsically linked to one another.
There are also aesthetic changes between the two that help with world-building, the gameplay changes are subjective in taste, but there’s no denying that Breath of The Wild certainly had more distinct architecture.
5Sheikah Towers
The replacement, Skyview Towers,focuses on puzzles surrounding Link’s abilitiesrather than the previously established climbing mechanic. Gaining these way points requires a more logical approach to puzzle solving that, while still maintaining the concept of a planned point of entry, forces players to engage with all their available options.
This change has both positive and negative consequences depending on who you ask, it allows the developers to come up with more imaginative puzzles that teach core concepts concisely. But it can also be overwhelming when presented with so many options and the linearity of these sections could cause the exact opposite problem for people that want to approach puzzles in many different ways considering the vast tools at Link’s disposal.
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Another slight change is that the new towers feel more cinematic, with an animation showing Link viewing the island from the sky after being catapulted into the air.
4Open-ended tutorials
The linearity of Tears of The Kingdom has been a big point of contention, for the number of ambitious ideas that Link’s latest adventure brings to the table, it makes sense that tutorialization is stricter this time around. However, Nintendo fans are accustomed to teaching through play rather than text, which makes their games more accessible from the offset to a wide amount of players.
It’s tricky to gauge how much of the game could have ended up working by simply allowing people to experiment and fail. Nintendo has achieved this withthe introduction of both 2D and 3D platformersto new players, and it’s fair to argue that Breath of The Wild brought more innovations to the series than any other title.
But experimentation is such a core part of the gameplay loop this time around that it could feel overwhelming for people to simply be presented with this many opportunities.
For some, the ambitious additions have made the game worse, and it’s hard to argue that the closed-off tutorial is an upgrade from prior titles. But, for the most part, the hundreds of hours former to this retain the open-ended level design while adding a new level of unprecedented freedom with in-depth mechanics.
3Stamina Spamming
Stamina has been a part of Link’s 3D adventures since Skyward Sword, it was initially used to limit actions such as running, throwing, and performing special moves within a small period of time to make the character feel grounded. Breath of The Wild made this mechanic feel a lot more useful for its implementations in large-scale abilities and the upgraded climbing system which uses stamina as a tradeoff to scale any surface.
The limitations of Link in these new situations helped develop a focus on environmental puzzles which used stamina as a vessel to plan out actions.
Stamina is a controversial addition to the series, many understand its use in convergence with other engaging elements but understandably dislike its use within Link’s initial move set as it makes simple actions more complicated. The most egregious of these is running, which makes traversing the new open-world Hyrule on foot feel unnecessarily tedious.
Breath of The Wild allowed people to circumvent this annoyance to a degree, Spamming the run button fast enough allowed anyone to run however long they wanted, to the dismay of their thumbs.
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Tears of The Kingdom does improve on the animal husbandry elements of its predecessor, allowing Link to roam the lands at the speed of a horse. And, of course, the vehicles help tremendously with traversal in any situation, but that just makes it all the more baffling to limit the run outside enemy encounters,as Hyrule is such a lovely place to explore at a leisurely pace.
It’s such a shame that it can also feel punishing when stranded in a vast landscape with no steed or vehicle materials in sight.
2Somewhat Accessible Controls
One of the most unfortunate ramifications of Tears' scope is its translation to the Switch’s control scheme, which feels overly cluttered and unintuitive, especially for those that haven’t played Link’s other open-world game. Neither game has the best controls, as each of the runic abilities requires the use of different layouts.
But the main problem comes in the form of moment-to-moment gameplay that involves equipping multiple types of items, running, jumping, climbing, attacking, defending, dodging, throwing, picking up items, and using abilities all at the same time.
Link’s base move set has inflated to such an excessive degree this time around that buttons are being doubled up for actions, which can lead to lots of frustrating deaths. On top of this, there is very little in terms of customization when it comes to the controls, which is a big accessibility problem.
Nintendo has never been the best when it comes to this issue as they often force people to use unconventional control schemes in many of their big titles, and it’s a shame that this genre-defining title continues this unnecessary trend.
1Destroyed Monuments
Sequels can end up changing things to enhance both the original and new experiences for people. The landscapes of modern Zelda titles are breathtaking, presenting the world of Hyrule in a naturalistic manner that shows the beauty of biomes through cell shading and subtle sound design.
The map is largely the same throughout these two titles, with additional areas above and below the ground in Tears of The Kingdom, butthere are lots of subtle changes in the environmentthat give context to the events between games and help each environment stand out for added replay value.
Each sound effect has been re-recorded to show how wildlife reacts differently to the new versions of familiar territories. There are now more civilizations built from the rubble-filled ground of its predecessor and a ton of added buildings and people, which shows how much Nintendo has optimized its approach to developing switch games while making a unique comparison between games.
But Breath of The Wild’s desolate, destroyed atmosphere also adds a lot of character to the environment, showing the flourishing flora and fauna that arose in the wake of human demise.
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