Recently I played The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild · 6:45pm Mar 20th, 2020
I've had a bit of time to play a few games recently.
Legend of Zelda = Awesome
Skyrim = Awesome
The Legend of Zelda + Skyrim = I'm not putting this game down until I'm good and ready.
The Legend of Zelda series has always had large maps for their system and allowed you to go anywhere you had the tools to get to. This removed the necessity of the tools save the Hang Glider (And maybe even that. I don't know, I haven't seen any of the videos where someone wakes up and runs right to Ganon.)
Once I got out of the cave I went about doing anything but the main quest. Died a few times figuring out what I was doing, jumping to my doom a few times, refusing to wear clothes, and in general enjoying the scenery. Eventually I had to start playing right(ish). So I talked to the old man and began the story.
Okay, controls. Well here's where I learned that my joycons weren't working just right as Link would occasionally run to his doom while I was trying to stand still. $80 USD later and things are working great.
Where you are and how you move in this game are important and with functional controls it was nice. I did have a lot of trouble riding my horse (Actually I took Ganon's horse.) But I still enjoyed it. I also really loved scaring the girl who takes care of the horses with Ganon-horse.
Stamina implementation was well done this time. I couldn't stand it in Skyward Sword (among other things) but here it was alright. I actually found myself calculating my stamina regularly and looking forward to increasing it.
I got really good at whipping out my glider at the last second to prevent damage from long falls, so I could glide long and far, even high up, and not worry about falling to my doom anymore.
Cooking wasn't big for me. I started with just tossing apples into a pot, and ended with tossing two apples and a beat or truffle into a dish. An inconvenience getting healing items, but more than compensated for all the healing items I could carry, and that it was all free.
At no time in this game did I find that point where Rupees effectively became useless, I'm always looking for more. And saving up enough to release all of the great fairies was tricky itself.
Getting lumber was really fun. Most people apparently used the Master Sword to do this because it never breaks. But why do that when bombs do the job just as well, and can even handle multiple trees at once.
I was a walking ecological disaster.
Shortly after leaving the plateau I found Lake Hylia, and shortly after that I saw my first Dragon in this game. It was … amazing. I was blown away by the size and scale. I don't know why this hit me more than Titan in FF15, but it is what it is.
I actually found a bit of that awestruck amazement each time I saw any of the dragons. That is until I started hunting them for materials, then it was only when they just showed up while I wasn't expecting them. And a couple times where I wasn't expecting them.
I'm not going to lie, I have no Idea why I stripped link down to his skivvies every time I walked into any town. I mean, for talking to Paya it's obvious. But every other time, no idea. Though I did like the store owner who reacted to my lack of clothes enthusiastically.
One thing I noticed that I particularly liked (not because I was looking too hard. I swear!) was that the vast majority of the Gerudo looked different from each other. Just a little detail to make the world seem more real with nobody really looking the same.
And of course all of the Gerudo had their own personality too, not just a generic people's personality. If you get the chance, sit in on their dating class. Plenty of good information, such as “Don't kidnap people.”
And their rule of no guys? Clearly they don't care that much as I changed into woman's clothing right in front of the guards and walked in with no confrontation.
The costumes mostly have bonuses and cool little effects, so I did spend a lot of time hunting down outfits. That was pretty fun, in and of itself.
Food is important in this game, and being able to get materials is necessary. Fortunately it's almost everywhere, and cooking just improves how much it heals. I even ate cooked wood in one of the dungeons. It didn't heal much, but it worked for the situation. And in a pinch, I could pull out my fire arrows and shoot a bird or dear or something and get a quick meal.
To hunt effectively you had to watch your noise, and the environment could effect that. So I bought the ninja gear and ran up with the Master Sword for my raw meet. Like the maniac I am.
I really enjoyed the story too, even though I did take my time getting to it (I had the Master Sword before before I actually started going about doing story objectives.) It let's you discover the back story of Link and Zelda, and even the other important characters. You can miss pieces, and some happen just to get through the story.
Making Link have amnesia at the start was a good choice for bringing you into the story as you're discovering it along with Link. You and Link have the same perspective as you move through the country side occasionally finding some little area of significance and learning more so you run off in a new direction. I could go into some of the story, but that would rob some of you of discovering it for yourselves.
After days I found myself fighting Ganon, where I realized I probably watch Game Grumps too much as I had totake a selfie with him when he's about to attack me. Curse you Arin!
I beat Ganon and went right back into the game to do many of the things I had missed. There's really just so much to do. I found myself finding non conventional ways to fight enemies. One of my favorites when I can't just run in glowing sword raised high, was to find a hidden area I can chuck bombs from. The moment an enemy (or a few) are in blast range, I blow them up and send them flying.
This may have gotten repetitive, but never lost it's entertainment to me. One of the structures you find enemies in is a giant skull shaped rock, I would toss bombs in through the eye socket. More than once I was lucky enough that everything lined up just right so an enemy was tossed out the socket, over me, and onto the ground below where they ran back in not knowing what happened.
And they don't all just stupidly walk to their doom. They do walk stupidly into their doom, but not just because their stupid. Many of them actually try to get the bomb away from them or the group. Of course I detonate the moment they kick it or something. But they tried, and that's important.
Honestly, this is now my favorite LOZ in the series, replacing A Link to the Past.
Not that it means anything since you just read this, but I also mirror these reviews on Reddit r/MLPLounge
The most fun I had in the game was when during my Master Mode playthrough I decided that Link needed to be a wandering fighter who broke up monster camps to make the region a little safer, even if just until the next Blood Moon.
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There's a good story in that one. Just the concept reminds me of old samurai movies.