Topic: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

I think you're missing his point.

@cookiex: That was kinda my point, there's no telling when and where the games took place, apart from quotes by Nintendo and the Hyrule Historia. The timeline doesn't tell us anything about the game itself and vice versa.

Well I've only seen the first Godfather so I can't comment on that. But if it doesn't have any connections to the first, then in my mind it doesn't count as a sequel.
You understand what I'm saying right? I'm saying that the concept of "sequel" as it's applied at a business level, is very often used for purely financial reasons. And therefore, from the point of view of the consumer, a better definition is in order than "whatever they tell me is a sequel", which is essentially what you're saying.
After all, if all it takes to determine a sequel is an enumerated series of titles, we'd all consider Final Fantasy 8 to be a sequel to Final Fantasy 7, which we all know it isn't.

Oh, it has plenty of connections. It basically picks up where the first film left off, actually. But all of the events that happen in the second part are self-contained. You don't see how Michael came to be the head of the Corleone family, but that's not particularly important to the context of any of the events in the film. To use a more recent example, you don't need to watch Jurassic Park to figure out what's going on in Jurassic World. It's a direct continuation of the events in the first film, but all of the events in JW are self-contained or sufficiently explained that the movie can exist perfectly well on its own too.

I agree with your Final Fantasy example though. That's a sequel just because of the brand recognition and strength, and things like spell names, some common monsters, general gameplay, etc. But I would argue that most Zelda games have more plot connections than the Final Fantasy games. For example, Wind Waker and Twilight Princess both do a quick recap of the ending of Ocarina of Time in their openings. Link to the Past has plenty of dialogue about sealing Ganon in the Sacred Realm long in the past, only for the realm to corrupt and become the Dark World, and then Ocarina of Time is all about sealing Ganon in the Sacred Realm. And then Skyward Sword of course is the prequel to it all, that's pretty self evident. Those five games make up the starting points for each distinct branch or fork and they all have direct plot connections.

And even if it was an afterthought, every game in the series does have some plot connection to at least one other game in the series evident in the games themselves. You can play any one of them in a bubble, but the threads are there for fans who want to get into the lore. Which is cool, I like it like that. It would be impossible to get new people into the series if they actually had to sit down and play through all 19 games to get up to speed on what's happening in Zelda U. Anybody should be able to get into any game in any series without having previously played others. If not, it's just bad writing.

Right. That's a great example. Jurassic World is right on that border between sequel and non-sequel. In that case, I'd fall down slightly on the side of sequel because whilst the World story is self contained, it does still add something to understand that the series was based on the idea of trying to start a theme park, and how it'd blown up in their face (without that knowledge it's just kinda something you accept as a brute fact of "ok, so they decided the best thing to do would be make a theme park?"). On top of that, you do get some understanding from their particular interpretation of paleontology where they assert very specific things like that raptors are exceedingly intelligent in a variety of ways (which isn't necessarily an established fact in reality). Then there are the few references back to the original film like where they go through the decaying visitors centre of the original park. And when that computer nerd is wearing a Jurassic Park t-shirt and she tells him off for it (perhaps suggests why they changed the name).
Of course I guess a good counterargument to this would be that Final Fantasy does that to some extent too. Zidane saying "No Cloud nor Squall shall stop me." or whatever it was. So maybe you'd also want to qualify that it also has to be set in the same fictional world.

Of all the examples to use of a sequel why chose Godfarther 2 where's it's both a sequel and prequel.

Even better. It's telling two separate stories set before and after the first movie, neither of which requires knowledge of the first movie to understand.

Race-to-the-bottom meme culture detected.

What kind of bosses do you want to see in this game. I've been thinking lately, and I've noticed that my favorite bosses tend to be the ones that you can approach/attack using the game's default weapons and abilities. Items can be helpful, but when they act like a lock+key, it robs some of the feeling that this fight is a test of my main skill that I've been using the whole game.

That's why minibosses like Ook, and bosses like Zant (final form), Ghirahim, and Demise are among my favorites in the series.

It's also part of what makes Shadow of the Colossus's bosses so cool, because they all use a very limited set of tools.

I want one boss to be an intense swordfight and another boss to be invisible so you have to hear for his movements.

I actually like the lock and key approach because it's a good way to test your knowledge of new mechanics, but I do think they could be more clever about the strategy and work in older and more general abilities. Something kinda like Mazaal or Big Octo in Minish Cap.

I'm dead.

Wait, what? D-Does this even work!? http://strawpoll.me/5623568

I tend to find the opposite. I enjoy Zelda bosses more the more they incorporate new items and abilities. Morpheel is still one of my favorite bosses because you had to use the iron boots, zora armor-enabled, swimming, and the clawshot to beat it.

For Zelda U I'd like a few bosses to be story sequences, some to be very open-ended, with several different items / ways to defeat them (not just via flat damage, tho), and some bosses to make use of the open world. Imagine the Helmaroc King, but out in Hyrule. There could be some really cool encounters.

Aw thanks.

I agree, a blend is best. A boss with this defeat pattern would work.

1. Boss has a weak spot, but it's inaccessible.
2. The first step to revealing the weak spot is slashing it up with your sword. You don't deal permanent damage thought.
3. After enough damage from the sword, the boss will shift into a form via which you can use the dungeon item to open the weak point up to slashing.
3. The boss will also shift into this form after occasionally performing a particular attack, but the more active approach is much faster.

Morpheel was of my least favorite bosses in the series. It felt really easy, non-threatening, and the mechanism of defeat was overly simple. I think the basic idea of Morpheel was done much better in Super Mario Galaxy with Kingfin. You were a lot more active in the fight, and the fight required some use of the basic game mechanics (swimming and spinning). That's not to say it was perfect, as the means of defeating it was still pretty obvious.

I've said it before, but Pandora's Tower's Ironclad Turret has my favorite boss of all time. The fight has multiple components to it, and figuring out each component and responding to it would make the fight much faster. The boss is extremely aggressive, so you are dodging until you see an opening. You can make this easier by getting him to attack the debris that falls from the ceiling, such that he gets stuck. Then, you can slash him up, which speeds up his "heating up", the process that reveals his weak point. Sometimes he attempts to release the heat, but you can also pull down his tail to prevent that. But the boss also heats up on his own. You really just have to continuously dodge, and wait for the weak point to resolve on it's own. I'd most like to see Zelda try something as involved as this.

lol. You even changed your avatar. XD