Games I Played in May

[@MrMonki-zc4pr]

Call me crazy, but tears of the kingdom might be on the list

[@Fink621]

🤯

[@rajbhosale9157]

You’re reaching

[@Rukai]

You must be psychic!

[@pingunooty]

Oh really? And where is your source????

[@Did_U_Know..]

Ur crazy

[@IronPineapple]

A lot of your thoughts mirrored my own, and I just wanna agree with the points about wanting unique rewards. I think the start of both BOTW and TOTK are so powerful because the worlds are filled with surprises and mystery. In TOTK's case, I was overwhelmed by the existence of sky islands, a changed Hyrule, and an entire underground layer. But that wonder faded more quickly than I would've liked as each of the zones became formulaic. You know what to expect and you know what the reward will be. Everything falls into a pattern. I think just including a handful of more surprises and more unique rewards would've gone a long way to cut down on the world feeling formulaic. All that being said, I loved my time with the game, and it's already such a massive game that attempts so much, so I always feel a little guilty even suggesting things like "I wish they did more."

[@nigh6374]

Yep

[@thisgamedev]

so true. when I completed TOTK, I felt SO satisfied. it will take a few weeks for me to revisit it, and explore it's world a bit more :D

[@Cyynapse]

nah for a game that took 6 years to come out I think its perfectly fair to expect a proper evolution of the formula rather than just BOTW again

[@geraltrivia9565]

Seriously the game needed unique rewards

[@finalcountdown3210]

I will say, the Sky Islands felt a little underwhelming as a whole. Most of the shrines are "Get this crystal over there." And while I LOVED the depths, I don't really care about finding all the Yiga Clan hideouts because my battery is already full, and I never use the schematics

[@phiter]

Speaking of quest rewards, one I really liked but saw noone talking about is the yiga technique you get at the end of their quest. It's so cool, even if it is useless. I wish there were more quests that give abilities like that.

[@scragar]

My problem with the Yiga powers is they're not consumable. Almost everything else is on purpose to encourage you to explore and stop hording. Getting a power with no limits to spamming feels antithetical to the core idea they pushed through the rest of the mechanics.

[@frewtlewps1152]

I love that the Yiga Hideout becomes a new village!

[@UhOhTheStoveIsOn]

It’s such a good way to kill stal mobs without wasting durability!

[@Your_Native_Mothman]

I will say the quest was way too easy for such a powerful ability

[@keviaaar]

​@@UhOhTheStoveIsOnyou can also use dazzle fruits to kill groups of them in one throw!

[@Qwarky]

Completely agree on the ending. It's exciting and satisfying and I got quite emotional throughout the finale. It's been a while for a Zelda game to nail such a thoroughly satisfying conclusion.

[@SillyMynabird]

Huh, I liked my squad of ghost friends and was actually glad that they weren't just the sages themselves aimlessly following me around on my silly adventure. Were I feel like the main thesis or tone of BotW was solitude and loneliness (like you said) I liked the fact that this game wasn't that but again. Whether it was with the monster survey team or my squad, I liked that Link wasn't alone in the world anymore. Great video, keep up the good work!

[@veggiedragon1000]

Yeah after beating my first dungeon I was so hype I now have a bird ninja shadow clone! Was almost disappointed all the others were the same.

[@Bakersmanbakemeacake]

Gotta say this series has given me plenty new games to play

[@dicksherman284]

yea bud? this video right here did? You never heard of Shovel Knight and Tears of the Kingdom

[@Bakersmanbakemeacake]

@@dicksherman284 fr

[@MisterK9739]

But sadly not more time in a day to actually play them, lol

[@riffraffmike]

7:25 holy shit. More true words have never been spoken. Spent like 2 hours on the amazing mistery quest wondering this is so much effort im putting what am i gonna get for it. And it just hands you a warm stinky poo.

[@kevindustries9130]

TOTK was/is a really nice experience to explore, but honestly with time a lot of the games' issues surface more and more. After several dozen hours my issues with the sage mechanics, quest rewards, general combat and area design, etc... made me less excited to finish the game. Maybe some of it was open world fatigue though. I think the game really shined in some of its best shrines. The puzzles and challenges that made full use of Link's abilities and the players' creativity were so satisfying. I would kill to get a "TOTK Shrine-Maker" where I could play endless custom-made puzzles and combat challenges.

[@nathanwanlass3083]

Same. I do like the game, but it’s definitely not my favorite game of the year. By the end I was mostly annoyed with all the recycled content in the sky and the depths, and I disliked reusing the same Hyrule again.

[@shinzo111]

Yeah, unfortunately the game got really tedious for me. After about 45 hours I just didn’t enjoy it anymore

[@amaryllis0]

I think I completed about every shrine that wasn't one of the tedious green gem ones, and none really stood out to me as being good. The proving grounds were decent but not exactly the main course. I don't know. I wish I could have had even a single "blue flame" experience

[@aluc7741]

As someone who HAS done every shrine, I would agree they were pretty weak. I quickly found myself just liking the caves way more. I can only think of 2 shrines that I were memorable and not uninteresting. First would be the Jenga shrine, just because I found it funny and it was a unique idea, and the other would be the troll blessing shrine. All the other shrines just blended together as too easy, short, simple, and overall just ok. They werent bad, they were satisfying to finish, just not memorable at all. I LOVE THIS GAME THOUGH. My playthrough was 200 hours long, I did most of what the game offers. I will remember it very positively.

[@yaderkunsama9454]

TOTK has made me glad to be alive during these times. It transcended video games and became one of the best experiences of my life.

[@filipzoric6881]

I don't wanna focus JUST on TOTK, so I'll also say that Shovel Knight is an absolute banger for the ages. One of my top 5 favorite platformers, it's such a stellar game in sooo many aspects. Like you said, polished to a brilliant shine.

[@NebulaStorm]

i hope you never decide to stop doing this, these monthly recap videos are so helpful and entertaining for me for both finding games and hearing your thoughts on games ive already played (as was the case this month), thank you for all the amazing videos!!

[@razbutwo]

Thanks! And yeah I enjoy doing them as they act as a sort of diary of what I’ve played, which will be fun to look back ones I plan to keep doing them for the foreseeable future but they do take more work than they probably should. Hopefully this channel keeps growing in order to justify the amount of time I put into it lol

[@NebulaStorm]

@@razbutwo i hope it does keep growing! it deserves to with how much work you put in! but for however long it goes on for know that your hard work is always appreciated, on both channels!

[@turquoisemaple]

one thing i didnt like about the dungeons is how at the end of them there's always... the same cutscene, more or less. and that sucked some of the joy out of it for me when i noticed it. i wish they'd implemented something similar as in botw, with memories or something

[@ytra1501]

Yeah after the first one I just skipped those cutscenes

[@degg7129]

I remember skipping one cause i had to leave my house in a hurry and wanted to save, when i watched it on youtube i realized it was the exact same thing i had seen already and felt dissapointed, the only thing i really missed was yunobo's killer soundtrack

[@adv78]

My favorite reward in the whole game was the Yigah Earthquake Hability. It's so cool to have an unique hability for doing a quest. I almost never actually use it, but just having it in the game felt way more rewarding than anything else, because it's unique, and it is also infinite The Link clothes are cool but I really wish each set had an unique effect. Wind Waker set could boost movement in water by a lot, or upgrade speed of Zonai devices in water, Skyward Sword set upgrade damage in the air or boost speed in the air constantly, not just while skydiving, etc. It would be way more rewarding and interesting to have, since it would be a cool callback to the other heroes

[@Not.A.Heretic]

tears of the kingdom impressed me at every corner, literally. it actually felt like every 5 or 10 mins my jaw was dropping. what a damn good game

[@thomaspuuggaard2062]

Please don’t stop doing this. I have started looking forward to these videos

[@Missiletainn]

I feel so weird seeing everyone talking about how they felt so enthralled reexploring hyrule and then exploring the new areas when to me I stopped after roughly 30 hours because I just felt like I was going through the motions and not actually enjoying it... it was probably because I found the story, the reason I needed to play, just like, a redo of all the mistakes BOTW did, all the coolest stuff except the final boss happened way in the past so you don't get to experience it and you have to go save zelda again and kill ganon again and do all the things you've done in every zelda game again. Like I can see that it is a mechanically good and satisfying game but I do not have the motivation to play it, when I usually find exploration enough of a motivation in most games, it wasn't here with TOTK. Great video tho, glad you could enjoy it so much!

[@Anni_ka]

I've been enjoying the story, but that is *despite* it feeling kind of bare bones like BOTW. And still, I am absolutely baffled that they just copied the same structure from BOTW. I think in both cases, the memories were absolutely fine, but the story bits we get in the "now" still feel like such an afterthought. Why not make connections between the two, and make more narrative use of all these freaking Zonai ruins for instance? I think I'm a bit disappointed because there's so much potential for a great story there

[@muneebqureshi7747]

I love that you are still doing this. Hope you keep this up.

[@swiftly_produced2694]

Hey Guys! So there was a weird youtube glitch so you can't see the full title of the video, but luckily I saw it, because I was early. It should say: "Games I played in, May I actually just talk about Tears of The Kingdom and a bit about Shovel Knight?"

[@shmooters5599]

I see TOTK as something similar to ITSV, where it’s great quality only serves to promote even more innovation. Without spiderverse we may not have gotten movies like Bad Guys or Puss in Boots TLW, these first steps show what can be done with the medium and I am incredibly excited to see where it goes from here

[@Verchiel_]

I only finished tears of the kingdom almost a week ago, and i absolutely love it. getting to explore hyrule all over again, exploring the same places but finding entirely new things in them is an amazing experience, kind of like coming back to your home town after having lived for years abroad. Probably the most awesome part of the game was just how much they improved the story over that of BoTW. I felt genuinely engaged and had a couple moments i teared up during (iykyk), and the characters, their designs and implementation was absolutely amazing. I enjoyed the powers too, even if i really missed not having things like stasis or bombs for windbombing. But as great as it was, and as much as i enjoyed it (it's probably my favorite zelda game now), it really does have a lot of really, weird design choices. The dungeons felt repetitive, simply being "use the newly gotten sage power to activate these five switches and trigger the boss", even though i loved the theming of them. The sage powers felt underpowered and their implementation just, is bad, flat out. If they removed the map icon from power wheel, moved whistling to that, and created a separate menu for activating sage powers on holding down on Dpad, it would have been a dozen times more intuitive. Ultrahand (and fuse to some extent) suffers from being so open ended that it can be really frustrating for anyone who isn't particularly creative or experimental. The inventory menu feels a lot harder to navigate, i much preferred the individual windows for each tab, even if it made scrolling to other categories a bit slower. I wish the material selection was actually categorized and not a single straight line, i wish it had a grid with categories like monster horns and zonai parts and food etc. And of course, as a completionist, i really wish the meaningless collectathon quests and untracked ones had value besides "here's some rupees and a crappy dish" 60 times over. The reward for completing all shrines was mostly pretty great, it's really unique, but the design of the reward is a bit, weird, and it's overall quite open to exploring more of what that reward might be. Also the ungodly amount of animations that just freeze the game and interrupt flow of gameplay for 3-20 seconds is amazingly frustrating. This is why i'm happy i can emulate the game, 60fps 1440p ultrawide with mods that provide some quality of life things like removed useless animations (like picking up bubblfrog gems, why would it need a special item animation) there's probably other irks i've had but despite that i still absolutely adore the game and i'm already looking forward to the next game. I didn't originally plan to replay the game at any point but seeing some mods, i'd love to do a challenge run in the future. Hopefully when some dlcs release

[@-aexc-]

i had all the same issues with the actual gameplay however the game never froze for me, it would briefly drop a lot tho. my experience emulating wasn't great, it ran at a really stable 60 at 4k but it felt off and made me nauseous (maybe the grandpacing was terrible). (I have a 5600x + 3060ti so I don't think the PC is the issue)

[@dickurkel6910]

In terms of sage powers, why even bind them to d-pad? They could be bound to actions like in botw and it would flow so much better. Also, not sure you noticed, but you can sort materials in the menus for faster navigation, although it's still quite clunky

[@Verchiel_]

I had a mod that actually made the sorting more useful but even then, scrolling through like 10 different types of items with not much indication is just confusing.

[@nerro984]

rantoni also talks about how he doesn't like the sage powers following you around, but I am the complete opposite of that, I love having their company, especially in the depths because they makes the exploration much less scarier

[@timotheninja]

I played Shovel Knight Treasure Trove for the first time last year and I cannot recommend it enough! This month I started playing one of the spinoffs SK Pocket Dungeon that just got a massive DLC and that game is also a ton of fun. Yacht Club Games definitely know how to mame games and I can't wait for Mina the Hollower when it releases!

[@dingus2k]

i still don’t understand why they didn’t move the horse whistle off of the down button and place another wheel for sage abilities there. i completely agree with raz that having to chase down the spirit, deal with the mess off all four on your screen, and accidentally engaging an ability when you’re trying to pick up a banana are all pretty frustrating occurrences solved by placing the abilities on a wheel

[@maximini4923]

btw the horse whistle is a command used to ask for the spirit to come closer too

[@ericwindsor339]

the horse whistle should have been the top left of the Rune menu, replacing the second map. And it should count as a Zonai power and let you teleport your current active horse to you (the same way the ancient saddle worked in botw). Feels like they intentionally made horses shit again to force you to use vehicles

[@sierra_619]

Love these videos I look forward to watching them at each month!

[@boredhuman6512]

Okay well lots of people threw their praises and criticisms towards totk already so I will share my complaint So like. Totk has a lot of new stuff. Like wow it expands so much. And you know what... I feel like that almost breaks the game for me. With botw it was one of the most immersive games I have ever played. I'd listen to quiet music and wander around this beautiful yet tragic world. Botw carries with it this aura which I loved, you fucked up, you failed the world 100 years ago and now... its still in danger. But its kinda healing. And its so wonderful. I remember one of those times just passing a random burned building and seeing a campfire and a little tent near and just thought to myself. Someone lived here, tied, probably horribly during the calamity then ages later another person finds shelter in the same place. Its somewhat comforting althrough tragic. There are so many places in botw like this through the environment expressing so much history and emotion tied to it. Totk is in an awkward spot. Cuz it quite literally just dumps new stuff on top. Gone is this perfectly maintained and healing with nature land it now has random rock and pieces of islands in a messy way. The harmony is disturbed... but I don't think the game really does anything cool with the idea. A lot of the news stuff doesn't feel like organic extensions of what was there cuz it literally isn't. Sky islands are a huge disappointment. Besides the starting one nearly all of them feel like nothing but puzzles and obstacle courses. Not a single sign of the civilization that could have lived there, the zonai of ancient hyrule it all feels like just a playthrough for new vechicles. The depths are a bit better between yiga clan, mines and wellsprings there is more to actually think on, see how this technology was used or is misused now... but still when you get more and more light in them you realize how samey the place is. There isn't much biome variety here, no change in wildlife. It again feels most of all like a place for just vechicles and new monsters. Even talking about that... being able to build your own cars or mechs is cool as a mechanic. But when you try to get into the fantasy world it feels so jarring when you just have advanced machines at your fingertips. Not even mentioning now with fuse, sure mechanically maybe people like this better than normal durability, but then 50 hours in I am running around with random parts glued to weapons in ways that look incredibly ugly and wondering why the game can't let me just immerse myself as a cool warrior in fantasy land. You also need to pause the game... so much more. Picking materials from a huge list to fire as your weapon or throw, drop what you want to fuse from your inventory... it doesn't seem like much but after hours of constantly those things breaking the pace of fights it felt tiring. All those many things combined harshly pull me out of the experience and I no longer feel like I'm helping save hyrule... the quests I am doing feel more like chores. Its no longer a fun puzzle its an obstacle to game objective 354. And man this sucks. I want to enjoy the game, there is so much to do and see but because of literally that fact I lose the desire to do so with each passing minute.

[@davdass4797]

Man I love these Videos so much. I don't know why it showed up so late on my feed but every time you post these I drop everything I'm doing to watch them. They have a sort of chill vibe your more focused content doesn't and I really am here for it. Please keep making these

[@spyrotikus]

I full 100%ed Shovel Knight on 3DS, and soft 100%ed the other three campaigns (everything except achievements.) And I LOVED them ALL.

[@Anni_ka]

I feel like TotK to me is proof that a game can be objectively better, but subjectively equal to (or worse) than it's predecessor. And that expectations before starting a game can have a huge impact on how you perceive it. Cause I started BOTW full of doubt as to whether I'm gonna be able to enjoy it, whereas with TotK I knew I'm probably gonna at least like it. And even if I did try to hype responsibly...I feel like I've failed myself a bit in that regard 😅 Although I guess that all boils down to TotK following up on a game that changed the Zelda formula fundamentally. It just won't feel as ground-breaking any more, even though it's still a marvellous sequel.

[@TheXientist]

Same thing with New Super Mario Bros Wii and U. The Wii U sequel is objectively better, but it is just more of the same with a bit extra sprinkled on top. It feels like an expansion rather than another game.

[@-aexc-]

why is totk objectively better?

[@TheRetroDen]

I've been looking forward to these videos every month, always a blast to watch them.

[@doubleasworkshop1692]

I think I have no problems with the quests because they are really well written. Still not as well written as the Xenoblade 3 quests. But the writing is FANTASTIC

[@-aexc-]

I really should get back into xenoblade 3, it's the first and only game where I was completing each quest in the game. I had to stop cause of college

[@temperedskinflint]

Agree on the must-play-Shovel Knight point.

[@thewalruscaesar]

My favorite series on youtube fr. Would love for you to keep doing them!

[@nikifallen93]

Came to your channel for your wife playing BotW and felt all of those vids personally. I ended up playing BotW for around 1500 hrs.-from 2021 right up until this game. Now I just play TotK. The reason I’m commenting, though, is because I hear you and see the comments and realise that people talk like their time with the game is mostly over, even if you loved the game. That never occurred to me. I expect I will continue to play this game-with revisits of BotW-until the next 3D Zelda comes out in 6-7 years. I _hope_ I get tired of this game and become willing to play other games, but so far, whenever I look at another game, I just want to play this one. It was the same with BotW. I’ve already spent hundreds of hours, and when I beat Ganon, I immediately want to start a new file-and do. Hopefully, one day I’ll be able to mod this game, like I did with BotW, and that just makes me even less likely to try something new. I think this is a great game! I guess that’s not how most people feel when they say this is a great game?

[@buckhaley3032]

Depths should have been smaller, sky islands should have been bigger. The starting area should’ve been in the depths, having link have to climb out of a deep pit to make it back to the surface of hyrule just to see massive islands in the sky and the surface changed would’ve been a better experience than falling from the sky

[@kermitpoptarts4841]

I’m so glad you kept this series going

[@TheJCghost]

I gotta say Raz I love this series you got going here so great

[@pabloc4204]

The thing that i most loved and actually made me get to th end of the game was one of its biggest shortcomings for me on this game, i reallyy adore the main cast of characters and love the cutscenes, i loved the main campaign and no doubt, the ending was amazing really, but i just felt so empty not being able to after 2 entire games spend any time at all with zelda or even other characters, i know this isnt that type of game but they are just so lovely and i as the player and also link worked so hard 2 times to clean this world from its darkness and both times we just have to leave after doing that hahahaha, but oh well, its not like this is persona 5 or smth, its a zelda game after all.

[@goese868]

What? One of the best endings ever? I genuinely can't see where you got that.

[@steegen101]

Exploring was my main reason to play BOTW, I'm still thrilled with TOTK :) also the light dragon plot hit me hard

[@BravosChannel]

I do share a lot of similar opinions as you do when it comes to Tears of the Kingdom as a whole, but one thing I want to highlight that I wished they really improved upon more was the dungeons. //SEMI-SPOILERS FOR THE DUNGEONS BELOW I do think the theming is nice, and having unique bosses is awesome, but the dungeons to me mainly felt like 4 shrines taped together rather than a puzzle box or explorable area that felt interconnected. The water temple especially felt like you can just fly to area to area without having to think about how to get there. The fire temple was extremely cheesable and cheesing it did feel satisfying, but also a bit trivial. The lightning temple and wind temple were the closest to feeling connected, but had puzzles that felt separate from each other. I didn't have that many expectations for what the dungeons were going to be like before I played. The map being given to you immediately as you enter also removes the sense of mystery of where the next area you're going to be is, and a lot of the ideas the dungeon has were already borrowed from shrines rather than being puzzles that feel genuinely unique and mind blowing. But as I remember you saying in another video, this game is definitely more about players coming up with creative solutions instead of developers coming up with creative puzzles for players to solve, but I still wish there could've been more done to push the limits of what the player can do. And having virtually only one unique enemy type per dungeon plus constructs didn't make this any better for me. They all share the same hub area with 4 separate paths structure that I wish they could've did differently, like having the areas feel more connected and maybe make you feel a bit more lost, even though that might be something that not all people are going to enjoy and that is valid too. I'm not trying to ask so many things from developers but I feel like they could've gone somewhere further with the dungeons with different ideas that push you to use all of the mechanics. //SPOILERS FOR NEAR THE END OF THE GAME I remember stumbling across the final area in the game early, and I still had 4 hearts at that time. I barely knew much of the mechanics and I was initially brute forcing myself in there, when suddenly, I started to think a bit more and saw what I could do with the resources I had. Going through in there was genuinely one of the greatest experiences I've ever had in video games, but the saddest part for me was that it ended up being the only part of the game where I felt like such mechanics were being tested to my limit. Even though I kinda expected that going underneath hyrule castle would take me to the end of the game, jumping in the chasm for the first time had me doubletake, since I was surprised that there wasn't much down there at first glance. The area I explored felt mysterious, like something I'd never seen before, almost like a dungeon that you can just enter from the map and complete without needing to do the series of events for the story it leads up to. It really did feel like player-driven exploration, and is something I wish they could probably do more in the future. Maybe I'm just spoiled with Outer Wilds, but I guess that's just how I feel, and everyone else's own opinion on the dungeons is just as valid.

[@Jonas_M_M]

This game's dungeons are mechanically less engaging than the predecor's; at least, the divine beasts had a central mechanic the whole dungeon evolved around - not just four shrines combined by a common, though asthetic, theme. They need to turn down the scope of the world to allow creating a good amount of puzzle-maze dungeons feasable.

[@nam9221]

I just think nintendo treats their fans, even kids that play their game too stupid. There couldve been so much potential with all the powers in place but they were too afraid to make anything remotely difficult to figure out.

[@tenidranluxor]

@@nam9221It’s a challenging balance to strike, especially since newer players will already feel overwhelmed by the sheer number of controls and abilities. Allowing players of every level the chance to experience the full game while offering challenges to stronger players is something I think TotK did well, overall. But it’s also reasonable to want more complex puzzles and harder challenges, which is sort of what the BotW DLC did. Hoping for the same with TotK.

[@quantumstormgames2741]

The dungeons were a step in the wrong direction. I liked the divine beasts and I did love the dungeons in TotK, which were somewhat similar but with actually cool aesthetics and unique bosses, but nothing in either game is close to BotW Hyrule Castle. It’s endlessly upsetting to me that they abandoned this perfect formula of an open-world dungeon. not locked by a quest or an ability, but seamlessly integrated with the world. Large enough to be maze-like, incorporating the navigation and “dungeon-crawl” experience without sacrificing the open-air exploration in the slightest. *incredible* soundtrack, filled with fun enemies, powerful rewards, it really had it all. TotK doesn’t follow that perfect model anywhere, instead they made Divine Beasts but slightly more linear. But at least they do look super cool

[@toob4858]

I love these videos. Please don’t stop.

[@l6ki]

One of your latest videos, “indie games you might have missed” inspired me to try almost ALL of those games- I was wondering if you could try like a “free games worth trying” style video? I feel like that could be an interesting video, considering how many games these days cost $20+, along with DLC, battle pass, etc?

[@razbutwo]

That is a really cool idea! I don't play a ton of free games, so I would need to do research for it, but it is an idea I will consider it.

[@l6ki]

@@razbutwo cool!! A benefit of doing it would be that you don’t need to buy games and be disappointed and feel you’ve wasted money… you will have only lost time, right?

[@BlueNip]

Games I recommend to play next is Umurangi Generations + Macro DLC and Sludge Life 1 & 2. Look forward to seeing them in the next games I played :)

[@CrispyMammaries]

King of Cards is the best of the Shovel Knights imo. Hope you enjoy it whenever you get to play it!

[@aprilmg7072]

When it became apparent that it was gonna be more shrine hunting and korok seed finding, I was disheartened. But the Depths and the fuse mechanic are new and fun to me.

[@HeavyEyed]

I knew it, i knew you played shovel knight in may

[@HerMi.T]

actually you can make sages come to you by whistling. Also you don't see the full potential of these sages like sidon which make your zora weapon like lightscale trident extremely powerful. although their is another way to do it mainly fusing hydrant with your shield. it is very powerful. i think mineru is very cool as well because you can customize her very much and make her a death machine for monsters.

[@sscu26]

I love the thumbnail lol Edit: 10:03 they should've used the whistle button as a Sages wheel. Keep the whistle but make it switchable with the sages

[@dugganater]

The game is just so huge that it’s hard not to feel underwhelmed by some aspects. I just try to keep expectations in check. Why would I eat one of the best ice cream cones I’ve ever had, to then reflect endlessly on how and why it could have been even better? Lol

[@evanonline8409]

The future of Zelda is bright as ever. What a time.

[@lienep7917]

God I wished I enjoyed the game as much as you did

[@riickmota]

this series has been one of the best things Raz has done, I don't know, it's just satisfying to hear him talk in a freer, unscripted way (I don't even know if these videos are actually unscripted tbh, but what what matters is that it looks like they are - so please, don't tell me)

[@LARAUJO_0]

I'd be surprised if anyone could talk this articulately without at least some notes

[@phiter]

lmao games I played in may, released on the last day of june! Waiting for the next one already, Raz.

[@iqui]

I absolutely love this series!

[@LeoGaming55]

Phew! I thought this series had been cancelled

[@supremechaosbeing2696]

SPOILER FOR FINAL BOSS the one flaw of the final boss is that they didn't call him Dragondorf

[@TerrenceMarie]

These are some of my favorite videos. Keep it up man 🤘

[@renaigh]

Queen Gibdo was a decent challenge, it was the only boss I too time away from to increase hearts

[@Jonas_M_M]

Even though BotW and TotK are among my absolute favourite games, I miss traditional dungeon design from favourites such as OoT and MM.

[@im_skrunkly]

although i agree with the sage abilities being clunky, i found that their regular attacks helped a TON in fights so i grew attached to them.

[@bubbles9844]

That thumbnail is glorious!

[@wangledteb5671]

Shovel Knight is fantastic, I keep meaning to beat King of Cards but I keep starting it and then giving it up past a certain point. Can't wait for Mina the Hollower though :P

[@THExLIFExISxTOxSHORT]

Always looking forward to your monthly videos

[@ThatSkiFreak]

ok im going to leave get out and go xd Can't wait for this to sit in my watch later for ages until i finally play and finish the game lol

[@rickimaru915]

“See you next time, unless I decide to stop doing this” - Me every day after work

[@mike_y1]

Babe wake up, raz monthly games video dropped

[@guswautier9410]

Thank you so much for making this video. I finally found someone who sees tears of the kingdom in the same light as me. (Not that other people havent liked it its just all your point where my exact feelings on the game)

[@amuah2336]

Pretty much every thought you have here I agree with, even the ones that I'm about to contradict by saying that... In some ways I do feel as if totk is better, but didn't give me the save experience as botw. Which is weird, because I love totk. I love finding solutions to things that fee unique, I love the ambience of Link no loner being alone, I love the new abilities that link has (the sages vow thing I totally understand, though. I have all but tulin and riju turned off right now bc they're the smallest and don't take up such a large portion of my screen). But I think largely what I miss from botw is... The fact that it was one of the first games I played, period. Like yes we had the wii and I had played mariokart and wii fit and things of that nature, botw was one of the first games with an adventure, story, and intrigue that I had played. Yes, that's because I'm pretty young. Botw came out when I was 12, but I didn't play it til about 16 or so. But it also has to do with the fact that I hadn't really been introducing to gaming culture before. Botw was a new experience for me not just because it's a phenomenal game, but because I had to learn how to play games in the middle of it. How to use the controller, what type of player I was, how video game logic and solving puzzles worked. I think that's an unforgettable experience for me. So totk while I have to say is better in every way you said it was, there will always be a sense of wonder that pervades every aspect of playing botw.

[@mattieice4785]

2:20 This is honestly how I felt about Tears of the Kingdom. Unlike you, even though I really did like the game, it DIDNT capture the same feeling as BOTW. Now this has created a problem. Up to this point, BOTW was my favorite game. But while I can recognize TOTK is (almost) objectively better in terms of gameplay, it never felt as good to play as my first play through of BOTW. So which is better in my eyes? Idk anymore. If anything, TOTK being pretty similar to BOTW has me acting more critical about BOTW. Honestly I’ll just let The Witcher 3 be my favorite game for now until I sort this out….

[@Anni_ka]

I feel the same. For me, my expectations going into the two games couldn't have been more different. I was super unsure whether I would like BOTW, but then ended up loving it so much. So I knew I'm probably gonna like TotK, and I feel like these different expectations lead to a different experience. At the moment, I'm im this weird position where I don't think too much about playing TotK any more, but when I play it, I get sucked in. Meanwhile BOTW consumed my thoughts for months. I think both have their own merits, but while I did all the shrines & side quests and collected all 900 Koroks in BOTW and was still sad to 'leave' the world being pretty much done with everything I wanted to do, I feel like I might not do that in TotK. Maybe I'll take a longer break, and then get back to doing all side quests and shrines. But I feel a bit sad that this game couldn't scratch my BOTW exploration itch that no other game has managed to scratch for me. It did fulfil me in other, new ways, though.

[@zedrico8577]

I definitely did not enjoy it as much as you did. But im glad you did.

[@TheXientist]

I feel like TOTK bit off more than it could chew. I hadn't played BOTW, so i was surprised to see that i was intrigued by it nonetheless. I greatly enjoyed my first ~70 hours, exploring hyrule, getting better weapons etc., but the game kind of falls apart towards the end due to lack of enemy variety, meaningful rewards and especially, lack of surprises. The depths are a y-coordinate inversion of the main map, and most of the unique content they have to offer can be found underneath the starting area. The terrain isn't interesting to explore because you already know how its gonna look if you've been to the overworld, and the darkness makes it even worse IMO, because not only do you miss much of the scarcely placed content, but it makes traversing the bland landscape even more annoying. Perhaps I would have enjoyed the underground more if I wasn't forced to go through it twice, once to turn the lights on, and once to actually explore. I don't enjoy my literal 40th Frox, Hinox or Talus, and i definitely don't care about nearly identical camps with the same enemies as always with the exciting reward of... zonaite. People shit on elden ring for reusing bosses but not only is the number of reused bosses much lower, they also usually have at least one unique difference, unlike TOTK (and i assume BOTW). I loved the weapon durability system, because when you get a better weapon from the enemies you kill anyway, there's no reason to save them. But even that falls apart in the endgame because you've hit the ceiling, once i have silver Lynels in my world the main incentive for combat falls apart. There is barely anything worthwhile underground, the link costumes are funny but i kind of don't care if they all offer me the exact same set bonus. Picking them up is better than nothing, but having them does not affect my gameplay in any way. The sky islands share most of these problems, but they are so much fewer and smaller in size that it didn't bother me much. The overworld is largely fine, though the lack of enemy variety still hurts long term enjoyability. The game feels like you aren't actually supposed to explore all of it (and I'm not talking about Koroks), because if you try to like I did, you'll burn out before the end, which is a terrible shame. I really hope that for BOTW 3? TOTK 2? they don't try to add a massive area that is essentially just an empty space filled with generic non-rewards and instead focus on making the one overworld they have as best as it can be.

[@chasingshadows3092]

As someone who hasn't played the new Zeldas, do you think since you felt the sense of exploration again in ToTK thay you will feel it again in a replay of BotW down the line? Anyways, keep up the good work!

[@razbutwo]

Interesting question that I don't have a definite answer on. I have always viewed Breath of the Wild as a "first experience is the best experience" type game, so given that I know the major discoveries, I don't think I can ever truly experience that magic again. With that said, now that I am so used to the state of Hyrule in Tears of the Kingdom, I do think going back to BotW will have me constantly being like "oh I forgot it used to be like this" and that could be its own cool experience, although I don't know that it will give me that same sense of discovery.

[@martinduebner]

Yeah, seems like the biggest flaw is still the lack of unique things around the world. Like in most places you'll find the same copy paste stuff like everywhere else. Whether you'll go to the Hebra mountains or the Faron Jungle, there will be a guy with a sign post, and a korok that wants to see his friend. Having a sky and underworld didn't change that.

[@Charcoal190]

I consider Shovel Knight: Treasure Trove to be my favorite game of all time. Not just because of the gameplay, but because of everything we were promised, and everything we got. We were promised 3 more playable characters, we got 3 unique campaigns. We were promised a battle mode, we got a whole fighting game. And sure, the base price got increased a few times, but if you bought the game at launch, that was it! You got all the expansions entirely for free! And I find that impressive. also tears of the kingdom is alright, i guess

[@CreativelyJake]

the best part of TOTK is the nearly 100 wells in the game

[@JDLT420]

*me foaming at the mouth like the guy from Kyoshi Island in The Last Airbender when I see a video from this series

[@ZerkUWU]

remember to stay hydrated. Also I lost the game.

[@high.level.noob.]

God damn I freaking forgot about the game completely. While I am kind of annoyed by losing, I am also kind of happy by remembering it exists. It is legendary.

[@childmanmanreal]

Classic shovel knight W

[@Jonas_M_M]

TotK feels gameplay-wise like a remake of BotW - with: the good, the bad, and ugly.

[@quadrupleheart]

“See you next time unless I decide to stop doing this.” Well I guess we know what he chose.

[@razbutwo]

Yeah, I put out a June, July, and August one after this, so it’s pretty clear that people saw me next time

[@creativeoj]

I disagree with you on the Sages. The mechanics of using their abilities are pretty clunky, but they are so useful that I kept them by my side the whole playthrough. Specifically Sidon's ability has way more utility than people give it credit for. The shield only dissipates when you let go of the attack button, so you can take a free hit while building up a charge attack. Use that with a two-handed weapon that does damage while charging or a Zora weapon that gets an attack boost while wet, and you can do a stupid amount of damage fast. Also Tulin's a demon who regularly head shots Lynels giving you an opportunity to mount them. Obviously the way you activate them could've been improved and caused me a lot of frustration (you can call them all to your side by whistling during combat, but that's less consistent than I'd like), but I loved having them with me. So often I would be running somewhere and look at all of them running with me, and I would feel like this world is so much more alive than BotW's. Those moments are really special

[@wordedhalo6746]

There is one side quest that has an insane and awesome reward and it was one of the first ones I did so I was really disappointed to find most of them weren’t like that

[@aglioeolio8494]

Can u give hint? A place name or the quest name?

[@wordedhalo6746]

@@aglioeolio8494 the Yiga clan hideout. Sorry if that is too specific I’m not sure how else to word it

[@aglioeolio8494]

@@wordedhalo6746oh yeah! My fav side quest..

[@BraxonGG]

Kinda kinda spoilers for TotK, look at your own risk Having spent well over 150 hours, doing almost every sidequest possible and completing all of the shrines, all of this without a guide of any kind, I will say: I'm, somehow, massively disappointed at tears :/ There are obviously incredible things in here, the throw mechanic is glorious and a must from now on, new clothing pieces and effects were really really dope overall (it's cool that they listened about the rain and actually implemented it nicely into the game) and the fact that the dlc and amiibo clothing is available for free is huge. The cave system and the wells give the world a layer of depth never present in botw, the possibility of refighting the dungeon bosses and obtaining unique fusion materials is neat, and the new abilities are nuts. Ascend as a whole is a lifesaver in convenience, and fusion (to an extent) is incredible. Now comes the ugly part. For starters: the sky is boring. yep. Apart from the starting area and the dungeons, it is but a huge space of nothingness filled with the occasional island, only made interesting by the always present shrine and the 1/2 chests with either A)A map for nostalgic clothing, B) A sage's blessing (is that the name? played it on Spanish lol) or C) a piece of clothing. The only reason they even exist is for being used as launch pads for the player jumps, due to the extra height. The sky could have been more expanded upon. Same could be applied for the depths, sadly. A reflection of the first Hyrule we got is insane as a concept and could have been, again, great, only for it to end up being only used for nostalgia (cool part, honestly), zonaite and the best sidequest in the game. Now, what's the way of traveling in this game? Ultrahand. Ultrahand... It's not what I wanted from this game, at all. Cool contraptions stop being cool when they self-destruct after one minute, take over tons of resources, take a lot of time to even build and for what? To move 300m in the sky? to move a "I need to reach my friend" to a whole nother continent? To help that guy with the sign? DEAR GOD THE GUY WITH THE SIGN. Listen, I get that it's cool to make your own contraptions to move around the world. That doesn't make it any different that you are moving pretty inefficiently unless you use the optimal builds (shoutouts to the hoverbike), and the fact that windbombs are marginally better at mobility than anything achievable by the Zonans. Overall, not my vibe at all in this game. I don't like spending 3 minutes building every time I need to solve a building puzzle, or every time I need to move a shrine stone. It kills the whole experience for me. Now, fusion. It's cool. It does lead to really cool combinations and awesome combat experiences. I do heavily disagree that it solves the hoarding problem. If anything, I think it makes it worse, somehow. Why would I use anything from my inventory to fuse to my sword if that enemy dropped a weapon I can't even pick up otherwise? I'll just fuse the weapons between them, objectively making them worse. And why? well because why would I do otherwise. Why would I fuse and break a lynel horn. A gleook horn. Anything that's useful, expensive or scarce, really. Even if I do, I will just stop using it when it's about to break and unfuse it at tarrey town, clogging even more the inventory until I break the cycle and go there. And dear God. The whole arrow fusion menu and by extension the throwing menu are hideous. Can't even put your favorites in a special section, and every time you want to shoot a special kind of arrow you need to pause the whole game. In botw it was sooooo much more convenient. arrows, fire arrows, ice arrows and so on. Now it's b a d, like r e a l l y b a d. "Oh you need to shoot ice for the first time? sure just look through this entire, unskippable, clunky list of almost the entirety of your items." What. Shrines. GOD. Why are there so. many. empty. ones. The Roomba one was cool. Overall kinda sucked, tho Really cheesable pieces, even more-so than the botw ones. "Well then don't cheese them". Listen if I can bomb a massive button instead of spend 5 minutes figuring out a puzzle, of course I will. it's pointless to do otherwise. Also, the fact that there were no pieces of armor in there anymore made me lose all interest in the chests in there, as almost all of the hard ones to get just had pretty normal stuff, achievable elsewhere. I don't even want to talk about the final reward of completion of shrines, as it makes me feel both: anxious to look at it, and cheated on. It don't even blink... The sages do have the problems listed on this video, so I won't expand into them much. Also Where is all the Sheika tech??? And no, don't tell me "they dismantled it all/they sunked after botw finished" Seriously? They dismantled not only the shrines located inside of three labyrinths, an abandoned castle and in the deepest thundra, but an entire place dedicated to nurturing people back to life? Isn't that one at least worth keeping?? And if they sunk why can't we see the massive towers anywhere in the depths???? really? To top it all off, there has been no further notice of a dlc that might solve any of the problems I have with it. In botw, we already had knowledge of the dlc by this time. matter of fact, it was announced a month before the game even released. So yeah, looking kinda grim. If you have somehow managed to read all of that, thanks for listening to me. I really wish I could just ignore all of it and enjoy it fully. I just. Can't. TL;DR: Game said to be 10/10 turns out to not actually be a 10/10 Anywho Have a good day/evening/night, hope it was worth the read lol (edit: spelling)

[@BraxonGG]

P.D. I agree. Shovel Knight is an awesome collection of games

[@gbf111]

so random i also decided to pick up shovel knight again, the dlc modes are sooooo good

[@SkyFlame27]

Haha totally read my thoughts in the first 20 seconds 😂

[@julianlanty2066]

The one thing that annoyed me was scrolling through the items when wanting to attach to an arrow or when wanting to drop o throw them. you have to scroll so much in the late game.

[@julianlanty2066]

they could have added a shortcut to a few items selected by the player like elden ring did.

[@AcidDotDrop]

Honestly, the map felt entirely new for the most part. Sure, it's the same map and many places feel familiar (duh) but all the areas I used to visit often in BotW, I barely visited during ToTK. And those few I vistited equally often, like Hateno, Hyrule Caste or Kakariko changed either significantly or, just by positioning the shrines somewhere else, give a literal and figurative new perspective that changed the entire perception. In regards to rewards... well, that's Zelda. Sidequests and Side activitoes had always boring rewards in 99 out of 100 times.And spirits... well, I deactivated them the second I got them, they were annyoing and only Yunobu, the most annoying character of them all, occassionally was used to spare bombs or preserve weapon durability to break stuff.

[@joanaguadomedina3060]

Play the other campaings of Shovel Knight. If you liked the first one, lest me tell you: _The others are better in almost every way._

[@flamingscar5263]

I went into TOTK with similar expectations as you, It would be good, great even, but not top BOTW as my favorite game of all time, I am so glad to be dead wrong

[@homonym7638]

100% with you on the companions, the contant wooshing noise every time you climb or finish climing a rock got on my tits alot. Definitely feel like their abilities could've been routed to some part of the controller rather than chasing them around mid-battle. I ended up hiding Riju and Sidon almost permanently, and brought out Tulin and Yunobo when doing some travelling high up or in the caves respectively.

[@juliprato]

awwww hell yea

[@timotheecaron852]

9:03 THIS !

[@lifeonleo1074]

TOTK was a great game but I enjoyed BOTW much more. Totk after a while felt like just more botw, I can't explain it, it just felt like I had seen this all before. I never felt the wonder of exploration in totk like I felt in botw. Totk is a good game but nothing will ever best my first experience with botw

[@PinchedSlinky]

Okay, you've finally sold me on Shovel Knight. I can't seem to buy just Shovel Knight anywhere nowadays though, do I have to get the Treasure Trove edition? Also, I mirror your sentiments towards TOTK greatly. I've since moved onto other games, but my 75+ hours in that world were incredibly well spent! 😁

[@pesto-boi]

Audio sound super quiet? Anyone else? Got my tablet at full volume and can still barely hear.

[@PianoIsArt]

What I'd love is a game that acts like you've fully finished it with nothing to do and gives you the idea that you want more and then it has a small thing that creates a crazy huge world or story or something, that's why I think I and alot of other people love creepypastas like Ben drowned, which added a sense of mystery and story to something that seem concluded

[@skew5386]

I always feel like I must be missing something because as a long-time Zelda fan who loved Breath of The Wild I found Tears of The Kingdom to be completely unenjoyable. The only sequel I've ever been more disappointed by was Axiom Verge 2. Not to say these are bad games, I know they're great, but I just personally couldn't find much fun in them matching the previous entries

[@PhyreSpore]

TotK's regional story missions had FAR weaker writing. The sages are mostly characters we already know but their arcs felt even more rushed this time around. To me, the writing in frickin Hyrule Warriors did more interesting things with them than TotK. Not to mention, the formula of: -We have a problem -Thank goodness Link showed up to solve my problem! -mysterious voice -dungeon with 4 locks -boss fight (these were definite highlights at least) -oh wow the mysterious voice is the ancient sage and now I'M a new sage wwhhhaaaatt -almost LITERALLY the EXACT Same cutscene every time. :was even more repetitive than in BotW. AND it was already repetitive by the end of that game. Honestly, once I finished all of the story missions up to "DESTROY GANONDORF" I was feeling really burned out on the story quests. But now that I know Ganon is next I'm just doing side quests and having more fun just exploring. Without the terrible character pacing dragging me along between repetitive story beats, the game is fun again.

[@kimwasalreadytaken]

Thanks for avoiding heavy spoilers! TotK is the only game I've played in June. I've also been finishing up university with exams and that took a lot of time. I'm "only" ~80 hours into TotK but I'm LOVING it. I don't even have the full map yet! I have two temples but I haven't been to the Gerudo region yet. I'm enjoying doing side quests for the time being. My favourites so far are probably the election in Hateno village and the crazy cook (finding clues to him and eventually finding him). Of course the Master Kohga quests too are hilarious. Perhaps a bit of an unpopular opinion is that I don't love the depths - I dislike scary games, and the depths are just that bit too scary for me.

[@SnakeEaterGaming]

Games I played in June, Zelda TOTK. Games I played in July, Zelda TOTK. Games I played in 2023, ZELDA TOTK!!!

[@alsokyle]

omg raz it's been out for long enough. idk what it is about tears of the kingdom specifically that has folks so terrified of spoiling for folks, even a month and a half later. surely everyone who would care has already played the thing for a hundred hours already.

[@razbutwo]

Idk my analytics showed a bunch of people leaving when I gave the mild warning/joke so I think you’re wrong