I know it’s long, but this is a pretty well thought out critique of Tears of the Kingdom - giving a lot of thought into what the game got right, what it got wrong, how/why the wrong parts were wrong, as well as how they could have been better.
I think the whole video is pretty well thought out, but I found myself agreeing most with the critique of the control system - I put 245 hours into the game and, while I only lost my weapon while trying to use ultra hand a few times (Almost lost it a whole bunch of times though), pressing one button when I meant to use another was a constant theme of my playthrough.
Another pet peeve of mine that didn’t get mentioned is that you hold B to run on land, but X to swim faster in water. What’s up with that?
[heavy story spoilers past this point] I do wish the video talked a bit more about the story. I think it was a good story, but that it could have been done a lot better - the entire thing with the secret stones and dragons seemed pretty cobbled together and deus ex machina-y. After a comment someone left in a different thread I made, I found myself wishing Zelda remained trapped as a dragon at the end of the game - since they did go through a lot of effort trying to drive home the point that it was a permanent change. This would then both make her sacrifice feel a lot more significant, and be a pretty neat setup for another direct sequel - where our goal is to go on some elaborate quest involving the other three dragons, who may or may not be the literal Din, Farore, and Nayru that created the Triforce. Only at the end of that game, once we’d assembled the full Triforce (For the first time in a while), would we then be able to use its magic to save Zelda in what I think would be a much more satisfying way than how TotK actually did it.
I think you press X to dash in the water because it’s a single press repeated action instead of a held down continuous action, like sprinting. Just like if you crouch and press X you dash forward, pressing x while swimming dashes you forward once. It always made sense to me that way, but I’d imagine there are a few people who don’t realize you can crouch dash.
…You can crouch dash?
Right? I don’t think they ever explicitly say you can do it, but even back in BotW, if you crouch and then press X, instead of jumping Link will dash forward once, pretty much the same way you dash forward when swimming. Ever been crouch waddling towards an enemy walking away from you slightly too fast? Bam.
I’d also prefer if that crouch dash had been on the dash button. It’s so clunky having to uncrouch to jump. I keep uselessly dashing at ledges whenever I want to get over it while crouched. That would make more sense alongside swimming too.
I don’t really see why it needs to be on two different buttons when sometimes it’s press and sometimes it’s hold. Attacks also have functions that work like that, and if that’s too confusing, they could just make it so that holding makes him repeatedly crouch dash and swim dash.
I would probably say I’d prefer being able to full sprint directly out of a crouch than to be able to jump out of a crouch. Jumping out of a crouch is moreso convenient, sprinting out of a crouch can save you from getting hit, which is a higher priority for me, personally.
But having options would’ve been cool instead of needing to choose, sadly the Zeldas don’t even have sliders for changing the audio balance, so fat chance we’ll get complex control options, lol.
Good point, but then I’d still drop crouch dash entirely for still having a jump. I had more problems getting stuck with ledges than with sneaking too slow.
Story spoilers
I wish they wouldn’t have repeated everything so frigging often all the time. I get that it is difficult to create an interesting narrative while simultaneously giving the player the freedom to discover everything out of order, but they could still have split the main story into different parts. I mean, each of the Champion cutscenes were the same: “We were too weak, we got Secret Stones, we were still to weak, Rauru sacrificed himself, now here’s the dang stone, go kill Ganon.”
At one point I honestly found myself mocking the dialogue. Blah blah Secret Stone blah blah Secret Stone blah…
My idea of a split storytelling would be:
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Sidon gets told that the “old” champions were too weak to defeat Ganon but not how they tried to solve the issue or what happened afterwards. As his sister was basically the “healer” of the BotW party and Sidon worries about the safety and wellbeing of his people all the time, it might be important to him to learn that the old Champions didn’t have a way to heal.
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Yunobo gets told that Rauru was the one who gave them the Secret Stones to make them stronger. As a Goron, the old Champion would have been pleased to know that stones of all things were the key element of their plan to defeat the BBE. He does not tell why they still lost in the end.
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Riju’s ancestor urges her to rid the world of the “evil” that the Gerudo race brought into this world, but at the same time warns her not to underestimate this enemy as they were no match for him even WITH the Secret Stones. She does not mention Rauru’s sacrifice or where the stones came from.
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Tulin on the other hand gets told that Rauru sacrificed himself without an explanation as to why this was necessary. Rito are dang proud people so it would be no surprise for the “old Champion” not admitting defeat, and not mentioning where the “help” came from, but thinking highly of someone who threw his very life away to save his people.
That way, each champion would have unlocked an important part of the narrative without duplicates, and frankly I don’t think it is important to tell these four bullet points in a specific order.
Something like this would have been better than what we got. For the most part I didn’t do much critiquing during the game, and just let myself enjoy things - but the repetitiveness of the Sage cutscenes was a bit too obvious to overlook. It’s telling that even Nintendo didn’t think they were worthy of spots in the Memories section of the Purah Pad.
I do wonder if a Goron should be told explicitly that they should never eat their stone…
“No, you don’t. No, just nibbling a bit is not okay either. Don’t even lick it! Oi, what do you have in your mouth!? Bad boy!” cue to Revali’s ancestor dousing the Goron Champion with a big spray bottle
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A third direct sequel would be too much. I think they got more than enough mileage of this version of Hyrule. I’m happier with Zelda turning back in this one, though they could have squeezed a post-game quest for that.
@TwilightVulpine I can imagine a a sequel where you explore the continent North and West of Hyrule, and the ocean East and South. And the current version of Hyrule would be “rebuilt” as a safe place or home base type area, with cities and ruins restored etc…
Even such a sequel would probably benefit more from having its own story like Majora’s Mask rather than being necessary to wrap up Zelda’s fate from TotK.
@TwilightVulpine Yeah, a completely non Ganon story would be nice.
Definitely a fair take - it was my idea and even I think a third would be a bit much.
I found myself wishing Zelda remained trapped as a dragon at the end of the game - since they did go through a lot of effort trying to drive home the point that it was a permanent change
Here’s a funny story: I tried to avoid all TOTK-discussions before I finished the game. For some reason, I saw a “spoiler”/discussion that said that Zelda stays a dragon, she doesn’t turn back. I saw the discussion after Impa said she will look for ways to revert Zelda in ancient literature. I though that the sequel to TOTK will be about turning Zelda back.
I have to admit that I was very positively surprised that Zelda was turned back; on the other hand, Nintendo would’ve had my deepest respect if they made an unhappy ending.
Seeing and believing false spoilers can be interesting. When you still thought it was true did you find yourself disappointed by it?
Taking a tangent from what you said, the Impa thing threw me off a lot. When she said that at the end of the Dragon Tears quest, I thought for sure it meant her quest wasn’t done yet, and I had to seek her out to figure out how to save Zelda. I didn’t yet have Mineru at this point, which is apparently the trigger that makes Impa actually spawn in Kakariko - so I spent quite a bit of time searching for her. All the buildings (At different times), the ring ruins, the well, the nearby terrain, even the depths…
Then when I did finally get Mineru and go to check up on Impa, I triggered some glitch that put two copies of her in the same room, day and night versions I believe, with their respective dialogue, at the same time.
When you still thought it was true did you find yourself disappointed by it?
I actually thought about how cruel Nintendo is to this specific Zelda; I think she must be the most traumatized of them all? First she can’t turn on her powers, then she is stuck with Ganon for 100 years in limbo, then a few years of happiness, then all of TOTK happens, where she endures multiple 10000 years as a dragon with a sword stuck in the head. I was relieved when she was turned back.
When she said that at the end of the Dragon Tears quest, I thought for sure it meant her quest wasn’t done yet, and I had to seek her out to figure out how to save Zelda. I didn’t yet have Mineru at this point, which is apparently the trigger that makes Impa actually spawn in Kakariko - so I spent quite a bit of time searching for her.
Ah! I was searching for Impa and I was surprised that Paya didn’t even mention her whereabouts. I didn’t check after Mineru; I guess, I’ll start TOTK one more time for the Impa-dialog.
Frankly Zelda already suffered so much on BotW that I’d be bummed if she was “sacrificed” for good in TotK. Yeah it would be daring, but what would that mean? “Sucks to be Zelda”?
TotK is fairly light on plot, which is fine, since it has to be able to be told non-linearly or missed entirely due to the open world. It is how it is, we aren’t here for the plot.
On major plot spoilers:
I was a bit annoyed not by the happy ending (I knew Nintendo was not going to have the balls for it), but by the fact that Zelda is doing a massive self-sacrifice yet again so Link can faff around shooting Koroks into space.
It’s not a huge issue, just something that irked me a little. Like, twice in a row?
I was excited by the early trailer speculations that Zelda might be playable in this game, but we’ve always got to rescue the princess.
I did enjoy the ending despite my complaints, and TotK is clearly GOTY despite how deeply I love FFXVI.
Another pet peeve of mine that didn’t get mentioned is that you hold B to run on land, but X to swim faster in water. What’s up with that?
What? That’s so bizarre. I switched the buttons for Jump and Dash in the options Day 1 in both BotW and TotK, so the X button is the “go fast”-button both on land and in water for me. I’m more confused why the swim button doesn’t get swapped as well if that’s the case.
Is there a link to the video somewhere? I can’t seem to see it (using Memmy on iOS)
Thanks!
