50 Years of Video Games: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (Switch)

For almost as long as Nintendo supported the Wii U, the promise of a new game in their renowned Legend of Zelda franchise was promised. However, as the console failed to catch on, soon attention was turned towards new opportunities, and in 2017 the Nintendo Switch would release and prove to be an even greater success then even the wildly successful Wii. Part of making a good first impression did lead to a pivot away from their initial plans though, their new Zelda title still coming out on the Wii U but in a clearly inferior state to the version that would welcome in their new hybrid hardware. Perhaps more importantly, after the Wii U was filled with games that were mostly safe continuations of pre-existing franchises, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild would shift away from a format Nintendo had stuck to pretty faithfully for the series since The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past. Rather than focusing on a fairly linear narrative where the player conquered dungeons in a specific order, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild would throw the player into a vast world where they were free to chart their own path, the strength of an enormous open land worth exploring proving to be the captivating bait to draw players into buying the new console.

 

When the player first starts a new game in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, they find themselves as Link, a warrior awakening after 100 years of sleep meant to heal his mortally wounded body. Once a knight for the kingdom of Hyrule, he stood in battle when a dark and ancient evil known as Calamity Ganon attacked. However, while Hyrule thought it had the upper hand by using ancient technology like the towering Divine Beasts and the spider-like Guardians against Ganon, his corruption seeped into them and turned the automated defenses against the people of the land, eliminating its champions before the princess Zelda just barely manages to contain his dark power in the castle. When Link awakens 100 years later he finds not a kingdom devastated but one still living under the shadow of darkness swirling around the castle, Calamity Ganon able to spread his power out into the land in the form of monstrous servants who will always return to life on the night of a Blood Moon unless Ganon is stopped. While there are many serene and peaceful areas across a kingdom so large as Hyrule, Link is the only one who has a hope of defeating Ganon and cleansing the land of this barely contained menace.

 

While it takes a bit for these specifics details to come into place, the player isn’t forced to sit through long cutscenes to understand these details if they wish to run out and experience the world. In fact, if you’re feeling so bold, this action adventure game does little to restrain the player in following their own curiosity, meaning you can even make a run on Hyrule Castle fairly early to try and defeat Ganon after things have barely begun. Of course, starting off in just a pair of underwear with three hearts for health even the simplest of enemies can deplete with an attack or two means you likely won’t get too far into the castle, so first the player will engage with an introductory area of sorts called the Great Plateau. A more contained area before you are truly let loose to explore the fantasy world with plenty to do in it, the plateau lets you acquaint yourself with the basics, learn some of the fundamentals of the world you’re entering, receive some information on how to learn more about your place in it, and provides you with some of your first tools for interacting with it.

 

With a small device known as the Sheikah Slate the player is given a handful of abilities with a surprisingly deep range of uses in a game with a variety of intertwined mechanics. The Stasis rune for example is able to freeze objects in place for a while so this can be used to stop a hazard or freeze an enemy in time. However, items stopped in time can be hit to increase their momentum, allowing you to turn normal objects into dangerous projectiles if you hit them or even a ride if you climb atop them before they go flying. Magnesis allows you to move objects around through the air if they’re magnetic, meaning you can of course open metal doors or make staircases out of metallic boxes but you can also magnetize a weapon and swing it around to hurt and enemy, and if there’s a thunderstorm you can even float that object towards an enemy encampment to use as a lighting rod for quite the surprise to your foes. The two Bomb runes have a more typical use in their explosive potential and Cryonisis is primarily used for making pillars of ice out of water, but you can still find clever uses like freezing the side of a gentle waterfall to climb it. Much of the puzzle design featured in the game only requires the use of these magical runes but also allows for the player to create clever solutions outside of the intended path.

Shrines are scattered around Hyrule that contain little puzzle rooms with treasures inside, a new fast travel point if you want to teleport somewhere instead of walking or riding a horse, and the reward of an orb that goes towards health or stamina upgrades. The prizes are valuable enough to engage with them but small enough that you won’t feel you need to do every one or always interrupt your current plan of action if you spot a shrine in the distance. Most of these will ask for some smart use of your runes but even how this unfolds can vary, since for example a shrine with fans where you try to outrace a ball that is blow into a socket to activate a lift can instead be completed more simply with a smart use of the Stasis rune on the ball. Some of these are about battling specific foes instead or even have the puzzle actually be getting to the shrine in the first place, many people around Hyrule sharing riddles or stories you need to work out to even reach certain shrines. Other times you might see a shrine in a seemingly inaccessible place before you consider the environment around it, gliding down with the parasail you get at the end of the plateau an option not just for navigating large areas by air but even a way around some dangers in the world. Plenty of clever but condensed ideas surround the shrine system, especially because The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild also has plenty of extra ideas in place to deepen its mechanics beyond your own runes.

 

Fires are not just a way to light up a place or hurt a foe in this game. A sufficiently large one creates an updraft you can ride with your sail to reach new heights, the player can burn grass and wood to eliminate enemy structures or overwhelm monsters in grassy areas with a blaze, and you can even cook meat with it into better healing meals if you pull it out of the open flame before it burns away. Wooden weapons and arrows can carry it to give you more ways to move a flame around or launch it into useful areas and other systems end up having similarly broad uses. Many trees can be cut down if your weapons are good enough, then turned into wood for future use or even rolled down a hill to kill enemies. Attach special Octo Balloons to them and you can make them into a floating ride, climb up a tree as it stands and you might find a way to get to a higher place. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild’s world is full of small things to find and do without feeling cluttered or forcing your attention towards them, and by having so many flexible systems in place to take advantage of and experiment with you are also given a more meaningful degree of influence on how you engage with it all. Whether you’re completing a shrine’s particular challenge or simply trying to reach a ledge or useful crafting item out in the world you’ll have a good batch of systems you can draw from to make your solution, and things only get deeper as other elements enter the picture.

 

In The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, you can climb most any vertical surface that isn’t too slick, this important for moments like climbing the towers that fill out your map that often have some danger or trial involved in approaching them. However, it is also a way to make Hyrule’s explorable terrain even wider in its offerings. If you see a mountain you can likely climb it, stamina preventing you from just scaling it with ease but finding ledges to rest on and recover or consuming special elixirs and wearing appropriate equipment can help you continue up even some of the highest peaks in the land. These areas are filled with their own things to find as well so it’s not just a means of going wherever you please, but it does add another layer to the experience as you are given more vertical options in many situations as well as a realm with much more potential for variety thanks to this option. Lava covered mountains to the northeast and frigid snowy peaks to the northwest offer as many places to visit as the open plains near the middle and the desert and coasts to the south, and when you do set out to infiltrate Hyrule Castle you’ll find even its walls can be scaled in a final area that has many possible routes to pick on your path to the final boss. Unfortunately, rain will basically make you incapable of climbing for a bit when it can sometimes be required to do whatever has currently caught your interest, a realistic barrier but one that often just leads to waiting out the weather rather than a truly interesting complication being added to the picture.

 

Each area of the world has plenty to do beyond just completing shrines of course. As you move about you might notice unusual incongruities like a stone of circles with one missing, a tree trunk with a rock chained to it, or suspicious flowers where they shouldn’t grow. These are signs of Koroks, little plant creatures who will provide a seed if you can solve their quick little trial that is easy to engage with as you travel and pay off by expanding your ability to carry combat gear. Citizens around the realm have concerns you can help with, not too many deep quests existing but some like helping to build up an entire town of your own with people from across the realm making up for the conceptually basic ones like helping a man get all of his chickens back in their pen. Materials can be found all around the world that can go towards cooked meals or brewing potions with special properties while others can be used to upgrade clothing or sold since the game’s currency is hard to find in the wild. You’re able to carry as many ingredients as you can find without limit so scooping them up for future use while going about your business is easy enough and the special materials that are a bit rare or require more effort to get often pay off with strong rewards.

Combat is a big part of the adventure though and here is where one of the game’s more contentious but vital features comes into play. Link can carry quite a few weapons with him, but over time their use will weaken their durability before they finally break. This holds true of shields and bows as well, meaning over the course of the adventure you will frequently be acquiring new gear and losing the older stuff as its use wears it down. Important things like the clothing that can help you overcome areas too cold or hot to travel through otherwise are thankfully indestructible, but constantly losing weapons can be hard to swallow at first, especially when a really good one eventually meets its end. However, this does lead to a progression of strength even though the world is so open to you exploring down any path you desire. When you begin you are underequipped and struggling to even hold your own against the goblin-like Bokoblins that are common across the realm, but as you go from tree branches to clubs to true metal blades and eventually enchanted magical ones you’ve found by pushing into more dangerous places, the weapon durability system becomes less painful. What it does do is ensure the player doesn’t settle into one weapon even as new options keep cropping up. A one-handed weapon has different attacks than a two-handed one, some weapons like the magic rods can fling their magic instead of striking normally, and even within classifications you’ll find a spear’s ranged stabbing plays quite differently to claymore you swing around more as a powerful threat than a way to repel a foe. Almost every enemy you kill will drop a weapon as well so its not an issue of weapon numbers and the best weapons in the game can be invested in with special smiths so they’re never truly lost forever, so its more a matter of adjusting your mindset, especially since eventually you’ll find more good weapons than you can even bring with you. Only the toughest of foes and the largest of enemy groupings ever really threaten to wear down your collection.

 

The battle system is deeper than a collection of weapons that is constantly shifting too. Not only do the runes put in work here but the open world design allows for you to often plan an approach that makes use of the environment. You also then have various arrows with different elemental properties, parry and dodge options to open up new attack opportunities, and enemies who come in a wide variety. Admittedly the world can sometimes feel overpopulated with the Bokoblins who serve as the most basic of foes, but depending on where you are in Hyrule you might face the lizard-men known as Lizalfos who are speedy and capable enemies, Moblins who are large heavy-hitters who aren’t afraid to lift and hurl anything in arms reach, creatures made of stone who won’t take damage from traditional means, the magic-flinging Wizzrobes, and plenty of situational foes like the Yiga Clan’s assassins who might suddenly strike as you travel or even try to deceive you by dressing as regular folks. As you make more progress in terms of getting power to fight Ganon the normal enemies will also increase in power and competence with new variants, but even before then you can run into the corrupted Guardians who can likely wipe you out while barely trying until you’ve learned their ways and equipped yourself in your journeys to face something so strong. Sometimes retreating is the smarter option as well but other times they might defend a treasure or area you are intent on getting to, and sometimes you might not even realize a danger exists until a world already full of little surprises soon reveals an entire boss creature simply sleeping around the corner or hiding beneath the sands.

 

Building up your strength through combat, increasing your potential with the rewards from shrines and Koroks, and simply traveling to new and interesting areas in a game world designed to have intriguing things always catching your eye makes moment to moment play feel both productive and full of hours upon hours of potential on its own, but there are a few larger goals to pursue if you do follow the story moments that arise. The four Divine Beasts are massive mechanical creatures that are making life for specific settlements more dangerous, these powerful giants actually a tool you can turn against Ganon so long as you find ways to approach them and flush out his dark influence. Doing so requires interacting with the affected races of the land, and in doing so you will not only get to learn more about Link’s past but also interact with new cultures of people. The fish-folk known as the Zora, the rock-eating Gorons, the female only society of the Gerudos, and the Rito bird-people all have a beast you need to tame, and in doing so you will not only meet an important member of their current civilization but be reminded of a champion of the past you fought alongside. Flashbacks will start to add more weight to the fight for this world, some even requiring you to seek out areas specifically just to trigger a memory of your time with the Champions and Princess before your unfortunate fall. Here some interesting personal stories are built up, Zelda herself perhaps having the strongest as her arc follows her worries over her own failures and attempt to marry her role with her true passions lead to a troubled but evolving character. The four champions of the past and their modern equivalents are all a set of interesting contrasts, some even having a tragic element or inspiring end once you’ve cleared the Divine Beast associated with them. In the past, Mipha was a softspoken Zora princess unable to voice her love for Link while her younger brother Sidon in the present can’t stop exclaiming how much he appreciates Link’s support, the boisterous and bold Daruk of the Gorons is the opposite of his descendant Yunobo and his timid ways, the confident Rivali of the Rito whose pridefulness leads to constant bragging is the antithesis of Teba who feels the failures of his people are his to bear and takes things all the more seriously for it. Admittedly there is some rather poor voice acting at times like Daruk’s actor rushing lines and characters like Zelda being a bit breathy in their delivery, but uncovering more of the past and learning how it relates to the present gives this element of the game an appreciated level of structure between moments where you indulge your wanderlust to find whatever in Hyrule can entertain you.

 

The Divine Beasts also offer what are essentially dungeons once you hop aboard them. The massive mechanical creatures all contain rooms to explore as well as important elements on their exterior so you do get the sense of climbing a colossus as you make your way to clearing the corruption. These beasts also each have a unique function where, once you acquire the map of their innards, you can influence their body in some way to change the layout. The elephant Vah Ruto can spray its trunk on different parts of its body to add water where you need it and the lizard-like Vah Rudania can tilt its position on the volcano it scales to turn the entire dungeon on its side. All your tools for navigation can help you here as well, and these aren’t the only moments the story-focused pushes for more power to fight Ganon with introduce you to. Sneaking through a ninja base, fighting special boss monsters, and interacting with different peoples who open up new opportunities and diversions continue to build up this game with plenty to catch your interest and a lot of activities to get involved in, the game managing to rarely feel like it has invalidated the worth of small diversions while making it enjoyable to pursue the many secrets even if you feel you’re more than prepared for the final battle with Ganon. Hyrule is truly a land of opportunity without feeling like it has broken its aesthetics in doing so, some beautiful natural landscapes to be found with often sparse music to set the mood that only picks up during moments of excitement or importance to make sure those are underlined properly.

THE VERDICT: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is a game brimming with interesting content to indulge in that also manages to ensure it neither feels required to the degree of tedium nor pointless to engage with. As you explore you might spot a shrine or Korok puzzle which provides an interesting yet brief challenge with a reward that isn’t pressingly important but not insignificant. More structured experiences like the story-related Divine Beast quests give you moments of honed challenges and interesting narratives to bring the world to life more but optional content can still provide entirely unique trials and dangers that can be flexibly tackled with remarkable fundamentals or your ever-shifting set of weapons. Small hurdles like rain restricting your freedom to climb can’t really impede the sense of adventure and opportunities the land of Hyrule provides, a vivid world full of potential able to fill your time in it with meaningful activities as you continue to scour its well-crafted landscapes.

 

And so, I give The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild for Nintendo Switch…

A FANTASTIC rating. While a few more side quests with stories to them like building up the town or bringing a pair of lovers together could have added to the already vast array of meaningful content to engage with, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is a game packed with so many activities to engage with it doesn’t really hurt that so many of them make more use of the game’s intricate mechanical systems and their wide range of uses than their storytelling potential. While some shrines will only have one real way to conquer them, many more will let you make special use of your runes or even bring in weapons and other items that might change the shape of a fight or puzzle. The ability to climb to great heights already opens up plenty of doors as you can drop into areas of interest or deepen your options for approaching fights both simple and complex. An enormous boss walking around the world can be handled in a variety of ways that can provide tough challenges or make you feel clever for concocting your own workaround, but the story moments tied to the Divine Beast quests also ensure there are moments with more structured experiences, characters to meet, and dungeon-like giants to test how far you’ve come. The ability to tackle those in whatever order you please, indulge in the opportunities the varied regions of Hyrule offers, and tackle Ganon whenever you feel you’re ready even if you truly aren’t give a powerful sense of freedom to the game while the experience also has plenty to ensure that deviating from main paths still provides worthwhile content. There are plenty of animal species walking around Hyrule that don’t draw attention to themselves but can be interacted with, Korok puzzles are quick but add little challenges without disrupting the sense of setting areas of Hyrule have, and new dangers can be found to fight with rewards that often offset the cost. The early pains of losing weapons are soon left behind as you form yourself into a capable warrior with every action you take and the game makes an effort to ensure you’re not high and dry with so many avenues for acquiring gear, a surprising balance and growth of character achieved even when you are given so much freedom to head off where your own interest takes you. By making sure there’s plenty of interesting things to do though, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild never feels like it overstays its welcome or forces you into doing something, the adventure’s shape yours to craft but reasonable barriers and limits exist so that overcoming them can be a satisfying step in growing beyond your humble start.

 

It’s easy to say that The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild was an excellent accompaniment for the Switch’s debut, to the point few even really remember the Wii U version that was released at the same time. However, its approach to open worlds in a time where the design concept was becoming so commonplace that some resented it also provided a breath of fresh air, the freedom to explore achieving a balance by having meaningful varied content without it being demanding in its importance or cookie-cutter in its design. The true openness to go where your interest takes you certainly helped without having to sacrifice moments of more involved and structured gameplay to ensure its not without moments of greater import and interest. However, a good deal of attention was paid to the optional activities and the core concepts that shape how the game plays provided such a wide range of opportunities that simple actions still hold an appeal and more potential than a single prescribed task. There are plenty of secrets, unique scenarios, and extra touches to keep Hyrule alive and full of wonder for someone looking to continue searching the land for more to do, and by providing a wealth of quality content that only distracts from the important story content in a good way, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild makes a game world that is open so that the player can personally decide how their experience will take shape.