Take away my gamer badge if you want, but Breath of the Wild didn't feel like a Zelda game to me, it felt like a Xenoblade game.

It's not a bad game at all, of course, I just don't like it as much as say, Ocarina of Time or Windwaker.

I wasn't a fan of the lack of real dungeons, the small pool of enemies and the even smaller pool of bosses (Bosses are usually my favorite part of Zelda). It all got very same-y fast.

I usually don't like to complain about graphics, but I really wasn't a fan of Breath of the Wilds art style. There was very little texture or definition to anything, which made the characters faces look like a blob of colours sometimes. I usually love cell shading too. In my opinion, Windwaker did it much better. It probably helps that Windwakers character designs complimented the style.

It also sucks that Ganon was reduced to a generic evil purple cloud without any character other then "ROAR!". He was an interesting, intelligent and intimidating character in Windwaker (I know I keep using Windwaker as an example shut up).

I kinda miss when Zelda games had that Dungeons and Dragons kind of feel to its world, with uncanny things like redeads, wallmasters and deadhands living deep in dungeons that felt like no one had set foot in them in hundreds of years.

I hope the new Breath of the Wild is at least going to have some more variety than the first one.

EDIT: Oh, and the music. The Legend of Zelda series has some of the most memorable music of all time. However, BotW went for minimalist piano tinkling with no real memorable tracks. I struggle to think of more then one. Not saying the music was bad, but again, it just wasn't Zelda. Zelda music isn't supposed to be forgettable background piano ambiance.

  • Mardoniush [she/her]
    ·
    1 year ago

    I mean, we have. Morrowind can be completed without bugs in about 20min, even without taking the "back path" and avoiding the main quest (I think it's 7 min for that).

    Less if you don't count the v1.0 alchemy singularity as a bug. You can just walk up, get keening and sunder, stab the heart with them before you die, and win.

    • Awoo [she/her]
      ·
      1 year ago

      Morrowind's devteam was only 30ish people, I don't think it's comparable to what we refer to as AAA. When they started work on Morrowind there were literally 6 people working at the company after a string of financial failures leading to them being acquired by Zenimax.

      The fact it got made was a miracle of passion by its absolutely tiny team on the verge of the company ending.

      • Mardoniush [she/her]
        ·
        edit-2
        1 year ago

        That wasn't too unusual for a circa 2000 AAA game. Half Life had 30 People, Halo even fewer. KOTOR was about 30.

        NwN1 did have 75, though, but it had the additional challenge of multiplayer persistent worlds and a whole DM game system, along with a new engine when Morrowind had one half made.