What Tears of the Kingdom is Like For Someone Who Doesn't Really Play Games

[@razbuten]

happy new year

[@xiongray]

Happy new Years!

[@valeelens]

Happy new year :)

[@TheRealMycanthrope]

Happy new year Raz! 🎉

[@walterheartwellwhite320]

Happy new year for you too!

[@ligstig]

Happy new years mate!

[@SlippyLegJones]

"Don't you write about me like that" is such a funny scenario to imagine. Her getting frustrated and you just taking notes.

[@orsolyafekete7485]

Day 3: Subject hit me with the controller because I was, quote: "making a smug face while taking notes". Experiment will continue tomorrow.

[@michaelfryers1914]

To almost quote Purah, taking notes unexpectedly in the middle of conversation is a rather charming quirk

[@thekingofawesomeness9173]

Imagine if they streamed these 😅

[@Sahumis]

I laughed so hard and replayed it hahaha "don't you dare"

[@McSheepyFace]

If only! They could turn comments off and I'd watch all damn day.@@thekingofawesomeness9173

[@watermelon-7464]

Her attaching the clock puzzle shrine is pure genius

[@skeetsmcgrew3282]

When I see people do stuff like that it makes me wish someone would do a huge poll on how they solved each shrine

[@Pineconiosis]

Iirk thats what i did too 😭 i didnt know they were clock hands and had to rewind them

[@renoirrr]

i did it the intended way cause i always go by the idea that shrines are meant to teach the mechanic it gives you, but doing the fuse thing is actually the way speedrunners do it so i wasnt surprised to see it. its faster than waiting for the two hands to line up if you use ultrahand to turn it.

[@freescape08]

When I first stepped in there, I used ultrahand to see that they highlighted, then switched tools and did it the intended way. I didn't even consider that I could've likely done it faster with ultrahand, since I was more accustomed to that from botw's magnesis.

[@OpposingPony]

I did it exactly that way with ultrasound because it seemed obvious to me that's what I should do.

[@Green0Photon]

I have great respect for your wife. Any clip of her voice just sounds like she's constantly insanely frustrated. Wild how she's stuck things out.

[@dmarsub]

Probably mostly because of the editing as he is looking for exactly these moments to find what can be improved.

[@vortbio]

As someone who has seen 'non-gamers' get very frustrated with games and quit playing them, I agree. It must have taken a lot of patience on her part. Good for her

[@GregHuffman1987]

i also found totk more frustrating than botw. overall i admit totk is probably the better game. but i stuck through botw meanwhile i gave up on totk at the fire temple. i was having fun but i became too stressed trying to figure stuff out

[@robinthrush9672]

@@GregHuffman1987 The irony is that the puzzles of the fire temple can be completely skipped if you make the hoverbike/trashbike. Haven't done it yet, but I've seen people talk about it.

[@dowfreak7]

@@vortbio I'll say totk definitely was also very tough to get a hang of. You do need to take a lot of inputs in mind, lots of powers that fulfill rather singular purposes and different options for the same inputs, just based on "stance changes" essentially. Using Fusion requires you to attack to attach. Meanwhile in ultrahand it's twisting. And in the menu it's swapping tabs. And oh boy, learning how to throw/drop stuff and have it slowly become muscle memory also takes quite a bit of time. You'll throw your weapons or just randomly have a bow in your hand so many times. All in all I think totk is a pretty rough game to get started with, between all the inputs, powers and forced (and bad, let's be real) story. Once you get stuff down and get to explore, it's obviously fantastic, but especially the start was a little butchered.

[@lucasx268]

23:41 okay but can we talk about how cool the physics engine is in this game? She glued the 2 clock hands together so they were applying equal and opposite forces to each other, which meant gravity was the tiebreaker causing them to both move down until they reached the bottom and hit equilibrium.

[@CharlyOmega]

When you need to hit a word count on your essay:

[@YayaFeiLong]

@@CharlyOmega god forbid people write a lot of words about stuff that interests them right guys

[@Mingulinthu]

@@YayaFeiLongIts not even a lot of words, it was explained clearly and sucintly enough without skimming through anything that was relevant, reading any small book probably is an insurmountable task for the other person. The comment comes across to me like that stereotype horseshit student that would go "BOOORING" as soon as the teacher would open their mouth. I don't know what compels people so annoying for no reason. And yes, it's incredible how those things can all work in tandem as you would expect from real life physics, when EVERY GAME DEVELOPER will tell you that that sort of interaction should make everything fall apart and burst in flames in glorious fashion. There was definitely some wizardry involved in coding.

[@OrdinaryLatvian]

@@CharlyOmega What a 5-second attention span looks like.

[@CharlyOmega]

@@YayaFeiLong why long word when short word work good

[@Left4Cake]

The down arrow on the dislodge just goes to show how much we take our "common gaming language" for granted.

[@morbid1.]

tbh there is no reason why pressing down on d-pad should not move dialogue...

[@Bluemoon11211]

Well the arrow is for knowing that there is more dialog after so its not like its completely useless it still gives information, some people just take the wrong info from it.

[@Religion0]

@@morbid1. Even as a gamer, what buttons to use can sometimes be weird. I've been playing Hades on my Switch, and to interact with things in the overworld you press R. In menus or dialogue, it's A... or Y, not R. I've more than once thought "Wait, didn't I change my Keepsake?" only to realise I must have pressed R rather than A because I finally got used to that being the interact button and A being the "shoot a rock at things" button. And I will curse the controls of RDR2 on the PS4 until someone stops me. So, yeah, it can be really unintuitive.

[@patrickj]

@@Bluemoon11211 Well, because it's the only info they *can* take from it. If anything up to that point told them the inputs required to progress, why wouldn't the textbox do so too?

[@patrickj]

@@morbid1. In this case it's probably fine, but generally there are valid concerns. The most glaring one is with dialogue that pops up while you were moving. Possibly downwards, thus accidentally skipping dialogue.

[@weirdlyhungry]

I'm sorry but the clock hand puzzle solution with ultrahand makes a LOT more sense than using recall and I cannot believe I didn't think about it. It's genius.

[@razbuten]

Yeah! That's what blew my mind about it. I think I went into the shrine KNOWING it wanted me to use recall, so that is how I looked at every obstacle, but she did not feel contained by that in the same way.

[@weirdlyhungry]

@@razbuten i went into the shrine assuming the same thing, I don't quite remember why and I'll be doing a replay later this year to see. I'm assuming Nintendo accounted for how both seasoned players and new players would want to tackle the problem and ran with the design.

[@lorraineeavis3248]

Same

[@roryreviewer6598]

This is actually how I solved that puzzle the first time I did it too. And then I felt dumb that I didn’t think about the recall solution.

[@larad4421]

Im making my boyfriend play the entirety of totk (or as long as hell endure it lol), he did finish botw before. He also did the clock hand puzzle by fusing the pieces together and i was so stumped i didnt think of it because the rewind solution just seemed so much more obvious to me. Its really fun to see how other players handle the same puzzles.

[@maxgreineder9867]

She’s back!!!! Sorry Raz, but we’re all here for Lady

[@akko8210]

"Not i" lmaooo , the bottom guy is dumb

[@cajunking5987]

Not I. Here to listen to the man talk. Frankly it would be better if he was just kinda reviewing. The perspective of a non-gamer is cool too tho.

[@tlam3028]

@@cajunking5987bro said “not I” 😭

[@VillHelm76]

Legit you and 3 people r only here for the lady I like to hear abt a life unlike my own

[@cajunking5987]

@@tlam3028 I’m sure you think “I not” is better

[@qwertydavid8070]

Videos like these should honestly be shown in university game design courses. There is so much to learn and you are really well spoken. you put things very succinctly and mention a lot of really good and interesting points. What I love most is that you frequently give counterpoints to your own points. That is very useful and it's something you don't see a lot with other creators. Truly, just like the game design in tears of the kingdom, you encourage the audience to consider multiple perspectives and think creatively, instead of just seeing the problem from one limited way. Seriously, I can easily imagine someone doing an entire college lecture based on this video alone. It's that good!

[@One.Zero.One101]

What i love about these videos is realizing we’re so stuck in video game logic, like not being able to jump over a waist-high rock. We just accept that instinctively but new gamers use human logic instead of video game logic.

[@Dimencia]

Not that it's a bad thing, but she probably enjoyed the game and mechanics a lot more because of your encouragement, where you assumedly told her when she solved a puzzle in an 'unintended' way. Obviously a genuine compliment on her creativity, from someone she cares about and who knows the topic, can be more meaningful than anything the game can try to reward her with. I wonder how she would have felt about the game without that extra encouragement, or without ever knowing that her solutions were creative or unintended

[@crstph]

i had a similar frustration with the totk tutorial and found myself just wanting to get past it so i could explore the bigger world, and in my experience there was a different “oh” moment when i solved something in a way i was “supposed” to versus just solving it. there were many “ohhh THATS how im supposed to do it!” moments, and then there were moments where i was like well, i think im supposed to do something with this obvious thing they left out, but what if i ignored that and tried something else. OH NICE IT WORKED IM A GENIUS the immediate feedback of someone who knows the game is probably rewarding, but i still felt clever and creative when i solved stuff even after ignoring half the shit in the room lol

[@Michael-io6ok]

21:22 was relatable as heck. Just standing there watching your makeshift step-stool or stairway topple without reacting to catch it is like when you lose to a Dark Souls boss and just laugh.

[@noyman1988]

There were a ton of times I forgot Ascend was a thing. Seeing your wife use ascend to bypass using rewind was really funny.

[@crstph]

as someone with a similar level of experience to her, i LOVE ascend. yay free shortcut everywhere! get me UP

[@dragontears]

I've been playing games for over 30 years and abused the hell out of ascend. I am LAZY. Any excuse not to climb a thing.

[@EmperorZ19]

I got really hooked on Tears, to the point where after I finished my 200+ hour playthrough I went back and played BotW again. Not being able to ascend and not being able to move every object around with Ultrahand threw me for a loop. But having an unlimited supply of bombs again was mindblowing in the other direction.

[@GeneralNickles]

Ascend is such a BS mechanic that my brain would constantly forget it even existed. There were so many puzzles that took me WAY longer than they had any right to because I forgot about ascend. It's infuriating.

[@V3ltix]

@@GeneralNickles lol

[@wjr4700]

Im not going to lie. Her brief yet thrilling fight won me over. Am fan now.

[@johnospina1953]

I'm sorry, but why is that profile picture so cute, @wjr4700?

[@caitplol]

Personally love seeing the progression of these with her going from total novice to casual gamer lol. As someone who first found your channel with the BOTW edition of this series, at a time when I myself was really just starting to get into gaming, it's been fun to watch as I've also continually gotten more familiar with the 'language of video games' and now interacting with these from such a different perspective than when they first started.

[@DesiB717]

I can confirm that the struggle 16:21 is not exclusive to non-gamers. I've been playing games all my life and I immediately put all of the available sails onto that raft and then watched in despair as the wind carried it away :') Ended up having to reload my save because I couldn't find any other way to get across

[@argentpuck]

I've been gaming for over 30 years now and made a LOT of the same mistakes as our subject did. Tears of the Kingdom really needed to pull the bandage off and make a linear tutorial: it's just too complex to leave it up to chance.

[@jam-the-hologram]

my brother literally first played totk today and instead of using all the sails on one raft, kept trying to make a raft with the least amount of wood possible so that the raft was faster, but because it was like one log, he kept falling off the rafts and had to reload the save and use 2 logs instead

[@Smeik2901]

I messed up with the sail too, so I ended up cutting down every tree in a 10 mile radius and sticking them together to a very, very, very long bridge so I could simply walk over to the shrine

[@Agent160FTW]

I struggled so much with this one that I ended up making two rafts and put one on the lake, swam to it, ultrahanded the other raft further out on the lake and basically used the rafts in the way I used Cryonis in Breath of the Wild. I felt stupid and ingenious at the same time.

[@theshyguitarist4536]

In my first playthrough practicing with the ultrahand ability, I made a pretty decently composed wooden log raft with fan propulsion. Jumped on it, pulled out my weapon (unfortunately an axe) and then did what the game told me to do which was to hit my newly constructed vehicle. Axe hits wood. Vehicle falls apart into tons of chopped wooden pieces

[@reganhulvey4213]

I really love Totk there is so much creativity. I love watching how other people do things especially when it’s not the way the “game wants you to”

[@Nulify-jc4fs]

I would love to see her play A Short Hike. It seems like a gamer would like it as much as a non gamer. Though by that point you can probably title the video “gaming for a gamer”

[@Archetype_Angel]

You really did open my eyes. I've been playing since the NES era and didn't really stop to think how complex some games have become and the learning curve and adaptability I've gone through in all these years. . ...and that's why my wife gets bored with cutscenes and tutorials too. She prefers games like Crash bandicoot: only basic text, only 2 action buttons, and oriented for gameplay only. . It never crossed my mind that the gap between the games we like was so huge until now. Thank you, this helped a lot.

[@RDR911]

…I’m sorry, but how do you pay such little attention to your wife that you didn’t realize this before a random KZbinrs told you? Christ.

[@tenor1190]

@@RDR911 ?

[@encarneye6865]

@@RDR911 What are you smoking?

[@One.Zero.One101]

@@RDR911 You're the type of person who takes things too literally. 🤣

[@NauyaIsOnline]

This reminds me of why TotK was so fun to play at the same time alongside friends. Every single one of us solved nearly everything in our own ways and it was a blast just talking to each other about how we did the Shrines differently.

[@billyjhamlin]

"Her goal was to burn the chest [out of spite and frustration]" Me too, bestie. Me too.

[@scragar]

RE: the solution to the chest on the wooden platform surrounded by leaves. The game puts the torches in the room specifically in case you use all the fruit and miss, since the fruit explodes on hit there's no way to reuse the fruit so once it's all used without the forces it'd be a softlock. I guess it's still a softlock if you use all your arrows, but the game spawns 5 arrows in shrines needing arrows if you enter with less than 5, so I guess that's not as big a softlock since leaving and reentering let's you get 5 more tries. Can't remember if the bow in the shrine respawns if you don't have a bow though, so that may be a potential softlock, I'm fairly sure though given the effort Nintendo went through to prevent softlocks it would respawn just to be safe.

[@diamondinmyeye6160]

I specifically used an arrow I lit with the torch just so I could keep all the resources. 😅

[@lethauntic]

It's honestly impressive if someone manages to softlock anything in Tears of the Kingdom

[@michaellane5381]

​​@@lethaunticthe closest i got was the Flux construct Island in the tutorial(i went there before getting abilities and it is damn near impossible to see the water below... I might have had zonai items but ultimately there is only a small frog pond below without them... And it does not look deep enough... I spent like hours trying to climb down the side and drop on the mine cart tracks.(hoping i could heal and tank the next fall). later Impa hijacks you in a ballon if you lack a paraglider there is no safe way off, you have to sabotage the balloon so she will save you both. That was the closest i got before i stopped screwing around looking for softlocks.

[@TailsPrower100]

I had no idea you could sabotage the balloon 😲 I just did what she said and jumped to my death 😅 When I eventually got the paraglider, I redid that section safely. But it's interesting to know that there was an alternative way to solve that issue.

[@michaellane5381]

@@TailsPrower100 there are even multiple methods, detach the balloon, put out the fire, or wait(IDR if she leaves you or not on that last one)

[@RandomEntry13013]

"Its also tough when a game relies so heavily on cinematics, despite them not being an important part of what the game is trying to do" "...and that became known as the imprisoning war."

[@cattysplat]

Modern Gaming really. Old games are almost entirely gameplay, almost to a fault if you enjoy story and context.

[@kit76149]

@@cattysplat I feel like many games from the 2000's had a good balance of story and gameplay and I miss that. KH2 has 60 hours of cutscenes but it never felt like it (especially playing through it the first time). Many more examples I could mention. Nowadays it seems like many developers can't balance the two anymore. Either the gameplay is almost *too* free, at a detriment to the story they are trying to tell, like here with TotK or with AC Mirage, or the story is focused on so much that there is barely any gameplay and they may as well have just made a show or a film. Ideally, the gameplay and story should serve each other so you can enjoy both the gameplay itself and the context/world/characters in the game. I of course want a game to be fun but I also want to care about the world and people I am saving. Sometimes the lure of getting to the next story point and seeing what happens to the characters next has been enough to push me through re-fighting a tough boss in a game. The cutscene that comes after serves as both a reward and a short break.

[@Imperial_Squid]

Secret Stones??

[@fiskoris5226]

@Imperial-Squid Demon King???

[@shiethegal]

​@@kit76149Now I want to see a Gaming for a Non-Gamer episode on Kingdom Hearts.

[@draculaman]

Great video. Funnily enough, my wife is playing through TotK at the moment and it's been interesting seeing some of the duality between your wife's experiences and how they are similar to hers - I actually laughed out loud at the whole Zelda stopping to talk over and over thing, because my wife's experience and reaction was almost identical. I think my wife has a decent amount more familiarity with games than yours so its not completely the same, but it does make me realise how much subconcious visual or mechanical familiarity I'll rely on compared to someone who isn't innately familiar with them. There will be a lot of times she'll be like 'why cant I just do x/y/z?' or 'why have they done x/y/z like this?', and I come away thinking 'yeah actually...why IS it done that way?', where it would previously have been something I really hadn't given much thought about either way, cos Id just accept it as a a norm within game design, positive or negative. It's also just really interesting watching someone interact with games in a different way and their approach to enjoying it in general. Often when watching my wife play I am envious of her capability to just...explore or experiement, where as I feel like I am quite guilty of playing something as efficiently as possible, or min-maxing my way to the best outcome. Anyway, awesome video as usual, and happy new year to you and your wife!

[@azuregriffin1116]

I had that issue with the Lego Hobbit game. Couldn't smash a door. Turns out I had to push that door. Once the door had been pushed, I could smash it. I turned the Xbox off and have not played since

[@Iasgo]

Min-maxing is a curse that has to be kept under control at all times, otherwise it will destroy your gaming life.

[@Lor_Duck]

We need a WIFE VS WIFE. Any game. Would be fun to see.

[@killaknight12]

I think it also comes down to what kind of story interests you most or if you just want the gameplay. I was sucked in from the get go, because I wanted to know more about the whole Zonai lore and what was up with Ganondorf, so my eyes were glued to the TV throughout the whole intro and I was omega hyped. 😁 Then there's my wife who will take any cutescene as a break, not really paying any attention to what is said and just compliments the visuals sometimes, lmao.

[@joegardner851]

@@Lor_Duckwe can get a squad going with our wives lol

[@darkmyro]

I think it would be interesting to see her complete a game (something really short like journey or flower that you could beat in one sitting) I also think it would be interesting to see her play some more niche genres like a bullet hell, a fighting game, a beat-um-up, a puzzle game, dating sim and so on. I also think it would be interesting to throw her into a broken game like a game that's not put together well and observe her reaction. I would also like to see her reaction to some gaming staples like assassin's creed, mortal Kombat, resident evil and some games that are parts of a long running franchises.

[@qwertydavid8070]

I think long running franchises might not be the best idea. As mentioned in the start of this video, you kinda need to be "into the lore" to enjoy and appreciate the narrative of those types of games. With no previous context, what the player will care the most about will be just plain gameplay. So if those "franchise games" are mainy focused on gameplay, it wouldn't be a problem. But any sort of worldbuilding or exposition that might be intriguing for us will be a bore to her. Honestly, exposition in general can be boring if you're not into the franchise, and in general it's better to show, not tell. Obviously there are certain moments where exposition is neccesary, specially if you care about worldbuilding. It's very hard to build a proper world with just vague statements lol. But to be fair, its not impossible. Subnautica is probably the best example of this. Subnautica uses a lot of environmental storytelling with very little dialouge or exposition. It encourages the player to figure the world out by simply exploring it. Subnautica is my favorite game ever, and it spawned my love for movies or series with less exposition, that encourage the audience to figure it all out by themselves.

[@ayoo_wassup]

@@qwertydavid8070 to piggy back off your point. narrative is something that is particularly affected by someones choice in it. typically people like certain genrees and elements, and will pick those out of a seas of things they arent interested in. for gameplay, its a bit different. choice still matters. but not as heavily because the player has agency by default and interaction will always be more stimulating than viewing with all other factors controlled. since he is picking these games for her. less of a focus on narrative is probably better. unless he fields her interests and has her input in the type of narrative she wants to see

[@E2STOPTV]

I think that at this point you can consider her a gamer 😂

[@razbuten]

deleting the video now

[@drgonzo123]

@@razbutennnnnoooooooooo!!

[@kaksspl]

She complained about her team in League of Legends. She absolutely is a gamer.

[@WednesdayTheClove]

a gamer who didn't realize the obvious visual cue to use the master sword to cut the vines :^)

[@half_real]

@@kaksspl Razbuten turned her into a LoL player? She should divorce him.

[@MrLinkDay]

That puzzle at 23:36 that she solved using ultra hand just shows how many ways we don't even think it can be solved.

[@Haiforse]

I hope that you never end this series, I love seeing the lady you live with’s progression through her playing of new games. Happy new year razbuten ❤

[@IPoopButterflies]

Bless you for having so much patience. I'm trying to let my son learn openly in games and it's been very frustrating to try to explain to my son how controllers and games work. Just seeing how Lady misses stuff, like the friendly constructs or the (what feels obvious to me) fire fruit with dried leaves, makes my brain hurt but the discoveries she made with the clock hands and ascend for the temple were an absolute joy to see. I hope she continues to find game's she enjoys. :)

[@UltimateTS64]

The first video of this series inspired me to try this with my gf once I got one. I now have one, and we've been dating for 2 years as of rn, and she's tried a lot of my favorite games of all time. I taught her the trick from BOTW about Z targeting to recenter the camera since she can't move the character and camera simultaneously yet. We're working on it, and I'm glad to see another entry in this really fun series.

[@TheLoneReni]

I feel like I agree on the tutorial but I also think that it was made that was specifically for veterans of Botw. It gave us new info. It allowed us to pick up almost exactly where we left off making it feel natural. There wasn't as much drive to get stronger because well, you didn't have to. And the opened played with that sense of security and vulnerability by stripping it from you and upping the difficulty. Also adding to the players personal motivation to win which is an all around good thing. It didn't tell you a lot of stuff because a lot of it was basics from the prior game and thus upped the challenges you get to face while traversing an area most of us would have breezed through with our glider. Well, ya know... if you had one. I really, really loved totk's intro because of all those changes but I can absolutely see how this game is not newbie friendly. I also think that it was a specific move on Nintendos part because botw is still purchaseable on switch so its kind of an "Well go play the first one." Which I get... to a degree, but i'm not really gunna touch on that debate lest i'm typing for another 10 min.

[@Lucie-ho1qv]

The way she solved the path to and the final shrine is insanely interesting!

[@brianisbrined9255]

I also find being stopped suddenly while walking or doing things to be quite jarring. It's one of the things I never liked about random encounters.

[@qwfp]

Thanks, to both of you, for this series. It's important to me (and also to the lady I live with, but she doesn't realize it). Thanks for the late Christmas gift, see you next year!

[@haarisajmeri9811]

These videos are very helpful because as an upcoming developer i always make sure how to make complex things more easier. And these videos gave me ideas for the approaches I can take. So thankyou especially goes to your wife because she is giving her time to your experiments so we understand game design to a whole approachable medium.

[@Balekkar]

Literally just yesterday I was thinking about how sad it was that this series may not ever have another episode. I'm excited to see it, but saddened that every episode means the next one is less of what we want it to be.

[@jakebrantley8889]

Weirdly, Im watching this video hours after the next Zelda game was announced! It has a creative feel too, but still VERY different from these last 2 open world.

[@jakebrantley8889]

Echoes of Wisdom announced today! I typed a comment but its not showing up for me so Im replying again. Ironically Im watching this video and reading your comment just hours after the new Zelda was announced. It keeps a creative feel although VERY different from botw and totk.

[@tsirakura1684]

Please keep this series going. As a relatively new gamer, it is really wonderful to see someone else experience what I did.

[@jacobkirk1846]

I’d love to see a Part 2 to this video with her exploring the game outside of the Great Sky Island.

[@Essentially_Empy]

Agreed

[@phrogthewise]

Yes, i thought that might be interesting too, because that's where the game started to get boring for me, i completed all the temples, but i never thought i really wanted to sit down and play, Tears of the Kingdom is great in many ways, but for some reasons i didn't really enjoy playing as much as i did with Breath of the Wild

[@annpc8266]

​@@phrogthewisei looked everywhere but i simply can't find who asked

[@mr.snaplles5964]

@@annpc8266 i asked

[@phrogthewise]

@@annpc8266 ??? This makes zero sense, we are in a KZbin comment section, is everyone gonna need your permission to criticize your favourite game? One day you’re gonna have to accept that people have other opinions than you, Grow up.

[@jasondeutschbein8102]

The videos you do with your wife are such an amazing value for the community. I'm really happy you both decided to do these for us. I hope this pushes more couples to do the same, to not only share the love of gaming with our loves but also provide fantastic information that only new players can give us.

[@HenryAshman]

The fiddly attachment system doesn't have to come at the expense of creative control or options though. Games like Valheim have snap points, but with a button press you can engage "manual mode". So by default it's user friendly, then power users can use manual mode later

[@hyper_lynx]

Totk also used attach points and limited rotation so I'd wager it's about as easy as Valheim to build in

[@wilpuriarts5895]

It feels fiddly at first, but I think that is the case with many complex gameplay systems. After a while it’s smooth and easy.

[@diegoacuna9706]

21:59 she did the Tom yell from Tom and Jerry lmao

[@Retreta_]

Thank you for commenting this, was looking for it lmao

[@iamjustkiwi]

This is a great series, I often take for granted how much my experience in games feeds into learning other ones so it's nice to see what someone coming in without all that preexisting knowledge goes through. This should be a must watch for developers who want their games to truly be accessible to everyone.

[@lilyblair1158]

I think part of the departure from BOTW's format for the tutorial/opening, was trust that the player has played the first game. Not many newcomers are going to start with TOTK, therefore Nintendo asks the player to trust them to get them to the core game play that we know and love. Great video, always a pleasure to have Lady back as a fellow former non-gamer ❤

[@EHAmos]

All the noises and little comments she makes are what I do in my head when I play, it always makes me laugh.

[@evanweaver1060]

“Do you wanna do another one?” at the end really made me smile. Setting new people get excited about this type of media makes me so happy.

[@BrandonWestfall]

We all have that "I'm an idiot" moment when playing games. That occurred to me several times doing shrines in both games. Things you would think are blatantly obvious go right over our heads.

[@raswartz]

I love this series. It's actually showed me a lot about what I don't know or don't notice about the way games try to guide you.

[@Ellary_Rosewood]

I love these videos. Been looking forward to this one since the game came out! Happy New Year everyone!! ❤️🌲❄️🥂🎇

[@Road_to_Dawn]

The whole thing about the controls being too complex in TotK reminds me of all the times I've heard people complain similar things about Metroid Dread. In Dread, it's true, basically every button on the controller is used for something different aside from maybe the up and down arrows (and they may have uses that I just forgot about). Even I, as someone who's been playing Metroid games for 20 years and has gone through Dread a dozen times, still get the triggers for missiles and the grapple beam mixed up. I've been dreaming of making a metroidvania for forever, and one thing I always think about is how I would lay out the controls. There's a lot more to consider when designing a control scheme than someone who's never attempted to make a game would never realize. It's a tough job.

[@crimsonhawk52]

yall should play a puzzle game that you're both new to! My mom's not a gamer, and we played The Witness together and had a blast

[@HandyDandy6]

They should play death squared

[@alecwoyke9152]

That sounds like such a good experience, I love gaming with family

[@lethauntic]

A lot of people gave the Witness shit, which I can understand, but despite just being line puzzles, there was a lot of creativity to them and they way they teach you to solve them was really cool to me.

[@tamsel814]

My mom is also not a gamer but still spend hours playing one of the professor patton games on my Nintendo (3?) ds.

[@YayaFeiLong]

@@lethauntic I'm pretty sure the reason people didn't like The Witness had less to do with the game itself and more to do with the developer. He's, like, a huge snob

[@WigneyR]

16:40 was definitely a “Top 10 biggest anime betrayals” moment

[@taylorii8664]

The long awaited sequel! Happy to see you both back for another go at Zelda

[@sass2836]

My jaw dropped with your wife's clock puzzle solution! The insight from her perspective is fascinating, and she makes so many valid points I take for granted. The down button not being used for continuing dialogue is a simple but great point.

[@ligstig]

Always love to see a new post from you, especially a new instalment from this series! These videos always provide such a unique insight!

[@OrigamiJawny]

0:33 luckily I didn't have to transition, I was assigned-gamer-at-birth

[@Roch_C]

Hey Raz! Hope you know you are doing some amazing work for the games industry with this series. Ive seen your videos circulated around game dev circles for years, and im sure this one will too!

[@sirgreedy88]

That's sad to hear, the last thing the gaming industry needs more of is dumbing down everything for casuals or non gamers in an attempt at widening the market. There has been enough of that going on in recent years.

[@crstph]

@@sirgreedy88breath of the wild is the perfect example of how that is not what lowering the barriers of entry has to mean at all, and if thats the result then its bad game design. the key isn’t “make the games easier so anyone can beat them,” its “make the things that make them difficult possible for anyone to learn.” if a game assumes you know to press B to run or eat food to heal so it never shows you those things, thats not a problem to an experienced gamer and makes it literally impossible for a newbie. every game is someones first game, and i personally would hate it if someone decided to throw out my favorite games without a chance because the game showed them it didnt even care enough about their experience to teach them basics

[@sirgreedy88]

@@crstph no shit genius. Why you felt I needed that explained to me if baffling. I bet you like to smell your own farts. I never said the problem was "make the games easier so everyone can beat them" You're strawmanning. piss off.

[@RDR911]

@@sirgreedy88 don’t worry, they’re really not shared around in any serious capacity. People at my studios call them “that guy and his stoned wife”.

[@Petriell01]

my god man this is so brilliant I spent almost 5 minutes trying to synchronize the watches I didn't know you could glue them together with the ultra hand, your wife is a genius!

[@amazingturtle4708]

We neeeed to see Tunic in this series. It would be so interesting to see someone who doesn’t play games figure out it’s secrets

[@gonzaurra1]

23:39 I did the exact same thing lol. Doing shrines "incorrectly" became my passion on this game

[@facilityhues]

My first real video game experience was with Breath of the Wild on the Wii U. I had never seriously played a video game before, only casually playing in Mario Kart and Wii Sports Resort. I never thought to use the internet to help solve problems and ask questions about the game, so I ended up learning everything through trial and error. I think the thing that set me on the right track for BOTW and later video games was my desire for experimentation. I wanted to check the controls, tinker with the movement and find my own ways to complete tasks. Going into Tears of the Kingdom I relived this cycle of learning, but I think my intro with BOTW helped me relearn the system with TOTK, where as going straight into TOTK might have confused me as a beginner. Great video!

[@bepis_real]

I gotta say, it’s really cool spotting someone who played BotW on Wii U. I imagine going from GamePad to Joycons would cause an even bigger rift in relearning controls

[@facilityhues]

@@bepis_real In like 2019 I was able to pick up another copy for the switch, but I actually prefer the Wii U version in a lot of ways! I used to draw maps and use them with the gamepad while exploring. I remember my biggest problem in my second playthrough was looking down at my hands expecting the gamepad!

[@guidedexplosiveprojectileg9943]

My first real gaming experience was Deus Ex

[@TerranigmaQuintet]

@@bepis_real Considering that version sold very little compared to the Switch one, you likely won't find one easily. And those who did likely were more seasoned gamers as those were more likely to have bought a system that failed commercially.

[@RDR911]

“I never thought to use the internet for its one use, looking up information” 🤣🤣🤣

[@rodrigopatricio880]

Seeing your wife find workarounds is mindblowing, some stuff i would never have thought of, like bypassing the gears recall ability by going to the spot and using the ascend ability. Genious, sometimes it's astounishing how different people think

[@Respectable_Username]

Absolutely love these perspectives you and The Lady You Live With give to games! I wonder how many years before The Child You Live With will be interested in being a test subject for preschooler-aimed games, and comparing the onboarding experience for literal children (who are assumed to have no pre-knowledge) with the experience given to adults of unknown pre-knowledge

[@thelastfinale805]

The SCREAM at 22:00 has enormous Goofy energy

[@inconspicuous45]

You need to do a part 2 bro the great sky island is very different from the rest of TOTK, and I personally think the rest of the game is 4x better lol. It would be great to see her do the storm wind ark, learn how to use fuse better, make ultrahand contraptions, find out about the depths, and stuff like that

[@zacharytaylor2676]

Hey Raz, thank you for letting your "Lady you live with" trying Tears of the Kingdom. Her solution for the 4th shrine was genius. Most people who know games know that Recall should be used, since there wasnt a shrine for that ability yet. But your wife just throws that "implicated knowledge" out of the window and did it her own way. Applause and kudos. For me, it has always been clear what I had to do, so I wasn't thinking there might be other solutions or atleast I did not think if there may be others. That's why I love your informal experiments. It gets me a little out of my gamey comfort zone and adds input from a total non-gamey bubble. Keep up the good work and Happy New Year!!

[@Chaoticbanana]

Happy new year! You absolutely have to get the lady you live with to play baldurs gate 3. Anything she wants to try she can probably do - the perfect game (with a crazy interface for newer players)

[@RaskylC]

omg it was so heartwarming to hear "Do you want to do another one?"

[@danielhuelsman76]

You should have her try out Banjo-Kazooie Nuts 'n' Bolts. I know that game gave gamers a sour feeling in their mouths due to expectations of it being a platformer, but she has none, and she loves building games, so I would love to see that game reviewed from a fresh perspective.

[@levanera]

"there are no wasted buttons" >dedicated whistle button

[@Anni_ka]

Yay, she's back again!💪 Her opinion of the beginning is so interesting to me. Maybe I'm so used to JRPGs taking forever to get going, but I loved the atmospheric start and getting some background info in TotK 😅 Although I can definitely see how getting straight to the action as in BOTW is more satisfying. I hope that generally she still had a good time, even with the frustrating aspects 😅

[@leesasuki]

I like that despite playing game my whole life, I have the same feeling as your wife for this game

[@cola3101]

first time viewer and massive botw/totk fan, very interesting concept and entertaining video! its neat to see what such a profound gaming experience for veteran players and diehard fans can seem like to someone outside the scope of the game's intended audience. i'm very interested to see what kind of results came of other games in this sort of experimental experience!

[@dingus_maximus]

I’ve been thinking about making a series of tutorial videos for non-gamers to ease them into gaming (teaching really basic stuff like controller layouts), and this series has been an excellent source of inspiration. It’s a really daunting task and I have no tangible idea of how exactly to go about it, but I’ll be keeping these videos in mind the whole way through!

[@aiden_obj]

Seeing you can bypass the recall clock section with ultra hand, coupled with so many other instances of niche things that just work, made me realize how awesome Nintendo’s player testing and QA must be

[@GamesAreCreative]

Love this series! My wife isn’t a gamer either, so playing games with her has helped me see game design through a different lens. Appreciate all the work and time that go into your videos!

[@DomenBremecXCVI]

I, as someone who started gaming in 2020 with BotW being my first game, but then falling back to the safe zone of Animal Crossing after spending 40+ hours on the Great Platou, also used ultra hand on that puzzle instead of recall. It made more sense to me to not give me a time limit for no reason at that point.

[@devilvocano420]

Wat time limit Just rewind it till its the same

[@some_williott]

Idk why but your ending thoughts always make me really emotional for some reason. Take that as a massive compliment

[@ZacharyHand]

22:00 😱 that scream is classic.

[@inoob26]

making the Zonai enemies look similar to the friendly NPCs is a good choice imo because it prompts careful observation from the player so that they start looking for subtle changes between behaviors such as battle music (as shown in the video) and moving patterns

[@bravecereza]

Agreed

[@SUNNY-BB]

Ive been playing games all my life but Im realizing that as I get older and less competitive the more that I agree with her way of thinking. I feel like theres lots to be said about how competition even in single player games influences how we interact with games. I say even with single player games because when I game comes out theres the temptation to see whateveryone else is doing with the game and how they achieved those things and I feel like a big part of playing games in the modern day is also seeking information about games. and in that sense there is a kind of competition that comes about even with single player games. but when you dont look anything up and just go in blind you start to kindof notice more issues. I feel kind of vindicated that even though Tears of the Kingdom is my GOTY for 2023 I still struggled in a lot of the same ways your wife did despite the fact that I have a lot more gaming experience. The tedious trail and error, that "start stop" stuff of the early game, and fully always getting that the game wanted from me all the time etc all of that happened to me. but at the end of the day I find that because I let go of competition and just started vibing in the world that let me just kind of roam freely without worrying about how was doing what. I didnt look anything up for tears of the kingdom I tried to make an active effort to not spoil anything or look anything up and yet I somehow stumbbled on to a golden horse just by hunting for the memories and repairing towers. Come to find out it was a really rare horse! funnily enough its not even the horse I wanted, the one I actually wanted kept bucking me off but the golden one accepted me so I just took it to a near by stable and they were basically like "we were gonna ask you to go find it but uh.... nevermind you keep it." My point is that even though going at it alone without looking stuff up created a bunch of hurdles it also made me feel more free to surrender to the sense of serendipity that the game seems to be built for.

[@NinaFelwitch]

I like your videos. I've been playing videogames for over 30 years and I'm also a teacher who teaches basic computer stuff to people who have never even touched a PC before. It's really hard to get into the mind of someone like that and your videos helped me to better empathize with such a person.

[@seastrawberry4]

The analysis in this video was really interesting! It's especially interesting to see the differences between BOTW and TOTK, because it really highlights why some people might prefer one over the other in a different way than just the surface-level mechanics. If you do more of these, I would love to see the lady you live with tackle a puzzle game. Outer Wilds would be an interesting one because it has both exploration and puzzle elements, or maybe something more tightly focused like Cocoon or Baba is You.

[@svenhudec6779]

Wow man... when she attached the clock hands together that blew my mind. What a spectacular video. I would love more of these.

[@dirtywhitellama]

I ignored fuse at the beginning of the game, with the consequence that battles were much more difficult than they needed to be. It was kind of shocking to me how much difference it made to put a construct horn on the end of a stick when I finally got around to it 😂

[@PlutoniumBoss]

The more I see other people play this game the more impressed I am with it on a technical level. There are so many different ways to approach these puzzles that just work.

[@phoenixsoren]

I know every shrine can be done in dozens of ways the devs probably didn't think about, but I had no idea you could glue the clock hands together with Ultrahand XD

[@remilegrand3874]

It's crazy man: two years ago I saw a video of you around the same concept, and I loved it. Last week, I start playing TOTK for the first time and I surprised myself thinking about your video and how your wife would play the game. Then here you are coming out with this awesome video!!! Thank you!

[@Goblincow]

These videos are so wholesome, entertaining and informative all at once. I really enjoy these and its lovely to hear the little audio clips of the two of you playing the game, it sounds like despite all the frustrations that you're surely scribbling down notes about you are clearly having a fun time together and it's just very sweet. Happy new year to you both and I hope it's a good one!

[@HamsterMaster8]

I love the take away about about totks streamlined tutorial being used to give a better understanding of the mechanics and allow for a different kind of freedom. Its really emphasized by the way Lady solved those puzzles in unconventional ways Definitely shows how some hard choices are necessary in game design for players to get the most out of it

[@ShadowRaptor1O1]

22:00 bro's wife turned into Tom from Tom n' Jerry 💀

[@hurkyl1560]

The intro reminds me of a useful trick that I figured out from watching lots of streamers -- it's a *really* good idea as a gamer to occasionally take the time to review the UI, various game mechanics, menu options, and whatnot to see if there's something you've been overlooking because you missed/dismissed it 10 hours ago and have since forgot about it.

[@Gokuroro]

22:02 it may be the alcohol talking, but I laughed so hard at the almost cartoonish way she screamed when falling

[@thirteenthhour370]

26:52 when the Lady you live with said "do you want to do another one" I got so excited!!!!! She sounded pretty stressed and frustrated for most of the totk tutorial (I HATE building mechanics so despite being well versed in game language, I also struggled and empathized with her "but that should have worked!" feelings). I'm glad she had some fun too!

[@Karsin8or]

As an aspiring game developer, I feel like this series is gold for keeping the newer players in mind, while also very entertaining. Love the series!

[@suntannedduck2388]

Same but with other genres to compare to real life rules (cars, sports) or more gamey stuff, story, themes, control schemes, camera perspectives, accessibility settings. Not trending games only with pretty similar elements because easy views and not really giving good results I find. I know researching many games for the first time new and retro and understanding gaming history helped a lot even as a gamer and Indies, understanding old games and their controllers and going oh that's what they want me to do. 2600, N64/PS1, Wii U and more. Whether collections, emulation or hands on with the actual consoles. Playing PN03 a GameCube game Capcom left behind was interesting to play compared to other third person shooters nowadays showing the formula we always see now, yet it doesn't follow that. Because it's controls and design are so different. The automatic crosshair, the dodging logic and tank controls, a very laser trap skin tight suit scene in a movie as a game, versus what we have now of aiming and shooting. The non standard era. The experimental era is ripe with video ideas and results. Same with fixed cameras of old DMC/GOW/RE, Mario 3D World is a great introduction to 3D game and isometric cameras and controls would be good tests, in between the two of 2D and full control camera 3D that they are over the 3rd person camera issues she had early on in the series besides just 2D plane games. I think he isn't pushing enough. Granted to respect her time and what she is willing to play is important as well no doubt not going to overlook that, but even besides that trending only games are pretty safe content I think. It doesn't have to be deep Guinea Pig but still better video ideas then safe cheap views ones and limited results from trending games. Not everyone plays trending games or looks for them. Also some Indie highlights or old but fresh would be nice. But I am just saying as someone that goes further into the medium old and new, Indies and popular (not only popular that people would come across and content for views) even if as a gamer discovering such research of game design of old that is fresh and still holds up with the right mindset is a great experience. The game's were never bad just not marketed well or too crazy for average people. Those willing to go further notice the great ideas not oh this has more cars, well this had a car builder. Such and such abilities. Actually cool mechanics and perspectives of worlds as say an ant not always whatever some human hero character does and the generic characters we got in PS3/360. Indies, and old games especially make for greater content besides oh trending game, easy views and only certain results being clear for game Devs or us gamers to go whelp only so much to not much learnt. I have learnt so much from old games design we don't have anymore and they do hold up some of them so to me it annoys me even more it's all oh what trends, safe games and only rare times do we see it again and no not because of remasters either. I mean literally unrelated games having said ideas return to a degree or the same. The racing game space (had a car builder and region system both continued 20+ years later, completely different studios and IPs, I was so happy to see that when the genre sucks right now), hack n slashes, 3D platformers, too Mario and banjo like inspired yet others of the 90s were better. Why do animal platformers have better movesets in the 90s than Biomutant does being so basic. Space Station Silicon Valley, average goals, good mix of animals and early 3D games AI as an environment puzzle. So many games are about combat I find the lack of AI or environment puzzle level design or good movesets or dynamic elements to games, rifts that do more and aren't heavily scripted and perfect (almost sandbox survival games level), more player controlled aspects, better real life like animations. Take the animal out thematically and put a human in and it wouldn't change a thing their movesets are so safe in Biomutant. Granted a AA game so giving them some slack but still. So unimaginative. Animal traits of movesets and abilities would have made exploring the world more fun. I already loved the gas immunity system in the game. That's why I care so much about expanding more about the player character and the world. Digging, flight, swimming. Preferences to make some quests and areas of the world more accessible but the vehicles still there for the other animal classes. Or the ability to add the other traits later in the game via some reason of magic or genetics video game logic/skills. Brilliant but nope. Why do that. A lot of work yes to make such an extension to the character creator and level design and more I know but would make it stand out for sure. Not feel to safe of a game. There is a reason I am open world picky most of them side quest wide are boring to me personally. Outposts snore. Give me tower defence instead (Sunset Overdrive). People come across games from many places. Ads, KZbinrs, game journos, browsing eshops or physical stores, people talking about them. Seeing the artwork even. So why not.

[@Karsin8or]

@@suntannedduck2388 yeah I ain’t reading all of that

[@suntannedduck2388]

Other games, other genres, camera angles, old controllers. Some annual casual games. Banjo N&B, Tears, PN03. Mario 3D World. Basically my TL DR. Not only trending games. Very little results to be gained. Mario 3D World/RE/DMC/GOW because fixed camera. PN03 odd aim/movement controls of the time. Some old games ideas are good and bad lessons. There shortened it. A fair bit more. :) I do go overboard.

[@sircombat3259]

It’s really interesting to learn about the struggles of making a game that’s friendly to new players. And I love that you get to have your wife play these games, It feels very insightful!

[@JHXC]

I remember when I first played, I went east into the cold region and got to the ascend shrine before even reaching the temple of time, and I was confused when I couldn't do anything with the shrine. I definitely feel like TOTK's great sky island is a step down from BOTW's great plateau because it sorta punishes exploring the world from the get go.

[@BonaparteBardithion]

Thank goodness, I'm not the only one that did this. It didn't help that I carried over my knowledge of how to handle cold and tendency to climb to the highest points from BOTW. I also completely missed the Temple of Time somehow by straying off the path to avoid enemies.

[@TroosterTube-2008]

Its cool how the lady you live with got upgraded from "non-gamer" to "person who doesn't really play games" cool video raz! It was entertaining like the other ones

[@EM-ES]

Im currently drunk and eating cereal. Happy new year 👍

[@kylespevak6781]

5:12 Definitely a problem with modern games having tons of options and realism whilst also expecting game-y stuff

[@rugvedkulkarni1593]

When I first played I went through the tutorial shrines going from Ascend to Fuse to Ultrahand to Reverse. I thought I took the intent path. It made sense to me because the abilities seem to escalate in what they're capable of, following typical videogame powerscaling. Just now I learned I went the complete opposite way 😂

[@Palemis]

FINALLY, i searched for this video a couple of weeks ago and i was dissapointed that he hadn't done this video