Soapbox: Zelda: Tears Of The Kingdom's Busier Hyrule Is Making Me Miss BOTW

I think this is a completely fair viewpoint to have. I prefer TOTK's busier and content-filled world since there's simply just more to do, but BOTW certainly has a special kind of serenity to it. I have definitely felt overwhelmed playing TOTK and getting distracted by everything, but I like that feeling here. BOTW could definitely be seen as a much more relaxed experience in comparison.

Yeah...I felt the same way. I love the diversity of gameplay and things to do in TotK but BotW had this calm chill to it that seems to be diluted somewhat in the sequel. I remember multiple responses to BotW about the calming zen-like effect and that it helped some with depression and anxiety, myself among them. I never expected TotK to have that same feel. But I do find myself longing for it.

Tears of the Kingdom is awesome.
But Breath of the Wild is the better game.

The emptiness of BotW was for me the only tiny downside of the game.

TotK fixes that, and every other downside you might have. It's by far the better game.

I get having more going on can be overwhelming. That being said, all the busy work and the expanding of Hyrule on top of the new ways to traverse. All that is saving this game from being written off as glorified DLC it was conceptually or just rehashing and riding Breath of the Wilds coat tails. Any attempt at Tears of the Kingdom being unique as far as the world was concerned was a risk of going its own route. Much like Majora's Mask did with Ocarina of Time.

I've felt something similar, but along with it comes the sense that I can't go back - at least not for a while. That glorious openness I felt when first exiting the cave or leaving Great Plateau in BotW fills me with nostalgia, but I quickly want the creative freedom of TotK.

And one of the neat freedoms of TotK is the ability to play how you want. There are so many systems you can pursue that if you want to play the game in a more BotW fashion (minimal zonai devices, fusions, etc.), you have that option.

I respect the oppinion but definitely don’t agree. I love BoTW but ToTK, to me, shows that BoTW really needed more. All I wanted was more story, and I am so glad we got it, but we also got a lot more in addition and am loving it all!

I haven’t revisited BOTW since 2017 on my Wii U. I’ve started TOTK but felt it was really aimed at people who were very familiar with BOTW (or have been playing it consistently since release). Even with the 130+hrs I put on back in the day I never really felt I’d seen what the world had to offer. So I’ve returned to BOTW and redone the Great Plateau fully as a refresher. Hopefully when I return to TOTK I’ll feel a bit more confident…

TotK fixed all the issues I had with BotW including minor stuff like menu navigation. I can’t go back to BotW anymore now.

The only thing I miss from Breath of the Wild is that its characters felt actually alive (mainly in the main story). Looking back at even Age of Calamity’s story there was more character there than there is here, with only Rauru and Ganondorf as kinda highlights. Somehow that really took out a lot of life from the world for me, not being intrigued by it nearly as much as before.

Open world games that are underpopulated/more vacant are why so many of them falter. Tears handled it right in my eyes, and I prefer it to BotW. Both are still stellar games regardless.

I simultaneously love TotK and miss BotW. I feel a little bit of a letdown traversing the map in TotK because I’ve seen the landscape before. The sense of challenging traversal and discovery in BotW was such a great time. Now I just hop into the sky and fly wherever I want… it kind of feels like cheating. I love TotK and agree, its a 10/10, but discovering Hyrule for the first time in BotW was the most fun I’ve ever had in a video game.

I feel like Tears of the Kingdom is just too vast and I’m never going to finish it. I understand this will be a positive for some people, but for me I don’t have as much time to see it all, which I never thought I’d be complaining about.
One things for sure, you’re getting a lot of game for that inflated price tag.

For me I prefer TotK simply due to the added variety. In BotW it felt like you saw everything after not too long, regarding environment and species going around. Both are great games though.

Funny story but one of my closest friends LITERALLY shares the same sentiment in that while he enjoyed ToTK, he still heavily preferred BOTW because he though the world was just a lot more fun to explore and easier to immerse himself in.

As for me, I agree to this statement to an extent. I think ToTK is the overall better game but BoTW I feel is the one that is the better/memorable experience. I got into BoTW 4 years later than most people and already had full knowledge of the more mystical moments of the game (e.g. Eventide Island, the existence of the dragons etc.) but I still managed to have several "WOOAH" moments throughout my playthrough just because of how meticulously realised the world was. With ToTK, I've not had any moments like that (though that could partially be down to me already having explored this world).

I feel like once a few more months have passed and people can start properly analysing both BoTW and ToTK's strengths/weaknesses, I think (unfortunately) another split in the Zelda fandom will arise with one camp preferring the more atmospheric tone of BoTW and the other preferring the more robust package of ToTK (heck, LITERALLY as I'm typing this I'm seeing new messages pop-up about some prefer BoTW and others prefer ToTK xD).

I completely agree with this. But unless we had a completely different land to explore I think TOTK is the best possible sequel to BOTW.

I just groan every time I see a Korok with a backpack. Building things is very slowly growing on me though.

BotW had the same issue 90% of open world games have, huge map and not that much to do.

TotK fixed that beautifully. Everywhere I went I could find people and quests, I progressed through the game very organically because the many quests led me to exploring new areas and finding even more quests.

I'm only about 30hrs into TotK and have probably only seen about 10-20% of the surface level map of Hyrule so far, so feel it a bit early to judge, but I was in love with BotW's exploration around a beautiful, mostly green landscape.

The upheaval in TotK and all the extra bits and bobs littering the environment have made for a less beautiful place, from what I've seen so far. And all the crafting serves to disrupt my flow of exploration. That's presumably deliberate and to be expected, but I'm still wistfully remembering BotW rather than falling even harder for TotK so far.

Interested to see what the rest of the kingdom looks like though. Just been lacking the spare time recently to lose myself in it.

I was on fence about Tears of the Kingdom, but because of this article, I’m going to get it. My main problem with Breath of the Wild was how empty and lacking in action it was

BOTW felt like a test. TOTK is king!

Some parts of BotW were too empty, some parts of TotK were too cluttered. It's 6 and two 3's. In the next Zelda game (probably in 5 years or so) Nintendo would do well to find a happy middle ground. I really love both games but I found some parts of TotK unecessarily irritating.

For instance:-

1) Lizalfos only drop their tails for you to collect some of the time when you kill them. This makes grinding for set upgrades even more tedious than it was in BotW.

2) In Totk you have Satori trees to help you locate caves. But the beacons that show you where the caves are were all one colour. Doesn't matter if you've entered said cave or not, it will always show up under a pale green Satori beacon. It would be much more useful to players if beacons had 2 colours. One to show a cave's location and another colour to show that the player has entered that cave before. Several times i found myself heading towards a beacon that I thought was a new cave, only to realise it was one i'd already been in. And other times i'd ignore a beacon thinking i'd already been to that cave when really I hadn't.

3) Caves on the surface world in general - there were just too many of them.

In BotW we had Koroks, Shrines, Set ingredients to grind for.

In Totk we have Koroks, Shrines, Set ingredients, Bubble Gems, Chasm seeds, Hudson signs, Zonaite ore, Zonaite charges to grind for.

I will say tears of the kingdom is a much more fleshed out and better game. But it doesn't have that same impact that botw had for me. I was more emotionally invested in botw for some reason. It was such a serene experience that no other game has come to close to matching. Totk however, is more balls to the wall crazy, frantic experience. If I want to a more calming experience, I'll play botw. If I want a more wild and crazy experience, I'll play totk.

I'm still not even halfway in TotK, and I have to say that for as great as it is and how well it evolves what was introduced before, it does NOT make BotW obsolete/skippable. There's just something irreplaceable about the first game's vibe.

I think both versions are fantastic and both deserved to be played. I don't have a preferred version because offer different things.

Nice article, @Olliemar28, it's comforting to see similar thoughts to my own getting articulated in the media, and you've articulated it nicely. Were it not for the use of 'even' twice in four words I'd give you a 10/10

BotW felt more elegantly designed to me. The backstory via the memories that come from visiting locations significant to Link; the Divine Beasts; the more chilled out vibe of the original; it has a more cohesive feel to it. It's a very pure experience, whereas many of TotK's additions feel like they exist simply because of the gameplay potential, like in a Mario game.

I think TotK's approach was the right one to take for a direct sequel, but it's definitely not as impactful as the original was.

I’ll have a hard time going back to botw with all the improvements totk has brought. I’ll enjoy the story, but just looking back at the 300-400hours in botw, with so little to do compared to totk, I’ll never actually finish tears. And I did most everything(including master mode and the bike), but 100% koruks. I really hope 1-2 years from now, we get a story dlc, and if I am running Nintendo, the ability to have local amd/or online co op. At the very least, reuse everything again for a 3rd installment and add multiplayer. The ability to play this game world with a friend is the only thing keeping this from being best game ever period

@NintendoByNature I don't think TotK could possibly have had the same impact without being an entirely new game, set in a new Hyrule and with new art direction. That's what BotW had that TotK doesn't. But I share your vibe.

Just a small nitpick, but can you really say two games are both 10/10 when there’s enough of a divide between them to warrant an entire article? Sorta feels like it devalues the idea of a real perfect score…

I have been an absolute blast with Tears of the Kingdom - but this article definitely points out the overwhelming number of distractions that are in this game.

I do kind of miss getting to my destination without passing like 10 things I force myself to ignore so I can focus on my goal.

Also, the item grind for armor upgrades feels worse than before. Maybe it's just because I am only focusing on the "best" sets for having the highest defense (did enemies always hit this hard?) - which require dragon farming (which is much more time consuming this time around).

I feel like once I finish all the Shrines and get the Wild Set fully upgraded I am going to just focus on finishing out the main story. I just can't see myself wanting to do the rest of the collect-a-thon stuff, side quests, and side adventures.

I found myself scaling a cliff in TotK recently, which is something of a rarity as I’d normally zoom up on a time-reversed piece of debris, or build some sort of fantastic flying machine, or blast myself from a tower, or dive down from a sky island. But for whatever reason, on this occasion I decided to clamber up with my bare hands — scouring the contours of the cliff face for crevices to rest in and being careful not to burn through my stamina bar.

It was laboured, slow, and inefficient compared to every other method of ascent available, but it was… somehow incredibly tranquil. It took me back to the ‘purity’ of the first game, which made the simply act of traversal feel like an epic achievement. It encouraged the player to engage more intimately with the landscape: to wrestle with it and learn to read it like a book. Elevation acted as the currency of exploration: broadening the player’s perspective and letting them glide down to wherever they saw fit.

One crucial difference between the two games is how this currently is earned. ToTK dolls it out gladly, whereas BotW made the player really work for it. There’s a reason one of the two key pieces of art for BotW depicts Link scaling a cliff: it’s where the player will likely be spending much of their time.

I don’t resent TotK for opening up the experience so much. In many ways, it’s everything a sequel should be — taking the form of the first game and expanding upon it in pretty much every way imaginable. The fact that it feels genuinely different is something to be celebrated. But I’d be lying if I said I didn’t prefer the first game for its relative simplicity.

Ultimately, both games are epic in their own ways. Tears achieves this through its sheer scale and abundant customisation options; whizzing around the world on custom contraptions makes for a power-trip so liberating it can almost feel like cheating.

Breath takes the opposite approach: it makes the player feel small and relatively powerless. A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, and Breath’s masterstroke was to make the player feel each of those steps acutely.

If Breath was a carefully constructed Lego set, then Tears is the entire toy-box. It almost feels like Zelda meets Garry’s Mod or Game Maker Garage. The game (quite literally) hands the player the keys to the hovercraft, unlocking a staggering amount of gameplay potential and allowing the player to discover the world in a whole new way.

But nothing with ever surpass the simple pleasure of Breath’s approach to adventure for me. For all its scale and grandeur, it was a minimalist masterpiece.

@gcunit you nailed it on the head. I absolutely adore totk, so let that be known. I just feel like botw was a deeper game for me, and meant alot more.

The only real thing I noticed in my changed approach compared to BOTW, is that there was a good period of time where I came across shrines, activated the fast-travel point, then promptly ignored them for a few hours. In a similar fashion, I have also ignored the Koroks which need transporting, as I wanted to continue what I was doing at the time. Otherwise, I did stuff as I came across it, just like in BOTW.

Botw was a tech demo for Totk. I will never go back

For me TOTK is much more interesting. It took longer to click but now it's certainly clicked. i've been paying since launch and still haven't unlocked all the map. I was standing outside Zora's domain yesterday taking a breath, watching the foot traffic and glanced a shooting star and raced off. It's just incredible

It really is personal preference. I can see where people can get overwhelmed with the array of options the game gives you but the best part? It's all optional. I much prefer ToTK, it just feels more like a complete game and improves on every aspect.

But like with every Zelda everyone has one they like more than the other and that's the beauty of this series.

I agree with you. TOTK is a fantastic game. Mind-blowing, really. My only complaint, really, is that it’s not clicking with me quite like BOTW did, and this is a big reason for that. It’s definitely a personal preference.

@Olliemar28 I get what Ollie's saying. I like TOTK, but it is on the overwhelming side. I'm definitely enjoying it, but I think TOTK is too much game for my nieces, ages 10-15, who already have busy lives with school, sports, and other activities. I can't recommend that they get the game even though they'd enjoy it.

Then go play BoTW, it didn't vanish because ToTK came out.

Anyway no I don't agree. ToTk fixed just about every annoyance I had with BoTW. I like it a lot more so far.

BoTW was great, however I think ToTK is all around a superior experience.

BotW and TotK somehow use the same world for completely different experience, and they truly deserve to be experienced in release order.
BotW doesn't overwhelm the player with too many things to do at once. You have two main collectables, koroks and shrines. You have four main areas with major quests, and the final Hyrule Castle, plus the lesser settlements of Hateno, Kakariko, Tarrey, and Lurelin (coincidentally, all on the East side of the map).
But when it gets down to it, you're clearing the Divine Beasts, increasing your hearts/stamina, and to a lesser extent finding materials to upgrade your armor, and otherwise just preparing yourself for the final Ganon fight.

TotK ramps the density up to an incredible height. Every cave has a Bubbelfrog. Every piece of gear that was previously Amiibo-locked is now found in a chest in a cave, in a chest in the depths, or sometimes after a lengthy sidequest.
We retain the main collectibles of shrines and koroks, but now add crystalized charges/battery length, we have the extra settlement of Lookout Landing, almost everywhere a shrine existed in BotW there is now a cave, korok, or treasure of some kind.
The depths are just as large as the overworld (although once you're proficient at exploring, rather barren save for the Yiga camps and ancient mines).
There's 80-odd instances of Addison failing to put up a sign too. Overall, there's just... more.
Personally, I won't complain that there is too much, I'm not sure that it is possible, but if a player goes into TotK having not thoroughly explored Hyrule as it appeared in Breath of the Wild, it might just be too much.

TOTK is the GOAT, that is not so say BOTW is not an awesome game as well, but after spending a long time with BOTW, and enjoying it immensely, I could not have imagined how much TOTK could improve on it.

We are so lucky to have such talented developers, who have crafted two games, that could be both called the greatest.

Yeah. That's exactly one of the reasons I liked 'Breath of the Wild' more than 'Tears of the Kingdom. There was an enjoyable fun and laid back feel to 'Breath of the Wild' that is missing in 'Tears of the Kingdom' and' having too much going on in this game especially new difficult enemies around like Gleeoks and Malice Hands and not having Ancient Arrows to take out Lynels and other powerful villains turns me off playing it because it feels like it is more geared towards advanced gamers and alienates casual gamers. I was looking forward to 'Tears of the Kingdom' and really liked 'Breath of the Wild.' I spent over three years playing that game before I defeated it and one of the things I liked the most about it was exploring. I loved exploring all the different areas in Hyrule and collecting items, weapons and Korok Seeds and doing the Shrines and getting lost in that but I feel you can't really enjoy that in this game since you have to worry about some scary creature killing you everywhere you go and after making it to the ground I was peacefully walking around collecting things in the bushes and a tree sprung to life and tried to kill me and when I finally burned it to death two other trees came to life too and were coming after me for revenge and since then I have come across Malice Hands and Gleeoks and had to teleport away from them. Then I see underground and that doesn't look like a fun place to explore and is terrifying. 😨

I think they made 'Tears of the Kingdom' way too hard compared to 'Breath of the Wild' and it should have an Easy Mode with less enemies like 'Breath of the Wild' had or make them easier to beat. I don't mind a lot of the other new enemies like the flying green dragons, the Like Likes, Constructs, Boss Bokoblins, Bubbulfrogs and Froxes that look like a mix between a Hinox and Talus but there are way too many of them that it feels like I am playing on Hard mode and I would rather have the Guardians back over the Gleeoks and Malice Hands.

Also they ruined The Great Fairy Mountain. I liked going there in 'Breath of the Wild' and it was one of the places I was looking forward to visiting again and they ruined it with one of their big chasms. 😯

Both games are incredible. bOTW is an excellent precursor to spend 100 hours in before going into TOTK. By the time I was done with BOTW, I still wanted more. I loved the open exploration of everything, though. TOTK has that “more” in spades. And I’m enjoying how I expect to come across a guardian in a lot of open places only to find that none are there (phew!). For me, TOTK wins at the end of the day because of the clutter. There’s so much to do and skip and come back to, I don’t feel like I’m ever just done with an area and have no need to go back, which keeps me always moving and going back to the towns already visited for more than just supplies and additional hearts.

I prefer TOTK... but he's not wrong, when you actually think about it, it is a little unnatural and crowded other than the caves that just feel right.

Using the same base map for this game has definitely felt like both a blessing and a curse. It is cool to see how areas have changed over the intervening years. But there are also so many areas that feel the same and there's not the same sense of discovering a new world like in BOTW. I don't like the depths and sky islands as much as the surface. There are many cool additions, however. And the story seems better. It's definitely a 10/10 game but I'm still wondering if it would have been better for this game to have been entirely new rather than a sequel. I'll enjoy it regardless.

I've seen this take pop up here and there, and it feels like a classic "searching for a subject" perspective. So much of the TotK world is exactly as you describe, but you have to choose to play it that way. Walk around off the path, skip the glider, no fast travel, etc. I've caught friends saying all the same things as they mechanically go from tower to tower or stable to stable, missing the copious amounts of wilderness and emptiness they're supposedly searching for. Slow down.

@Nintendancies It feels like there are 10 times as many enemies in 'Tears of the Kingdom' than there was in 'Breath of the Wild.'

I do feel some of the things placed around the landscape are a bit on the nose.

Great article. I do like TotK overall, but it feels like a lesser experience to me and I think this articulates my experience as well.

I like that both games feel different, have a different energy. But I get the chill vibe every time I head up to the sky islands - it's so serene and isolated up there that it replicates that feeling.

@Debbiee
You might be right about that. However, I don't know if it's because my skill has improved over the years (I just played cozy games when BOTW came out) or the game is just easier with the fusing items, but I can dispatch them much more quickly this time around. and take on bosses that scared me before. The puzzles are easier too.

My son recently started playing BotW again because TotK is just too scary for him at 5. One thing I noticed is both how quiet, and how aggressively load BotW is. Running around just doing nothing, well there's no music and all you hear are the footsteps of Link (somehow it won best music, I think, even though most the time there isn't music at all most the time?). But when you clear out a mob and earn a chest, it's like twice as loud as TotK. It's just obnoxious because it seems as though there is no in between. I get the point, it's supposed to make it more suspenseful going from no noise to aggressively loud when fighting a guardian or something. But for me it's just annoying.

@NintendoByNature because it was a new world. Exploring regions and discovering the map for the first time was a thing of BOTW only. Yes, TOTK is amazing, but that feeling you mention belongs to BOTW. Both the Depths, Sky Islands and even the Caves are great additions, but their landscape feels the same, no matter in what region you are; and the main Hyrule map with all its changes, is the same Hyrule with more things to do.
Next Zelda must have a new map and regions definitively

I also preferred BotW, but for different reasons.

I really don't like TotK's building mechanic—it's tedious and never felt fun to me. I also don't enjoy exploring the depths—it's more annoying than it is fun. And the sky islands are nearly all copy and pastes of each other. And lastly, exploration of the main overworld is so trivialized by your ability to fly/glide your way around it. That also makes its sense of scale feel so much smaller than it is.

TotK absolutely does do a lot of things better. The story, bosses, and big set piece moments are all way better. But that isn't enough to make it a better game in my opinion.

I remember not long ago, a lot of people were talking about their dream DLC that would add questlines to BOTW focused on helping citizens rebuild and restore parts of Hyrule, similar to the Tarry Town questline, but on a much larger scale.

It was a little sad to see several abandoned and decrepit towns and cities scattered all around BOTW with not much lore or even secrets to be found. They were nice for immersion, and definitely better than just endless open space, but they didn't seem to have much purpose otherwise. Same goes for the NPCs, they were few and far between and while many of them had schedules to follow, a lot of them just felt a bit too generic.

I'm about 1/2 way through the main story and completed maybe a quarter of the sidequests, but even within the first 4-5 hours of playing, it seems they really listened to that sort of feedback.

The tranquility and simplicity of BOTW was lovely, but TOTK feels closer to the bustling Hyrule I remember from older games like Ocarina of time, and I definitely prefer the complexity and variety of this version.

From what I saw on Youtube the game feels even more salty than Breath Of The Wild. And now it also feels often nuts, so I call this game the Salty And Nutsy Kingdom. I replayed Skyward Sword on the Switch and realised how I miss this holy Zelda atmosphere. Even that game really had soul. I think it is more than just the music that is responsible for this. Would I have played Tears Of The Kingdom I would propably also prefer the Hyrule of Breath Of The Wild.

Having more stuff to do that is meaningful sounds good but after thinking about it I really do not feel like being disappointed again, so I better leave this series.

I much prefer TOTK, Breath of The Wild always felt empty to me and quite lonely much of the time. Where as now Hyrule feels more alive and its NPC's more interesting and that's before the shrines, BOTW had many which were frankly rubbish with that one enemy but every one I've done so far has been fun and interesting. The only weakness is the depths and I feel they didn't need to cover anywhere near the entire map amd would be better served as a few small areas like the Sky is

Overall I liked BOTW but it's way down the list of my favourite Zelda games whilst TOTK is very near the top

@Diowine fully agree. It feels different enough, but I know the lay of the land well enough to know where I'm going at all times.

Completely the opposite for me. I don’t think j can go back to BOTW.

@Jhena If I may ask, what do you mean by TOTK being "Salty" and "Nuts" based on some Youtube videos you watched?

I'd recommend playing the game for yourself before writing it off and declaring you're leaving the Zelda franchise because of this new title, but that's just my opinion as someone who has actually played it for many hours. I feel the tone and story is almost identical to BOTW.

It's all very new in story, mechanics, and exploration, but at the same time very very similar to BOTW. I also understand longtime fans of the series didn't like the direction BOTW was headed, so if you didn't like BOTW, I would understand not wanting to return for this game.

Tears of the Kingdom is the better game.

But, especially at the 35-40 hour mark, where most of the map might still be unexplored, maybe you’ve got like 2 dozen shrines and a main dungeon….

I can also understand feeling pretty overwhelmed with how much game is “still left to go.”

Without wanting to sound ungrateful as I'm absolutely in love with TOTK but it's too big! There's too much trying for my attention so I end up just doing nothing. I think that sometimes when they make open world games are made so very massive but they don't think about do they need to?

I was hoping Castle Town and some of the other ruined settlements would be rebuilt, but I guess that comes in Part 3.

I also preferred BOTW. I actually wanted to beat that game.
I have no desire to finish TOTK. It's too inconsistent with its story continuation from the previous game, it feels a bit lifeless too.

The original, starting with almost nothing on the ridge is one of the best experiences you can get to an opening of a video game.

TOTK is literally BOTW with a load of noise added. This article is absolutely right in every aspect except one. TOTK is NOT a 10/10 game. It's clearly a 9.

Nintendo delivered a sequel that failed to create anywhere near the sense of adventure of the original. They padded it out with repetition and a lot of uninspired content. They copied and pasted bits that actually I don't want to do again (Korok seeds?! Are they taking the mick or what?)

This screams of cash grab on old hardware.

Compare this to the world Majora's Mask created from Ocarina of Time and I think you'll start to see where I'm coming from here.

Also, 6 years? That doesn't ring true either. What have they really been working on...?

I’m glad everyone ‘s having a great time. But please, we need to talk about something real openly here.

The crafting is downright horrid and I don’t understand how anyone can defend the way it was executed.

My guess is that this feature alone is why the game has been postponed for such a long time, and they had to do a lot of tweaking because the concept is just not really suited to gamepad controls.
It takes too long to figure out how to trick the system into not ruining your entire construction because something snapped to the wrong place. You try to shake it off and a burning boulder falls on your head. Awesome. Those physics are a real feat in game development. But it’s too cumbersome and un-precise, and nobody is having fun when that happens.

We might like the result when it does work out, but for me this is a major flaw in the game.

Nintendo is hesitant about VR, but this is exactly the kind of game that would work a lot better if you could just build things with your own hands.

@nocdaes Every word you said is true. Except I’d give it a generous 7/10 so far

@Zuljaras This. I was hoping to see the Divine Beast as well

@Astral-Grain
Salty like tears. As in sad. The whole intro section just had that lonely and sad feeling. And the whole stuff like ultrahand, glueing weird stuff together and islands and cubes just flying in the air make it feel crazy or nuts to me.

I was already disappointed in Breath Of The Wild. It is certainly a fresh experience but to me it is a very bad replacement for Zelda.
And what I saw did not feel that much different. I was also not a really big fan of the story in Breath Of The Wild. It even felt like the developers made a joke of it, by making the player search for it.

But you are propably right. It might be too early to write of Zelda. I guess I will wait and see what comes next.

I really enjoyed Tears or the Kingdom, it has its pros and cons compared to Breath of the Wild, but I have to admit that I don't want to play another Zelda that is similar to either of them. I feel this style of Zelda has reached its peak and drastic changes would be needed in a follow up.

What did it for me was not that there was too much to do, but that there seemed to be a lot more enemies all over. Barring places with patrolling Guardians and the like, BotW felt peaceful and relaxing. TotK, by contrast, had too many people and people-like monsters: it felt crowded, and I don't like crowds.

Breath is the better first game for a newcomer. It's got a smoother overall flow, from opening to conclusion. It's also more focused and pure. The free exploration of open terrain is unobstructed by clutter or complicated mechanics.

Tears assumes you've played Breath. Much of the emotional sweep of it depends on you remembering how Hyrule used to look before the Upheaval. The opening tutorial section is also harder and requires trickier navigation. The whole game, really, is just more difficult. And the mechanics take more getting used to. I still prefer Tears, though. I like the building, the creativity involved, the fusing to make new weapons. I like the more involved sidequests and the weirder and moodier vibe, especially in the caves and the Depths. I like that the combat shrines, this time around, are all different from each other.

In all, I love both Zeldas. My only issues are more conceptual, the fact that you have so many repeated structures in both games, over and over again, from towers to lightroots, shrines, Korok seed puzzles, Hudson sign puzzles, and so on, all with often identical or similar cinematics and mechanics. It makes the experience feel a bit repetitive and less special. It's one thing to have, say, collectibles strewn about, like Skultullas. But the above are full-fledged gameplay moments, that you do a lot of, and repeat constantly, and always convey a similar emotion or vibe, no matter where you are in the world. I miss the more bespoke, room-by-room variety of earlier Zeldas, for sure. You might get "less game," but those were still 40 to 50 hour adventures for a completionist run. Not exactly short, either.

The only thing is that, as much as I appreciate the Link's Awakening or Ocarina style of Zelda (with Majora's Mask remaining my personal favorite), I don't know if it would sell as much. Which, I don't care about. But Nintendo does. The open sandbox-y approach is definitely more streamable and sharable on social media, because of all the wild stuff high-level players manage to do. Which, you know, there's something to that. It's hard to make a game that gives you so much freedom. There's a reason I love these games anyway. But I don't know that I want another one in this style. It's gonna take me all year just to get through Tears.

I was worried I would find it boring having the same map, but I needn't have worried. One thing which absolutely has to change next time though is giving us some actual overworld music. Just throwing out the same silent track with the same piano melody interrupting it certainly makes me miss the old Zelda's. Music feels as if it's taken a back step in the series now, which is a massive shame as it was one of the most beloved parts of Zelda. I'd love to have a different theme playing in every part of the map, the same way we do in games like Xenoblade. In whatever game is next, we need to have Link playing music to solve puzzles or change the environment again. Wind direction, time of day, weather conditions. I'd even love it if they did similar to the Oracle games and change seasons or time period to find a way forward. Make music a part of Zelda once more.

Oh I’m the exact opposite. Honestly I never fell in love with BOTW as much as others did because it felt so empty. Sure, the world was big and vast, but I felt like there wasn’t enough in it to discover. Hardly anything beyond the story grabbed my attention and, once I beat Ganon, I put the game down and rarely returned.

TOTK is the exact opposite. The world feels more lived in, if that makes sense. Hyrule feels fuller, richer, and more alive than ever before. Don’t get me wrong, BOTW is great, but I think TOTK is a vast, and welcome, improvement.

@Switch_Pro 100% agree. BOTW/TOTK is a nice installment of Zelda, but I don’t want it to be the only kind of game we get in the future.

@Aaron101 it’s a definitely a game you need to be in for the long run. I’ve been like you where I’ll play for a few hours and it feels like I accomplished nothing lol. It’s just easy to get sidetracked, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it does keep you from feeling very “accomplished” whenever you play.

tears is a collectathon in my opinion and yes it makes a lot better but i think it's design wise a lot less elegant. yeah you get dopamin every few seconds because you collect stuff all the time but it often feels like work and i never ever had that feeling with botw. that being said i think tears is still a brilliant game and 10/10

@PinderSchloss,

In all fairness you do not like many games, so a seven from you is like a ten.

So I picked both. I think they both have their winning elements. Personally I think between the two if you could wipe your memories and go back to one for the first time all over again I would pick BOTW. It’s true that it’s more quiet and to me that makes the discovery in it that much more exciting even if when you discover something it’s not hitting you with a big old DISCOVERY! Like TOTK literally does.

Totally agree with you Ollie. I love TOTK but I still think BOTW has a certain magic. I think you did a great job describing that here!

Gaming is just as much about doing silly stuff as it is about quiet, natural moments, if not more so yeah, I have zero problems with totk.

While there is more going on in the world, I really don't feel compelled to engage with absolutely everything I see. For instance, I'll see one of those korok dudes trying to reach his friend, then see how far away his friend is, and just be like yep, good luck with that and be on my merry way. Much like botw you can still play the game on your own terms, which is great.

I’m glad TotK does as much as it can to be different to BotW considering it’s the same base world, including packing it with as much stuff to do as possible where BotW gave you more time to breathe. There’s a much greater sense of urgency from the gameplay to the story in TotK compared to BotW and I’m glad we have both games to offer those different experiences within the same world.

And I don’t think there’s anything wrong with their approach with this game, in that’s it’s very much made for people who already played BotW. It’s a direct sequel and a companion to that game and doesn’t try to hide it, and that’s fine. It can be nice to see a great world and interesting characters get more time to be fleshed out, especially for Zelda which rarely indulges in direct follow ups.

@Switch_Pro Well, get ready for disappointment, they basically said they won't be changing the formula. Though I'm of the same opinion.

I simply miss the abundance of animals I TOTK.

I was really expecting to read some lingering note of indulgent thinking in the delivery of such a companion article, but it's surprisingly terse and inline with how I felt in this new Hyrule.

The original game was so pure in its openness, taking the first steps from the Shrine of Resurrection and emerging into the bright vista of that first plateau. Even this moment echoed seems to highlight a difference in design ethos, a contrast in the moment to moment focus between the two games.

My main gripes would be... the proliferation of materials into the environment as the article mentions, such as those constant wagon building depots. There is no way any of the citizens in Hyrule are using these items and it takes away from the purity of the space to see all this clutter laid out for you alone to utilize.

@Jhena I think one could argue the desolation and suffering that existed in BOTW's world is just as sad, if not more sad than TOTK because at least in TOTK, there is a feeling of hope to rebuild and overcome the evil in the world. I thought BOTW was a lonely game, personally.

One could also argue that a big wide open world with climbing mechanics and super powers is also "nuts" compared to previous entries. This new game just built upon the foundation that was already there. There were already crazy physics and mechanics and people were already making flying machines using these properties, this new game just made it much easier to do those things without using glitches.

I'm certainly not going to sway you as you've already made up your mind about TOTK, I just think you have some deep seated opinions for a game you've never actually played yourself, that's all.

@OldManHermit I think what you described is the best way to navigate these Skyim-like worlds where there's billions of things to do, we just have to get better at having cone vision and only doing the things we want to do rather than get distracted by all the things that are possible to do.

I remember not long ago when almost every game felt like a Skyrim clone with tons to do and endless mechanics, it was very overwhelming when you think you need to do it all. In my first play through of the Witcher 3, I didn't even touch Gwent. It was just too much at once. I'm glad I skipped it though because I came back to it later and it kept me playing longer.

I think the ability to say "I'll pass on that for now" and just do the things you really want to do in the moment, despite there being endless possibilities, is the ultimate strength for gamers these days.

Same. It took me a few days to get into TOTK. Part of the issue is that there is SO much to do. I'd set off to do something, and stumble upon a cave, or something else that caught my eye. There's this sense of dread that if I don't check out that cave, I may never be back again to see what was in it. I just spent my entire play time last night checking out the noise at Lookout Landing. I'm learning to appreciate TOTK for what it is, but it does feel a bit overwhelming sometimes.

I'm def in the camp that tears seems less boring than wild was to me. So as a game, it actually seems worth a purchase and trumps wilds emptiness time wastingness

Great article, one of the few I fully read around here and happen to totally agree with. It's about the nicest way of saying "TotK isn't as good," and that's all down to personal preference.

I think sometimes, we have so much pressure to love the latest hot new game, that it takes a bit of courage, or some good explanation, to address how it might not be as great of an experience as some make it out to be. Once again, that's kind of down to personal preferences.

I think I can relate to the writer here as I too just get overwhelmed by these open world games these days that just try to throw as much at you as possible. That, and I just don't have the time to be dedicating to these games that they seem to demand. Like my main interest isn't games like this, it's usually games like GT7, Forza Horizon 5, and Session that get my consistent interest. Games like this tend to be more or less just a distraction for me, something different for me to get into, between racing game and sports game sessions. I mean I just really enjoy video games and checking them out, but with TotK, it feels like something that I have largely already seen before.

I love it how someone actually appreciates the so-called "emptier" world of BotW. Of course, it's not really empty. The only people saying that are those who've already played 500 hours and have done everything there is to do in the game and suddenly wonder why there's no content.

No game has endless amount of content.

BotW felt a lot like TotK when it was released. There was always some distraction to filll traveling distances. Although I have to say TotK multiplies this almost to the point of overwhelming.

I love both games because despite sharing the base surface map, they still feel like different games and TotK has not made BotW unrelevant.

BotW really feels more "pure" in many ways. The weapons are traditional swords and spears instead of fused ninja katanas and monster horn clubs, basic armor sets are easier to get, and it has enemies such as the Guardians that evoke their unique blend of panic while your riding on your horse instead of mowing enemies down with some weird contraption.

Most importantly, BotW has easier controls including the runes which differ a lot from TotK's skillset. You learn everything that's needed quickly and there won't be misclicks after that. I've played TotK for 70 hours at least and I still press the wrong button at times when I try to change the ability or open the quick materials menu.

I've heard some people saying that the world of BotW doesn't feel "alive" enough. This is bollocks. The lighting and particle effects and the animations of the flora and fauna certainly makes it feel the most living open world game there is. TotK feels exactly the same with the difference there is more population. Is nature not alive if there are no people?

All in all, I can't really say which game is better. TotK has a lot better story, though. Then again, the simple premise of BotW dresses the game as it should.

But goddamnit the Zelda fans. Nothing's ever good enough. Either the game is too empty or too full. Too linear or too open. Now I hear people wondering how it took Nintendo 6 years to create TotK. Just for the info, the mechanics alone are complex enough to leave your mediocre game developer baffled and there is SO MUCH CONTENT I have no idea how they could've done it in less time. And all that with basically zero bugs or glitches.

Normal people seem to appreaciate the new Zelda games a lot better than the so-called fans. Somehow BotW and TotK have managed to get people who normally wouldn't touch a video game completely hooked. That alone is quite a feat.

I don't know if it's busier, but perhaps its that we are 6 years older? I play games differently now I guess. I don't have reflexes and patience that I did 6 years ago, nor time I guess. I have less free time, kids, etc. I played more games 6 years ago, and am spending less. 6 years ago my daughter started college, she recently finished her Master's.
Don't get me wrong, this game is great. Although good grief I'm having issues killing Lynels still, and definitely the Gloom hands/Ganon..and the Gleeks. But, I'm determined and will get through it.
I will say though, I'm cheesing too many of the shrines I guess. The ones with targets especially..I'm just not doing the way the dev team wanted us to do them...and last night I cheesed my way through three of them simply shooting a bomb arrow.
Finally, like others, I'm missing some aspects of the BotW, like the Divine Beasts, where are the remnants? And, I know Zelda ordered all the guardians dismantled, but seriously they GOT EVERY SINGLE ONE? I'm hoping still there is one last guardian out there no one has found.

@Chopsworth
What are you talking about? Totk has even more animal species than BotW.

@Astral-Grain
Yes you are right Breath Of The Wild was already sad, lonely and even a little bit nuts ( though I feel like climbing is not really weird) and I know there is always weird stuff in Zelda. Maybe it just does not feel as natural as in previous games. Not sure.

The problem I have is I feel it got even worse in the sequel, so why should I play and support a game that will very likely disappoint me again?

BOTW was a bland and boring open world with nothing to do. Tears is a vast improvement

@Baker1000
The music IS different in different parts of the map. Sky islands have 3 or 4 different themes which are completely new. Then there's the normal field theme, desert music, cold air music, volcanic theme, depths theme, different themes in different villages, different music depending on the enemies, etc.

The music is made with good taste and it's subtle because you're out on the field most of the time. If there was some epic banger theme playing 24/7 it would drive people crazy in a game this big.

@Jhena I hear you, but life is full of risks, is it not?

If you didn't like BOTW, I don't recommend you picking up TOTK because it's much of the same, though also completely different. I realize that description is confusing but I can't think of another way to describe it.

It's a strange kind of feeling really, because of my experience playing BOTW, I won't play TOTK for more than 2-3 days at a time to avoid getting burned out. I remedy this by playing another game for a few days in between (I just got into Nier Automata) and going back and forth really helps me keep both games fresh and new. I played BOTW to death, so it's not interesting to me anymore, but TOTK is a fresh new take and I haven't drained the fruit of its juices yet like I did with BOTW, so it keeps me coming back, and probably will for at least another few months. That's not to mention there will likely be DLC, but that may be a bit down the road.

If you played BOTW before, you have the luxury of knowing what to expect. Basically, if you could go back in time and experience BOTW all over again, would you still choose to play it or not?

If you wish to re-experience the feeling of playing BOTW through a very different lens, I'd say it's a game for you. If not, I'd say you should skip it and that is perfectly fine.

I'm the complete opposite. The barren feel of BotW is one of many reasons I disliked it. This is still Zelda, I don't want an empty world to explore, which much of BotW felt like. BotW to me was just a new open-world game with the Zelda name tacked on to help it sell. TotK feels more like an open-world Zelda game than BotW did.

For the most part, there was no reward for exploration other than chests with useless gear or a pittance of rupees/resources, and the highly repetitive shrines.

Everyone loves to complain about the Ubisoft open-world formula, but Botw (and TotK) are pretty much the same thing. You wander the world, run into the same handful of activities like shrines, caves, the same enemy encampments, and all for the same pitiful rewards of gear worse than you have or if lucky equal.

If it wasn't for the physics systems and abilities in BotW/TotK, there really isn't much difference between them and your typical Ubisoft formula open-world. The only other difference is that instead of the game marking every point of interest for you, you get to do so yourself. That's hardly a revolution of the open-world format. Of course BotW/TotK superfans will tear you to shreds for opinions like this.

So far I'm a tally enjoying TotK where as I didnt enjoy BotW and felt forced to play it to justify my purchase. TotK is a far superior game in my opinion.

@Astral-Grain
Mixing up games to not get burned out is a good idea. If I could go back in time to experience it again for the first time, I wish someone or even myself would stop me from playing Breath Of The Wild.

I am very thankful though that you are explaining how it is like to experience Tears Of The Kingdom. And I like it that you are very understanding.

The wait and see approach is propably the best approach for the time being.

@Kang81 I'd classify myself as a BOTW/TOTK fan and I'd have to agree with all you said.

Similar to Ubisoft games, Nintendo created a repeatable "formula" that can either be seen as repetitive and boring or as addictive and engaging, it just depends on your tastes and preferences. It would be nice if there were more randomized loot in these games so I could look forward to treasure hunts, but that's just another mechanic from other games, and not really innovative either I suppose.

The innovations/physics/mechanics you mentioned are a big part of why I think BOTW/TOTK stands out, but you're correct that almost all else are built upon what other open worlds games did first. Small innovations go a long way I guess.

@Jhena I think you made the right call, you can always change your mind later if you feel differently.

It's been very nice talking with you.

BOTW was barren and empty feeling. it didn't feel like a lived in place, it just felt like there were technical limitations preventing Nintendo from making it feel more alive.

TOTK doesn't have that problem, its a more believable and engrossing world as a result. If you want to find serenity and peace in TOTK- you can find it. you can go off the beaten track and disappear into nature.

I really can't believe people are holding this view that there is too much going on, especially as the emptiness was one of the most frequent complaints in BOTW. People also saying there is too much to do in TOTK... !? Seriously? The game ticks every box when improving upon BOTW and still people will creative negatives.

TOTK is the best game I have ever played, its incredible!

@Brumblescope

I really want a different feel to the setting in the next game. The idea of a BotW/TotK game with the setting of Wind Waker sounds like a great place to take the next game.

I love how different games like Majora’s Mask, The Minish Cap, and Wind Waker make a Zelda game seem fresh with a different take on Hyrule or in MM's case, leaving Hyrule behind.

I completely get what you're saying. To me it's not that there is so much to do as I enjoy the heck outta plowing through sidequests in JRPGs, it's just that there is so much to do, with little to no guidance on how to complete them. Like I'm not expecting a guide point system in the way that Xenoblade does since Zelda is much more about exploration, but there is so much to do with vague hints I'll be completing this game and bypassing so much of it. Which I guess can be said is a good thing on a replay of the game at a later date.

All that being said I have been loving TOTK. To me it has improved over BOTW in almost every way. I was so meh on BOTW that I almost didn't get TOTK but I am glad that I did.

@piecez

People will always combine, but that's because a game can never please everyone and never will. I did not like BotW, it felt like a game with the Zelda name tacked on to sell it. TotK is vastly improved and feels more like what an open-world Zelda would be to me. Still doesn't excuse the lack of proper dungeons, the temples feel no different than the divine beasts to me, but at least they went back to unique Zelda style bosses instead of a slightly different Gannon fight each time.

TotK may be the greatest game you've ever played, and I do find it great, but as I've aged I've learned to criticize games I love as much as games I dislike. There is still a lot of criticisms I have with TotK, but its still a major improvement.

@Tarolusa

I can see this difference of opinion. There is something calming about BotW. However it grows stale and boring rather quick for me. If there was more to discover that didn't feel like a waste of time or result in a reward that I felt was useless I'd enjoy exploring more.

Another aspect is in BotW you had to painstakingly traverse Hyrule leaving one to experience more of the world in a way. In TotK, the travel abilities make it easier to bypass a lot of Hyrule.

I wouldn't want to go back to BotW traversal after TotK though. The ascend and recall abilities along with rocket shields, zonai springs devices, and sky tower/islands make traversal so much less of a chore than BotW.

Now i have legit options to continue where i was heading in the rain with the aforementioned options where in BotW i would have to either sit for 5-10 real world minutes to wait for the rain to subside (only to return within another short amount of time) or completely change where i was going. Sorry, I just spent 20 minutes climbing these mountains, I'm not changing direction and.doing it all over again because of this stupid rain mechanic.

@Kang81 I have played a lot of games, I have fallen in and out of loves with gaming, lost interest, came back etc TOTK is the sort of game that makes me want to play games. Its not perfect but when compared to my other favs such as Mario 64, ocarina of time, goldeneye, Xenoblade Chronicles etc it offers so much more. Of course your memories associated with certain games can inform how fondly you feel about them, but this game, even as a brand new game is obviously monumental.

this game creates a more realistic hyrule, I mean, what is a dungeon? in ocarina of time they were quite abstract places.. In TOTK they gave us spoiler Caves and the underworld areas. There are temples, which in true Zelda style are very abstract environments. There are (as you said) bosses. Also the sky islands and of course, shrines. Over all, combining all these elements you do get the 'dungeon' experience from a classic Zelda game. BOTW didn't have these elements at all, outside of those Devine beasts and shrines.

BOTW felt like an actual world where a significant historical event recently happened. The remnants of the upheaval didn't feel as significant even though there are floating islands in the sky!

BOTW tugged better at the explorer instincts. TOTK feels like a video game toybox with an un-natural "game-ified" world topography & constant distractions to chase after. I prefer the former like yourself.

The building is also too invasive. I've seen that Ultrahand red screen filter & heard its' rune activation noise so often that I avoid building if I can. It kind of feels like the game is almost punishing you by doing so however.

Anyway, to each their own.

@Aljebra

I hear you, I don't know the major age group of BotW/TotK players, but I've only got so much time to play games as an older.

I hear you on the Lynels. They wouldn't bother me so much if they didn't d3cimate my health so much with a single hit. They make it so your severely punished if you don't fight perfectly, or spam bomb arrows from above.

Gleeoks are actually easier than I had though. I watched a good tip on YouTube. Use an arrow with an enemy eye attached and it will instantly target and disable one of the heads. Do that 3 times and they're down. Run up, spam some damage, run away and repeat. I can down them before they usually have a chance to even get an attack off. They are supposedly suppose to rise up out of range to make that strategy different when they're almost out of health, but if your fast enough with the auto aiming arrows you can get them before they fly too high. Just be careful of your surroundings. I fell off the side of a cliff mid fight with the electric Gleeok and it peppered me constantly with electrical attacks even at the bottom of the mountain. I had to reload an auto save.

The eyeball arrows helped me with lynels early on where I could hit them as they where charging me and then mount them for attacks free of durability loss. I've noticed this doesn't work much anymore. The stronger variants seem to block or parry my arrows so now I've gone to bomb arrow spam. Thankful for the dupe glitch as I now have 400 bomb plants. 😈

I also agree with the entire guardian situation. Where are they, what happened to the remains? Hyrule is more populated, but not enough to clear the entire world of their existence.

Also, if another 100 years have past, why is anyone from the first game even alive let alone barely aged?? It feels like the last game has nothing to do with TotK. I feel BotW and TotK still don't handle story well.

@jimmytodgers

I feel the building is a niche mechanic but still useful. I'm not a creative builder and usually detest building in games. TotK isn't much different but it does allow so many ways to cheese things in game.

I get a lot a strong 'Subnautica' vibes from TOTK

@Astral-Grain

Yeah, I and don't say that to try to start arguments with people, I just think a lot of fans seem blind to just how similar BotW/TotK are to a typical Ubisoft format open-world game and they get defensive very quickly when mentioned.

I'm a lot older now, I criticize everything, even games I love. Nothing is perfect, and I even look back on games I thought were perfect when I was younger with a new outlook and see how far from perfect they actually are.

@Drew250 I just learnt to ignore these little ***** with their backpacks. My inventory is big enough for everything I need.

@piecez

No doubt, nothing is perfect, but as my brother and I were discussing recently, TotK is the first game in a long time to get us so absorbed in it. That alone is an accomplishment as so many games are losing appeal to me. I can't remember the last game I've completed outside of GoW: Ragnarök. It's rare I finish games now.

Nostalgia can really effect one's opinions, but as I've gotten older I look back at games I thought were perfect with a new perspective and realize how far from perfect they are.

I do appreciate how TotK has the 3 layers of Hyrule now. I do wish the sky was more filled and the underground was less repetitive though.

As for the temples/dungeons, this is an issue I have in general. I'm a major Tomb Raider fan and I feel the tombs in the reboot trilogy pale in comparison to the older games. It just seems like puzzle design is being streamlined into smaller and simpler designs and I'm not a big fan. Puzzle solving in games is one of my favorite types of gameplay, not enough games do it right let alone do it at all.

The shrines are definitely improved in TotK, but unfortunately so many can be cheesed. That or by building some monstrosity in the ones involving building.

I just suck at creative building, so when I see most people's solutions and how simple they were to my overly complicated work around I just face palm often. Haha

i love theres more gameplay segment tied to specific part of the game now, Tears of the Kingdom is much more content richer because of the that, i always doing something/fiding something intereting thanks to this, the sky that is more puzzle focused, the Depths that have a rougue-like/survival aspect and horror too, and the surface that has expanded to include caves that offer you useful loot for you, all this, give you a more richer gameplay expirence, plus the sidequest that is much more involved now.

It sounds like you can return to BotW if you want that experience. : )

I'm yet to play TotK, but I loved BotW for similar reasons to you. I loved exploring for exploring's sake and sometimes something like coming across a Lynel could be the kind of distraction I didn't want.

The clear answer for me is Lil Gator Game. Seriously.

But if we're talking about Zelda, then BOTW for me. I really enjoyed TOTK (I've finished it), but that calm in BOTW won me over more. However, Lil Gator Game is so chill and charming, that its #1 in my book.

I get it. Tears can be overwhelming at times. Maybe it needs a "distraction" slider setting that'd allow the player to dial down some of the serendipitous encounters a bit.

I have the exact opposite opinion. Breath of
the Wild just never hooked me because the simple gameplay of climbing, walking, and fighting scattered camps just never really did it for me. When something big happened, it was fun, but it was few and far between. TOTK, on the other hand, has enough big activities that the little ones, which are great, can be supplemented by something actually happening, so for me, it’s just the right balance. However, I respect other people’s opinions if this ruins or dampers TOTK for them, although many did not respect the people who said that the lack of things to do in BOTW hurts that game.

ToK > BotW

sorry you miss hyrule being less busy, I don't. Roll on more Zonai contraptions.

For me the most fun experiences in both games were combat and exploration, so the endgame of BOTW was kind of boring while in TOTK everything still feel fresh up to the end with new places around every corner.

It's a true sequel to possibly the greatest game every made.

I tried starting BotW from the beginning (not recently), but after spending so long with the game (350+ hours which is probably not a lot by some standards but probably 5x more than any other single player game - Vice City excluded!), but I had no real impetus to do so.

TotK feels like a remix, but fresh and full of surprises, which is incredible really when you consider it's the same basic Hyrule. The Depths in particular have really captivated me, more so than the surface, as there is a great sense of discovery and unknown.

Nintendo has really made this for the typical BotW player; and the typical BotW player will have sunk 100s of hours into that game. So it has to be mixed up quite a bit; coming face to face with a Gleeok with only half a dozen hearts now seems like fair game, but that is only because of my experience with BotW.

For me it has allowed me to start (figuratively) BotW again. I'm happy to grind again as the experience is fresh!

(I still miss the traditional linear Zelda game though, and would love to see another offering in some way shape or form. I don't think either BotW or TotK are the strongest narratively, and I think it is a shame for anyone not to have experienced Ocarina of Time!)

All these people saying that they wouldn’t go back to BOTW after playing TOTK is exactly what’s wrong with TOTK in the first place.

There’s never been a Zelda that replaces the previous games experience EVER.

Like Super Mario Galaxy, the first game was the more eye opening experience to me but the second one took everything and flat out made it better. How I feel is that Tears of the Kingdom makes Breath of the Wild feel obsolete. That's the vibe I'm getting based on my own perceptions and experiences.

@YoshiF2 Eh, people say that about any number of things. I don't think it's true at all that Breath of the Wild is obsolete because of Tears of the Kingdom. It has its own more relaxed vibe and different toolset for Link which some people are bound to prefer. However, for me the issue with both of the games is that they are way too long, so I don't see myself playing them again like I do with other Zeldas.

I really love how TotK took what BotW introduced and expounded on these new systems. I do think that TotK is overall a better game, but BotW still holds a special place in my collection. Heck, I've gone back to BotW a couple times in between my long sessions of the new game. I think that both Hyrule are special in their own way.

(but seriously, did all the sheikah tech just magically disappear between the games? Maybe the citizens of hyrule lost all trust in it after the events of the Calamity?)

@YoshiF2 TotK and BotW have very simple stories relative to the percentage of time spent traversing and existing in the open world environments. So, yeah, it’s very different. But not wrong or broken. Traversal is more joyful in Totk and that is a huge percentage of time.

@Brumblescope I feel exactly the same. I also agree with the sentiment of the article mostly.

BotW was a masterpiece in both storytelling (I know I know, not many would agree....), pace and exploration. I think everything got introduced beautifully. Yeah it had too few enemy types and way too many boring bokoblin camps, but aside from that, the game was stunning in captivating my imagination and gave me a true sense of wonder at traveling through the landscape. Exploration at its best!

Now I love the more natural caves etc in TotK, but I'm not a big fan of Fuse compared to e.g. magical weapons from BoTW. I don't care much for the vehicles etc even if fun the first time with something new it removes some of that magic for me (just like I strongly disliked the motorcycle in BotW; felt misplaced.)

I guess, it slightly went from a true adventure to a playground feel for me. Still enjoying it, but not captivated by it.

I agree completely. I'm really enjoying TotK. 10/10. But I do prefer the world map in BotW. Even though Hyrule is the same size and they've added the sky and the underground, TotK actually feels smaller. It's ironic but all the extra things to do, construction equipment scattered everywhere, more people, more quests and the entirety of the depths makes the game feel claustrophobic.

I do love the sky islands though. Exploring those really feels like a proper successor to the great feeling of discovery in BotW.

Have to agree 100 percent with this article, personally.

I disagree 100% TOTK is like they took BOTW and removed stuff I didn't like, and added more fun stuff to do. The improvement to climbing alone makes it more fun to play. I rarely use fast travel in TOTK because there's so much to stumble upon when wandering around. In BOTW doing the same, I'd end up with a quick laser death from an off-screen robot octopus.

They are both equally as lovely and are a joy to play. The article seems to indicate you actually care about the game (TOTK). That tells one a lot in itself. TOTK needed to have more to do and more going on if it was based on the same open world vista. Especially considering many, many ppl have explored it in detail. The sequel is just right and so was the first game (in respect to it). Remember, the first game was our first introduction into true open world Zelda whilst the sequel is, as I said the same open world. It has to be built upon and that building upon is giving you more mass within the world.

@Baker1000 @Takoda yeah ***** that. I got annoyed hearing the overworld theme back to back and I’d hate it much more with the distances you have to traverse.

With the way that TotK's world was designed, it perfectly justifies BotW remaining playable. To me, this is very similar to the OoT/MM split. You play OoT for the simplistic, basic experience. You play MM to expand up what you've gone through in OoT, but it doesn't act as an irreversible evolution. You can still walk back into OoT and enjoy it fully, and I believe the same thing applies to BotW and TotK.

I think this is exactly what's drawing me to the depths. The depths give me that feeling of uninterrupted exploration, with a twist, and I love it. It just lacks some of the diversity of the overworld. I love both games, and totk outshines botw in several ways (including a livelier world), but I still feel botw excels in certain areas. Some things are hard to measure.

Well said, Ollie! This is exactly how I’m feeling. I’m not disappointed in it, I don’t wish that Tears of the Kingdom was any different than it is. I’m enjoying it and I’m going to finish it. And then I’m going to go play the Super Nintendo. These days I just need something more straightforward. Crazy that we can now consider Breath of the Wild “straightforward”, but here we are.

For me personally, there is still plenty of empty wilderness to get lost in, and forget about the newer conventions of Tears Of The Kingdom. To be fair though, I didn't play Breath Of The Wild to get lost in the world. I primarily played it for the main quests, side quests, characters, and dungeons. I like having actual things to do, and not just a space to live in so I appreciate all of the new mechanics and locations.

Personally, I am really not enjoying TotK.
I liked BotW, but it was by no means my favourite in the series, but TotK pretty much takes everything I did not like about BotW and either leaves them the same or amplifies them.
The weapon durability I absolutely hate and always have.
The horse-riding I really hate too. Just feels like I have very little control over the horse and calling it to you is annoying compared to just calling it from anywhere (like in Ocarina by using Epona's song).
Fusing weapons is annoying, because you cannot unfuse weapons and refuse them to new things and the aforementioned durability makes it extra frustrating when you fuse yourself a good weapon, only to have it break shortly after!
I hate all the building stuff. I loved the Zelda series and I have no interest in playing Minecraft, so I really am not a fan of all the sticking bits together mechanics.
The combat feels really off to me for some reason as well. Indo not know if it is because I have become a bit more used to more "Souls-like" combat in the past few years ( it played BotW since it first released), but the combat in TotK feels really clunky and dull to me.

Yeah, generally just really struggling to get into the game and I do not find myself at all compelled to carry on playing, whereas even BotW, despite not loving it as much as some others, I still always wanted to get back to playing whenever I was not playing it!

Maybe Zelda has just evolved into a series I do not love (or even really like) anymore like I used to... Sad for me, but if more people are enjoying it then I supposed it is good for them (and Nintendo).

LEft out a fourth option on your poll. " I don't like either game, I prefer pre-botw games".

BotW was reason enough for me to not come back. Kind of threw me under the bus with that one and have moved on with their new more important bigger audience. Which is fine. Not like I don't have 3 decades of zelda games to fall back on. Your overall complaints just seem silly to me. BotW had a lot of issues and it wasn't a 10/10 experience. The fact that you're happier with an emptier world, makes me wonder if you enjoy playing games or really just need a nice nature trail in your life. The empty barren world of BotW never made sense to me, not to the degree that it was. For a game it was just obnoxious waste of time. While everyone else was spending 100s of hours playing botw with what I can only explain as a mcdonald's cheese burger, I was taking on far more memorable events, bosses, and quests in much more condensed experiences. If you spend most of your 40 hours running from place to place, then you're not playing the game. Even with fast travel the games a chore, not an experience. If TotK fixed that, more power to it. Right now all i'm hearing is how a bad design wasn't made worse, from someone who probably needs to diversify their library of games a bit more.

How can anyone like Breath Of The Wild more than Tears Of The Kingdom? Breath Of The Wild was underwhelming and boring, without much to do. Tears Of The Kingdom; however is stuffed with things to do, with actually a little something for everyone. All three maps offer a different variety of adventuring. The Zonai devices are sick, making shrines and just movement in general more entertaining. The Korok escort missions are amazing. I hated Koroks in BoTW. The weapon breaking was awful in the first one, but fuse(which I was making fun of in the beginning)gives you enough control over weapon properties that I no longer care. I have many comments deriding BoTW, and I refused to get ToTK, but my cousin gave me their copy to borrow(since they're too busy playing other games). I've put more hours in a 2 week period on ToTK then in the entire lifespan of BoTW(I had it day 1). Anyone that hated BoTW should try ToTK. And anyone that hasn't played either and wants to should 100% skip BoTW, it's obsolete.

@NotSoCryptic It's far better than BoTW, though it's still not a traditional Zelda. While it's not what I want Zelda to be, I actually like ToTK which cannot be said for BoTW.

Totk is the better game for sure. Breath of the wild was much less Accessible in my opinion.

@Akurusu No idea why I was tagged in your comment about the overworld theme or which one you mean (I assume AoC) but uhm, yeah, sure.

I honestly think its way too early to tell, especially considering your play time. We've had 6 years to think about BotW and one month for TotK. Also, if your feeling overloaded by distractions, just put down a relevant marker. You can put down 300. That way you can stay on track and not feel anxious over forgetting to do something.

@YoshiF2 Breath Of The Wild being a mediocre, unfinished game is the problem though. It kinda deserves to be made redundant by a better game. I'm under the impression Breath Of The Wild and the Switch were rushed out to try to save the sinking Wii U ship.

@ArcticEcho 'How can anyone-' will always be answered very simply with 'because different people have different tastes'. Glad you could enjoy Totk while you couldn't enjoy Botw but Botw is not just magically obsolete now.

TotK comes off as just silly. Link is basically a god and getting to any place is so freaking easy with all the tools you have.

I actually really don't like all the building in the game. It's just not why I liked BotW - I liked the core of that game much better.

@Cia I disagree. I've played huge open world RPGs (Xenoblade as I mentioned) and the music lifts the environment, it's not a distraction or off putting. See what happens to Satorl Marsh at night and imagine it without the music. Sure there ARE different piece of music in different areas, but it's still the same old subtle silence with a mellow piano melody every so often. It's genuinely refreshing when you get to a settlement or a stable and you actually have a theme being played constantly. None of the overworld themes are particularly memorable or iconic imo. It's even just down to something simple like the title screen. Why is there no music? Someone posted a clip of the Wind Waker title screen the other day and it hit me with nostalgia. No one is going to get nostalgic about the BOTW or TOTK title screens. For a series that was once known for it's cinematic title screens and iconic theme music, such as Ocarina of Time, it's a big let down. I haven't watched any of the last trailers for this game, so I still don't even know what the "Tears of the Kingdom" theme music is. I'm waiting for it to appear.

Don't get me wrong, I love the game. I just hope we move away from this idea that exploring needs to be done in near silence in the next entry. Let people turn it off if they find it annoying. But some of us remember when music was a staple of wandering around Hyrule.

I have to agree. I'm glad to have totk and I'm having lots of fun with it. But it does often feel haphazard and I feel like I'm stretched in every direction at once. Whereas, in botw it was a straighter line working my way through the game and that was ultimately more rewarding and relaxing

I kinda feel the same way, there are a lot of distractions in this game, almost to the point of annoyance. BOTW was that way too, but TOTK is a step beyond.

That being said, it makes sense for TOTK to be "busier" then BOTW. BOTW was essentially a fresh new start for the Zelda series, and needed to take it slow (not to mention Nintendo took a huge risk with it). And to be fair BOTW does get kind of boring after a while with its endless wildernesses and deserted ruin followed by deserted ruin.

I want to see this new Hyrule bursting with excitement. I want to see Castle Town and the other ruined villages restored to their former glory, with tons to see and do.

Like I said, the many distractions in TOTK are almost an annoyance, but not quite. Like in BOTW I never feel as though I wasted my time even if I didn't accomplish the task at hand.

To me, that's brilliant game design.

TOTK's world is better in almost every way. Except that it's not as new. It's not able to quite re-capture the thrill of exploring a new world for the first time.

@HylianFox Yeah, I wish I could see Hyrule Castle Town totally restored. And once, just ONCE, I would like to see Hyrule Castle as a place I can visit and not ruined or corrupted in some way.

I will admit there is so much to do in TOTK. I thought this way of BOTw, but dam this is several times more the case in TOTK. I eventaully had to buckle down and just focus on the story. Almost done now some 120+ hours later, about to say forget it and go take down the villain, so I can move on to my backlog lol. Going to miss TOTK and will have to replay it again at some point.

I'll say for me, that while there were alluring things in BOTW that would snap my attention (like the trees mentioned in the article) it was about a 50-50 shot whether my curiosity would be rewarded. I think the game did a great job for the most part, but in TOTK, I don't feel let down nearly as often and I feel like there really is something for me everywhere and that I am rewarded for my curiosity so much more. I think part of this is because the systems play off one another so much better in TOTK than in BOTW, however I can empathize with the writer on the peacefulness that BOTW's map had though.

My issues with Breath of the Wild were its empty world, bad side quests, lack of rewards for exploration, lack of places to explore, and samey Divine Beast dungeons. Tears of the Kingdom fixed all of that and more. I can’t imagine going back to Breath, it would feel like a Beta version compared to TotK.

The game is testament to what developers take their time can produce when given the time. Nintendo had 6 years to take the foundations of BotW and make it so much more for the sequel.

Couldn't disagree more. BOTW was besieged with Guardians and exploring was very dangerous and difficult for some of us. I barely explored the center of the map because of the density of the sheer amount of Guardians in Hyrule Field and around the Castle. So I like being able to fully explore every nook and cranny this time around. The Apocalyptic feeling of BOTW was cool to experience in Zelda, but I much prefer this version of a more alive Hyrule reacting and proactively involved with the overall story.

Next game I'd like to see the Hyrule species inhabit different spheres rather than being limited to small cities.

So Zoras would be underwater (with Link being able to venture there in this game) Gorons would be in the Depths, Rito in the Sky Islands, with Hylians and Koroks on the Surface.
Gerudo can be omitted to be honest.

I 100% agree with this article. I enjoyed botw more because it was quiet and the distractions were few and far in between. Finding something out of my way felt earned.

Totk has so many things on the surface going on that trying to do something I want is difficult because there is constantly something pulling on my attention that I forget what I wanted to do in the first place. That feeling of guilt you mentioned rings true.

However, this is exactly why the depths is my favorite part of the game and where I personally spent the most time. It’s quiet and empty with very clear direction, intriguing and just gives me the botw and subnautica vibes.

At the end of the day totk’s ability to give me this kind of experience and it’s only 1/3 of the experience says a lot about the game. I may not be in the right place to enjoy the chaos of the surface as much as other people but it still gives me the depths.