Topic: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

@Snaplocket I think theres really nothing else to do than completing stuff. Its kind of lke an endurance test.
Enjoyable in its own way. I feel like i accomplished something.

@gcunit But the feel of grind starts pretty early in this game. Visiting the same looking shrines over and over with the same tools. I realized relatively early that this game has no content. I enjoy grind sometimes. I did in this game. Of course not all of it.

Well it takes a special kind of someone to spend 335 hours in a game that felt grindy to them fairly early on, just for the sake of 100% completion.

For your next challenge, grab a local telephone directory and make a handwritten copy

I come from the perspective that that game is full of content - the landscape is the content. Some say it all looks too similar, but I see the uniqueness around every corner, behind every tree.

I find exploring the landscapes wonderful, and the Korok seeds are a little reward when I come across them. But once you set out to find every Korok seed and upgrade all the armour, you're not playing the game any more, you're doing a job. A pretty pointless one. And you're not even getting paid.

I don't mean this as a personal criticism, but if someone tells me they voluntarily spent 335 hours doing something as pointless as that, and then passes judgement on it as a game, I'm inclined not to value that person's judgement, because to me they seem like someone with a skewed idea of what playing a game is.

I'm interested to know of another single player game where you've undertaken this sort of task and would rate it higher after 335 hours.

If the game was the same but there were only 300 seeds to find, and less armour to upgrade, would you rate it higher?

@Tsurii Ones we are in the game theres no going back. Its worth it. The pain just makes us stronger^^
The grind will stay slightly enjoyable. No worries.

@gcunit Yes i know its a beautiful screensaver with korok seed collecting. I dont know why you dont understand that grind is not all bad. And i dont know why you dont understand that i still enjoyed it.

I get that you got some enjoyment out of it, I just wonder if maybe you'd have stopped at 50-100hrs, and not done all that unnecessary grinding, whether you'd make a different assessment of it as 'one of the most overrated games' and the weakest 3D Zelda...

50 hours of awesome is better than most other games provide, but then you seem to have tainted that feeling by pushing for 100%

To be fair, if collecting things gives you nothing... Is it really grinding?

Someone who collects all the Koroks, for example, is doing so because they want to... It's not like there's any actual reason do so. Unless said person has some psychological condition that forces them to do so, but that's not really the game's fault.

When you play for 335 hours leveling up and collecting without having fun (but all of this is needed to beat the game) then it's called grind.
When you play for 335 hours leveling up and collecting and having fun while doing it it's not called grind. It's called enganging, addicting gameplay.

I'd say doing anything repeatedly is grind, particularly just to max out an upgrade system, whether it's necessary or not.

I wouldn't say the Korok seeds are grind because they're all uniquely located and have to be found, it's not like you go to a place, find a seed, leave so that it respawns, and then go back and get the next one. That would be grind.

@gcunit If i played it for 50 hours and stopped i would still consider it the weakest 3d zelda. I enjoyed it because i was wowed by the graphics or the artdesign. Just strolling around and exploring was fun until i realised theres nothing worthwile to explore beyond beautiful artdesign. The world felt lively because the weather system felt so dynamic. I like to see the whole game. If it gets "tainted" like you say so be it. Personelly i think i just got much more out of my game. Yes it wasnt the fun it was like in the beginning but it kept me going. So what? About the korok seeds being grind or not: I think they are grindy because you basically do the same stuff just slightly altered or like you said in different locations.

@Meowpheel The game gives you for pretty much everything you do something. Even if its just a golden piece of poo^^ Yes and i wanted to 100% the game. Its good to have goals as pointless as they seem to be. Just having that feeling of pushing forward to it is sometimes all life needs.

@SKTTR Personnely i think your definition of grind sounds much too negative. Yes grind can be exhausting. But its not just work. And i think even parts of upgrading gear were fun. For example collecting the yellow lizard tails was enjoyable. I think gcunit is right that a big aspect of grind is repeating stuff.

Working towards 100% in Normal Mode, and just... survive Master Mode I guess? (Though I did suck it up and got over my fear of Guardians and their unpredictable laser shots in this mode, and now my life is so much easier. Courage is key, especially when playing as Link?) XD

I beat the game once already in Normal Mode when I just followed the main quests and did anything else that I stumbled upon. This time I'm totally taking my time, thoroughly exploring the world and I'm having a blast. Finding the koroks is especially fun, since I think I found only about 100-ish the first time around so I have no idea where most of them are, and it is giving me the motivation to explore every nook and cranny of the map. Have stumbled upon several side quests I missed the first time around, and many more shrines as I didn't bother to look for them the first time. (This is especially helpful, so I know more or less the locations of many shrines when I'm playing Master Mode and desperately need to do as many shrines as I can. I'm basically just beelining from one shrine to the next in this mode.)

I've heard many people complaining about the lack of enemy variety, and while I can see where they're coming from, I don't really mind personally. The layout of the camps are all different and I like coming up with different ways to approach the situation. What kind of enemy is there doesn't really make much of a difference, so having more variety wouldn't really change much, only meaning more pics needed to fill out the compendium.

I also didn't really get the complaint about weapon durability until I played in Master Mode. In Normal Mode I always have too many weapons and constantly have to throw out something in order to pick up something else (which is frustrating when I've gotten to a point where all the weapons in my inventory are weapons I really would prefer to keep.) But in Master Mode... yeah, I'm constantly hunting down more weapons, because I never feel like I have enough. XD

Just out of curiosity, is it possible to find red enemies in Master Mode? I haven't decided yet if my Master Mode file will be 100% or not, but if I choose to do so I would want to fill out the compendium, but I haven't seen any red enemies yet so I'm not sure that's even possible. Or are they hiding somewhere I just haven't been yet? I haven't played my Master file as much as my Normal one, so it is fully possible I they're just "hidden away" somewhere I have yet to go. I would prefer not to give Purah my rupees (I'd rather save them for Robbie and his weapons) just to fill out the compendium...

@Snaplocket Thats cool. So just keep playing. I can only recommend the master mode. By your logic you can at least play it for 600 hours.

After finding all Great Fairies, I really think that Link should join the #MeToo campaign. Seriously, I am not so sure how to assess these sequences. It is not so funny as it should be. However, I got my upgrade for my armour. Was it worth that price?

@Snaplocket xD

I'm going to do a Master Mode run in Japanese soon. Plan to complete all shrines, side quests, and DLC content. I'll probably only collect korok seeds until I open all of my inventory slots, though. I'm pretty sure that "reward" you get for collecting all of them is Nintendo's way of telling completionists to chill the heck out, and I couldn't agree more.

@Ralizah Please forgive us for wanting to play as much of the game as possible.^^
We dont mean to destroy your game and its not our fault you have not enough endurance to play a game. Its the developers responsibilty to put meaningful content for everybody in the game not ours. Besides collecting them isnt so bad like how people on this forum make it out to be. You basically do what you do in the game. Traversing the world and exploring. Its funny people have not enough fun with this xD
Seems like nintendo is trolling the non completionists. At least we can force the troll to dance with the help of poo^^

@Jhena Why do you think Nintendo is trolling non-completionists?

I don't understand how people could want to collect all the Korok seeds for any reward, let alone a piece of poop. I just don't see how that could possibly be fun. To each his own, I guess, but man. I started getting bored of collecting them after I got like 60, let alone 900.

@Ralizah I see what you're saying, after all everything it showed was in the game. But it still focused quite a bit on story, it was disappointing for me at least to see there wasn't much to the story and weren't too many cutscenes in the actual game. But I still enjoyed it which what matters.

@Hallonblad Fair enough, I see where you're coming from.

@KirbyTheVampire @Jhena @Ralizah @gcunit @Snaplocket Honestly, I think that's the most common reason why people say they don't like BotW. I found the people who dislike the game often are the ones who play it to 100% by collecting every Korok Seed, doing every side quest, and completing every shrine. They often complain that the game is repetitive, but what game isn't if you play it to 100%.

Honestly, I think the secret to enjoying the game is to play as much content as you want at whatever pace you prefer, and accept that you probably won't reach 100%. Like I completed around 90 shrines, found about 60 Korok seeds or so, and did about 50 side quests. I also found all the memories and beat Ganon to get the true ending. At this point, I decided not to play anymore because I didn't feel like it. I played 120 hours, and I accepted that I probably wouldn't complete it all. As a result, I enjoued those 120 hours.

@Ralizah Because many say they wouldnt go for 900 seeds or even half of it. Some stop after 100. To me its like saying they dont think this game is worth playing. Or like another poster said: If i kept playing it wouldnt be fun anymore ( xD). So i think your antipathie towards completionists is funny because we actually play the game and enjoy it enough to play it to the fullest.