Your snowball analogy is spot on. I probably don’t have enough free time in my life (botw took me 4 years to complete) but it certainly feels like after many hours I find myself getting much more comfortable in the world. I don’t mind at all how the game looks or runs. I’ll take my many many small victories along the way, and I’ll see you in a few years 😆
Great impressions! I have the same likes/dislikes, though the performance issues haven’t really taken me out of the experience. My main dislike is how overwhelmed I feel, but I have to remind myself that I’m not trying to just burn through the game and I should just enjoy the experience.
I’m finding that sometimes too. Overwhelmed. It brings truth to the saying that less is more. Having said that, the game is amazing. I’m thoroughly enjoying it.
Best reviewer on the platform. Found you when you reviewed Days Gone, big fan ever since. I love that game to death and I am also a huge fan of Sam Witwer. 8 bit terror is doing podcasts with the actors and developers if you're interested. For me it's endlessly fascinating as the game lives rent free in my mind. You're wonderful at your job mister, critical and considerate of the hard work and time that goes into making these games. I hope you're having a wonderful day.
Great video Vic! I’m really not clicking with TOTK, I keep playing hoping for the highs of BOTW but so far nothing has filled me with awe like in 2017. Every other bit of content about this game is near universal praise so it was nice to hear someone else express some things that maybe aren’t perfect
It is nice to see you actually give both sides of how the game is instead of praising every little thing that majority of the reviewers have been doing. Thanks VIC!
I loved BOTW, so I was a little surprised I wasn't excited at all about TOTK. I tried to change my opinion about this game by watching videos, listening to podcasts, etc. Heck, I even bought the game last week. But it didn't click from the beginning. Mind you, I only played a few hours. But, TOTK feels tedious, overwhelming, and the physics based puzzles seemed more like work than being relaxing. I sold the game yesterday and feel a sense of relief. Still, I'm happy it'll go down as one of the best Zelda games of all time and people are over the moon about it. I guess I loved this kind of game formula once and that was enough.
If you'll allow me to be a grumpy 31 year old Gamer - this LoZ: Jazz formula is really just not clicking with me. If anything BotW & TotK have given me a new appreciation for more Formula Based and Linear Games especially from this Franchise. I'm happy other people are having a blast with it, but the amount of freedom & creativity to get the full experience is too much for me; to borrow an analogy from a few different TH-camrs this is too much of a Bucket of Legos type of game and I need a Lego Playset with more Structure & Directions experience. Although after I wrote off Wind Waker back in the day and then later found it to be my favorite, I'm always happy to come back to any variation of Hyrule and try whatever Nintendo decides to throw in these great games. Ashamed to admit I've missed most the handheld adventures but I'm gradually trying to pick them up as they become easier to access. Thanks for the Candid thoughts Vic, look forward to your final feelings after the dust has settled.
The breakable thing is understandable in the sense of pure freedom to create, but I wish they gave us an option to say, save up to 2-3 weapons from breaking, or having to charge like the master sword after you beat the game. I know everyone would just save OP weapons, but after they break you just make it again anyways so it just saves time for the most part.
@Falcon2 Yeah. I would just prefer my run and jump buttons to be close together so I can run and jump gaps. But in TOTK they are directly opposite of eachother on the game pad lol. I fall a lot because of it lol
Annoyances I have with the game: Puzzle design. You're given subtle clues anout what to do in any situaton, bit occasionally, i cannot figure something out without looking it up. Like the goat quest where the game implies you should follow the wind but doing so takes you in the wrong firection. Or when you're doing the light pillars but visibility is so bad you cant see the crank. I cant fuse from my inventory. Why do i have to drop something to fuse it? I have a material select screen, so why isnt there a 'fuse to weapon' option there? Shrines glow the same cor before and after completion. Going from orange to blue on botw meant you instsntly knew if youd done it. Now you need a batter look.
The problem with traversal in the game is that it isn’t fun. There’s so much more garbage in your way between point a and b in the first game that it’s maddening.
I pretty much agree with everything you said, especially the part about the breakable weapons!!! Just like you said, I never really had a problem with it in BOTW but it feels soooooo much more annoying in totk. I also agree about the confusing controls, I'm constantly getting annoyed pressing the wrong buttons!
This was all so well said I’m not deep in Totk yet but this is how I felt about botw. So overwhelming and lonely but still fun. It took me years to bear breath of the wild
Thats interesting because mechanically, fuse fixes the weapon durability problem. In breath of the wild, if you're fully stocked up on good weapons, getting into a fight is just going down, unless you're fighting an enemy with a weapon just as powerful and rare as one you have, which isnt common at the end of the game, making combat no longer rewarding. Fuse makes it so the weapon is no longer the valuable part, its the fuse material. Sure, fusing my 32 damage silver horn is a little better on a 7 damage royal halberd than a 2 damage stick, but it's not a huge difference. By making the valuable part be the fude materials you can carry an endless amount of, you fis the combat resource equation.
Pretty spot on. I think the only way the controls could be implemented properly would be with a keyboard. They're fine and it doesn't ruin the game but like you said, they're clunky. I'm 20 hrs in also and I do all the same things you mentioned still. I think the game is fantastic so far. It feels like climbing has been made easier. There were moments in botw where I couldn't get anywhere until my stamina was way higher. It seems like they've given more stop points to regain stamina in this one. I've done maybe 24 shrines and haven't felt the need to upgrade my stamina at all yet. My only minor complaint is that I don't feel like I've stumbled onto anything "special". In botw you could walk around and just find something that didn't feel part of the game, the best example would be those two lakes, one was heart shaped, the other, broken heart shaped. It was just a cool random story that had nothing to do with anything. I've definitely found hidden things in this one but doesn't feel the same. It's probably because botw was first and it was a new thing. There's still lots to find in this so I'm sure there will be stuff like that. When it comes down to it botw and totk might as well be viewed as one massive game because they transition so well together.
Nice tip for anyone with a newer tv. Turn off game mode and then turn on a setting like tru motion to smooth or max and the game will look and feel like it went from 30fps to 60fps it’s absolutely game changing
I feel you in the scale of the world. Being a dad, its tough to get to play the game. You just don't have time to allocate 5 hours at a time time play. It worked for me when BOTW when my kids were babies and I can play while putting them to sleep, but now that they're older. Nope. This needs a FWD button to get from one place to the other. The horse isnt fast enough.
I’m also about 20 hours in and it’s shaping up to be the best game I’ve every played. I think it runs fine considering it’s on a portable system that only has 10% of the processing power that Redfall has available on Series X.
I love TOTK. I think the graphics look amazing, but the whole time I'm thinking how much better it would like with 4k visuals. It would be even more breathtaking.
Hey Vic! I'm not very far in, but I love totk so far. The new abilities are very interesting especially the Ultrahand. Not a big fan of fragile weapons again this time, but at least there are plenty around to pick up. Looking forward to hearing more of your thoughts after you've completed the game. Enjoy!
it is realy strange that you are feeling that in the second game about breakable weapons and the lonely feeling. in breath of the wild, it was super lonely and the breakable weapons was super annoying. in tears of the kingdom, i dont feel so lonely, there are more stuff to do and more people in the world and more quests. and i can always fuse new weapons so they have more durability. the weapons in tears dont breake that often. not like in breath of the wild. in tears, i have 5 10-15 damage weapons now and no one have broken yet. if i have a stick and fuse it to a rock, it holds a couple hits. but if i have a sword and fuse it to a rock it holds 30 hits, even more i think. it depends what you are hitting on.
Played roughly 15 hours now, its a great game but it feels like a botw 1.5 - nothing wrong with that. But I kind of enjoyd the jump from windwaker to twilight princess or skyward sword to botw etc. but hey, they had a story to tell and - we will see how it ends.
I do wonder if after Breath of the Wild was a hit the dev team groaned at making a new game with the engine, design and code base they'd built. It could be that it was a nightmare to work with to keep everything working and the performance under control. And they had to make the game bigger this time. And with this new game being a hit, I can see even with more powerful hardware, they will struggle again with performance holding them back in the next game. As they'll be told to keep the style similar and will no doubt re-use the code base again. Who knows? As for my expereience so far, I've found the performance to be annoying only on the ground level from the previous game. It runs well elsewhere except for a few odd moments. And I find the companions annoying at times getting in the way. And certain places not letting me drop items despite there being space for them. It can be tedious searching through all the materials, so a way to hot key a material would be great. The majority of the puzzles I've done have been incredible and the story is certainly far better. And one dungeon/main quest was such a major step down compared to another one, it's crazy but maybe that's part of them being held back by the performance issues. Needing to limite what they do. Also, it's notable that all these issues with the game lagging were present in Breath of the Wild. Anyway, I'll stop rambling on.
My one wish would be a better tracking system to see what I have completed in an area. Maybe they can show a percentage per area of the map at the minimum. So much to see and do I forget if I explored a cave for example that I found.
I agree that it does _momentarily_ break the sense of immersion when you climb a surface and realize how the textures are probably not even to current mobile game standards. But the gameplay has not yet failed to win me over again and again. My biggest dislike is the timing, but it's really unique to me. I started Persona 5 Royal in December (first ever Persona experience). I assumed that five months was plenty of time to get through P5R and then I could focus on TOTK. I now find myself caught between two massive games that I can't let sit idle because I want to keep going in both. I kind of wish TOTK was a fall release because I don't want to fall too far behind everyone else, so I am giving it my focus for a few more days but then I will need to alternate. It's not really a critique, but it's not ideal for me.
@Falcon2 No, it often looks great. I am judging it on its own art style choices. So whereas you can stand at a high vantage point and see beautiful vistas, when you get close enough to certain surfaces it's a blurry mess, e.g. climbing a mountainside.
@Falcon2 I saw your question and wondered to myself, "I bet I could find an example in the upload that we're commenting on." In other words, not on my TV. So at 7:50-7:51, Vic pans the camera above Link on the top of a mountain. Not only is it blurry from a third person view, but it is FAR worse when you first approach these surfaces to climb them. Characters and objects mostly look great.
@Falcon2 "Again, this art style isn't supposed to be photo-realistic." That's called a strawman argument. So let me spell out where your logic fails. Whether viewed natively or compressed, the entire picture is subject to the same display. (I'm not trying to speak down to you, but you've forced me to make this clear.) So to refute the straw man: I am NOT suggesting that these textures are to be judged against photorealistic textures displayed on current titles for PC, PS5, or Xbox consoles. (I've only ever seen anything I would call photorealistic in tech demos though.) What I AM saying is that, the same display has more detail in other similar surfaces than it does on the example I shared. I am judging the textures I am critiquing against other textures _in the same game and on the same display at the same time_. I am convinced that you have better displays and far worse vision than I do. But even though you might have superior screens, the idea that mine can display some surfaces well but not others is indicative of a poor ability to reason through your own statement. Oddly, you seem to agree. You say, "Can you see every minute scrape and crevice on the stone mountain walls, etc. No, of course not. Again, this art style isn't supposed to be photo-realistic." But I don't accept your underlying assumption that "not photo-realistic" is the same thing as "not detailed." The statues of Hylia that give you heart containers and stamina vessels have an element of "roughness" to them. Rocky surfaces would normally be varied in that some surfaces would be smooth and others less so. We don't get that here, even though it's clear that some things are given more attention. The water effects look above "cell shade" quality and the "short grass" on the sections I have identified are just painted on, not material objects. Can't help you if you don't understand those concepts.
@Falcon2 Yeah see most other players seem too harsh on the graphics. You seem too positive. Rocky surfaces in low areas and caves look great on my TV. I guess the problem is with my Switch, huh?
@Falcon2 I'm trolling as much as you're simping. My sense is we're both being pretty genuine. Again, I showed you an example from the upload. You made the bogus claim that we can't judge based on that, but it renders Link and the UI with so much more detail than the ground surface. If the compression is compromising fidelity, it should do so for the entire image. Your argument is bogus. You do realize you always had the option just roll your eyes and not engage me at all, right? We probably are having the same experience from a technical standpoint. You seem to lack the social awareness to recognize hyperbole. So let me be utterly literal in what will also be my last post: I am not experiencing literal blurring effects in the way the textures display. I am saying _some_ of them are so less detailed than others that up close they look subpar, _even_ when compared with other objects in the game.
Fair. Hopefully Nintendo is less nervous about their next console. They should have customized the chip, but they were so concerned about battery life. I don't really think that matters in a world with so many portable chargers.
Completely agree with a lot of your points. The most was the fact that it just doesn’t look / perform great. Switch hardware needs a big bump to clean all this up.
Man I am so glad the controls took time to master for you because I thought it was just me. lol All your examples rang true for me too. I just finished Horizon: Forbidden West so I kept messing up here because the button layout is completely reversed. Playing the Xenoblade and Horizon series prepared me for the scale.
Absoloutely adore BOTW, TOTK so far for me (Ive just reached Purah) has been a chore. I dont like crafting and the difficulty feels like its been scaled up 2 settings, still its a Zelda game and that means its better than 99% of the other stuff in the market.
Yeah something about this game doesn’t completely click with me. I still think it’s great for the most part. Building stuff, fusing weapons, ascending all seem pretty good and functional, but at the same time, I feel like I’m going back to 2017 instead of playing a game in 2023
excelente la review, dood. no need for no final score either. fuq dat. 😁excellent review. I understand how important these zelda games are as an art form. they have inspired other amazing games. respect to these two open world Zelda games. rispek indeed I played a lil bit of breath of the wild at the beginning of this year for the first time, and I can say that: Majora's Mask, The wind waker HD and Twilight princess are still my own personal favourites Zelda games. just like the triforce and shit. the 3 pieces are equally important. none is better than the other. and just like Skyward sword, I ain't never touching Tears of the kingdom. I can already tell they are not for me. I'm glad they exist tho. they are indeed a source of inspiration for other artists. let more Zelda games be made 🤓
Liking the game so far but having trouble always hitting the wrong buttons and for me it just fills like breath of the wild and man the performance can run in the low 20’s
You can add things onto your weapon to extend it now. as well as the fact the game forces you to use game knowledge and use weapons with logic, the game is a survival/exploration RPG if you thought totk would change that. it is def an acquired but I enjoy it.
it sounds like this has a bit in common with Death Stranding, in terms of the loneliness that the game portrayed. Glad to see a balanced review, I am going to jump in and see how I like it, but my guess is it will be a 40 hour play for me and then sell it and my Switch OLED as I have played it out. it served me well but after this, there is nothing really on the horizon for it. It maybe $70, but if you buy the disc version, but you can re-sell it for $55 to $59 and the game literally costs you $11 to try. With Nintendo never lowering game prices, the re-sell is always great. The cost to play is literally pennies.
How on earth you ended up climbing mountains in this game ffs? Play the depths, upgrade your batteries. This is not botw. It's not meant to be played the same way... The depths replace the surface when it comes to lonely exploration and the surface is a cake walk. fly you fool:P
I'm definitely not having as much fun this time around! Only about 6 hours in mind you, is it me or od the weapons break much easier this time around? And that damn horse 😡
yeah the things you dont love about this game sound more like you problems as well as nitpicks. kinda makes it sound like youre looking for a reason to not like the game. also you cant compare something like horizon to a stylized game like zelda, thats just bad comparisons.
I don't mind them but there has to be proper counter measures in place. The ability to create crafting kits or visiting a blacksmith for repairs would be fine.
I like how the next recommended video was your review of Forbidden West. Really shows how bad TOTK looks. TOTK runs sup-1080p with sub 30fps. My eyes hurt trying to play this. I mean I still enjoy it, but its sad to look at. This shoulda been a Switch2 launch title.
Is this video a joke? I am not being facetious. Every single complaint you have is there and sometimes even more pronounced in BOTW. EVERY. SINGLE. ONE. BOTW was a good game that was seriously held back by various smaller problems. That is expected when you are the first one to try something. Plenty of games have improved on this formula since. TOTK listened to their audience, and while they didn't fix all of the problems, or didn't go far enough, they did make a lot of improvements. It is a far superior game to it's original and the fact that you call BOTW your favorite game of all time, and yet complain about the same problems it had in the sequel says a lot about the quality of your understanding, and that is surprising since you have done this for over 20 years.
Same. Did BOTW until I beat first two beasts, got very very bored. I loved the exploration, but once I realised the 4 beasts were the same sorta pattern...then what? Do a billion shrines to get hearts, cook some rubbish to survive, just didn't do it for me. And I loved all the Zelda's before. Getting a new weapon quickly feels dull when you know it lasts 6 hits, in a stupid shrine I went through 6/7 of my best weapons to knock a janky ball that wouldn't go straight...lost the love. Plus soundtrack is rubbish.
Nah I hate it. So overrated. It's just a bad open world Ubisoft style clone, but worse. And with horrendous graphics and frame rate on top of dumb Japanese controls and no plot. Returned my Switch.
yea the graphics and performance are bad. the combat is garbage. it was ok for 2017 but combat has improved so much in gaming this is just garbage now.
How the hell is it garbage? You lack both experience and imagination. This game has a great storyline, fantastic gameplay mechanics, and it’s already a system seller! 10 million copies worldwide in just three days!
@@TonyKanameKuran I said the combat is garbage. not the game. who cares what it sold. GTAV 5 sold 180 million copies and the combat is garbage in that game as well. i was pointing out what i think the problems are with the game
@Falcon2 sales don't indicate shit. GTAV had shit combat and performance on 360/p3 yet. it sold gang busters. same for pokemon on switch was pure hot garbage.animal crossing another garbage game that sold a shit ton, red dead 2 amazing open world but gameplay was crap. please don't bring up sales when talking about a games quality. i think zelda botw was a great game but it has problems. i guess you gonna tell me wii sports is the best game ever cause of sales.
This is this what modern gamers want. A 100 hour adventure. A free open world. Use every control on the controller. 100percent exploration. And now your complaining. Lol. Give me a link to the past and I am happy. You people need to get a life.
I totally feel like I could play this game for years and still not even finish it. Even more than in botw! But for me, that's part of the fun because I have a lot of free time.
Very good thoughts!! I feel the same way at times!
Your snowball analogy is spot on.
I probably don’t have enough free time in my life (botw took me 4 years to complete) but it certainly feels like after many hours I find myself getting much more comfortable in the world.
I don’t mind at all how the game looks or runs.
I’ll take my many many small victories along the way, and I’ll see you in a few years 😆
The game runs great when compared to a lot of AAA games that are releasing on much more powerful hardware
Well Vic, you said “play forever”, and here’s your chance to do just that.
As always…nice work…so far… 🕹️
Great impressions! I have the same likes/dislikes, though the performance issues haven’t really taken me out of the experience. My main dislike is how overwhelmed I feel, but I have to remind myself that I’m not trying to just burn through the game and I should just enjoy the experience.
I’m finding that sometimes too. Overwhelmed. It brings truth to the saying that less is more.
Having said that, the game is amazing. I’m thoroughly enjoying it.
The only place I dropped frames was satori mountain.
Great stuff, great summary. I am only about 10 hours in, 4 hearts, 6 shrines, so much to do.
Best reviewer on the platform. Found you when you reviewed Days Gone, big fan ever since. I love that game to death and I am also a huge fan of Sam Witwer. 8 bit terror is doing podcasts with the actors and developers if you're interested. For me it's endlessly fascinating as the game lives rent free in my mind. You're wonderful at your job mister, critical and considerate of the hard work and time that goes into making these games. I hope you're having a wonderful day.
Great video Vic! I’m really not clicking with TOTK, I keep playing hoping for the highs of BOTW but so far nothing has filled me with awe like in 2017. Every other bit of content about this game is near universal praise so it was nice to hear someone else express some things that maybe aren’t perfect
It is nice to see you actually give both sides of how the game is instead of praising every little thing that majority of the reviewers have been doing. Thanks VIC!
My mom asked if i wanted to watch a movie last night, ha ha, its gonna be a few weeks/months till I interact with people.
I loved BOTW, so I was a little surprised I wasn't excited at all about TOTK. I tried to change my opinion about this game by watching videos, listening to podcasts, etc. Heck, I even bought the game last week. But it didn't click from the beginning. Mind you, I only played a few hours. But, TOTK feels tedious, overwhelming, and the physics based puzzles seemed more like work than being relaxing. I sold the game yesterday and feel a sense of relief. Still, I'm happy it'll go down as one of the best Zelda games of all time and people are over the moon about it. I guess I loved this kind of game formula once and that was enough.
If you'll allow me to be a grumpy 31 year old Gamer - this LoZ: Jazz formula is really just not clicking with me. If anything BotW & TotK have given me a new appreciation for more Formula Based and Linear Games especially from this Franchise.
I'm happy other people are having a blast with it, but the amount of freedom & creativity to get the full experience is too much for me;
to borrow an analogy from a few different TH-camrs this is too much of a Bucket of Legos type of game and I need a Lego Playset with more Structure & Directions experience.
Although after I wrote off Wind Waker back in the day and then later found it to be my favorite, I'm always happy to come back to any variation of Hyrule and try whatever Nintendo decides to throw in these great games. Ashamed to admit I've missed most the handheld adventures but I'm gradually trying to pick them up as they become easier to access.
Thanks for the Candid thoughts Vic, look forward to your final feelings after the dust has settled.
The breakable thing is understandable in the sense of pure freedom to create, but I wish they gave us an option to say, save up to 2-3 weapons from breaking, or having to charge like the master sword after you beat the game. I know everyone would just save OP weapons, but after they break you just make it again anyways so it just saves time for the most part.
As much as I played BOTW and this game I STILL have trouble with the controls. I'm glad I'm not the only one 😂
@Falcon2 True. For me I wish Y was run with B being jump and X being attack. That would help me out a lot lol
@Falcon2 Yeah. I would just prefer my run and jump buttons to be close together so I can run and jump gaps. But in TOTK they are directly opposite of eachother on the game pad lol. I fall a lot because of it lol
Annoyances I have with the game:
Puzzle design. You're given subtle clues anout what to do in any situaton, bit occasionally, i cannot figure something out without looking it up. Like the goat quest where the game implies you should follow the wind but doing so takes you in the wrong firection. Or when you're doing the light pillars but visibility is so bad you cant see the crank.
I cant fuse from my inventory. Why do i have to drop something to fuse it? I have a material select screen, so why isnt there a 'fuse to weapon' option there?
Shrines glow the same cor before and after completion. Going from orange to blue on botw meant you instsntly knew if youd done it. Now you need a batter look.
The problem with traversal in the game is that it isn’t fun. There’s so much more garbage in your way between point a and b in the first game that it’s maddening.
I pretty much agree with everything you said, especially the part about the breakable weapons!!! Just like you said, I never really had a problem with it in BOTW but it feels soooooo much more annoying in totk. I also agree about the confusing controls, I'm constantly getting annoyed pressing the wrong buttons!
I find it odd that weapon durability is more of an issue now, considering that fuse mechanically fixes the issues with weapon durability in BotW
This was all so well said I’m not deep in Totk yet but this is how I felt about botw. So overwhelming and lonely but still fun. It took me years to bear breath of the wild
Thats interesting because mechanically, fuse fixes the weapon durability problem.
In breath of the wild, if you're fully stocked up on good weapons, getting into a fight is just going down, unless you're fighting an enemy with a weapon just as powerful and rare as one you have, which isnt common at the end of the game, making combat no longer rewarding.
Fuse makes it so the weapon is no longer the valuable part, its the fuse material. Sure, fusing my 32 damage silver horn is a little better on a 7 damage royal halberd than a 2 damage stick, but it's not a huge difference.
By making the valuable part be the fude materials you can carry an endless amount of, you fis the combat resource equation.
The flying is incredible in this game
You don't have to put stuff in your hands any more. Just hold up and drop it from there or hold throw and press up.
Are you going to stream some more gameplay, Vic?
Pretty spot on. I think the only way the controls could be implemented properly would be with a keyboard. They're fine and it doesn't ruin the game but like you said, they're clunky. I'm 20 hrs in also and I do all the same things you mentioned still.
I think the game is fantastic so far. It feels like climbing has been made easier. There were moments in botw where I couldn't get anywhere until my stamina was way higher. It seems like they've given more stop points to regain stamina in this one. I've done maybe 24 shrines and haven't felt the need to upgrade my stamina at all yet.
My only minor complaint is that I don't feel like I've stumbled onto anything "special". In botw you could walk around and just find something that didn't feel part of the game, the best example would be those two lakes, one was heart shaped, the other, broken heart shaped. It was just a cool random story that had nothing to do with anything. I've definitely found hidden things in this one but doesn't feel the same. It's probably because botw was first and it was a new thing. There's still lots to find in this so I'm sure there will be stuff like that.
When it comes down to it botw and totk might as well be viewed as one massive game because they transition so well together.
Nice tip for anyone with a newer tv. Turn off game mode and then turn on a setting like tru motion to smooth or max and the game will look and feel like it went from 30fps to 60fps it’s absolutely game changing
Great work as always Vic!
I feel you in the scale of the world. Being a dad, its tough to get to play the game. You just don't have time to allocate 5 hours at a time time play. It worked for me when BOTW when my kids were babies and I can play while putting them to sleep, but now that they're older. Nope. This needs a FWD button to get from one place to the other. The horse isnt fast enough.
Make a hovercraft. You can cross regions in a couple minutes.
I’m also about 20 hours in and it’s shaping up to be the best game I’ve every played. I think it runs fine considering it’s on a portable system that only has 10% of the processing power that Redfall has available on Series X.
I do wish that for the controls, I could manipulate the Zonai abilities with the Left Thumb stick instead of the right thumb stick...
The camera for Ultrahand is ass. It doesn't always focus on the thing I'm moving, forcing me to work blind.
Great review Vic. Nice comparison to Ocarina and Majora, spot on. I also feel the loneliness, on both BOTW, and this TOTK. #PlayForever
I went into it knowing I will be playing this for years
I love TOTK. I think the graphics look amazing, but the whole time I'm thinking how much better it would like with 4k visuals. It would be even more breathtaking.
Hey Vic! I'm not very far in, but I love totk so far. The new abilities are very interesting especially the Ultrahand. Not a big fan of fragile weapons again this time, but at least there are plenty around to pick up. Looking forward to hearing more of your thoughts after you've completed the game. Enjoy!
This game gives me the feelies!😊
it is realy strange that you are feeling that in the second game about breakable weapons and the lonely feeling. in breath of the wild, it was super lonely and the breakable weapons was super annoying. in tears of the kingdom, i dont feel so lonely, there are more stuff to do and more people in the world and more quests. and i can always fuse new weapons so they have more durability. the weapons in tears dont breake that often. not like in breath of the wild. in tears, i have 5 10-15 damage weapons now and no one have broken yet. if i have a stick and fuse it to a rock, it holds a couple hits. but if i have a sword and fuse it to a rock it holds 30 hits, even more i think. it depends what you are hitting on.
Congratulations on 69k subs
Played roughly 15 hours now, its a great game but it feels like a botw 1.5 - nothing wrong with that. But I kind of enjoyd the jump from windwaker to twilight princess or skyward sword to botw etc. but hey, they had a story to tell and - we will see how it ends.
I dont’ mind the weapons breaking but when it comes to bows breaking mid battle, lets just say I get a bit miffed 😂
I do wonder if after Breath of the Wild was a hit the dev team groaned at making a new game with the engine, design and code base they'd built.
It could be that it was a nightmare to work with to keep everything working and the performance under control.
And they had to make the game bigger this time.
And with this new game being a hit, I can see even with more powerful hardware, they will struggle again with performance holding them back in the next game. As they'll be told to keep the style similar and will no doubt re-use the code base again.
Who knows?
As for my expereience so far, I've found the performance to be annoying only on the ground level from the previous game. It runs well elsewhere except for a few odd moments.
And I find the companions annoying at times getting in the way. And certain places not letting me drop items despite there being space for them. It can be tedious searching through all the materials, so a way to hot key a material would be great.
The majority of the puzzles I've done have been incredible and the story is certainly far better.
And one dungeon/main quest was such a major step down compared to another one, it's crazy but maybe that's part of them being held back by the performance issues. Needing to limite what they do.
Also, it's notable that all these issues with the game lagging were present in Breath of the Wild. Anyway, I'll stop rambling on.
My one wish would be a better tracking system to see what I have completed in an area. Maybe they can show a percentage per area of the map at the minimum.
So much to see and do I forget if I explored a cave for example that I found.
The map shows completed caves and such, though.
The speed runs on this game are going to be wild
I can't understand why anyone would want to speedrun this. That's like rushing through a threesome as fast as you can. Why?
Already are.
I agree that it does _momentarily_ break the sense of immersion when you climb a surface and realize how the textures are probably not even to current mobile game standards. But the gameplay has not yet failed to win me over again and again.
My biggest dislike is the timing, but it's really unique to me. I started Persona 5 Royal in December (first ever Persona experience). I assumed that five months was plenty of time to get through P5R and then I could focus on TOTK. I now find myself caught between two massive games that I can't let sit idle because I want to keep going in both. I kind of wish TOTK was a fall release because I don't want to fall too far behind everyone else, so I am giving it my focus for a few more days but then I will need to alternate. It's not really a critique, but it's not ideal for me.
@Falcon2 No, it often looks great. I am judging it on its own art style choices. So whereas you can stand at a high vantage point and see beautiful vistas, when you get close enough to certain surfaces it's a blurry mess, e.g. climbing a mountainside.
@Falcon2 I saw your question and wondered to myself, "I bet I could find an example in the upload that we're commenting on." In other words, not on my TV. So at 7:50-7:51, Vic pans the camera above Link on the top of a mountain. Not only is it blurry from a third person view, but it is FAR worse when you first approach these surfaces to climb them. Characters and objects mostly look great.
@Falcon2 "Again, this art style isn't supposed to be photo-realistic."
That's called a strawman argument. So let me spell out where your logic fails. Whether viewed natively or compressed, the entire picture is subject to the same display. (I'm not trying to speak down to you, but you've forced me to make this clear.) So to refute the straw man: I am NOT suggesting that these textures are to be judged against photorealistic textures displayed on current titles for PC, PS5, or Xbox consoles. (I've only ever seen anything I would call photorealistic in tech demos though.)
What I AM saying is that, the same display has more detail in other similar surfaces than it does on the example I shared. I am judging the textures I am critiquing against other textures _in the same game and on the same display at the same time_. I am convinced that you have better displays and far worse vision than I do. But even though you might have superior screens, the idea that mine can display some surfaces well but not others is indicative of a poor ability to reason through your own statement.
Oddly, you seem to agree. You say, "Can you see every minute scrape and crevice on the stone mountain walls, etc. No, of course not. Again, this art style isn't supposed to be photo-realistic." But I don't accept your underlying assumption that "not photo-realistic" is the same thing as "not detailed." The statues of Hylia that give you heart containers and stamina vessels have an element of "roughness" to them. Rocky surfaces would normally be varied in that some surfaces would be smooth and others less so. We don't get that here, even though it's clear that some things are given more attention. The water effects look above "cell shade" quality and the "short grass" on the sections I have identified are just painted on, not material objects. Can't help you if you don't understand those concepts.
@Falcon2 Yeah see most other players seem too harsh on the graphics. You seem too positive. Rocky surfaces in low areas and caves look great on my TV. I guess the problem is with my Switch, huh?
@Falcon2 I'm trolling as much as you're simping. My sense is we're both being pretty genuine. Again, I showed you an example from the upload. You made the bogus claim that we can't judge based on that, but it renders Link and the UI with so much more detail than the ground surface. If the compression is compromising fidelity, it should do so for the entire image. Your argument is bogus. You do realize you always had the option just roll your eyes and not engage me at all, right?
We probably are having the same experience from a technical standpoint. You seem to lack the social awareness to recognize hyperbole. So let me be utterly literal in what will also be my last post: I am not experiencing literal blurring effects in the way the textures display. I am saying _some_ of them are so less detailed than others that up close they look subpar, _even_ when compared with other objects in the game.
Fair. Hopefully Nintendo is less nervous about their next console. They should have customized the chip, but they were so concerned about battery life. I don't really think that matters in a world with so many portable chargers.
Leave everything to Nintendo and NVIDIA.
Completely agree with a lot of your points. The most was the fact that it just doesn’t look / perform great.
Switch hardware needs a big bump to clean all this up.
I only ever dropped frames on Satori mountain. Did you get the 1.1 patch that improves performance?
Man I am so glad the controls took time to master for you because I thought it was just me. lol All your examples rang true for me too. I just finished Horizon: Forbidden West so I kept messing up here because the button layout is completely reversed.
Playing the Xenoblade and Horizon series prepared me for the scale.
The amount of weapons I've accidently thrown away 😆
Nintendo used to be state of the art.. would love to see Mario and Link in a UE5 level engine
when was it ever state of the art? snes?
Absoloutely adore BOTW, TOTK so far for me (Ive just reached Purah) has been a chore. I dont like crafting and the difficulty feels like its been scaled up 2 settings, still its a Zelda game and that means its better than 99% of the other stuff in the market.
... Wouldn't it be cool if Metroid Prime 4 was a flagship launch title for a new system?
Ala Z:TP & BotW for GC-Wii & WiiU-Switch.
Yeah something about this game doesn’t completely click with me. I still think it’s great for the most part. Building stuff, fusing weapons, ascending all seem pretty good and functional, but at the same time, I feel like I’m going back to 2017 instead of playing a game in 2023
I was gonna say the same, I kind of gives me the vibes of replaying a better BOTW but still BOTW.
Exactly. It’s not BOTW 1.5 but it certainly can feel that way sometimes. But I’m also not that far into the game
Im assuming beating the full game of BOTW is integral to starting this game?
excelente la review, dood. no need for no final score either. fuq dat. 😁excellent review.
I understand how important these zelda games are as an art form. they have inspired other amazing games. respect to these two open world Zelda games. rispek indeed
I played a lil bit of breath of the wild at the beginning of this year for the first time, and I can say that:
Majora's Mask, The wind waker HD and Twilight princess are still my own personal favourites Zelda games.
just like the triforce and shit. the 3 pieces are equally important. none is better than the other.
and just like Skyward sword, I ain't never touching Tears of the kingdom. I can already tell they are not for me.
I'm glad they exist tho. they are indeed a source of inspiration for other artists.
let more Zelda games be made 🤓
Liking the game so far but having trouble always hitting the wrong buttons and for me it just fills like breath of the wild and man the performance can run in the low 20’s
Did you get the 1.1 performance patch?
I smell a review coming up later this week...
You have the face of an angel, so beautiful ❤
I cant get into Breath Of The Wild. I like Zelda. I admire the game. But I feel disconnected from it. The sequel doesnt excite me much, sadly.
I still don't understand the people who like the breakable weapons. I think it's annoying AF.
I've heard it would be neat if there was an option to repair damaged or broken weapons... maybe in the next game
You can add things onto your weapon to extend it now. as well as the fact the game forces you to use game knowledge and use weapons with logic, the game is a survival/exploration RPG if you thought totk would change that. it is def an acquired but I enjoy it.
Agreed
Does "THE" sword still break?
That sucked with the last game even if it regenerated. Like, C'MON!
Except in games like S&S Ch 1 & 2 where it makes sense due to the survival horror experience
The building of things in the game looks awesome. Can see many other future games copying this.
The controls are the same as Breath of the Wild, though.
Zonai weapons last a lot longer
it sounds like this has a bit in common with Death Stranding, in terms of the loneliness that the game portrayed.
Glad to see a balanced review, I am going to jump in and see how I like it, but my guess is it will be a 40 hour play for me and then sell it and my Switch OLED as I have played it out. it served me well but after this, there is nothing really on the horizon for it.
It maybe $70, but if you buy the disc version, but you can re-sell it for $55 to $59 and the game literally costs you $11 to try. With Nintendo never lowering game prices, the re-sell is always great.
The cost to play is literally pennies.
I feel like you still have a lot to learn about the game cuz a lot of your complaints arent really valid once you get further.
How on earth you ended up climbing mountains in this game ffs? Play the depths, upgrade your batteries. This is not botw. It's not meant to be played the same way... The depths replace the surface when it comes to lonely exploration and the surface is a cake walk.
fly you fool:P
Makes skyrim look like a snowglobe.
I'm definitely not having as much fun this time around! Only about 6 hours in mind you, is it me or od the weapons break much easier this time around? And that damn horse 😡
got to fuse your weapons, they last longer
@@Theendingman I do man but they still dont last the craic
Graphics and frame rate look horrendous. Switch Pro should have come two years ago
How on earth were you able to play for 7 hrs straight and then another 20 hours on mothers day weekend?! Please teach me your secret!
it's his job?
yeah the things you dont love about this game sound more like you problems as well as nitpicks. kinda makes it sound like youre looking for a reason to not like the game. also you cant compare something like horizon to a stylized game like zelda, thats just bad comparisons.
Watch his final review.
BOTW is your favorite video game of all time? You must not have had friends when Goldeneye came out. 😋
I don’t like games that have weapons that break down.
I don't mind them but there has to be proper counter measures in place. The ability to create crafting kits or visiting a blacksmith for repairs would be fine.
I like how the next recommended video was your review of Forbidden West. Really shows how bad TOTK looks. TOTK runs sup-1080p with sub 30fps. My eyes hurt trying to play this. I mean I still enjoy it, but its sad to look at. This shoulda been a Switch2 launch title.
Actually it runs at 900p and a solid 30fps. Secondly, it’s powered by AMD FidelityFX Super Resolution.
@Falcon-um7vo Ha ha ha ha ha!
Imagine if Nintendo made these games run on a PC...
Not happening. They’re not Microsoft!
Is this video a joke? I am not being facetious. Every single complaint you have is there and sometimes even more pronounced in BOTW. EVERY. SINGLE. ONE.
BOTW was a good game that was seriously held back by various smaller problems. That is expected when you are the first one to try something. Plenty of games have improved on this formula since. TOTK listened to their audience, and while they didn't fix all of the problems, or didn't go far enough, they did make a lot of improvements. It is a far superior game to it's original and the fact that you call BOTW your favorite game of all time, and yet complain about the same problems it had in the sequel says a lot about the quality of your understanding, and that is surprising since you have done this for over 20 years.
I think I might be the only person who can't stand Zelda? The first one when the switch came out drove me nuts. It's just collecting dust.
Same. Did BOTW until I beat first two beasts, got very very bored. I loved the exploration, but once I realised the 4 beasts were the same sorta pattern...then what? Do a billion shrines to get hearts, cook some rubbish to survive, just didn't do it for me. And I loved all the Zelda's before. Getting a new weapon quickly feels dull when you know it lasts 6 hits, in a stupid shrine I went through 6/7 of my best weapons to knock a janky ball that wouldn't go straight...lost the love. Plus soundtrack is rubbish.
Nah I hate it. So overrated. It's just a bad open world Ubisoft style clone, but worse. And with horrendous graphics and frame rate on top of dumb Japanese controls and no plot. Returned my Switch.
@@ChrisJohannsen this couldn't be more different than a ubisoft game lol. Wtf..
its not that good of a game, bros.
yea the graphics and performance are bad. the combat is garbage. it was ok for 2017 but combat has improved so much in gaming this is just garbage now.
How the hell is it garbage? You lack both experience and imagination. This game has a great storyline, fantastic gameplay mechanics, and it’s already a system seller! 10 million copies worldwide in just three days!
@@TonyKanameKuran I said the combat is garbage. not the game. who cares what it sold. GTAV 5 sold 180 million copies and the combat is garbage in that game as well. i was pointing out what i think the problems are with the game
@@issacdragon3834 Third parties doesn’t count, Isaac Drag Queen!
@@TonyKanameKuran GTAV is still the most popular open world by far but who cares. not sure what sales have to do with discussing a game problems.
@Falcon2 sales don't indicate shit. GTAV had shit combat and performance on 360/p3 yet. it sold gang busters. same for pokemon on switch was pure hot garbage.animal crossing another garbage game that sold a shit ton, red dead 2 amazing open world but gameplay was crap. please don't bring up sales when talking about a games quality. i think zelda botw was a great game but it has problems. i guess you gonna tell me wii sports is the best game ever cause of sales.
ff16 is killing Nintendo games sadly
what? it's not even out how could it be killing multiple games? dope
This is this what modern gamers want. A 100 hour adventure. A free open world. Use every control on the controller. 100percent exploration. And now your complaining. Lol. Give me a link to the past and I am happy. You people need to get a life.
I totally feel like I could play this game for years and still not even finish it. Even more than in botw! But for me, that's part of the fun because I have a lot of free time.
destructible weapons suck
Youre too old for this game sir.
U never out grow video games my friend