Breath of the wild review: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild Review

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild Review

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild’s sheer freedom and sense of adventure is a remarkable achievement. Right from the start, the vast landscape of Hyrule is thrown completely open to you, and it constantly finds ways to pique your curiosity with mysterious landmarks, complex hidden puzzles, and enemy camps to raid for treasure and weapons. The fact that you can tackle any one of these things at your own pace and almost never get pulled to the main path is liberating, but the way all of Breath of the Wild’s systems fit elegantly into complex light survival game is even more impressive. I’ve been running around for over 50 hours and I still have plenty of mysteries left to track down and lots of wonderfully crafted puzzles to solve. I’m in awe of the scope and scale of this adventure, and I often find myself counting the hours until I can get back in.

The untamed, post-apocalyptic, techno-fantasy land of Hyrule is the main character in Breath of the Wild. Not only is it vast, beautiful, and filled with a diverse set of locations from grassy fields to craggy alpine mountains, but it follows surprisingly realistic rules that let you pull off solutions so intuitive that you might be surprised they actually work. The trees bear fruit, grass fields can be set ablaze, and even enemies and animals behave in a believable manner, based on the skittish and aggressive reactions I’ve seen in the wild. But the realistic touches don’t end there. Each object you encounter, from sticks to apples to rocks and metallic blocks, is made of a material, and those materials usually respond to forces like fire and magnetism as you’d expect.

It all sets up a surprisingly fun and responsive sandbox to interact with, and one I’ve rarely seen executed so well in an action-adventure game. If you think something should work, it usually does, and that led me to all kinds of fun and hilarious experimentation. You can stand under an apple tree with a torch and bake the fruit into a quick-healing snack before you even pick it, or drop a metal sword in front of a weaponless enemy and watch it get fried by a bolt of lighting. Meanwhile, Link needs warmer clothes to survive the cold and flame-resistant gear to near the volcanic Death Mountain. It’s consistently amazing to learn how all of these systems interact with each other while you play.

What elevates Breath of Wild above its contemporaries is its sheer freedom.

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But what elevates Breath of Wild above its open-world contemporaries is its sheer freedom, both in its non-linear questing structure and in your ability to climb almost any surface and travel in any direction once you leave the starting area. It is the heart of what makes this action-adventure game truly special and addictive. Like many open-world games it delivers on the implied promise that if you can see it out in the distance, chances are you can eventually reach it – but here, figuring out how to get there is more often than not a satisfying puzzle in itself, and one that never gets old. For instance, a tantalizing island far off the coast of the mainland was just out of my paragliding reach for the first several hours until after I’d upgraded my abilities. When I finally did, what took place when I finally reached my objective was a great twist that blew my mind – including finding an easier alternate route I’d missed.

That paraglider is easily one of the most useful tools in Breath of the Wild because it’s so versatile. You can use it to effortlessly glide across lakes and gaps or ride updrafts into new areas, and I often used each long trip across the map as a way to scan the marvelously lit horizon in search of clues or meditate on what I need to do next.

Every IGN Zelda Review Score

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From overhead you get a glimpse of what’s even more evident from the ground: each individual area has its own little ecology, and systems built around extreme hot and cold temperatures and high altitudes mean you have to take the time to think and prepare in order to travel safely through them. It doesn’t matter, for example, if you can glide into the chilly mountains if you’ll freeze to death before you hit the ground. Going in with the right equipment makes all the difference.

As you continue to improve Link’s stamina meter and skills you can reach even more of these varied locations. But no matter how much stronger you get, the world and its resident Mother Nature is always more powerful than you will ever be. Random events like rain and thunderstorms slow down your movement across slick surfaces, and dangerous lightning bolts can strike with little warning if you’re wearing any metal. Additionally, the day/night cycle is constantly running, and makes meaningful differences: nighttime brings monsters that spring up from the ground, it’s easier to spot some useful bugs and plants, and other secrets that are best discovered for yourself. These are all constant reminders that you are always at the mercy of the world itself.

LoadingYet there are still pockets of serenity and beauty spread throughout the gorgeous, tantalizing landscape. In these moments, subtle music queues matched the tempo of my adventure, swaying between playful piano melodies and ambient sounds of wildlife. In the foreground, Breath of the Wild’s anime-inspired art style is colorful, remarkably lively, and beautifully animated, but it comes at the cost of brief framerate hiccups and object pop-in that’s most noticeable when you’re playing the Switch in TV mode, where it renders at 900p, and when there are a lot of physics particle effects flying around the screen. The issues are less frequent playing on in portable mode on the 720p screen, but regardless of where I played the performance problems never significantly soured my gameplay. Performance on the Wii U version is roughly the same as the Switch, although it’s important to note it renders at 720p. This makes the jaggies a little more visible and lighting appear slightly different. Otherwise, it looks good on Wii U.

Extreme Chef

The light and flexible cooking system offers lots of opportunity to experiment.

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Unlike a lot of survival games in which every item you use must be created from felled trees and dug-up minerals, Breath of the Wild focuses all its crafting systems on cooking. It’s a light and flexible system that offers lots of opportunity for experimenting with different ingredient combinations to help you survive. Raw food and quick-and-dirty snacks cooked by a fire will replenish a small amount of health, but the most interesting and stat-boosting dishes come from tossing ingredients into a pot to make a hearty meal. I’ve spent many hours figuring out the best recipes by using clues noted in the ingredient descriptions to come up with effects like stamina boosts and elemental resistances of various potencies, and I loved that whenever I got a little carried away with the my recipes I ended up with a censored-out dish appropriately called Dubious Food that’s apparently too disgusting to even look at. Making buff-imbuing potions is equally as flexible, and you’ll find plenty of bugs and monster parts with which to mix up a special brew.

The art of cooking is a relatively small feature, but like Breath of the Wild’s other components, every piece of this sandbox feels meticulously thought out, and almost every action has a natural consequence that makes sense.

Just the Right Tools

Breath of the Wild’s skillful combat is as approachable as it is deep, but you’ll need to study its nuances if you want to survive in the late game. Link can still use swords, spears, and axes (as well as other amusing blunt objects) he finds in the world, but for the first time in the Zelda series they’ll wear down and eventually break from use, which fits perfectly with the survival angle. Especially in the early game, when most item durability is low, you’re constantly swapping out weapons, never getting too attached to one sword or hammer and always ready to improvise by, say, picking up a bony limb of a downed Stal Bokoblin and using it to finish off the last of a group of enemies.

Breath of the Wild’s skillful combat is as approachable as it is deep.

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But no matter how prepared you think you are, you can still run into large Moblins and other enemies that can slay you in one hit. Naturally, as you make progress in the main quest you’ll gain access to empowering special abilities that will improve your chances to survive, but to say more about them would be spoiler territory. I like that Nintendo allows you to switch certain items off and continue using the most basic tools if you feel these they’re too powerful, creating an informal hardcore mode.

Archery plays a much bigger role in combat this time around, and it’s for the better. Link can quickly pull out his bow and take aim at enemies at any time, using a wide range of arrow types (like ice and fire) to take advantage of their weaknesses. The metallic ping you hear whenever you land a headshot is an immediately satisfying treat, as are the slow-motion attacks initiated by jumping off of high places and drawing your bow as you fall toward a batch of enemies below. Since the duration of this arrow-time effect is dictated by your stamina, early on it feels like you rarely have a huge advantage. A few stamina upgrades will buy you more time, but the stronger enemies you’ll face on the outer fringes of Hyrule can usually withstand several headshots, which brings it back into balance.

The way you can work the glider into combat is equally impressive and it makes for some engagingly versatile, skill-based action. Link can glide in, let go of the glider, and go into slow motion to fire off a few headshots, then grab hold of the glider again only to fall and downward-stab another unsuspecting enemy. The combat is open enough that it inspires more of the same playful experimentation as the world itself.

Breath of the Wild tosses difficult encounters at you early on.

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Tense boss fights against larger foes are still a major highlight of the Zelda series, and Breath of the Wild tosses up more difficult encounters at you pretty early on, such as the imposing rock monster named Steppe Talus who will come right out of the ground. If you feel overwhelmed, you can always run away and come back to them later, and these emergent challenges add another welcome layer of danger to the survival sandbox. And you’ll find plenty more optional bosses well-hidden in this massive world.
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On the other hand, dungeon bosses are challenging face-offs you can’t run away from. They’re as big on spectacle as ever, and my favorite ones involve ingenious combat puzzles where you need to use your Shekiah Slate, a powerful tool given to you early on that gives you special abilities like magnetising metal objects or creating bombs, to weaken the boss before you can take it down.

Puzzling Mementos

The Sheikah Slate is a major piece of the main quest, which puts Link on a journey to reclaim his memories of Princess Zelda after an apocalyptic event left Hyrule in ruins. It took me roughly 40 hours to slay the final boss and piece together what happened 100 years ago. While most Zelda games are rooted in heavy tradition, this coming-of-age story is anything but and has plenty of charming characters and surprises to reveal. It’s amazing that it works so well while letting you tackle its dungeons in any order you want.

My favorite quests involved piecing together a series of clues.

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Hundreds of NPCs waiting to send you on side quests and puzzle shrines pepper the landscape, and there’s even more to discover hidden behind vague clues. The fetch-questy ones aren’t as interesting as the bonafide rabbit holes of The Witcher 3, but they still introduce you to interesting characters and dole out helpful info, meals, and materials. My favorite quests involved piecing together a series of clues: in one example, a wandering minstrel sang a mysterious song that dropped hints as to the location of a special shrine. Some don’t even show up as quests in your log, so you have to pay attention.
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Puzzle shrines yield their own useful rewards in the form of materials and handy weapon upgrades. These shrines involve short, inventive puzzle rooms which present you with a few clues and leave your to experiment in order to solve them. There’s a wide variety of them and a majority are excellent little puzzles to figure out, but a few of the combat-focused challenges are repeated and another handful use motion controls that just don’t feel quite as sharp enough due to wonky physics.

Motion controls don’t feel quite as sharp.

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Still, the techniques you learn from Shrines become essential training for Breath of the Wild’s fantastic dungeons. For the sake of avoiding spoilers I won’t go into too much detail, but these daunting, massive logic puzzles demand that you look at all the moving pieces in order to solve them. But every time I came across a new Shrine I was excited to uncover whatever new challenge it contained, with some Shrines in particular feeling as intricate as early levels in Portal, because they hinted at something much bigger and more impressive to come.

There are even more cryptic challenges throughout Hyrule, some hidden behind riddles, and others are large mazes or other inventive ideas. Even after 50 hours, I still can’t believe I haven’t seen almost everything, but the surprises keep on coming. I estimate it would take over 100 hours to solve every side quest, puzzle, and collectible. It is a truly massive game to tackle.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is a masterclass in open-world design and a watershed game that reinvents a 30-year-old franchise. It presents a wonderful sandbox full of mystery, dangling dozens upon dozens of tantalizing things in front of you that just beg to be explored. I’ve had so many adventures in Breath of the Wild, and each one has a unique story behind what led me to them, making them stories on top of stories. And even after I’ve spent more than 50 hours searching the far reaches of Hyrule, I still manage to come across things I haven’t seen before. I’ll easily spend 50 to 100 more trying to track down its fascinating moments.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild review

The moment I realized The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild might actually be my favorite Zelda adventure ever struck me like lightning — literally.

While running through the picturesque green fields of Hyrule, a massive storm unexpectedly rolled in. As heavy rain began to pour, a strong wind rustled the tall grass, and in the distance I could hear the crack of lightning. The sharp sound rapidly came closer and closer until zap! I was electrocuted to death by a bolt. Every time I restarted, the same thing would happen. I couldn’t understand why the lightning was targeting me, the helpless hero, until I realized that both the spear and shield on my back were made of metal. With the steel unequipped, I was able to safely make my through the storm.

Breath of the Wild has something that’s been missing from the series for years: surprise. Most recent Zelda adventures have become formulaic, abiding by a rigid and proven structure that offers nostalgia and familiarity, but little room for revelations, either big or small. Breath of the Wild is more open and natural than its predecessors, letting you discover things — like how lightning works — through experimentation. It isn’t always as curated and cinematic as other Zelda games, but the unpredictability makes it feel like a true adventure, where you’re uncovering your own path, instead of hitting your marks and following the script.

Zelda games have always been large, but Breath of the Wild feels uniquely grand, a massive open world filled with so much to do that I suspect most players — even those who complete the main story — will miss large swaths of the map. The scale could have been daunting, but the joy of discovery and the satisfaction that comes from finding your own way make it inviting instead. I want to go the places I’ve yet to discover. I want to uncover new secrets and abilities. I want more.

At 50 hours into the game, I still haven’t reached the end of Breath of the Wild. In some ways it feels like I’ve only scratched the surface. But even still, these bold changes have profoundly altered my expectations of what a Zelda adventure can be. And I’m entirely convinced that this is the best Zelda game I’ve ever played.

This review contains light spoilers for the early hours of Breath of the Wild.

Breath of the Wild opens with series hero Link awakening in a dark cavern. A mysterious disembodied voice guides him to a tablet that has a passing resemblance to both the Switch and Nintendo’s maligned Wii U controller. The tablet helps to navigate this version of Hyrule — the fantasy realm that has long been the heart of Zelda adventures. As you learn in the very early parts of the game, a century ago, powerful evil destroyed much of the world, allowing nature to reclaim castles, and littering the land with abandoned machines of war. People still exist, in small towns and stables, but much of Hyrule is beset by hordes of monsters who have bivouacked into the hills. This is a dangerous place. Naturally, your job is to set things right.

The lack of direction can be disorienting at first

One of the game’s greatest strengths is how it goes about explaining how you will do that — or just as often, not explaining it. Breath of the Wild rarely gives you explicit directions as to what to do. Instead, it tells (or shows) you what needs to happen, and lets you fill in the rest. One line of quests tasks you with uncovering shrines (more on those later) using only lines from a poem or a riddle as guidance. Another presents a series of images of scenic Hyrule locations from before the calamity, and asks you to find them as they are now. In order to defeat Ganon you’ll need to first uncover four “divine beasts” scattered throughout the world. Of course, the game doesn’t even tell you what a divine beast is.

This lack of direction can be disorienting at first. I played Breath of the Wild immediately after finishing another huge role-playing game, Horizon Zero Dawn, and it was a jarring transition. After spending 40 hours playing a game that literally pointed me in the right direction at all times, now I was forced to fend for myself. But it very quickly turned into a liberating sensation. Instead of worrying if I was following the correct path, for the first dozen hours or so, I largely ignored the story altogether. Instead, I trekked across Hyrule activating the specific towers found in each region, which not only help fill in the details of the map but also provide crucial fast-travel points.

Even the act of filling out Breath of the Wild’s map instils a deep sense of adventure. In most open-world games, particularly Ubisoft titles like Far Cry or Assassin’s Creed, your map is overburdened with icons from the very beginning. You can spot where everything from a city to a treasure chest is located before you even start exploring. It can feel overwhelming. Breath of the Wild, meanwhile, does the opposite. When you first start out, the map is almost completely empty. You can see the dividing lines between the various regions that make up Hyrule, but none of their details. It’s only once you start exploring that it fills out. A town won’t appear on your map until you actually go there, which you can only do by finding it on your own. Discovering a new place or thing truly feels like an act of discovery.

Breath of the Wild features two significant additions that completely changed how I viewed the world around me. In addition to the usual methods of traversal — foot, horse, and fast travel — Link now also has the ability to climb nearly every surface you come across. If you spot a mountain, a castle, or virtually anything else, you can climb it. The only restriction is Link’s stamina — which expands over time and can be augmented with things like potions — but even then there are ways around it if you’re clever. This marks a fundamental shift for the series. Instead of an impediment, walls and mountains are now just another potential pathway. Often I would bypass monster-plagued roads altogether and simply climb the comparatively safe mountain instead.

Link’s climbing ability is made all the more useful and important by a seemingly innocuous paraglider, which lets Link temporarily soar through the air. In short order, it became a pivotal part of the game, and my main method of transportation. Instead of walking or riding to a new location, I would climb the nearest high point — a mountain, or maybe a tower — and then glide in the direction of where I wished to be. The act of getting somewhere became exciting in and of itself. There’s a certain pleasure that comes from just having enough energy to reach the top of a tower before losing your grip, or sailing peacefully above enemy camps as the monsters sleep below, unaware.

I was constantly discovering new places and puzzles, both elaborate and diminutive

Not only is Breath of the Wild’s map large; it’s also dense. I was constantly discovering new places and puzzles, both elaborate and diminutive. One of my favorite additions to the game is the shrines — glowing caverns scattered liberally across the map. Each one is like a miniature, self-contained Zelda dungeon. Early on these shrines serve as tutorials, showing necessary details about Link’s powers — like his ability to temporarily halt time or use bombs — but later they essentially become puzzle boxes, which approach Portal-levels of cleverness. The shrines also simplify the Zelda dungeon formula in an almost mobile game-like manner, resulting in satisfyingly quick puzzles that can usually be completed in less than 15 minutes or so. Even better, unlike typical Zelda puzzles, those in Breath of the Wild’s shrines often have multiple solutions.

Many other additions help bring Breath of the Wild in line with contemporary open-world games like The Witcher or Skyrim, while also contributing to its overwhelming focus on adventure and discovery. Link can now cook, for instance, gathering ingredients in the wild, using them to make food that replenishes health or buffs abilities. I found myself especially taken with this feature, scouring the world for new vegetables and meats, and seeing what I could make of them. Again, cooking isn’t really explained, making it all the more compelling. Whipping up a tasty mushroom rice ball or meat-stuffed pumpkin using guesswork instead of a recipe is satisfying. I especially love the way ingredients dance and jump in the pot as you prepare a meal.

There are also survival elements, forcing you to protect Link from extreme heat and cold. You’ll often find him shivering or sweating because of the weather, his health depleting. Weapons, too, give way. For the first time in a Zelda game your swords and shields degrade as you use them. But weapons are everywhere. You can even pick up a downed skeleton’s arm to bludgeon beasts, its fingers still twitching as you swing it about. Using your best equipment becomes a risky choice, not an assumption.

Even though Breath of the Wild introduces RPG-like elements such as crafting and a greater focus on gear, it’s missing a very distinct kernel of the genre: experience. In most RPGs, numbers determine almost everything you can do. If you’re a level 5 character in a typical RPG, you definitely don’t want to head into a dungeon filled with level 10 enemies, and there’s a whole range of items and abilities you can’t use until you grind long enough to meet the appropriate level. This effectively walls off large portions of the world until you’ve achieved a numerical level of success.

Breath of the Wild scraps this logic. Link gets more health and stamina as you progress, and you can acquire stronger weapons and armor, but he never gets stronger himself. He doesn’t learn to swing a sword or shoot a bow any better. But you do. Breath of the Wild offers a more open and expansive world to explore, but it also demands more of its players than other Zeldas, forcing you to get better and smarter to survive. It’s the most challenging Zelda I’ve played in many years, but also the most satisfying. (Though it never approaches the daunting difficulty of games like Bloodborne or Dark Souls.)

Despite the changes, it still feels like a ‘Zelda’ adventure

All of these many changes fundamentally alter the Zelda formula. But what’s perhaps most remarkable about Breath of the Wild is that it still feels like a Zelda adventure — and it’s more than just the familiar setting and characters, or the stirring rendition of the Zelda theme that plays in the background. Breath of the Wild may be the biggest Zelda game to date, but it’s also an experience that distills the essence of the series into something more pure. More recent Zelda games have become bogged down with needless hand holding, an overabundance of tutorials, and overly complicated narratives. Breath of the Wild gets away from that. It changes the Zelda formula in dramatic ways, yet paradoxically it feels more Zelda than almost any game in the series before. By going big and open, Breath of the Wild gets at the heart at what a Zelda game should be.

This new direction, and shaking up of the age-old formula that has come to define the series, helps Breath of the Wild return to what made Zelda so beloved in the first place. More so than just about any game series, Zelda’s heart lies in exploration, that moment of seeing a towering mountain in the distance and realizing that eventually you’ll be able to reach the top. Breath of the Wild takes this idea, cuts out the fluff, and expands upon it. It pulls ideas from other games, like crafting or survival, yet makes them feel perfectly at home in its beloved universe. It’s exactly the Zelda game I’ve been waiting for.

Just watch out for lightning.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild launches March 3rd on Nintendo Switch and Wii U.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild Overview

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is an action-adventure RPG with open world exploration. It’s beautifully designed, with graphics that look great despite the Nintendo Switch’s hardware limitations and smooth controls. Zelda fans won’t be disappointed with this new addition to the series, and even those unfamiliar with previous Zelda games will enjoy Breath of the Wild. We took our Switch and explored the story, gameplay, and graphics of Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. There is much to like and little to criticize.

Installation process: easy as it should be

The installation process for Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is as easy as you’d expect. If you purchased a physical copy of the game, you will insert the cartridge into the Switch and let it do its thing. After a brief setup, you will begin your game where you will wake up in a dark cell as an amnesiac link. Obviously there is no character creation.

Plot: not much, but enough

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is a beautiful game with amazing gameplay and a lot to offer, but the story is not its forte. This does not mean that the plot does not exist, it exists. The game begins with Link waking up and discovering that the kingdom of Hyrule could be attacked by Calamity Ganon. Without going into too much detail since we don’t want to spoil anything, the premise of the game is that Link must become strong enough to help Zelda defeat Ganon for good. To do this, Link must travel the kingdom, uncovering its secrets and his memories.

Nintendo spent a lot of time and attention on the visual design of Breath of the Wild, making us love the game even more for it.

At the beginning of the game, you get clear objectives. You will need to visit certain shrines to unlock your magical abilities, and you will need to talk to a person before you can leave the starting area. When you gain access to the world beyond, you will receive a few more missions. You will be asked to visit a temple, then a laboratory, and finally you will need to visit every tower in every country to uncover more of the map. But there comes a point in the game when a lot of what you do is entirely up to you.

In the end, you will have to fight four divine animals. In order to level up to accept the challenge, you need to collect enough orbs by solving shrines. But really, it’s up to you which shrines you visit and how you achieve the end result. This brings us to one of the few negatives of the game, at least for us. The open world is great, especially in RPGs, but sometimes we felt it would be nice to have a little more direction when it comes to quest objectives and main quests. On the other hand, some may enjoy the exploration and freedom of the open world, which is an important aspect of game design.

Check out our guide to the other best Nintendo Switch games you can buy.

Gameplay: the real beauty of this game

While the story, or lack thereof, can be frustrating for gamers who like to have sequential objectives to complete along the way, control is a breeze. Breath of the Wild balances complex gameplay with fluid controls.

Nintendo was smart when they designed the controls. You can easily switch weapons with the arrow buttons without having to open the inventory menu. The same system allows you to switch between different types of magic. It’s all very intuitive. Your ice magic allows you to create blocks of ice, lift things out of the water, and allows you to cross rivers that you could cross if you didn’t cross. Your magnetic magic allows you to move things around by pulling them towards you. You can even freeze time.

While the storyline, or lack thereof, can be frustrating for gamers who like to set constant goals along the way, the controls are made easier.

It is these various magical means that you must use to complete the various shrines scattered around the map, each containing a challenge or puzzle that you must complete. The game also inserts other puzzles by placing hidden koroks (a race of forest people). Sometimes when you do something like pick up rocks, Korok will show up and give you a seed. You can give these seeds to Hest, who will improve your inventory space allowing you to carry more weapons and items.

Other activities are almost limitless. You can fish and pick apples by combining different edibles that you will find in the fireside gourmet meals. Getting a mountain involves trapping wild horses and calming them down until they are yours. You can even hunt down a fairy to upgrade your gear. There is so much you can do in Breath of the Wild that you can easily play for hours without completing the main quest.

Fights range from simple fights like bokblin to more difficult mini-boss fights like scree. Overall, the combat in Breath of the Wild is well-executed and designed with a wide range of players in mind, from those who might not be very good at fighting games to those who know what they’re doing.

All these small actions just complement the main game feature of the game — combat. Luckily, it’s just as good as the other gameplay elements. Your bow is easy to use with the Switch motion controls, and switching from melee to ranged combat is as easy as pressing a button. You can also dodge and block attacks by blocking a specific opponent. Healing involves eating cooked food stored in the inventory (similar to Skyrim in some respects).

Enemies range from Bokoblins, a common infantry unit, to more difficult mini-boss fights such as Stone Talus. Overall, the combat in Breath of the Wild is well-executed, and the difficulty is designed with a range of players in mind. From those who may not be very good at fighting games to those who know what they’re doing, both types of players will find a lot of love for them.

Check out our guide to the best Zelda: Breath of the Wild cheats for Switch.

Artistic and beautiful graphics

We really liked the Breath of the Wild graphics. They have an artistic flare, almost like a saturation filter has been set across a landscape. Bright, saturated colors give the game a unique look and help make exploring the world more fun. You will be looking for these beautiful landscapes on the screenshot. There are also some wonderful subtle touches such as grass blowing in the wind and the sun rising in the sky.

In addition to simply beautiful scenery, you will also encounter unique creatures and races as you explore the kingdom of Hyrule. Even the simplest enemy, Bokoblins, feel original, although they resemble traditional goblins. The divine beasts have an interesting steampunk visual, each referring to a different creature.

Nintendo also made sure that the design was such that it would be visually easier for users to follow it. Items you can pick up sparkle as you pass, notifying you of how different they are from the surrounding area, and shrines glow bright red and blue, bulging out from the rest of the landscape. It’s clear that a lot has been done and we put a lot of thought into the visual design of Breath of the Wild, making us love the game even more for it.

Read our guide to the best open world games.

Price: Absolutely worth it

Nintendo Switch games may cost more at the standard $60 MSRP, but Breath of the Wild is worth it. There is a lot to explore in the world and there is layer upon layer to the gameplay. The amount of time you can spend in this game is more than fair for the price. We really recommend this game to anyone who loves open world RPGs. The fact that the game has such beautiful visuals is just a bonus.

Competition: several other RPGs

There really isn’t much competition for Breath of the Wild. It ranks among the best Switch games ever made, especially when it comes to action-adventure RPGs. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim is another great RPG that will have similar open-world combat and exploration, but it’s not as good or well thought out as Breath of the Wild. You can also try Xenoblade Chronicles 2, another RPG. It will have similarities to Breath of the Wild, especially with the controls, although the world and environments are a bit more complicated and the combat is more difficult.

Top 10 Nintendo Switch RPGs

Final Verdict

Get this game.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is a beautifully designed game with amazing graphics, smooth controls and a huge open world to explore. While the story is sometimes lacking and the game isn’t as focused as other RPGs, there’s a lot to do and you’ll always be entertained.

15 Breath of the Wild Tips Before You Start Playing

The Legend of Zelda has been a huge success since the 80s, so if you want to play the award-winning Switch game and prepare for your next adventure, we have 15 Breath of the Wild tips to get you off to a good start on your adventure. This game has won multiple awards including Game of the Year, Most Anticipated Game and Best Action/Adventure at The Game Awards, and with a more complex plot than we’d like to admit, this is an epic adventure set in in the Kingdom of Hyrule after the events of Ocarina of Time.

Most people still consider Breath of the Wild one of the most important open world games ever released. This masterpiece shows the players exactly what this genre is capable of, if a lot of innovations are put into the mechanics of this genre. This serves as a lesson to the developers of most modern open world games, who often prefer copy and paste mechanics to create something truly unique and interesting. For people who want to get into this game, keeping the following points in mind will make things easier.

And no forget to comment What do you think of this list and did it help you reach the end of the road?

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It won’t be easy to save Zelda here

summary

Have you ever played Legend of Zelda before? Do not worry. The vast majority of games do not have a fully defined story sequence. Yes, the games have one (or several) well-defined timelines and are connected, but not necessarily in a direct sequence. You don’t need to play the game that was released before this one to understand the plot now.

So you can enjoy each Legend of Zelda game individually without worrying about missing any points or missing something, but if you want to go too deep into the Zelda timeline, you can browse the games and play them in the correct order. But for now, let’s focus on that, with these beginner tips to help you on your journey without spoiling the game. Without further ado, these are 10 things you need to know before you start The Legend of Zelda: The Breath of the Wild.

This is an open world game

Forget everything you knew about the past worlds of The Legend of Zelda. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is the biggest open world game we’ve ever seen. According to mashable.com, «The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess is slightly larger at 1. 7 square miles, while The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim is even larger at a whopping 15.1 square miles.» But the winner was Breath of the Wild with 23.7 square miles of explored terrain.»

Be aware that The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild takes place in an open world and you will have to travel a lot on foot. Those looking for more focused level design might be disappointed. This does not mean that The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is not interesting. On the contrary, because it is excellent, to say the least.

Weapons are fragile

Weapons in The Legend of Zelda: The Breath of the Wild are not very durable as we have seen in previous Zelda games. They are a little fragile, so save your best weapons for the critical moments in the game. In-game shrines may require you to defeat difficult bosses. Boss battles are a great time to use your best swords. It is also worth noting that weapons cannot be repaired in the game. Wasting your best gear on smaller enemies throughout the game is not recommended.

Game mechanics are flexible and interact well with each other

Breath of the Wild has an extremely reactive open world. The elements in the game fit well together, resulting in very unique and interesting results. The opposing elements interact with each other in unique ways, and the game allows the player to manipulate the physics of the world to great effect. The sheer number of ways the player can use the environment to their advantage in Breath of the Wild are quite extensive and fun.

Cooking luck bonus activates during a blood moon

People who cook frequently in Breath of the Wild will notice the unique sound effect and animation sometimes played when the player cooks. It’s a lucky bonus that adds extra bonuses to the dish that Link was cooking.

What most people may not know is that this lucky bonus can activate whenever the player decides to cook right before and after the Blood Moon. During this time, Link should try to cook as much as possible to take advantage of this bonus.

The game has a steep learning curve

Trying to complete The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild in one day is not possible unless you are a talented speedrunner. We can’t help but compare Breath of the Wild and Skyrim due to the many similarities between the two games.

Breath of the Wild is a longer game than Skyrim and players will stay awake day and night trying to get through the more difficult parts of the game. Breath of the Wild has a steep learning curve, so be prepared for some early game challenges.

Dash Flurry is easy to make and does a lot of damage.

Combat in Breath of the Wild may seem a bit difficult at first, but this is where the concept of Flurry Rush comes into play. This strategy proves useful against even the most dangerous enemies. Dash Flurry is fairly easy to do due to the indulgence of the time it takes to execute this tactic. Players who understand the mechanics of this move can use it with a big punch to take out most enemies with ease.

The world is big and you need a horse

Learn to ride a horse

Just like riding a bike, riding a horse can be difficult at first. The game makes it clear that you need to press the A button to mount the horse, but doesn’t explain how you can get to that point.

You need to sneak up on a slow moving horse, so press the A button at the right time. It doesn’t stop there, you have to calm the horse down before gaining control. Riding a wild horse will save you a lot of time, allowing you to get to your destination faster.

Is there a way to bring back dead horses

Players can form a very permanent bond with their horses. This makes it quite emotionally draining when the beautiful rider gets caught in the crossfire of an enemy ambush and dies as a result.

However, there is a way to resurrect a slaughtered horse from the dead. Travel to the Bridge of the Horse God in the Faron Meadows and cross it to the source of Malanya. There will be a structure that looks like the Great Fairy Fountain, but is actually the home of the spirit of Malanya, the Horse God. Offer her 1000 rupees and she will resurrect all the dead horses lost during your journey.

Saving money will pay off in the long run

Most people’s first impulse would be to buy clothes and accessories as soon as possible. At the beginning of the game, you can wear the default clothes that the game provides. Save your money in the beginning and it will pay off in the long run. Rupees may be difficult to find at first, but by selling items and exploring, you will find all the riches you want.

Bestseller #1

Nintendo Switch Console — Neon Blue and Red …

Bestseller #1

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild — Nintendo. ..

PriceBestseller #1

Blue and Red Nintendo Switch Console + Joy-Con…

Traveling gets easier as you go

Nintendo’s decision to start The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild with a grueling start was a controversial choice. Players will have to cover huge distances without any tools to speed up the journey. This part of the game is discouraging for some players.

Just remember that traveling long distances becomes secondary as you progress through The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. You earn items such as
Glider, which allows you to glide from great heights to plains and plateaus. So be patient and keep going.

Complete all Shrines in your path

Players are encouraged to conquer all Shrines along their path. Shrines unlock fast travel options, unlock skills with runes, gain valuable items, and more. Some shrines can be difficult to complete because you haven’t unlocked the skills needed to complete them.

Aside from a few exceptions, players must attempt to solve the puzzles of each Sanctuary in order to benefit. It is important for you to advance in the game and prepare for the end to face the challenges that lie ahead of you. Are they optional? Yes, but what do you have to lose?

Save your best weapons for later

Through trial and error, players will find that the rewards of consistently using the best weapons aren’t worth it. Sure, you’ll save time defeating enemies with your best weapons, but when you least expect it, you’ll face the strongest stick-wielding monsters.

Of course, the game will quickly send strong enemies into Link’s path, so players want to save their best weapons for later. Also, given the low durability of weapons in The Legend of Zelda: The Breath of the Wild, this is another reason to put your weapons away.

Rescue the Master Sword

Prioritize Resist Intelligence

Using Spirit Orbs on goddess statues in The Legend of Zelda: The Breath of the Wild offers two options. If you love open world exploration (mostly all of us), make sure you max out your stamina. This will make it easier to climb mountains and explore in general.

You will be able to run longer and this will make the game more manageable. Without too much spoiler, it’s worth noting that the powerful weapons you earn later in the game require thirteen hearts. It is advisable to increase your hearts to thirteen, and spend the rest on endurance.

Breath of the Wild takes a long time to complete

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is not for casual players as it will take about fifty hours to complete. Nintendo puts a lot of effort into their exclusives, which is why they rarely sell. Before buying and playing the game, it is worth noting that The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild will take a long time to complete.

Some players finish faster, others slower. It’s not uncommon for players to complete the game in less than forty hours, although if you play on your own time, explore, want to give your 100%, have a little difficulty here and there, it’s easy to get past 100 (up to 200) hours.

On 26 мая, 2022 By alexxlab

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