Oscillator
Rattata
Though it came out a while ago, still, FULL GAME & FULL DLC SPOILER WARNING
Originally posted on the Zelda Universe forums between July 2017 (finished main game) and June 2019 (finished DLC).
Part 1 of 3 - pre-DLC review
Played on Wii U -- at least 190 hours played -- all shrines -- 482 Koroks -- took 279 Hyrule Compendium photos manually
*****************
To start with, let me get this out of the way - BotW does NOT beat Majora's Mask, which of the Zeldas I've played, has the best atmosphere, the best writing, and the best dungeon (Stone Tower Temple). However, has it managed to beat the mainstream favorite, and my second-favorite Zelda, Ocarina of Time? Let's take a look.
*****************
One can not help but compare this to The Elder Scrolls. It's got a similar land mass, a similar inventory, Koroks vs. Nirnroots, and for the first time in Zelda history, an actual physics engine. It doesn't have quite the kitchen sink mentality of TES (you can't move everything anywhere, storage is limited, fewer characters, fewer sidequests), but it still expands on all previous Zeldas by leaps and bounds in many ways, while somehow managing to keep the charm intact.
It's an incredible technical achievement. Numerous varieties of landscapes with a handcrafted feel, populated with countless varieties of wildlife that feel alive. Many unique and great looking weapons and armor sets. And many opportunities for manipulation and exploitation via the runes, the paraglider, and the climbing ability. Yet in stark contrast to TES, during my entire playthrough, I only encounted a SINGLE noticeable bug, a Bokoblin that walked into a tree and disappeared. I've never seen so many testers in a game's credits, and boy do the results show!
The framerate's not perfect, and there are some instances of fade-in and skimping on graphical effects (volume light only seems to exist in the Lost Woods), but these never hampered my enjoyment.
There are only five things that truly irritate me about the game, and most of them involve reoccurring events. One, it rains too much. Not only does this affect climbing, but about half the time it rains, there's also lightning, and bomb arrows don't work in the rain. Second, the control mapping, or lack thereof. You can switch a couple of buttons around, but that's it. Run feels awkward on B, Jump feels awkward on X, and the champion powers get stacked onto buttons with existing functions, which is nuts. Third, the blood moon happens too often. The enemy respawning isn't a big deal, but the interruption is a pain. Fourth, there's too much mist/fog. Everything looks better, and you can see farther when it's clear and bright, but unless you're in the desert, that view often gets obscured. And fifth, Star Fragments. Whatever way you get them, from the sky, from Lynels, or from amiibo, there's no quick or guaranteed method, and you need a lot of them to fully upgrade certain armor sets. It reminds me of my least favorite part of TES, repeatedly visiting shops to see what they have in stock.
So yeah, on the purely technical side, this game TOTALLY delivers. But how does it rank as a Zelda game?
*******
Let's get the big new feature out of the way first, the voice acting. It's fine. Zelda sounds stilted as heck, but all the voice acted cutscenes are short, so it's not a big deal. I'm glad they didn't go full-blown TES in this department, because it would've destroyed the flow and atmosphere.
Now let's get into the meat. How is the feel of the game? For the first 25%, perfect. Actually perfect. In that relatively early going, this world exudes such a sweet sense of wonder. I haven't felt that from Zelda since visiting Clock Town. The vistas. The progression. The personality of the characters. The feeling of the rain. The power of the runes. Evenings and sunsets. And always seeing something new over the next hill. After grinding up the Zora River through constant rain, electric enemies, and undulating hills, when I finally stumbled across Zora's Domain at night, from up high, my mind was blown. A shimmering, sci-fi-like installation filling an entire canyon. Then diving down, and discovering a multi-level, fully populated city. And they've got a BIG problem, in every sense of the word.
BTW, a note here. The Zora's Domain discovery/story arc wouldn't have been as impactful had I discovered it after another major city/storyline. I have the ability to go anywhere, do anything, so how did I manage to go the BEST way first? Well, Nintendo has a great talent for laying out a path for you without you noticing. They know how to position landmarks and situations in ways that induce insatiable curiosity, leading you other points of interest, and eventually to the next big moment. This is especially effective in leading you to Koroks. This development style goes all the way back to the original Super Mario Bros., and it's really something how they did it to an entire open world.*
Anyhow, it all culminates with the single best moment in the game, the Vah Ruta entry battle. Jet-skiing on a Zora's back, deflecting ice blocks, and eventually setting mines for speeding ice spike balls, then swimming up waterfalls to Matrix-jump shock arrows into an angry giant mechanical elephant's back!
DAMN!
Cool dungeon too. Good puzzles, good layout. A bit short, and the boss was way easy, but a great start. Onwards and outwards...
After all that story and action, you feel the need to chill out and explore for a bit. Starting off on the typical Hyrule scouting mission on this scale and with this level of beauty and variety becomes anything but typical. For once, you feel like an actual explorer. And once you crave more main quest, the trademark Nintendo positioning of towers, expanses, and hint givers gently points you towards the next best city, that being the Goron. It's smaller than Zora's Domain, but is once again fully populated and awesome looking. And though Vah Rudania is more of an annoyance than an imminent existential threat, it still looks just as badass as Vah Ruta.
The first chink in the game's armor shows itself here. After that super epic jet-ski ice battle, the entry "battle" for Vah Rudania isn't much deeper than avoiding falling rocks and spotlights. It's also here that you discover the game's number one design flaw - the main dungeons are all pretty much the same. They have different central gimmicks, but they're all pretty much the same size, length, and look the same inside too. Another disappointment is after experiencing excellent puzzles in the shrines, the main dungeon puzzles can't quite compete. And again, the boss is a pushover. The final dungeon that I tackled, Vah Naboris, had a strong entry battle, a bit more depth, and finally had a boss that I had to use actual strategy against, but the grand scale you find in the fields, mountains, and lakes rarely manifests itself in the action segments. Another example of starting strong, but dropping off are the Lomei Labyrinths. The one you notice first, in the upper right hand corner of the map, is accessed via long paraglider flight, has a huge central atrium, has Guardians overhead, and after you think you've finished it, a massive basement with great loot. The other two are just plain, easy to access mazes with shrines.
As you complete the shrines, another disappointment rears its head - the runes never reach their maximum potential. When I first saw the Stasis rune in the previews, my hype was through the roof. I thought of dozens of crazy physics puzzles made possible by it. There are some, but not nearly enough, and never to the level of craziness I imagined (though "Pushing Power" was pretty close). Only a single shrine delivered the sense of epicness that I had hoped for, and it was the very last one I found - Trial of Passage, a giant, glinting, clockwork puzzle filled with hazards. Why can't they make more Zelda dungeons that look like Mario Kart tracks?
The landscapes are front and center, though, and they deliver consistently. Even after I'd gone literally everywhere except Hebra, that region still managed to offer something fresh. Monotony only shows up once all the major discoveries and tasks are completed, and you're playing cleanup. Probably the biggest contribution to this consistent enjoyment, though you don't think about it much, are all the little bits of immersion. You can destroy materials before you pick them up. Enemies use whatever's available to them, even smaller enemies! There are other adventurers wandering around, sometimes camping, sometimes looking for treasure, and sometimes needing rescuing (and sometimes fighting back!). And there's so much context for the things you encounter, and the way townspeople live their lives (I was very happy to see daily schedules again, though they're a bit simpler than in Majora's Mask). TES offers a similar, if not quite as polished exploration meta though. It is of course incredible to have it in Zelda, but the hook for Zelda is always the dungeons. Open world fanatics like myself who came for the classic Zelda experience aren't going to be quite as enthralled as Zelda players who've never experienced such freedom and discovery before.
So, after I'd put the bulk of my time in, my thoughts were "this is a really, really good game, successfully pulling off Zelda meets Elder Scrolls, but there's not enough classic Zelda dungeon crawling and super imposing bosses to make it the best Zelda, or even second best". An incredible final dungeon/final boss could make up for that, though. Did it?
Almost.
Hyrule Castle is the densest structure in the game, loaded with great treasure, seriously tough enemies, and good secrets (dat shrine). However, it merely acts as another location you can visit, just happening to contain the final boss, instead of a true test of everything else you've learned. Maybe the DLC will provide that, but it's a shame that the main game couldn't be capped off like that.
The final boss was SO close to pure epic. SO close. I had to use up all of the champion powers to get past the first form, even with the help of the Divine Beast blast. And laying eyes upon the second form gave me the same "holy crap" feeling I had when the final form of the boss in Majora's Mask was revealed.
But the true final battle itself didn't quite deliver. As long as you keep moving, you don't take much damage. I had been hoping for something more like the Vah Ruta entry battle, or a God of War/Shadow of the Colossus/Bayonetta style boss where you have to scale it to access the weak point. Or best case scenario, taking place ON the castle, with the boss flying around it, like Twinmold x10. And the fact that you're on horseback and it doesn't move...what a waste. A bit on the style over substance side, I'm afraid.
Then before the credits, you rescue Zelda, finally get to talk to her, and...WTF is she babbling about? After all the grand story elements this game delivers, THAT'S the best you can do to close it out? And the credits themselves are just a generic scroll with generic photos? Definitely a case of journey, not destination here.
So yeah, it doesn't quite beat Ocarina. Not for lack of trying, though. I see BotW as a fantastic practice session for Nintendo. For once, I can see them matching up to all the giant western AAA titles, like many have always hoped they'd do.
There does, however, remain one thing that concerns me about the Zeldas of late that BotW did not alleviate - the soundtrack. One of my main gripes about Skyward Sword was a lack of epic and catchy tunes that Zelda always has been known for. BotW certainly has a GOOD soundtrack, that's not in dispute. It nails the ambient stuff. But the town themes, the battle themes, and the dungeon themes are, for the most part, just ok. Nothing really bad (though Hateno Village gets old quick), but like Skyward Sword, few true standouts. Only four tracks really made me feel something - Naydra Battle, Vah Naboris Dungeon, Dark Beast Ganon, and the best track that scores the best moment, once again, Vah Ruta Entry Battle. Even then, the upbeat piano track that was used in the reveal trailer beats them all.
There's very little of the classic Zelda bounciness (even the reused tracks aren't the greatest arrangements...I'm looking at you, Great Fairy's Fountain), and it's pretty clear why - the two composers who worked on it never worked on a Zelda before. The lead composer previously worked on an Animal Crossing game, which is a more laid back style.
For the next Zelda, please, PLEASE bring back Toru Minegishi (who is KILLING it on Splatoon!), Hajime Wakai (who supervised BotW, but didn't directly compose), and Koji Kondo, or at least people who have done stuff similar to traditional Zelda such as Yuka Tsujiyoko.
Main game score
#1. Majora's Mask - 9.8
#2. Ocarina of Time - 9.7
#3. Breath of the Wild - 9.4
Part 2 of 3 - post-DLC thoughts
After 2 years and a few months, I am finally all done with Breath of the Wild. ^_^
Final numbers after DLC - 357 hrs, 24 min (although I had the game on hold a lot, actual gameplay definitely felt like at least 300 hours), 531 Koroks.
So, how was the DLC?
I did the Champions' Ballad first. I loved the One-Hit Obliterator sequence. Fantastic abstract atmosphere, felt very intense.
The remainder wasn't as good, but still positive. The new shrines may have been the only ones that felt like legitimate mini-dungeons rather than just long puzzles. And as I love reaching far-off spots on open world maps, the method to find the shrines totally gave me what I wanted.
The big drawback of the shrine hunt, however, was how it was mostly repurposed assets rather than something totally new. The new cutscenes were some of the best in the game, but that's not what I paid $25 (CAD) for.
But being just a third of the package, I don't think there was any doubt I was eventually going to get my money's worth.
And the main event was up next - the fifth main dungeon.
And the BEST one, if just for it finally looking different.
But really, it felt so much better than the Divine Beast dungeons. A transmission-style mechanism linking all the puzzles together? Spike and pit hazards? Getting a sense of size from dragging huge metal blocks all the way from one end to the other? Fresh and fun puzzles?
Good. Stuff.
And the last boss, while not as epic looking as any of Ganon's forms, offered fast, intense, artistic, and high variety combat...and at long last, a real BANGER of a battle theme - the best one since Twilight Princess!
And the motorcycle looks awesome. Love the little fuel-up animation. I wish it went a little faster and sounded more souped-up, though. Kind of felt like a streamlined horse with power steering rather than something with legit power under the hood. Still fun, though.
Now, the Master Trials. Fantastic concept. Basically more Eventide, which you can't go wrong with. But by that point, I was godawfully DONE with the shrine aesthetic. It would've been SO much more awesome if the entire thing had themeing like the later stages.
The big problem though was the difficulty balance. It doesn't ease you in at all. Even with 20 hearts, unless you take extreme caution to the degree that a significant chunk of the fun is sucked out, you can fail the early stages. And as a result of learning to take so much caution, I was overloaded with gear at the end. Kind of the story of the whole game's combat progression, really - intense early game, comfortable midgame, way-too-easy late game.
The costumes were all really cool looking, but they didn't take much time to find. Needed more vague directions, like just giving you a starting point and then having to spot landmarks to make a path. I would've loved more tasks that made you do a deep re-exploration of the terrain.
Champions' Ballad score - 9.0
Master Trials score - 8.2
Overall DLC score - 8.4 (main criticism = not enough brand new assets)
Effect on main game score - none.
***********
Well, thus endeth my journey.
This game was really something else. Every corner, every hill, every plain, was bursting with charm. I did one last runaround the map, and it still felt good. At the very end though, I realized just how much they overdid it with the inclement weather. Too many cold places, too much cloud cover and mist, way too much rain. The longer you spend in the game, the more you long for the bright blue skies and flowing green grass that was used to sell it.
After balancing that, the next quality-of-life improvement I'd like to ask from the sequel, thanks to all the time I spent climbing and revisiting areas over and over, is better texture mapping, especially on rocky surfaces.
Finally, I'd like to see the whole movement and stamina system rebuilt. Reminiscent of hammering on the roll button in OOT, the rhythm of sprint-recharge/climb-recharge got to be quite a drag. And one more movement option would really make the game feel more dynamic. Maybe something in the vein of a hookshot? Hover boots? Short-range teleportation?
Part 3 of 3 - My journey through photos
Up to the start of the Master Trials, the photos used in this review were posted on my Miiverse account during my playthrough.
-----> Here are ALL of them, in chronological order. <-----
Originally posted on the Zelda Universe forums between July 2017 (finished main game) and June 2019 (finished DLC).
Part 1 of 3 - pre-DLC review
Played on Wii U -- at least 190 hours played -- all shrines -- 482 Koroks -- took 279 Hyrule Compendium photos manually
*****************
To start with, let me get this out of the way - BotW does NOT beat Majora's Mask, which of the Zeldas I've played, has the best atmosphere, the best writing, and the best dungeon (Stone Tower Temple). However, has it managed to beat the mainstream favorite, and my second-favorite Zelda, Ocarina of Time? Let's take a look.
*****************
One can not help but compare this to The Elder Scrolls. It's got a similar land mass, a similar inventory, Koroks vs. Nirnroots, and for the first time in Zelda history, an actual physics engine. It doesn't have quite the kitchen sink mentality of TES (you can't move everything anywhere, storage is limited, fewer characters, fewer sidequests), but it still expands on all previous Zeldas by leaps and bounds in many ways, while somehow managing to keep the charm intact.
It's an incredible technical achievement. Numerous varieties of landscapes with a handcrafted feel, populated with countless varieties of wildlife that feel alive. Many unique and great looking weapons and armor sets. And many opportunities for manipulation and exploitation via the runes, the paraglider, and the climbing ability. Yet in stark contrast to TES, during my entire playthrough, I only encounted a SINGLE noticeable bug, a Bokoblin that walked into a tree and disappeared. I've never seen so many testers in a game's credits, and boy do the results show!
The framerate's not perfect, and there are some instances of fade-in and skimping on graphical effects (volume light only seems to exist in the Lost Woods), but these never hampered my enjoyment.
There are only five things that truly irritate me about the game, and most of them involve reoccurring events. One, it rains too much. Not only does this affect climbing, but about half the time it rains, there's also lightning, and bomb arrows don't work in the rain. Second, the control mapping, or lack thereof. You can switch a couple of buttons around, but that's it. Run feels awkward on B, Jump feels awkward on X, and the champion powers get stacked onto buttons with existing functions, which is nuts. Third, the blood moon happens too often. The enemy respawning isn't a big deal, but the interruption is a pain. Fourth, there's too much mist/fog. Everything looks better, and you can see farther when it's clear and bright, but unless you're in the desert, that view often gets obscured. And fifth, Star Fragments. Whatever way you get them, from the sky, from Lynels, or from amiibo, there's no quick or guaranteed method, and you need a lot of them to fully upgrade certain armor sets. It reminds me of my least favorite part of TES, repeatedly visiting shops to see what they have in stock.
So yeah, on the purely technical side, this game TOTALLY delivers. But how does it rank as a Zelda game?
*******
Let's get the big new feature out of the way first, the voice acting. It's fine. Zelda sounds stilted as heck, but all the voice acted cutscenes are short, so it's not a big deal. I'm glad they didn't go full-blown TES in this department, because it would've destroyed the flow and atmosphere.
Now let's get into the meat. How is the feel of the game? For the first 25%, perfect. Actually perfect. In that relatively early going, this world exudes such a sweet sense of wonder. I haven't felt that from Zelda since visiting Clock Town. The vistas. The progression. The personality of the characters. The feeling of the rain. The power of the runes. Evenings and sunsets. And always seeing something new over the next hill. After grinding up the Zora River through constant rain, electric enemies, and undulating hills, when I finally stumbled across Zora's Domain at night, from up high, my mind was blown. A shimmering, sci-fi-like installation filling an entire canyon. Then diving down, and discovering a multi-level, fully populated city. And they've got a BIG problem, in every sense of the word.
BTW, a note here. The Zora's Domain discovery/story arc wouldn't have been as impactful had I discovered it after another major city/storyline. I have the ability to go anywhere, do anything, so how did I manage to go the BEST way first? Well, Nintendo has a great talent for laying out a path for you without you noticing. They know how to position landmarks and situations in ways that induce insatiable curiosity, leading you other points of interest, and eventually to the next big moment. This is especially effective in leading you to Koroks. This development style goes all the way back to the original Super Mario Bros., and it's really something how they did it to an entire open world.*
*Here's some insight to how they did it, from a Japanese game developers conference.
Anyhow, it all culminates with the single best moment in the game, the Vah Ruta entry battle. Jet-skiing on a Zora's back, deflecting ice blocks, and eventually setting mines for speeding ice spike balls, then swimming up waterfalls to Matrix-jump shock arrows into an angry giant mechanical elephant's back!
DAMN!
Cool dungeon too. Good puzzles, good layout. A bit short, and the boss was way easy, but a great start. Onwards and outwards...
After all that story and action, you feel the need to chill out and explore for a bit. Starting off on the typical Hyrule scouting mission on this scale and with this level of beauty and variety becomes anything but typical. For once, you feel like an actual explorer. And once you crave more main quest, the trademark Nintendo positioning of towers, expanses, and hint givers gently points you towards the next best city, that being the Goron. It's smaller than Zora's Domain, but is once again fully populated and awesome looking. And though Vah Rudania is more of an annoyance than an imminent existential threat, it still looks just as badass as Vah Ruta.
The first chink in the game's armor shows itself here. After that super epic jet-ski ice battle, the entry "battle" for Vah Rudania isn't much deeper than avoiding falling rocks and spotlights. It's also here that you discover the game's number one design flaw - the main dungeons are all pretty much the same. They have different central gimmicks, but they're all pretty much the same size, length, and look the same inside too. Another disappointment is after experiencing excellent puzzles in the shrines, the main dungeon puzzles can't quite compete. And again, the boss is a pushover. The final dungeon that I tackled, Vah Naboris, had a strong entry battle, a bit more depth, and finally had a boss that I had to use actual strategy against, but the grand scale you find in the fields, mountains, and lakes rarely manifests itself in the action segments. Another example of starting strong, but dropping off are the Lomei Labyrinths. The one you notice first, in the upper right hand corner of the map, is accessed via long paraglider flight, has a huge central atrium, has Guardians overhead, and after you think you've finished it, a massive basement with great loot. The other two are just plain, easy to access mazes with shrines.
As you complete the shrines, another disappointment rears its head - the runes never reach their maximum potential. When I first saw the Stasis rune in the previews, my hype was through the roof. I thought of dozens of crazy physics puzzles made possible by it. There are some, but not nearly enough, and never to the level of craziness I imagined (though "Pushing Power" was pretty close). Only a single shrine delivered the sense of epicness that I had hoped for, and it was the very last one I found - Trial of Passage, a giant, glinting, clockwork puzzle filled with hazards. Why can't they make more Zelda dungeons that look like Mario Kart tracks?
The landscapes are front and center, though, and they deliver consistently. Even after I'd gone literally everywhere except Hebra, that region still managed to offer something fresh. Monotony only shows up once all the major discoveries and tasks are completed, and you're playing cleanup. Probably the biggest contribution to this consistent enjoyment, though you don't think about it much, are all the little bits of immersion. You can destroy materials before you pick them up. Enemies use whatever's available to them, even smaller enemies! There are other adventurers wandering around, sometimes camping, sometimes looking for treasure, and sometimes needing rescuing (and sometimes fighting back!). And there's so much context for the things you encounter, and the way townspeople live their lives (I was very happy to see daily schedules again, though they're a bit simpler than in Majora's Mask). TES offers a similar, if not quite as polished exploration meta though. It is of course incredible to have it in Zelda, but the hook for Zelda is always the dungeons. Open world fanatics like myself who came for the classic Zelda experience aren't going to be quite as enthralled as Zelda players who've never experienced such freedom and discovery before.
So, after I'd put the bulk of my time in, my thoughts were "this is a really, really good game, successfully pulling off Zelda meets Elder Scrolls, but there's not enough classic Zelda dungeon crawling and super imposing bosses to make it the best Zelda, or even second best". An incredible final dungeon/final boss could make up for that, though. Did it?
Almost.
Hyrule Castle is the densest structure in the game, loaded with great treasure, seriously tough enemies, and good secrets (dat shrine). However, it merely acts as another location you can visit, just happening to contain the final boss, instead of a true test of everything else you've learned. Maybe the DLC will provide that, but it's a shame that the main game couldn't be capped off like that.
The final boss was SO close to pure epic. SO close. I had to use up all of the champion powers to get past the first form, even with the help of the Divine Beast blast. And laying eyes upon the second form gave me the same "holy crap" feeling I had when the final form of the boss in Majora's Mask was revealed.
But the true final battle itself didn't quite deliver. As long as you keep moving, you don't take much damage. I had been hoping for something more like the Vah Ruta entry battle, or a God of War/Shadow of the Colossus/Bayonetta style boss where you have to scale it to access the weak point. Or best case scenario, taking place ON the castle, with the boss flying around it, like Twinmold x10. And the fact that you're on horseback and it doesn't move...what a waste. A bit on the style over substance side, I'm afraid.
Then before the credits, you rescue Zelda, finally get to talk to her, and...WTF is she babbling about? After all the grand story elements this game delivers, THAT'S the best you can do to close it out? And the credits themselves are just a generic scroll with generic photos? Definitely a case of journey, not destination here.
So yeah, it doesn't quite beat Ocarina. Not for lack of trying, though. I see BotW as a fantastic practice session for Nintendo. For once, I can see them matching up to all the giant western AAA titles, like many have always hoped they'd do.
There does, however, remain one thing that concerns me about the Zeldas of late that BotW did not alleviate - the soundtrack. One of my main gripes about Skyward Sword was a lack of epic and catchy tunes that Zelda always has been known for. BotW certainly has a GOOD soundtrack, that's not in dispute. It nails the ambient stuff. But the town themes, the battle themes, and the dungeon themes are, for the most part, just ok. Nothing really bad (though Hateno Village gets old quick), but like Skyward Sword, few true standouts. Only four tracks really made me feel something - Naydra Battle, Vah Naboris Dungeon, Dark Beast Ganon, and the best track that scores the best moment, once again, Vah Ruta Entry Battle. Even then, the upbeat piano track that was used in the reveal trailer beats them all.
There's very little of the classic Zelda bounciness (even the reused tracks aren't the greatest arrangements...I'm looking at you, Great Fairy's Fountain), and it's pretty clear why - the two composers who worked on it never worked on a Zelda before. The lead composer previously worked on an Animal Crossing game, which is a more laid back style.
For the next Zelda, please, PLEASE bring back Toru Minegishi (who is KILLING it on Splatoon!), Hajime Wakai (who supervised BotW, but didn't directly compose), and Koji Kondo, or at least people who have done stuff similar to traditional Zelda such as Yuka Tsujiyoko.
Main game score
#1. Majora's Mask - 9.8
#2. Ocarina of Time - 9.7
#3. Breath of the Wild - 9.4
Part 2 of 3 - post-DLC thoughts
After 2 years and a few months, I am finally all done with Breath of the Wild. ^_^
Final numbers after DLC - 357 hrs, 24 min (although I had the game on hold a lot, actual gameplay definitely felt like at least 300 hours), 531 Koroks.
So, how was the DLC?
I did the Champions' Ballad first. I loved the One-Hit Obliterator sequence. Fantastic abstract atmosphere, felt very intense.
The remainder wasn't as good, but still positive. The new shrines may have been the only ones that felt like legitimate mini-dungeons rather than just long puzzles. And as I love reaching far-off spots on open world maps, the method to find the shrines totally gave me what I wanted.
The big drawback of the shrine hunt, however, was how it was mostly repurposed assets rather than something totally new. The new cutscenes were some of the best in the game, but that's not what I paid $25 (CAD) for.
But being just a third of the package, I don't think there was any doubt I was eventually going to get my money's worth.
And the main event was up next - the fifth main dungeon.And the BEST one, if just for it finally looking different.
But really, it felt so much better than the Divine Beast dungeons. A transmission-style mechanism linking all the puzzles together? Spike and pit hazards? Getting a sense of size from dragging huge metal blocks all the way from one end to the other? Fresh and fun puzzles?
Good. Stuff.
And the last boss, while not as epic looking as any of Ganon's forms, offered fast, intense, artistic, and high variety combat...and at long last, a real BANGER of a battle theme - the best one since Twilight Princess!
And the motorcycle looks awesome. Love the little fuel-up animation. I wish it went a little faster and sounded more souped-up, though. Kind of felt like a streamlined horse with power steering rather than something with legit power under the hood. Still fun, though.
Now, the Master Trials. Fantastic concept. Basically more Eventide, which you can't go wrong with. But by that point, I was godawfully DONE with the shrine aesthetic. It would've been SO much more awesome if the entire thing had themeing like the later stages.
The big problem though was the difficulty balance. It doesn't ease you in at all. Even with 20 hearts, unless you take extreme caution to the degree that a significant chunk of the fun is sucked out, you can fail the early stages. And as a result of learning to take so much caution, I was overloaded with gear at the end. Kind of the story of the whole game's combat progression, really - intense early game, comfortable midgame, way-too-easy late game.
The costumes were all really cool looking, but they didn't take much time to find. Needed more vague directions, like just giving you a starting point and then having to spot landmarks to make a path. I would've loved more tasks that made you do a deep re-exploration of the terrain.
Champions' Ballad score - 9.0
Master Trials score - 8.2
Overall DLC score - 8.4 (main criticism = not enough brand new assets)
Effect on main game score - none.
***********
Well, thus endeth my journey.
This game was really something else. Every corner, every hill, every plain, was bursting with charm. I did one last runaround the map, and it still felt good. At the very end though, I realized just how much they overdid it with the inclement weather. Too many cold places, too much cloud cover and mist, way too much rain. The longer you spend in the game, the more you long for the bright blue skies and flowing green grass that was used to sell it.
After balancing that, the next quality-of-life improvement I'd like to ask from the sequel, thanks to all the time I spent climbing and revisiting areas over and over, is better texture mapping, especially on rocky surfaces.
Finally, I'd like to see the whole movement and stamina system rebuilt. Reminiscent of hammering on the roll button in OOT, the rhythm of sprint-recharge/climb-recharge got to be quite a drag. And one more movement option would really make the game feel more dynamic. Maybe something in the vein of a hookshot? Hover boots? Short-range teleportation?
(with the 'passing through solid objects' ability coming in the sequel, I may be getting my wish!)
Part 3 of 3 - My journey through photos
Up to the start of the Master Trials, the photos used in this review were posted on my Miiverse account during my playthrough.
-----> Here are ALL of them, in chronological order. <-----
If you backed up the visual examples, I'd love it if you reposted them.
