I’ve been revisiting anno 2205, infamously the ugly duckling of the Anno series of RTS games. I don’t mind so much the fact that it’s different, lacks customisation and random map generation - I’m bothered because the game is so slow to progress through on challenge settings, and it feels like a game designed just to artificially waste your time; in other anno games, you can always pull tricks to dig yourself out of economic crisis - selling off assets and surplus goods, completing quests for other parties, or taking loans. 2205 is very very confined in terms of what you can do to financially recover in the early game and forces you into a lot of military events.
Breath of the Wild and moreso Tears of the Kingdom.
Not bad games. But not Zelda games.
BoTW did not play into the metroidvania that I felt defined a Zelda game. Plus it lent on the “sim rpg” style of eating, cooking, durability, etc.
Then ToTK just felt like a gimmicky cash grab. Copy paste terrain, “gadget building” straight out of some steam early access game.
Ultimately, both games felt like a hodgepodge of stolen concepts, slapped together. And the adoration that they received just makes me hate them more.
I felt ambivalent about BotW mostly because I thought the destructible weapons were bullshit. I’m a completionist for Zelda games, and this one didn’t let me feel I’d completed it.
Still, I didn’t hate it. I guess the open world was impressive?
Then a few years later Elden Ring came out and I realized that BotW’s open world is actually garbage. In Elden Ring I see something that looks interesting in the distance. I go to it and find a new, unique dungeon. When I finish it, I get a reward, usually some kind of new weapon or spell. And even if that weapon or spell doesn’t fit my playstyle, I can totally imagine a scenario where it’s actually really great.
BotW I see something that looks interesting in the distance, and it’s just another fucking shrine or Korok seed or some other bullshit.
Sounds like I should try Elden Ring then. Though I loved BOTW.
There are a lot of things about Elden Ring that are great, but they’re just not for me. Like the whole gross aesthetic or the sweaty-rolly-dodgy combat. None of that works for me.
But in terms of creating an actual meaningfully open world, it’s a fucking masterpiece. I was constantly, constantly astounded at how full the world was. If that’s something you value, I can’t recommend it enough.
Same here, I really did not enjoy BoTW for many of the same reasons. It just felt more like a typical open world sandbox RPG, but that had been done better elsewhere. The lack of true bosses and level and constantly breaking equipment just made it unfun.
I kind of enjoyed BotW, but once the awe factor of the landscape wore off it was just a load of mostly unrewarding traveling to too many shrines that were too small. Combine the 120 shrines into like 20 that were 6 times longer each and they would have been cool mini-dungeons that I would have happily done, but as it was I was so bored. The main dungeons were good and I still put 80 or so hours in, but unlike everything pre-Skyward Sword I’ll never revisit the game.
Then Tears of the Kingdom was like hey here it all is again but there’s three times as much and this time there’s no WiiU version to emulate so the performance will be so much worse. Nah.
I don’t think most people consider Zelda games to be metroidvanias, so we shouldn’t hold that against those two games.
While I haven’t played TotK, I did enjoy BotW, just less than other games in the series. I felt it was unique, had great atmosphere and music, was incredibly polished… but very shallow. The long, well-crafted dungeons were replaced with many mini-dungeons that only rewarded you with more stamina or more health. Every single time. I eventually stopped even checking out the shrines I found. Also, I understand why they implemented the weapon degradation mechanic, but it’s definitely not for me. And the missing story. All the cool events in the world have already happened. Which fits the atmosphere, but it’s less fun, and gives us less story-driven things to do…
TotK fixed some of those issues, but I’m not sure it would make it enjoyable in your eyes. It follows a similar pattern of getting all the runes in the tutorial area before opening up. Each boss fight now has a longer dungeon that does give more unique abilities (and some that sort of open new areas) but not in the way metroidvanias do. Also weapons last much much much longer in BotW.
I had a similar experience. Played through BotW and enjoyed the game, but it didn’t feel like a Zelda game to me.