It’s no secret that The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom has enjoyed a massively successful launch. Nintendo Life has reported that the game surpassed 10 million copies sold in just three days. I sadly didn’t get through replaying Skyward Sword before it came out because I did not have the patience to finish it before breaking out Tears of the Kingdom. I’ve logged a lot of hours and feel like I’ve barely scratched the surface of the game and I am loving every minute of it. For me, this has been an amazing sequel to Breath of the Wild for so many reasons. I won’t discuss any specific story points, but if you want to go into the game completely blind then stop reading here.
The first challenge that the game overcame was how to make an old map feel fresh and new. Those who 100% Breath of the Wild probably had very little of the world that they hadn’t explored (those dang Koroks found themselves in the darnedest places). Well the surface level map is both familiar and has some new twists added to it, but now we have both the sky and underground to explore. This was a brilliant way to keep things fresh and new while giving players some fun with rediscovering familiar places. It was way fun to come upon the Great Plateau area again and it has been really fun to see how other familiar places have evolved. But the sky and especially the Depths has so much to offer in terms of exploration, you can spend hours just trying to complete your map. There are also old familiar monsters and some terrifying new additions to the enemies, so be on your toes as you explore.
The story for this game has been so much fun to learn. I don’t want to get too spoilery here, but suffice to say Link and Zelda get separated and there are places you can go that will show you what Zelda is doing during the separation. It’s been really cool to see her be a more proactive character which totally tracks with what we saw from her in Breath of the Wild. While I still think Ocarina of Time has had my favorite characterization of Zelda, this is definitely a close second. But I digress. The thing I really liked about this game for discovering pieces of story is that there are giant glyphs that you search around in for the spot to unlock the cinematic scene. I like this more than Breath of the Wild which was a little tedious in how you unlocked those memories. This made it easier to see a glyph in the distance and mark it on your map for later exploration. I haven’t gotten too far into the actual story, but what I have found is really cool and definitely worth unlocking.
The new abilities in the game are so much fun. You’ve probably already seen tons of videos of people making both cool and ridiculous weapons and structures. It is way fun to see what you can build and how new weapons and shields can work. But my favorite so far has been ascending which will allow you to reach the top of any structure from below. It has done so much to help in exploring to prevent a lot of tedious climbing. There’s still plenty of climbing around to be done, but it is a fun way to exit a cave that turned out to be too difficult for you to get through.
Finally, the game looks and sounds beautiful. Does it run at as high fps as other new games? No. But does it still look amazing? Absolutely. And it runs smoothly with no terrible glitches that I’ve found. You wouldn’t think that would need to be said, but sometimes it feels like fewer and fewer games are coming out actually complete. This game feels like it was made by a team of people passionate about it and who wanted to make a great game. Also, the music is just too perfect, I desperately need the official soundtrack to release.
I am seriously loving this game. If you enjoyed Breath of the Wild then you definitely will too. Absolutely no notes, just a great game, 10/10. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have some more shrines to complete.
