Goodbye NX, hello Switch

[cmdrdredd]

Yep, also we've had plenty of Zelda games that change up the ALttP formula. Side note - I'd pay for a remake of Skyward Sword without the horrid motion controls.

Yeah the game itself was not bad, the controls ruined it.

 

[Red Hawk]

Yep, also we've had plenty of Zelda games that change up the ALttP formula. Side note - I'd pay for a remake of Skyward Sword without the horrid motion controls.

To the extent that Breath of the Wild did? I mean, there was Majora's Mask - a fantastic game, make no mistake - and...? Doesn't seem like "plenty", to me.

 

[nurturedhate]

Yeah the game itself was not bad, the controls ruined it.

I hate motion controls.

To the extent that Breath of the Wild did? I mean, there was Majora's Mask - a fantastic game, make no mistake - and...? Doesn't seem like "plenty", to me.

The Adventures of Link, Wind Waker, Four Swords Adventure, Spirit Tracks.

 

[Red Hawk]

The Adventures of Link, Wind Waker, Four Swords Adventure, Spirit Tracks.

You realize that Adventure of Link was made before A Link to the Past, right? And Wind Waker was very much so in line with the conventions ALTTP started. FSA was more of a spin-off game, and Spirit Tracks was a handheld game, not a main series home console game.

 

[nurturedhate]

You realize that Adventure of Link was made before A Link to the Past, right? And Wind Waker was very much so in line with the conventions ALTTP started. FSA was more of a spin-off game, and Spirit Tracks was a handheld game, not a main series home console game.

Were those goalposts heavy? 90% of the overworld in WW is ocean. You sail around... Platform doesn't matter, it's a Zelda game made by Nintendo. Full stop. If I would have used a link between worlds as a point about the "standard" zelda formula no reasonable person would have brought up that it was on a handheld... Nintendo experiments. They are usually successful at it. BotW is a solid Zelda game. It is a Zelda game. Can the argument be made that some people wanted a far smaller number of larger dungeons over the massive amount of shrines and the 4 beasts? Sure. Doesn't make it not a Zelda game.

Honestly, I'm not even arguing with you. I'm right there with you that it's closer to the original zelda than most of the other games.

 

[JujuFish]

Platform doesn't matter, it's a Zelda game made by Nintendo. Full stop.

Indeed. Some of the best Zelda games were handheld.

 

[JujuFish]

There's also the argument to be made that Breath of the Wild is closest in spirit to the original Legend of Zelda than any other game has been, before they started adding all the conventions with the later games.

Um, no? The original Zelda had actual dungeons, with boss battles, with weapon variation, without weapon degradation. If anything, A Link Between Worlds is the closest.

 

[Chaotic42]

You guys are really making me not want to dust off my copy of the new Zelda that I bought but never played.

They need to make a Link to the Past clone with randomized dungeons and overworlds.

 

[nurturedhate]

You guys are really making me not want to dust off my copy of the new Zelda that I bought but never played.

They need to make a Link to the Past clone with randomized dungeons and overworlds.

You should 100% play it. If not for Super Mario Odyssey it would be game of the year.

 

[Oyeve]

You should 100% play it. If not for Super Mario Odyssey it would be game of the year.

And skyrim.

 

[Chaotic42]

And skyrim.

I've already beaten Skyrim on the PC. I've got Zelda for the WiiU, I just haven't been in the mood.

 

[Oyeve]

I've already beaten Skyrim on the PC. I've got Zelda for the WiiU, I just haven't been in the mood.

I've over 500 hours on skyrim on the pc. Got it for switch and love it all over again.

 

[Chaotic42]

I've over 500 hours on skyrim on the pc. Got it for switch and love it all over again.

If we get a couple of strong third party titles on the Switch, I'll pick one up. I can't really justify spending $500 for a Mario game I'm kind of lukewarm on.

 

[ImpulsE69]

The new Zelda is Zelda in name (and skin) only. It's really more like a more boring Witcher 3 or even Far Cry. The complaints about the 'newer' Zelda games weren't because they were the same formula, it's because they made them 'easy' not that interesting. BoTW isn't a bad game I'm sure, but it certainly is very repetitive and just not that interesting unless you simply like to explore and 'combine things' (which I can't stand in games). Now....I never made it far enough to fight the giant monsters...but it didn't really hold my interest long enough to get that far.

 

[JeffMD]

I felt BotW was the next step in shadow of colossus, where you added people and monsters to the abandoned landscape.

So no xenoblade 2 love yet? couldn't put it down after getting home from work. Got to work one more day then 2 days off.

 

[drbrock]

BOTW was a soild game. IMHO Mario completely crushed it.

I am a Zelda first person but BOTW was just too boring and kind of a grind fest. Going through a billion boring shrines was the worst. The same enemies over and over got annoying. Overworld was beautiful and I loved walking around in it but after about 15 hours in I got bored and just grabbed a ton of bomb arrows and beat the game. I know there is DLC but I won't be picking it up unless they change the enemies.

I agree with the guys that said it was closest to the original NES game. It was just too long and repetitive. I would buy Zelda Maker or a clone of ATTP or ALBW in a heart beat.

Mario was unique and captured me from start to finish. The new donk city and campaign final mission gave me goosebumps.

 

[gorcorps]

You should 100% play it. If not for Super Mario Odyssey it would be game of the year.

Speak for yourself... Horizon Zero Dawn far surpasses Zelda in my eyes, and frankly I think a lot of the Zelda love is due to the franchise name, and less to the game itself. I enjoyed my time with BotW, but I certainly wasn't blown away by much other than how good it looked when playing in portable mode.

It's a very good open world action game, unfortunately there's a TON of open world action games it's up against and IMO the things it does right balances out with what I think it's lacking. The lack of enemy variety has already been mentioned, but in this day and age it feels wrong to have as little story and character development as Zelda had. It's a typical save the princess story, with a short backstory as to why you're have to track down these four champions, but it uses the cliche "you don't remember anything!" story telling trick that's just lazy. The production values in fleshing out an amazing single player experience felt so much higher when playing HZD than BotW that I have to think anyone that claims BotW is better just hasn't (or can't) play HZD.

Anyway, at the end of the day this has simply been an amazing year for gaming and all of these games are worth the full price tag associated. They'll all scratch slightly different itches for different people, but they should all be played

 

[purbeast0]

I'll be shocked if Super Mario Odyssey doesn't get GOTY from like the big media publications. That game is like the definition of perfection to me in a game. It's just crazy how like EVERYTHING in the game has a meaning. And you don't really realize that until post-story when going back and getting moons. I played Mario Odyssey on 2 flights until my Switch died which was probably a total of like 6 hours, and even then I barely got to do more than going back and finding moons in New Donk City and then the water level right after that. It's crazy how much there is to this game after you beat the story. I probably have around 680 or so moons at this point and 100% plan on getting them all. And I like how you can find them out without having to resort to the internet to tell you where they are. I'd rather pay hint Toad 50 coins to point me in the right direction or talk to the parrot than look up a guide online, and that's all I've done so far.

 

[SteveGrabowski]

Speak for yourself... Horizon Zero Dawn far surpasses Zelda in my eyes, and frankly I think a lot of the Zelda love is due to the franchise name, and less to the game itself. I enjoyed my time with BotW, but I certainly wasn't blown away by much other than how good it looked when playing in portable mode.

It's a very good open world action game, unfortunately there's a TON of open world action games it's up against and IMO the things it does right balances out with what I think it's lacking. The lack of enemy variety has already been mentioned, but in this day and age it feels wrong to have as little story and character development as Zelda had. It's a typical save the princess story, with a short backstory as to why you're have to track down these four champions, but it uses the cliche "you don't remember anything!" story telling trick that's just lazy. The production values in fleshing out an amazing single player experience felt so much higher when playing HZD than BotW that I have to think anyone that claims BotW is better just hasn't (or can't) play HZD.

Anyway, at the end of the day this has simply been an amazing year for gaming and all of these games are worth the full price tag associated. They'll all scratch slightly different itches for different people, but they should all be played

Yeah I thought Horizon was significantly better than BOTW. BOTW is at #5 on my GOTY list, and that's having not played Mario Odyssey, Yazkuza 0, Wolfenstein II, or AC Origins yet. I enjoyed the combat way more in Horizon and there was actually a compelling story. Combat was just downright boring in BOTW, fighting the same six or seven enemies with reskins the whole game got old after a couple of hours. The exploration and climbing is amazing enough to make me rate the game an 8/10, it really is the best game I have ever played for exploring and the physics was really interesting in it. But everything else about the game was just lackluster. If it was even average in combat and story it would have been at least a 9.5/10 for me based on the strength of the exploration.

 

[renz20003]

Sold off a chunk of my retro collection for a switch and
Mario . I didn't want to plunk down $370 on myself before the holidays.

I'm satisfied with it, the system os is snappy though very simple. I would have liked miiverse carry over as well. Build quality seems sufficient sans the kick stand.

Mainly bought it for Mario, I played Zelda on my Wii U. Will prob pick it up again at some point along with skyrim.

 

[zerocool84]

Mario Odyssey should definitely win Game of the Year from every publication. There's no doubt about it.

 

[RearAdmiral]

I finally beat Zelda yesterday, after wandering around Hyrule for quite some time. Perhaps I'll need to pickup the expansion at some point.

 

[zerocool84]

I finally beat Zelda yesterday, after wandering around Hyrule for quite some time. Perhaps I'll need to pickup the expansion at some point.

It seems like the Champions Ballad, the second part of the DLC which just came out, is supposed to be very good. I'll eventually get to it but have such a backlog of games right now.

I wandered around in Zelda a lot too, before I even attempted too get to Hyrule Castle I had around 95hrs in the game. And that's without attempting to actually try to get korok seeds.

 

[RearAdmiral]

It seems like the Champions Ballad, the second part of the DLC which just came out, is supposed to be very good. I'll eventually get to it but have such a backlog of games right now.

I wandered around in Zelda a lot too, before I even attempted too get to Hyrule Castle I had around 95hrs in the game. And that's without attempting to actually try to get korok seeds.

Aren't there something like 900 seeds? I think I found 200 or so just exploring. I'll probably play some Mario for a while and maybe come back to Zelda after.

 

[nurturedhate]

Aren't there something like 900 seeds? I think I found 200 or so just exploring. I'll probably play some Mario for a while and maybe come back to Zelda after.

Yep. 900.