One of the most keenly awaited sequels in Nintendo history is finally here, but can it live up to the legacy of Breath Of The Wild?
Nintendo has done this before. Since there is generally only one or two mainline Super Mario or Zelda games per generation, the only way they can create additional sequels in a timely manner is to cannibalise a previous game to make something new. Rather than being a lazy way to make a quick buck this practice has previously resulted in Ocarina Of Time giving birth to the classic Majora’s Mask and Super Mario Galaxy 2 evolving from a small DLC expansion to one of the best video games of all time.
Over the years, the accolade of being the best game ever made has been assigned to many Mario and Zelda titles and no less deservingly than with 2017’s Zelda: Breath Of The Wild, to which this is a direct sequel. But Tears Of The Kingdom doesn’t work like most other Nintendo sequels, even those that reuse the assets from previous games. Instead of creating a new map it reuses the existing open world from Breath Of The Wild and then adds to it… and adds to it and adds to it some more.
Because Nintendo has revealed so little information about the game, prior to release, it’s important to emphasise that while Tears Of The Kingdom is piled high with layers of new ideas and alterations it is much more similar to Breath Of The Wild than many will be expecting. That’s not a criticism but it is important to understand what Tears Of The Kingdom is, before you begin to dissect how and why it works so well.
The story of Zelda
No matter what score a game gets, nothing is perfect and you can certainly see where Tears Of The Kingdom tries to address some of the complaints levelled against its predecessor. One of the few problems it creates for itself, is that in its attempt to ensure it remains accessible for new players, that haven’t experienced the last game, there’s very little direct story connection between the two titles. To the point where, in terms of the plot, this doesn’t feel like a sequel at all.
As with all Zelda games, Tears Of The Kingdom is very light on storytelling but it begins with Link and Princess Zelda exploring caverns under Hyrule Castle, as depicted in the first teaser trailer. Therein they awaken a very familiar ancient evil and Zelda mysteriously disappears. This causes Hyrule Castle to rise and hover just above the ground, allowing a poisonous miasma called Gloom to escape and create sinkholes in the land, as ominous sky islands appear overhead.
Several years have passed since Breath Of The Wild and while some returning characters do refer to your past exploits, they do so only in passing. Ultimately, the best evidence for the fact that a great victory has recently been won is the reconstruction work that’s going on, with building supplies scattered everywhere – which play directly into the game’s new abilities.
If you’ve already read our preview of Tears Of The Kingdom, or watched the 10 minute gameplay demo from Nintendo, you’ll be well aware of the four new magical abilities. They replace those from Breath Of The Wild and include the relatively straightforward Ascend (instantly phase through any object above you) and Recall (rewind the position of any medium-sized object in time).
They may sound odd in theory but in practice they’re both very easy to use and are exploited in a variety of clever and unexpected ways, being useful for everything from traversal and combat to all the game’s many and varied puzzles. However, the real heart of the game is Fuse and Ultrahand, both of which revolve around combining different objects together and utilising collected resources.
How Fuse and Ultrahand work
Fuse works by melding together any two weapons or items. So, for example, you can fuse a sword with a rock to make a rock hammer or with a staff to make it longer. But you can also combine objects, adding a fire fruit to a staff so it sets enemies aflame, a Lizalfos tail to make a whip or a dazzlefruit to shields so that if someone hits it, it lets off what is essentially a flashbang.
Fuse is also a means to address complaints about the way Breath Of The Wild handled weapons, as while they will still break with use they’re much more durable if they’re fused. In fact, there’s a conceit that the Gloom has decayed all weapons everywhere to such a degree that they’re virtually useless if you don’t fuse them.
Ultrahand is the real game-changer though. A lot of smartasses will try to compare it to 2008 flop Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts, which allowed you to create vehicles out of component parts, but Tears Of The Kingdom is far more open ended than that. It allows you to combine multiple objects together and make whatever you want, from simple ramps and rafts to buildings and aircraft.
Wooden beams, panels, and wheels from the building supply drops are your primary source of raw materials, but there’s also a wide range of Zonai devices that include everything from flamethrowers and rockets to water hydrants, time bombs, and fans. Together with the other resources this allows you to make everything from a simple hot air balloon to multi-functional land and air vehicles.
Ultrahand also comes in handy for simply moving objects – much like Magnesis in Breath Of The Wild – and solving puzzles. We were particularly pleased with ourselves when we realised that we could reach a chest on the far side of a gated room by knocking down some icicles, melding them together with Ultrahand, and then using them to latch onto the chest and drag it towards a small hole in the wall.
We were even prouder when, while trying to get across Lake Hylia, we realised the only resources nearby were a few planks of wood and some giant 4×4 tyres. We have no idea if the paddle steamer-like creation we made was how the developers intended for this problem to be solved but the fact that it worked was hugely impressive and a testament to the game’s faultless physics system.
The return of dungeons
Ultrahand is involved with many environmental puzzles in the open world but it’s also a big part of shrines and… dungeons. Nintendo announced just days before launch that Tears Of The Kingdom has traditional dungeons and they’re not lying. Just as fans hoped, there’s half a dozen of them and they all have their own individual art style.
However, they do feel more like a halfway house between the Divine Beasts of Breath Of The Wild and a ‘proper’ Zelda dungeon, since they’re often quite small and very focused on whatever new ability they introduce and an additional gimmick – electric attacks and light-reflecting puzzles in the Lightning Temple, for example.
As well as dungeons you also still get over 150 shrines, which we found to be amongst the most enjoyable parts of the game. There’s generally less gimmick and combat-orientated ones than before and because they’re able to use the Ultrahand and other abilities they’re wonderfully varied and inventive. Some are so clever that when the solution clicks you can’t help but mentally applaud the designers.
One where you have to protect blocks of ice with wooden planks and another where you have to build your own cable car system are early standouts, but there’s an interesting, and often unique, idea in almost every one. As with everything else in the game, there’s clearly an officially intended solution, or two, but it’s also possible to contrive solutions that it seems unlikely the developers ever imagined.
Not only does the game have dungeons but there are many quality of life fixes that are also clearly aimed at placating fans, including several ways to climb more reliably when it’s raining. It’s rare to see Nintendo respond so straightforwardly to fan feedback but the new recipe cards, that remind you of ingredients for meals you’ve cooked before, are another sign that they do listen.
Another complaint about Breath Of The Wild was the lacklustre bosses, but while the ones here are much more distinctive, they’re still not up to the best standards of the series and we actually enjoyed many of the mini-bosses and random encounters more. That’s in large part because the bosses are purposefully traditional in design, since that’s what fans wanted, and require specific solutions to defeat, which goes against the freeform design methodology of the rest of the game.
An adventure of your own making
Mechanically, the combat hasn’t changed one iota from the original, which seems a little disappointing, but because of all the new options in terms of weaponry it still feels surprisingly fresh. One of our favourite moments was when we came across a sleeping Hinox on a bridge and since we knew how tough they were from the last game (there are new monsters but also all the old ones) we knew a frontal assault wasn’t the best idea.
A supply drop was nearby so we got the idea to build a cart, pile it full of bombs (which are now a resource, not a rune) and push it towards the Hinox, lighting the bombs with a fire arrow as it woke up. Once again, the plan worked perfectly, exactly as we envisioned, which is a marvellous feeling.
Eventually you get the ability to recall previous creations instantly – so you don’t have to recreate them from scratch every time – as well as the chance to use pre-made designs that are often more visually impressive and versatile. You can even create them while lacking all the parts, paying for the artificial replacements with an abundant collectable resource.
We’ve had Tears Of The Kingdom for just over two weeks and we still feel like we’ve only scratched the surface in terms of some of the ancillary activities. Although there’s still not much actual story there’s a little more structure to the adventure this time, as you try to work out what’s happened to Zelda and save the different kingdoms from the various calamities that have engulfed them.
That means you lose the elegant simplicity of Breath Of The Wild, where technically you can go straight to the final boss battle from the very start, but there was no need to repeat that trick a second time.
There are now different scales of side quests, from trivial to ones that seem indistinguishable from story missions and provide significant, unique rewards. The subtle signposting is as clever as ever, but we have no idea if the route we took through the game will end up being typical. You can tackle the first four temples in any order you like but, in our experience, we saw very little of the sky islands for the first half of the game, once you get past the initial tutorial area.
Sky Islands and the Depths
It varies by region (each one overlooked by a tower, which you have to activate in a different way) but in many cases the sky islands only amount to a relatively small collection of platforms. By comparison, entering one of the sinkholes in the Depths reveals a completely unexpected new map that Nintendo has barely alluded to pre-launch.
While FromSoftware certainly took some inspiration from Breath Of The Wild for Elden Ring, the Depths are where you can see that the admiration is mutual. The bleak darkness of this antediluvian world is very un-Nintendo and while the tone of the game as a whole is never as macabre as Majora’s Mask, exploring in the near pitch blackness, as Gloom-infected monsters lurch out of the darkness at you, is an unexpected thrill.
Although the Depths are as large as the overworld they’re less geographically varied, with few landmarks, but this is in part so you get more use out of vehicles, as there’s more space to drive and fly them around than on the surface. Part of the Goron quest, for example, involves you trying to make your way to the Fire Temple using a giant jury-rigged 4×4 as legions of monsters attack, illuminated only by your feeble headlights.
You’re accompanied in that quest by a Goron sage, who has a special ability that can destroy rocks. Each race has their own sage, who work as the equivalent of champions from Breath Of The Wild. Except this time, they fight alongside you and, thanks to the excellent AI, are genuinely useful and proactive. When you complete their mission, you then get to use an avatar version of them at any time, calling multiple ones in to help you whenever you want.
Tears Of The Kingdom is an astonishingly large and varied game but what’s most surprising about it is that it never feels overwhelming or abstruse. As many different systems as it has, each one is very simple on its own and all interact with each other logically and organically. Constructing more complex objects using the Ultrahand may frustrate some, since you do have to manipulate components in 3D, but all but the very basic creations are automated if you get frustrated.
Tears Of The Kingdom flaws
What’s especially surprising, and impressive, is that the game makes no effort to provide hints or solutions for anything that isn’t mission critical. If you can’t solve a shrine then it’s not going to get solved unless you come back and try again or give in and look it up on YouTube.
Some may find that irritating but considering how many recent games *cough* God Of War Raganarok *cough* have had an AI companion tell you the solution the moment the problem is presented it’s a relief to be treated with more respect for your intelligence. Where other games treat puzzles as a brief and trivial distraction before the next fight or cut scene, here they’re one of the most important and challenging elements of the game.
In terms of complaints, we can envisage some being upset that the graphics haven’t improved since Breath Of The Wild, which was originally developed for the less powerful Wii U, but it’s clear that Nintendo has used the extra processing power for the physics engine and AI instead – which seems a far more interesting choice than just reducing the amount of object pop-in or smoothing out rare occurrences of frame rate slowdown. In terms of what it’s doing on the underpowered Switch, Tears Of The Kingdom is a technical wonder but we suspect it won’t be widely acknowledged as such.
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In the end, the only meaningful problem is the danger of déjà vu, where even much of the music is the same as Breath Of The Wild. But while the map has been reused there are changes everywhere and nothing is ever exactly the same in terms of how it looks, where objects and secrets are placed, or how quests play out. Using Breath Of The Wild as its foundation is the only way Tears Of The Kingdom could exist, given it would be impossible to create everything it contains from scratch.
In that sense this feels like a once in a lifetime experience, one that has only come to be because of a specific set of circumstances, as Nintendo inevitably look to create something entirely different on their next console. It may not be as groundbreaking as Breath Of The Wild but the Ultrahand elements alone are an incredible achievement and ensure Tears Of The Kingdom can stand proudly alongside the best of the series, as one of the greatest video games of all time.
Zelda: Tears Of The Kingdom review summary
In Short: An excellent sequel and one of the best Zelda games ever made. A follow-up that builds upon and refines the achievements of the original, while adding many new and equally innovative ideas of its own.
Pros: The Ultrahand and other abilities are genius and organically woven into all the many other gameplay elements. Huge game world, with three separate maps and some incredibly clever puzzles. Highly impressive physics and AI, with some useful quality of life improvements.
Cons: The ground map being the same is not an issue but some elements, notably the combat, are barely changed at all from Breath Of The Wild. Dungeons and bosses are still a little underwhelming.
Score: 10/10
Formats: Nintendo Switch
Price: £59.99
Publisher: Nintendo
Developer: Nintendo EPD
Release Date: 12th March 2023
Age Rating: 12
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