I get that they want to give you complete and total freedom to either fight Ganon right away or never fight him, but for God’s sake. There is literally no evidence that Ganon even should be stopped other than the fact that Zelda and the king told you to. There are several instances of civilization, and all of them are doing completely fine. I mean, you could argue that they have been rebuilding in the last few years and maybe the fact that Ganon has been nicely kept in the castle for the last century has given them a false sense of security, but look at Rito Village. That super tall spire of rock? Realistically, that thing would have crumbled at the first glancing blow from a single guardian laser. And you couldn’t rebuild that either. So Rito Village was completely untouched at least. But even the Divine Beasts were pathetic in their attempt to convince you into action. The Rito talked about some vague threat from Medoh’s cannons, but all it did was float there, not to mention there is absolutely no evidence of it firing at the Rito before you fly up. The sandstorm caused by Naboris never came anywhere near Gerudo Town and never caused them a single inconvenience. Rudania made it rain rocks. On a civilization of people who eat rocks. Not exactly a crisis. Rutah is the only one that came anywhere close to causing an immediate threat, but even then, civilization of fish people. What happened to OOT and MM, where you would literally see a town of happy people transformed into ****ing zombies before your eyes, or listen to everyone talking about how the moon is about to kill them all, or see that defeating a boss in the Snowpeak Temple brings spring back and stops the Gorons from actually freezing to death? If you have to create a world that literally does not care if you exist in order to give you freedom, you’ve sacrificed too much.
But what about the characters? Look at games like WW or TP where you had characters like Midna that had motivations, fears, backstory, hidden information, and comedy. Then compare that to this game's most involved character, Zelda, who only complains about living up to her Dad's expectations. The Champions are equally as stupid. Each Champion more or less says the same line to you, “Sorry, I couldn't help you then, but I can help you now!" and the characters are completely one dimensional. What happened to the Tetras and King of Red Lions? The Midnas and Malos? The Linebecks and the Happy Mask Salesmen? Instead we get boring two dimensional characters that we only have to interact with for about 15 minutes and then they become completely irrelevant. I mean, for ****’s sake, Groose’s little finger was more interesting and memorable than anyone in this game.
Not to mention the sense of urgency makes absolutely no logical sense, but I ain’t getting into that.
Oh my ****ing God, the world in this game is atrocious. The world is beautiful, I will admit. It is genuinely satisfying to look around from the high vistas onto the cel-shaded landscape. But that’s about it. The world is absolutely barren. People talk about how “alive” and “interesting” the world is and how its "resparking their childlike wonder" and I feel like we aren’t playing the same game. 80% of this ****ing map is open space. It’s like they took the OOT map and stretched it by 1000%. What makes exploring in this game in any way rewarding? Because you might find a Korok seed? Nothing in any game has felt more like the developer was coming out of the screen and giving me a giant middle finger. 900 of them? Their only purpose is to let you carry even more useless paper-thin weapons. Or, maybe if you're lucky you’ll find a chest hidden in the ground with another of the aforementioned paper-thin weapons that will break in 20 uses? Or perhaps, Rupees that I can 10,000 of by hitting a random stone on the side of a cliff, then can’t figure out how to spend? Or maybe adventurers fighting for their lives against 2 one-hit kill bokoblins, which you trounce them and get rewarded with a worthless meal you can effortlessly outclass by throwing a couple durians into a pot? Or maybe, a Hinox or a Lynel? You know, the same exact one you have fought 20 ****ing times, but this time maybe it’s a different color. Wow! And what do you get as a reward for fighting these “difficult” bosses? More paper-thin weapons that you will burn through in an hour and some parts you can use for elixirs that either will help you explore the empty world or help you fight more pointless enemies. Best design, 10/10.
