Zelda With Nintendo Black Crisis and Monster Maze | Yggdrasil Podcast 31

0:00 Intro
28:38 Criticism

[@3max_well376]

In the depths there should have been a comedic man-shaped indentation in the ground where Master Khoga fell during BotW.

[@robertjoseph2764]

His belly has a clear indentation too lol

[@cato3277]

This would have made a solid 7.5 go to an 8.5

[@willo_x9]

My biggest criticism for the game is the summons, I really dislike having to run after the ghost to get to use its power

[@the_shadow_clasher]

true, It can also be the opposite. i love tulin but god STOP STANDING NEAR ME WHEN IM COLLECTING STUFF

[@Charnutboy]

That design decision is truly a "Nintendo being Nintendo" moment

[@xiggles]

Yes. I have very few complaints about this game, but this is the one that really gets me pissed while playing this game sometimes lol. Just have a quick access menu for the spirit powers or something, I can't imagine that'd be very difficult

[@VashTown]

For me, I'd estimate the annoyance of uncooperative sages makes up maybe 10 minutes of my time max. Still stands out enough for me to complain, but doesn't really factor in to my overall enjoyment of the game. They just need to bind ally abilities in general to down on the D-Pad. We're already used to complex key combos to do things, another set of them is nothing.

[@cidadearts4369]

Use the whistle to call them to you

[@FriendBe]

Me: standing next to an item button mashing Tulin: *blows everything away*

[@LaserFace23]

Every one of the sages, even Tulin, the only one I ever really find useful, has the energy of "I'm helping!! 😃" whenever I'm trying to do literally anything, seriously considering just turning them all off even though I hate to do that and feel it negatively impacts whatever story experience there might be.

[@sparxskywriter2589]

​@@LaserFace23 I only ever keep Tulin out at all times but whenever there's an outpost or large cluster of enemies or a particularly tough mini-boss like the doom hands, I summon the whole crew. It's actually a pretty cool and fun feeling, like whipping out a secret weapon, a trump card. It's much more rewarding and less frustrating to just pull them out when you need them.

[@amanofnoreputation2164]

Me:Trying to pick something up Tulin: sneezes it off a cliff.

[@noatak6852]

I did that with a construct 3’s loot😭

[@TROBassGuitar]

Tulin is useful for most situations, yunobo for breaking through rocks

[@amysteriousviewer3772]

I think people often forget that you can greatly enjoy something and still be critical of it. TotK is one of the best gaming experiences I've ever had but I can still recognise that there are aspects of it that are not perfect or could have been executed better.

[@zegominha3586]

yeah, even my favorite game of all time (Bloodborne) is far from perfect

[@amysteriousviewer3772]

@@zegominha3586 Bloodborne is my favourite too. It has a ton of issues but it does so many things so well that it's still a masterpiece to me.

[@tehCostHD]

@@amysteriousviewer3772 exactly. No game is perfect, but some games do things SO GOOD that it rises above its faults. The souls games and this game are those types of games

[@TheRealNintendoKid]

yeah, like Breath of the Wild was amazing, but it was ultimately pretty shallow. There's not a whole lot of unique stuff to find. I feel like the things they repeated from the last game they greatly improved, and all the new stuff is great... except gloom hands. FUUUUUUUUUUUCK gloom hands.

[@shanperera3400]

Of course you can critisize a game you love. Thing is they have hardly been praising it at all during any of these podcasts.

[@cullenmuir2707]

An easy way they could've fixed the loss situation is by creating a Midna situation. Make Raru stay for longer than the tutorial and comment in parts of the story, and then in the ending have the same scene where he transforms Zelda back and you lose the arm and he dissappears. He could've even given you hints about your objective if you get confused on quests, or maybe he could sense shrines of light instead of your purah pad. That way you're losing someone that became relevant to you. I mean he's obviously along with you anyway given he pops up at the end and takes his arm back, so why not just make him a factor in the main active plot, even just as a backseat commenter.

[@fairjuniper8658]

This is exactly how I felt. I wanted Link to loose his arm and I wanted R to hang around and be more significant than he was? When he vanished on the sky island I was like...What the heck? Missed opportunity. So much missed opportunity.

[@cullenmuir2707]

@@fairjuniper8658 I know right?! I couldn't put it into words until this podcast, but I just remember thinking, "Oh Link is getting a companion and it's his arm!" And then as you said just poof..... Maybe they can somehow make up for it a bit in some dlc by Mineru somehow awakening Raru or something, and then you get that banter from them as the story substance in the dlc. Sort of like how you got a bit of extra dialogue from the champions through the BOTW DLC. Could be after this Raru becomes a summon like the sages, and or gives us a power that we can use to help against the gloom considering he's effectively the sage of light. That said much like my hopes for TOTK's story probably an excessive amount of wishful thinking and it will never materialize.

[@gamanzhiydanil]

So he would be kinda like Johnny Silverhand from Cyberpunk 2077!

[@gamanzhiydanil]

Mineru is supposedly always with you on your journey, in the purahpad, but I guess she couldn't comment on things for that "woah moment"

[@fairjuniper8658]

@@gamanzhiydanil yeah it's not the same unfortunately. Also I feel that Rauru would have been a more significant or relevant to Link personally character because of the arm. Rauru is a type of Link thematically so it would have been fitting.

[@orissonogawer4088]

Concerning why ganondorf raises the castle: if you go through the secret pasage that opens in the bunker after a while you will find a tablet saying that the castle was specifically built there to seal him thus explaining while first thing he does is lifting it up

[@JaidynReiman]

Yeah, the castle being there was to reinforce the seal. The main seal was Rauru, but placing the castle there strengthened the seal on him.

[@BaronSterling]

This also means that, if this game's story wasn't riddled with inconsistencies and incongruities with games it directly references, this version of Ganondorf should have been freed in the adult timeline in OoT when that Ganondorf destroyed Hyrule Castle and built his own in its place, leading to two Ganondorfs being active at once. This game's story is really its worst aspect, it's complete Swiss cheese.

[@TheSSBBfan666]

@@BaronSterling pretty sure Nintendo says BotW/TotK takes place at the end of the timeline(s), meaning this is LONG after OoT

[@BaronSterling]

@@TheSSBBfan666 TotK does, yes, but the events of the past shown in memories in TotK are stated to be near the founding of Hyrule - so sometime after Skyward Sword and long before Ocarina of Time.

[@TheSSBBfan666]

@@BaronSterling perhaps this is a completely new Hyrule and timeline after the three that came before

[@shoobagoo6108]

The "Link doesn't tell anyone anything" is actually even worse because after doing all the geoglyphs you can actually report back to Impa and ONLY Impa. You go up to her, Link does the ol hand wave and she says something to the effect of "My god she is a mindless dragon now? Thats just too sad we must find a way to bring her back! I will return to Kakariko and study the old zonai ruins further and try and figure out a solution to this." She is not in kakariko or at least I couldn't find her and this confirms Link knows the entire story and is literally not telling anyone. I did this after only having done the Rito dungeon so this was VERY prescient info that link could give Purah and yet he just doesn't. I also had the master sword at that point and he also doesn't tell anyone he has that which is just baffling to me.

[@JaidynReiman]

Impa only returns to Kakariko after you've gotten all the Sages IIRC. She gets some interesting dialogue there. (I also like the dialogue from Cado and Rola. Its only really about what happened to Cado's house now that he's returned back to the village, but I found it kinda cute.)

[@Ryuxpale]

I haven't been able to find this criticism convincing because I keep thinking about the cutscene when Link held Zelda's hand inside the temple of time at the beginning of the game. This suggests to me that in Link's perspective, Zelda still to an extent (or perhaps her soul) is preserved in some form because at that very moment we know in hindsight that Zelda was in her dragon form. Not only there, but even when we see and hear of Zelda all over hyrule prior to confronting Ganondorf revealing her to be a manifested puppet, it makes sense to me that Link would simultaneously be sure that Zelda is a dragon and also be unsure of whats going on with the sightings of zelda BECAUSE he had already seen her in humanoid form while at that time was in dragon form. I know the response to this may be that we see a similar situation in the cutscene when Ganondorf uses a puppet to deceive Sonia, so Link should've just told peopleit was Ganon. But to be fair, even after seeing that cutscene, there still isn't 100% confirmation to the characters until they do confront Ganon. Maybe I'm reaching here, but the detail of Link and Zelda holding hands really bothers me and I never see anyone mentioning it and what it could entail. It's also why I have no problem with Zelda returning back to human because they've hinted at it prior.

[@bravecereza]

The thing is Link doesn't tell anyone but Impa because the dragons are only visible to some people in Hyrule, and most people do not fit that description. I think Link knew Impa would believe him, as she's very aware of Hyrule's legends, but most people either have never seen of the dragons or have heard about them from rumors, Zelda's case being no different.

[@Ryuxpale]

​@@bravecereza I forgot about that detail. Good point.

[@shoobagoo6108]

@@bravecereza You know I totally forgot about the whole "Dragons can only been seen by cool people" bit so that's a fair point. I still think its super stupid that he doesn't tell Purah though, like I think they are close enough that she would believe him like Impa does. Furthermore my real actual problem is the fact that you can get this info before you do a single dungeon, not tell Purah you actually might know where Zelda is, and then proceed to do every dungeon area by going up to them, asking where zelda is, they say "ah naw m8 we don't know where she is" and then you do their whole quest. At the end they go "alright we will start searching for her" even though Link knows exactly where she is. I will also say that by the very nature of Link telling impa but no one else, this proves that Link absolutely knows where Zelda is, enough to then tell Impa about it. So the only thing we can conclude here is that Link is so scared of being doubted by people that trust him that "hey those rumors about dragons being in the sky are true, zelda is one of them" that he lies and acts like he doesn't know where she is for almost the entire game. I'm sorry but dragons only being seen by a select few doesn't solve this for me it just doesn't make sense.

[@Mechadeuce]

I think the problem with Zelda returning to a Hylian form isn't that it happens, but rather the asspull of a method they use. We're expected to believe that the spirits of Rauru and Sonia just randomly have this power to transform her back? After explicitly telling us that draconification is a forbidden, dangerous, and most importantly, irreversible act? Well, I've got an idea. Instead of having this out of nowhere ghost magic transform her back into Hylian form, how about we use the all-powerful, wish granting set of triangles left by the three golden goddess' to do it. Oh wait, I forgot that's not even mentioned in these games...

[@WhiteRockFace]

The worst part is, this re-transform magic implies that the 3 elemental dragons can just be transformed back too within a blink of an eye! So why are Rauru and Sonia not using their superpower-ghost-powas to turn back the 3 dragons that have the names of the 3 creators? Are they even the creators? Looking at them implies they are all 3 of the same race. So? uh.. maybe use them? Dunno. it fcks up way too much stuff... because now Zelda can theoretically turn these 3 back too (they said she got both powers of Rauru and Sonia). Well. Cant wait for "The Legend of Zelda: The 3 Dragons will be never mentioned again"

[@j.r.b7661]

Pretty sure they used the rewind ability in addition to Rauru’s light power to rewind the dragon back into Zelda

[@dblsomeday]

I figured they were just amping Link’s recall to bring her back.

[@Mechadeuce]

@@dblsomeday I mean, that makes enough sense. It's just weird how they make such a big deal of it in the past, only to end having the ability to reverse it all along. Kinda over it though tbh, I'm just looking forward to seeing the next game now

[@tenalf759]

I loved the mineru part. I stumbled on dragon head island way before I was supposed to and it turned out to become the best accidental side adventure ever.

[@maxrn3923]

I experienced the same thing! It was amazing

[@barrelrolldog]

fave part of the game, wish the whole game was designed like this.

[@MatthiasW97]

Yea i also just build a flying machine to go there. Fully blind by the storm i thought : wow this is really difficult to traverse. I felt marginally stupid after doing the quest. But it was really fun to discover it without any quest

[@josiahtheobald689]

It's part of the main quest

[@questionmarkquestionmarkques]

the mineru part and the ending brought the story from bad to mid after having to watch the same cutscene 4 times in a row

[@piszanshid1953]

My biggest gripe with the story is why does ganondorf throw away his personality and consciousness to become the demon dragon. It just seems so out of character. The act of throwing away your own life to change the world is a selfless act, even if the outcome is evil it's still selfless. I don't understand why the demon king would be interested in destroying the world if he can't be the king of it afterwards.

[@piszanshid1953]

Lmao. They actually brought it up.

[@bravecereza]

He wanted to plunge this world in darkness, he says so himself. Transforming into the Demon Dragon allowed him to summon a blood moon in the middle of the day. Ganondorf has always been a character that follows the "the end justifies the mean" philosophy, that time was no different.

[@weatherman1504]

Imo it feels like a very Ganondorf thing to do. Absolute power at all costs, even your own humanity. Pretty much how his Ganon transformation in the downfall timeline happens.

[@teo_many]

Six months after, I'm still here trying to put a patch to Nintendo's mess. This is a legit question, since the malice of calamity Ganon already tried to ascend into the sky by infecting Neldra in BOTW. This Ganondorf is not very well fleshed out. All they should have done is one more cutscene were Ganondorf is shown studying the enemy, which is implied he already did, knowing about the Zonai power, and him confessing the dragonification as a last resort. Or man, listen, you don't want to spend in cutcenes? Take advantage of the whole archeology theme and make the Yiga clan flesh out the whole Ganondorf motivations in ancient written form! Line of text! AND by doing this you make the underground actually interesting to explore! Anyone of us can come up with any better way (admittedly not very original, but still!) of deepening the character and the plot, with both not making it a mess AND link it to the lore of BOTW, which they made a whole accurate book of. This was just lazy writing. The only way I can explain it is that something happened during development, and it still doesn't explain it fully. My theory is that the game was aimed at a canceled switch refreshed hardware, digital foundry apparently had a source who told them at one point there were development kits out there which basically consisted in a switch pro, which were then subsequently called back by Nintendo. It would explain why the game was basically done in 2022 but needed optimization, but it still doesn't explain the writing! Both from an animation planning pipeline point of view, and the infamous interview to the Italian Goron dubber, it's clear and logical that any story and cutscene were planned, wrote, storyboarded, and recorded waaaaay in advance. And NO ONE noticed the inconsistencies with the bible they created in Creating a Champion (the book)? No one pointed out that it's strange how Zelda doesn't notice how GANONdorf has a lot in common with the whole calamity GANON thing, wink wink? Why? In a direct sequel? Why? Did the writing team suddenly just stopped working on the title to do other stuff? None of it doesn't make any effing sense! I want a rational explanation for the lazy writing!

[@darknesswave100]

​@@teo_manyanother comment I saw was from somebody who knew the original Japanese and it actually explained why Ganondorf did what he did. He hated the Zonai because they're basically gods who came down to rule over everybody and that hyrule had lost itself from before they came so he didn't think they had any right to basically come down from their high horses up from wherever they were from to rule. He wanted an authentic king to rule instead of gods who decided to come down and rule. That right there is clear motivation for him since he essentially thought of the Zonai as usurpers who took over without anybody having a say in the matter and frankly.....if the zonai did just come down from the heavens and take over then he's right. Now did he go about it the completely wrong way with turning the world upside down? Sure he did. Problem is the english version makes him into a villian just cause we know who he is from name only. It felt like they used his name and people would be like oh well he's evil so he's evil for evil's sake. Instead what they did was have him seem like he has no motivation at all. Cause he never mentions a reason in that version of the game

[@silentlore2458]

Im near the start of your criticisms so forgive me if you address it later 1. The time travel conundrum is explained by mineru. Zelda (draconised) has control over time completely for herself. She wasnt around during botw or pre totk beginning because her dragon form specifically went to the time of links Rauru awakening. I believe mineru explained that factor. Its also why (in the secret ending) Purah comments on the temple of Time floating. The entire emergence of zonai architecture was planned by zelda and mineru in the distant past. This is also why the shrines appear randomly. 2. The time travel of totk is actually quite solid because it is circular. Ganondorf being sealed happened because zelda went back in time after accidentally awakening the same ganondorf. Essentially: there is no beginning or end of and event. It was always based around zelda going back in time to set fate in stone. It is an Ouroboros. Edit Number 1: at 2:13:00 you guys mention the lack of motivation for Gdorf. Sadly, it is actually another blunder by the localisation team. In the Japanese (ive been told) Ganondorf indeed has a motivation. That motivation is to cleanse the world of divine interference from beings like the zonai.

[@silentlore2458]

Apologies if this comment is not adequate

[@thealchemist1789]

Lmaooo. Us Xenoblade enthusiasts understand time related things like no other fandom

[@justajoshy]

Have you never prayed the time would simply stop? Have you wished the now would lasts forever?

[@pokemonmaster1505]

​@@justajoshy Get out of here Z!

[@silentlore2458]

My feelings have never changed! THEY'RE THE SAME AS THEYVE ALWAYS BEEN

[@DGenHero]

I think a lot of the issues with the narrative stems from them trying to have their cake and eat it. You CAN fight Ganondorf as soon as you get your glider. The story can't be made where you NEED certain things if you want that design goal.

[@saikanzen1762]

You can actually do it even without the glider. Without using tricks or glitches, you can make it by maneuvering onto a wall climb as you're falling and you take no damage.

[@Leemmmm]

I totally get that too, but I would personally sacrifice the ability to kill the final boss near immediately if it meant I got a Zelda story that actually makes me feel something again.

[@michaeltovah4]

@@Leemmmm I think we can separate that aspect of gameplay from the story. Yes you CAN just go fight the final boss immediately, it's just not canon. It's like a speedrun.

[@mkv2718]

@@saikanzen1762 you could also get the glide SET and then unlock two fairies to upgrade the set twice and use its set bonus to remove all fall damage…. but this is needlessly complicated and most people would get the paraglider at that poin, unless they’re purposefully avoiding the story for some reason. and really dont want the map. 🤷‍♂️

[@mkv2718]

@@Leemmmm hate to tell you this, but these stories were never that deep. nostalgia is a powerful drug. beware.

[@TheJcris87]

I believe she was intentionally not telling them the events that sent her back because she didnt want to (ironically for a zelda game) mess up the timeline. Butterfly effect and all. She only told Rauru the truth right before he went off to fight the demon king to his canonical death in the legend of the first king, knowing for certain at that point that Rauru didnt die but instead sealed the demon king. Rauru then taunts Ganondorf with pieces of information, knowing now that the demon king breaks the master sword when hes unsealed. This makes Ganondorf underestimate the sword so the fully powered up sword catches him off guard.

[@JaidynReiman]

It sounds like you guys just wanted a darker storyline and Zelda really doesn't do that very often at all. Even in the older games the "darker themes" you keep talking about aren't really explored very well and are only vaguely touched upon. "Oh the Sages can't come back" Who says they can't? You have to come up with that conclusion yourself to say that's the truth, but the game never actively says this. Zelda games aren't really like this and they never have been. You can read deeper things into it, but these aren't actually the truth. Also, Mineru's first comment to Zelda implies its permanent, but for the most part her main implication is she just doesn't know. The later memory (which I have gotten them all since the last time I commented on this) does have her say "its permanent" but I think that's more of a warning. When you talk to Impa after getting all the memories, she flat out says "No! This can't be true! I'll return to Kakariko and research the ancient texts to see if there's any way to revert this." So, like.. Basically, Link and Impa both state they'll look for some way to restore her, with the implication being that they'll find a way to do it. Even if there isn't some handwavy "oh Rauru's spirit just goes and does it". I get that you want something deeper, but Zelda games really don't have that. All of those past events you mention from prior games are due to ambiguity and you can say "oh its a darker theme about sacrifice" because they don't actively explain what's going on. Also, Makar and Medli return back to the surface in the game's ending. You see them on the pirate ship when Link and Zelda rise up out of the ocean after Ganondorf's defeat.

[@dantlee14]

I prefer to imagine that Link and Zelda were forced to share a single twin-sized bed like every other broke teenage/early twenties couple in on-campus housing has to.

[@moosiemoose1337]

I like to imagine zelda makes link sleep on the ground outside.

[@_itsmunah]

Zelink people are weird. They weren’t a couple and never have been

[@tristenj1992]

​@@_itsmunah k

[@wiskerfall4519]

The situation with wether or not they lived with each other is very complicated on one hand it’s cannon that Zelda does love link it was what caused her power to awaken so I doubt that she would just kick link out and there is evidence that link did live there his hairband is there and the champions balid picture and the house is set up for 2 excluding the bed witch he can sleep in oi oi.but on the other hand all npcs don’t recognize him in heteno besides Simon witch does not make sense so on one hand Nintendo at the very least wanted to imply that they lived with each other but they contradict themselves with the whole npc thing

[@wiskerfall4519]

@@_itsmunah skyward sword:am I a joke to you

[@amanofnoreputation2164]

I think it's more likely that the goddess statues and the bargainer statues are both "hotlines" to the same metaphysical place and it's the non-human intelligence on the other side that mediate between Link and Hylia non-corporeal form. So it's not the goddess who talks to you directly. It's more like an angel.

[@GoodAsGravy]

The graphics discussion was incredibly dumb, I'm sorry. The hardware team is not the Zelda dev team, the Zelda dev team have squeezed every last drop out of the switch. Why "punish" the zelda devs by deducting "points" from the score, really stupid.

[@michaeltovah4]

Thank you.

[@linkofhyrule6580]

yes, thank you. they were not bad enough to count against the game, that is asinine.

[@thefinalday5858]

About the calamity People weren't in the middle of a calamity That happened 100 years ago people were already living in relative peace When link wakes up in botw

[@gamanzhiydanil]

Yeah, Calamity was just about to break out again

[@diccchocolate416]

Yeah a lot of people seem to misunderstand the calamity. It wasn't a thing that lasted for 100 years, it almost happened 100 years ago, was postponed, and then stopped for good in botw.

[@nworder4life]

@diccchocolate416 No, it definitely did happen 100 years ago. The entire royal army was wiped out, and many people died to the guardians.

[@diccchocolate416]

@@nworder4life the calamity refers to the return of calamity ganon, what happened 100 years ago was just the prelude to a complete apocalypse

[@nworder4life]

@diccchocolate416 you said it almost happened, but it did. It just didn't last long because Zelda sealed up calamity Ganon.

[@victorthevictorian]

Rauru is literally the definition of wasted potential. He could have been one of the series' best companions and make the story have way more impact. I really don't get how they thought making him disappear at the very beginning was a good idea.

[@thomasw9286]

Personally, I don't want companion characters in open world zelda

[@fernandosimon5621]

I really fail to understand how some players wanted Rauru as a companion type character, when he clearly is the device used to set the plot in motion, like king Rhoam in BOTW.

[@victorthevictorian]

@@fernandosimon5621 Bcs he's a character that had a lot of potential, and him just being a plot device feels like a waste

[@christophertaylor8166]

The thing about story complaints that sucks to think about is, if that ends up being the big takeaway from the game’s post-honeymoon shakeout, Miyamoto is just going to say, “See? This is why we shouldn’t do stories. It’s too hard, and it’s not the core of the product. Just skip the story next time.”

[@FlumpyTripod]

I doubt that will happen. Miyamoto understands that story is important to Zelda and he's pretty hands off with the series at this point

[@HArrowsmith]

I have to disagree about the ending. Spoilers for anyone who skipped that bit obviously. They set up how Zelda could return to human form in the memories. Sonia explains that recall works by knowing the "Memory" of a thing and just returning it to that point. We also know that Rauru's light abilities are innately suited to empowering the abilites of those around him, so their spirits returning, spirits who are very closely linked to both Zelda and Link themselves, and empowering the Recall imbued in Link's arm with all of their remaining energy to rewind Zelda to the point shortly before she consumed the tear makes sense. It's also entirely possible that their power then resonated with Zelda's innate Light and Time magic to help the process, we know that Zelda as a dragon is still exuding this healing aura around her from the Light Dragon parts we can collect. Them Recalling Zelda to her true form could also explain why she doesn't remember anything that happened between the two times, that would be the cost for rewinding a living being, and probably why Sonia didn't explain that she could to Zelda. I also disagree with there needing to be more of a "cost" for Zelda to return to her true form. The Cost was to Rauru and Sonia, they sacrificed all of their remaining beings to do it. Zelda might not remember her time as a dragon, but don't overlook the fact that she got again completely uprooted from her life, sent back in time, made new friends, lost *another* mother figure, fought an entire War against an empowered Ganondorf, almost lost all of her friends again, lost *another* father figure, and then on top of all of that had to make the choice to sacrifice all that she was for the chance of Link to be able to defeat Ganondorf in her original time. We don't know how long Zelda was in Rauru's time for, but it was presumably quite a while considering everything that happened. Also, as for there being changes in the world due to the time travel that takes place, there's a strong theory around Time Travel of fixed points, meaning points on the timeline that are always destined to happen, so in OoT for example, the Song of Storms is a fixed point, it MUST happen for any of the events to play out as they have. Link must always acquire the Song of Storms, he must always use it in the past to drain the well, and he must always get the Lens of Truth which weakens the seal on Bongo Bongo. The magic beans are not fixed points, they are only changed because a change was acted on them in the past

[@Ryuxpale]

I would also like to add that at the beginning of the game, after the tutorial section, Link actually sees Zelda in the temple of time and holds her hand while she's under some sort of slumber. This suggests that her spirit and self are being preserved to some extent because at that point in time we know in hindsight she is a dragon, yet Link is interacting with her. And then Impa also implies that Zelda's draconification can be reversible when you speak to her after collecting the dragon's tears.

[@Saracen93]

I’m grateful to have lived to this day to play TotK and I can still recognize all your critiques. I’m surprised you didn’t talk about how much everyone in Hyrule knew about the Zonai when we had to dig for scraps in BotW. It’s almost like the Zonai replaced the calamity in their minds.

[@Ryuxpale]

The calamity happened over 100 years prior to TOTK and only the main characters and elderly ever speak of it, with rare exceptions. This is also a new game with new plot lines, so it's more than reasonable as to why the calamity wouldn't be emphasized too much.

[@vivid8979]

In BotW the Calamity is known for Malice, Monsters and Guardians and the citizen in hyrule are aware of them... They just don't have a means to do anything against them and with Robbie and Purah being the only active people researching to it the progress can be indeed slow.. Heck they even need your help to finish some testing because they're too old to do field research.. In TotK tho they learned from what happened from Calamity already and thus have more preparation... Zelda as a nerd herself might've stumbled upon the Zonai artifacts during their cleanup with the Sheikah tech.. The citizen of Hyrule we're pretty cooperative to the cause of rebuilding hyrule thanks to Zelda's kindness and such so progress is exponentially faster... Which makes this game m's world building wonderful because this time around Link is not alone in the fight and the game makes you feel that way...

[@sfrert2759]

@@RyuxpaleBro the calamity in Totk happened only 5-7 years before, there is no excuse.

[@sfrert2759]

@@RyuxpaleAnd if the calamity happened 100 years ago in Totk, then why Tulin is still a child?

[@godly_potatoe69xd19]

Link usually returns the sword after he finishes his quest so maybe that’s why he put it there to let it rest? And also with things like Zelda being on the mural already it implies a deterministic time line which means it’s already a predetermined loop that cannot happen in any other way, like aot where eren caused his father to cause his birth from the future, but obviously for him to do taht his birth already must have happened. Basically it’s like events of the past determine the future with the illusion that the future changes things and there is free will when it’s just the same causal loop taht was always going to happen. Idk about all these things like the sky islands and the dragon tears appearing tho. Ig it’s possible that zelda was just always above the cloud barrier where the dragons went in botw before the upheaval, but I don’t think there is any explanation rn.

[@feral_orc]

So it's badly written, gotcha lmao

[@godly_potatoe69xd19]

@@feral_orc the time travel thing itself, is a real concept and not all that hard to understand but the elements surrounded it are ass yeah

[@feral_orc]

@@godly_potatoe69xd19 I do understand it, but is one of the most weakest time travel explanations because the answer is basically "it was always going to happen this way regardless", so it's good for like a thematic story beat, but "it's inevitable" or "no free will" are not good for the plot

[@godly_potatoe69xd19]

@@feral_orc no free will isn’t necessarily what I was trying to imply with this, I was just using it because that’s what it was used to show in aot and that was my example of how it works, I never said it was a good explanation, I just said what it meant and what it looked like they were going for because that type of timeline (excluding the new things like the geoglyphs) works, so it makes sense, it’s just that the more minute details inside of it like the things that came after and the unmentioned child of rauru and Sonia feel like patchwork rather than a story.

[@carljohansson3512]

One explanation I can think of about the Bolson/Tarrey town situation is that the quest was never done but Link and Zelda did help build Tarrey town after Calamity Ganon's defeat.

[@gamanzhiydanil]

That's a good theory. Like, Zelda came to Hateno and asked Bolson to repair that house, and then the rest happened, while Link was just memeing around collecting koroks and whatnot

[@JaidynReiman]

@@gamanzhiydanil Even though Hestu doesn't remember Link either....

[@amysteriousviewer3772]

The TV series Dark is the best and most internally consistent time-travel story I've seen. It's truly remarkable.

[@mkv2718]

Primer. don’t know the thing you’re talking about but the answer is Primer

[@been_rly_n2_paragliding_lately]

Dark was pretty good. It got quite annoying towards the end though. They said "the beginning is the end and the end is the beginning" wayyy too much.

[@been_rly_n2_paragliding_lately]

​@@mkv2718 very cool movie. Definitely the most plausible time travel movie I've seen. Consistent as well. And they did it all with basically no budget.

[@amysteriousviewer3772]

@@been_rly_n2_paragliding_lately They did repeat some phrases a lot but that doesn't take away from how expertly the different timelines were pieced together.

[@amysteriousviewer3772]

@@mkv2718 Primer is good but Dark is on a much, much larger scale.

[@anthonynguyen1289]

I just did the Mineru stuff last night and I’m pretty sure she was saying Ganon’s gloom affected her waking up. It was after the boss fight for her tear where she mentions it I believe.

[@ctre2]

They could just check the botw save file like they do with the horses. You bought the house-you know bolson Its fully upgraded- you know him very well

[@skippernick3577]

Yes! Thank you! That would have made playing both games so much more rewarding as well!

[@Martdogg3000]

Yeah Mass Effect has managed to handle far, far more complex relationships without issue I'd sure think it would be pretty doable here as well.

[@itsgoodcrispy8947]

Love these conversations you’ve had since the game came out. These podcasts are great

[@jacobkirk1846]

1:14:50 I think that, in regards to how Zelda was turned back into her hylian form, we hear Zelda discuss with Mineru about how she could potentially return to the future in her Hylian form if she masters her abilities as the sage of time. But with not enough time to master her abilities before Ganondorf’s take over, she instead decides to swallow the stone and become a dragon. I think that when we see the spirits of Sonia and Rauru with Link, it is implying that their spirits, Rauru imbedded in Link’s arm, and Sonia’s perhaps imbedded within Zelda through swallowing the stone, or released once you destroy the stone on Ganondorf, together they use the power over time that was hinted at in that memory to turn back the time on Zelda’s dragon form to revert her into a Hylian. Which would also explain why she has no memories of her time as a dragon. Plus this also explains why her being reverted back into a Hylian was only possible at this point, because it is only at that point after thousands of years that Sonia and Rauru’s spirits have been reunited once more, along with Zelda being present in her dragon form.

[@JaidynReiman]

That's a good explanation and basically how I would solve it, but the complaint is that its not explained very well. And that's a good complaint. Even Impa implies they'll find some way to restore Zelda, so that right there makes it clear enough they're going to bring her back (admittedly, its optional going back and speaking to Impa after the Tears main quest). I do think it makes sense that Rauru's spirit still remained in Link's arm, and Sonia's spirit was still tied to the secret stone Ganondorf stole. By defeating Ganondorf her spirit got released.

[@SouDeePop]

Thanks, this explanation makes sense and makes the deus ex machina a lot less frustrating

[@badsoda9883]

Regarding the Sky Islands appearing, it seems that the Light Dragon broke the barrier, not Ganondorf.

[@JaidynReiman]

Yeah, when I progressed to that point the Adventure Log flat out told me that the Light Dragon split the cloud barrier. So that's pretty clear the cloud barrier was opened up by the Light Dragon.

[@Ryuxpale]

​@@JaidynReimanWhich log was it? I would like to read it!

[@weatherman1504]

Ratatoskr never does any actual research and this is proof. He also consistently ignores the Japanese translations for stuff as seen in his "Zelda and Link are totally not living together" video.

[@daveyjoneslocker4703]

I think the point of the Deku Tree scene is to account for the possibility that the player did not use the mastersword in BOTW. If the player didn’t use or draw the mastersword, this scene shows link retrieving for the first time since he fell in the calamity If the player did draw the mastersword in botw, this scene explains that the sword was returned to rejuvenate. This is a clever way of serving a piece of story to new players, and two separate groups of players that did different things. Pretty clever to make a scene that covers 3 groups of players.

[@Moranen420]

But if he has the sword as he does at the opening then he definitely did draw the sword and TotK is not the first time since the calamity

[@daveyjoneslocker4703]

When do you think the new scene of him drawing the sword with zelda accompanying him in front of the deku tree takes place? Hint: it’s memory 1. Meaning it precedes memory 2 which is the intro of the game

[@daveyjoneslocker4703]

@@Moranen420 so you’re saying he has the sword when totk starts because he drew it during botw. So we see a scene that definitively takes place between the end of BOTW and before the intro of TOTK where he draws the sword. So why does the scene show him drawing the sword if he already drew it in breath of the wild? There are two answers. A) be drew it during breath of the wild, but he put it back and is now drawing it for a 3rd time B) he did not draw it during breath of the wild. Zelda returned the sword when link fell during the calamity, and he is now returning to draw it for the 2nd time. Both make sense, are equally possible and account for all possibilities. A) for returning players who drew the sword in botw B) for returning players who did not draw the sword in botw B) for brand new players who obviously never drew the sword because they did not play the game. The very existence of this scene is to explain why Libk would have the sword even if the player did not retrieve it in BOTW. Imagine you didn’t draw the sword in BOTW. You start the game. He has the sword. Weird right? Later upon visiting the deku tree, you receive memory 1, which occurs before the intro of the game, but after the events of botw. It shows link drawing the sword. Now even if you didn’t do it in botw, the reason he has the sword is accounted for. But if you did draw it, we can assume it was put back as is always done after the final battle of Zelda games. I have now essentially typed the same comment 3 times over in different ways.

[@Ryuxpale]

Well said!

[@mtamer2943]

Seems to be that way, yes. My headcanon is just that it was being charged for the incursion towards Hyrule Castle.

[@jnrosenb]

I feel this game sort of hates its predecessor. It tries WAY too much to be its own thing and therefore does things which feel are done just so you dont *need* to have played botw. - I have yet to find any in-game connection between calamity ganon and ganondorf. Sure, zelda says the name is eerie, that would be it. Hell, the calamity itself I only found it referenced by impa. And even then, when she spoke of the demon king, it felt like she meant another demon king (by that point I had completed the demon king quest so everyone knew about the current ganondorf-demon king). - Malice is no longer mentioned, and nobody ever feels like connecting gloom to it. Like I get it, gloom is different, and its effect is also different. But at the same time, gloom was CLEARLY meant to be malice at one point. They could have just said gloom was a more pure form of malice or whatnot. It would have been a neat way to confirm the connection between calamity ganon and ganondorf, and to connect this game to the previous one. - Minor nit, but having the purah pad instead of the sheikah slate also feels like a way of hiding the previous game details. - The first game states that zelda's sealing power comes from the goddess blood running through her, and also when she uses her power, the triforce symbol appears. This game retcons this by making it that its because of rauru that she has sealing powers, and also just burying the triforce altogether (we do get symbols of it, which is even worse since, why?). I will finish this by saying I did like the game (and LOVED the final fight/ending sequence). But I do not understand why they went out of their way to cut all these cool connections that they basically had for free. I feel this game would have felt so much more rewarding if they had kept these in there for people to discover and have their AHA moments.

[@megamannt125]

Honestly, I think the way certain details were left out is 100% intentional. I think in some ways Zelda fans have shot ourselves in the foot. Because Nintendo is seeing HUNDREDS upon hundreds of videos of fans theorizing, dissecting things, coming up with their own interpretations and explanations, and Nintendo is under the impression that they are actually catering to fans by keeping things vague. I feel like answers to many of the questions people have exist. Like where the Sheikah Tech have gone, how Ganondorf awakening made the Sky islands appear, what happened in the past, etc. There's no way the team just didn't ever think of these problems. They intentionally left the answers out to fuel theory videos OR, sell that information in a book months from now. Or both.

[@feral_orc]

There's a huge difference between being vague and leaving stuff out completely. Bear in mind what you're suggesting they've done is react to what they think the fans want. The problem with that take is they tried the exact same thing in botw as well, before they knew people's reactions, and did it better. The zonai ruins in Farron were all there but had no information about them in the first game. That's vague, but it's not like they suddenly appeared out of nowhere. Like everything else in this game. The story in totk sucks major ass, and I imagine a lot of logical consistency was thrown out the window to make room for time travel. Which is a shame, because other Zelda games have way better use of time travel.

[@feral_orc]

@@megamannt125 circular time travel that relies on the person who time traveled having already set up the situation that allows them to time travel is a very big paradox. The time travel part specifically was bad. I do agree that the actual cutscenes of Zelda in the past are the best story parts, but that's because they're the only real story parts.

[@megamannt125]

@@feral_orc It's not a paradox. It's a stable loop. A paradox would be something like Marty erasing himself from existence in Back to the future. If he doesnt exist he can't go back in time and mess with it... Which means he still exists. Zelda's story is self completing. It has a clear cause and effect and doesn't deviate from the loop.

[@feral_orc]

@@megamannt125 how does the loop start? How does Zelda time travel for the first time having never time traveled before? With the murals on the walls at the start, all of this is already established. But you need a starting point before the circle starts. What is the point of origin that it branches from. It just exists with no explanation, so it's a paradox

[@megamannt125]

@@feral_orc The origin is Zelda going back to the past. And it's clear her activating her secret stone was not intentional but happened accidentally as a result of her panicking during the fall. Look at this way. There's three hypothetical models for time travel used in fiction. There's "Replacement" Time Travel, like Back To the Future, where travelling to the past and changing thing alters the future, there's "Stable Loop" Time Travel, where the past cannot be changed because it has already happened like Terminator (And this game), and "Split" Time Travel, where changing the past creates an alternate reality branching off of the change, like Dragon Ball or Ocarina of Time. One issue with Skyward Sword is it tried to mix Time Travel 1 and 2 together which is why its time travel falls flat on its face when you actually think about the logic behind it. With time travel, consistency is the most important thing. TOTK is consistently stable loop time travel and can't say it "doesn't make sense" because time travel isn't real in the first place. As long as the rules are consistent, time travel can be a good writing tool.

[@davidshepard8672]

My biggest problem with the story is that Zelda, who is already the incarnation of a goddess, turns into an all powerful dragon and bathes the Master Sword in her power for eons AND IT STILL RUNS OUT OF ENERGY. Revitalized my ass

[@allgood54]

That's just for balance. I doubt it's canon.

[@davidshepard8672]

@@allgood54 I get that. It's still just funny seeing all these dramatic cutscenes, pulling the master sword from her head, and then it breaks in 5 swings

[@allgood54]

@@davidshepard8672 I hated that in botw as well, though at least in totk you can fuse things to the sword so it's not completely worthless.

[@blackbloom8552]

Think botw and totk just retconned that the durability of the master sword is because of its ability to regenerate from any damage instead of the blade just being unbreakable. Its a rather big change but it at least help with balancing.

[@licota11]

It's cool that it'll automatically come back for the Ganondorf fight at least.

[@ListlessWither]

My idea for the cost at the end of the game should have been Link's arm since they bothered to show that not only did Rauru and Sonia fix Zelda they also bothered to fix Link's arm. It would have been so fitting for the arm they needed to channel through to save Zelda be permanently lost.

[@stathisconstantinou]

Ye

[@heyheythrowaway]

I'm surprised how much I enjoy the sky islands and the simple korok transports, but that's because I only use the materials nearby that you're supposed to. A lot of people complaining about these puzzles just autobuild the most efficient hoverbike, which always works but would be insanely boring. You're right that limitation leads to a more enjoyable gameplay experience.

[@_itsmunah]

People complaining because koroks seeds are one of the worst additions. We already found 900 in botw now there’s 1000? It’s just a lazy way to fill a world

[@heyheythrowaway]

@@_itsmunah I don't get peoples' complaints about koroks. They give expanded weapon inventory, which aside from armor, is the most impactful thing on gameplay because you can now carry dedicated hammers, magic rods, axes, etc. and just generally have more combat options like dedicated rocket shields or minecart sheilds. They're even more impactful than health or stamina, because most things one shot you anyway until far into the game and stamina doesn't matter with the building. I guess they don't like the look of them? Would you rather have skultulas instead? But then you wouldn't be able to have as varied puzzles (transport, climbing, chasing, shooting baloons, etc.), it would just be "shot this spider" x1000. Koroks are a great addition to the game and I'm tired of pretending they're not.

[@_itsmunah]

@@heyheythrowaway not really. I beat the game and whole story with 6 weapon slots and not even a full line of hearts. Koroks are monotonous. Throwing in 900 and 1000 are just lazy ways to fill a world.

[@darkspiro6467]

​@@_itsmunah suprise suprise you do not have to do every korok thats the point of a open world game freedom to do what you want my god do people just try to rush to beat any and every game they play and not try to take their time and enjoy a game that's ment to be enjoyed

[@_itsmunah]

@@darkspiro6467 the games been out for 6 years everyone took their time

[@Fixti0n]

My problem with the ending Isnt that Zelda is turned back, its that she is turned back by default. The only way she should be able to turn back is if you recover all her memories and awaken the five sages. It is a nice and touching ending, but it lacks from the investment of the player, and you need to put in the legwork to undo her sacrifice.

[@vivid8979]

The memories are just her memories... The five sages doesn't even have any contribution to what Sonia and Rauru did in the ending... So with how the story is framed yes Zelda is supposedly to be turned back to human because Sonia, Rauru and Link made a Miracle happen...

[@Fixti0n]

@@vivid8979 I get it, but it causes a narrative dissonance when Link does not know who the dragon is, and that its not suppose to be a dragon, all he knows is that it has the master sword on its head. And you as a player, if you are one of those who dont do any of the quests and memories, you will also be surprised from the fact that Zelda just shows up. If saving Zelda from the dragon curse was a completonist reward, then the moment would hit even harder then it already did, because you put in the extra effort, you went beyond what was expected of you, and as such you should be rewarded for your effort. Also, the game would do with some better completonist rewards then the golden poop, glowing seeds and those. A nice story reward for getting Zeldas memories would help, well, other then a slightly easier access to the light dragons back that is.

[@daryabob7680]

I guess it's unpopular opinion but I'm glad that Zelda returned as herself in the end bc I FREAKING LOVE HAPPY ENDINGS! GIVE ME MORE HAPPY ENDINGS!

[@samf.s.7731]

Sure but ... I think they're having issues with it not being written well.

[@McGomezAddams]

If you live in Florida, I know a place

[@Ryuxpale]

@@samf.s.7731 It is written well. The basis of their critiques were that they just don't like how it played out, which is not the basis for valid criticism. Zelda's becoming a human again was hinted at the very start of the game, geoglyph memory cutscenes, as well as dialogue from Impa. It's not a detail the writers just pulled out of their metaphorical ass at the very end because they were too afraid of having a sad ending to the story. When the game is out for longer and these Zelda content creators go over the dialogue, I think there will be more appreciation for the spiritual concepts in the story.

[@FRuMMaGe]

That's fine, but the characters deliberately make a point of how the dragon transformation is "irreversible and permenant." If they had described it as just a risk of not being able to change back it would have made more sense They chose to set the rules in a very clear way and then break them which undermined the drama of it

[@varden506]

@@FRuMMaGe it could easily be explained away as a special case that was allowed and revealed due to Sonia and Rauru being dead when they performed what was basically a “miracle”. Spirits are pretty powerful in the series lol it could also be explained away, based on Mineru’s end dialogue, that by being in spirit realm where consciousness clearly persists in some way, the myth of draconification being irreversible was revealed by whoever is out there to be just that: myth. Just because the Zonai said it was irreversible doesn’t mean it actually was.

[@threes_leaves]

My headcanon for the missing Sheikah tech is that while trying to reverse engineer the teleportation system, Purah accidentally activated something that teleported all active Shiekah tech to the Trial of the Sword dimension. So they had to scavenge all of the decayed guardians in order to build the new towers.

[@weatherman1504]

That... honestly doesn't sound too out of character for her.

[@robertjoseph2764]

But it also sounds completely made up.. since nothing would even allude to that

[@nathankurtz5960]

RE: the deities speaking to you through statues. Idk if the Zelda team was thinking this, but in the ancient pagan world, the way a god was enshrined in a temple was with an idol (a statue) that would act as the body of the god. And then the people would offer sacrifices to that statue. So that matches up.

[@cato3277]

Doesn't Phantom Ganon fill the role of Ganon causing havoc in the world? It isn't a being separated from him, the game describes it as his puppet. So no, Ganondorf didn't just sit and wait for you, he just used his phantom like he did in BoTW to cause chaos in the world while his real body regenerated before the final battle.

[@JaidynReiman]

Yeah. Phantom Ganon is the active threat and is running around being controlled by Ganondorf and pretending to be Zelda.

[@jamesmorseman3180]

@@JaidynReiman bro I wouldn’t call telling people to chill in their underwear and spooking horses at night “causing havoc” across Hyrule lmfao

[@fernandosimon5621]

​@@jamesmorseman3180Those were not caused by Phantom Ganon tho. More so the regional phenomena was Phantom Ganon's doing. He could have started a Zora-Hylian war when "Zelda" attacked King Dorephan. I'd say that is very chaotic.

[@jamesmorseman3180]

@@fernandosimon5621 I was responding specifically to the comment that said puppet zelda was causing havoc across Hyrule. Also, I’d call that havoc sure but from the memories we’re led to believe Gannondorf to be supremely powerful, and that does not really come across to me personally

[@Ryuxpale]

I actually cannot believe MonsterMaze made that critique. After Ganondorf's awakening he caused : - The upheaval, causing ruins falling from the sky potentially killing people and destroying homes - Summoning Colgera, driving the rito into starvation and ruining the village's connection to the outside world - Summoning queen Gibdo driving the gerudo into hiding from a swarm of monsters destroying their town, not to mention the entire desert is unexplorable and dangerous. - Summoning Mucktorok which poured out sludge utterly poisoning the entire domain and ecosystem causing many zora to fall ill and the king nearly dying from it. - Summoning Gohma causing the Gorons to suffer substance addiction and psychological disorders. Obviously this plot is analogous to substance abuse, but it reminds me a lot of the Old Gods lore in World of Warcraft and how they corrupted lands and people with their influence. TOTK executes a similar concept in a lesser and almost comedic fashion, and I'd say it was the weakest of the phenomenon of the four, but it still doesn't warrant "Ganondorf didn't do anything". -Summoning a greater army of monsters in hyrule leading them to raid Lurelin village and destroying their home causing the villagers to flee across hyrule. - I could go on and on. The stakes in this game are literally greater than any of the Zelda games if you just simply read the dialogue and take into consideration the implications of all the phenomenon. I think everyone in the podcast are great and intelligent guys, especially Monster maze, but this was one of the worst and petty critiques I've ever heard about TOTK. A lot of the criticisms made here are as if they didn't pay close enough attention to the dialogue and story.

[@Phyoka]

I think you're wrong about Dragon Zelda turning back. You're reading in that her Draconification was a sacrifice - it was not. It was a gamble. She sacrificed what she did semi-permanently- no draconification had ever been undone, so as far as she knew it was a sacrifice. Also, once Ganon's Dragon form, representing 'Chaos' was defeated, obviously the Light Dragon should have exited the story- otherwise there would be an imbalance. You're fixating on Zelda sacrificing her life, that draconification is death. The writers decided to tell you the rules of draconification _this game_, and they have just as much authority to say this is the first time it's undone, also.

[@amysteriousviewer3772]

I think the main problem is not that she turns back but that there is no real explanation of how they are doing it and especially how they know how to do it if it has never been done up to that point. I think if there was a proper side-quest with Impa after you find all the Geoglyphs where you would have to go and find ancient Zonai texts to piece together some ancient spell to undo draconification to get the "real" ending it would have been much more satisfying.

[@goku-jesus]

they say this ganondorf isn't very active in the world, but while he is rehydrating down there he uses puppet zelda to lure the sages and link in traps against monsters, scares the great fairies to prevent them helping link, tries to kill link by jumpscare with gloom hands and phantom ganon and even starts a whole drug cartel in death mountain. his downfall is caused by his own arrogance as it is shown at the beginning of the game where he underestimates the master sword strengtht and link's prowess, he couldve totally done more to stop the hero, yes, but that doesn't mean he wasnt actively trying weaken him

[@RustyhairedAlp9575]

That's not puppet Zelda, that's fake Zelda

[@phoenixknight8681]

​@@RustyhairedAlp9575 🤓

[@MoonTaLoo]

Suuuuch a good episode. You guys touched on so many things that were bothering me. Still absolutely love this game.

[@JWalker444]

I still think Link and Zelda lived together. There are way too many npcs in the game that don't recognize link at all for that to be a valid reason otherwise

[@nuh-uhbro765]

I’m on the fence about the living situation but I agree that the towns people not recognizing Link is a flimsy argument, and what his entire argument was based on. Not even Hestu remembers Link.

[@JWalker444]

Also I get the "sacrifice ended up not being important" criticism, but I believe it was more about her perspective of the sacrifice, she genuinely did believe she would be a dragon forever, but the fact she did it regardless is powerful. I think they just don't want to end the Zelda bloodline quite yet so they made her change back

[@llamadrama1090]

@@nuh-uhbro765 but different hair tho :(

[@JWalker444]

Another thing, remember how the dragons would disappear into a sky portal in botw? That had to have been a magic barrier hiding the sky islands

[@JWalker444]

And Ganondorf raised Hyrule Castle because the state of Hyrule Castle is directly tied to the state of the seal on Ganondorf

[@Kooptj]

After that community post you know the comment section will be salty

[@cato3277]

ToTK is easy to love but SO easy to tear apart at the same time. Love it to pieces.

[@togglebott7748]

Is this the final review?

[@Kooptj]

@@togglebott7748 no, he is still working on it

[@godly_potatoe69xd19]

Im pretty sure very few people have knowledge of the most recent calamity from botw because this one was prevented and the last major one was 100 years ago so people were living pretty peacefully and almost no one knew about link's fight against the new calamity. Hence the need for schools and education on it now more than ever. The Gerudo sage said that he became sick with power and they split off to try and fight him. Still dumb the way they did this though.

[@brydonprice6216]

See i actually feel like the open air dungeons still have potential to be better. I really feel like there are ways you can improve them still that dont require restictions, and i want them to at least give this style one more shot because of this.

[@_itsmunah]

Only if they expand them like elden ring dungeons. But traditional Zelda dungeons are far superior than the divine beasts or totk “dungeons”

[@Velarieth]

The reason the characters are so emphatic that draconification is permanent is to make the player more shocked when it gets reversed at the end. It was a mistake to tell it that way. They needed some tell and it would have been fine. But they wanted the payoff. Also, I totally disagree that there's no cost. You don't see the cost. But Zelda killed herself, essentially. For eternity. It's worse than death what she did. That's the sacrifice. Not remembering the thousands of years waiting. She had to spend days, maybe weeks knowing she was going to die, then walking up and doing it. And she clearly did not want to die. She did not want to make the sacrifice. That was what has meaning. This is only my personal read; but I would bet that she spent a lot of days bargaining, trying to find a way out, and put on a strong resolve for people. But in reality she was a wreck. In this game they establish that there is an afterlife and she would have seen all her friends and family again. But that sacrifice was giving that up forever. It was always too big and too tragic to force on the story. They had to change her back, because that's what her character earned. And it doesn't diminish the fact that she still did the act. She thought she was stuck forever. That's what matters. Not that she's actually stuck.

[@MousaThe14]

1:01:50 the funny thing people forget is that Nintendo did do the whole “all about the power and performance” thing and you know what happened? Despite having some of the most critically acclaimed games to this day, the Nintendo 64 and the GameCube didn’t sell well and lost to their competitors. They’ve done it before, they didn’t start becoming “the gimmick” company until the DS and Wii when they felt like they had to innovate to catch up when power wasn’t working out for them.

[@jhonayo4887]

Yeah but understand that the GameCube and N64 had crappy disk/cartridge formats that where limited in memory that killed 3rd party development and even their own. I'd argue in the 3d era home consoles Nintendo only had the switch as a successful console. The Wii was fun for a minute but most people abandoned it after the gimmick wore off.

[@raskolnikov6443]

@@jhonayo4887 that wasn’t the reason they didn’t sell

[@shelbypbj]

Yup- red ocean vs blue ocean strategy.

[@daitenshiMitsuo]

I'll start by saying: I love this game overall. The gameplay is fantastic, the abilities are great - even if I miss the runes from BotW, and the game is just dang fun. With that said, it has some very glaring flaws that it's sad to see remaining in a game that was 5 years in the making. The biggest of those is the story and world building as you all discussed. I was expecting, whether it was explicitly stated or not, that the towers and shrines would have deactivated and and returned underground, but seeing the Shrine of Resurrection as well as both of the Ancient Forges - that had been 'burning for thousands of years', were ineloquently removed was more of a gut punch than the Yiga making a hideout within the old Shrine of Resurrection. (Why did they even bother keeping that name?) When it comes to story and dialogue issue, I wonder if not having a Script Supervisor for this game was detrimental. (Thanks to Akihito Toda who was the Script Supervisor for BotW.) There are credits given for Cinematic Director and the Storyboard Artists, but neither game has credits for any writers and it makes me wonder who is responsible for that now. I love this game and it makes me want more. My problem is that I don't just more of all the great things, it makes me want a "remastered" version that fixes what it feels like it is still missing. I want to get into what I would change to the cutscenes to make them more weighty and narratively sensical, but this comment is already much too long. If you've read this far, thanks for reading, and thanks for sharing your thoughts in this podcast!!

[@TheJcris87]

Just remember, zelda made you an armor that required you to farm pieces of her to upgrade.

[@iamalaser4185]

I felt like it was a huge missed opportunity to not have Zelda's transformation back tie into the power of recall and how they had already set it up as something that can restore a thing to its earlier state (like Sonia talks about in the tear memory when Zelda breaks the tea cup)

[@fernandosimon5621]

But...that could have been what happened. Yes, the game does not go "and now let's use recall on Zelda" but it kinda shows us without telling us. Zelda games are not famous for laying out and explaining every single thing.

[@linkofhyrule6580]

@@fernandosimon5621this is what happened. it was the power of time and light, there’s actual dialogue explaining it. wont say where in case y’all want to find it

[@imaheadout2639]

The sky isles are explained. If you go back to the temple of time and talk to the construct on the top of it, he tells you that the ancient sages raised the Zonai ruins in order to make sure that link can be safe after the demon king comes back.

[@imaheadout2639]

It’s a stupid explanation though and should have been part of the story

[@gracehall4675]

I get what you’re saying about TOTK ending not having that sense of loss, but any other ending would have been abysmal. It works because TOTK is a sequel to BOTW, which was an incredibly brutal game in terms of story. Zelda loses everyone and thousands die. The big goal of B is getting closure for everyone killed. The loss from BOTW is so great it still carries into T with the castle still being abandoned and the little memorials Zelda placed all over to remember the dead. Unlike B, T story has a focus on finding Zelda. It’s the whole point of the game. If she didn’t return then what was the point of game? Where is the payoff if you work to find her but never get her back? In this case it’s more about payoff than loss, because loss from BOTW still carries over. At least that’s how I see it.

[@cato3277]

Reading the story from Link’s perspective makes the story better for both games. In BoTW, I read it as Link walking through the graveyard of a world he failed to save, but he could at least save one person - Zelda. For ToTK, he immediately loses her again from a failed grab, and pulls the world back together all to rectify that mistake. There’s something viscerally emotional about seeing the person you’ve come to know and care about, maybe even love in Link’s position, falling just within reach for a fleeting moment to be saved again. Whatever the writing after with Zelda not remembering any trauma from being draconified can’t take away from that moment.

[@gracehall4675]

@@cato3277 Yeah. the moment of him being able to finally catch up to her and grab her hand in the end when he missed in the beginning was very powerful. Brought it all together in the end. That would not have happened if she stayed in dragon form for the sake of “loss”. He’d already lost so much.

[@kei7540]

Yep kinda weird they want loss so much. Botw was about loss everyone died in the war against calamity ganon and totk is about rebuilding and protecting hyrules peace

[@akiraraiku]

@@gracehall4675 Gotta continue the godess's bloodline 👀

[@woodgod5858]

I mean, having a darker tone would makes the game much better though. Sacrifice and loss are incredibly important in story telling. In fact, if this game were to have something akin to the eclipse from berserk, I would actually bump it up a few points. Hell, they already have blood-moon as a plot point. It would be so raw for to comes in with his army, cuts off Link's zonai arm (so there would be no blood), assaulted Zelda in front of him (obviously not sexual stuff, just beat her up or something), while the sages and other people in the lookout landing get killed off, one by one at the hand of Ganon's army.

[@Paradox1012]

I think gannondorfs motivation could have been communicated better, but i think what the writers were trying to get across was that he wanted to rule a kigndom that produce's strong people so there would be strong people to fight, and that the power that makes one a king is wasted on people like the Zonai.

[@ashleygilliam6205]

The thing about dungeons is that the name "dungeon" implies that you are trapped or imprisoned and you need to find and fight your way out, therefore the experience should restrict you and put you at an intial disadvantage. I really wish they would have made them more classic in that regard. Still loved the game though. The gerudo dungeon felt the most like a classic dungeon to me.

[@viorel1852]

Here would be a cool alt ending: the sages combine their power to turn zelda back, it works but at the cost of all the stones shattering. Mineru disappears as well but differently. The rest goes as normal but the sages continue on their own strength.

[@TheRealNintendoKid]

For the next Zelda game, I want basically Zelda 1 in 3D. I want hidden dungeons that I have to find, not some big spectacle, not something that I'm pointed directly to immediately. I want SOME kind of dungeon items, but I want them to be useful in normal combat/traversal, not just token items for the dungeon they're found in. I want melee combos that involve more than just pressing Y 2, 3, or 4 times. I want shield bashing to be incorporated. We can parry, why can't we bash enemies in the face with the shield? The boomerang stunning enemies was a good idea, give it back. And maybe use hookshot to remove weapons or shields from enemies' hands. The raft could be used to cross bodies of water all over the place. The ladder could be used as an actual ladder, but that one's kinda lame. There's also stuff like the blue and red rings, that's always useful. I LOVE open world Zelda. The original Zelda was open world. But it was full of secrets, and some of the dungeons were even secrets. I want that back more than anything. I don't NEED the dungeon items, but they were kinda nice. Breath of the Wild was clearly inspired by the original game, but it strayed too far. It still felt hand-holdy in certain ways. And Tears of the Kingdom did the same kinda thing. It didn't tell you EXACTLY where you needed to go from the beginning, but it still gave you waypoints, and once you got there, the NPCs would get you the rest of the way. There was nothing to really figure out about where they were. There was no discovery about it. And damnit, if they're gonna be this bad at writing stories, I'd almost rather they don't even bother with one beyond the kinda brief backstory we got, again, on the original game's cartridge/in its instruction manual.

[@raskolnikov6443]

I don’t think the time travel is an issue at all. Works very well. Zelda in dragonform wasn’t visible in BOTW just like the sky islands. But here already being in dragon form during that game is not an issue at all. Makes perfect sense. I see no plothole there. Zelda was always going to be born and travel back in time, so no version of the timeline/ world exists where Zelda doesn’t show up in the past. The changes of that world are already part of that world going forward (including BOTW). It’s a closed and stable time loop. Pretty cool

[@samf.s.7731]

I'm sorry but the gentlemen mention in the recording that it's actually a problem that the skyislands popping up is not explained nor is anyone phased by them... So you're really not explaining it, just saying it's unexplained like other stuff.

[@bravecereza]

​@@samf.s.7731 the sky islands are explained, and the game makes it very clear they were hidden by a cloud barrier in the adventure log, that Zelda broke right before you exit the tutorial islands.

[@lmbritoilust2849]

I appreciated the inverted geography of the depths , it makes easier the exploration

[@ginganinja6596]

There is a steward construct on the great sky island that will give you an explanation as to why the sky islands are there. You just have to find the construct.

[@dmajorvgm8735]

It’s a very nothing explanation though IMO

[@codemastertalon6439]

sheikah tech answers (my assumption) 1) shrines went back underground - their purpose fulfilled; or monks who were very old (probs dead) moved on and their spirits were linked to shrines, so when they moved on shrines ceased to exist 2) towers turned into new towers, duh 3) shrine of resurrection could only be used once so was either stripped, or same as 1 4) anything that was infected by malice, degraded/eroded after calamity was defeated - divine beasts & guardians

[@Pikaclev]

My main issue with the game is that it doesn’t feel like a sequel to BotW, but rather a different game set in the same world.

[@jwoodsonmusic]

Shiekah tech being gone I can forgive. But where the FUCK is my boy Kass??? Legitimately bothered me the whole game.

[@koboldbiopellet]

There is an in-game explanation for the floating sky islands, although there isn't an explanation as to why nobody could see them (unless they meant the cloud barrier of the Great Sky Island was obscuring them). They've been there since the memory cutscene time period. The Zonai discovered that Zonaite can float when it is refined and struck (just like the floating platforms that you can hit to make float in the air). It is implied by some of the survey team that the sky islands contain Zonaite in them, and especially the bigger islands have upside down spires below them that seem like they could contain a flotation device. Mineru was able to develop technology to shoot large landmasses into the sky and keep them there, which she confirms is what she did with the temple of time (and by extension the great sky island). She says she did this to protect it from Ganondorf's forces. Finally, the chamberlain also confirms that her writings were sent by Mineru into the sky for Link to find in the future. Together, I take this information to mean that the Zonai gained a lot of their technological advancement from the aptly named Zonaite, and Mineru made even more discoveries about Zonaite transport that allowed her to send landmasses into the sky (the stone contains Zonaite that allows them to remain there). Mineru sent specific things to the sky to protect them from monsters and to help train Zelda's hero of the future.

[@BlackBerrieNinja4297]

My head cannon on the sheikah tech disappearing is that it decays like the shiekah monks do once their purpose is complete. Sure ganondorf is still a threat but the shiekah tech was built for calamity ganon not the sealed ganondorf under hyrule castle, and the sheikah don’t seem to know much about the sealed ganondorf.

[@BlackBerrieNinja4297]

After listening more to the podcast I realised my theory doesn’t make sense 😂

[@7milesdavis]

I wish we had dungeons. What we got is open air Devine beasts, five easy ass bite sized puzzles. A lot of things are improved but way to many things are the same. The dungeons in ocarina and majoras mask put anything in botw or totk to shame. I even prefer a lot of the 2d dungeons. They took more thought and were intimidating. I’m finished with a totk dungeon in fifteen minutes.

[@FlameOwNer]

What if the Shrine of Resurrection is gone because the Yiga purposefully destroyed it and laid a trap knowing well that Link would return?

[@mkv2718]

It’s not gone tho… it’s just buried in rubble. You can still see the water Link woke up in, and it bubbles in a way that no other cave pool does.

[@simplyfrozenwater]

​@@mkv2718 nah it bubbles the same way as a hot spring

[@sm_cheesy3144]

The story of this game is just really good ideas with incredibly mixed execution. Ganondorf is the only part of this story that seems like a lot of effort was put in to properly build him up, but it comes at the cost of making half the cast seems like idiots.

[@amysteriousviewer3772]

But he is not properly built up at all. The opening is cool and he appears in some of the memories but other than that he has a very small presence throughout most of the game.

[@nuclearscarab]

Half the cast seems like idiots because time travel doesn't make sense. Of course they could have done a lot better job even with the time travel, but the more you explain a story with time travel the more difficult making sense becomes.

[@sm_cheesy3144]

@@nuclearscarab Some issues aren’t even due to time travel. Rauru is warned about Ganondorf, says he agrees, and still decided to do nothing. Sonia and Zelda figure out Ganondorf is using a Phantom Zelda, and they proceed to not tell anyone and do exactly what Ganondorf asked them too. It’s not even time travel shenanigans, it’s just bad decision making.

[@sm_cheesy3144]

@@amysteriousviewer3772 I disagree. He gets more screen time than most incarnations of Ganondorf, and even when he’s not around, people mention the Demon King a lot. His motives are very clear and his development to the demon king makes him more than just a one note villain. It’s difficult to give him a larger presence without losing tension, just because this game is so big.

[@JaidynReiman]

​@@sm_cheesy3144 I would have liked to wander around the world and suddenly Ganondorf shows up to kick your ass. I think that's what people are talking about. That being said, Phantom Ganon gets really close to that. IMO I think it would have been better if like halfway through the main story, suddenly Ganondorf starts showing up everywhere physically (even if it isn't hydrated Ganondorf). I like what we got, but I do think they could have improved things to give him a stronger presence.

[@mackerel6099]

I was happy that Zelda turned back into a human because I really wanted that "Spirited Away" moment ever since I suspected that she was the light dragon, but this is what I think should have happened: Zelda returning to human form would be a conditional cut scene that the player only sees if they get all of the memories so that the implication is that Link with the Recall ability (amplified by Rauru and Sonia's powers, similar to the molduga memory) restores those memories to Zelda and consequently her sense of self that she sacrificed when she became a dragon. BUT on top of that it means that those memories are also the only things she remembers. She doesn't remember present day Hyrule, and she doesn't remember any of her history with the player except that we are "the swordsman Link" We would have the happy ending if we dotted our i's and crossed our t's before going to the final boss, but it would come with a punch to the gut

[@lethallohn]

Zelda team did a 4d chess move and said: "They'll figure it out and this game will get more free advertisement."

[@davithy_]

I definitely understand what Ratatoskr was putting down at 1:12:56 about the issue with Zelda's return and how the script itself mentions that it is an act that cannot be undone. Mentioning things about needing a little sorrow to really flavor the happiness. Perhaps Sonia COULD'VE returned Zelda to a pre-draconified state, but regardless of whether Sonia lived or died, she would have been long gone before Zelda needed to be returned. This could then lead to an exploration of why Sonia's ghost would still be around after eons. Rauru is connected to link by his arm (Btw I did just get to the discussion of "Where did Rauru go???" and I completely agree. At least with King Rhoam he disappears and doesn't really have importance to the story, but Rauru was incredibly pivotal to the plot so he could've shed some light on his actions), maybe Sonia is connected to Zelda's dragon because the secret stone Zelda ingested is one infused with the power of time?? Alternatively, they could've taken the Sheikah tech path with Purah - or maybe even Impa since she DID mention looking for a way to reverse draconification - figuring out a Sheikah tech way to return Zelda. This could have then explained why Sheikah tech is missing as well as cover your gripes about why Impa and Robbie don't de-age like Purah. I could go on about possible storylines they could have followed to return Zelda into a hylian. The issue is that if you WANT a happy ending to occur for your characters, at least put effort into making it possible, rather than pulling a Deus Ex Machina "Sonia and Rauru channel their powers through Link's arm" draconification cure at the end. Now to point out that I still think this is an incredible game and I felt really giddy grabbing Zelda's hand and saving her as she was falling back onto Hyrule!!

[@VonBoche]

It's baffling that the devs went out of their way to have her out loud say that her sacrifice was basically just akin to sleeping. Just a tiny dialogue change would improve that story, have her aknwoeledge that she still felt the years passing and immediately, her sacrifice and return feel all the more meaningful.

[@andrewmurray5789]

Three hours long? This is gonna get me through work. Hell yeaaaaah

[@noahmart0124]

What was the ancestor to the horse called in Totk? I missed it and can’t find it scrolling back

[@Brando2301]

*SPOILERS* I feel strangely about Zelda returning at the end. I desperately wanted her to come back, and felt really fulfilled to catch her in the scene that parallels the first time you failed to catch her. In terms of effective storytelling, it's great. It also changes the perspective on your journey. When you learn Zelda's a dragon, the goal is no longer to save her - it's to save Hyrule. When Zelda is an immortal dragon, the prerogative is now solely based on Link's commitment to saving the kingdom. He goes from being Zelda's protector to the people's protector. Once I internalized that fact and still faced the Demon King, getting her back was a pleasant surprise and something I honestly wasn't expecting. It was strange HOW she comes back for sure, though. I was hoping for a reverse OOT, where you go back in time, stop her from eating the stone, and create some sort of timeline split.

[@Absol7critical]

I could have sworn that Mineru said something about Ganon's puppet there (the boss) preventing her from waking up, but maybe I just assumed.

[@simplyfrozenwater]

she said that she was planning to wake up and lead link to the construct that she didnt expect to be seized, but although it altered her plans, i dont really see how the construct being seized would have affected her from waking up

[@Paradox1012]

@@simplyfrozenwater if they just said a spirit needs a physical form to channel their thoughts it would make sense. Because you only hear her voice when you get close to the head. But they dont say that so IDK lol.

[@simplyfrozenwater]

@@Paradox1012 for sure, the story isnt written in a way that contradicts itself necessarily but there are...SO many things left unexplained that honestly they couldve gone with so many explanations that were serviceable but instead theres just nothing. like there _are_ explanations that make sense, theres just no way of telling if theyre true (i love the game tho storys mostly real interesting and ganondorfs motives were done so dirty in translation)

[@Paradox1012]

@@simplyfrozenwater i assume he wants strong people to fight but Hyrule only produces weak people according to his judgement so the reason he wanted to rule was so the kingdom could produce strong individuals and cull anyone who isn't worthy. that's all i could pull from his last bit of dialogue right before he rehydrates.

[@simplyfrozenwater]

@@Paradox1012 yep, its something along the lines of the whole "hard times create strong men" philosophy + despising a reliance on gods or god-adjacent beings (the zonai) edit: the monolgue about hyrule being in darkness instead of light before he rehydrates is less about just being evil and more like "hyrule should face more hardships so the people dont get complacent with peacetime"

[@puz369]

The thing with limiting Link's powers in dungeons - you could tie that a gameplay characteristics derived from a story beat. You could then make the villain somehow in control of those effects or some such.

[@generalgarchomp333]

As someone who usually prefers happy endings, I agree that it was rather cheap. I personally think we should have had to work for it, it being a Deus Ex Machina is too much. An example is Stein's;Gate, to get the happy ending you need to not only sacrifice what makes your friend's happy but also do something incredibly specific to open the way to save Kurisu. It's such a good ending, especially if you played all the other routes first.

[@themar.i.per3374]

my favorite type of lore is the organic lore. the zelda team didnt think about the lore that much and now we are historians who have to piece bits of organic lore together. hollow knight is special because it has a lot of it

[@thomasw9286]

I agree

[@moosecannibal8224]

My biggest peeve is the knowledge that all these plot holes and unexplained parts of the story... They all went by the people who worked on the game either completely unnoticed, or noticed and uncared about.

[@raskolnikov6443]

There are not many and most can be explained

[@xcelentei]

SPOILERS I didn't mind the ending where they saved Zelda, explicitly because Recall is an established tool in Link's arsenal and using it to revert Zelda all the way back to her human body (in the same way she was sent back to the Ancient Past using a tear,) is a solution that players could come up with and implement. Two dungeons in I realized Link with a secret stone would give him specifically the power to save Zelda using one of his abilities, so the fact that he used recall on her like in the beginning of the game, sending her back tens of thousands of years to return to her pre-dragon body, was actually ludonarrative Assonance. The problem was, I didn't use recall on her. There was a point where, instead of a quick time event to stab Ganon's sacred stone, I thought I would have a chance to use fuse or recall on the light dragon to trigger a secret ending. The fact that Rauru and Sonia came back (with no explanation) and robbed me of the satisfaction of MY idea was insulting. Zelda coming back is fine, it's the implementation of the true ending that was shoddy. I agree with NBC that leaving this Zelda a dragon would be unsatisfyingly bleak for this kind of story.

[@Pikaclev]

1:40:00 The phantom armor being upgradeable would make the champions leathers useless in this game. Royal Guard’s outfit actually became upgradeable, but yeah, otherwise, nothing else seems to be upgradeable.

[@minty9959]

the sky islands were so disappointing there was nothing interesting to do up there especially compared to the depths which just confuses me because why was the sky such a big focus in the advertisements if there was so little there

[@guswautier9410]

I think the phantom ganons and the evil zelda are his influences and effects on the world. Those reslly made him feel like a presence to me.

[@ElJosher]

I agree with you on the finale. Bringing Zelda back is not the problem, but rather the way she was brought back. I mean the whole game you spend time trying to find her, so it is expected that once you do, there needs a way to turn her back. They just executed it poorly. (Edit after watching till the end) About limiting Link, you guys are 100% correct. The reason why these dungeons fail to capture a more traditional feel, is precisely because their is no limit placed on Link. And yeah shrines limit link, but not dungeons which is weird. One explanation is because the dungeons are in the overworld, and since it is open and seamless, getting in and out need to be open to allow traversal. But I say they could have done like the shrines and make dungeons in another dimension/space that needs to be loaded in.

[@_itsmunah]

Or. Just put a traditional dungeon in the game. Just because there is freedom of exploration doesn’t mean the dungeons have to be too. It’s pretty normal irl to encounter something at simple as finding a key to a locked door. There is absolutely no reason that traditional dungeons are gone. Let them be done in any order but when you enter make it traditional. It’s really simple.. Same as the story telling. Why are we again watching memories to get a story. Cause Nintendo doesn’t know how to put a linear story in a open world.

[@enzodemetry5335]

I feel like this is honestly a very fair critique of TOTK as well as some aspects of Nintendo. Honestly I think they need to hire better writers because not only is TOTK struggling to tell a compelling story, but a lot of other IPs are in the same boat. As freaking fun as Fire Emblem Engage was, it felt like fan fiction at best and really cringy at it’s worst, which is very unfortunate. Many of these IPs are known for having VERY compelling stories. I will admit, I am a big gameplay guy. When I play a game, it’s for the gameplay. So the muddled story didn’t hamper the experience for me, I do understand others need for it and it does make a more compelling game. I would be on the side of telling Nintendo to figure their shit out with their IPs stories. One thing I do heavily disagree with is the Dungeons. Despite popular belief, I actually REALLY enjoy them. Like a lot. I enjoy how open ended they are. I enjoy their themes. I actually enjoy fighting the constructs because to me at least, they are more visually interesting than the mini guardians. To be honest, I see BOTW and TOTK Dungeons as completely different experiments than the older dungeons. Because of that, I never really compared them, which made it so much easier to just enjoy them as they are. Fun open ended puzzle boxes. Maybe it’s just me here alone in this belief, but I enjoyed just solving the game my way. And I know that’s a personal preference. Overall, great video. Thank you for sharing your opinions. Got me to think about TOTK and what I wish was better and what I know I still love about it. You guys are great!

[@VonBoche]

You're not alone, I had a really good time with the temples. Also the build-up to the temples often felt to me like part of the dungeon itself, like the whole climb to the Ark or the cistern which compensates for some of the weaknesses of the temple in terms of length and lack of combat. It's not exactly puzzling to climb towards the water temple but it's still relatively tightly tailored level-design that was a lot of fun to go through and I can't imagine doing the whole process to reach the temple then telporting elsewhere. it's all part of the dungeon for me, even if technically you only enter the dungeon when the name appears on screen. That said, it doesn't reach Elden Ring levels of impressive given that ER managed to have even better dungeons than the studio's previously linear games but for what they're worth, the temples were definitely some of the highlights of my playthrough. Could be better, but definitely a massive ste up over the Divine Beasts and a good time.

[@uzumakiigor]

In my opinion the story of the Zelda games follows a certain "tale". They tell this tale as they prefer in games, some don't tell the whole tale, others continue a previous tale, others retell a part of the story they weren't satisfied with or for another interpretation. It looks like what exists from Grim's tales and Disney's tales. It's the same story in different styles

[@DashSwordSlash]

Also! As I recently started a second file, pay attention when you leave the Great Sky Island and you can very clearly see Dragon Zelda breaking the cloud barrier and making the surface visible

[@lawthirtyfour2953]

My biggest criticism is the base melee combat, it just doesn't feel good and the fact that you can build a mech to fight your enemies isn't a reason that it needs to. It's not just that it's simple and not some complex DMC style game, the simple things it tries to do just don't work well, The lock on system just doesn't hold up with multiple enemies, which honestly can be said of even some top tier fighting games to some degree, but in addition to that the block and dodging system is tied to it, so when it fails they all fail meaning there is a lackluster implementation of the most basic defensive actions. The game could also you a little bit less lag after some actions like a successful parry and jump attacks and some more aerial control just so you aren't 100% locked into your direction and and range after jump. But that's more personal preference.

[@blueylewis9419]

There are aspects of this game that I absolutely loved, and I'm really impressed and fascinated by the mechanics and game design and how everything in the game works together. I've had an absolute blast playing it and experimenting with all the mechanics. The plot is still poorly told, but then at the same time there's some really moving moments in the game, some of the best story moments in any Zelda game. The individual puzzle designs are really clever at times and make you think about how things will work inside of the physics. I've dumped more than 130 hours in over the last 3 weeks, so clearly the game is doing something right. I've never put that much time into any game in that amount of time, let alone a single player game. At the same time... there's so much wrong with this game. There's still not enough enemy variety. BotW's world is beautiful, but they threw all these rocks all over the place, and they're eyesores and get in the way of the vistas, and since they're literally everywhere it makes every location in the game feel the same. The dungeons are in some ways a step in the right direction, but also doubling down on what didn't work about the divine beasts. The dungeon plots and characterization are even worse than BotW's. It's a game about freedom, but too many features are locked behind intrusive cutscenes and sidequests. Every character in the game repeats themselves endlessly. The depths are cool and scary and amazing at first, but then there's barely anything down there. And I could go on. BotW is really special to me because before that Zelda was becoming increasingly stale, and they kept doubling down on the aspects that didn't work, like the pointless and never ending hand holding. So for them to switch the formula up, and remove much of what wasn't working about the games for me, and do it in a way that I largely enjoyed was really exciting. But for this to be only the second entry in this style, and they already seem to be digging into new bad habits, and reintroducing some of the old... it's worrying.

[@awesomepeople100]

What's the wheel bridge thing that was mentioned around 48:00?

[@Apeacrobat01320]

They could've very easily made Zelda stay a dragon for the emotional impact and then make this games version of the Champions Ballad based around finding a way to turn Zelda back

[@JaidynReiman]

But then that would require post-game DLC. Tbf, Impa implies they'll seek out a way to restore Zelda anyway. So even if Rauru doesn't magic it away, Impa suggests they'll find a way regardless.

[@jordanf.6213]

I definitely agree with all of the criticisms you guys had, but I think I can overlook most of them. Especially some of the story stuff, but there really should have been some loss at the end. Zelda being semi-haunted by things after turning back, a better reason she turned back, and Link's arm should have been lost when Rauru leaves (Like the BotW concept art). He could have caught her with one arm. I wrote off the people not remembering you as you just not making a strong impression on them (at the time in BotW they didn't know you were a Legendary Hero, and quite a bit of time passes between games), and I pretended Link not telling people Zelda turned was because he didn't know if she could be turned back (and he had every reason to believe she couldn't have been) and the people not knowing her fate might have been better for them and the fight ahead of them. Not knowing may have been better for them. I agree about the islands, I wish there were more and maybe a civilization up there, I wish there had been a bit more changes/expansions to the towns on the surface. But my biggest complaint is the Dungeons. I flipped between loving them and wishing they were more traditional. When I did the Lightning Temple, it made me realize the traditional dungeons could and would work in an open air formula (you said keys wouldn't work, but even some of the shrines had keys in this game! And the champions abilities acted as dungeon items). The moment I realized this was when I opened up one of the pathways in the Lightning Temple there was a room where I was ambushed by both Gibdos and Constructs, and it was glorious. I then expected to face something each time I opened a pathway from the main room, but that didn't really happen. The rest of the combat in the dungeon was disappointing. There should have been a combat room between the main room and the puzzle down each branch. That alone would have elevated this dungeon to the where it would need to be to live up to a traditional dungeon. The temples in TotK had the weakest puzzles (compared to most of the shrine puzzles in this game, the hardest/most complex puzzles should be in the dungeon) and lacked combat (I agree with Monster Maze, why aren't ganon's minions ever there when the bosses are his creations, think about if the constructs and Ganon's minions were duking it out on the airship, Ganon had Pirates in this game!). I think they could build dungeons that were traditional in the sense of having a unique theme/atmosphere, unique bosses, a solid mixture of combat and puzzle rooms. The shrines show they can build puzzles based off of your abilities, and it felt like some Ideas could have been used in dungeons or taken further. There's no reason they couldn't craft an open-air traditional feeling dungeon. I felt that way with BotW too, but I feel the step in the right direction within this game proves it (despite the fact they fall short). One thing you guys didn't mention was the materials quick menu. I would have liked if you could select stuff in the main menu to hide from the quick menu (like they'd still show up in the main menu and have a little eye icon in the corner of the item if their hidden but not in the fusion menu during gameplay) that or just better filters. And on filters it'd be nice to filter by quantity or value in the shop menus. Also, really wish that Shadow Link was here. I think he's overdue for a proper return to the 3D games and he would have fit perfectly as a mini-boss in the Spirit Temple when bringing back the last piece to the center. But all in all, I love this game. BotW wasn't in my top 3, but this game definitely made it worse in retrospect. Despite the complaints, I'd say TotK is either my second favorite or tied with Majora's Mask for my favorite Zelda game.

[@nicholasharris6726]

39:30 Actually, the Song of Storms paradox is a recursive loop. In TotK, Zelda doesn’t experience that. Or rather, multiple timelines of Zeldas experience different things including that. Zelda falls, then 10k years pass, then link recalls the master sword, then Zelda does a dragonbreak by doing the forbidden act, making another timeline. That’s not a loop.

[@nicholasharris6726]

Song of Storms has no cause. This does.

[@michaelflynn5643]

My theory on the Sheikah tech is that it was specifically tuned to detect and deal with Malice. Malice and Gloom aren't the same thing, or at least different enough that it doesn't register for the Sheikah tech. That also makes me wonder if there were other Calamities beyond the tapestry, just because the Sheikah would have needed to know what the Malice is in order to develop the tools to fight it, and they did not have anything ready to deal with Gloom. Of course, from BotW, all the Sheikah stuff was buried underground, so I guess it's all hanging out in that area between the Depths and the overworld? Must be awfully packed in there.

[@nicolasflores6056]

Where is Kass ???!!!!

[@JakeA6956]

About time travel. It isn't necessarily about it making 'sense', but rather it being consistent.

[@Martdogg3000]

Agree with so many points here, good and bad. Unbelievably fun game, but also a complete mess narratively. I have a few personal gripes that weren't mentioned as well, but I'll only mention one for the sake of brevity. I think Mineru was criminally underutilized, imagine how ridiculously valuable she should be as an information source; she's the last vestige of both her ENTIRE RACE and her time period- maybe ask her a few questions about what happened. Maybe ask her a few questions about the motherfucking underworld. Instead she's given 30 seconds of dialogue and that's it, which is really frustrating.

[@troysaxon8740]

How you got yin and yang from the ouroboros is beyond me. It reperesents a loop not a balance…