#i mean like totk ending spoilers ahead here

[creaturetap]

what if totk sheikah tech prosthetic, hmm? inspired a bit by that botw concept art where link has a sheikah tech arm

sketch of the arm itself under the cut

[ID:

digital drawing of link from tears of the kingdom. he wears the climbing gear from in-game: a red bandana, blue tank top, and green trousers. his hair is down and he has scars on his face and arm. his right arm is a prosthetic made from dark material, with glowing orange and blue patterns. he has an eye symbol on the back of his hand. he sits on the floor, looking at his prosthetic, moving the fingers. the lighting is warm and yellow, and the background is pale green.

/ end ID]

the right drawing was traced from the ancient armour in botw! it was my starting point and the inspiration for the first sketch on the left, though i ended up going with a more obviously/visibly mechanical design in the middle

[ID:

digital sketches of 3 prosthetic arms made from sheikah technology, from zelda: breath of the wild and tears of the kingdom. on the left is one that looks similar in size and shape to a human arm, with harder plating on the outside. in the middle is a thinner design, with swirling patterns on it and more visible mechanical joints. this one has arrows pointing towards it. the third is a colour sketch, showing mostly dark grey design with light brown/grey edges, and bright orange and blue details.

/ end ID]

[rawliverandgoronspice]

I absolutely love your analysis of the gerudo and Ganondorf because they put into words what bothers me about how TOTK portrays Ganondorf. That being they remove his agency as a character in favor of having some great evil against the good guys.

[Major story spoilers ahead for the end of the game]

At the end of the game, when you’ve defeated Ganondorf, he swallows the secret stone and becomes a dragon, like Zelda, fully knowing the consequences of what happens when that happens. And it’s just kinda left me with a bitter taste in my mouth? In the context of the story it makes sense, he’s portrayed as a egomaniac who just wants to destroy Hyrule. But compared to other versions of him, this one just feels more openly biased against him and the gerudo, with no reason or justification other than “he’s evil, hate him.” As far as I can tell… They never really show us that he’s done anything horrible or deserving of being feared before the show of fealty cutscene, other than not submit to Hyrule, attack them once, and generally have bad vibes. It feels forced how much they want us to hate him and the people who follow him. I’m not saying character in video games always have to be nuanced or complex but comparing like, Wind Waker Ganondorf next to TOTK Ganondorf…. 🙃 Waste of an excellent design imo.

Heyyy sorry for being a billion years late with this ask!! I was busy finishing the game!!! among other things!!! Thank you so much for your kind words, I'm super happy it resonated with you in that way!

I mean, the whole draconification plot beat doesn't really work for me. Like yeah, sure it's sad that Zelda is now a giant dragon and it's cool to have her soaring above your head while you have no idea where she actually is (a situation that isn't nearly tapped into enough in the narrative imo, like it gets obvious way too fast if you happen upon the wrong memory, etc), and I actually think the whole sequence of you removing the Master Sword from her head was the best scene in the entire game in terms of mood and emotions --even THOUGH it would have been so much better with a stronger story and stronger stakes-- BUT. How does that build up thematically?

I think what doesn't work for the Zelda side of this plot point (I'll get to Ganon next) is that... she doesn't make that choice. It's not like she's being tempted by an easy way out and decides to sacrifice herself for the sake of Hyrule or Link or whoever: she has no choice in the matter. Her powers activate (?? somehow? once and never again also, talk about dropped plot threads), she finds herself in the past, is the passive witness to a bunch of shit that only tangientially relates to her --it's like she's visiting estranged family in a foreign country and watch their drama awkwardly before being dragged into it against her will even though she was just trying to renew her passport and get back home (if there had been any callback to her relationship with her father it would have landed better, but it's just completely ignored so vOv). Then her relatives all die or corrupt or something, and she still can't get back home. What is she meant to do besides draconify? Grow old and die in the past? What would that accomplish?? Her adventures in the past are just basically about solving a shrine puzzle with a particularly weird solution --but the game treats it like a huge sacrifice when it's basically her only way out, and she lost absolutely nothing making that sacrifice (and then she... cries about the weird family drama? sure. Honestly I think it would have worked better if the tears were Rauru's, it's his bullshit everyone is dealing with right? He's the one who feels broken and aggrieved by the whole thing.)

So, if we ignore the draconification precedent builds up to zero thing thematically beyond cheap drama that reveals nothing about neither the characters nor the world, I think Ganondorf's case is a little more compelling because he does make a choice here: dying as he tries to achieve his weird lofty goals (and fail), or postpone his victory eternally by sacrificing his objectives but reject death and defeat --while also barring himself from victory. In a better crafted story, this could be utterly excellent and it feels very Ganondorf to me. BUT, my beef with that plot beat isn't that he chooses the second option, making him kinda active for the first time in the entire game (and makes an appropriate hideous smile: *loved* this second one, the first one didn't land for me but this one really captures the ecstatic insanity and transcendance and desperate madness of the act --I have nothing against Ganondorf offputting smiles and cackles when they feel earned, and the Sonia one just... doesn't to me, it just feels like weird rigging and mesh deformation choices getting out of control).

My problem is that his existence as a dragon contradicts everything we knew about dragons before --both for him and for Zelda. I thought the big issue with draconification was that you'd lose yourself to the act entirely, and would become this sort of organic landmark of infinite power and eternal life but without will to act on your precedent goals and understanding of yourself. But the second the big man becomes an evil dragon, suddenly Zelda zips in to the rescue (apparently remembering who you are? understanding she's meant to fight Ganondorf? I mean, this kind of works emotionally as a climactic ending and the power of love or whatever, again it would have worked better in a better story), and Ganondorf is still very much into destroying the world as well as you and Zelda.

Also, he's very definitively mortal (and he has the stone on his head again? And so if you destroy it you destroy his immortality? why???)

So... What I dislike here is the suggestion that he was somehow so evil and rotten and bad that all of these rare moments of interesting worldbuilding and ambivalence gets completely swallowed in the bossfight logic, making his choice (and Zelda's) completely meaningless in retrospect.

also: let Zelda remain a dragon you cowards, that way Hyrule gets any sort of chance to escape and reimagine its horrying eternal monarchy instead of re-establishing it even harder than before!!!

[tarotcard0]

Okay, so here's my long-as-fcuk post complaining about Zelda's damselification in TotK

Spoilers ahead.

Part 1: Why is Zelda not allowed to have agency in her own fucking game?? (Spoilers for TotK, OoT, WW)

People have wanted an official playable Zelda in a Zelda game for years at this point, so the fact that Nintendo went out of their way to basically do the same thing again, is... lame.

"Oh, but this time she turned herself into a dragon and she restored the broken Master Sword." Yeah... about that: That's bad, actually.

I really don't think there's a good way to spin the whole Light Dragon thing. For starters, that plan was fucking stupid. It only worked because Zelda got ludicrously lucky, but it goes beyond that.

On one hand, it means that the largest impact Zelda had on the plot was the help she offered when she wasn't even herself. They brought her back at the end, but that doesn't undo the writers making the active choice of having her make the active choice to stop being a character/person in order to do anything. On the other hand, it could be said that Sacrificing herself for the good of her people was very Noble of her. But then they bring her back, undoing the Sacrifice part of her Noble Sacrifice and there are no consequences. So it's kinda fucked no matter how you look at it.

Zelda is, for some inexplicable reason, not allowed to help, so in order for "her" to help, she has to become somebody else. Sheik and Tetra can be used as examples of this, but at the very least, she was still her own person in those examples (and still got to do things as Zelda), it never got as bad then, as it did now with the Light Dragon. Unlike Sheik or Tetra, who are essentially ostensibly Zelda in a different outfit, the Light Dragon is a Non-sapient animal! Which makes it fighting alongside us to beat the Dark Dragon kind of confusing, like, why are they fighting? It's just another Dragon.

Some to think of it, why was the Dark Dragon fighting anything? How do you know you're evil, Dark Dragon? you were just born.

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Part 2: So... about that haircut...

Remember in part 1 when I said people wanted a playable Zelda in a Zelda game?

See, I did say that :3

And that's really important, because when that first teaser dropped, we were all hype as fuck!

Not only were we getting a new Zelda, but a Direct sequel. This has only happened 3 other times (1 -> 2, OoT -> MA, Oracles -> Awakening)

This is a very rare and exciting thing for the series. But there was something else people were excited for. Something I didn't notice at first, but many others did.

Zelda got a haircut :3

I was confused why people were so excited about that at first. "It's a haircut, what's the big deal? I didn't even notice until you brought it up." then it was brought to my attention that Zelda's shorter hair matches up well with Link's. Then I was like "Oh!" Then I remembered Skyward Sword was canon and I was like "oh..."

I didn't want to get my hopes up. I really didn't. There's no way Nintendo would do something that cool. And you can bet your bottom Rupee that I blamed Skyward Sword for that conclusion. Yet I remained silent. Apparently it was impossible for me to not get my hopes up. To want this one theory to be correct. To want Nintendo, for once in their god damn life, to prove me wrong.

Then that second teaser came out...

And pitched Zelda in a hole in the ground.

A lot of people weren't happy with this.

Simultaneously, a lot of people still (somehow???) held out hope. I'm looking at you Arlo.

(Both of these released right after that second teaser btw)

But I'm pretty sure most reasonable people understood it was over.

And we were right. Zelda falls down a ditch. The princess needs to be rescued by the noble (male) knight with basically no shakeups to the trope whatsoever, and Zelda got a haircut because... That's the end of that sentience. They redesigned her for no reason. Not one that'd be satisfying to hear at least.

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Part 3: Why is no one talking about this?

Even me. Seriously, the only reason I'm making this post now is because someone else made a post saying how weird it was no one is talking about this.

What's even weirder to me, is that it's not just that no one's talking about this; it's that nobody's talking about this all of the sudden.

When that first teaser came out, I saw dozens of people talking about the short hair and how that'd make it easier to adapt Zelda's Animations to being a playable character.

And when the second teaser came out, I saw dozens of people expressing disappointment at Zelda's Fall-in-a-ditch-ification.

Myself and likely the others in my camp at least have an excuse. It was 2 whole years after that teaser before the game came out. I'd already gone through the stages of grief and just accepted that Zelda would play the same part she always fucking has.

But that still doesn't explain why the previously hopeful have said nothing. Why a second wave of disappointed voices didn't appear. Surely the hopefuls would have been hit with the same disappointment the realists were previously hit by once the game came out and it turned out they were wrong?

They should have been even angrier than I was. Yet... Silence. I watch Arlo's content regularly. Surely if he was going to say something about it, he would have done so by now, right?

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Part 4: Let's take a look at that second teaser again for a hot minute.

Why'd they release a second teaser when they didn't even have a name for the game yet?

And why'd they show Zelda falling in a ditch specifically?

The best theory I have, if you'll allow me my tin-foil hat, is that Nintendo saw the hype around a potential playable Zelda, but, having already decided the story wasn't going to allow that, decided to show that scene to squash that hope. And it basically worked.

But that begs the question... Uh... Why'd they do that?

Dragon Quest 4 gave us a girl option for the hero on the god damn NES, and the fact that Nintendo still refuses to put such an option in the Zelda series is... concerning. Which, now that I've written it, is a line I really wish I put in that video of mine.

Fans have wanted a Girl option in Zelda for years, if not decades. Nintendo themselves has gone on record as saying if they were to add such an option, they'd just have [us] play as Zelda, instead of making a new character or a Girl Link.

Okay. Cool. Fine. FUCKING DO IT THEN

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Part 5: Uhg.

I've done my best to write down all my thoughts here in an ostensibly organized manner, but on top of just having way too much to say on the topic, I accidentally hit "undo" once which "undid" literally the entire document, which I then could not Redo, inexplicably. As a result, some of what I originally had to say may have been lost.

This post is ranty, and rambly, and has no real ending. Because the ending to this conversation is the Zelda Team giving us a playable Zelda (in a non-spin-off title) or, in my opinion, any playable lady protagonist.

So, because I have no real ending to this post, I'm going to just stop it here. Feel free to add to it in reblogs, tags, comments, etc. I'm sorry this post is so fucking long.

[seedlinggames]

Solo Cairn game - some thoughts on maps

You can find the game so far here.

In a discussion in discord, we talked about TotK (no spoilers) and how in that and many other video games, getting on top of a large structure allows you to see farther. Should that be the case in TTRPGS as well? I've been using my game Procedures to Discover the Path Ahead to generate the world as we go, so that I and my characters discover it at the same time. With a simple modification though, I could go in and add some tall mountains that can be seen. I've found that "pre-seeding" the map with some structure - usually like a large body of water - and then building around that works well. So what I'm doing here is a pass, in pencil, where I just figure out where the mountains go:

It's a bit hard to read, but I'm still using the increasing number thing, so that barriers tend to be farther away from settlements. Here, wherever the number on the route + the number on the die = 7, we have a barrier (in this case a tall mountain).

So we end up with a mountain near the inn to the south, a mountain in the north close to the hostile town we found earlier, and other mountains near the bandits halfway down the route. The way this is set up, you're more likely to get mountains in parts of the route that are otherwise more challenging. I was hoping, for reasons, that there would be a mountain closer to the bandit camp/tollhouse from the south, but there isn't. So this means it'll still be complicated to find a way past.

[gerudospiriit]

[Okay we all knew it was coming. I've got to go on a ramble about the Gerudo (edit: it ended up being about TotK in general oops). I'll go ahead and put it under a read more because there will be some spoiler-y things BUT--]

If I didn't have a million and six questions about the Gerudo in BotW, TotK did nothing to answer them and added another billion.

For starters, I was so glad to see that Ganondorf and the Gerudo together. Working together. The Gerudo loyal to him. I, of course, wish we got MORE because again, more questions and no answers, but I've always been fascinated by the position the Gerudo are in, ESPECIALLY Nabooru, and how their attitude toward Ganondorf evolved from pretty much OoT to BotW (I know they're in like four swords but). I loved seeing it even if it brings in a ton more inconsistencies and anxiety for me as an OoT/Nabooru fan.

So what am I on about. From seeing the scenes from the geoglyphs, seeing the Lightning Sage and how she reacts to news of Ganondorf I guess attacking the desert settlements, which may include Gerudo Town or whatever it might have been back then (which brings up more questions of course), I was immediately like "wait what happened then?" Did Ganondorf turn on the Gerudo? Did they turn on him? Was the sage a single actor, similar to Nabooru? IS she supposed to BE Nabooru, introducing a whole other can of worms for me specifically? Why would Ganondorf attack his own region when the Gerudo were obviously loyal to him? What changed their minds or what changed his? There's just soooo much there and they just....never explain a thing. And I get they MIGHT address a little more with the old sages in DLC but DAMN IT. I just want to KNOW.

All of that said, it also makes OoT more complicated because, unless this is like...the beginning of New Hyrule like the concept introduced in Phantom Hourglass after the flood, it doesn't fit. The obvious thing is looking at Ganondorf. If this is the BEGINNING, and Ganondorf is sealed away in the imprisoning war until Zelda and Link find him again in TotK, we couldn't have OoT, TP, WW, or any other game that features him. Like...my doom and gloom reptile brain can't help but wonder if this is meant to REPLACE OoT and therefore make all the other stuff irrelevant but that can't be because, again, Nabooru is mentioned by name and in a historical context. She existed in other words. So akdkjrbr.

But then bring in the Gerudo too. So they're loyal to Ganondorf here. Then they're...maybe not? But then they are again in OoT. And then, if we go by Urbosa's scorn, his memory is a despised one. The inconsistency is the same brand as a friend pointed out to me: with the scene looking so similar to the one from OoT where Ganondorf surrenders and pledges loyalty to Hyrule, why tf did the Gerudo and Hyrule fall for this AGAIN? Which makes my reptile brain again fire up and wonder if this imprisoning war stuff is meant to replace OoT. Like I get it's dramatic, but making the same mistake with the same man on both their parts is just...silly. And i guess you could argue that the Zonai history has been a lost one but like was it really? Rhoam and rulers before knew not to go down beneath the castle and apparently that was respected until the second Calamity messed things up and the gloom started causing problems. So the royal family, especially closer to the events of the imprisoning war, should know SOMETHING about it all. And yet they still APPARENTLY made the same mistake. Same goes for the Gerudo...and that's just being generous and saying it's a possibility they would even SEE Ganondorf again considering...you know....he's supposed to have been sealed up under the castle by the time OoT comes around, meaning the Gerudo would have never seen him after that and therefore their idea of him wouldn't have changed to what we see in OoT.

And you know, as I'm writing this (welcome to my stream of consciousness I guess lmao), I thought of an easy way they could have avoided all of this: don't involve Ganondorf and just use Demise. Don't get me wrong. I love Ganondorf and was very very happy to see him back. However, his return AS GANONDORF makes things so janky and complicated and I known it's just fanservice. I know why they dont, and the short answer is they've overly connected Demise and Ganondorf to the point they're just one person, but hear me out. They almost STRICTLY call him the Demon King anyway, suggesting the tie to Demise. The look after he transforms is Demise. Sealing Demise away again and him having no connection to Ganondorf at this point would keep everything following intact still, and they could just do what they have been doing with the curse and working in Demise's curse and influence like choosing Ganondorf as the vessel when he's born (as much as I still kinda hate that). Basically, Ganondorf should have just been Demise HIMSELF returning. And if you really wanted to bring Ganondorf back, fine. Tying them so tightly together as basically one in the same in this context is just a mess, so it would have been better if it was back to the sort of vessel idea. So I think it would have been better if

1. It was DEMISE they showed in the flashbacks to the beginning of Hyrule and the Imprisoning War (also isn't that what they called the events from SS? Does this stuff predate even THAT?). No Ganondorf for, as it stands, he couldn't exist yet. This solves the inconsistency of Ganondorf being in other eras when he should be sealed away. It makes how Demise and Ganondorf get involved a little squickier to work with, but that whole thing was already weird and hard to explain anyway.

2. Demise, then, is who gets resurrected beneath the castle. If you want Ganondorf back, to be like a physical body for him or whatever, make that another plot point. Make it to where someone finds a way to resurrect Ganondorf SPECIFICALLY, whether that's Demise himself or another actor like the Yiga Clan (ugh don't get me started on the damn Yiga Clan and the little sense they make god). Sprinkle in hints that this is going on, along with the historical context of who Ganondorf was. That maybe even part of the main story is TRYING (and failing) to stop Demise from getting Ganondorf resurrected because then he would be at actual full power or something like that.

Basically, just...separate Demise and Ganondorf more. Like I get there's the curse and I guess Ganondorf becomes some kind of vessel for Demise, but this game has basically just made them the same person and it makes everything all fucky and confusing with how they've presented this new founding of Hyrule and the imprisoning war. We would have a little bit better cohesion and sense at least.

And yeah I know people are going to bring up time traveling Zelda and that maybe this is just an entirely new timeline altogether from even BotW, and the past she ends up in is a completely different past than that of OoT's or something, but....idk. I also heard this was supposed to tie up all the timelines so????? And that she just fixed everything in the past is another theory??? It's all just really bizarre and adds nothing to the established story and lore. Too much fanservice and too little thought and consideration for plot.

Anyway. Maybe I'll figure some explanation out for at least the Gerudo. Or I'll eventually just stop trying to make it work. Maybe something will come out that helps in the DLC. and don't get me wrong: for all my criticisms on these points, the game was super fun and was a huge leap forward from botw, which always felt sparse and unfinished to me. This game did so so soooo much good and I still think it's an amazing game. But I love the story of the Zelda series. I love the lore. And I don't even hate what they did with all this, necessarily. I just wish they either cut these two games off from the previous games entirely without making all the historical references (and I'm not referring to place names, the outfits, or easter eggs necessarily) or did a better job of showing how these events related to the past games and lore instead of just tossing something out there with zero explanation of why it matters.