I hold Ocarina of Time in high regard. I’m talking about “Michael Jordan over everybody” type of high regard. I’ve said before that it’s the game that made me want to do this for a living. And then I played Tears of the Kingdom. While I still hold Ocarina as my favorite Zelda game of all time, Tears is fighting heavily for that spot. And it has a lot to do with my time spent just roaming the world.
zelda’s open world is incredIBLE
Exploring Hyrule in Tears of the Kingdom is special. The only time I fast travel is if I want to get to a Skyview Tower. Beyond that, I’m walking it. I rarely use horses in game. And that’s down to how well Nintendo constructed the overworld. There is always something to see or check out. I’ll have a list of three or four side quests I want to knock out with the full intention of doing so. Three hours later, I might have two of them done because I’ll see something off in the distance and need to go see it.
Playing Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom was the first time I saw the true value in Link being silent. I never clamored for him to be able to speak, but it also never mattered to me either way. Expanding Hyrule into an open world and letting me get lost in it changed the way I saw Link. I was able to feel like I was the one exploring Hyrule and I would get locked into the experience to where I would get those feelings of dread diving into the Depths.
Of course, I understand why people feel the way they do when about the Depths. It can come off a little bare. My only complaint about it has always been the number of high walls that seem to make up 90% of the area. Now of course that isn’t the case, and it helps to discover all of the chasms on the surface, but when you set a course in the depths and can’t continue straight through because you’re basically circling a gigantic wall, it can be a bit annoying.
i’ll always want a return to the old school dungeon structure but there’s room for this
I said before that I would prefer the next Zelda game to be structured like the older 3D games, and I stand by that. Those games feel a particular way that the open world structure will never be able to replicate. But what Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom brought to the series can never be denied.
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