TOTK Burnout & the State of Zeldatube - A Discussion with Zeldatubers
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 16 พ.ย. 2023
- The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom released 6 months ago to near universal acclaim, but now here we are 6 months later and many of the most prominent Zelda TH-cam Creators have expressed dissatisfaction and burnout in relation to making TOTK focused content. Many even saying that Tears of the Kingdom was an outright disappointment.
What has changed? Why has this shift come about so suddenly?
I'm joined by a handful of amazing creators to discuss the state of Zeltube.
Thank you to the following creators for participating here:
@HyruleGamer,
@NayruYT,
@RMFHGaming,
@TheBreadPirate,
@TheGeekApprentice,
& @TriforceTrends
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Videos mentioned here:
Bandit’s update video: • The Zelda Rant
KingK’s TOTK review: • How Tears of the Kingd...
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#tearsofthekingdom #TOTK #zelda - เกม
Take a drink every time I say "There's something to be said for..."
(Don't actually, please. You won't make it to the end of the video)
Thanks for watching everyone! Hope you enjoyed these insights and thoughts about the state of the Zelda-TH-cam-Creator space. Let me know your thoughts below, and make sure to check the description so you can hop on over to these other channels!
@@DanielMazahrehthe video was positive on TotK overall idk what you were watching
I don’t recall ever mentioning Mario Odyssey or a potential sequel in this video, so I’m confused at your point?
@@TriforceTrends 20 minutes into this video, its impressive how positive the video is with how much negative there is to talk about 💀
People maybe watching the negative videos to see each others opinion about the topic of the video. And then they might relate.
Can only speak for myself but I fell off the Zelda content train because after Tears it just felt pointless. That game, as good as it mechanically is, felt like a slap on the face to people who care about the timeline and the lore. Like vindication for everyone who said the timeline doesn't matter and/or isn't real. If Nintendo dgaf, why should I?
exactly, nintendo just said screw having a good logical story, lets just distract these gamers with some janky game-gimmick that they can make little youtube-memes with, and take these millions all the way to the bank.
@thedarknate172 That's...not what the top comment said. Infact, it specifically said the game was mechanically good...
@@Aktedya1-jt7vw I really don't care lol. , I agree with the main point of the game's story being pointless. thats the focus; ultrahand is "whatever" to me; ultrahand has good to it, but it undeniably has jank to it too, so it's whatever tbh
The timeline doesn't really matter. Only the fans have sensationalized the whole timeline thing and Nintendo just played along to humor you guys. The franchise never has or never will be made with a timeline in mind. Most games serve as soft reboots and tell their own stories while keeping the overall lore mostly consistent unless they want to try new things. You guys are only just now getting mad about something you should have been mad about since Ocarina of Time.
@mr.awesome6011 nah, many of the previous games referenced each other directly. Characters from Ocarina of Time appeared on stained glass in The Wind Waker, to name just one example. Nintendo not showing any care at all about the series continuity and lore only became an issue with more recent games. Hence, our current reaction.
I think you guys are being way to generous regarding the shieka tech disappearing with no explanation. People are right to be pissed off at that “they just disappeared and everyone in hyrule watched it” quote because it is not a satisfying or even interesting mystery. Why doesn’t Purah, Robbie, Impa, or heck even Josha have a throw away line like “I haven’t been this confused since the shieka tech began to disappear” or something in one of their journals even mentioning it. The fact that the director stated the mystery months after the game came out is unacceptable to me because if they wanted US to care about the mystery they need to make the characters in game care about it. And since there is not a SINGLE mention or illusion to them disappearing by any character it just comes off as feeling like the creators didn’t care enough and just wanted to move on to a new ancient tribe with new tech. I don’t think people necessarily wanted every answer spelled out in the game, at least I didn’t. What I wanted was the same level of intrigue that BOTW gave me, and it felt like that intrigue was lost in TOTK after the first 20-30 hours. The “mysteries” feel empty and not worth theorizing about this time which is an insane fumble.
So true! And everybody seems to ignore that the developers didn't give af.
Well duh, these guys are “nice guys,” they have feeling to consider- forget about honesty.
also, the explanation just objectively wrong. so all the sheikah tech just disappeared, right? what about the tech that was very clearly reused for the purah pad or the towers? what about the fact that we see a guardian in the game? is that guardian just special for no particular reason?
it’s such a cop out answer, i wouldn’t be surprised if they just made up answer on the spot for the interview
The mystery is gone for me because Zelda was able to go back in time. Like it diminished the history.
@@gabvsd5934 Zelda should have gone to the past pregnant where she would have delivered a baby Zelda. Turned into the dragon, and finally the end-game miracle was to bring forth the baby girl through time beginning Links real journey as a father.
For a game that's all about exploration, the fact that the sky is lacking + the depth is dark and boring + the surface is pretty much botw really hurt its longevity. And no dlc is the nail on the coffin
There is dlc…, err, I mean it is dlc.
I agree and disagree. No Zelda game has unlimited longevity gameplay-wise, unless we're talking about speedrunning. Yeah, the sky and depths aren't as robust as I wanted, but I've gotten many more hours of enjoyment from those additions than I had with the base package of BOTW. And I've spent hundreds of hours in BOTW, but there came a point where I'd reached the end of all there was to see. The running-out-of-steam phase happens in every Zelda game, but that process has been at its slowest in TOTK.
like botw (imo) was a masterclass in environmental storytelling. you see all the different ruins, even from different periods of time (ex. the forgotten temple/lanayru promenade are from a much more distant past than say, the mabe village ruins) and you can envision how they came to be destroyed, maybe even what was going through villagers' heads as their demise came to meet them, etc. everything in the environment felt so meticulously crafted and cared for, and totk just erases that - copy and paste sky islands and a copy and paste depths, neither with really any aesthetic variation, characters, or anything. it's honestly a shame.
@@c.nk.01 Imagine if they put Skyloft ruins in the sky. Or ruins of the City in the Sky. Or imagine even if they weren't ruins but were still flourishing. Or what if the Depths had references to Subrosia. BOTW was packed with references, especially to Skyward Sword, but TOTK did not add a single thing like that. Any references in the game are only in the game because they were in BOTW and carried over. It bothers me and feels like they didn't really care.
I think the problem with TotK is that its lore is sooooo hidden that people just scratch their head and can’t conclude anything about it. There is nothing to say about the Zonai. We know practically nothing about them aside they came from the heavens and Rauru and Mineru are the last ones alive.
The Zelda series has never been big on lore so I think people expecting there to be deep knowledge about the Zonai are looking in the wrong place. I just think about how we only got the information about the Twili, the most interesting race in any Zelda game, that we needed for the story of Twilight Princess. That’s just how Nintendo has done it with Zelda.
There's quite a bit of archeology work that can be done around the Zonai (I'd know because I did do it). I definitely would have preferred if there was a town full of them hidden somewhere, where we could talk to them and learn about their culture, but what can you do.
@@Beamo1080We still knew they were magic users who got turned into fantasy Australia. They still had enough lore to understand they were prisoners but learned to love their new life. And you could see their roots in the fact they praise artificially created suns in their world of half light. We didn't get a full fairy tale, but they also see a wolf as the sign of a savior and hero.
There wasn't much but there was some. And it was done more coherently than the very zen sand garden Zonai who then also have all these types of magic constructions that really doesn't make any sense with the hand powers.
@@Beamo1080 There might not be mountains of lore for other races etc, but at least there is enough lore to make them seem like a last-minute addition, whom we know little to nothing about.
With the Twili, we learnt that they were a race of magic weilders who wanted to rule the sacred realm to claim the triforce, so the light spirits banished them to the twilight realm so their magic couldn't hurt anyone.
What do we know about the zonai? Godlike goat people who, at some undisclosed time, founded hyrule. Yeah that's interesting, i'll admit, but we never *see* any of that in-game; all we see is the last 2 zonai, and very little of this version of hyrule.
Why couldn't we have gotten more info into the lore of the depths? More on places like lost Gordonia? How did the upheaval actually reveal all of the sky islands? What actually happened in the imprisoning war, other than what we were told FOUR TIMES throughout that game- that being, the sages fought Ganon underground, and Rauru sealed him there. How did they get underground? What happened to the rest of Ganon's army? The Zonai never really seemed like all powerful, god-like beings because we only ever see 2 of them. Nintendo could definitely have fleshed out the lore of the zonai more, we know they can, because they did with the Twili. Especially seeing as they're such an integral part of the story, you'd think Nintendo would spend more time portraying to us, the viewer, who they actually are, instead of just teasing them for months, only to leave us with a smidge of information on them.
Thank you for coming to my TedTalk
I think it's the opposite. The lore is in your face, you TALK with both Zonai mentioned, and at that point they become as mysterious as the Gorons, but even less so since not only do we talk to the Zonai, we explore every single one of their ruins, fight with their robots, and talk with their robots. We wear their clothes, we use their weapons, we even use their magic. The Zonai are so insanely well covered that they become mundane. If we wanna talk about a mysterious people we genuinely know nothing about, how about the Oocca? There's some CRAZY lore in that sky city and we don't know anything beyond what we get in Twilight Princess and it's awesome. I love not knowing how an advanced civilization built a flying city, and only having fragments to go off of. I love finding out about magics that I could not even possibly comprehend. Zonai? Shiekah? We've pretty much talked over tea while they trauma dumped on me for upwards of 40 hours. The Zonai and Shiekah were both old news 2 hours into the game, and ganon is not even worth considering as news.
This game was destined to disappoint many people from the moment Aonuma confirmed they were reusing the map more than 6 years ago. Sure, we argued about how things could be changed to make it fresh, and yeah, things have been changed - but in a sequel to a game centered around exploration, the bulk of the meaningful content being in the same environments and vistas is a fatal blow to that drive to explore, especially if you've already done all that in BotW. It feels like they spent too much time on mechanics that would've been better suited for a completely fresh map. Ultrahand could've been so much more impactful if there were more unique sky islands/depths biomes to traverse with your vehicles.
And because they tend not to bring mechanics forward except for broad mechanics like horses and items. We may not see anything ultra hand related ever again 😕
The issue with the game isn't the map, it's the lack of a quality story, dungeons, and a disconnect from Zelda lore compared to BOTW which left things more ambiguous
Seeing how Hyrule and its citizens changed in the meantime is quite exciting, though. Like, not being able to go the usual path and get confused.
For me personally, I play mainly Zelda for the dungeons and progression. BOTW was a disappointment for me in that regard, and to me, felt like something anti-Zelda with a Zelda coat of paint.
To me, TOTK was a chance to redeem it, to make it "Zelda" again. But it just doubled down on the things I disliked, which really caused me massive amounts of disappointment. Combined with the fact that, to me, it feels like it goes out of its way to contradict previous Zelda games lorewise, and can't even play nice with its direct prequel, really just felt bad. It felt like a game made specifically to spite me, even though I know it wasn't.
Zelda seems to be moving away from what I want, and that's really sad for me. If the next Zelda doesn't bring back enough "Zelda" charm that I like, I'll probably abandon the series entirely. But thay doesn't mean the new games are bad. Just that they aren't for me.
Exactly. But it’s definitely time to put down Zelda for good. Botw brought in a bunch of new players that think this is it. They love it. My mom raised me on Zelda and she hates totk, to put it bluntly and so do I.
As die hard Zelda fan I was surprised to like Elden Ring much more than latest Zelda. I gave Totk a chance and it felt even worst than Botw. So it’s dead Jim, time to move on.
@@ceel4223 I grew up on the original Zelda, and I think BOTW/TOTK are the closest thing to oldschool Zelda we've had in 20 years.
@@TheRealNintendoKid Delusional bs. If you want to go oh "its open world again" news flash the original was not open world. It was also quite directionless and void of content.
Have you played Zelda 1?? To say it is not open world is like saying that grass is not green or that Mario doesn’t jump lmao
Me: *Has clear concise thoughts
Also me: *Rambles endlessly :O
Thanks for having me on! It was awesome to chat with all of you!
SAME!
Why can't we say the things we want to say. 😭
Cause I need a script I've edited at least 3x to do that! XD @@TheBreadPirate
I love you❤
"Zelda's greatest puzzle is its story."
That's a bar!!!!
My bar is long and hard 😩
no cap tap
Thank ya for having me on capt! Definitely a topic I’m really passionate about in the current climate, hope people enjoy watching… or listening I should say haha!
Strongly suggested for future videos like this: I really wish that there was a caption on screen saying the name of whoever was talking at a given time. Would have made it easier to keep people and their viewpoints straight in my head, and also would have helped me know whose videos to look into more when I agreed a lot with them.
Noted, thanks! I had em pop up with names at the beginning and end, but maybe in the future I’ll do more throughout
Thank you very much for inviting me on Captain! Always a pleasure to chat with yourself and everyone else :D
I also appreciate you hosting this chat as it was a very good place for us to get our thoughts out, bounce off each other and see how we all feel in one big room (well a call xD).
Great discussion, thank you ✨
i honestly feel like as good of a game as it was, 7 years of development time doesnt exactly show itself in the game. they had a game engine that was already 7-8 years old, the graphics are identical outside of minor optimization updates. we got 3 new mechanics in the form of fuse/ultrahand, ascend, and autobuild (which is useless without ultrahand, so its a subsection of ultrahand).
we got caves, but most of them are just copy/pasted throughout the world with different enemies and small changed tunnel endings. the depths was smart by using the mirror image of the ground hyrule map but at the same time there isnt anything really new down there besides the colosseums, froxes, and stal enemies capable of spawning all times of the day because of lack of sunlight. and then, they decided to fill in the depths a bit they'd place generic yiga hideouts and copy/paste mines/refineries throughout. so essentially once you've seen 10 lightroots, 1 refinery, 2-3 mines, a colloseum or two, 3-5 yiga hideouts, all 3 frox varieties, and the endless amounts of mining camps with the same 3-5 enemy varieties there, you've seen the entire structure of the depths' difficulty outside of the boss fights being repeated down there.
the biggest disappointment for me is hands down the sky. it is so barren once you realize its the same copy/pasted island designs, 3 spheres, the 3 sky dive challenge islands, and thunderhelm isle, it lacks suprise nor entertainment outside of the rito dungeon and the gleeok or two around.
its a 8/10 game, but thats only because botw was already a 8/10 game and nintendo managed to make a few things better. outside of ultrahand and ascend, nothing else in the game was that impressive.
BotW is easy 8/10, but Totk is 5/10 for me.
7 years? It's been 6 years. One of these years was entirely spent on polishing the game to work well on the worst piece of hardware on the market and the fact that there was a global pandemic right at the start of development, it caused development to slow down quite a bit.
they didnt have the same game engine. totk and botw have two complete different engines and thats known from datamines. its the same engine as nintendo switch sports and splatoon 3
@@ausgod538 Is that somehow supposed to be better?
@@ausgod538 oh dang, really?
Lovely discussion. I really appreciate all of your perspectives. My only thing I take issue with is the "your expectations were too high" argument. While I do think that does play a role in some people's reactions to TotK, the bulk of their criticisms are not "oh we didn't get enough answers". People didn't think that it was going to be a lore dump with answers, that's taking those gripes the wrong way. There's a conversation to be had about what feels mysterious versus what just feels incomplete or inconsequential. And I think a lot of people feel that TotK represents the latter. The lack of explanations of story or lore can either feel intriguing or negligent. You can argue that the response to that is either in the fault of the developers or the audience's expectations. It's probably somewhere in the middle, but I think asking "why were you expecting this when it wasn't that way in any other game" is not considering the question of what exactly is it about TotK that is not clicking - that was apparently not an issue in other games? Honestly some of the arguments made in the video that "people don't know what they want. they'd only be happy if they got all the answers" is not giving people enough credit - especially the creators who dedicate so much of themselves to the series. To be honest it kinda pissed me off, lol - but no hard feelings from me.
Lore enthusiasts didn't necessarily want complete answers about everything, they were just baffled by the disregard to topics that seem otherwise integral to the games: why would the Sheikah tech be completely abandoned if it was so consequential to the direct predecessor? Why are we getting another Hyrule-Origin story when we just explored that two game installments ago? TotK _is_ way more of a direct sequel than any other Zelda sequel. People's gripes seem to be more about consistency, rather than with not getting answers. It's more about the lack of anything interesting to talk about or connect. TotK exists in its own bubble, and the mysteries it presents upon itself have not encouraged a lot of debate or theorizing. There are definitely vapid criticisms out there but I think it's unfair to give those so much thought above thought-provoking criticism.
For me personally regarding TOTK and BOTW, I live in a state where right now it is getting cold and staying inside is the only thing to do. In the previous years, this time of year is when I would do my inevitable BOTW play through. I 100% like TOTK better as a game, and i know in my heart it is the better game, but the nostalgic feelings of BOTW all come flooding back at this point of the year. I miss the tone of the BOTW, it was much less “man from ancient civilization relies on you to defeat ganondorf,” and much more “explore the woods and climb mountains.” TOTK is a magical experience that I consider to be the best game ever made, and absolutely my favorite game ever, but BOTW’s tone is so nostalgic that I can’t help but find myself yearning for the simpler experience of BOTW.
my thoughts exactly
The way I look at it, despite TotK being a direct sequel in the same world, they're completely different games with completely different goals
I agree 100%. I just feel as if botw is much easier to replay and do everything at your own pace. Totk is fantastic but it’s also like adhd overload and takes 3-5 hours to get going. Then another 1-2 to get the paraglider. Compared to botw where you’re just thrown in the world after an hour. I think Totk is just too overwhelming to restart and that’s what stops me and others from replaying. The idea of having to find all those schematics, zonal charges, shrines, AND koroks is just too much to make wanna start from scratch again. That’s not including the map discovery from the depths and overworld. It’s not necessarily a bad thing. It just makes it something you can’t replay without a huge time dedication.
Botw is a lot easier to stomach and I’ve replayed it 3-4 times. There’s also fun challenges like trial of the sword that aren’t in the sequel.
@@JJGateway01 yea, i think totk could benefit from a new game plus or master mode
I agree with everything except totk being the best game ever made. But glad it is for you.
Botw had lots of mysteries to talk about. Zelda has always had subtle stories with insinuated answers for fans to theorize about. What's the timeline placement? How come there's things from every timeline here? What happened to Ganondorf? Where's the triforce? Who are the zonai? And many many more!
The problem with totk is it doesn't follow up anything that botw (or even zelda as a whole) had set up. The story is extremely self-contained and detached from the rest of the series. And the story itself has a lot of issues that make people call it outright bad
I think the biggest reason why people aren't as engaged in Zelda right now is because of that, the lore. Zelda has never been storu driven, yet what the devs did for us was always more than enough to make it feel bigger than it was. Totk does not
I felt like I've seen everything that totk had to offer dozens of hours before I even went to fight Ganondorf. I started the game with so many questions and got them answered in a non-satisfying way. I knew what happened to Zelda, and that's it. There's nothing more.
Plus, gameplay wise, I already knew the map. I played botw for years after finishing it and still discovered new things. The best thing about that game was exploration, discovering the unknown, it's novelty. Totk burned out on the novelty factor like 50 hours in for me.
I loved playing it at first and I was so freaking excited to see how the map had changed. And it did. It was amazing to rediscover everything. But once you finish the four main regions and some other stuff here and there... You already know everything. Those were the epic morntns, but there were so little of them
I feel the same way
Zelda has been story driven, especially Skyward Sword, Majora’s Mask, Twilight Princess, etc. the problem is that the answer to every “mystery” in ToTK is immediately answered with the Zonai. The Zonai are just behind everything. Botw and ToTK make such a pivotal weapon in not only the series, but an iconic sword in video game history, as this nerfed up glorified stick rather than a powerful sword forged by the first hero and blessed by the goddess.
Everything is just the Zonai. That is, beg my language but, the stupidest, apathetic, most boring and unimaginative answer given. As you said, the devs just pretty much threw away the timeline and lore presented in past games, and just created this whole new Hyrule disregarding all the story they had set up.
I’m content to just consider Botw and ToTK a whole other seperate timeline and universe. It’s just so unsatisfying.
They even re-released Skyward Sword to show how much they didnt care about pre-established lore.
Im only like 9 minutes in but I already really disagree with the first guy's thesis. This isn't a normal game crash for me, I have absorbed many thoughts and critiques on the game and hav looked back at my own experience and really seen how lackluster the game is. I saw this more and more when I started to look back at older Zelda games. We didn't crash from breath of the wild, we talked and played and posted about it for 6 years straight. THEN we got a spinoff game (that no one really mentions in all this) the used the same map and characters. Then this huge sequel ALSO used the same Map and same characters. It didn't recontextualize the characters, honestly most of the NPCs didn't seem to know who link was. The game never felt like it could commit to being a true sequel, since they probably wanted it to appeal to people who never played BOTW. It just wasn't substantial to me at all. The game was certainly bigger, but repetitive and mindless. The disjointed story didn't work the same way it did for the theming of breath of the wild. I could go on. I think the sandbox open air has been great, I think this hurdle and this iteration of Zelda characters have been great. It's honestly taken up a large portion of my life just anticipating and playing these games. But im sick of it all. Not in a normal way that I usually am with video games after a few months, sick in a way that I want Nintendo to listen and make some changes. I think there was something special to the linearity of Zelda and Im really not looking forward to the next Zelda game if its going to just be Tears of the Kingdom 2 with just a new map and more bells and whistles. We have had fun in this huge playground for almost a decade and I just want something with more meaning. I don't care if anyones reading this I just have so many thoughts about Zelda and this feels like the right place to dump them haha. Alright time to finish the video.
People deep in their in their autism can’t see what people with mild autism see- never mind what normal people see.
Nintendo listened and made changes that made TotK worse, but of course hardly anyone will take responsibility for that.
the thing that makes me not like BotW or TotK is that they have extremely clear cut lore. Almost everything is either Shiekah/Zonai or Ganon. These games feel almost entirely self contained to their own mysteries and what sucks about that is that those mysteries aren't that deep. There's no magic, everything is clearly explained tech, and every event that's relevant to the lore gets shown to you in a flashback cutscene. These are MASSIVE worlds, and there is SO MUCH to do in them, but none of what you do has any actual substance. None of what you explore has any mystery deeper than ancient tech or evil ganon magic that you're already well familiar with.
In my opinion, there's not really a whole lot to theorise anymore. Every single mystery from BOTW was answered with either "Zonai magic lmao" or absolutely no new info. There's just not really a whole lot more to be said.
Just kinda felt like they took every thread from BOTW, no matter where it was leading and just tied it to Zonai stuff or just deleted it from existence. It's just rather boring.
I think people are a little too focused on the mysterious from botw and are completely overlooking the ones that this game presents to us 🤷♂️
@@CaptBurgerson Exactly! 💯
@@CaptBurgerson what mysteries?
@@CaptBurgersonAwful take, man
There's a lot of fun to be had in TotK and in ways I prefer it over BotW, but the thing that is exhausting that I don't want to do is upgrade all my armour and do the compendium at all
My ding dong is big long
Part of the problem also is that outside of Ultrahand the game just feels like a very lazy sequel to BotW. Compare this to the outstanding MM coming after OoT. With no time to make sequel, Nintendo made one of the best games in the franchise. They should be held to the high standard that they set decades ago.
No more TotK videos for me.
How did they drop the ball this hard. Whoever makes this documentary will take all the money there is on Totk videos.
Hot take: majoras mask wasn't that great of a game.
@@Matthew10950
MM is the best Zelda. Disagree and I will slap your balls
i'm struggling to play majora's mask, i can understand where you're going to some degree, but there's literally no way you can claim totk is a better sequel than MM, MM just beats totk on every level, despite reusing assets it feels new in its own rights, where in my opinion, totk doesn't even try to feel that new? i dunno, but in any case MM managed to do much more as a sequel. on that note still need to finish it tho lol @@Matthew10950
I think truth is that, TOTK is not as good as BOTW was, some people keep saying the gameplay is better, but that's simply not true at all, BOTW does basically everything better, I see a lot of comments like "well, totk is good, but is not the same feeling of BOTW", and you see people blaming work or nostagia, but I think the truth is that TOTK is a very inferior game, and I think a lazy sequel, that's why people are loosing their interest on the game.
The sages power are terrible, it's by far the worse mechanic of the game, they also are very usuless, like, riju and yonobu just explode some stuff, they do exactly what bombs do, there is nothing special about that, the champions powers not only was more useful, they actually changed how you played the game, they were also a lot easier to use.
The bosses in BOTW actually attack you, in TOTK, they just stand there waiting for you to attack them, the memories were this really cool mechanics in BOTW, where you had to actually explore the map to find it, on TOTK they are essentially mark points on the map, which is pretty dumb, the koroks were this little fun challenge puzzles to keep you distracted on BOTW, on TOTK the are so tedious, you have to stop you progress, to buid something became a Uber for koroks, it's so stupid.
There is also not anything fun or memorable to find on the TOTK map, on BOTW you had a few missions, like the dragon stuck on the mountain, or the terrey town, on TOTK I have more than 100 hours and everything I found was a bunch of NPCs asking for favors, there is nothing actually fun to do on the map outside the main missions.
Anyway, almost everything on TOTK is a worse version of BOTW to be honest, so it's tottaly understadble why is not getting enougth attention.
That may be your truth, but let’s remember to separate the subjective and objective. It is totally okay and valid to have your opinion and your feelings, but when something is a matter of taste, of opinion, we can not say that anything is the objective truth.
I could, subjectively make a counter argument to all of the points you’ve made, but it it won’t change your mind, because that would be my truth, not yours.
@@CaptBurgerson I'm very open minded actually, I like TOTK, so if you wanna share your points that would be great.
I also would add that, basically everything in TOTK involves slowly opening the menu to do something, while BOTW(with the exeption of cooking)was a lot more simple, it's kinda funny, because I remember everyone criticizing Ocarina for the "iron boots switch" thing, and now pretty much every single mechanic in TOTK is just that.
I guess my point, is that TOTK is like a very good exemple of how the hype can blind people, there is a bunch of wrong thing with the game, but now that the game is sort of dying, some people like to find some other explanations for why this is happening, instend of just trying to find the problems with the game.
Furthermore, some "objectively" better things, such as greater enemy variety, do not translate into a less repetitive experience. On the contrary, I actually felt more bored fighting the same guys in TOTK than in BOTW, because now there is more rubbish forcing you to grind (zonaites for example), which exposes you more to boring tasks. TOTK does this all the time, and after 150 hours of playing I'm not only convinced that it's a step back as an experience when compared to BOTW, but also when compared to video games as a whole. This will become increasingly clear over time.
I disagree with every point you've made.
@@chunkymonkey7983 Do you really prefer to run after the sages and click A than just hold one button?
The problem I have with Totk is that there's a lot of pointless things to do. It's big but kinda pointless. The sky islands are mostly empty. The depths are mostly empty. The caves are all mostly the same. The story is pretty shallow and short.
In BotW, when you were exploring there was alot of resources to get, now it's empty.
The memories were nicely hidden while the geoglyphs are huge and in your face.
Also, while the vehicles are fun for a while they completely break the game. Everyone knows how to make the cheap and efficient air scooter and imo, like in Minecraft when you get the elytras, when things get too convenient, you lose interest.
So like they saif, while it's a VERY good game gameplay-wise (except the sages' powers), it's very lackluster in other aspects.
When you're someone like me, who wants to do everything the game has to offer before going for the ending the repetitive and empty aspect of this game burned me out of it.
i think it's a project management problem, i have the feeling that the zelda team tries to make too much, and ends up making too much of not much, i really think consolidating the game, but making it on a smaller scale would be really the way to go to make it feel less empty
i don't like the non-linearity those games offer that said, which is fine, it's different games for different people, so i don't think i'd be convinced by that personally, but i do think that would help a lot of people who struggled with totk
also that might make us wait less than 6 years next time :p
@@nepeta3286 I agree with you, while I love both recent games, I miss the good old recipe. Even though tloz is not really known for its riveting storytelling, I'd love to see a really intricate story for once with solid gameplay. It can, and would have to, be way shorter.
I enjoyed the sage's powers
@@mbii7667 The problem I had with the sages is mostly how inconvenient it is to use them, having to talk to the npc. It is programmed to not get in your way so sometimes, it kinda runs away from you, or if you summon them all, they can be on top of each other and you activate the wrong one. If they had attributed a button to their power it would have changed a lot for my enjoyment. Now the power themselves were mostly good.
I liked Riju's lightning strike.
Yunobo's cannonball was also fun in fights and convenient for mining.
While not as good as Revali's Gale, Tulin's power could be useful but I kept activating it while collecting loot and ended up blowing resources away from me a LOT of times, even sometimes off a sky island. Because you spam the button to collect, you don't have much time to realize you talked to Tulin instead of picking up the loot.
The only one very niche is Sidon's bubble and when you need it, it is useful, I just ended up never really needing it.
So yeah, if they managed to include a quick access, like for the modules and ultra hand powers, I would have had no problem with it.
@@XSaebaYRyoZ yeah I agree it was a pain to activate them during a fight
I think with TOTK... the community asked for answers, and we got answers. Fresh mysteries would have done more to fuel lore discussion. I do honestly feel like there is still so much to talk about and theorize about. Maybe it's a good time to start making videos 😂
@@freakingluigi6626 and adding further, they kind of went crazy with the theory fan service. Everyone on line wanted to learn everything about the Zonai, etc. I think the whole thing was better off as a mystery.
I think looking back at the big theory videos before release, we got exactly what we asked for and the story suffered because of it.
We got 2 answers and it didn’t answer anything.
I asked for a story.
I asked for Link to be part of that story.
Instead I got Link being even less of a character and his silence about Zelda's whereabouts ruined him beyond salvation.
The main answers were "no, we don't care about the timeline at all" and "we barely even care about the story and continuity"
Here's a Zelda theory I thought of. Use it in a video if you like, I don't need credit for the idea.
What if the Secret Stones were each carved from broken pieces of the Triforce of Power? They greatly enhance the power of whomever wields them.
Perhaps the Triforce of power was broken on purpose and carved and distributed. With three volunteers each agreeing to swallow a piece to ensure it could never be reassembled.
Hold up you might be on to something
@@Squimblinkonto fan-fic
I hadn't thought of that! By Jove, I think you've got it!
Such a great video topic! Someone had to bring up the state of the community. Thank you again for having me on dude I really enjoyed talking to you guys ❤ Btw I really enjoyed all of your shots you used.
You guys are awesome
For me, Totk was overwhelming, and I felt like I had to make the effort to play it, especially longer sessions. The Sages were not as good as the Champions, and there was soooo much to explore. I think totk does what botw didnt, but botw is just fun, and maybe more relaxing? I would say Totk is a better game overall, but botw was just more fun for me
Great game? Maybe. Great sequel? Nah, not really. Great Zelda? Absolutely no.
@@ceel4223 Eh...I disagree it was a great sequel and a great zelda.
@@jaydenc367 there is no Zelda without good dungeons
@@jaswanthvardireddy2243 Eh no there is still a lot of good puzzles in it.
@@jaydenc367 compared to the other games, not even close
I think there’s a big difference between abstract lore and a sequel retconning so much and in turn creating so little. The sky and depth don’t feel like places people ever lived, even in an abstract video game way. I don’t watch theories about tears of the kingdom because there’s no mystery to solve
I think content over saturation was a big part of it. Even before the release, there were so many theories and stuff that I decided that I didn’t want to see any of it and experience the game without lots of insane expectations. Just the trailers was enough for me. And I wanted to actually play through the game before I watched other people’s thoughts. It made the videos that I did eventually watch have more meaning to me than they would if I was spamming through content for months at a time.
I haven t played botw but I have played age of calamity.So going into totk was a big leap forward.Experiancing this familiar world in a new way was mind blowing.The new ability s link has in this game make the shieka runs a thing of the ancient past
I stopped caring about Zelda lore when Skyward Sword came out, simply because the Master Sword became a magical item the new goddess left behind and Link went on by catching fire to make the Master Sword, retconning the ancient sages who forged it to combat evil. I knew by then we'd never get a truly in-depth lore focused Zelda game so long as Miyamoto and Aonuma are still attached to the series. TotK proves this point further, I think. It retcons the game that retconned the original lore, and makes it way worse. So now Zelda is a furry descendant, a magical goatman founded Hyrule and not the (then) new oc goddess along with her chosen hero who saved the world and reestablished humanity's hold on the surface, and yet the game that retcons where Fi was introduced keeps using her as a memberberries plot device. Guardians/divine beasts go poof, no one remembers Link, and you could go on and on.
I didn't even bother buying TotK because of the price point. Nintendo gets greedy when they're successful, and TotK was never going to do badly, but it was painfully obvious it was going to be less impactful than BotW. Now I'm glad I didn't get it.
Meanwhile I did just pick up Age of Calamity and it's so much fun, and I'm enjoying the bs time travel stuff a lot too
That's what I've been saying - some people have been very doom and gloom about views dropping, as if the community was dying because everyone is so mad about the lore apparently, but then I went to Zeltik, compared his views now to his views from the news drought and found them to be largely at the same level. Frankly, me personally, my channel is thriving right now, I'm covering nothing but TotK lore and each video is doing better than the last. There definitely is demand, even if moods are sour after interviews.
I want to do some stuff that's a bit more critical of the game as well though because there are some story related criticisms I want to express (and also it's gonna be interesting to test out Nayru's theory!).
As a new creator in the Zelda community as of the last few years, I didn't have much insight, if any, into how these types of aspects affect creators of a new game release, but I resonate with a lot of what was said. I think everyone made great points, and you did an excellent job covering this topic! Thank you for this Capt!😄
Amazing video. I watched the whole thing. It was a good chemistry between yall
I also wanted to say that no one talked about how the pandemic led to massive views with zelda videos. It's how I got into every single one of you
glad i aint the only one that feels burnt out with Zelda TOTK stuff.
I think Zelda content got boring because it just turned into ‘TOP 500 BUILDS IN TOTK’ or discussions about specific parts of the game. Idk what more u can do because whilst they did add a bunch of new stuff, TOTK is just like a big BOTW DLC, might be wrong but that’s just my opinion
I do not get people trying to make "The Zelda Cycle" a thing. This isn't Sonic where people get hyped for a game that will end up getting a negative response at launch. Most Zelda games are loved at launch (when they're broadly considered good), and then the hype dies down over time while people who were initially less interested in the game end up playing it after hearing all the hype and then they end up disappointed cause their expectations were set by the hype. This is how it is for EVERY game. It's not just the Zelda cycle, it's every tech product cycle. This is far more of a Skyward Sword situation where the game is great if you like what it chose to do, but otherwise has a lot that could turn off even fans of BotW. For a lot of people, the shieka tech disappearing was alone enough to break their immersion. Some people didn't like the focus on ultrahand, or how puzzles can be broken with it. Some people didn't like that the lore elements were so heavily repeated from BotW only scaled up (new more ancient technology, new more ancient tribe, new more ancient King, new more ancient champions, etc). There's a lot of elements that could displease some people while also making it the best game ever for others. It may be looked back on more fondly in the future, like Skyward Sword, but the discussion with largely be with the TotK community, not the broader all Zelda community. Because every Zelda has the fans of that particular Zelda. I still know people who won't touch Twilight Princess cause of the Wolf Link and Tears of Light sections, even though the dungeons are great, and people who hate Wind Waker cause they find the ocean boring (me being one of them, though I also hate the islands and find that I run out of things to do right as I'm getting into the flow of the game, an issue I also had with BotW in many cases, such as reaching the end of Hyrule Castle right when I thought I reached a good halfway point to stop at)
People feel this way because Zelda has progressively gotten worse, so people just look back at the times to realize how good they had it.
@@ceel4223 Hahahaha, this is pretty true. Every game from the Gamecube on had at least one aspect that was half-baked. Wind Waker was rushed and clearly missing dungeons and content (plus the islands were really small), Twilight Princess's world was less of a world and more of a cut together collection of shapes put together that treated all of the items as keys and just keys, Skyward Sword was just an empty sky overworld with dungeon styled landscapes on the land. Their biggest issue is their incessant NEED to differentiate themselves from Ocarina of Time and clearly either wasting tons of dev time on developing out gimmicks or realizing they bit off more than they can chew and having to cut back (that seemed to be the issue with Twilight Princess). Imagine if Wind Waker or Twilight Princess were given the excessive amount of dev time TotK had. I mean, how TF did Tears take so long and end up like it did? I'm guessing they wasted years on just Ultrahand and making all of the nonsense shrines just so they could claim the game is so much bigger than BotW, and then they rushed to make the depths in a 2-6 month period. Genuinely, for what we got and as technically miraculous ultrahand is, it feels like they wasted a ridiculous amount of time on one mechanic, even if it's highly versatile, and making stuff for the sake of having stuff to do, like the type of content added to a mobile game over years just to keep players regularly logging on.
As a longtime Zelda fan myself I can say this... There isn't that much interesting lore to put together in Zelda. I'm not alone in thinking this. I wish this wasn't the case, but it is. The Zelda team consistently shows they don't care about the lore so it feels kinda pointless to put it together.
As for FNAF, the theories in that series stayed alive because the creator actually cared about the lore and put down specific clues for people to put together.
Plenty people never even played fnaf, but followed the theorizing. Very telling.
Just keep in mind that the internet is not real life. The truth is there’s the majority of people who do still love the game. The general consensus is still super positive.
I just miss the guardians and ancient weapons in totk
Hi again! Here's all the opinions I promised and you didn't ask for!
I actually wanted to focus mostly on your primary subject here on Zeldatube, so I've provided my own observations and takes, as a viewer. Near the end, there's a bit of... disagreement... regarding TOTK directly, but I know that wasn't really the reason for the video and I didn't want to cheapen it by screaming and hollering for 20 paragraphs - although I most certainly could. Nothing any of you haven't already heard before, I'm certain.
I stated it before but I still do desperately want to enjoy TOTK, and to that end I've gone and subbed to you all, to hopefully get a positive, more insightful look into this game. Thanks!
6:50 (The Honeymoon phase is over, and this is normal)
It was called the "Zelda cycle" initially here but this is entirely normal in *any* media, even outside of games. This is completely accurate and should not by any means be used as a measuring stick for the overall "health" of a game. A good example of this phenomenon being used as measurement was with the recent Hogwarts Legacy, where people used the dropoff in popularity as a sign that the game had failed... right as it was passing 15 million copies sold. Have whatever opinion of the game you'd like, but it definitely didn't "fail", and neither has TOTK.
7:30 (BOTW's longer term content success was an exception, not a rule)
I think there's definitely some truth there even though the point was pretty quickly countered. There was a *ton* of hype for BOTW because it launched alongside the Switch, and there was a *ton* of hype for the Switch. It was a fantastic time to be a Nintendo fan, not just a Zelda fan, so I'm sure the extra buzz caused a favorable uptick in content. To that end, it's mentioned that Mario Odyssey got picked up and Zelda started to lull, which isn't a tremendous surprise either. Again, it was a great year to be a Nintendo fan, and I can't imagine there are many people who are just fans of only one of those franchises without also liking the other.
However, there's another good point regarding the at-launch promise of more BOTW on the way through DLC and eventually the announcement of a sequel, which TOTK doesn't have. BOTW is indeed the only (mainline) entry with that benefit. As a viewer, this definitely disincentivizes me to seek out more content for TOTK, knowing that what's here is all there will be. My gripes with the game aside, I would have been much more keen on gathering information about the game/world if more story was on offer.
9:50 (Theorycrafting is really hard)
Yeah, I bet. Fujibayashi certainly didn't give you much to work with.
15:45 (A drop in interest in games is normal, but TOTK is dropping harder than normal)
the 85/15% split between natural cycle and development choices seems fair to me. I would actually change that to 75/15/10%, where the additional 10% is simply its status as a sequel. As stated, BOTW was new and exciting and nobody had ever seen a game quite like it. TOTK, on the other hand is (for sake of argument) BOTW 2. No matter the choices made by the dev team, it was still a game in an established world we had 6 years to become familiar with, and there's no getting around that.
18:25 (TOTK only met expectations, but did not exceed them)
I don't agree with this point, and I've had to retype this response out quite a few times because it's sort of a je ne sais quoi concept for me to put to words well.
I feel like expectations of what a BOTW sequel was supposed to be are going to vary from person to person a great deal. For many (perhaps such as yourselves) those expectations were indeed met or even exceeded, but my personal expectations for a BOTW Sequel most assuredly were not - and I'll mention that my expectations were hardly lofty.
19:00 (TOTK's lore is no more obtuse than usual)
The Zonai & time travelling stuff throw a gigantic wrench into the entire established timeline in a way that doesn't personally feel like a satisfying puzzle to solve or work with. If there's any turmoil within the community regarding placement or broader-universe lore, I would expect that's why. It's not about wanting the answers spelled out to us, it's just that the pieces fit so unbelievably poorly that figuring it out isn't fun.
24:00 (Tiered content expectations, Negative videos get the most views)
This is interesting. Was it this way with BOTW as well? At some level it seems sort of intuitive that this would be the case - if you have a problem with something, you seek out more information with it. At the same time, though, I don't feel like I routinely look for negative videos regarding media I'm interested in. Perhaps it's TOTK - maybe at this stage in the lifecycle, most people looking up content would be looking up lore and story-based information, and the lackluster story has left a sour note amongst the community so they're more likely to watch critiques? I've only been aware that I wasn't alone in my overall negative feelings for TOTK for just a few days, so this could be completely off base.
31:00 (Extended lull due to delays, TOTK returning to cycle)
The TH-cam landscape as a whole has also changed quite a bit since BOTW's release, which could be a contributing factor. Perhaps TOTK's waning interest is something of a natural correction in levels of interest from the highs of BOTW as was suggested but I feel like that's really hard to confirm just due to how fickle the YT algorithm can be at times. OTOH, if this is an established trend from previous series releases, that may really be all there is to it. Interesting.
34:45 (Guides continue to gain views)
Good observation! I have a friend who used to be a walkthrough guide writer for IGN. He stated that during his tenure there, their walkthroughs revenue was always consistent and lasted for years. How-to's and reference material will always be sought after. Definitely worth keeping in mind. Regarding being the first person to post the guide...
36:30 (Speed vs Accuracy, and creator side vs viewer side)
Viewer side perspective: accuracy is definitely important but if you're racing to be first, I would maybe disregard production quality. Personally, if I have to watch a video for information on where to find/do something, I'm scrubbing through that video and jumping right to the information I need and ignoring everything else. Don't make it a garbage video you aren't proud of, obviously, but for small guides such as finding a piece of armor like your example, save yourself the time and just get to it.
38:20 (Make content because you enjoy it, not for views)
I genuinely admire that attitude.
41:00 (Built-up Expectations, Content Creator's Fault)
I actually went out of my way to see as little about TOTK as I possibly could in the final months leading to its release. And I came away far more disappointed with it than any of you. If we're acknowledging that the state of current TOTK content is being caused by *more* than just a "standard Zelda cycle", I don't think that hype the community generated is responsible for it. The game that I saw from initial reveal, first trailer, and then the first Sky Islands reveal trailer painted a picture of a game completely different from what I played. Expectations were set by the developers.
(continued because I have more words than youtube wants me to)
42:30 (KingK's success, personality vs subject)
I think the general sentiment here was that large channels that do variety content are not a good measuring stick for the... community health? Of a franchise. Fair enough!
44:45 ("Why were you expecting more answers? On what basis was this from?")
I think you might be underselling the introduction of an ancient race being mentioned in one game and then the focus of the sequel with as absolutely little explanation on the race as possible. We know more about the Twili from one game than we know about the Zonai from two - that doesn't strike you as unusual? And I cannot reasonably believe people expected "a massive lore dump that will tie everything in the series together" because you're right, that's never been what's provided in the past. I don't think asking for the beginnings of a scintilla of an explanation on exactly what in the Goddess's name is going on with the Zonai retcon is asking for much.
45:05 ("Even direct sequels, they just disregard the previous game")
In the same way that you cannot understand why people thought there would be more answers, I cannot wrap my head around you comparing the BOTW-TOTK relationship to OOT-MM or WW-PH as being equivalent with sincerity.
There has never been a true, honest-to-god sequel in the series as firmly connected to the previous entry as TOTK. MM may be a sequel to OOT, but it's in a completely different world with completely different characters. PH may be a sequel to WW, but again it has a completely new ensemble of characters and exploring a unique part of the Great Sea. TOTK has the *exact same* characters in the *exact same* world as BOTW, and yet outside of less than a handful of lines of dialogue and maybe three in-game models there is absolutely no indication that the two games are at all related - and that is a profoundly bizzare, uncomfortable decision for a "sequel" that has so much in common with its predecessor.
45:55 (TOTK does lore building better than any other Zelda game)
tremendously low bar ._.
So, I want to present the perspective of: how does the lore building of TOTK compare to other games released this year? Kindly ignore Baulder's Gate 3, that's just plain not fair, but: Remnant II, Alan Wake 2, Final Fantasy XVI, Dead Space, Metroid Prime (Remastered)? All of these are established franchises, fantastic games to play in their own right, but dive into *their* lore a bit, even on a singular game-by-game, non-franchise basis? It's not even close - and again, I just restricted the comparison to *this year*. Even with games where the gameplay is more important than the story and the lore, TOTK gets soundly trounced in terms of lore building.
That's what I've been doing, ever since release. Not comparing TOTK to BOTW or the rest of the Zelda games, but to the current state of ALL gaming. And that's why it's so disappointing. I know for a fact that the Zelda team can write amazing stories and can have engaging world lore, but, frankly, TOTK was an absolute failure in that regard.
47:00 (Why do people play Zelda?)
Personally, I replay traditional Zelda games to re-experience the stories. I replay BOTW because I love the world and the gameplay. It's a fair point that if what you predominately look for in Zelda is puzzles that TOTK will be a fantastic game for you.
48:30 (People wanted everything explained)
They didn't. I didn't. This seems to be a running theme where you're under the false impression that if people aren't satisfied with the amount of explicit information that was given, then clearly, they just want absolutely everything spoonfed to them. At its very best, this is a strawman argument. At its worst, it's honestly insulting. Do some people want that? Sure, probably. Do most of the people who are disappointed want that? Highly doubtful.
50:30 (The Sheikah thing was blown way out of proportion)
On the contrary, I think you're underselling how profoundly disappointing that decision really is. The Sheikah tech was very much part of the identity of BOTW and they unceremoniously deleted it all, nary an in-game explanation to be found. You are probably right, of course - they did so because they didn't know how to resolve its existence with the new Zonai tech and wanted to just move forward. The problem is it took them longer to make TOTK than BOTW, and the best reason for it being missing they could come up with is:
51:00 ("Nobody knows" is the true answer)
Absolute cop-out. I wish, lord almighty do I wish you had just faced this head-on and called it what it is. They had SIX YEARS to justify the decision with an in-game explanation.
SIX. YEARS. And the best they could come up with was an interview 4 months after launch with "well gee i dunno man you figure it out".
But of course, the real reason they deleted it without a reason is:
53:00 (Developers constrained by BOTW)
To me, TOTK feels like a BOTW clone wearing BOTW's skin. You're all 100% correct, and I feel it too; TOTK desperately wants to be a different game than what it is. My running theory, ever since I beat it, is that this isn't a *sequel* to Breath of the Wild, it's a *replacement*. Basically 0 references to BOTW, the Sheikah tech removed, nobody mentions the Calamity even in passing: the Zelda team are trying to replace BOTW entirely. Despite all of the similarities, world, character, gameplay, this is a sequel in the series that has been closer to its predecessor than any other entry by a country mile, and yet there's absolutely nothing to tie them together, outside of a few lines of dialogue, a picture here and there. It's not the next chapter in this Hyrule's story, it's just a new story wearing this Hyrule's skin.
56:00 (Content outreach hurt by good year in gaming)
I don't know about best year for gaming EVER (2007 has my vote) but yeah, it's damn-close. I have no doubt that has contributed to TOTK losing the limelight a bit earlier than maybe it should have. Excellent point.
57:20 (Windwaker is better than Twilight Princess, and other terrible opinions :p)
Outside of BOTW, my favorite traditional Zelda game is always whichever one I've replayed most recently. So, um, Twilight Princess.
1:00:00 (Spoilers, Marketing)
Hope your husband keeps enjoying it!
As previously stated, I generally avoid trailers/spoilers/marketing for things I'm looking forward to. Didn't work out for me this time. Although maybe they did show too much -- my idea of what the game would be like was heavily influenced by what they had shown off to the public. Definitely something to ruminate on.
1:02:15 (Implicit vs Explicit lore in the Depths)
I haven't spent enough time exploring specifically the ruins of the depths to say for certain, but again I feel like this is a reach. The wild popularity of FromSoftware's series, and the implicit lore within them that people love so much, disproves your line of thinking to me. People are perfectly happy to chew on a story they don't have all the information for. I think I don't have all the information here and don't want to be a voice for the entire audience, of which I am generally not a part of, but these sorts of generalizations always rub me the wrong way.
1:03:00 (are the caves in your copies of the game better than the caves in my copy of the game?)
Because I'm pretty sure every one of you sounded off positively about caves, and I'm out here ready to call them the single worst addition to TOTK, bar *none*. I don't think there's anything in the game less disappointing than dropping into a cave that looks like it got copy-pasted from another cave I vaguely remember on the other side of the map, making my way through it to the end and getting rewarded with a gem worth 200 rupees. Disaster.
1:05:33 (obvious shade-throwing disrespect at fellow creator Bandit)
oMg HoW cOuLd YoU
Incidentally his video was what randomly popped up on my home feed, watching that led me to this one. I know the last several paragraphs have been straight vitriol, but I really have genuinely enjoyed this video!
1:04:00 - 1:14:21 (closing thoughts, positive vibes)
As mentioned, yeah, I really did enjoy listening to your thoughts and opinions. I know this video was not *really* about TOTK so much as the community around it and I wanted to really provide my thoughts and responses on what you all have said. I do genuinely hope you all find more success on youtube and weather this content lull and keep going, because all of you have contributed and provided insight that I appreciate, and more than that, I do so enjoy when people succeed!
Hey friend, thanks for engaging with the content and your well thought out comments here. (Not sarcasm, I promise!)
I enjoyed reading it and (time permitting) will have to come back to replying point by point when I’m in a better headspace. (Some comments that were less level-headed and kind-hearted than yours have me in a sour mood lol)
Thanks again, and keep being awesome
Thanks for the discussion. Haven't finished it yet but it's bringing me joy listening to the great panel you put together.
Really glad to hear you’re enjoying it!!
This was such a great video. It was honest, realistic, and level-headed. You all made a lot of really good points and brought up a bunch of questions that you might not be able to answer now but maybe in the future you will.
I've seen a similar discourse going on in the God of war community regarding the recent game. Many people Love the game but there are some people in the community that have openly talked about how they didn't like it or that it didn't live up to the hype. They've also said that they are burned out after the lead up to the game. So you guys aren't alone. I think part of it is that we live in an age where games take forever to come out so there's a lot of anticipation and excitement leading up to the release. And there's no way to keep hype going forever because hype is a temporary feeling. It's an emotional high.
As a creator who jumped into the space specifically because of TotK, I'm sure I don't feel the same "burnout" as others who were theorizing and preparing for the ultimate experience post BotW. I think it's possible we just hyped ourselves up with the possibilities. From a gameplay perspective, I find TotK to be a Masterpiece. Sure there are some issues, but the experience at the end of the day was invigorating. The story certainly left much to be desired... but so did BotW's. As I dig into the lore, I think there's a lot more there than meets the eye. I'm enjoying it, anyway
Those issues are glaring, lmao. Quit the 🧢.
@@ceel4223agree. Too many of us Zelda fans are too nice.
They will make a long list of things that are wrong with the game but still say "however it is not bad and is in fact my favorite game of all time!"
Just say it failed in many aspects.
My main impression after finishing the game was that it definitely wasn't what I expected it to be, but I still loved it. I can see how moving away from the timeline can be alienating, but it got really messy so ultimately I think it's for the best.
For the record, I've been making TH-cam videos for over a year and I've made exactly 0 money from it lol the fact that anyone can make a career out of their passion is wildly impressive to me
Really great discussion everyone, awesome to hear thoughts about the interesting state of TOTK discussion online right now
Really great talking points guys! I have definitely felt the burnout through other creators, but I think it’s okay, there will always be more Zelda stuff to talk about. For me, I’m fortunate enough to kinda be in a very niche position within the Zelda community that has allowed me to grow this year. Since I primarily focus on fan art content, I am not nearly as impacted by lack of interested in TotK. People just wanna see anything I do regarding Zelda and if anything my audience likes seeing the other Zelda’s being represented more than TotK (at least based on my comments) though my TotK videos are some of my most viewed. I really hope the gang here can keep their heads up because they have audiences that just like to see any sort of Zelda content from them ❤️
I felt this sort of burnout after a while, but then after watching beyond ghiblis and OSPs videos on tears of the kingdom reinvigorated my interest in the lore, it showed me there’s so much more to it then what some would say.
@CaptBurgerson what is track that is playing at 34:26 ?
Hi! The song is "A Shine Upon Inkwater Marsh" from the soundtrack to Ori and the Will of the Wisps.
Here's a link: th-cam.com/video/oqbvsEwg_5Q/w-d-xo.htmlsi=dxTlJrV9MZgJRDm5
I think, for me, TOTK didn't really have a lot going for it story-wise and character-wise, and that's why I got burned out with it. I don't feel like any of the characters went through any meaningful internal changes that impacted the narrative. The foreshadowing felt incredibly heavy-handed (The cutscene with mineru explaining the dragon stones was quite unsubtle). Also. I felt like the game kinda spelled out its themes, but didn't really have much to say about them (like, sacrifice is mentioned and shown a lot, but what is the game trying to say about sacrifice? I just couldn't find anything deeper than a surface level 'sacrifice for the greater good is good') I just feel like TOTK had so much potential for telling a compelling and emotional narrative, but the execution (at least for me) falls flat. That's just my opinion, though. Sorry for all the negativity, I think it's really cool that others can take something positive/enjoyable from TOTK, be it from the narrative or gameplay. 😊
Straightforward. If a video just says "TotK is great" there's a million of those, there's no reason to click on it. A "controversial" topic will be unique, so can concentrate more views. Similarly, a dungeon design deep essay is unique and we get the feel that there must be someone worth watching and learning. And of course much more relevant right now than LttP
I've been upset for a while at the fact that I can hardly ever find a place on TH-cam to discuss how much I love certain aspects of the game, but then I thought about other games I loved like Metroid Dread and Mario Wonder, and I realized that I didn't really look for those types of discussions this long after they were released. I guess I was just expecting that with Tears of the Kingdom because of Breath of the Wild spawning a massive community of lore theorists and challenge runners. This idea that most people were disappointed with the game and the general consensus is that is wasn't that good never made sense to me, because you'd see so many people early on play through the game and talk about how incredible and mind-blowing it was, and that doesn't just go away after the honeymoon phase.
I was initially upset by a lot of the lore because I interpreted it as saying "all other games didn't happen only the Zonai did," but I don't think that's the implication. What bothers me now is the refounding idea, I just can't take any theory or lore video that starts with that premise seriously, and I'm tired of seeing people insist that it must be canon just because Fujibayashi brought it up as "only a possibility." Seriously what's the point of having a lore if the whole of Hyrule can just be entirely rebooted off-screen? There isn't one, and the fun of theorizing of putting things together is lost if your entire answer to how the game fits is "it just doesn't," which all the refounding idea is.
i think the issue might be rather that it's actually not a possibility, according to the very lore of botw-
though i dunno honestly i don't really care all that much about the lore of those 2 games personally, which is fine, we all connect to games and stories differently!
@@nepeta3286 It barely works and takes a ton of assumptions and lore stretching to say it's a refounding.
Someone on the video, not sure who, says every direct sequel in the series immediately dismisses the previous entry, and then says it happened with Phantom Hourglass and Majora's Mask. Honestly, I have no idea what that's all about, and would have to question if we played the same games, because Majora's Mask and Phantom Hourglass *did not* dismiss Ocarina of Time and Wind Waker. Hell, even *Spirit Tracks* didn't, and that's a more distant sequel. The games don't go out of their way to acknowledge events from their predecessors that aren't relevant to the current story, sure, but they don't *neglect* their predecessors either. On the contrary, they *build on top* of their predecessors anywhere it's relevant. Even Zelda II does that. To try to claim that every single direct sequel in the series has always been like this, is honestly pretty asinine.
Yeah the guy who said that couldn't have been more wrong.
if tears of the kingdom can have time travel and time-line alterting plot points, then Age of Calamity is perfectly in the realm of being cannon and acceptable as well, thats my opinion.
Links Crossbow Training is an amazing fun game, i played that game till i got platinum on all stages.
The stars that burn the brightest die the fastest
Yea, but a disappointing game just kills all the hype in general. Didn’t have to burn bright, just had to lack a good experience.
The lack of answers because it’s a sequel and none of the sequels had answers from previous games is a moot point when you realise the previous sequels were in different locations from the prior games (Termina, New Hyrule, etc.) and Tears of the Kingdom is legitimately just the same place, just a few years later.
Loved the video, would love to see a part 2. My biggest problem with TotK wasn't nesesarily the new lore, but how even the most basic parts of the lore from BotW were completely ingored. The Divine Beasts, the important side-characters not remebering Link, and so many other little inconsistancies that really took away from my experince. Don't get me wrong TotK is still one of my favourite Zelda games, but personally, in terms of a sequel, I think Nintendo, at least in the story/lore department put in the minimal effort.
I think it's important to take into account the timeline of the Zelda series and TH-cam itself as well. TH-cam has been around for a while but not even half as long as the Zelda franchise. Meaning that the mid-2010's, which saw a lot of creators up their content quality with mics and camera's, meant there was also a lot to catch up on in terms of lore, audience cultivation (to incentivise looking further into it) and filling major content gaps for said audience.
Some games, movies etc. have always had huge acclaim in say the retro gaming sphere, but are only recently being criticised using contemporary standards. Now, with a lot of creators putting out theory after theory and missed details content, they were all expecting a major supply of new content in TOTK to talk about. With the world being largely the same, and the story being pretty barren for the most part, this was clearly not enough to keep the Zelda content machine going.
This is sad to see, as I was also hoping for another influx of Zelda content on the new mainline entry. We get a reveal of the mysterious Zonai tribe, but they are not really explored besides the fact that they were advanced. This means all the mystique built around the subject of Zonai did not amount to much, as discovering the tribe should mean discovering its history, or at least allusions to this history. Instead the biggest mysteries around BOTW were solved rather nonchalantly, as by the time Link returns from the sky-islands, everyone on the mainland thinks Zonai are interesting, but treat them as a given just being part of the world now, even having major translations done and everything.
What struck me in BOTW despite the story being rather small and rigid (Link barely has influence on its developments aside from resetting the beasts), was the fact that the story changed the player's perception over time from "I guess I need to save the princess." to "I need to save princess Zelda, avenge my friends, and revive what was lost in the calamity." It becomes a very personal task which is reflected in the final boss theme against the underwhelming Dark Beast Ganon too. This game took all those steps back, erased the history with the champions and Sheika tech, and got you back to "I need to save princess Zelda I guess."
The elements they added to the game are so little, and so self-explanatory that they do not add much to the overall story at all. TOTK to me was fun, but it suffered from Miyamoto's influence in which story is more of an afterthought to motivate the player while they worked on the fuse mechanic among other things (Which did not amount to much as the shrines were too easy once again). The secret stones are just weird mcguffins and Ganondorf is evil because he is evil, with no ties back to previous Zelda games that expanded his character like it did in Wind Waker.
Think about it like this: We find out about this whole underground map, wow surely that is an insane well of new info! Instead, you almost immediately deduce that these just contain old Zonai mines, ghosts of fallen soldiers/people, the Yiga and the poe collectors. The only thing on this list with a semblance of mystery to it are the poe collectors. The sky islands do not feature any interesting architecture either, as they seem to just be shapes and rocks that do not merit looking further into. Even when announcing "proper dungeons" they all had the same central mechanic with some different paint over it, barely had any identity and were overall underwhelming. When I saw the water temple was just a glorified sky island I was genuinely disappointed. TOTK pulled away most of the mystique and personal drive that BOTW had built up to while not actively trying to replace it with new or further mysteries.
Theories are not just fun because they can be proven or disproven, they are the most fun because it * might * be true due to some form of evidence, which bring implications with them that expand the lore. Where previously the Zelda team might have been able to design areas for the sake of designing something pretty, and building some form of context around it, they are now facing the fact that with an open world like this, it becomes clear all too quickly when a spot on the map has no purpose to it. The world certainly feels more alive with the new NPC behaviour, but not exactly lived in, due to the erasure of history between BOTW and TOTK.
I personally found the beginning and ending to TOTK pretty amazing and interesting, mostly due to how story-driven and structured the moments felt. I do not need a larger map personally, I would just like for there to be more care and emphasis on locations in the games. OOT is so great partly because of how dense simple villages felt. Small secrets, discoveries in shops, NPC's doing their thing. The map is insanely smaller in that game, but it doesn't feel that way due to the purpose and design behind all the towns and dungeons. When you visited an area, you would be there for a while to take in the scenery and especially he dungeon on your first time through. In BOTW and TOTK however, the NPC's feel like ants to me that just bog down my momentum, which might be my own fault really. For the future, I wish they would make an open world but with more developments like TOTK's opening and ending. Get the player into the drama and cultivate mysteries they can pursue on their own while exploring a variety of areas rather than some underground dungeon that can be invalidated by climbing every wall for example. Dungeons which explore Hyrule's history like a Shadow Temple did. If these two Switch entries were demo's and culminate in a 10 year journey to experiment and understand what needs to be then for future entries, I'll be happy. That said, we don't live forever, and I would like the years that I can still enjoy the franchise to the fullest to be filled with experiences that let me explore and enjoy the LOZ world again.
I finished Totk pretty fast after it came out and was definitely hyped for the game. But as time went on I found myself picking up botw more and more over tears of the kingdom.
I love tears of the kingdom more than botw but i just played it so much and still haven’t beat it so I’ve avoided a lot of totk videos to avoid spoilers
lol
Same I only started watching TOTK videos this month as I just did not have time to play
I have yet to really start Tears of the Kingdom. I got to the mainland and then set it down and haven’t touched it since… didn’t hate it or anything just never went back. I’m finally going to go back and start over. Which is weird cause my feed start populating with Zelda videos around the time I started thinking about playing the game.
The lack of dlc didn’t help
If you stop to smell the roses, you’ll come to realize that THIS WAS THE DLC. lol
I think two of the mentioned points had major contribution as well- very high expectations from years of speculation (with a healthy dose of unreasonable expectations), And a few gameplay elements that bring you out of the experience (sage UI and the memories -both tear order and temple repetition).
That said i have literal hundreds of hours in the game and believe i have much more in store.
as someone who was trying to keep their expectations low, I feel the marketing still oversold the actual content and left me dissapointed.
They made the sky islands seem like it would be a much larger part of the game than they are. They also made it seem like the story would be told in a very engaging way, as opposed to memories like in botw. The marketing also implied that the world would be changed in meaningful ways, refreshing the map. This definetely happened in a few spots (death mountain, lookout landing, and gerudo desert), but the rest of the map feels pretty much identical, and some sections of the map feel emptier than in botw! (gut check rock, gerudo highlands, pretty much all of tabantha).
finally, although this isn't from the marketing, the first time you enter the depths the game implies that it is an entire new map that will host lots of new gameplay challenges. I'm sure you know that this is not the case
I really appreciate you having me on!
You all brought up the the longevity of Elden Ring content, but you have to keep in mind that game has things like a vibrant PvP community and the upcoming Shadow of the Erdtree DLC to keep it going. Aside from the fact that its just an amazing game of course.
There's something I don´t see anyone mentioning and that is... the fact that Botw was the only big Nintendo game during several months after the release of the switch. That was most likely a big factor that made the game be so popular at the time.
For me, I love the game. Beat it in like 3 months with the amount of time I could play. But, not going to lie… the announcement for no DLC was a bit of a turn off. The least then can do is give us a master mode and my replay drive will kick in. I also wasn’t to happy with the Zonia route they went with, but overall I was happy with the game.
me personally, i need more than just a master mode; there needs to be a whole new DLC quest that ACTUALLY goes more indepth about the Zonai since we barely learned anything substantial about them, and i want some **real** dungeons in it. Just, for the love of God, i need Zelda to finally give me good story and challenging gameplay again.
This was the dlc, don’t make excuses. Stop the 🧢
I can confidently say after TOTK, I do not want another Open World Zelda game.
To the more point though it's because it reuses the same location. All the other direct sequels take place in a different realm, there didn't need to be an attempt in carrying the lore since the game had no barrings on the previous outside of taking place directly after.
no putting in question what you said, just curious, what do you consider an "open world zelda game"? because we throw the world open world on a lot of things, to me all zelda games are relatively open world-
@@nepeta3286 a massive world that's empty, where it has you collecting the same shit over and over throughout it's entire runtime in the name of freedom.
so the issue with the last 2 games in your opinion is in the lack of variety, and the lack of worthy rewards for your actions? sounds fair, botw and totk both really had issues with variety and i don't think anyone ever disagreed about that :p@@challengerjakku1943
Well, brace yourself because the sales and critic reviews are way too good for them to ever go back on it.
@@BrianStorm742 that's fine I just won't buy the games anymore. Piracy from now on, if I even want to try the next game that is.
I still love this game both BOTW and TOTK. I think a lot of these "zeldatubers" got the hype train when BOTW was announced and these zeldatubers started to pop out.
I've been playing Zelda since the beginning in the 80's Zelda has its up and lows. I think a lot people got into the hype with BOTW and wanted to bank on it. But at least for me, Is better to weed out those who were there just for the hype and not really zelda fans. (In my opinion)
BOTW and TOTK brought a larger audience that the big majority are not Zelda fans or are just new Zelda fans. Since its larger numbers of people looking at Zelda it would seem the lack of interest to be bigger, but real Zelda fans stick to it.
When Wind Waker came out, a lot of Zelda fans back then were disappointed and wanted for the Twilight version but at the end Wind Waker became a success.
This is a normal cycle of Zelda, those who love Zelda will always find something fun to talk about, those who don't, well, don't but that's ok too. Its not bad if you wanna branch out. But at least to me those never were true Zelda tubers, just hype tubers. That's all. (Which is not bad either)
I always play and replay all Zeldas, at this point I'm fed up of Ocarina of time so TOTK is really amazing and a great change to something new. Not everybody is gonna like it and that's ok too.
7:30 I argue because BOTW kept people captivated was because we got a teaser not too later on about TOTK coming, plus DLC's. TOTK has none of that.
15:50 the Issue with Baldurs is, that they created a game that requires no microtransactions and they left everything available and free, in contrast to what western Video games studios like Blizzard have been doing lately. So people want to support Baldur's so they are being used as an example to the Western Video Game industry.
For Zelda this not apply as much because they are exclusive to Nintendo and Baldur is not exclusive in that regard as well. so yes, it has the upper hand on Zelda in that regard. If Zelda was available in other consoles and PC, Zelda would blew up.
20:00 You can say the same from Ocarina to Majora's reusing the same characters or a crashing Moon that only affects Termina but not Hyrule? Like whaaaaa...?
Plus Ocarina is considered the best Zelda game and Majoras a very Psychological game that everyone loves. Majoras doesn't have the popularity of Ocarina but its still there. The same could apply to TOTK from BOWT.
Another factor with BOTW and nostalgia lore wise, we thought it was closer connected to the old games but TOTK revealed that BOTW was just set tens of thousands of years far in the future of any of the three timelines and they really don't link up anymore.
57:16 this man simply cannot go one group discussion without slandering twilight princess lmao
We need to teach him a lesson man smh
what can I say
This is somehwhat rooted in people's expectations as stated by you, the panel, and KingK. It's understandable though why. There are other variables, but based on the content I've paid close attention to, expectations ruined it. Not the game. There was no way TOTK would meet them in the first place. The burnout started long before TOTK released, has rapidly declined, and now it's reached a low point... in some cases. There are people in the community and content with realistic expectations who take responsibility for their own experiences.
The more I personally reflect on my own experience with TOTK I realize how MUCH of a supreme improvement it is to BOTW in so many ways. But they're completely different gameplay experiences. I can't even imagine what they'll do next.
Like with everything in life, there are flaws and TOTK has some humiliating ones considering the resources, assets, and time available to them. But wow. They went for it and it deserves it's nomination for game of the year.
It will take some time for people to heal from their unmet expectations (which were unrealistic/astronomically high) and will eventually see TOTK for what it is.
Edit: oh and finally, the reason negative videos get more views is because people... LOVE drama.
Well I think the expectations came from the extensive amount of time the Nintendo team spent on it and the new 70$ price point I think it was valid to have higher expectations in this case. I definitely won’t have higher expectations anymore it’s clear Nintendo likes to focus on specific aspects of their games and ignore other aspects they don’t find important at the time. It’s just how it is, TOTK was a fun game with creative ideas
I had no expectations (probably because I didn't like BotW much) but still felt TotK was lacking. Imo this game is the definition of quantity over quality.
A game's story can still be good even if our specific expectations aren't met. There's plenty of times I've been pleasantly surprised by a story/game that didn't meet my initial expectations.
The REAL issue is TOTK's story just flat-out isn't good to begin with; It misses alot of fundamental storytelling-techniques and has a weak structure. I'm 31 now and I've been gaming since I was 5; I know a good game by the 2nd day I play it, so I dont need "more time" to recognize the smell of shit when I smell shit.
The thing that blew my mind the most was Nintendo had the **audacity** to just copy & paste those Improsing War scenes after each temple, like we didn't just see the same scene ten times already. That was UNDENIABLE proof that they put no real thought into the writing (and that's besides all the other stuff they copy & pasted in this game); and we paid $70 for this??? Hell no, this game doesn't "deserve" GOTY in the truest sense of the word, but it's probably gonna win it anyway just because most other games are even worse in comparison to it, but that's really not saying much.
@@TonyDaExpert Right, like how are we NOT gonna have above-average expectations after Nintendo took 12 years in total to develop one of the biggest game-sagas ever? TOTK objectively failed its own audience after hyping up the sky islands, just for there to only be like sky islands that were actually worth anything; The rest of the sky is literally barren with hardly anything else of value.
And charged us $70 on top of it?? you better believe I had expectations for a damn good game.
The story felt like it was missing a lot at first, but I was able to appreciate it much more when I just started looking at it and Breath of the Wild as their own thing. As much as there are certain things I wish we could've seen more of such as the fate of the Zonai and Ganondorf's actions before becoming the Demon King, I think this works well as an origin story for Breath of the Wild's Hyrule and the Calamity.
I will push back on the sentiment that people just wanted everything explained to them and that’s why people didn’t like the story, cause I didn’t want that and yet I found the storytelling of the game to just be underwhelming. Of course they can do a completely different story from BotW and not have them connect all too much, which is what they did. I also didn’t need, or want, them to explain every mystery of BotW. I just find it to be sloppy writing when there are blatant inconsistencies in the world between the two games that go unexplained. After all, it was produced and marketed as a direct sequel, not as a standalone title, and it continues directly from the continuity of BotW. They should’ve done the due diligence of having the two games be consistent with one another or they should’ve just not made it a sequel in the first place. And the game didn’t have to relate to the other games in the series, I don’t think anyone was really asking for that. Theorists can come up with those connection, that’s not the job of the devs.
I also felt it was kind of lame that half the new content was just recycled from OoT, it felt lazy to me. Also, I personally really liked that they elaborated on the eighth heroine lmao, it was one of my favorite part of the game, specifically because it was this story element present in BotW that I was curious to know more about. That and the continuity of the world’s NPCs was imo some of the best aspects of the game’s storytelling as that was actually building upon events from BotW instead of being just some completely unrelated to thing.
Just clicked, first time watched. Whenever I sit down to play Tears, I play for a couple minutes, then get the urge to play Breath. So I go back to my Master Mode playthrough and play. Not sure if that's what you mean by "burnout." Maybe I'm slowly realizing that I like Breath more than Tears. Maybe it's the apocalyptic world, maybe it's the quiet, maybe it's the simplicity of a single plane to play on. Hard to say.
I feel like we were right to expect more answers. Botw set us up with half told stories to be continued. Were we wrong to expect the stories to be tied together when they gave us the Leviathan quests and their locations around the map like the arbiter's grounds, the breach of demise, lon lon ranch and so on?To put so much effort into the lore then drop it like that actually bums me out. I really enjoyed the speculation. We've all been talking about this for years. I think what really topped off the disappointment was the trailer we saw with ganondorf looking like demise from the back. Unlike the previous sequels this game is made in the same world with the same characters and we actually got answers. The answers are all the same... Zonai. This was a fun game to play but I've already stopped. I was revisiting breath of the wild right up until tears of the kingdoms release.
Here’s what I wouldn’t have minded:
-A much smaller overworld/open world , more focus on the sky element. But keep it large(r) than the standard overworld size. I really feel like the sky should’ve been more fleshed out as a primary overworld, with hyrule being the secondary.
- keep the weapons’ durability ability to not break
- more puzzle/combat dungeons' and keep the TotK dungeon blueprint.
- tone down the size of the original 4 (wind, lightning, fire, water, secret) dungeons and temples.
- utilize the ultra hand a little more. I’d would’ve like to see a little more variety as to what it can do (but that’s just me)
Maybe like a hybrid of old Legend of Zelda formula mixed in with some elements of open world BotW/TotK formula
tone down the size of the dungeons? i think the opposite would be better, they were way too small imo, i think the better tradeoff would be the reduce the amount of shrines, to scale up the dungeons and make them feel more fleshed out
Personally speaking…I think there was a lot of neat aspects of TotK. It’s well built, beautiful, and the potential in ultrahand is amazing…I just lack the motivation/creativity to tap into that potential unless it’s something I actually need to figure out for a dungeon/puzzle (as lack luster as the spirit Temple was for me, I do gotta give it credit on regards to some building puzzles).
That said, a lot of my issues stem more from…I’m burnt out on open world/go in any order games. TotK, gen 9 Pokemon, etc. (I still jump into Sonic Frontiers sometimes because I enjoy just running/rolling around the islands, but the islands themselves also have a bit more linear of a progression). It’s just.. Not my cup of tea. I might not mind open exploration like the Era of Wild games, but more linear in the dungeon puzzles/story?
The story was the other aspect. I like the callout of story as Zelda’s greatest puzzle, but there were story/plot aspects that were a miss for me. Notably, the same as happened in botw, most of the big beats felt, to me, like they all happened in the past and I’m just observing, not being involved in it. Others like it, but it’s something I found I’m not enjoying (contrast to Age of Calamity where the story/plot is current events and things we’re actively connected to and bringing about).
Great discussion though all. Intriguing points brought up all around
I disagree with your guys' take on the expectations of the game. Lore enthusiasts weren't looking forward to direct answers. I think most fans are well aware that theories are theories, and don't expect them to get confirmed by the devs.
What fans expected of the story aspect of the game were just basic things like consistency and maybe more material to theorize about. TotK did basically none of that. In fact, their approach was even counter productive I would say. The storytelling is as inconsistent as it gets, it can't even stick to its own established rules, even less so to those of BotW even though it's supposed to be a direct sequel, in the same world, with the same characters. Plus, nothing about the story is interesting in the long run. It might convince the player for like 10-20 hours that it is, but once you get more into it, the story completely falls apart. It's so detached from the previous games and in itself so shallow that there is simply nothing to theorize about. The depths? They're literally just empty space to fill the map with. The Zonai? They just descended from the skies one random Tuesday and then just died out for no apparent reason. The Triforce? Completely absent. The Secret Stones? Irrelevant relics that mean nothing to the overall lore and in itself created plotholes. Ganondorf? He's just some random evil guy with no deeper motive at all. Zelda sacrificing herself for the Kingdom, forever existing as a dragon bcs the game LITERALLY said it's impossible to turn back? Nah, the power of friendship rescues her anyway. Just forget what we said earlier.
What I'm trying to say is that TotK makes it seem like the developers simply didn't care about putting together a coherent story with sense and meaning. Therefore, if even the devs do not care about it, then why should the fans? Theories at this point just feel like fanfiction because there is no consistent lore to support them anymore. Nintendo just spat on it all for gameplay's sake. The fact that we were shown the same copy and paste cutscene at the end of every temple should be enough to tell everyone that they didn't put a single thought into that part of the game.
Anyway, I'm sorry for the rant. Also, this isn't meant to be negative towards you guys. I appreciate that you all came together to talk about this and I really enjoyed listening to your thoughts on it all. Just needed to drop my thoughts, since there is so much debate on the game lately and it's been built up in my mind.
Sorry to hear about the downturn. Though this video has done a good thing in that it has introduced me to a ton of channels to look into. Of the channels in this chat the only ones I followed were HG, Bread, TT, and Capt B. Now there’s a whole other group to look into and give support for during this dip.
BOTW was my first Zelda game. I just couldn't play the older Zelda games. I'm currently playing TOTK and because I subscribed to several video creators I am looking forward to experiencing some of the things I've seen. I just wanted to thank you all for the content you shared and know that there are still people out there that watch. The dip may level off or climb back up after the holidays. I'm guessing the game will be a gift to many players. Enough from me, thanks again and I'll be watching in YT land.
The best thing to come out of these two games is the beautiful fanart because the games themselves were very underwhelming….
The depths were awesome… until you landed.
IMO, TotK is the better game but I loved BotW more. TotK started off great but once I got to the ground from the sky islands, BotW fatigue started to set it. I spent 300 hours in BotW, so returning back to Hyrule under the same console, game engine, graphics, music, gameplay (combat, koroks, stables, weapon durability, etc.) just made me get burned out after 100 hours of TotK. I was afriad this would happen and it did. I am ~190 hours into TotK and I am already looking forward to finishing so I can move on to another game. With BotW, I didnt want it to end.
@@DanielMazahreh Oh, piss off. I’m plenty good at the game. My complaints and criticism are valid.
@@DanielMazahreh Most of the music is exactly the same. This is a literal fact. Sounds like you haven’t even played it.
@@DanielMazahreh I said "Most of the music is exactly the same." Are you a child or a troll? Go to any of the stables or villages or city or any area on the ground map, and the music is the same as BotW. Just because there are a few new additions does not strengthen whatever point you think you have made.
BotW fatigue doesn’t exist, this is just a bad game. Stop the 🧢
@@djb6496Don’t argue with autist brother, it’ll keep you from disdaining humanity.
A lengthy video but I’m gonna watch it.
I originally got into the zelda lore videos because of how deep and interesting all the insights all these creative people were finding. I had no clue about anything Zonai until watching all the lore. I put totk down months ago and have comeback to eat up all that lore that came along with botw but theres just burnout and disappointment. No one is making lore content except to trash it.
The lack of continuity wouldn't have been a problem if totk wasnt a direct sequel. Botw had a lore creator explosion but there was a lot of confusing continuity issues there too. Like the rito and zora both being around which led to interesting theories about time line integration. But the ideas people came up with were just better then what we ended up getting in the end for totk. Its never a good sign when the fanfiction is better then the media 😂
Great chat with a bunch of great creators! I myself as a Zelda creator am feeling the burnout a bit, but we prevail! Let's keep this community strong, and keep making great videos
Quit the 🧢. There’s nothing to talk about when it comes to Totk.
@@ceel4223 I think we just have to be creative and come up with new ideas. I mean heck, BOTW was still coming up with new things like challenge videos, mods, and speed runs up until this year! It's all about attitude and how you look at things :]
@@curtomatic My honest take is that the director failed. The fact he vanished Shiekah tech into thin air without any in-game reference is outstanding. Those things were everywhere! It was Robbie’s life’s work for decades at least. Nintendo projected it would make massive sales before they even started, that’s my bet; and that doesn’t foster the dependency a well made game.
@@ceel4223 Yeah, there are definitely parts of the game (especially lore related) which nintendo kinda flopped on. But I think the core gameplay and the creative things that you can come up with now make up for that, at least a little. I wouldn't say it's a bad game necessarily, it's just not exceeding the expectations of fans like we were hoping for. Especially with how simple the lore is compared to botw.
@@ceel4223 Failed is a very strong word. The game did screw up in certain aspects for sure and I can see how this format wouldn't win over certain classic fans, but I'm in the camp that this is merely a normal phase of the Zelda cycle. BotW and TotK are excellent games with glaring issues and they'll take those into consideration when designing the second Zelda open world.
I love Tears of the Kingdom. These glitches from 1.1.1 are great. Been on airplane mode since May. Msgnotfound till the wheels fall off!!!!!
Everybody is dancing around this, people called it as soon as gameplay trailers dropped, but I didn't want to believe them. TotK IS a glorified expansion pack. The way the game damn near refused to truly acknowledge Link and Zelda's relationship and the events of BotW, the sky islands being new but EXTREMELY barebones and same to the depths, the copy pasted cutscenes when recruiting a new sage. This was not a true sequel. THAT is why people don't talk about it.
i'll be honest, i got had by the trailers, when i saw those footages of the sky temple i was like "no way, finally, they bringing in what i like the most about zelda", got disappointed by that, i'll stop just hyping myself up over those future games, and just try them when they get out, and live them as they are, just games made by someone, not games made by god, and not games made for me
When you have these podcast like meetings with other people, could you please add some indicator of who’s talking?
That’s good feedback, I’ll do that next time. Thanks
I think there is heavy misinterpretation here over what people actually want lore-wise. If people were satisfied with the questions they were left with and the lack of concrete answers then they would agree with you. If its a mystery and nobody knows where the sheika tech went then they would say that in game and *then* we would get curious. This applies to the zonai, dragons, depths and sky islands too.
The problem is that we actually have the answers to a lot of these because we are told something in game that is never questioned. If we're just getting these answers then they should be consistent, satisfactory and raise further questions that don't over-complicate the original.
For example, the explanation given for the sky islands is something along the lines of that zelda and mineru put them there for link, which is something we don't tell anyone else in game asking the same question. Even then this barely explains:
The lack of consistency between the great sky island and the great plateau
Or those skydiving training bits that were supposedly for zonai children that far outdated even mineru's time apparently
Or why we couldn't see them earlier
Or why the labyrinths are connected to the depths too and have phantom ganon armour
Nobody in the game is asking these questions and there is one half-assed answer that is supposed to have all of it make sense. They shouldn't have to do the game's wordbuilding in an interview
51:58 "Zelda's greatest puzzle is it's story, which has no way to be solved sometimes" is probaly the most perfect thing I ever heard when it comes to Zelda lore talk lol. I wouldn't be suprised if that's how the devs internally think about it when it comes to developing their stories
No, I doubt it. I've played games where the story is the puzzle. Ace Attorney is a perfect example of this, where the story has to be solved by you until you learn the whole truth. Zelda stories are not puzzles. They are intentionally simple so that it doesn't get in the way of gameplay. And thus they only make vague references to other games and why so much lore is up to interpretation.
@@ShallBePurified I certainly see where you're coming from, and 100 agree with the Ace Attorney example. While you say Zelda stories are simplified, I think it's more apt to say their plots are simplified. I guess I was referring more to environmental story telling and world building as there is often a heck of a lot more to digest than meets the eye.
@@tbpbTB2010 I don't trust their environment storytelling after TotK. To me, it feels like nostalgia baiting and pandering to old fans. Referencing old areas and then making the continuity not make sense with any previous games, or even with BotW. Is it cynical to think that Nintendo is only doing this to nostalgia bait? Yes. But it's cynicism they created by being so bad at actually caring about their own lore. They've made it crystal clear they don't care. They only pretend to care so fans don't get mad.
Tbh I don’t think the dev team thinks about the lore at all
Zelda TOTK has a huge potential to "burn out" players. This explains the recent backlash.
Instead of repeating clichés like "Zelda cycle!", we should understand what elements of TOTK are so draining that a significant number of players come to dislike the experience. Often, the fatigue is even worse than what happens in BOTW. For example, the repetition of fighting the same enemies was bad in BOTW, but TOTK makes it even more repetitive, even though it has a greater variety of monsters. TOTK features a huge underground world where navigating is a pain in the ass, and your combat experience will be attacking camp after camp with the same 3 enemies you got tired of fighting in BOTW, but now it's kind of a necessity because that's the mechanic for accumulating zonaites. It's such a bad design that it feels like Nintendo did it on purpose out of contempt for the player: "They said BOTW was too focused on fighting the same three enemies? Ok, now let's give them a whole world to do the same thing, and now they'll have to do it because they'll get an important resource, lol!".
The more you analyze TOTK, the more of these elements you'll find, scattered throughout the game, involving basically every gameplay mechanic, and often on a more aggravating level than in BOTW.
The menus, for example... TOTK takes menu management to the point where it's almost unbearable, and while it can be tolerated at first, it starts to become one of those tedious factors that undermine the player's experience. From building gadgets to fusing your weapons, from choosing a skill to shooting a damn arrow, you'll be accessing menus, sometimes several of them, all the time, for dozens and dozens of hours, to do the most trivial things.
I think that in a few years, people will compare BOTW and TOTK and give BOTW a big advantage in terms of the final experience, because of the more nuanced idea of intimate interaction with a world, a more organic gameplay that privileges the player's freedom, but without giving them so much freedom that they feel like they're breaking the game every thirty seconds, and so on. Some people will disagree and say that this is yet another example of the infamous "Zelda Cycle" and say that TOTK is "objectively" better because the numbers are bigger, but I think that with time, more people will see the absurd problems with TOTK and understand that it was a step in the VERY wrong direction. This current confusion of people lost, not understanding why the game is causing this backlash, is only because it's a very recent phenomenon. Things will become much clearer in a few years, and people will see TOTK as an example of how NOT to make a game, especially if your intention is to provide a healthy experience for the player, instead of making everything a thankless, exhausting task that will "break" even the biggest fans of the series.
Two words: copy paste. The rito/gorons couldn’t even upgrade your armor. Link forgot he already bought the gear, the whole game is amnesiac.
@@ceel4223 Yes, Nintendo decided to do BOTW again, but now focusing on a new gimmick. This was so disappointing. I think most of the players were hoping that now the world of BOTW would be full of unique things because after all, the guys worked on it for 6 years, only to discover that nothing really interesting was done, and the whole game is a copy + pasted BOTW, ignoring pretty much anything from that game for convenience.
But that only explains part of the recent backlash, in my opinion. Yes, it's disappointing to see that instead of BOTW 2, we have BOTW again, but now the focus is on building garbage. But even if you judge the game on its own merits, ignoring its relationship with BOTW, it is still a game that starts to get immensely tiring and tedious after a few hours, one of the games with the greatest potential to burn out players ever done. A beautiful example of bad design.
@@jpa3974 wholeheartedly agree.
I think people being drawn to negative discussion on things is because of just how much positive discussion there already is about things.
Not that negativity doesnt just harbor more attention on its own because... thats what i came here for lol.
Also, some social media sites like twitter and tiktok are so heavily ruled by negativity.
At this point its clear nintendo doesnt care about the timeline. They just dont. They want to just make sandbox games with related elements. They arent Fromsoftware, making a carefully crafted world with attention to lore is not their thing.
I have a zelda gaming channel and I have to add that my best videos on totk are on fused weapons and cool things you can do with recall. Mostly fused weapons though. All of my videos on any other zelda game get hardly any views.
Imagine if the depths weren’t copy pasted every square inch, then you’d have loads to cover… Oh well. Better luck next Zelda.
I think there was quite a bit of lore. But I wonder if this timeline ends here if its on only one. However I will continue to watch Zelda content
Great video! I made a video recently about this topic, and I agree. Love seeing you guys talk about this :D
Me personally, I thought it was a cool follow up to BOTW. Not a perfect one, but it’s exceptionally serviceable imo. I think one of the main problems is no DLC or updates to keep the game’s water afloat. This game could be so much more than just this single player adventure. Not a lot of gamers these days play games for the story. It has great gameplay mechanics that could be expanded upon, but when that seems to be ignored as well, I guess I can understand why people can get a little burnt out from this game. I think it’s a damn good one, don’t get me wrong, but think back to how BOTW had additional DLC. I think TOTK could’ve benefited from that as well
Quit the 🧢. Totk is a tech demo
Fantastic discussion! Forgive the long comment, but y'all gave me a lot of thoughts.
Going off of the 'we did this to ourselves bc of our own expectations' thing, I think one interesting thing about the fan anticipation & expectation aspect of TotK specifically, is that there are probably a contingent of passionate Zelda fans who fully expected TotK to be: Breath of the Wild, but with everything I love about old Zelda games smooshed into it too this time. Y'know? Whether that was a reasonable expectation to have is up for debate, but I can 100% understand the impulse, because there are few things more painful than to have a franchise that you LOVE start to become something that just...kinda isn't for you/doesn't gel with you anymore. It's a tough pill to swallow, and many fans would probably rather say that TotK was a 'bad' game or 'not a zelda game' rather than accept that franchises change (something that's unfortunately simply necessary to keep them alive). We're in a new era of 3D Zelda, whether people like it or not. Tears doubled down on BotW (while fine tuning it quite a bit, imo) rather than being 50% old and 50% new, or what have you, and that was a huge bummer for some people. I understand and feel for them. That doesn't mean 3D Zelda will never be their thing/for them again! As one of you said, this is only the second attempt at figuring out what open world Zelda looks like. I have full confidence that the Zelda team will either eventually figure out the perfect balance between the older formulas and the new, or maybe use this as an opportunity for the 2D games to give us what we love about 'classic' Zelda, while the 3D games continue to diverge in this new direction. Who knows! That's part of the fun, seeing what on earth they're going to do next. I adore ToTK, but it's by no means a perfect game, and I think it's totally okay for people to feel disappointed or frustrated by it. That's super valid. But I think the intensity of those emotions will wane into something a bit more measured over time when the wound doesn't feel so fresh. It's possible that, for at least some people, the game may end up being more enjoyable a few years down the line once we can just kinda accept it for what it IS rather than what we WANTED it to be.
Also, obv I'm just one viewer, but I am def still super interested and actively seeking out TotK content (and zelda content in general) and can't wait for people to keep making more theories & various related videos about the topic as time goes on! I'm sure it's not just me. Personally, I'm super excited to see more people's thoughts on a whole bunch of stuff in the depths (the dark skeletons, the ancient observation deck, the ancient underground fortress, the bluepee den, the underground cemetery, the fact that a freaking well has a direct connection to the depths), discussions about the hidden royal passage/escape route & other noteworthy caves, some of the more involved sky islands (starview and lightcast island), who these owl, boar, and dragon lords/gods of the mazes are--and that's all just off the top of my head! I'm sure there are a zillion things I would never think of that y'all will bring to my attention in future videos, giving me stuff I didn't even know I wanted. It's a massive game, and like y'all said, I'm sure that as people start to really dig around looking for ideas in the coming years, some fantastic stuff and really interesting revelations will get made.
ANYWAY, sorry to hear that view counts are dipping and possibly stressing a lot of Zeldatubers out.
Thank you for such a well thought out comment
fire comment tbh
As someone who didn't like BotW much (I thought it was okay for what it was but it was still one of my least favorite Zeldas), this was basically what happened to me. I thought, perhaps naively, that 6 years was enough time for them to see and address what I thought of as massive flaws in BotW's design and adjust their approach. Maybe I was just in an echo chamber, but most of what I didn't like were fairly common criticisms about that game.
That wasn't really what the game turned out to be, though. I had suspicions about it in the immediate lead-up to release as it became more and more obvious that none of the usual criticisms of BotW were being addressed, but I still felt a little betrayed at the total double down on literally everything about BotW, good and bad alike. It stung, because it gave the impression they had no intention of actually improving the game's weaknesses relative to other Zeldas at all.
Regarding what you said about 2D Zelda, though, I feel like that was another thing that caused TotK's expectations to balloon. There haven't been any truly new mainline top down Zelda games since the release of TFH eight years ago. There haven't been any single player ones since ALBW came out ten years ago. Before BotW came out, this was basically how Zelda's release schedule went, big 3D game with two smaller top down games in between. After BotW came out though, this just kinda stopped for some reason. So literally all there was, for 6 years, was BotW, which I don't think really helped TotK's case. If there had been a smaller, non-remake top down game in between that would have given the community a bit more to talk about than having to foist all expectations on TotK and would have done a bit more to appease those traditional Zelda fans who would inevitably be disappointed at TotK's double down.
I am just done with the switch era, and TOTK cemented how I feel, it was a great time that will forever be special for me, the games are fun to play and there is more to play on switch but the magic is gone, no game is gonna fulfill the magic of the early switch era games, next Zelda is confirmed to be in a new world and with new hardware I am sure Nintendo will think up of elements we will never imagine. I enjoy the switch but my hopes are in the future, I am done with BOTW’s Hyrule, I will remember the fun times I had in BOTW and TOTK, it’s time to move on for me
I hope yall just go more speculative. I really liked that recent video on gerudo cities
I know for me, I'm even regretting buying the special edition TOTK switch Oled. The developers don't care about their history, so why should I? It goes beyond the timeline, there are things in BOTW that are completely forgotten in TOTK, many things also don't make sense. I long for STORY, THE TRIFORCE, and I'm done with this open air formula. Yes exploring in TOTK is great, but to me that's not a Zelda game. Link to the past is more a Zelda game than TOTK, the 3d games that started with OOT are true Zelda games.
Let’s be real, ALttP is prime Zelda, but I get what you mean. 100% agree.
@@ceel4223 Yea I was just using the 2D zelda framework as an example.