Thoughts on The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

I’ve finally got round to picking up a Nintendo switch. One of the games which was high on my list was Zelda: Breath of the Wild. I’ve played a couple of Zelda games in the past Link to the past, Wind Waker and Majora’s Mask. Here are more thoughts on the game on the recent game.

The game was launched on both the Wii U and the Nintendo Switch. The story takes place at the end of the Zelda series timeline. The game is an open world adventure game where Link can pretty much explore anywhere within the first hour or so of the game.

The game sees Link wake up from a tomb after 100 years. With no memory of what happened he then goes on to reclaiming four divine beasts. Think Japanese mecha or Power Rangers zords. From the corruption of Gannon. The player then makes their way to Hyrule castle and confronts Gannon. But since this is non linear all this is optional and if you wish you can confront Gannon straight away.

What I liked

• You can pretty much travel anywhere I often found myself just climbing a tower and just looking at a shire or something interesting in the distance and just gliding, climbing and runing to that location. When you get Revali’s Gale it just opens up more of the world. In terms of just exploring and traversing the landscape it’s one of the best open world games I played for exploration.
• The game doesn’t have typical dungeons as normal Zelda games would have instead Shrine’s in which I would call very micro dungeons. The Shrines are sometimes Combat, Puzzles or sometimes the challenge itself is getting to the shrine. The puzzles shrines often use the physics of the game to solve the problem. The puzzle shrines are a throwback to the old school Zelda dungeon which I enjoyed.

What I didn’t liked

• I would’ve liked a few quality of life improvements such as a recipe book once you’ve made a dish the ability to save the recipe to a cookbook. So you can recreate that dish. Also something which would be useful is Weapons durability indicator to let you know how far the weapon is a way from breaking. The durability didn’t bother but what did is not knowing how long the weapon would last I found myself hoarding guardian weapons for that reason.
• It’s a bit of unfair comparison but the side missions in open world games, the Witcher 3 is the new measuring stick. Breath of the wild I just didn’t find the side missions engaging as the Witcher 3 Return to Crookback Bog and The Last Wish. I just feel when I look back at the game in six months time none of the side mission will stick out for me.

Final thoughts

I can appreciate why this game had such great reviews as the freedom to go out and just explore the enchanting world of Hyrule. It’s a place where you can just get lost in. The story of the game is your own journey round Hyrule and crafting your own experience. But for me personally I like my games to have more structure. For example in Ocarina of Time getting Death Mountain then getting into the Dodongo Cavern. For that reason I would rather pick a Link between worlds or Majora’s Mask if I was going to replay another Zelda game again.