Tears of the Kingdom: Fixing & Repeating BotW | Analysis, Critique, and Video Essay
This is an analysis and video essay on The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom where I examine the game's core identity, and question if this new direction for the Zelda series has worrying implications. If you enjoyed the video, please consider liking, subscribing, and sharing with others.
Introduction: 0:00
Weapon Durability and Fusion: 3:08
Shrines and Ultrahand: 6:52
Shrines - Flaws: 11:02
Dungeons: 14:28
Exploits - Bosses and Introduction: 18:54
Exploits - Shrines: 23:27
Exploits - Further Examples: 30:11
Exploits - Counterarguments and Conclusion: 32:42
Story: 37:23
Conclusion - Freedom Fits All?: 42:49
Conclusion - The Potentially Worrying Future of Zelda: 46:18
amogus: 49:42
========= CREDITS =========
All rights belong to their respective owners. I neither own nor represent any of the intellectual properties used in this video.
-- Research Sources --
~ In the video ~
"Interview: Tears Of The Kingdom And The State Of Zelda With Aonuma And Fujibayashi"; gameinformer.com; Brian Shea; May 12, 2023.
www.gameinformer.com/intervie...
"A conversation with The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom’s creative leads"; theverge.com; Charles Pullman-Moore; May 12, 2023.
www.theverge.com/23721063/zel...
"Ask the Developer Vol. 9, The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom-Part 4"; nintendo.com; May 11, 2023.
www.nintendo.com/whatsnew/ask...
The entire nintendo.com interview series was used for research.
~ Other sources ~
"Creating Tears of the Kingdom (SPOILERS) Eiji Aonuma, Hidemaro Fujibayashi interview"; Mark Santomartino; May 12, 2023.
• Creating Tears of the ...
"The making of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild - The Beginning (Part 1)"; Nintendo UK; March 14, 2017.
• The making of The Lege...
"[ENG] GDC 2017 - The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (Fujibayashi, Dohta, Takizawa)"; Lega Hyrule; November 15, 2021.
• [ENG] GDC 2017 - The L...
-- Songs Used (In Order) --
A link to the video's soundtrack, in order, can be found here: • TotK Video Soundtrack
Korok Forest - Day (BotW)
Lookout Landing - Main (TotK)
Kakariko Village - Day (BotW)
Dragon Roost Island (The Wind Waker)
Shrine of Trials (BotW)
Tallon Overworld - Main Theme (Metroid Prime)
Gerudo Town - Day (BotW)
Null Moon (Silent Hill 2)
Water Temple - The Great Wellspring of Hyrule (TotK)
Lightning Temple - The Mural's Myth, Risen from the Sands (TotK)
Mucktorok (TotK)
Colgera (TotK)
Groose’s Theme (Skyward Sword)
Phendrana Drifts (Metroid Prime)
Twilight Sniping (Metal Gear Solid 2)
Stray Sheep (Catherine)
Black Market (Shin Megami Tensei IV)
We Are Finally Cowboys (No More Heroes)
Shrine of Light (TOTK)
Heaven's Night [In-Game Version] (Silent Hill 2)
Gleeok Battle (TotK)
Pirates (Wind Waker)
Shibuya: Underground District (Shin Megami Tensei IV)
Battle - Shrine of Light (TotK)
Shinjuku: Underground District (Shin Megami Tensei IV)
Greenpath (Hollow Knight)
Gloom's Lair (TotK)
Demon Dragon (TotK)
Tranquility (Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors)
Riding - Day (BotW)
Temple of Time in the Sky (TotK)
Abandoned Mine (TotK)
Corridors of Time (Chrono Trigger)
~ Musical Credits ~
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
Manaka Kataoka, Yasuaki Iwata, and Hajime Wakai
The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom
Manaka Kataoka, Maasa Miyoshi, Masato Ohashi, and Tsukasa Usui
The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker
Kenta Nagata, Hajime Wakai, Toru Minegishi, and Koji Kondo
Metroid Prime
Kenji Yamamoto
Silent Hill 2
Akira Yamaoka
The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword
Hajime Wakai, Shiho Fujii, Mahito Yokota, and Takeshi Hama
Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty
Norihiko Hibino and Harry Gregson-Williams
Catherine
Shoji Meguro
Shin Megami Tensei IV
Ryota Kozuka, Kenichi Tsuchiya, and Toshiki Konishi
Hollow Knight
Christopher Larkin
Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors
Shin Hose
Chrono Trigger
Yasunori Mitsuda and Nobuo Uematsu
My biggest problem with TotK was the reusing of the map. Most of the game to me just felt like replaying BotW and imo this is the first game in the series that almost completely lacks its own identity.
Completely true. And when you also have a lot of the same UI, sound effects and music, it really becomes hard to tell the difference. The reason to reuse the map would only make sense if they had filled that same map with so much new content that it felt justified. Like new towns or other one-off elements where there was nothing before that would make the map feel populated and varied - which was the biggest thing to fix from Botw.
They should of focused on Remixing the Map in more Meaningful Ways instead of Taking on a bunch of junk like the Sky and Depths and focused on making the map feel more distinct. Like there could of been SO much more interesting things going on. Or simply make a new map. The time it took to make the sky and depths combined could of been better spent just making a new map, designed with this game’s mechanics in mind.
@@T-Dawg75 After I had been playing the game for about 20 hours and found a little over 10 Lightroots I thought to myself "There doesn't seem to be a whole lot to do down here." And as I continued exploring The Depths I realized just how right I was. Pretty much the only reason I ever went down to The Depths was to farm Zonite or if there was a Lightroot that was nearby already exposed areas of the map and I knew *exactly* where it was. The closest The Depths ever get to actual content is the Kohga series of sidequests, and even that just tells you where Ganondorf is which is redundant because he's literally in the first place most people would think to look anyway.
@@HunterStiles651 yeah-i personally find Activating the Lightroots weirdly addictive (it’s satisfying slowly lighting up the map) but not only am i in the Minority, that’s like the MAIN thing to do down there. And they don’t exactly give you Spirit orbs. There should of been Actual Shrines down there, because after activating like 37 of the things…not only is it not at all varied in environments, but there’s just not enough happening. It’s just a giant empty space, filled only with wasted potential.
Exactly! With sequels like Phantom Tracks or Majora's Mask, they had some returning mechanics, and a some similar aesthetics and story beats, but on the flipside, they also had their own host of unique mechanics, featured completely new regions, and even took a break from the classic Ganon vs Link stuff we see in every other game otherwise (aside from Skyward Sword). They not only justify, but take advantage of being a direct continuation of the previous title Meanwhile, when TTOK reuses the map, it needs to come up with things like all new shrine and quest locations, dungeons, and the fuse mechanics, for a region that fundamentally can't properly support these things, because they were designed with BOTW in mind. Notice how some areas feel empty now that the shrine or quest they were built around in BOTW is gone, or how every dungeon, or new monuments like the Yiga hideout or labyrinths, are all either in the Depths or the Sky, save one.
Your long section on cheesing the shrines was exactly why I actually prefer the shrines in Breath of the Wild. The new abilities in Tears are AMAZING, but way too powerful when combined for puzzle solving. I just found so many of Tears' shrines to be trivially easy, whereas the more limited ability in BotW made shrines more challenging and satisfying.
I appreciated that more of the shrines had *something* unique from time to time, whereas BOTW's shrines were so agonizingly boring and simple. In BOTW you only cheesed the shrine puzzles because you wanted to get them over with quickly. In TOTK you cheese them because there are so many ways to do so, and that can be fun on its own. Anyone who never played BOTW is gonna have an incredible experience because they won't have that 'been there done that' feel us returning players did.
Something I feel is worth noting about shrines is it can be hard to tell if the solution you're trying that isn't working isn't working because it's not correct, or if the ultrahand build required is just being finicky/precise and you're just bad at getting that precision. This is actually what happened to me in the Forward Force shrine you mentioned. For the second puzzle, I was absolutely convinced that the solution was to make a car that drives along the wall instead of the floor. So I tried it. It didn't work. In a more traditional Zelda game, that would have been the end of that line of inquiry. But because Ultrahand can be so finicky, I assumed I had built it slightly wrong and kept trying the same solution over and over again to repeated failures. Eventually I got frustrated and went with a cheese solution, completely missing the actual intended solution. This video was my first exposure to the actual solution and it makes me somewhat frustrated that it was so hard to tell what I was doing was wrong compared to other Zelda games.
I had a similar experience in the shrine where you need to cross a massive pool of lava; the game gives you a water hydrant and a fan, so I thought to combine the fan and hydrant, push the hydrant upstream while it was active, and then use recall on the platforms being generated. I got this working eventually but it was pretty finicky (I think the intended solution is to make a platform with the water and then attach a fan so you make a lava boat of sorts). I think it's hard (if not impossible) to reconcile having more free form, physics based problems without these potential irritations though; it's an inevitable flaw attached to the emergent type of gameplay.
28:14 It's basically like that bit in Ed, Edd 'n Eddy where Double-D asks Dumb Ed to solve a maze and Dumb Ed rams through all the walls in a straight line.
Great video! However, I do disagree with you regarding fusion improving weapon durability. Many of the strongest materials come from mini bosses which means unless you are fighting another miniboss which can provide you material of equal value, you are still losing value if you use them against normal enemies which are most of the game's encounters. In the end game, I primarily used silver bokoblin/lizal horns for melee because they are the most efficient fusions for most encounters and are easily obtainable. I only used the rare fusions specifically for bosses. I also just used the fusions with the biggest damage output and not the ones with unique properties since I found out that is actually most effective way to fight enemies. I think TotK's system still suffers the same problem as BotW except now you have additional steps to do the same thing because of fusion. You are also now not only losing the material but also the base weapon which feels even worse than using just the weapon, increasing loss aversion. It doesn't help that the menu system is extremely clunky especially in the late game, making obtaining new weapons tedious. But I ended up just using bows for most of the game because how op they are as you mentioned and allowing the sages to do my fighting since I can defeat the enemies without sacrificing any durability. In all honesty, I hope we go back to a permanent item system maybe one similar to Monster Hunter. Let crafting materials be the primary reward to craft permanent weapons/armor which then can have a whole upgrade system that will give incentives for players to continue exploring/fighting. Weapons found in the wild can be used as a "base" for the player to upgrade upon. For balance, just tie the ability to wield them with hearts like the Master Sword. Essentially, we are treating weapons more like Pokemon rather can consumables which still encourages exploration while retaining a sense of progression that breakables weapons could never fully achieve.
32:40 Surprised you didn't mention that Eyeball Arrows also negate even the necessity of bullet time. Not only do they practically always bullseye, they will follow the Gleeoks into the air as they ascend to do their super move, and usually knock them down before they can get away. A single keese swarm + bomb arrow = a dozen eyeballs at least, so they're very easy to stockpile.
I hadn’t even thought to do that, that kind of reinforces my point of “if the developers removed Bullet Time, Gleeoks could probably be cheesed in some other way that would become just as routine.” I thought the automatic homing items were really silly so I rarely used them
@@jackdonsurfer Before using the eyes I had actually found Gleeoks to be the most challenging enemy, for all the reasons you mentioned, but I found it difficult to precisely hit its three heads, and once it retreated to the sky I couldn't easily get to him. But once you realize eyeball arrows are homing, every single one can be dispatched without even needing any kind of precise aim. Kinda crazy how unbalanced combat becomes with just a few fusion combos.
Something very different about the series for BotW and TotK to me is that that I want to get the dungeons and puzzles over with rather than experience them. The terminal thing for dungeons and the natural inclination to cheese mini challenges in shrines just really tarnish what I considered best aspects of Zelda
I feel like gloom/Ganon's curse on Link's arm could have been used as a cooldown/ability timer to help avoid cheesing. Then Rauru's blessing at the end of puzzles or objectives would remove or temporarily restore them.
I think some kinda upgrade being unlocked along the way (outside of hearts/stamina) would be cool but ultrahand puzzles would be insanely annoying with a cool down and a lot of recall puzzles straight up wouldn’t work. Some kind of restriction in certain areas to avoid that cheesing would be great though
@@jackdonsurfer I hear ya. Great video, btw!
what also sucks big time is that there's essentially no fanfare for fully purifying the malice from Link by doing all shrines. you get a pat on the back and the final reward chest just materializes in the temple of time. no explanation or anything further
I don't think cool down timers are a good idea it just adds a lot more waiting. In most cases I would recommend something like finite charges or resources that can only be replenished in certain locations or under specific circumstances but for this game I don't think it's really possible to avoid cheese since the tools you use to solve puzzles are the same tools you cheese with so removing them or limiting them will just make engaging with these puzzles longer more annoying or even impossible.
Aonuma may consider cheating fun, but when the game makes cheating so easy, it ceases to be fun for a lot of people. Him saying that making puzzles with 1 solution being design of the past really is off putting to me and makes me so un-enthusiastic for future Zelda games that I genuinely don't think I'll bother picking up any future games in the series until they can prove to me that they aren't easily exploited sanboxes that barely qualify as games. Sure, sandboxes are great for people who want to make their own fun, but most games get their fun from figuring out what you can do within their limited set of rules and capabilities. If your goal as a game designer is to remove limits then you're no longer making a puzzle or adventure game, you're making a toy for people to do whatever they want with. For me, that's not what I ever wanted to come to Zelda for, and it still isn't. This mindset really throws a lot of old fans under the bus for mainstream, blue ocean popularity. Good for Nintendo for finding a more financially lucrative model, but I really feel like it's a stab in the back to all the people they thanked with that hidden message in their pro controllers thanking all gamers
I actually think Tears of the Kingdom does many things a lot worse than BotW. The whole Ultrahand thing feels finnicky and makes solving shrine puzzles a lot more cumbersome compared to BotW. The Fuse system gives you more menuing and pace-breaking pausing to deal with.
I agree with he Ultrahand statement somewhat but 100% agree with fuse. They should've allowed you to fuse arrows beforehand because it's impossible to shoot an arrow with a 6 second pause in between each shot.
It really baffles me that people say that Fuse fixes BotW's weapon durability, when objectively it makes it actively worse. Since it's just the same system from BotW with extra, pacing-breaking steps. Its only saving grace is that part effects add for some interesting new functions for the shield*, but the whole thing is one step forward, two steps back. * Not the weapons, though, since the effects are all the same ones from BotW, again, in an "extra steps" kind of way as well.
That’s because you’re not good at the game.
@@DanielMazahreh It's pretty much impossible to not be good at the game. I don't believe you ever experienced a game that actually challenged you. You have no idea what "not being good at a game" even means.
@@Thirteen13551355 Watch the video again & listen to the incompetent gamer’s dialogue full of illegitimate criticisms and gameplay footage. There’s so much the player could’ve done to improve.
Great video and I completely agree. The only reason I had fun with my first totk playtrough is because BotW taught me that the game just let's you cheat yourself out of the experience. So in TotK I made sure to try to find the intended solution to puzzles and never cheat. I don't think this is ideal at all and they should return to giving more restrictions imo
The memories are weird. I followed the quest to the Forgotten Temple and saw the symbols in order so I instinctively did the entire thing in order. I totally understand that people did it out of order and I agree that it's a frustrating element of design. I got them in order because I anticipated this problem, but it really shouldn't have been a problem to begin with.
Honestly, this style of storytelling probably would have benefitted from each memory being unlocked one after the other instead of in any order you wanted.
I'm only 10 seconds in and I just want to say I really appreciate things like that comprehensive spoiler warning. Not that other videos don't do it, but I never seen one so detailed before.
I think you put my exact feelings about the game and this new direction for the series into words.
I think we need to save Marin from being trapped as a seagull forever !
Woops I think I shot her for bird meat
The only issue I have with the ultrahand-recall combo is that recall has such a larger range than ultrahand. If they had the same range, the combo would still be incredibly useful, but wouldn't break as many puzzles. You could still be determined to do it that way, but it wouldn't always be as easy. Also, why make the targets bombable? That actually annoyed me and it would have been easy to just not program it that way.
I kinda liked being able to use recall on objects that were hundred of meters away, it made it possible to recover objects that had accidentally fallen from the sky amongst other things. But yeah, the puzzles definitely needed more balance. Maybe the range could be changed only inside shrines or something similar
it's not that the targets are bombable so much as the game treats any incoming physics projectile as if it's the 'puzzle ball'. I wonder if at one point all shrines were supposed to take away your inventory, but then they eased up and only applied that to the survival challenges.
If we would have gotten a new Hyrule, new costumes, weapons, music, enemies (too many reused) I would have been very happy with this game. This is glorified dlc, let's face it. Very good and elaborate dlc, but not enough new to feel like a new game.
I find myself caring less about the Zelda series because I disagree with many of the choices it is making. I liked BotW but TotK doubled down on many of its worst aspects and presented these parts as the way that things should be going forward. Players wanted better dungeons so the developers were like "okay, we'll allow the dungeons to be as good as they can be... within our new framework." But why did they need to keep the framework? Nobody liked the divine beasts but the developers are convinced that this system is the right direction to go in. Players wanted a better story so the developers tried fitting a linear story into the existing nonlinear framework. This allows the player to see cutscenes that spoil everything before they see the buildup that makes the scenes have weight to them. If the zelda team really wants to tell a nonlinear story they can look at something like 13 Sentinels for inspiration... But let's face it, they don't have the storytelling chops to pull that off. Personally, even looking at this story in its intended order, I really do not think it's very good. The Zelda team is so committed to freedom that they're refusing to put in some linearity that would make the game way better. But their ideas for nonlinearity are failing to evolve beyond "activate x number of terminals" and "collect x number of memories". If they want to prove nonlinear dungeons and storytelling in a Zelda game can work, they are welcome to do so, but so far they have only hinted at the idea that it doesn't work. And the small amount of linear segments in TotK are some of the most fun, so really what's the issue here? What's the problem with tightly designed linearity? It's like the fans are asking the developers to simply make the games better and they're responding with "But that doesn't fit our design philosophy". If people think Skyward Sword era Zelda team was stuck in their old ways, then they're stuck in their old ways now as well. If these complaints keep falling on deaf ears with the Zelda team it's going to be very hard to not lose interest entirely.
This is 100% on the money. I hope Nintendo doesn't think "everyone loved BotW, let's rigidly stick to what made that game work" because, as you mentioned, there are many points where the excessive freedom doesn't work.
@@jackdonsurfer I expect and hope the Zelda team learns from past mistakes, because it is this stubborn mentality of “Ocarina of Time was so well received, so nothing has to change” that led to the utter mediocrity of Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword.
"What's the problem with tightly designed linearity?" Nothing, but in the industry, specially Western video game designers, there is this notion than linearity is always inherently inferior to non-linearity because non-linearity is what allows the thing that Western video game designers consider the be all, end all of video games as a medium: player agency. Linearity is fundamentally opposed to player agency, so it has to go. And if you aren't willing to let it go, you better do something to compensate, like for instance, allowing for player expression through combat, or by writing a good story. But not any "good story" for the common gamer. A "good story" that would be accepted by university professors, and allow video games to be finally accepted as high art by old people with art degrees.
@@XanderVJ Nintendo is an eastern dev
Except the dungeons are even worse than the divine beasts because you can climb on and ascend through everything, meaning you completely lose the puzzlebox design of the divine beasts.
You made a lot of great points in this video. Personally I have always disagreed with the idea that Breath of the Wild was a good modern version of Zelda 1. On the surface that might seem true, but when you consider the game as a whole I think it failed pretty miserably at that goal. For me the magic of Zelda 1 was its challenge in both exploration and the dungeons, and its soft linearity. You couldn't instantly go to any area of the map, instead the areas would open up one at a time and you would need certain items or special knowledge to access certain areas. The dungeons could sometimes be beaten out of order, but they got progressively more challenging and had a clear difficulty curve. This all made finding new areas and beating dungeons feel meaningful, because it required skill and perception. Almost all of this was gone in BotW. Ironically the exploration is at its most challenging at the the start of the game at the Great Plateau when you have no Sheikah Slate abilities, no paraglider and almost no health. After that it is pretty much trivial to go to any place you want in the game. There is practically no challenge to the exploration of the game because of the extremely lenient save system and the broken health and armor systems. Once I realized that the shrines are pretty much the only reason to explore the map, and most shrines were very unfulfilling to me, my interest in exploring the world completely died out. I think that BotW's commitment to absolute freedom was a misguided idea and hurt the game a lot. I would have vastly preferred if the world was smaller and more dense (and had proper level design), and if the game meaningfully prevented the player from reaching certain areas without certain items or very high skill. I think exploration should require planning and improvisation to some degree, and being able to reach new areas should feel special. One way to do this would be only being able to save at certain locations, and for example only being able to cook and change clothing at stables, and only being able to hold maybe 5 cooked items at a time. After the mid-game in BotW engaging in enemy camps became completely meaningless, which was very dumb. There should always be a mechanical incentive to engage with the enemy camps. It would have been very cool if there were 8-10 proper, large dungeons in the game, but the player would have to find them on their own in the overworld. They could have been more in the style of Zelda 1's and A Link to the Past's dungeons with proper combat challenges, since the 3D dungeon design got quite rigid in the later games. I am very disappointed if the style of BotW and TotK is the blueprint for future Zeldas. Zelda games should be elegant and respecting of the player's time and intelligence, they shouldn't make the player collect a million pointless things that have no mechanical value. I think that an actually good modern reimagining of Zelda 1 would be very exciting, but at this point I have basically zero faith in modern Nintendo being able to make a game like that.
I agree with a lot of this. I think the difficulty in Zelda 1 is largely artificial, especially in regard to exploration, where bombing every wall/burning every tree is more tedious than it is difficult. Games back then often expected players to read the manual and guides though, so some of the cryptic difficulty players experience today is definitely because they aren't playing the games in the way they were intended, which isn't really the player's fault. A common opinion that I've seen (that I also agree with) is that BotW and TotK are both games that get worse the longer you play them, and I feel this way about the majority of open world games too. They seem too eager to indulge the player into a comfortable, complacent experience instead of pushing players to be engaged the whole time, and one unbalanced mechanic (like meals) can completely tarnish everything else in the game. And I definitely agree, I want the next games to be scaled down a solid amount. Openness is really exciting at first (I still remember being blown away by the Great Plateau's size, only to open up my map and realize how comparatively tiny it really was) but that appeal loses it's luster pretty quickly. Quality of content should always be prioritized over quantity.
@@jackdonsurfer Yeah, I am not a fan of some of the overly cryptic elements of Zelda 1 either. Still, I like how genuinely challenging some of the later dungeons are and how the overworld opens up bit by bit through exploration. Hyrule feels truly alive and mysterious despite Zelda 1 being a relatively small NES game.
@@atmatey i kinda disagree, i think the freedom to go everywhere and explore at your own pace is amazing and should definietly stay, BUT important areas should be blocked off either through strong enemies or locked because you dont have a certain item yet, things like that to actually create a sense of progression. why do they give us all the abilities at the start instead of one by one by solving each dungeon? that would be way better and then you can go back and do the challenges and explore areas you coldnt access before with that new item you just gained.
Don't sell Ocarina of Time Ganondorf short. Sure, he may not be seen doing much, but he causes all of the curses on the dungeons to happens and is felt throughout the story from the very opening, both in Link's dream as foreshadowing and looming over everything as the Deku Tree warns Link that he died because of the curse from Ganondorf. Plus, the guy plays his own theme music on the organ as you climb his castle, which is kinda peak gaming badassery. He's a lot less shallow than this one ends up being, as he seemed to be a spark notes version of OoT's Ganondorf in the flashbacks, with some motivations related to fulfilling his duty as King of the Gerudo, but he kinda throws all that away to be evil rules man cause he can't stand someone beating him and he must win and kill the hero because he is the ultimate evil blah blah nothing villain. I'm not saying OoT Ganondorf wasn't just some blah blah evil guy at the end, but he had a lot more lore around him and commentary on how he changed and influenced others around him over the course of the game. This one kinda just hit a handful of highlight moments. Attack the kingdom for no apparent reason, knee before the Hyrule King to gain his favor, immediately make the king who said he'd take advantage of this to keep a closer eye on him look like a fool as he let's his wife get killed immediately (not really a Ganondorf commentary, but yeah, Ganondorf makes Rauru, Zelda, and all the sages look like idiots, they couldn't even stop him from murdering one of them, who had all powerful secret stones, letting him get his hands on one and transform for no apparent reason and become even more all powerful than them), and then Ganondorf goes to war and waits under the castle like an idiot waiting to fight Link and prove he's the best. So dumb. At least the OoT one was chilling in his actual throne room partaking in his favorite hobby of playing ominous music for anyone approaching him to hear, lol
Besides, in ocarina of time he not only was behind the curses of the dungeons. He also tricked Link into opening the Door of Time so he could even get the Triforce (or at least the Triforce of Power) and rule for seven years. And even in the end he knew that Link would lead him to Zelda who was hiding as Sheik. He's a much better villain than this joke of a Ganondorf.
@@chrischl8003 I will give TOTK's Ganondorf some benefit as he does have a physically imposing presence, and a pretty fun boss fight. As far as characterization goes however he is the worst Ganondorf in the series by a country mile. His motivation boils down to the line"A King must rule"... because a king must rule i guess? And if you ask me it makes zero sense why one guy with a sacred stone absolutely stomps 6 other people also wielding secret stones. I swear TOTK's story is like watching a long running series, but all you get to see is the recaps at the start of each episode and none of the details beyond that.
The way you articulate yourself and make us understand your point of view is very entertaining. Glad to see you posting again!
Man, this was a great video. I really appreciate how in depth you went on so many complex parts of this massive game, when a lot of videos I see just summarize things and throw in a couple random opinions. This is the kind of video game discussion I often search really hard for. Keep it up!
Welcome back. Good to see you again
I was thinking the same thing about how some of the characters are one note. Some of them get more of their character shown if you do a side quest involving getting photos of ancient Julian text found on flower shaped islands.
Zelda 1 still has item progression and a strong focus on dungeon. Thats why I completely disagree with comparing it with BotW where you can do almost anything in any order and dungeons are optional and comparable to mini dungeons in other games.
totaly agreed, this game consumed a lot of my time, 215+ hours to be exact, and during this time playing I managed to accomplish a tone of monotonous missions where I grab something and deliver this to npc. just so boring… LoZ can be better than this.
not gonna lie I didn't expect this channel to post again. Its a pleasant surprise to be sure!
That was an amazing video! I am so glad I subscribed all those years ago when I saw your Pokemon video. Thanks for making such a great analysis!
Great review. I beat the game recently and I'm finally letting myself watch reviews, this is the one that captured the way I felt the most. The game's this fascinating blend of exhausting economic design, harmful amounts of player freedom, absolutely sublime beauty, and some of the best quest design in a Zelda game. It's great, it's bad, it's mixed? It has high highs and low lows. It's just phenomenally *weird* for a BOTW sequel, and I dig that about it.
Hella clear in explaining your points as always. Glad to see you back, Great vid!
Apparently the wheel Zonai device was too complex for my brain. Forward Force was a shrine I struggled with and didn't learn the intended lesson. The second one on the rail I couldn't get the wheel to properly roll along the wall which is what I thought was intended, when that failed, I opted to use a carrier with a rocket. Then on the water portion, I simply made a super long bridge with all the wood pieces, and was able to ultra hand carry the orb on the bridge - so no wheel even used as I never considered the option you show in the video.
If TOTK was a fresh new game i would be more forgiving. But they had 6 years and most every asset ready to go before production even began. The fact that so few improvements were made over the BOTW formula, and seemingly all effort was put into Ultra hand is baffling to me. Nearly everything good i have to say about it is undercut by something negative and you outlined many key issues i have with this game over the course of this essay. IMHO TOTK is a game that fails to recapture the sense of discovery and exploration that BOTW captured, while simultaneously failing to incorporate elements from the usual Zelda formula in any sort of meaningful way. It falls apart under the weight of it's own philosophy of player freedom. As someone whose played every Zelda title and who considers The Legend of Zelda to be my favorite series in gaming, If TOTK is the direction they want to take all future Zelda, then i want no further part in it.
Ninetendo literally said going forward they are done with the btow formula...calm yourself.
@@anthonykarnes6804no, they said they were done with the current map of Hyrule. The blueprint for open air is staying.
Someone seems to be awaken from his slumber.Welcome back
Nah I just remembered my password
How do you not go crazy stitching together all this footage lol
You think I didn't go crazy??? Seriously though, I made a bunch of notes on what events happened in each part of my footage (cmd + f came in clutch) and created a ton of spreadsheets to keep track of what parts of the video needed footage. So if I had a few "holes" (sections where I hadn't found fitting video) I'd take note of it, and I compiled all of that into a checklist on google sheets and then went back into the game and specifically got footage of the things I needed if I couldn't find it in the rest of my playthrough
Silent Hill 2 music! Nice Bro! 👍🏻 EDIT: and Chrono Trigger ^_^
With Aunouma’s quote about problem solving- I agree with him under 2 condition- the “intended” solution to the problem must be clear and difficult in order for exploiting it to feel good. Often in TOTK, I couldn’t even see a puzzle, just an another obstacle, not unlike a generic mountain in the over-world. I didn’t get any satisfaction from “cheating” or cheesing these solutions. Honestly, many challenges in this game made me feel dumb because I couldn’t even see the puzzle and therefore felt like I was missing a game moment. Resorting to the path of least resistance (ie hoverbike or ultra hand, recall, ascend) in these moments did not make me proud, it made me resentful.
i really like both of these games but I don't think the formula can survive a third game without some major overhauls
The whole point of BOTW was to change up the Zelda formula that admittedly to a degree had become a bit stale over the years. To BOTW's credit it did improve upon the sense of exploration in the overworld to a huge extent, but it came at the cost of many great things about the traditional formula. TOTK is proving that once you take the rose tinted glasses off this new formula has already grown stale after just two games, and will definitely have to change things up if they don't want to loose a lot of long time fans.
I agree with almost everything in this video but the divine beasts were better in every way and not in a subjective way either (talking about the puzzles themselves not the bossfights)
That exploit was actually EXACTLY how I completed Forward Force
Thanks for another great video! I definitely agree with your points on exploitation within these past Zelda games. I went into Breath of the Wild completely blind, and swore to myself I would never fast travel, and I think I can attribute these two compromises with a lot of my enjoyment. Not knowing a lot of the mechanics before hand and being forced to run or ride my horse to new, challenging locations was difficult and fun. I mean, looking at speedruns of BOTW shows how truly broken the game is (what game isn't), but choosing not to use these exploits or simply not knowing them shows what the original design was intended to be. But to be honest, in subsequent playthroughs I abused the heck out of whistle sprinting and the likes, so I can definitely appreciate the freedom to exploit the game. I don''t think it's an inherent fault of a game to have exploits, and sure major ones that damage the game should be removed, but I think it's kind of fool hearty to try and remove every glitch from such a game. Maybe that is an issue of scale, like you mentioned in the latter parts of the video, but I can see both sides of rigid game design and the goofy freedom being someone's primary enjoyment of the game. Thanks again for the video, hope you're doing well!
if a player's exploitation of intentionally-made-available mechanics - especially mechanics made available for the player-known, express purpose of *enjoying the feeling of working an exploit* - is diminishing gameplay enjoyment - then at that point, responsibility for curating enjoyment falls to the the player. totk's player agency is intentionally tuned ridiculously high, so that the player sort of enters the designer room and is able to curate the gameplay experience within their preference. this becomes really complex from the designer's point of view, because they've already made once a very bold decision to open the can of worms and let the player in on the curation experience. then the power fantasy transcends the narrative space. from your critique, what is then the designer's responsibility? now they must put limitations around their desire to remove limitations, for players who cannot resist the urge to exploit everything constantly? I have seen this critique several times this year and I find it so interesting. if you're very good and smart at the game, you are put in the luxurious position of making your own fun. I guess it is like in speedrun communities, where in the spirit of good fun, certain avenues of play are intentionally blockaded by savvy players in order to keep the fun & challenge "honest", something like that. like, try beating a gleeok without bullet time, or without keese arrows. refuse to allow yourself the hoverbike, or arbitrarily cap your battery capacity. I guess to sum up, your critique here is in my view 110% to the game's credit. I guess I am reminded of that DOOM Twitter exchange: @DOOM: The new ice bomb will let you freeze demons in place in DOOM Eternal. @Otakugear: Will we have an option to turn off that canon and play classic? like good old times? @DOOM: you control the buttons you press
Thanks for the thoughtful comment. A lot of this discussion gets tricky because a player's psychological relationship with a game is very complex and individualized, but I also find that relationship to be the most important part of game design. This core idea you're discussing is really a matter of preference, but I'll go deeper into some of the problems I have with it: Consider this thought experiment: imagine if, during shrines, a player could pause, scroll through the menu, and select a "Skip Shrine" button that allowed them to get the Light's Blessing without needing to solve any puzzles. Or imagine that a debug menu, where the player could teleport anywhere, get any items they wanted, or auto-complete dungeons etc. was available in the menu. In these examples, the player could just ignore using these menu options, but I still don't think these features would be good inclusions. You're basically allowing players to just not play the game, which doesn't seem like a wise decision when designing a game that should be engaging. Or, to stick with an example I provide in the video, why do pine cones not work in shrines? Why did the developers think it worthwhile to arbitrarily place a restriction like that when, from the designers point of view, they could have trusted the player to just not use pine cones in the first place? Because a lack of restriction and a necessity for the player to self-inflict restrictions leads to underwhelming experiences for a lot of people. The reason that I don't think self-imposed challenges should be a necessity for games to be enjoyable is twofold: firstly, self-imposed challenges are pretty niche, as most player are just going to roll with whatever experience is most comfortable (path of least resistance), and, secondly, a game being enjoyable both with and without self-imposed challenges is not an impossible feat by any means. The plethora of "Can you beat (game) WITHOUT (important mechanic)" videos on KZhead is evidence enough that a lot of games can be enjoyable with this kind of mindset, but plenty manage to be enjoyable without that mindset too. A game being interesting and engaging normally and being interesting and engaging with arbitrary restrictions placed upon it are not mutually exclusive. I think TotK's lack of restriction manifests itself in pretty subtle ways that go far beyond the more egregious examples (Gleeoks, Meals etc.) because the mechanics of TotK are so insanely rich that there are possibilities most players won't ever consider that they might use if they weren't allowed to cheese their way through so much of the game. A lot of people want to play a game to relax/enjoy themselves, and they don't want to turn that time into an exercise in willpower where they force themselves to not use certain items, and I think a stronger focus on balance would enable an entirely new level of engagement/creativity from players. In a way, BotW and TotK are like Rorschach tests, where what you get out of them perhaps reflects yourself and your own habits over the design of the game itself. There are merits to this approach, but I don't think it needs to be as all-encompassing as it is.
@@jackdonsurfer Thanks for an awesome comment reply... it makes me reconsider my own comment in a new light. I guess I am weighing perspectives of 2 groups beyond the astute player: the player who isn't as smart or as diligent with the mechanics (as you (or I)); and the designer. It isn't fair for me to confront your critique by cornering you into suggesting the solution to the problem you've rightly identified, but if I try to do the same myself, I can't envision something aside from "create more pinecone walls in the areas we playtested that led to reduced mechanic-engagement". which seems trite or pedantic in light of what the game clearly sets out to do. If I think from the point of view of a good tabletop DM, I can see it as a responsible and good design decision, at the end of the day, to see the possibility, and go, "You know what? If the player is so proficient and cognizant of every system at play, it is a greater loss for me to hardwall them out from that agency, and thereby make the puzzle artificially harder for children, etc., by targeting their exact (and likely quite small % of all players) demographic by isolating the specific systems I want them to use here; than it is for me to leave the question a mad-lib." That's to say, it could well be - and I intuitively sense, *is* - the case that the devs are aware of hoverbike, device cheese, etc., but decided on a philosophical and demographic basis that that's an acceptable tradeoff for the very many exciting and creative experiences the game makes available in general. It seems like TOTK sets out to be more of a "toybox" than a "puzzle" and I think that lends itself very well to what's so good and memorable about the experience.
watching you talk about the forward force shrine makes me feel bad about how i solved it. I didn't know you could attach something to the wheel itself to make it spin the entire game. The 2nd puzzle i just turned the wheel on and then just wedged it as far up as possible and it stuck where i could climb up and grab the ball. The 3rd puzzle i just built a bridge across the water along the walls. In my defense i did give those puzzles a good 10 minutes each of thought before cheesing them.
Those are creative solutions I wouldn’t feel bad about it lol
TOTK the best and most ambitious expansion pass to a game I've ever seen
Hang on… bro has a regular rock fused to a magic scepter at 2:26. We’re dealing with a psycho here
36:50 Bro deadass somehow captured my gameplay and just HAD to call me out so harshly! 😭
OMG you uploaded a video
Excellent video. I pray that Nintendo takes note of all these criticisms. We need gameplay that feels meaningful again, not just mindless and meaningless boxes to check for rewards we don’t need or have already seen 1000 times
I just wished there was a reward to gain access to a type of hookshot For me BOTW and TOTK especially could have benefited so much of this item
I liked botw because it felt intentionally dead and quiet, which made sense and made you want to restore the world and explore what it once was. It felt very similar to Minecraft in that way without being quite always so mindless. In this game although I haven’t played it, it feels like with its grand posing it just has a lot more bark and a lot less bite than the previous game.
Ooh! Some more content from this channel :D. I don't really have a strong connection to any of the games you talk about, but I stuck around because your Twin Snakes video really impressed me.
28:34 oh my goodness you can do that??? put a hoverstone to catch a dangling chest?? i am a fooool orz
40:40 "imposing" is the last word I'd use to describe ganon. I thought he looked goofy and dumb, I preferred how he looked under Hyrule Castle and I thought he'd stay that way
They should have done more combat shrines
the hollow knight music 😭
You know whats crazy about recall... you can literally recall them to the very bottom of the world. Its insane
It’s an unpopular opinion, but I believe Tears of the Kingdom is the most overrated game of all time. It’s not bad but I was so disappointed by it, yet so many outlets call it one of the best games ever This is coming from someone who loved Breath of the Wild
What were some of the main sources of that disappointment? It feeling so similar/derivative, or something else?
@@jackdonsurfer almost all the “new” aspects of the game, whether it be the depths, the sky, the zonai engineering, the dungeons, and the story, we’re incredibly disappointing. Certain parts of Breath of the Wild were disappointing, but the game was new and fresh, it’s understandable they’d make mistakes. With 6 years of development time, I expected a higher quality. Quick rundown on why I felt each aspect was bad *Sky* - so many islands were copy and pasted crystal puzzles or just dull repetitive areas. They all look incredibly similar and they’re all really small and in memorable outside of the tutorial island and lightning area *depths* - just a massive timewaste, I don’t really understand the point outside of the short Yiga sidequest *Zonai engineering* - I can’t be the only one who thought it would be way more complicated / interesting then it ended up being. Imagine if you actually had to use the tools in clever ways to solve puzzles. I never had to think about how to solve a puzzle, the answer was immediately obvious. That’s not a good puzzle. *Dungeons* - the Divine beasts were better I’m 100% serious. Each dungeon in this game would fall in the bottom 25% if you ranked all Zelda dungeons AND there’s only 4 of them. With how long we had to wait, I would say the dungeons are not good at all. *story* - doesn’t push any boundaries for Nintendo. Very bland with no real characterization or stakes. If Zelda was truly gone forever, it could’ve made for an interesting ending. I have low standards and it was still not very good There were a ton of flaws from Breath of the Wild that they just completely ignored too. Shallow combat and an over-reliance on shrines as a reward. Like I said, Breath of the Wild has problems but it had so much new content and ideas that it wasn’t a big deal. After waiting 6 years and then reusing 60% of the old game, I expected something exceptional but it’s just ok
@@eanderson9599 The sky was definitely too sparse, but I feel it's selling it a little too short to say only the dragonhead isles and great sky island stood out. The two orbs in the sky, and the darkness island, stood out significantly to me. depths - to each their own. It's not my favorite part, but i genuinely enjoyed exploring it more than the overworld, to the point where I'd explore a new region in the depths, take note of the root systems extending from the floor, then go back to the surface to locate the relevant cave system, far easier than hoping to find them on my own on the surface. dungeons- puzzle wise, you're probably right, I haven't played the BotW ones so I can't speak to them. Design wise, these kick the pants off the divine beasts, except the Fire Temple, that was extremely underwhelming. The other three temples (and their lead-ups) all commit to distinct design themes, which is something that discouraged me from buying BotW. Distinct Dungeon aesthetic is crucial to 3D Zeldas imo, more than almost anything else. otherwise i completely agree with you. engineering needed actual puzzles, story sucked, flaws from BotW were exaggerated, etc.
@eanderson9599 I totally understand that perspective, a lot of the game doesn't really push you into using the Zonai devices, you have to want to work with them on your own. If you were looking for better dungeons I totally get being disappointed too
If someone hasn’t played BOTW or TOTK do you think that they should just jump directly into TOTK and forget about BOTW or vice Versa?
Aint no way pinecone can make an updraft at Rito Village. I CUT DOWN TREES AND MAKE 1 LONG BRIDGE BRUH 😭 All that effort and i had to balance myself to go across 1 log bridge. This game still surprises me comapre to botw and I'm still loving the game
I started a 2nd play through and a few hours in realized why am I doing these construction signs? Why am I going into a cave or well? Why am I collecting memories etc. It’s kinda pointless.
This is honestly hands down one, if not the best Analysis, Critique, and Video Essay for this game. You are rational and level headed and don't have to resort to insulting the game. I thoroughly enjoyed this game but after the honeymoon phase I decided to listen to critiques and my opinion began to change. While a good game it definitely left much to be desired and is actually shameful this is what we received after 6 years of development. 6 years just for ultra-hand? ugh its frustrating to be sure. This franchise and the fans deserves much better. Great job
This is just a KZhead comment, so I can't get very thorough without killing most's desire to read onwards, my apologies. Just wanted to express my experience with ToTK. I think Tears of The Kingdom is a great testiment to the qualities of intrinsic motivation, potentially a lesser game for more extrinsically-minded players. Even if extrinsic motivation needs an intrinsic ideation, some people will still decide to optimise, and I'm not sure this is the game for that. The game's unending commitment to freedom through self-modulated difficulty, which is why the sandbox and food systems are so free-form, I engaged with every single shrine puzzle in their intended manner due to the intrinsic fun provided by the sandbox features and traversal. My opinion of the sled-bound shrine was still one of glee due to how fun I find the act of just... interfacing with environments and vehicles, despite me knowing of the sled's properties in a more nuanced manner than the vast majority of players initially arriving at the Bazaar. That's not to hand-waver flaws, I believe the limitless food is a commercial reality given the budget and demographic for a game like this, one could freeze any enemy endlessly in Tears of The Kingdom and it's predecessor, but an intrinsic spark could create a methodology that encourages more elaborate strategies. I think the caves in this title exist in a bid to make sure those exploring thoroughly on the ground would have content within every crevice. One can't necessarily notice most obscurities on the surface from the sheer height the sky offers. I wouldn't argue that this renders the contents of the game obsolete, the freedom isn't just a backdrop to these games and imposing restriction in a manner you personally find most endearing is just another component of that aforementioned commitment. I'm not of the belief that players will tussle with their instincts upon expressing self-modulation, if one wants to go without healing provisions, they can always create elixirs and (In ToTK) damage distribution has been bolstered alongside better telegraphs (Enemies with spears don't have the capacity to unfairly and instantly dispatch you now) which justifies the amount of times Link was OHKO'd into the stratosphere to me. Even with the food system in place, this is easily the most times I've perished in one Zelda title, perhaps more than any title in recent memory? I've platinumed every Souls title outside of DS3, perhaps they offered more decrepit corpses in totality than Link has ever endured under my jurisdiction. 😭 I'm not exactly sure why you compiled footage of Poes and Zonaite collection when they always have some sort of relevance, Poes can recover the powerful classic weapons alongside every magic rod and Zonaite can be invested back into an Ancient Blade, or to transport previous building ideas anywhere you please. I'm of the belief these are net-positive additions, there is also (most likely) more time where Brightblooms are relevant and consistently useful than playtime where they aren't. After 300 hours, I opted to sell my valuables to see every compendium picture the developers and I think that was a good footnote that justified garnering so much to me. A game as experientially focused as this is bound to have myriad stories like that, discovering the vow to the hero after building intricate vehicles to deliver orbs became something I tipped off to friends. Having another game that recaptures such personal value in experiences divorced from the main story is all I wanted in a new Zelda title. I liked that you touched on this, but I'm not convinced by your conclusions. That's alright, a video of this breadth will never conform to my thoughts irrespective of how well-considered it is. Your work is genuinely brilliant, one of the only analysts that doesn't present poor scripts without much care, which seems to be a common thread in this era of KZhead. I'm not sure why your concerns lie in the scale of the future games, ToTK is one of the only directly iterative sequels within the franchise and it looks like the Zelda team just sought to dry the well of ideas for this particular version of Hyrule. It's likely that the next title will retain map layers with direct relevance to eachother (My favourite feature is shooting into the sky, obtaining an Old Map and diving from top-to-bottom to collect a fragmented piece of an old hero's garb). This team has always been at odds with fulfilling some of their world's sense of sprawling adventure (OOT overworld is comprised of scarce holes, Termina Field is fairly miniature but has the same issue, Wind Waker's sea has a few curated challenges, but ultimately just acts as downtime between it's main story events to me, TP got close, but most content was strung across the edges of the field, Skyward Sword has mostly great surface levels but a lacklustre series of sky islands), but I think they finally stuck the cadence to create another dense open-air game without extreme padding. Tears of The Kingdom has a narrative just as flawed as any other Zelda title, but I'm grateful they partitioned the Sage cutscenes in a manner that allows one to skip over their repeated summation. When Zelda finally commited to a selfless act by her own volition, when Rauru sealed Ganondorf to the orchestral tune of the hero to finish what he couldn't, every moment of sacrifice in favour of retaining community and sanctity in Hyrule really hit the emotional spot. There's a lot more I want to say, but your video made me appreciate this game even further, and that's incredible to me. I thank you for consistently delivering quality videos, this is the first work on this game I've seen without any shred of objectively wrong, or disingenuous complaints. It's one thing to levy endless derision at recent media; but it's another to illustrate thoughts in the intricate manner that you provide. ❤
Thanks for the comment! You've definitely given me a lot to think about, which I always appreciate. There are a lot of nuances in these discussions, and if I covered every possible base, this video would have been hours upon hours, which I don't think anybody (especially myself) wants lol. This relationship between freedom and restriction is fundamental to the entire human experience, and I actually cut a ton from my rough draft when discussing this idea, so here are some further examples/ideas that I was thinking about. This response probably won't be super focused but I hope you can get something out of it anyway. When I was finishing up the rough draft of this script, that big Starfield presentation that got everybody really excited about the game had just come out (yes, this video took me an insanely long time to make). And when I watched it myself, I internally revolted a bit at the idea of playing it. Because the idea of playing a sprawling, massive 100+ hour game with all sorts of resource management is absolutely exhausting to me. When I was younger, the scale of games like Skyrim, The Witcher, and Metal Gear Solid V seemed so enticing, but after enough time my opinion has completely flipped. *That* core feeling is what I was trying to capture in this script. Yes, Poe's souls and Zonaite absolutely have a "purpose" in the game, but I'd wager (based on my own personal experience and the opinions I've read from others, which, admittedly, is a pretty limited sample) that a majority of players are grabbing these items on a lower-level, impulsive basis. I doubt most people are specifically grabbing Poe's souls because they want to purchase the Gloom-resistant armor, for example, but rather, they see a shiny object, think in the back of their mind that it may be useful in some way, and just run up to it and grab it. There's no long-term assessment being made; there's an item and picking it up feels good, so a player is going to pick it up. I don't think this explanation is enough on its own though to warrant any actual arguments. A criticism of Super Mario Odyssey that drives me up a wall is when people point out how simplistic most of the moons are. Yes, at the most literal level, most of those collectibles don't require much, but it's the gameplay in between, where players expressively move around the environments in fun ways, that actually makes up the player's experience. Similarly, literally pressing A on a bunch of Poe's Souls isn't fun, but building a cool Zonai device that the player can use to drive or fly around the depths can be fun. In that way, the collectibles are really just a way for the developers to push players into having fun with the other mechanics, and, in the case of games like Odyssey or these past two Zelda games, those mechanics are rich enough to where players can absolutely have a ton of fun experimenting with different options. Any game can be broken down into a reductive explanation like this that makes it sound boring (which is what a lot of game reviews do) but that often doesn't account how much mental processing or problem solving the player is doing at any given second. But, my question is, why has the hoverbike become so popular? Why do so many commenters brag about shooting bombs into targets or abusing rocket shields to break the shrines? It's because a ton (probably a majority) of people are motivated by that exact lower-level, impulsive thinking that I mentioned earlier: wanting to collect something for the sake of it, wanting to get stronger because on an emotional level that feels good, wanting to do everything as painlessly as possible because we all want to go down the path of least resistance. There's nothing wrong with people who operate this way, but my main point is, why do players *need* to make their own fun? Does this dichotomy between extrinsically motivated players and intrinsically motivated players need to exist with regard to how much fun they have with a game? I don't think it does. I think about how *literally everyone* seems to love Eventide Island, regardless of what motivates them. Now, imagine that Eventide Island was the exact same, except the player wasn’t stripped of their resources; you just go on the island and do the exact same things but you’re able to use your usual tools. In this hypothetical, it’s easy to envision intrinsically motivated players having an enjoyable experience where they do some kind of self-imposed challenge, but to the rest of the player base, this would just be another forgettable section of gameplay that was the exact same as any other enemy encampment in Hyrule. But the area’s restrictions are exactly why players found it to be such an exciting section of the game, and the player still has the freedom in that area to solve problems in dozens, if not hundreds, of ways. It’s a win for everybody, whereas the rest of the game is amazing for players that toy around with the game’s mechanics for the sake of it, and kind of monotonous and padded out for those that are extrinsically motivated. I don’t think that, over the course of an entire game, that split in enjoyment should be so vast. Now, let’s return to the depths. It’s easy to see why players being able to build a hoverbike is a problem for those that are extrinsically motivated. For these players, the area is really vast, empty, repetitive, and boring, because they’ll spend the entire game doing the same thing over and over again. But, and this is the problem, Tears arguably incentivizes this repetitive optimization *because* there are so many collectibles. Instead of the collectibles getting players to think creatively, they become an impulsive drive that leads to an unengaging, detached experience from the player, and increasing the size of the world and quantity of collectibles will only exacerbate the issue. Most people don’t want to spend hundreds of hours tinkering around with a game’s systems, they want to complete the game in as simple of a way as they can, and Nintendo are feeding into this emotionless detachment by pumping so many upgrade systems into this game. This is already a massive comment and I could keep going and going, but I’ll end it with two separate examples that should solidify some of my earlier points. Minecraft is the most popular game ever, and I’d argue that’s because it does such an amazing job of catering to both intrinsically and extrinsically motivated players, but Minecraft has the advantage of having separate modes. If you’re intrinsically motivated and want to build as many cool things as you can, there’s Creative mode, which allows you to literally build any and everything you could possibly want, while extrinsically geared players get Survival mode, which, through its difficulty and limitations, provides an engaging experience while still having a tinge of creativity. Tears obviously doesn’t have the benefit of two separate modes though, and it doesn’t straddle the line and please both players as well as it could. Here’s the second comparison: imagine telling a five year old that, through the power of magic, they can (for no cost) eat anything they want to for dinner every single night. Think about how many different foods they could try, or how many nutritious, high quality meals they could take advantage of. But what’s most likely to happen is that the kid will ask for ice cream, brownies, and cookies every single night, even though that’s arguably the worst option, just because that’s what emotionally feels good in the moment. You may think me comparing players to literal children is crude but I don’t think it’s unfair; a lot of people will just favor instant gratification and make an emotional decision without much conscious effort when presented with numerous options. In this way, I think it’s helpful to almost view a game designer as a parent that stops a kid from doing that; while yes, many people would genuinely benefit from the freedom to eat whatever they want because they would make great decisions with that freedom, many people wouldn’t. Some restriction or guidance to stop people from making the impulsive, short-sighted decision is only beneficial, as those who were already making good decisions can continue as they were, while those who aren’t as prone to making more conscientious decisions won’t be enabled to do the same boring things again and again. Again, thanks for the comment! You might already be aware of this, but Matthewmatosis’ video on the game heavily emphasizes the intrinsic/extrinsic motivation conflict, and I would strongly recommend watching it if you haven’t already.
@@jackdonsurferI absolutely agree, my experience with the Depths definitely contrasted that of someone who employed a sparse amount of lateral thinking (presumably discovering a device like the hoverbike/Green Goblin vehicle on their own) and vowed to use nothing else or a fraction of the resources provided. It does recontextualise that area, what I think of as a place that bends the traversal mechanics to their feasible limit, whilst carving a distinct path to gather useful items, is another person's slog to every lightroot and armour piece. While Tears of The Kingdom's trust of the player to evade this is admiral, they even made the paraglider optional in this game which had me gleeful for future runs (I've played about.. 75% of the game without it, but being saddled between 81 hours of a joint timespan in uni and my job a week hurt that aspiration), what I see as immense faith may run in the opposite direction for another. I can't be as thorough as I would like to be in this format either (The mobile app prevents any revising of these, or even drafts to read the comment above), but your comment really sold me on the idea that you care. A common thread woven into game's analysis is the aforementioned reductive criticism you mentioned, I've sort of been irreparably scolded by too many poor video essays without any rhyme or reason behind fickle ideas. Recently (Not to berate this content creator, he's great! Whilst his criticism is usually off the mark for me, the editing prowess and footage is usually enough to make me chuckle.) I watched Nerrel's video on this game and the lack of care or forethought, nor even proof that he experienced much of this game given the whopping singular side adventure he committed to, just struck me as.. depressing. I wrote a biblical anthology just detailing the objective discrepancies and disingenuous statements but one example can suffice, touting his current weapon as "one of the best in the game" whilst attempting to beat a Silver Moblin to a pulp struck me as curious given the time it took. One examination at the weapon, and it's a Soldier Contrust III horn fused to a pristine Soldier's Broadsword, the game expects you to either get more elaborate when health pool expands or to engage with prefixes. He could've utilised any Gerudo or Zora weapon, attached something better on, utilise the chemistry system, just.. throw some jelly at the Moblin and go to town with lightning, but he didn't. It's this lack of care that permeates across the entire video. I don't want this comment to be too long (arguably is, but I digress), I'm just so grateful for your channel not out of adherence to my beliefs, but due to the immense time and care you put in. It really shows ❤️. I'm sure the next Zelda game will conform to more technically freedom-driven, but confined areas. This title did give us so many linear crevices to explore but their traversal challenges are freeform. The team have expressed their desire to create more of these from the poultry (Despite being excellent, definitely not dismissing that) offerings present in the run-up to Zora's Domain, the Lost Woods, the pitch-black Typhlo shrine (Which I'm sure the team were clamouring to make more of, ToTK really surprised me with it's methodology in lighting the Depths. Ironically, I find it's most beautiful moments come from jumping to a cliffside wall from a vehicle and watching as it tumbles to the abyss. The Zonai probably didn't envision their technology as a Yoshi-like height boost.) are all now ever-present in this entry. My biggest hope for the next Zelda is a given, but I'd rather this team still try to innovate in a bid to seek something better even if it alienates some fans. To not imitate Breath of The Wild or this game to a tee, but aspire to be remembered for soemthing distinct. I think they've reached the height of density within the Surface (I've made this a pronoun in reference to the in-game map), and the curated Mario Galaxy levels contained in Sky Islands most likely prompted a more conservative mindset in creating the Depths. I'm willing to say the layered maps are successful to me, atleast, but the last game to actually bore me was 'Shin Megami Tensei IF...' so my threshold for high-octane action per minute is impeccably low. There is something I do genuinely find alarming in Aonuma's statement. Thinking of BoTW as a jumping point to a "new formula" of sorts does scare me, not due to a desire to revisit classic Zelda as those games are plentiful, but because an inflated workload and budget may introduce more concessions to get the game set in the market. Zelda has had the luxury of being able to circumvent most of the issues such a gargantuan undertaking entails, but the genre of adventure game they've carved will probably need to be slightly more obtuse (less acclaimed, most likely) to satiate my personal needs. If the next Zelda has "being Tears of The Kingdom: but larger" in the cards, I hope someone would interject with "We can't replicate Tears of The Kingdom; because it already exists". That's my line of thought for this series, atleast, keeping every entry distinct from the rest needs to be the height of the hierarchy for me. ToTK feels like it's own thing despite being an iterative sequel; benefitting from NPC continuity, the player's previous experiences being reworked into fresher locales (I had a list of places I'd like to go upon touching down, and they all delighted me upon arrival), using the first title as a stepping stone for bolstering it's weaker ideas into real figureheads of the combat, good.. spear.. telegraphing.. thank god, and more.
@@jackdonsurfer Quick question, how would you define intrinsic and extrinsic motivation? Typically the way I have seen the terms used in a psychological context is: Intrinsic motivation = Doing something because of the enjoyability of the act itself, Extrinsic motivation = Doing something that is not enjoyable by itself to get an external reward or to avoid a punishment. Matthew didn't use the terms in that way in his video, and the definitions he used seemed to be more like: Intrinsic motivation = Engaging in one mechanic in isolation that is fulfilling by itself, Extrinsic motivation = Engaging in a mechanic mainly because it affects other mechanics and systems in the game. The problem is that he seemed to conflate these definitions even though they are very different in my opinion. Also, I am not sure if the latter definitions can even be well defined or a particularly useful way to look at game design. In particular I object to categorizing player's as "extrinsically motivated" or "intrinsically motivated", since that is really reductive both from a game design and psychological point of view. For example, are collecting stars in Mario 64 extrinsic or intrinsic motivators? Even though the player plays the game to collect stars, the stars incentivise interesting platforming and exploration. The stars set the primary goals for the player, therefore I would call the intrinsic motivation, since without them there would be no game and no system to encourage skillful play. I would say the same thing about scoring in Tetris or other arcade or bullet hell games. Even though you are playing to increase a specific number, doing so requires constant improvement in the player's skill and meaningful play, and thus I would call intrinsic motivation. On the other hand, grinding or farming in RPGs I would definitely classify as extrinsic motivation, because they don't encourage meaningful play and instead reward the player for just using up their time. Some people would call themselves "extrinsically motivated" and are often addicted to grinding. I think saying that this is just how some people are and they should be respected for it would be really detrimental to both game design and generally to players' psychological well-being. I think games that encourage addictive behavior through their mechanics is pretty much always unethical and people who say that they like it are usually unhappy people who try to avoid the problems in their lives by escapism and subsequently get very easily addicted to short, shallow dopamine hits. Overall, I am not convinced trying to define intrinsic and extrinsic motivators with the second definition is always possible. Often different mechanics and systems in a game affect each other in a web of complexity, and good games use those mechanics and systems to force the player to make constant decisions and learn new patterns in the game to create a valuable experience. I'm not so sure that trying to separate them into psychological intrinsic and extrinsic motivators is the best way of analysis for game design.
@miomi1707 You're spot on. I like Nerrel a lot, but his video seemed to be an attempt to justify his own frustrations with the game instead of a balanced analysis. That's fine, the game has gotten enough praise as is and there are some legitimate flaws worth mentioning (as I say in the video, I didn't use the sage's vows but the control interface looks like a hot mess) but it definitely seemed to be a script written out of emotion. Again, writing about (or including) your own emotional experience is totally fine and can even be beneficial, but there was an air of frustration throughout that video that seemed to result from a few bad moments he had (having a hard time solving puzzles or some jankiness with Ultrahand) and I thought he had a difficult time looking past those frustrations to have a more balanced mindset. You're right about the pace of these games' release being a concern too. Not because I need to play a Zelda game every other year or something, but rather a slower pace puts way more pressure on each game to be amazing. I think that feeling that "we need to outdo the last one" instead of "let's try to make an engaging game that has a unique identity" could definitely result from those expectations and lead to the next game being more of the same in a different environment, which would still be a great time, but would also possibly disappoint. I also hate the general conflation of game length and value, I would much rather play a tight, well-designed 10 hour game than a bloated 100+ hour one, even if they both were the same price. I think heightened expectations from both the fans and Nintendo could result in safer games that are massive just for the sake of it, whereas older Zelda games were able to take more risks (think Majora's Mask and Wind Waker). Personally, I would love for them to revisit the ocean/sailing idea from Wind Waker but make it way more engaging with underwater content or some other unique area that would increase variety.
@atmatey The difficulty in discerning extrinsic/intrinsic is the reason I didn't bring it up in this video, and I think the idea of "extrinsic" rewards in a video game is a little shaky anyway. Obviously, getting a power star in Mario nets you literally nothing in the real world so it's a little dicey to categorize an item like that as you would money/acclaim/experience or whatever. For me, I would more define it in the first set of definitions you gave, but I don't think extrinsic motivation is only for things you wouldn't do otherwise. If you love your job, for example, your motivations are still somewhat extrinsic as it's how you make money, but there's an element of intrinsic motivation too. With your Mario example, I'd actually say the power starts are an extrinsic motivator: they're the reward at the end of something. I don't think this is bad, actually, games need things like these. Thinking about the opening outside of Peach's castle is a good counter example; out there, there is no extrinsic drive to do anything, but players still may mess around and try out different jumps or explore just for the enjoyment of it. In that instance, the player is being very intrinsically motivated, while power stars give stages definite rewards that are needed for progression and completion of the game. How much fun players have while getting to those stars may reveal where they fall on the extrinsic/intrinsic spectrum, as many players will want to grab it as quickly as possible, while others may want to explore a level, experiment with creative ways to make jumps that can take them further/higher etc. but the star itself is an extrinsic motivator. For me, the problem isn't that extrinsic rewards are bad, the problem is that an excess of rewards often is used as a mask or supplement for a lack of engaging content. SM64's stars are extrinsic motivators, but they're a positive inclusion because they encourage the player to actually play the game, which, hopefully, should be a fun experience. I feel the same way about Odyssey's moons, even if they aren't always weighted or valued the same by the game, which is why I can't stand the reductive minimization of moons as "throw a seed in a pot and get a moon" or "make this one jump and get a moon". A lot of games (especially mobile ones) will place rewards like these around without anything interesting happening in between though, and that's where the borderline exploitative/addictive element comes in; combine this kind of stuff with intermittent rewards, and you basically have a gambling simulator. I'm not especially familiar with Stardew Valley or Animal Crossing (so take this with a grain of salt, but this argument definitely applies to plenty of games) but games like those often seem to emphasize this lazier sense of progression to hide the fact that the literal moment-to-moment gameplay isn't very interesting; players perform a lot of menial, fairly basic tasks, but the progression systems and collectibles in those games cause people to literally get addicted. I'm not a fan of those kinds of games at all; when I'm playing a game, I want to be mentally engaged, but there's admittedly a place for games like that. It's almost like comparing reality TV, which can be entertaining for plenty of people, to a well written psychological drama. I vastly, vastly prefer the latter but plenty of people want entertainment to be fairly simplistic which is fine. Whether that escapism is healthy or unhealthy is on an individual basis though, and, even if someone is using a game in an unhealthy way like that, if the game didn't exist there would be some other mechanism the person would use in its place. Someone looking to avoid thinking about things they need to think about is going to find a way to escape from that reality, with or without games, so I don't feel comfortable making definitive statements about games' role in that individual emotional issue. Plenty of healthy, happy people can play Animal Crossing from time to time and have it be a nice break from the stress of their normal lives, and that's 100% ok. I just really don't want Zelda to turn into that kind of grindy, monotonous, bloated type of game. I want cool areas to explore, fun puzzles to interact with, memorable and surprising moments, etc. (the foundation the series was built on) and areas like the depths potentially suggest that the grindier, junk food type of gameplay is something the team is willing to include to pad out the game's length. Again, I think the game's mechanics are rich enough to where I would in no way say this excess of extrinsic rewards is a replacement of interesting content, but the trend is worrying. Addison signs were fun to complete for me, but that feeling of "I have sooooo many things to do" just by sheer volume of smaller tasks is not a positive feeling for me at all
Wait you can sky dive into colgera?! 😮
I think TOTK is a phenomenal game and don’t have any issues with many of your complaints. Nintendo wants the game to be accessible to a very broad audience and a lot of the things that would make the game better to you wouldn’t for other people, but you have the freedom to play the game in the way that is most satisfying for you. I do wish the main storyline was somehow locked in a linear way because it is very easy to get the dragon tears out of order which would spoil one of the best plot lines in the Zelda franchise. My only other real complaint is how underwhelming mineru’s construct was, it was built up to be this big impressive thing and it’s the most useless of all the sages. Even for that short segment that is designed around riding it, you are better off just getting off the robot and more or less ignoring it.
you're back! how lovely.
Glad to see you uploading again. 🫡
Glad to see you commenting again 🫡
I feel like botw and totk should have just been 1 perfect game. Totk doesn’t feel like a sequel It feels like an alternate version of botw. And some npcs not recognising you doesn’t help that.
What does “iterates upon it” mean? That seems like a strange choice of words
Best game they've made since Wind Waker.
39:07 have we played the same game? Botw has one of the best stories in any Zelda, it’s only that people aren’t able to appreciate non western marvel kind of cinema
Your comparison to the first Zelda is ridiculous. To the past blew up the quality level of gameplay The Zelda series provided. They're not two types of games. One is simply an upgrade of the other. Which is why ocarina of time was so amazing.. it was such an incredible leap of graphical experience while maintaining the puzzle stack effect that Zelda games were famous for. Breath of the wild and tears of the Kingdom both make you feel like every little thing you do is almost worthless. The exploration gets really boring when you find out that there is no major advancement. Every dungeon and traditional Zelda gameplay unlocked mechanical features that allowed you to progress in the game. Everything had a purpose that was iconic in nature and super fun. The new open world style does not feel like a puzzle game anymore. It just feels like a half-ass completed RPG style game. The fact that you can't go through a single boss without breaking your weapon multiple times and spending most of your actual time in menus takes away from all the action and all the immersion. The series had a really great mechanical upgrade but the gameplay was terrible. They need to bring back meaningful gameplay design. I don't need to grind. Zelda exploration. I need to grind the puzzles in order to advance to the next more complicated puzzle. I wanted to challenge me in ways that isn't just time sucking my life away.
40:40 maybe because calamity wasn’t an antagonist, surprise
I FOUND IT!
😭
"Tear of the Kingdom" is such a weak sequel, too afraid to hold itself up by it's own strength, relying to heavily on the first game in way too many ways.
The drops you couldnt pick up were infuriating
I have to say, unfortunately you are talking from a very experienced gamers perspective. Forums for example, aren't reflective of a mass audience. Stripping resources for every shrine would be too much of an imposition for a lot of players. Same with having straightforward shrines, they are necessary for balance, everything being complex induces too much frustration. You make some good points, but the game you're describing would be a lot more niche.
Strong conclusion tho, I do hope to see a similar direction.
Counterpoint: a linear game starts off easy and slowly ramps up in difficulty. If done properly, it teaches the player its systems and mastery of the game.
@@amandaslough125 No I agree, it just wouldn't work in an open world.
The weapon durability is okay until you spend 2 hours makeing the strongest weapons you can and they break in the next battle Rip gerudo thunder gleeock spear 80damage and lightning Rip gloom sword You will be missed
Interesting overall, but you overestimate how quickly people are going to figure out "simple" shrines. Just because they've used certain mechanics before doesn't mean they're going to immediately realize how to combine them in a new setting. Some of them may not even occur to the player until after some hilarious wrong approaches. Or they may figure out a completely different way to get through. This is what makes the shrines mostly brilliant.
This is a hard thing to define exactly but a lot of my research suggested that a lot of players found the shrines to be too easy. That's not an absolute by any means but a lot of the puzzles that are simple aren't even new puzzles, as they're often repackaged ones the player has already done. The "use recall on a rotating gear" concept is used numerous times in exactly the same way, and it's the same with the "use recall on a falling platform to rise upwards." In these instances, shrines using these interactions don't use their new setting to make them different, the puzzles are literally the exact same as they've always been.
@@jackdonsurfer Nah, I solve each puzzle in different ways, if its too easy then I go for another way, if there's no other way then I would go on the hard way.
It's obvious to me that the shareholders and bean counters at Nintendo are still interested in making money off of the Zelda name, but the developers are no longer interested in making Zelda games. So, the developers put in just enough iconography to trick their fans into buying something that only resembles a Zelda game. There are characters named Link, Zelda, and Ganon. There's a setting called Hyrule. There's something called the Master Sword. But that's it. I thought "Breath of the Wild" was going to be an experiment. Can Nintendo really make an open world Zelda game? No, they can't. Or, perhaps they could, but they didn't. I was excited for "Tears of the Kingdom." I saw potential and lots of room for improvement. But I still haven't finished the game. I probably never will. Why would I? I've already finished "Breath of the Wild" twice.
Pretty much the reason I love this game is that you can make it as easy or difficult as you want. And I still found plenty of times where I was stumped on a shrine and it took me several minutes to figure out. Then I'd get that "aha!" moment. And even with the luxury of being able to pause to eat healing meals, I had more than my fair share of tough battles (particularly with gloom enemies) and even found my health wiped out more quickly than I expected.
Depths are the worst part to me. It's the worst area that has ever existed in a mainline Zelda game. Boring, dull, soulless, empty, pointless to explore, bland music, getting all the lightroots gives you a useless anti-reward akin to the Korok turd. Just a dank pit for countless hours of mindless grinding. The Depths encapsulate many of the worst things you could ever put in an open world game or any game for that matter. It is also painfully obvious they barely put any time or thought into its design. It's just a negative copy of the overworld map, then randomly dot it with monsters and minerals. I doubt it took more than a week to completely design and populate the Depths.
Fixing botw? Please. It imitates botw and does it all worse. It fixed none of the issues that botw had and added so much more.
Concerning weapons in both games I'm going to preface this by saying that i don't think the loose of weapons for either BOTW or TOTK is a real problem the late game stages because you have so much access to powerful weapons that the major issue of loosing them becomes moot. But i don't understand the argument when some people say TOTK solved BOTW's weapon durability issues. I always hear that the problem with weapon durability is it disincentivizes you from engaging in combat for fear of loosing your good weapons. So how is TOTK any better? You still attach your best monster parts to the best item's and continue using your weaker ones on weaker enemies saving your stronger weapons for more challenging opponents. The problem exists in both games where your punished for entering combat to the best of your abilities and often coming out of it weaker than when you entered depending of the rewards of each encounter. Now with the added benefit in TOTK of having to scroll through more menus, hold monster parts, place them on the ground, scroll through each weapon you wish to attach them too, and then finally fuse each material to the desired weapon. the only real benefit is you can add a rock smashing ability to a cutting weapon, or a cutting ability to a smashing weapon.
@@facepwnagewtf People say it's fixed because totk allows you to upgrade your weapons, which gives them more durability. Of course, these people completely forget that almost every weapon you'll find is tarnished and has a fraction of its usual dps and durability. Fuse only cancels that out.
……except for ITEM DUPLICATION PHUCC THE UPDATES WHAT A GARBAGE MOVE DIRTY GAPS
Wow your channel may have the most shockingly inconsistent viewership I’ve ever seen
Lol I know, uploading is always a gamble. I always go to outside places to share my vids, I haven’t done that with this one yet though. I think I attract a lot of viewers that really care about just one franchise (Pokemon, Metal Gear) and not much else
KZhead doesn't like it when you take a long time working hard on a good video. KZhead favors consistent uploads - good or bad. KZhead also tries to show your new videos to people that watched your most popular videos, even if the new video is a different subject matter - and then when the Pokemon fans don't click on the Tears of the Kingdom video, KZhead thinks the Tears of the Kingdom video must not be good. But for scenarios like these, there's always a chance that the algorithm picks the video up later on when KZhead finally figures out the best audience for this video.
So I really disagree with those arguments about the exploits in the game, I really, really did not feel that while playing TotK, and I think it's mainly a question of intrisic vs extrinsic motivation. Take the shrines, for instance. Sure, a lot of puzzles can be circumvented just with clever use of Recall - and, if really what you're after is an extrinsic motivation, such as completing all shrines in the game or getting more shrine reward to get more hearts/stamina, then yeah, you will be tempted to just circumvent the puzzle to get your reward. But personally, I really like the shrines by themselves, I want to understand the riddles and to solve them. I just won't use the easy solutions, not because I'm resisting my temptations, but because it's not tempting to me - and if it has become tempting, it's because the shrine itself became really annoying, in which case I'm glad to have this option to skip the tedious part. I would have enjoyed having rocket shields in BotW motion control shrines. Your example with proving grounds doesn't really work, because IMO what makes proving grounds really good isn't the restriction, but the level design. So, even if I had all my stuff in the infiltration proving grounds, or the "tank" making proving grounds, I would have still done the shrine in the intended way, because that's the fun way to do it - but then, the restriction makes the bad proving grounds really even worse, because they become tedious with no solution (eg the luring proving grounds where the level design doesn't work, the first one which is really not that great either, etc). To me, these restrictions make those bad proving grounds some of the worst (actual) shrines in the game. And that's the same for everything, actually. Take the hoverboards : Sure, it's practical and fast, but if you want to explore the grounds, have some fun killing some enemies, then you won't build such a vehicle. I don't spend much time in a hoverboard for this very reason. And, if you're tired of exploration, if you really want to travel quite fast from point A to point B - the hoverboards are a great option to have. Removing them to make me forced to explore all of the time would make my experience worse. I don't think viewpoints like mine have really been heard in most videos on TotK I've seen, sadly. I personally really enjoy TotK, more so than BotW and I feel it is clearly the superior game - as such, it's been really annoying to me seeing several videos like yours pop up, arguing things I like in the game are actually problems and arguing for fixes that would actively make the game worse for me.
🤗 Promo`SM
Your criticism of the narrative is to the point; of gameplay, not so much, I think. I wonder when, if ever, will it become a starting point to understand as given that the only true reward a game offers is the intrinsic experience of playing it. As such, if player repeatedly chooses to ignore the available creative or diversified solutions to traversal, combat and puzzling, in favor of rote shortcuts that make the game less enjoyable, whose fault is that? Or when the player invests hundreds of monotonous hours trying to complete tasks the game never demands (or even implies) need to be completed, whose fault as that?
40:16 this is a stupid opinion, botw has a much superior story than totk
One of the greatest gifts of freedom is choosing to NOT do the “easy” thing. It’s tough, sure. But that is what freedom really means.
All the lames making these videos completely miss that point. Most games brag about giving you the "freedom" to play how you want, this game actually does that and all they can do is whine about it??
One of the greatest gifts of limitations is that you MUST rise to the challenge, and that there are no cheap shortcuts. The emotional experience of overcoming an obstacle that refuses to meet you at your level is completely different from the experience of overcoming a simulated challenge. For example, if I were to simply choose to live on meals that cost less than $10 a day as some kind of simulation of food insecurity, I am not experiencing the same kind of challenge that I'd be experiencing if I actually HAD to live on meals that cost less than $10 a day due to external pressures outside of my control. In that circumstance I'd be experiencing a much more visceral set of emotions and stress. If I managed to overcome those external pressures, I would feel a more visceral feeling of relief and triumph than if I overcame a simulation of those pressures. In the same way, if you are presented with a challenging video game boss or puzzle that you MUST overcome before you're able to access a certain area, you are going to feel certain powerful, visceral frustrations and triumphs as you try to overcome that challenge. Those feelings are unique experiences that you can't have if it's just a safe little simulation where you can give up on it at any time and still be rewarded all the same. Imagine if OSU, Guitar Hero, or similar rhythm games gave you the same amount of points for inaccurate input as for accurate input, so that players could have more agency to tap/click to the music however they please and not have to feel frustrated for getting low scores. The triumph of getting high scores would be significantly diminished, and such games would essentially become something more like a fidget toy rather than a rhythm game. The locus of player control is a valuable tool to create a whole range of emotional experiences. It's silly to think that the only valuable locus of control for video games is an internal one, because an external locus of control encompasses valuable experiences as well.
I don't understand Zelda fans' obsession with "traditional Zelda content". How many games do you need that follow the exact same beats? There are plenty of games I love, but that doesn't mean I need them remade over and over and over again.
It's odd too because a ton of fans were hoping the series would get away from that formula to begin with. With such a massive fanbase though, I guess it's impossible to please everyone
BotW formula is growing stale far quicker than the traditional formula imo
@@athorem Sure, maybe the concept needs to change again. I just don't understand the obsession with effectively remaking the same game every few years with a new coat of paint for 35 years. If I wanted to replay Link to the Past, I could just replay Link to the Past.
@@toby2581 Tell that to the Zelda team because they seem determined to remake BotW over and over
@@athorem They've only made two games, bro. Relax.
Tell me you understood nothing about botw without me
game bad
TOTK is a bad game Not only that, it’s a bad sequel to the last 40 years of Zelda…
I just want to say this game sucks!
Worst 3d Zelda
I was enjoyimg the video until you criticized the game. Instant dislike.