Topic: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

@StuTwo I never thought I'd read a Capability Brown analogy on a gaming website, but I think you've nailed it. 'Scrambling up to a high spot, surveying the landscape, seeing a point of interest perfectly framed against it and then heading there' remains one of the game's most distinctive and intoxicating elements. And that's before you mention all the inevitable distractions you find on the journey to the point itself.

The game doesn't want you to explore every inch of the map in all directions (which is why you need less than half the Korok seeds), but it does seem designed to make almost any path you're likely to take feel unique, interesting and deliberate.

There are exceptions, with a few wide open spaces that are simply wide and open. And there a definitely a few places where travel will feel sluggish if you've forgotten your horse (though they're mainly in the centre where all the stables and horses are). The Edlin Badlands strike me as one 'horse-scale' area where you can't use a horse, and I think there are a few others where you wish Link could reach Sonic speeds (for which elixirs are helpful). But generally it's pretty deft at creating meaningful feeling paths within an open plane that feel well defined enough that you want to follow them, but not so restrictive that you have to. Zora's Domain (initially) and the Lost Woods excepting.

regarding weapons, sometimes I enjoy stealing what sleeping enemies have and giving them a leaf to use...

lol. I never thought of that! Great tip!!

I don't have an issue with the weapon system in the game, however I think a couple adjustments would have been nice.

1) Being able to fix or strengthen weapons either at Blacksmiths or on your own at fires (similar to cooking). It sucks having a weapon you like and want to keep using only to have it break. I understand that part of the game was designed that way, and no weapon except the master sword (maybe a top tier bow) should be indestructable, but giving you methods to spend money or resources to repair weapons would have been nice and I think fit into the game.

2) Being able to buy weapons, like you can buy armor or arrows, would have been nice.

@Maxz There's nothing that feels "sluggish" traversing the wide open fields in the center as 90% of the time you'll be running for your life from one or more Guardians. If anything you just can't move fast enough!

Do weapons repair themselves when left in a mount at your house? I haven't been home in a long time.I know I placed a Travellers Sword in one but I can't remember what condition it was in at the time.

@OorWullie I don't think they do.

They may end up losing their buffs, actually.

@Maxz I wouldn't be surprised at all if we were to find out one day that some of Aonuma's team studied Capability Brown for BoTW. There are even a few actual "Aha's" in there.

It's really amazing - just like a Capability Brown garden the game world feels so chaotically natural but it's all very deliberately designed. Even the bits that might feel "empty" have a real purpose to them. It's just a masterclass in world design and I think it's one of the biggest things that will elude would be imitators.

As for collecting the seeds I agree - you're clearly not meant to collect them all. It's a bold choice when so many of the loudest voices in gaming culture online are OCD 100%ers. Infact the whole game sometimes feels likely it's trying to send a statement to the 100%ers: "you're playing games wrong".

@Octane They're just for show then . I suppose they're kind of an extra inventory slot but I doubt anyone running low on weapons is going to fast travel back to Haterno to grab one.Might as well fill them with Farmers Pitchforks and Soup Ladles.

I went to cook a couple of meals to protect me from the cold but I had ran out of inventory slots.Instead of using up a couple of meals to free space I ended up changing my plan and going somewhere else .I never seem to have the ones I need at the time. I've got plenty of speed boost and stamina meals and elixers but I never use them. I've only used stamina boost a few times to save me from falling and having to climb all the way back up again. The speed boost I've never used yet.

@OorWullie I used them to store some exclusive breakable weapons. Three per weapon is more than nothing at all, but I wish the game had a chest you could store more items in.

@StuTwo
It's funny you say that cause I just finished the Zora quest line last night. I have only had the game 2 days.

I reached the Dueling Mountains I think it was called and got extremely side tracked. That's what's really great about this game. Even though I didn't go the suggested path I did not feel underpowered, confused, or even like I skipped anything.

Why would anyone willingly pass down that kind of information unless they were some kind of religion dedicated to evil, like the Grimleal? Even as a human, no one ever told Ganondorf that he was destined to take over/destroy Hyrule (except maybe Koume and Kotake, but they're evil too), just rule over the Gerudo as king (something tells me that tradition fell out of favor after THAT whole fiasco...). The only person Ganondorf can argue with in this matter... is himself (or Ganon, if you prefer).

Lady Urbosa of the Gerudo also mentions the Calamity taking the form of a Gerudo at some point, so it's implied that Ganon (aka Demise's curse) just decided to drop the whole pretense this time and just wreck stuff. Makes sense, considering Demise's other main goal was ''get the Triforce'', which is notably absent in this game, as well as it requiring that one be mortal (Ganondorf) to benefit from it.

I think it would be cool in an upcoming DLC if they let you pick what kind of plants you want around your house and maybe be able to put fish in your pond and pick your tree, more house customization.

Blocking vs Dodging. Which one do you prefer? I think blocking is superior because both you have to time, but the backflip will just do an ordinary hop which will get you hit, if the angle is just not perfect and its a very small window that can be messed up by just twisting the camera around just a FEW degrees.

Dodging and the reason is only one: flurry rush! I kind of mastered it so that i'm able to use it multiple times on one lynel fight for example. It's kind of OP

It would be great if there was a character who could craft weapons as long as you had it listed in your hyrule compendium the materials and the money, of course it would need to be balanced right so as you can't just farm powerful weapons, having a character also who you could hire to find ingredients at a cost would be also useful and as long as it's scaled right, as in if you want that really rare thing in a dangerous area you gotta pay danger money man. Not that I've ever really been lacking enough in weapons or materials, except for that time I need beetles which I'd been giving away hand over fist.

@NEStalgia True. I was mainly thinking of the horse paths. There've been a few times when I've been running along a track, and thought, "come on Link, get a move on" and felt like it's like they've not designed on a Link-sized scale. Then I've remembered that the whole reason paths exist at all is so you can send a horse down them at a decent clip without having to touch a button, thanks to in-built equine navigation systems.

It's funny, I find the experience of moving enjoyable if it's super hands on (navigating a complex environment or fleeing an enemy) or super hands off (letting a horse follow a path while I lazily spin the camera around and admire the view). But if it's awkwardly in the middle, then I get slightly frustrated.

Still, after getting into the habit of using horses and their paths, I've unsurprisingly found general navigation a lot smoother. I've heard a few complaints, but I really like the horse mechanics. Often I'll take a horse to a reasonably distant location, just because it's more pleasant to watch the world go by on horseback than to discontinuously jump to a shrine.

@Maxz True, though the other thing is in MOST areas horses really ONLY fit on the roads, everything else is rock face. The central fields and Akkala are the only fully wide open areas you can run your horse through full speed anywhere. Though I still follow the roads around because I do not want my horse getting blasted by guardian lasers.

It's official. Breath of the Wild needs Horse Armor DLC!

Interesting you'd say that though, the past week or so I've taken to riding my horses around everywhere too. They're not the fastest horses, but they're ok. I usually liberate mine from bokoblin archers....they're a lot easier to mount and it's fun taking a better than bad horse home from an annoying silver bokoblin But I was walking everywhere at first, then fast traveling some (lets face it some of those distances are extreme) but I've been enjoying riding slowly through recently. Even all the way from Akkala to Gerudo Desert! That's the more annoying one. I was proud, I even managed to take my horse into the heart of the Lost Woods! Managed to find a few places including shrines I'd missed by not taking roads too!

So, I was on a mini journey from Death Mountain - heading back south towards Kakariko Village - when someone told me about something cool to check out in Gerudo Desert...so I think to myself: 'I'll go to the desert via Kakariko' ..it didn't go well! Somehow, after a string of distractions, I've ended up in the ice flats north of Rito Village without ever getting close to Kakariko - let alone the desert!! ...man, I love this game! ..but it's best not to plan more than 5 minutes in advance!!

How are everyone's stats? After 75hrs+, I've just completed my 60th shrine - still yet to tackle a dungeon - and I've only collected 125 of the 900 Korok Seed's! ..many, many more hours to come!