The Reason(s) Many Are Dissatisfied with Tears of the Kingdom 

Hey there folks, I might add that this video is one of multiple ones that ended up in a place I call "Editing-Limbo". In a nutshell, I wasn't sure about finishing the video mid-editing. Simply because I generally feel that I kinda suck at these discussion videos, with the language barrier being the biggest issue for me. Maybe some things that I intend to say, end up being received completely different than I had originally intended. The recording itself is a bit older, and I was still wondering if I'm one of the few who felt rather weird about TotK. But now there are more and more videos that talk about its issues and... heck, a billion times better than me haha. I'd just like to apologize for the few pop-ins that you'll see here and there. But I still stand with the things I'm saying in this video. I'd like to hear your opinion on that matter. Feel free to share it here, respectfully. Personal attacks and overly toxic behavior will not be tolerated.

Discover the mystery of the Zonai and where Zelda went...five minutes after you start the gsme and realize theres no lore on who the Zonai are and Zelda is in the past.

I have to question why ganondorf was just chillin in a bubble bath for the entire game until you show up

I felt alone on this, then I saw people calling it out. I still think BOTW is a great game, TOTK just felt more like a DLC.

If i didnt play botw i would have gotten more out of totk

I agree with most of your points. My biggest confusion for this game is it was in deployment for 5 years or so (longer than BOTW dev time), built off BOTW's map and game engine, and there's not much added or done for that amount of Development time, and having the base of the game already made. It just seems odd that with that amount of time, you think it would be filled with new content in comparison.

the 1 main thing i wanted from TOTK was for it to not feel like BOTW after waiting 6 years and thats all i felt

I just hated how everything had some fog or haze in TotK making it really hard to see.

Totk also really disappointed me and it felt like a dagger in the back of Zelda lore. The Triforce is no longer there, instead there are tears that have no origin or explanation. In addition, they appear to be far stronger than the power of the gods. And that is simply wrong on every point. They could have just used Triforce pieces instead of the tears. These had often been shattered into 7 parts.

Ultrahand is only “enjoyable” for streamers and content creators. If you are just playing through it is a novelty that quickly becomes and annoying. With many of the shrines I played the solution was to build a thing. I already know what needs done at the start, but I have to spend 20 minutes to build something to complete the objective. This is not a puzzle, it is a chore.

I would call myself a traditionalist when it comes to Zelda. I enjoyed the old games a lot and I wasnt that much of a fan of Breath of the Wild. However, I could tell that the game tried something new and was pretty successfull at it and had a lot of qualities that I felt could become part of the future of Zelda. I hoped that Tears of the Kingdom was gonna bring back the Zelda magic that I felt was missing. Instead it brought more of the same with less meaning. Playing the game felt like playing a game for the second time. The only highlights for me were the leadup to the Wind temple and the Lightning temple, as well as pulling out the master sword. These were the more structured and linear bits of the game. So for me it just kinda proved to me what I already desired. More linearity. But instead we got a worse, more expansive, but empty version of what Breath was. So I was, and am, dissapointed. Especially with what Aonuma said about linearity not being good. I hope he changes his mind or I mightve seen the last of the Zelda that I loved since I was a kid and played Wind Waker for the first time. I believe they can strike a balance between old and new. But now... Im not convinced they will.

Oh, we exist friend. TotK was disappointing.

I think there are a lot of good things about this game, the mechanics are very unique. However I think TOTK it's essentially just a worse version of BOTW, people seem to drop the game a lot earlier, I think the reason is because we already played a better version of this game before. BOTW was not a perfect game, but it made everything it wanted, pretty much flawlessly, while TOTK has a bunch of little problems with the story, the exploration and mechanics. TOTK has a lot of good things, but I think it's fair to say that it was a lazy sequel.

6:28 You fcking nailed it, if the trailers were like that (aka honest) I wouldn't have bought this game ever.

I think part of the magic of TOTK is revisiting those areas you knew about in BOTW. Hell, the first thing I did right after I got my paraglider was go to Terry Town because I wanted to see what Hudson was up to. But that's all TOTK is really interesting for me, it's the revisiting of areas you already knew about and them claiming it to be "a sequel" when there was barely anything told about it was boring. In fact TOTK made me like a character I used to dislike in BOTW with Sidon. Sidon's whole character in TOTK is the most sequel-like reference we'll get to BOTW with him trying to overcome Mipha's death and take place for the throne. You can tell Sidon is growing in TOTK and that's what made me love him, it's too bad his ability kinda sucks. Also to the people who say "oh story doesn't matter, why bother" I have three words for ya: AGE OF CALAMITY!!!

I had to think over my thoughts about TotK after watching this... Firstly, I had a brilliant time with the game and I can recall many key highlights of my playthrough. 200 hours in more or less a single sitting and I enjoyed all of them. TotK is a fantastic game, my opinion on that isn't changed. However... One thing that has always been consistent with me after beating a Zelda game is contemplating its feeling, atmosphere, story and characters. I remember feeling exceptionally giddy over the plot-twist right at the end of A Link Between Worlds or how right at the tail end of Skyward Sword, I suddenly felt a deep connection to Fi and remembered how at the end of Wind Waker, she is basically sitting alone at the bottom of the sea, and all the emotions that came with that. I can honestly say I never had any such feeling after BotW and TotK. In that respect, the games do feel really, really hollow.

It annoys me thst Aonuma has essentially shown in recent interviews that he has 0 respect for everything the series achieved in the past and it honestly seems like he hates those older games pre botw.

- Horrible Temples - No amazing bosses - No unique items (jump shoes, hookshot, mirror shield etc.. - An entire sky and underground section empty and devoid of content

This game disappointed me so much that I'm doubting if I will ever get the next entries in the series, the last nail in the coffin was the lack of continuity from BotW. Besides, I don't get people who say the story didn't matter in Zelda when Nintendo itself said that it didn't share the title of the sequel because it would spoil the story. They didn't have to make a super complex story, a simple, yet heartfelt story like BotW's one would have been perfect. Thanks for the subtitles man.

The story is the main reason I play video games. It's like watching a movie or reading a book for me. Sure there are a handful of games that don't have a lot of story that I can enjoy anyway, but in general there needs to be a story and a through line brining me from point A to point B. Some exploration is cool, but it can't be too much, and there have to be actually interesting things to discover, which for me personally both BotW and TotK lacked. And it can't be to long between the story beats either. If I want to progress to the next story related mission or dungeon or whatever it is, it should not take more than a couple of minutes to do so, but in TotK I spend like 1 real life hour just traveling from point A to point B, just to be told I had to go back and fetch something or I didn't have enough money to buy X item or whatever. A game with a good story can have somewhat lackluster gameplay and still be enjoyable for me, but a game with no story needs some super stellar game play to keep me interested, and neither BotW or TotK has that for me. I'm not interested in building just for the sake of building, and I'm not interested in exploring this version of Hyrule, which is quite forgettable to me. It's massive, but not as iconic as some of the older ones. And I'm definitely not interested in this combat where some of the most common enemies can one or two hit me after several health upgrades, yet take like 20 hits to kill for me. Challenge should be for the bosses, but the only boss I got to before quitting TotK, the Wind Temple one, was probably the easiest enemy I faced, maybe because it felt more like a traditional Zelda boss.

Tears of the Kingdom, more than any other Zelda game, feels like a cash grab to me.

Gotta be blunt here, TOTK just didn't bring anything truly new to the fans. Saying this as somebody who put hundreds and hundreds of hours into BOTW, I got TOTK...and I was so quickly disappointed in it. It felt like DLC for the first game. It felt like they copy and pasted BOTW and just added shallow, small things meant to make it 'different'. It was really, really saddening. The trailers had me so hyped because they sold the game on being a new adventure! With new reaches of Hyrule to explore, and a mysterious, darker story - Obviously, that wasn't what we received. The islands and the underground felt empty, the open world was almost too open still, the story was a letdown, the characters were still sort of forgettable, the music was worse than BOTW, there was no sense of mystery or even the same ADVENTURE feeling of BOTW that came from exploring an entirely new Hyrule because we've already seen this Hyrule. Not to mention the building mechanic was cool...to start off with. But it so quickly turned gimmicky and annoying to have to use. It just doesn't feel at all like a game that was in development for six years. It feels lazy. And boring. And repetitive. I'd rather keep playing BOTW, and I'm practically never this negative about the game it was just...so disappointing. It makes me sad.

Honestly, i agree 100% with you. I loved botw and i loved totk but after beating it and sitting down ti digest it all. There really isnt all that much different to botw, it annoys me more so that totk really was just an over glorified dlc. I wanted to love the story but its so bland. The final boss is amazing and had me thinking zelda was gunna stay a dragon and have a consiqunce and a bitter sweet ending...........................but nope Honestly im glad the game isnt getting dlc, its about time we see a new hyrule and hopefully get a good story!

People said that if you removed the Zelda name from BOTW that people wouldn't recognize it as a zelda game. TOTK literally doubled down on this. Which is also why the game is a direct sequel with the same world, they really needed to REMIND you that this was a zelda game.

One of the things i miss ever since BotW is the rememberable music that the Zelda series is known for. It adds so much to make a Zelda game FEEL like a Zelda game. Also TotK was nothing more than a huge DLC for BotW but pretty much the same game. 6 years and that is what we got? I'd say screw the open world aspect and actually get back more into a liniar game. But i fear that we'll get a ToTk 2.0 in the future with even more towers, 5000 korok seeds, 2000 shrines (we need dungeons ffs) and people will hype it up as a masterpiece... i lost somewhat hope for the Zelda series.

Xenoblade 3 has been my "salvation" because I like stories, and I didn't completely dislike TotK's but it's meh, on the other hand xenoblade 👀

I enjoyed a lot of totk but it did feel hollow or tedious at points. Haven't even gotten around to all of the shrines. Map is so large but still feels empty and a bit rehashed after botw. Something overall just doesn't feel right. Good game, but doesn't scratch my Zelda itch. I miss the slightly more constructed progression, smaller but substantial side quests, and puzzlebox dungeons

I loved TOTK for about 10 hours, and then the more I played the worse it got. So disappointing.

5 minutes into the game a fully powered, Master Sword wielding, post Calamity Link gets attacked by 3 keese. Zelda asks "are you okay?" BOTW never happened. And where did my Champion's abilities go? They gave them to me. I have so many frustrations with TOTK.

Honestly, even the environmental story telling in BOTW was super basic compared to practically every other open world game available.

I agree with everything you brought up. Props and respect to everyone who genuinely had fun playing this game. I personally didn't and if this is the direction Zelda is going to take, then I believe my time will be up with the series. I will forever be grateful though for the impact the series had on me growing up and all the fun and memorable experiences it gave me.

I didn't even realize that the people in Hateno don't know Link... that's whack.

Yea I agree with most of what you said. I liked the game a lot but it just didn’t offer the same sense of discovery for me since it’s essentially the same journey in the same world where you are going to all the same locations. The shrines and abilities were overall a step up from botw but that’s about it. I enjoyed playing botw for the first time more

Definitely one thing I don't understand is why there just doesn't seem to be any real remnants of the events/story of botw. In an interview, someone asked Aonuma about where the Shiekah tech went and he essentially said: "Don't worry about it.".

This was an interesting watch. I'm still playing through Tears of the Kingdom and I really love it, but I can understand why the game is so divisive. I honestly haven't really done much story content at all, but the things I've seen or heard from the game's story are pretty disappointing and I wish that it could have been better. I'm also really not a fan of how most NPCs don't remember Link at all for some reason. While I do enjoy the Depths and the Sky for what they are, I wish they could have been expanded more. Your idea for corrupted Sheikah technology in the Depths was really interesting and I think that would have made it a much less boring area. With the Sky, I wish we could have seen more unique areas. I get that they're supposed to be empty to some extent, but I would have liked to see more mini dungeons, more proof that people might have lived there, and, while it may be a little silly, more references to Skyward Sword. I feel like being able to visit the ruins of Skyloft would have been an awesome addition and they really had no excuse not to add that considering how areas like Lon Lon Ranch and the Sealed Temple are present on the surface. Overall, I still think the game is great and I'm still having a lot of fun with it, but I hope that the Zelda team takes all of this criticism to heart and makes the next game even better.

Wouldn't it be cool when while riding Mineru's Construct, the enemy constructs dont attack or show a sign of respect, as im sure it was Mineru who crafted them

They spent 7 years making a building system that is cool for 2 hours. Or until you learn how to make an airbike. Then you have the rest of your playtime experiencing the stuff they did not put much effort into. I played the game and beat it in 12 days. And since then I have not touched it in over a year.

Personally i felt like the shrines were too easy. Botw had better puzzles

How sustainable of a business model is it to keep bringing in new fans and then alienating them? If my math is right you’ll eventually run out of fans plus they might get pissed and keep their kids from playing. The success is temporary

I paid $70 so they could take away my bike...

I'm going to start by saying... I love this game... With that being said... I expected so much more for the time it took to put this together. The story was weak, the dungeons weren't "Zelda" dungeons , and the master sword should be unbreakable, losing power on a red boko is wack. The sky and the depths were awesome at first, then became very copy and paste very quickly.

People disliked TotK because it's filler upon filler upon filler, that the story is shit and told in the worst way possible, that the sky is barren and empty with nothing to see, and its mechanics while impressive on the Switch, don't gel with the overworld. It feels as tacked onto the game world as the elements are glued together. It's an abomination. The world is a game world, not a believable world. It's a playground, with nothing to do. You keep teleporting and dropping from above. Nowhere is interesting or arresting. You're always spurred onward, and there's no natural flow. It's as confusing as the game it blatantly draws from : Fenyx Rising.

You're not wrong, I play for the story like Xenoblade and this video made me realize why TOTK couldn't keep my interest up, I like all story parts but compared to everything else, it's too little 🤔

The marketing was a disaster in my opinion they showed the weakest aspects of the game that the game designers clearly didn't care about at all. I didn't watch any of the trailers because I wanted to go in completely blind so I expected BOTW 2 and not any classic Zelda elements like a bigger focus on story or lore so I wasn't disappointed but I could see why someone would be 100%. The game definitely could been a lot more ambitious but i'm not mad with what I got at the same time every game have to be within a certain scope or it just won't ever release you can think of what if for any game if you try hard enough. While I wish we still got traditional 3D Zelda games on the side but it sounded like after Skyward Sword developers they were super burned out with that formula so the only way would be them making a brand new team just for that old style which I would love to happen.

I wish the story had better pacing and was liniar

My thoughts are that the tutorial area in the Sky Islands was excellent and set me up for a big disappointment with the rest of the game. It's like Fruit Stripe gum. It tasted good for a few seconds but the flavor wore faded quickly.

Once the wow factor wore off, it became quickly apparent how repetitive TOTK is. For example, I feel like the only reason that a single battery cell upgrade costs 100 cores is to justify the need to explore the depths to grind enemies you've already fought. The fuse mechanic is fun, but it feels tacked on. As another RU-vidr states, all of the puzzles were dumbed down to a Blues Clues level IQ... "what obvious contraption should we make with the pieces the developers conveniently placed here?"

A while after my hype died down I had to come to the sad reality that this was what I waited 4 years for and it just wasn’t as great as I thought it would be

The series being story centric at 9:10. Most story neighsayers would just say something about Ocarina fanboys, that the series was only that way from that point on. But in reality, even though the tech limits resulted in "low story" elements, the earliest games in the series still featured that story concept. The actual set up was done in manuals, which most people dont realize were integral to the orignal experience. You were expected to read them. And in there you had stuff like Impa being the one to find Link and ask for help saving Zelda. And the fact Adventure of Link was a direct sequel while Link to the Past was a prequel to both. So there always was a sense of time and basic lore to set up a proper adventure.

the story, they could have uncluded way more. I will try to give an example, even though noone will read this. You can collect for example diffrent armor pieces, of diffrent zelda's. They are just randomly found. I find it sad there wasnt a way you could find them more targetted. I remember in older zelda games, you could feel the NPC lives, you could feel in for example in majoras mask how the sisters in lon lon range were talking how the younger one can have milk before the moon comes down. There is such a lack of it in this game. I have no connection with any NPC in BotW and Totk

I don't get why Aonuma didn't like Majoras Mask for not following the formula (so they modified MM3D a lot for the worse) yet nowadays he states how not sticking with the formula is the way to go

They could have set the game in the past. This would give them the chance to not only make a Story, they could also flesh out the Zonai and it would explain why all the Sheikah Tech is missing. They could have made it so that the events of the Flashbacks end the same way, Ganondorf gets imprisoned and Link and Zelda return to the present, one way or the other, to deliver the killing blow.

Really nice video! To me personally, Tears of the Kingdom definitely lived up to my expectations and is one of my favorite games of all time. I loved how open the game felt, I loved the exploration and I loved how Nintendo remixed the BOTW world and gave it more life, energy and content through more meaningful sidequests, caves, wells and added two additional biomes which were really fun to traverse. I also loved the music too. I wouldn't have spent 110+ hours in the game if I disliked it lol and I do think the hate it's getting rn is just a product of it not being traditional like the others since BOTW received similar hate back then which is understandable but I'm glad the Zelda team is carrying the team in a new, fresh direction and am very excited to see the future of it and see what else core Zelda mechanics they will reinvent. Saying all that though, I do have some criticisms. I really enjoyed the story of this game, I genuinely think it is one of the most solid/best Zelda stories we've gotten. It had a lot of HYPE moments like the Imprisoning War Cutscene, All the Ganondorf scenes lol, the Hyrule Castle sequence, the Wind Temple Arc and the entire final battle. The story of this game felt much more than BOTW imo and added some cool lore and interesting tidbits to BOTW's great environmental storytelling. The issue I have with it is how the story progression/storytelling is handled. You could easily get spoiled due to the game's nonlinear story progression which kinda hurts it since you go from meeting Sonia to accidentally seeing a tragic event regarding the people you met. In addition to that, I'm disappointed that we're not getting a spinoff/game that takes place in Rauru's era to see all that transpired because there's some really cool lore that is wasted if this is the only game that will bring it up. So I hope there'll be an Age of Calamity type game where we see what happened back then because the game has some great stuff that isn't expanded upon lore wise. But I do think the plot twists and plot moments land much better than Breath of the Wild and find the memories much more engaging and interesting than its predecessor. Lastly, the Sky was very disappointing. I REALLY enjoyed exploring all of them but they were too little. I do understand from an interview that adding more would've cluttered the game and most likely destroy the Switch but I still wish we could've gotten more! In conclusion, imo, Tears of the Kingdom is one of the best games I've ever played, despite its more glaring flaws. I think fans instead of having civil discussions, needlessly disrespect the Zelda team and the game just because it wasn't their cup of tea. Calling something poor game design just because it doesn't suit your tastes is very ignorant. We all have different tastes and they should all be respected. Looking forward to what is to come next and looking forward to your other great videos Spark! -Eren

I have looking for this exact video for so so long. I personally loved BoTW. Were there issues? Yes, but only because it was the first Zelda game with a truly modern touch. But my issue with TotK is how much it tries to reuse ideas from BoTW, but fails to do so. The shrines, the towers, “purah’s” technology, blue spirits helping you with powers, flashbacks, etc… The Champions powers worked so well because they were genuinely useful and had emotional value attached, in TotK, not only are the sage abilities copies of the Champions’, but we also have to sit through a dumb cutscene 4 times that brings no emotional value. They refuse to acknowledge where all of the old shrines and towers went, likely to be more approachable for new players, but in doing so they completely ignore the games direct prequel. The sage idea comes out of nowhere and we just ignore the tri force , and when we finally get to see Zelda again she is spirited away, so we get to see flashbacks that mean nothing to us because they have nothing to do with Link, and they set it all so far in the past that it doesn’t feel like it happened at all. boTW had such a large and often empty map to emphasize the feeling of being alone, a beautiful sort of melancholy and solitude. TotK tries to replicate that, adding even MORE empty land like the depths and 3 million differebt caves, while at the same time trying to show us that Link is no longer lonely, as he has 5 annoying sage characters following him all the time and they often get in the way or activate wrongly because they’re each tied to the same button. Throughout the game, it felt like they did things just to add a cool new function, like somehow the upheaval ruins ALL weapons so now we get to make ugly weapons, and don’t get me started on how autobuild is the dumbest thing ever. The more I played, the more the wow factor went away, and the more I realized that I hated going through a bunch of small plots that had no meaning and no character development. At least in BoTW, malice affected things around us, like the overtaken Duvine Beats Blight Ganons and Malice Naydra, and the past had an actual impact on characters in the present. In ToTK, that threat is nonexistent except for major plots that basically say “oh the upheaval brought new monsters 😀” and have nothing to do with Ganon, whose taking a nap I guess

Because its a cheap cash in.

Making zonai non human creatures and making a zonai being the first king really is what threw off the whole story for me. Like idk how the fuck in any world that makes sense and honestly I can't even comprehend who thought that was a good idea

people were still playing and discussing botw for years after it came out, meanwhile, from my perspective, everyone has pretty much already moved on from totk. the lame story, the game following the exact same beats, the re-used map and empty depths and sky, the lack of any continuity.... totk didn't feel like a full, finished game to me. so disappointing.

ToTK still ranks in the top 10 favorite Zelda games of mine. Besides the story, I think BOTW had better music. BoTW is my second favorite, but no Zelda game will ever beat OOT in my opinion. The introduction to open world, the amazing music, the awesome story, and the fact I experienced the game as a kid makes OOT my overall favorite.

Personally, I liked Totk story. It’s not the best in the series, sure, but I love how everything comes full circle, and how they make you really want to save Zelda and destroy ganondorf. In other Zelda games, that was just the thing you expected to do by the end of the game. In this game though, seeing Zelda’s sacrifice and knowing she’s trapped as a dragon that you constantly see flying around, and knowing that it’s ganondorf’s fault, motivated me like no other Zelda game to save Zelda and destroy ganondorf. That being said, I know that other Zelda games have compelling Zelda and ganondorf characters, so I was trying to figure out why I felt more motivated to save Zelda in this game. I think, oddly enough, it partly comes down to the fact that the story is not super linear and that you have so many options for what you can do at a time. Hell, you can have plenty of fun in this game completely ignoring the story and just defeating monsters, exploring, and building devices. Because of that, it feels like taking on the main story and engaging with is more of a choice, whereas you just _had_ to do it in most previous games. By making it feel like a choice to engage in the story, it is that much better and rewarding when you see everything come full circle.

11:20 that sounds so cool. I was also thinking at the beginning of the game about cursed horror guardians looking like their concept arts walking in the darkness. I thought the game would be much darker because i heard once it's going to be the darkest zelda.

This game was a rushed production. I expect something new with the release of the nintendo switch 2. propably produced simultaniously to totk.

The game is BOTW's map with what feels like absolutely random content thrown at it. A lot of that also feels and looks junky (e.g. most weapons you can forge or monter horns), BOTW was a game with its mechanics and world in harmony and it all "makes sense". TOTK just ruins it by giving you the ability to build stuff to bypass anything or using the sky island as jumping pads and scout positions. And the map is the laziest reuse ever... OMG, it is so lazy. They could of truly change settlements and create A LOT of new settlements so that the map told the story of a kingdom that is being rebuilt but instead it is the same map from BOTW that is now not even telling the story of dispair and abandonment that it did. It then adds all this repetitive content and new "locations" that feel like choirs. Zelda BOTW was my first Zelda game btw... and finishing TOTK was a massive uphill, I won't be replaying it ever again unlike BOTW.

As soon as I saw the “nuts and bolts” building concept I was put off from the game. Also open world games are dead

I enjoyed the gameplay and exploring. Everything else is worse or recycled. BOTW should of been a single entry. TOTK just makes a mess of things.

I was the person who got all the spoilers first. Between that, the copy pasted cutscenes, copy pasted depths, copy pasted sky islands, the overworld being one I have played before with the legaly mimumum changes made and very static, the ease of optimising the fun out of play, the fact that the puzzles were still in a disjointed genertic other space, the fact that the dungeons sucked, getting a glich I think (but dunno, it may have just been badly made) on the town defence section... I could'nt finnish the game. Waste of my time and money.

The fact they made 2 new areas that are even more shallow and boring than botw map is kinda amazing.

No interest in the sandbox. If I wanted a complex physics engine Id play Little Big Planet

It’s not storytelling exactly but campaign-that’s where Tears falters more than Breath. Campaign design was disjointed and paltry.

The thing that hampers this game the most is that we're not in the middle of the action where Zelda is dealing with during the Imprisoning War, we're stuck in the present dealing with the aftermath of the Upheaval. If Link would've went back in time WITH Zelda then while Link still has his destroyed right arm, we could've taken ahold of Zelda and made her the main character for the journey. Being in the past also would've been a great way to change the map enough to make it feel different to the way it has been, Death Mountain is further out and VERY hot, the cold mountains reach a new starting Rito village, the desert goes into the canyon and gerudo can be a bit more hostile depending on the situation. There could be a quest that allows Zelda to help link by collecting Sundelions to heal Link's arm or to even go to the main dungeons to gather orbs of light to heal him. When I saw Zelda falling into the darkness I thought she would've been either corrupted due to malice (or Gloom in this game), OR she would've landed in the depths where she'd have her own adventure. So much missed potential all because Link was stuck in the present, if I can make all these cool ideas off the top of my head then surely the big brains at Nintendo could've done it as well. Hire me Nintendo, I'll at least give you a reason to have a good story lol.

When the game came out and I spent the first 3 months 100%ing it, I hated myself for wasting my life and investing myself in it so much. The game was so flawed and it felt like everyone was sucking its toes, heralding it as the game of the year, while I was clenching my fist of rage. Recently, everyone started hating on it, I even watched the 3 hour rant, and everything was fully accurate about how I felt

Thank you for this video. It definitely feels like those of us dissatisfied with the game are being whiny and entitled, but you excellently articulate the reasons for why our feelings are valid. Nintendo made a fine game, but a mediocre Zelda game.

In my humblest of opinions I feel like tears of the Kingdom has a lot of mechanics that I think feel great, but the stories were it lost its luster. I feel like this is more of a deal see than an actual sequel. I feel like we should have explored way more with the underdog if you're going to have sky islands make individually different sky islands, maybe sky Islands for each region. I also feel like maybe even having an underwater section that would have also be pretty interesting. We never really got to explore in the deep depths of water, but they said I felt like this game should have been the mix of wind waker breath of the wild Twilight, princess and Majora's mask I also feel like the Zora should have been the villains of the story. Think about it. They bring this new technology to a world that didn't know it. This energy comes from nowhere. It's explicit has no origin. What if it was actually what caused the blight to begin late? Remember Gannon is never the cause of the issue. The issue would have always happened, which would have been very interesting to see play out. What I generally feel like is that the Zelda franchise between breath of the wild and tears of the Kingdom needs one more game to polish out everything else and to truly finish the story

Personally loved the game, think people hate on it for no reason. It definitely has flaws but there comments make it sound like a trash game and I’m sorry it just isn’t bad quality at all. As for the points in the video, I will run through them. Ganondorf presence: Bro outside of Ganondorf being the main point of the memories, his phantom Ganons are causing all the regional phenomena and 5th sage that make up the whole main quest. Plus, it is entirely related to the reporting side quest and Master Kohga. Sure he wasn’t physically there but he is still controlling it and no other Ganondorf shows up that much. Hell, you can argue he has more impact than any other ganondorf on main story expect maybe OoT. Sky islands: could have been good to see more but they still include many great islands with the thunderhead, water and wind temples, Zonai set islands, various archipelagos and great sky island. Could there have been more? Sure, but watching the trailers they were never being diseving, outside of great sky island you could see in trailers there wasn’t much. Plus the game still has a high emphasis on verticality with the towers sending you up and completing the challenges. Story: it’s not the best story but it’s simple done well. For the memories claiming out of order, I hate to be that guy but it’s so obvious the order. Even if you stumbled on to a geoglyph, you literally have no idea you are looking for the tear, and you likely will find the intended first tear, which takes you to the forgotten temple which gives you the order. You can’t say it’s bad design when Nintendo literally tells you the order and you ignore it. Unanswered questions: Some are answered, some are through intuition, like Ganondorfs power with the stone, while others definitively needed further explanation, i agree, but it also makes the community so much better as Nintendo gives us the pieces and we as a Zelda community work together to find out, especially timeline placement and obscure things like bargainer statues and Zonai stones While I respect your opinion on the game, sometimes people just need to look at the game for what it is, rather than expected. You said it could have been so much better, and there are rooms for improvement but so many things in the video were about expectations which weren’t met and Nintendo is never going to be able to fit everyone’s expectations and therefore you need to look at it for what it is, which is a phenomenal game

"You shouldnt have any expectations" is the dumbest excuse for a game. Here i have a tissue. I expect it to clean up messes. Should i not expect it to do that?

my main issues with totk are the same as botw lol. the shrines are a sloggish chore of baby level puzzles with some needing a google search when they are too vague like the constilation put ball in hole puzzle or the 2 twin peak puzzles from botw, the weapons break after 5 swings at a rock instead of just not breaking, the side quests are just grindy or just collecting "insert item". though it has good game design in terms of encouraging exploration for the most part its only really for weapons armor and health. it would be nice to be rewarded with dungeons and actual fun side quests lol like with its inspiration skyrim lastly the story is just... meh. ignoring that the fun parts of the game are obvious with as i said it does a good job of encouraging exploration, the combat is super different which made it some of the best a zelda game ever had, the dungeons are decent but not really head scratchers and though i dont think the mechanics belong in a zelda game of all things i do enjoy the sandbox mechanics. i dont think i got it all right as its been like 5 years since i last played botw so i am just basing my critique with memory comparisons with botw

It would've been great if Rauru was the spirit guide the whole game. Maybe in a state of memory loss or something in a different body. I didn't like any of the companion spirits running around. And never touched their abilities (except tulins) after the temple was completed.

I would have been way more interested in a real origins story. It could have still tied into BOTW and the Zonai but been a prequel to where Ganondorf's history is really fleshed out. I thought it was interesting how he had affection for both his monsters and the Gerudos. And how no one seems to hold the Gerudos at fault for his actions despite them very clearly feeling resentful of Hyrule. Ganondorf made clear that he hated Hyrule because it was so prosperous which was in direct opposition to his harsh life in the desert. People just label him "inherently evil" and that's true but it's so multi faceted. He has a lot of depth and they really need to pivot into something other than Link and Zelda. I'm also really tired of the goofy characters. I hate whatever the Rito character is and the Goron. They annoy me to no end. The melancholy of BOTW made it far better. IDK I just don't like games where the good guy ls always wins in the end.

underrated channel i swear, remember me when u get famous >:)

*To further BotW's sheer superiority, I will say this:* TotK's story is bad, Fs with pre-established key lore aspects, absolutely shatters all the Master Sword's reputation, unga bunga buff Dorf with little to no ambition other than "me strongest there is" uninteresting, nearly everyone forgot who you were despite this game taking place a mere 4-6 years after Wild, Rauru existing is an insult, no Fi, no breaking of the Demise curse despite it being falsely hinted being the case what with all the Skyward Sword PR this game got (I distinctly remember Skyward Sword being advertised as heavily linked to TotK somehow which, again, is misleading as on Nintendo's part), no dog petting, no hookshot spiderman swinging with the physics being suuuuch a driving factor in these newer Zelda games, no underwater exploration instead a damp dark smelly overgrown cave can't see jack, COLLOSAL missed opportunity to hitch the princess with her handsome knight in shining armor, no stakes since Zelda's sacrifice was reversed giving the story little to no agency or consequence, Link as a protagonist felt nonexistent feels like everyone else was the star of the show not the guy who's saving all their 🫏s, no Link backstory before any of this went down aka no Arryl 2 or Granny 2 aka NOT WIND WAKER, didn't make me cry like Twilight Princess, dungeons are STILL NOT dungeons (pulling a couple levers to open a door and then be treated with literally the same copy-paste cutscene at the very end with each champion? Yeah naw), sky islands hardly anything worth noting although they are pretty asf to look at, I was expecting a totally NEW revamped endgame super Saiyan master sword golden tier 4 legendary new hilt new everything but naw same design with a booboo scar and hilariously less powerful... hoverbike autobuild pales in comparison to THE Master Cycle As a game, sure, it's leagues above BotW but BotW will never be topped as a one-in-a-lifetime *experience* TotK was an overblown $70 DLC and I'm tired of pretending it's not. Mid.

TOTK just erases one of the best games ever made in an attempt to "fix" it.

I think you're spot on. I've been playing Legend of Zelda since the 80s, I should take a break. Haha, but anyway. Tears of The Kingdom is very lacklustre. I mean, we waited 6 years for that? Tears of The Kingdom as we know it could've been released about 2 years later. back in 2019. like you said... it wasn't worth the wait. they gave us true masterpieces a lot quicker before. Tears of The Kingdom is mindless "fun" in a lame game. there's no mystery or adventure at all. I like Breath of The Wild but for this type of Legend of Zelda, 1 game is enough. no sequels. Nintendo should've gave us a new Hyrule to explore or take the current Link out of this Hyrule. Link & Zelda could've been transported to the past or alternate version of their world. Nintendo has become lazy and don't care about creating actual adventures for people to play. I don't think they know how to make masterpieces like past Legend of Zelda games anymore. this is why we get these lacklustre "adventures" now. plus, there's a new fanbase out there too. they enjoy these mindless games that are full of repetitive side quests and collecting clothes. this is all I see in today's games now. even Super Mario Odyssey is full of that lame crap too. I don't want Breath of The Wild or Tears of The Kingdom to define Legend of Zelda in future but I'm afraid that is already happening. sadly we've lost what Legend of Zelda actually was. this new fan base wants the same lame game over and over again. they love repeating stuff. new adventures, new puzzles & new anything is too much for their tiny brains. they're stupid. it's not Legend of Zelda anymore. it's Zelda Scrolls now. oh and Rauru & Sonia suck so much. they're easily the most boring characters in Legend of Zelda. I don't like this Ganondorf either. he looks dumb and the samurai style for him looks ridiculous especially since he's a Gerudo. plus, it's supposed to be Legend of Zelda not Legend of Zonai. this revision is extremely lame. I'm sorry for the long comment but I had a lot to cover regarding this game. good video btw

I barely got through BOTW, because of how frustrating the game was to me, as opposed to it being fun. However, I let myself get convinced that TOTK was better🤦🏿‍♂️. Needless to say, I never regretted buying a Zelda game more than I regret buying Minecraft, I mean, "TOTK"🙃

Good opinion piece. Zelda: Paddings Of The Kingdom is a logical expansion of Zelda: Padding Of The Wild's ideas, so nothing really new, just more padding. Even durability system is a way to pad the game. There is 8-12 hours of mediocre gameplay and messy story, almost everything else is padding. Zelda as an openworld sandbox game is an absurd idea and devs clearly don't know how to make it work (linear story with an openworld exploration after the story ends is the way). It is surprisingly disconnected for a game that was started as DLC for BotW. As of now it's a mix of Assassin's Creed 1 and FarCry 2 and neither of those are truly good.

*To further BotW's sheer superiority, I will say this:* TotK's story is bad, Fs with pre-established key lore aspects, absolutely shatters all the Master Sword's reputation, unga bunga buff Dorf with little to no ambition other than "me strongest there is" uninteresting, nearly everyone forgot who you were despite this game taking place a mere 4-6 years after Wild, Rauru existing is an insult, no Fi, no breaking of the Demise curse despite it being falsely hinted being the case what with all the Skyward Sword PR this game got (I distinctly remember Skyward Sword being advertised as heavily linked to TotK somehow which, again, is misleading as on Nintendo's part), no dog petting, no hookshot spiderman swinging with the physics being suuuuch a driving factor in these newer Zelda games, no underwater exploration instead a damp dark smelly overgrown cave can't see jack, COLLOSAL missed opportunity to hitch the princess with her handsome knight in shining armor, no stakes since Zelda's sacrifice was reversed giving the story little to no agency or consequence, Link as a protagonist felt nonexistent feels like everyone else was the star of the show not the guy who's saving all their 🫏s, no Link backstory before any of this went down aka no Arryl 2 or Granny 2 aka NOT WIND WAKER, didn't make me cry like Twilight Princess, dungeons are STILL NOT dungeons (pulling a couple levers to open a door and then be treated with literally the same copy-paste cutscene at the very end with each champion? Yeah naw), sky islands hardly anything worth noting although they are pretty asf to look at, I was expecting a totally NEW revamped endgame super Saiyan master sword golden tier 4 legendary new hilt new everything but naw same design with a booboo scar and hilariously less powerful... hoverbike autobuild pales in comparison to THE Master Cycle As a game, sure, it's leagues above BotW but BotW will never be topped as a one-in-a-lifetime *experience* TotK was an overblown $70 DLC and I'm tired of pretending it's not. Mid.

i like Totk, no matter what others say. Ive had a lot of fun with the sandbox aspects, the exploration, and seeing what changed in the world. to me Totk had plenty of stuff to do, and im still not done. i do agree with your opinion on the story though. i wish we had more going on in the present, all there really was, was the dungeons, phantom Ganon and fake Zelda parts. and i too, wish that ganon was more active and important. like, idek what bro is doing underground, propably just waiting for me to find the remaining koroks. i feel like they couldve made the memories playable or something, to give us more interactions with the story. but all in all im happy with TotK, the joy of finding new enemies, new stuff to do and see, finding a new change in the world (even if its small) and trying out new things with the abilities, (which i really like.) i like it, for its gameplay and the fact that they allow you to be free and creative. But i do also agree with some of your points here, like the story, shrines, sky etc. but i really do like the game and will continue to have fun with it in the future, even though the story was dissapointing, i still really like the gameplay and world. but yeah... thats just my opinion.

I love breath and tears honestly but yall are right on point with why to be disappointed I do kind of like the idea of the story taking place in memories

I really think Link should've been in the past instead of Zelda and you should've been able to play a magical instrument to go between the Past and Present. Oracle of Ages did this amazingly well. Seasons too, how cool would it be to be able to change the environment in real time? For me Tears of the Kingdom isn't a bad Zelda game, its a bad sequel.

Absolutely...i lol'd at the "yellow trees" comment. They tricked us!

Breath of the Wild had a superior story with better shrines, characters, and side quests. The part that was disappointing the most is that before the game came out Nintendo was selling to everyone that the main reason why people should be excited about the game is the fact that we were going to the sky. That was the main selling point. Come to find out that it’s just small copy and paste islands with the same exact shrine puzzles for nearly all of them and the two sky dungeons are incredibly short and easy. The depths were just as tedious if not worse. This means that 90% of the entire game still takes place on the same surface and the same hyrule as Breath of the Wild and its not as impactful or meaningful as visiting these areas the first time around in Breath of the Wild. Tarrey Town is a perfect example. I’m not trying to build cars and planes. I’m trying to play a damn Zelda game and this was by far the worst Zelda experience.

Tears just doubled down on all the aspects I didn't like about BotW. Nintendo should have been like "enough fuckin around!" When most of the game was already built for them from the previous game it should have gave them enough development time to go hog wild. There's an asset flip like Majora's Mask and then there's one like Tears of the Kingdom. It's a big pay out for extremely little effort. And unfortunately I'm afraid Nintendo is gonna look at the numbers because they are a business and say that's what we want cus that sells.

I actually played Totk first before Botw and loved it.

I think I’m done with TotK. I’ve put about 3-4 hours into, and it’s just irritating. I’m not the biggest fan of BotW, especially with the breakable weapons along with a lack of dungeons and story, but it was fun and engaging enough for me to finish it. I even put 100+ hours into it. But TotK? I don’t want to have to spend so much time in shrines yet again, and now there’s more of them. Also, the fusing mechanic is downright awesome, but needing to fuse every weapon is tedious and they look dumb afterwards. I’m someone who likes ancient weaponry, and fused weapons in TotK are just laughably stupid looking. If they could combine something like OoT and BotW in terms of gameplay, story, and lore, that’d be a killer Zelda game in my opinion. Oh well. I was lucky enough to score a collector’s edition of TotK, but I guess it’ll likely remain a shelf ornament at this point. Here’s to hoping they return to form with the next Zelda entry, should there be one. I imagine there will be, but you never know.

In my opinion, Totk Ganondorf is the coolest of them all😎

Since I already beat the game, it's safe to say that Totk truly was a great experience for me, and to this day I still play it everyday. I already poured over 300 hours into it and I still have many things that I want to do or try out. The gameplay has been significantly improved from the last game and the sheer amount of content is just absolutely insane. But I do agree on your take on the story. Especially when it comes to the continuity from Botw. I, like many others, also wanted a much more linear and interesting story, at least more linear than Botw. But in all honesty they kind of screwed up in the story department. Also, as you stated in the video, the sky islands and the depths had way too emoty and felt like a really missed opportunity. Part of Botw's main strengths was the environmental story telling. Some good examples being Akkala citadel and Fort Hateno. In totk, they should've put more environmental details that tell stories in the sky islands and the depths, making them at least more interesting to explore and speculate on. Because right now, there's just too little we know about them, and too little to even start speculating on. Despite all the flaws, I still think that Totk is the best video game that I ever played so far, and I really hope that Nintendo learns from their mistakes and make even better games in the future.

between japanese temple of time to making Human rauru a dog and claiming all the royal family descend from dogs and giving link a feminine longnailed dog hand I am just disgusted at the path they are choosing with this franchise story-wise.

I quit skyward sword halfway through because I hated the swing mechanic and some other little things but I might try the had version. I rushed through botw to finish it and never played it again. I have no intention of playing tears of the kingdom. Sucks cause the Zelda series was always my favorite and i have zero faith for the next one

TotK is my least favorite Zelda game of all time at this point. I liked, but didn’t love, breathe of the wild. When all we got was more of that, with Banjo Kazooie Nuts and bolts attached….well that is just inexcusable after 6 years. Mainstream reviewers giving it 10 out of 10s is setting a horrible precedent and sending the wrong message to Nintendo. You praise mediocrity, and you get more mediocrity.

Yeah you sadly hit the nail on the head with this one.

Simple reason: OLD MAP

in my personal opinion totk was a great game but ig there is always room for improvement, but far from a bad game