#just a thought I had while playing botw

[adrift-in-thyme]

I love Wild having a fox as his dark world form. Or a dragon

But have you considered…blupee Wild

[waywardsalt]

after replaying botw i think my general issue with it is that it’s not really good at anything in particular. its kinda like its stretched thin trying to provide a ton of things for the player to do but none of it is really very deep or really engaging

[quirkycritters]

Game Night: CHAIN ATTACK!!!

i am,,, withering away but ITS DONE ITS DONE IM FREE FROM THE CURSE (<<< still haunted by wips) clocking in at 32+ hours, this sucker has been getting pushed around for 10 months-

while theres some things i would have done differently if i could redo this from scratch, i still had a BLAST cramming in as much detail as i could tolerate >:) some highlights / cut ideas / ramblings are below the cut, but please zoom for details! (if tumblr doesnt shred it to bits)

gonna be real i locked so hard onto drawing ripped jeans that i forgot i could have just shoved legend into a skirt and called it a day

SOCKS. SOCKS. the amount of Joy anytime i figured out how to personalize them with game references: legend (hibiscus), twilight (ordon goats), and four (force gems)

i WAS going to put time in a turtleneck, but had an epiphany and started digging for the most obnoxious hawaiian shirts i could find,,, ft. a sea flower (wind waker) and a saturation boosted plumm (twilight princess)!

yeah so warriors got the sweater instead of the skintight shirt, sorry gang

speaking of if i ever say im going to draw a cableknit sweater again, somebody PLEASE shake some sense into me- warriors sweater was a NIGHTMARE since my art program has an astonishing lack of good brushes (and yet here i am still using it)

MOST of the text has been modified using the twilight princess cipher because yeah. i was procrastinating shading. also the other ciphers were in japanese- times shirt is cropped, but reads "its 5 oclock somewhere"

winds lobster shirt :) that is all i just think its neat

wilds jacket :) link w(ild) 2017, aka the release year of botw

jewelry! sky has the fireshield earrings, and wild has the amber earrings~ could barely squeeze the bombos and quake medallions onto legend, and wind got the joy pendant

hyrule :D embroidery on his sweatpants because i was struck by whimsy- also i 100% thought his shield was purple tinted for weeks while drawing this because the page i used as reference was set at night, and i was originally basing his sweater on his shield- scrapped the cross pattern after several failed attempts but kept the color ^^

the chips are bbq because im biased (reads "crisps" in twilight princess cipher for no real reason except whimsy)

bless my dearest homie for game reccs because the og plan was to have them all be loz games! titles include wii sports resort, elebits, super mario party, smash bros ultimate, just dance 2016 (its box art is colorful ok), and myth makers orbs of doom (I HATE THIS GAME WITH EVERY FIBER OF MY BEING, as i should, anyways i should play it again). four is suggesting orbs of doom, buddy aint even playing,,,

kinda was hoping to play around with hair colors and skin tones a bit more, but again, see the hour count- ill get em next time surely,,, also blue vs violet eyes for legend already had me in decision paralysis

the whole gang was gonna have friendship bracelets with color combos based on dynamics i found neat but oops! didnt finish the layer :')

thats a wrap! didnt yap about everything but im curious what yall catch onto- anyways surely ive learned something about biting off more than i can chew (<<< lying liar who lies)

[artful-ang3l]

North East Basement 1 Analysis!!

Well I was wrong in my preditction last time! We got the Problematic Group! I can almost hear the Warriors fans playing their fanfare, more power to y'all!!

Update is here if you hadn't read it yet! North East Basement 1

My thoughts are under the cut!

I find it so incredibly funny that we see the difference between BotW and HW here. Wild taking out 3 Boarblins while Wars takes out at least 6.

Wild can fight a lot of enemies in his game but Warriors can take out hordes!

Boarblins are also from Link's Awakening and the Oracle Games so... another enemy from LA

I feel like Warriors is trying to push the talk about what happened with the Iron Knuckle very carefully, bringing up Twilight and Wild possibly training together. He knew that Wild was trained as a knight and the phrasing seems like he's leading Wild into a conversation here, which is a good strategy.

Wild being excited about his sword is sooo cute!! Look at that little goober!

Sidenote: I would love to know more about Four's "trade secret". But maybe that's just my bais towards Smithy. He has great craftsmanship and the boys all know that!

Was Warriors even paying attention when Wild said the dungeon was similar to shrines? My boy said "These are LIKE shrines."

Entrance pt. 2

I mean yeah, dungeons are kinda similar to shrines. Puzzles, enemies, and the like. But like Wild said, they were made to train the hero, not try to stop him.

Cue TotK Wild slapping his younger self for that comment. I did infact laugh when I read that.

Wild's pretty young and has a very different life than Warriors has. Once again, this shows how similar Wild and Hyrule are. Plus that is pretty dark humor, something someone who's been through a war and seen people be amputated might not appreciate. Especially since Wars is trying to be serious here.

What does Wild WANT to be? That's a very good question. Wild's had the Master Sword from a very young age, around 12 as he told Twilight.

Memories pt. 2

His father was a knight so he was expected to be one. He was Flora's appointed knight so he was expected to be in her shadow protecting her for the rest of their lives. What does HE want? He may not know based on his face.

Sparks! Yet another enemy from Legend's era but also Wind and Four. These ones are defeated the same way as the Anti-Fairy from earlier. Boomerangs or magic powder. Which I'm not sure if Warriors or Wild have. But electric monsters next to a big pool of water is probably not a good sign.

Blade traps! They seem to be similar in design to either the Oracle games or Ocarina of Time. I'm gonna say Oracles because of the Downfall theming of the whole dungeon though.

Also Wild! What did Legend say! Watch your toes! Thank you Warriors for saving my boy!

Cryonis time!! Although it is worth noting that when Time looked at the Shiekah Slate with the Mask of Truth in Masks pt. 2, it said that the Cryonis Rune was unavailable. I don't remember exactly which line says that but I did spend a good chunk of time translating all of it a while ago and it said it was unavailable. Is that because he wasn't near water at the time or because the rune isn't working at all? I guess we'll have to see!

But that is all for now!

Predictions for next update! Wild is either going to use Cryonis and Wars is gonna be impressed! Or Cyronis isn't going to work and they'll have to find another way. Either way, I'm excited to see what's next!

All art belongs to @/linkeduniverse !!

[librarygarten]

I’ve been thinking about the infodumping to the chain about Zelda games post and all I want to do now is tell them about the speedrunning in botw 💀

Like imagine looking Wild dead in the eyes and telling him that he could’ve beaten Ganon with a pot lid and a spoon completely naked not even a day after he wakes up habdmdvsusjsbd

Even better, imagine the potential angst if the boys DID use speedrun strategies... because of Isekai! Reader. Reader is their player, and the line between their control and the boys' free will is incredibly blurry at best >:]

#1 Chain x Speedrunner! Deity! Isekai! Reader - Who's in Control?

Part 1 includes Wild, Four, and Warriors Part 1 (you are here) ✿ Part 2 ✿ Part 3

When you first fell through the portal and joined the chain on their quest, you had revealed that they were only stories in your world. It had taken a while for them to understand the concept of a video game, and even longer for them to come to terms with the fact that some of the most traumatic events of their lives were reduced to children’s entertainment. However, as they talked with you, they came to another horrifying discovery: YOU were their “player.” Your actions in your world, the decisions you made while playing the games, directly influenced their own lives. What’s more, you were a speedrunner.

Wild

It was a peaceful day in camp. You were sitting near the fire, watching Wild cook, chatting about nothing in particular. Suddenly, his head snapped up, as if he suddenly realized something important.

“You made me fight Ganon in my underwear.” he says. He stares at you. You stare back, unsure how to respond. Anything you could say dies in your throat. He continues. “I couldn’t beat Ganon back when the Champions were alive. Back when I had the Master Sword. But you managed with a pot lid and a spoon.”

“Well, that was still you.” You can feel the sweat run down the back of your neck. “The line between what’s me and what’s you is kind of blurry. It didn’t feel like you were being controlled, did it?”

“No. I just remember thinking I had to get to the castle as soon as possible.” Wild looks down at his hands, contemplating his next words. “I did things without thinking, really. When I jumped around and shot that arrow, I didn’t know why. It just seemed… natural.”

You were aware of what he was talking about. A common way to skip Windblight Ganon. The only things needed were some well-placed jumps and an arrow. Shooting the arrow at just the right place would make it get stuck in Windblight’s head, essentially one-shotting him.

Wild turns back up at you.

“You made me fight Ganon in my underwear.” He emphasizes the last few words, as if he still can’t come to terms with this reality.

“I’m sorry?” You really don’t know what to say. Nothing could possibly make this situation worse. “It would have made a difference, really. I wasn’t planning on getting hit, so armor was pointless.”

“That’s right. I didn’t get hit once.” Wild looks shocked. “I dodged everything.”

“So everything worked out!” You smile nervously.

“But why?” He asks incredulously. “Wasn’t it hard? Why would you go straight to the castle?”

“Gotta go fast?”

Four

Another busy day at camp. There was food to cook, clothes to mend, weapons to fix. While the others went out to gather materials, you and Four kept yourselves busy, trying to get as much done as possible before they got back.

“Y/N. You played my games, right? You kind of influenced what I did and stuff?” Four asks out of the blue.

“Yea, why?” You put down the shirt you were mending and looked up at him. He was staring into the distance, as if lost in thought.

“Are you the reason why I could walk through that wall?” He turns to look directly at you. His gaze is almost paralyzing.

“Which time are you talking about?” You laugh nervously. “There’s a couple areas in The Minish Cap where you can glitch through walls into other areas.”

“The Octorock!” He exclaims, “I pushed a pot into the wall and went through the wall! Did that actually happen? I thought I was going crazy!”

“Oh, yeah. The Octo Clip is essential for speedrunning.” You explain. “It’s one of the few glitches available in your game for the 100% category.”

“Speedrunning?” He tilts his head, confused. “What’s that?”

“It’s a thing people do when playing video games. It’s like a challenge to see how fast you can beat the game. People compete to get the fastest time.” You pick up your needle again, praying that would be the end of the conversation. Talking about the nature of the chain’s free will was uncomfortable to say the least.

“Did you win, at least?” Four asks. He could understand competition; one of his games was mostly a competition between the colors.

“Ugh, not even close. I messed up the timing on the final boss so the fight took way longer than necessary. I ended up missing the top ten by a whole minute.” You lament.

“I think I remember that. I was fighting Vaati, and suddenly started panicking. I thought I was just scared.” He points an accusing finger at you. “But that was you, realizing you messed up?”

“I guess?” You shrug. “It could be both. Like, maybe you just happened to feel fear at the same time I realized I messed up? Or maybe you felt fear, causing me to mess up? It doesn’t have to just be me influencing you. It’s the multiverse. You probably influenced me too… right?” You try not to sound too desperate with your question. Surely, this connection went both ways. Otherwise… you don’t want to think about the possible implications.

“Maybe.” Four nods, but you can tell he doesn’t really believe it. With nothing more to say, you slip into silence.

Warriors

(I legit cannot find speedrun glitches for his game??? Let’s dive even deeper into the nature of freewill lmao.)

Warriors was silent as you walked along the trail. The rest of the group had run ahead, apparently excited about something they had spotted over the horizon. The last thing you heard was Wild shouting something about Hinox toenails. You were glad to have a moment of silence. You loved the boys to death, but they were a bit much at times. Unfortunately, the silence was short-lived.

“I’ve been talking to the others about their adventures. Now that we know about you, some things are starting to make sense.” Warriors’ voice is quiet, his voice low. Almost threatening. You don’t say anything. He continues. “Four told me you like to do something called speedrunning? Where you try to beat the game as fast as possible.”

“Yeah,” you say. You can feel his gaze on you. “I’m not very good at it. Most of my times don’t even get on the leaderboard.”

“And your behavior during the games influences our world.” It’s not a question. He knows.

“I guess?” You chuckle nervously, suddenly finding the dirt beneath your fingernails very interesting. “I’m still trying to figure that out. Multiverse travel be wild.”

“Was it worth it?” His voice is laced with venom.

“What?”

“What is worth it?” He repeats, then scoffs at your confused expression. “You wanted to beat my game as fast as possible. You’re the reason Zelda and I were constantly trying to push forward. Even when our supplies were low. Even when we knew we were outnumbered. That. Was all. YOU.”

You don’t know when you stopped walking. You only realize when you notice the small wet spots on the ground in front of you. You wipe your eyes, trying to stop the tears. It doesn’t help. Warriors only watches.

“I’m sorry.” Your lip trebles, but you keep looking at the ground, using your bangs as a curtain to hide your face. You don’t want him to see you start sobbing. That wouldn’t help anything.

“Sure you are.” He continues walking, leaving you standing in the middle of the path, completely alone. Before he’s out of earshot, he turns to look over his shoulder, and sarcastically remarks, “Glad you had fun.”

[palmolli]

I did not care for Breath of the Wild.

WAIT WAIT WAIT! I CAN EXPLAIN! DON'T SHOOT!

It's not that I HATE BotW. I certainly don't. I just don't love it. Though I very much DON'T like totk... that's an opinion for later. This is in no way a good critique or a review. It's just my opinion.

Breath of the Wild was the first Zelda game that I ever played, like many of you in the fandom right now. I bought it with my own money (I'm a jobless minor) after interacting with the fandom for a bit before even picking up a game. And like most people, the feeling of starting the game and waking up in that bathtub, that feeling of wonder and mystery, was awesome.

I will give credit where credit is due, BotW got me through a time when I was at my lowest. It gave me an escape to a much better world, a safe space, one I could go to when I had no hope for reality, something to hold onto if you will. The release of TotK gave me something to look forward to during a time when I didn't want to wake up the next morning.

I have every reason to love this game, but I don't.

Honestly, I'm TIRED of BotW and all the sequels and spin-offs.

Botw came out since people were so tired of the linear Zelda formula. ... that formula lasted for longer than I've been alive, yet it's only been about 8 years, and there's been such an uproar of people complaining about the new shiny open world formula.

Why? Well, because most of the gaming industry is open world now and having a linear formula is what made Nintendo feel unique... oh, and also because Nintendo completely failed at making totk's map feel new and interesting. They just slapped a bunch of random crap on the map here, and there with almost zero thought. When I first played totk, I felt like I was playing some kinda modded version of botw. It felt a little illegal. And playing it feels like a chore. That's never happened with any other Zelda sequel.

Even though Majora's Mask's assets were all reused from Ocarina of Time, the game still felt new and inventive. The game had meaning. The game had a THEME. AND THAT GAME WAS MADE IN TWO YEARS. TOTK TOOK SIX!!!

Cough cough. Pardon me.

Another reason I'm just sick of botw.

It's everywhere. It's Nintendo's golden goose. Just about everyone who plays games has played BotW. It's so big that it overshadows the rest of the franchise. It's basically Ocarina of Time all over again. Just... worse.

A sequel, a prequel, and another on the way. Ocarina of Time was never THAT BAD. It was given one sequel. That's it! Nintendo is just turning into Disney. And let me tell you something.

I loathe disney.

Too afraid to make anything new, so they rely on things that they know will make them money. Too afraid to say anything and spark controversy, so all of their content is void of anything actually meaningful. There's no particular audience. They appeal to no one by appealing to everyone while overly reliant on a fan base they know will bow before them and just buy whatever they churn out.

And, again, it's just like the word Zelda has just become synonymous with Breath of the Wild. Any Zelda content on most platforms like Tik Tok, YouTube, Twitter, Pinterest..

I AM SICK OF HIS FACE. WHEN I CLOSE MY EYES HE'S ALL I SEE. WHEN I OPEN THEM, HE'S ALL I SEE. HE IS EVERYWHERE AND I CAN'T ESCAPE HIS STUPID. FACE.

EVERY DAMN SKYWARD SWORD EDIT IS SOMEHOW MADE ABOUT BREATH OF THE WILD ZELINK I CAN'T TAKE THIS ANYMORE!!!!!!

and this isn't a you problem, by the way. If Breath of the Wild's your favorite game, own that, bro. This is a Nintendo problem.

Like... echoes of wisdom... seems like everyone kinda forgot about it. Including me. It brought new things to the table. AND NOBODY CARES!!!! BECAUSE THEY'RE TOO FOCUSED ON BINKLE BONKLE'S MISADVENTURES. Though, it did keep the art style of Link’s Awakening... which I honestly do not like all that much. C'mon Nintendo, give us a new art style, you bunch of greedy cowards.

Now, to get off track for a moment.

My favorite game is Skyward Sword. Yes, this is relevant. Breath of the Wild and Skyward Sword are almost complete polar opposites of each other. One leans into tradition, while the other runs from it. One is reliant on story and characters, the other on gameplay.

People absolutely HATED Skyward Sword once upon a time. Now more people are starting to like it. People LOVE Breath of the Wild, and now more people are starting to think differently.

This point I'm making here is expanded further in this very ahead of its time video that explains this far better than I ever could.

Basically. People complained. Nintendo over corrected. Now we're here.

These two games are what REALLY got me into the franchise. Breath of the Wild was the first Zelda game I ever touched... but Skyward Sword was the first game I ever finished. Like ever not even lying, I'd never finished a game in my life before Skyward Sword.

The game actually motivated me to continue. The dungeons were fun and engaging, and same with the characters. I was genuinely invested and finished the game at one in the morning, shaking and in tears. Keep in mind I'd watched a playthrough of the game before I was able to play it myself. I already knew the story.

Then I finished breath of the wild.

I did not cry.

I did not shake.

I just finished it and put the game down.

Skyward Sword gave me a reason to give a damn, Breath of the Wild did not. Sksw Link felt like a person to me. He wanted to get his Zelda back, and so did I. Breath of the Wild Link, however... he just woke up, and he has no idea who the heck Zelda even is, so he's just gonna go collect koroks and blow stuff up. No motivation... just... do whatever whenever. Which is fun, yes... but it's not all that impactful.

Skyward Sword gives me a cozy, warm feeling, while Breath of the Wild gives the opposite. Empty. Cold.

Like... I just don't care about Breath of the Wild. I really just don't. And I am just so tired of it being the only thing on the menu nowadays. The characters felt like cardboard cutouts to me. You have to actively seek out any character or personality in them (the main ones). That was not a problem in Skyward Sword. Just sit down on a dang bench, and you'll find more character in Link there than in most botw memories.

I know botw Link's whole silence thing has a reason behind it, but it just feels like an excuse. They could've expanded on it a bit more. In concept designs, he's shown to have a family. But they scrapped it. They really could've done so much more with that.

This rant was incredibly messy, I know, but I just needed to get this out somewhere. This has been boiling within me for far too long, and I had to put it into a teacup and make tea, or else I'd go insane. I'm not trying to be a contrarian or anything. This is just how I feel. And I'm not trying to say any fans of botw or people who don't have access to the other games are fake fans. I understand that games are expensive and hard to access.

This is purely my opinion, and you're allowed to think differently. Thanks for coming to my TedTalk, and have a nice day.

[nokillbananashelter]

THE NEXT ZELDA

Things I Think The Devs Are Thinking About

This is going to be a series of posts digesting what Zelda has done/is doing recently, namely, with EOW, TOTK, BOTW (& AOC/AOI) and how that relates to the fandom and their responses to reception of these games and where the devs have clearly shown interest with their whims. I was originally going to post this as one thing, but we don’t need to be that insufferable and I’m still formulating some thoughts on the other ones. And please remember- This is speculation!

PART 1: DUO PROTAGONISTS

I think we are at the point where dual protagonist structure is on the doorstep. Echoes of Wisdom was almost that already and they seem very keen on addressing giving Zelda space to be the protagonist. It would be absolutely incredible to have this open format where you are either journeying through as Zelda in one part and Link in another, or you are actually united and have to figure out how Zelda or Link’s toolset fit into the puzzle in front of you.

It’s been a minute since we’ve had a narrator companion. Zelda has already been in that role so I think this time they have the opportunity to simply just have her be… a voiced protagonist. I’m not saying she needs to have a voice actress this time (she probably will) but it would be interesting to have dialogue happening in a more tangible light. Link DOES talk in BOTW/TOTK, but also….Imagine how they could play up the characteristic of being kind of quiet. Maybe link does not interact with NPC’s in the same way that Zelda would. Maybe he says things that are a little more simple, functional, and Zelda does a lot more negotiation and investigation. Imagine the comedy, drama, and development that can happen by having link reserving his words more and Zelda speaking very freely and openly.

Idk, I think they are trialing the interest of zelda with the voice memories too- do players have interest in Zelda lore dropping on us, as we explore the world? I think the answer to that is a resounding yes. Imagine as you’re exploring as Zelda, or with Zelda, and it gives you the option to let her lore drop if you wanna hear it. It’s not forced on you, it’s not required, it doesn’t stop you from doing what you’re doing. It’s there to engage in if you want. I think people would want that & the new totk content is probably gonna be wanted in the base game next time.

And I also think they already kind of trialed this in the BEGINNING of TOTK too. Link is there to make the path safe for Zelda so she can interpret ruins and offer context for what you’re going through. I think my only complaint about that beginning section was how she ripped attention away from moving forward to demand the player pay attention to what she was doing. It was necessary as an opening act in a video game where you wouldn’t necessarily know to not skip past that, but in a more sustained capacity, the ability to skip over it would be right in the heart of how they’ve been developing these games- and I think a lot of players would appreciate that.

Further on teamwork, EOW’s last dungeon felt like a prototype for swap-between puzzles. I honestly really liked it. And while I didn’t really like sword mode for EOW, a game starring both Zelda and Link has a lot of potential for that kind of switching dynamic to work out really cool and feels like a fertile ground for creating challenge and interesting puzzles. I genuinely wanted more puzzles where Link & Zelda got split from each other in a room and had to independently figure out how to solve it. That fucking owned, even though it was only like three rooms.

It also defines and reinforces their skillsets a little bit more. Narratively speaking, Link is not credited for all of the creative adventuring you do that often, despite you showing a lot of wit and creativity and wizardry as link. He’s credited as a swordsman most often, and Zelda is the priestess. It makes sense for her to have the wacky powers and being more oriented towards creative wizardry and sleuthing and for him to be a audacious Fliptastic acrobatic fighter. Obviously, they are also defining Zelda as being insanely capable in combat, as we see in EOW & soon AOI. Combat = Link and Puzzle = zelda do not need to be mutually exclusive to each other- they both can be forces of nature and creativity and wit. But I think it gives them a lot of space to be defined and complement their skill sets in navigating solving puzzles and doing combat. Dungeon items can be made to be more Linky or more Zelday. Link could get a hookshot, Zelda could get a superpower. It just makes sense to me. I would love it if Zelda retain some of her summoning power from EOW, and Link retained a lot of his cool adventuring gear. They both can be capable in every aspect of gameplay, but one is tinted more magically and the other is tinted more adventurously.

And although the Sages in TOTK are sloppy implementations, they are 100% a trial of what it feels like to have people follow you around, and how you may possibly interact with them to engage with their abilities. I think there’s a lot of successes and failures learned from the way that they were implemented. A second pass on reactive companions could work out in a really cool way, and it’s not like there aren’t 1 million other examples in other games that worked better that they can learn from. They’re thinking about this and I don’t think they’re done with it!

i know a lot of people probably wouldn’t like this, but the notion of having to look out for both characters & make sure that they can complete their task while you do yours is fascinating to me. Imagine you can even choose which character you want to use in a fight or troubling situation. When you’re link, you gotta keep the baddies away from Zelda, disarm bosses through their various phases, and deal the finishing blow. When Zelda, you gotta maintain and complete seals/spells, keep baddies away from link, and change the shape of the battlefield in your favor. You may even have players that end up preferring one or the other in the challenges that come from being one or the other. It could make the game more accessible in that way. Imagine sometimes you get separated, and have to find the other one and break them out of a situation. This is something that could happen in particular story beat points, or be a consequence/complication of exploration that entice you to solve puzzles or explore areas you may otherwise miss or skip over.

And Imagine how dual protags opens up the possibilities for co-op! I would love an open world Zelda, where my partner can just drop in and drop out however we please. Imagine one of you exploring one end of the map while the other explores the other end. It would be so insane if that flexibility was a primary feature of the next Zelda. I wouldn’t even mind if the game was relatively conservative structurally if that was the primary gimmick. I really think it’s worth exploring.

And this isn’t even to mention four swords and what they may have learned from that experiment.

Genuinely, I think this duo protagonist concept is eminent. Out of all the things that are going to happen next, this one feels like the idea they are coming around to most. It could please a lot of people and it could be done in a way that doesn’t require you to sacrifice Link’s or Zelda’s importance in the story, or even your capacity to play the whole game as just one of them if you really wished that.

[arkus-rhapsode]

What is up with Switch 2 Prices? (A discussion on the Switch 2)

Soooo Switch 2 Direct happened and I’ll say-I thought it was mostly good. Mario Kart World looked packed, NSO adding GameCube with many first titles promised, actually showing that after a decade they can run third party triple A titles, and the show stopper being an open world Donkey Kong game. But then the price came down.

Now… 499.99 for a console at the level of an Xbone or PS4 is certainly more than I think people were expecting. Especially considering the Japanese version is reportedly a hundred dollars cheaper. But hey, for a portable system as strong as this that’s gonna to likely be a one time purchase for most, I think this is manageable. Not the best, but not the worst.

However, what good is an expensive piece technology without a game to actually play on it? Well from what see of the first party/second party offerings, it’s pretty absurd to see these prices to say the least. Let’s start with things that I don’t believe are too bad and work our way up: Kirby And the Forgotten Land I actually think is the most justifiable. Because Nintendo games basically never go on sale, this previous gen game still goes for about 50-60 bones if you buy it new. So that means this version with the added campaign is essentially a definitive version with DLC bundled it. And because of backwards compatibility, you’d have the option to buy this Al la Carte. So while it may seem pretty prima facie exploitative, I think if you consider what new material you are getting, it’s lack of a price drop, and that there’s an option for those who already have the game, this seems fairly reasonable.

BOTW and TOTK being 10 dollars more despite already being high profile releases from a previous generation offering no new content though is a different story. While these are originally a 60/70 dollar games respectfully, the ten dollar increase in price is for more enhancements to the graphical resolution and frame rate of the original. Quite frankly that’s BS. I know these games weren’t originally made with the intent to be run on a more powerful machine than a switch, but the fact that these are enhancements that should just be automatic when put into new hardware is wild. They try to off-set this by saying it’s coming free with NSO, but that’s still payment.

And look, I’m not stupid. Like most people getting a switch 2 already had a switch, and likely own a copy of BOTW by now. So you already of the game. what’s wrong with paying 10 dollars then to make it play at it’s most enhanced state? It’s not like you’re being forced to buy just the switch 2 version. Well once again, I believe that personally that if all you are adding is basic graphical upgrades on a game as old as BOTW and TOTK, that’s not worth any money. At least if BOTW had the dlc bundled in I could maybe treat it like a delux edition, but it’s not. It’s just such a bad look in my opinion.

And now onto the new games. It’s pretty evident to me that Donkey Kong Bananza is going to be the Mario Odyssey of the Switch 2. Their big showpiece game on why you should buy this system associated with not only a member of the Mario-verse, but the first Nintendo video game character mascot. A character who for a time had his own consistent franchise through two generations of hardware. It does look great. So the idea of this being a 70 dollar purchase (potentially more with physical), is somewhat upsetting. Not that I didn’t believe this would be coming. When TOTK released, Nintendo pretty clearly stated they would consider 70 dollar games for select titles. And the tentpole for your launch line up of first party titles, it is understandable from a business stand point. So maybe MAYBE, if this was the only 70 dollar launch title most would grin and bare it.

However, this is coming with an announcement of games older than Bananza being priced at or higher than it, feels incredibly tone deaf. A brand new DK experience is valued that same as essentially a remaster the highest selling Zelda game that could run on a Wii U. I’m sorry but that just seems wrong. I think Nintendo thought that they could essentially make a sort of bespoke work around for cross gen titles, but, you do realize that some of these switch 1 games won’t be available forever. It’s not gonna be “just buy the cheaper option and don’t bother with the paid enhancement.” Well eventually all one might have is the switch 2 version. An enhanced version of a game that’s practically a decade old, right alongside your flagship new release? It takes what could’ve been at worst a rub down, and turns into some real salt in the wound.

And finally, Mario Kart World… yeah there’s no justification for this. I understand this is more ambitious than any other Mario kart. I saw the size of the world map, the costumes, the off road, the open world, the extra modes, etc. I don’t disagree that this is a premium title. But almost a hundred dollars for a video game is frankly wrong in my opinion. You could say that delux plus its dlc tracks would’ve equaled the same amount in the end, but once again, you had an option. You could always purchase the base package of delux for the same amount as every other triple A game on the shelf and receive countless hours of fun. With world however, it seems that it was impossible to make any concession with its scope, and rather than selling the software on a loss, Nintendo will do as Nintendo does. Now, believe me when I say ,y harsh words are because I think it lacks quality, but I struggle to believe in any game that is truly worth 80 dollars on launch.

Maybe some of this could be mitigated with a pack in title. Sadly post the Wii, getting pack in games on Nintendo systems isnt really a thing (at least on initial launch). A shame because while the PS5 had a rocky first few years, Astro’s playroom was at least a free tech demo game included on the system for those with no access to PS5 games. This is made even more egregious by the fact that this direct included the Tour of the Switch 2 game, that, while not as charming as a Wii sports, was a very basic interactive guide of the console with a few tech demo games throw in, that would be charged as a stand alone game. Like what?

I know I’m sounding very negative, maybe even jumping the gun in some instances, but these prices are genuinely frustrating. Especially seeing how the video game industry is going. Many speculate game publishers are looking to uniformly increase the prices of games at retail. With many news stories about how some have been waiting for GTA 6 to come out and be a hundred dollars. And the fact that Nintendo who is one of the bigger game companies that still shows it has a creative spark and has been praised for not following industry trends like turning franchises into games as a service and aggress expansion through acquisition of AA studios, has basically shot themselves in the foot with the most basic thing people will note when it comes to the exchange of goods and services, the price, is frustrating. It feels like I’ve gone back to the PS3’s first year, except I at least think the switch 2 new content looks much better.

I want to add, I don’t think anyone who buys these games at full price are bad. I’m not calling on people to boycott Nintendo or vote with their wallets, some people just want to play the next Mario kart and don’t care about the price to do so. For some people it’s normal to buy just one game as a big purchase and invest weeks even months into it before even buying another one. That’s fine. However, I do at least want people to be aware that we are drifting to state where games are becoming more and more expensive. It’s very easy to see this as the start to a slippery slope, and we ought to think about what that might mean for us, the consumers.

I’ll end it like this-I was overjoyed seeing that NSO is getting the GameCube emulated. Games like Luigi’s mansion, Fire Emblem Path of Radiance, Chibi Robo, F Zero GX etc. all games that go for hundreds of dollars second hand could now be accessed through a simple subscription service. And then I saw how much current gen games were gonna cost on the switch 2 and I thought “wait am I gonna be okay with spending 80 dollars at a GameStop, but not on eBay?”

[meruz]

hi meruz please tell me all your thoughts on outer wilds I am absolutely Living rn

HI oh my god i have so many thoughts. I think I'm gonna keep posting fanart so this definitely isnt gonna be my last word on the matter but wow what a game! um... idk if I wanna just type forever but I can give you at least a few key thoughts I had...

It took me a second to get into! I had been waiting for the switch port so I was really excited starting out but there were a couple early play sessions months apart where I was struggling with the controls and overwhelmed with the openness...I have a hard time with a lot of open worlds games because I just..dont have a lot of free time LOL. But I was complaining abt this to my brother and he was also having a hard time rly digging into the game so when he flew over to visit me a couple weeks ago I was like ok lets do this together (incentivizing gaming by making it social/co-operative). And we had a blast!!! it rly is the type of game you can play as co-op just by having someone else on the couch or on stream doin the thinking alongside you or bouncing theories off of. I do think he's a much better puzzle solver than me though lol (he works in research, so he's got that researcher brain), he made a lot of the leaps of logic way early while I was still turning things over in my head lmao.... AND he's better with the controls because he plays a lot of flight sims?! i think he got annoyed watching me bumble around anytime i had the controller. my sole contribution was doing the stealthy parts in the dlc because im stupid and consequentially lack fear.

I kind of grew up playing majoras mask and windwaker like that was the era of zelda games I was rly activated and engaged for as a kid and I didn't realize how much I was missing and craving that type of experience again LOL. I think especially with how I personally felt that tears of the kingdom was narratively and structurally a step down from botw... idk... i mean you can tell from interviews abt Outer Wilds that the devs clearly have a lot of affection for and thoughts abt the Zelda series as well and I think Outer Wilds was like such a good encapsulation of everything I loved abt those games and also everything I wish they would do lol!! IT ALSO kind of solved a lot of my pain points with open world games and did it in a way that was so elegant... like I think i initially recoiled at the openness but then when i started exploring and realized the scope and level of detail it rly clicked into place.. im just in awe.

umm i love every hearthian they were all so charming. it rly did feel like an older school of nintendo rpg where every npc has so much personality lol. i loved that every alien race in the game was some weird animal like the designs for all of them were rly good. i love that it was a "worn" universe and that everything looked old or used. I love astronomy and space and space concepts but I don't really like really lofty and impersonal/minimalist scifi so i feel like this was a great and accessible art direction for me personally. i especially thought the backpacking/outerdoorsy aesthetic was really inspired! I think "exploration" sometimes exists on a spectrum where one end of it can be really colonialist/militaristic LOL... UM which im not like. fully against i think it can be an interesting idea to dissect? but i feel like we see it a lot and it was neat to see this which felt like the complete opposite end of that spectrum. weirdly enough playing Outer Wilds made me immediately go and finally finish Firewatch right after but I felt a little spoiled I was like ehh..that was good but it wasn't Outer Wilds LOL.

i think a lot of the themes reminded me of lord of the rings/tolkien lore LOL IDK. I GUESS THIS IS LIKE BIG SPOILERS SO if you havent played dont read but like. the entire concept of being born at the end of a great and enormous world/age with a rich history and you only getting to see the end of it, living in the shadow of great civilization...keeping your humble home in your heart idk. but then also the new world being a song ... I'm a sucker. I love it.

yeah sorry only compliments. anyways yeah i want to do more fanart... soon!! hopefully!

[tea-cake-and-sarcasm]

☆ TEA'S NEW AND IMPROVED INTRO POST ☆

Hello! You can call me Tea or Albert. Other nicknames are cool too! I'm a rather private person so neither are my real name. My pronouns are She/Her/They, and I am one of them queers. I mainly reblog, but on occasion you may see some of my incoherent ramblings, or even some of my art. I promise I will get to tagging all of these one day, but for now it will be like a fun little surprise whenever you find something of value here

Some quick and important notes:

I've had a major bot problem recently, so when following me please know that if you have no description, profile picture or title etc. I will block you. Even just one of these tells me you aren't a bot. Make a little post that says hello, and that's good enough:)

I will not be answering any donation asks

Here's why:

-I am a minor and therefore cannot support your cause even if I want to

-I'm literally broke

-My follower count is too small to argue I could promote the cause by answering, and many are in the same situation as me

-It sounds mean, but if I answer one, my inbox fills with 5-10 new asks, and I can't do that.

Tl;dr: I don't have money, and no way to give it if I did.

My interests!

Some favourites:

-Jujutsu Kaisen

- Moriarty the Patriot

- Death Note

-Persona (currently playing through 4)

-Ace Attorney

-Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint (though I haven't finished it, so no spoilers please)

-Totk/Botw

-Saiki K

-Attack on titan

-Alien Stage

-Cult of the lamb

-Sky: Children of the light

-Neon Genisis evangelion

-Howl's moving castle

-Tokyo Ghoul

-Sherlock (The ACD books, though I've watched some of the BBC version)

-Portal

-Many many more, if you ask there's a good chance I will have at least heard of whatever you're talking about :)

Some Favourite Characters:

-N Harmonia (Pokemon B/W)

-Howl (Howl's moving castle, especially the books)

-Suguru Geto (Jujutsu Kaisen)

-Gojo Satoru (Jujutsu Kaisen)

-William Moriarty (Moriarty the patriot)

-Era of the Wilds Link (Botw/Totk)

-Misa Amane (Death Note)

Favourite Music artists:

-Malice Mizer

-Kikuo

-Maretu

-Cö shu nie

-Österreich

-All the persona osts

-Alnst ost

-Miracle musical

Progress on watching/reading things etc (LAST UPDATED: 22/5/25):

-Orv : roughly chapter 70, up to date with the webtoon

-Aot : early s2

-Persona 4 : Apprehending/rescuing the kid in the video game themed dungeon

- Bsd : S3 ep 4

-The Case Study of Vanitas : Episode 8

-ENA : episode 4 (I believe)

-Arcane : Just into s2

-JJBA : I think episode 11 or something of battle tendency

Some mutuals I care rather a lot about:

@sssssaaaaaaammmm - Evil Wizard @wondersoftheimagination - Parent of my late slug son (Rip Ryuzaki)

@y0url0calcryptid - Silly clown

@fearofgodandtolkien - someone I cannot imagine as a person, only as a whole forest

@mehtoohardtofindasuitablename - the owner of the most darling cat in the world

@liquidpaperfoundation1 - very wowzers type of guy

@numberoneah-duofan - I have never been bribed quite so much in my life as I have by this person in the last two years or so

@lara-prim07 - Satorboo <3

If you aren't tagged here I still love you I just don't want to be yapping too much, or I'm not sure about your thoughts on being tagged in this way :) any mutuals who wish to be added (or removed!) Js let me know!

Some trivia under the cut! (Idea from @y0url0calcryptid)

-My favourite colours are purple and red

-I LOVE BUGS

-I love steam trains <33

-My current manga collection consists of all tokyo ghoul, tokyo ghoul:re, volumes 1-17 of mtp, 1 tpn, 1 Mr villains day off, all death note, 2 jjk

-I'm stereotypically english, in a sickly victorian child kind of way

-my favourite animals are giraffes and crows

-when I was younger I really wanted to be an author, but I haven't written anything substantial for a good while, aside from assignments

-growing up I developed an obsession with poisons and diseases that was pretty cool

-chat I love trains

-I'm awful at all sport, but I do aerial hoop and silks, and i love swimming

-I love forests so much

-I play piano (~grade 3-4), but I've been meaning to learn electric guitar

-My spice tolerance (in a metaphorical and literal sense) is negative (stories or food)

-My MBTI is enfp (tragically the same as Shinji from nge)

-I'm a yapper :(

-I'm planning to make an oc masterlist soon!

[suniix]

perfect match | (botw) link x reader

synopsis | you find a rock that perfectly matches link’s eye color

word count | 2.2k

note | saw this trend on tiktok and thought it was adorable :((

UPDATE my amazing moot rain made like an angsty continuation to this AND YOU SHOULD LIKE TOTALLY GO CHECK IT OUT!!

Summer had hit Hyrule, hard.

Of course, the heat was not as bad as it was on Death Mountain, but it was damn near close. Fanning yourself was proving to do nothing, but you liked to think it helped just a little bit.

Link walked not too far ahead of you, seemingly unaffected by the heat. Despite keeping a steady pace you could see sweat beginning to drip down his neck. He was feeling the heat too.

“Link,” you called out, jogging a bit to catch up to him. “Why don’t we take a break for a bit? This heat is killing me.”

He paused, contemplating your words. Sensing his hesitation you leaned into him to look at the sheikah slate in his hands. “Look!” You pointed at the map. “There’s a river nearby! We can rest there for the rest of the day then head out at first light!”

You knew you won him over when he sighed. Giggling, you gently tugged him to follow you. “Come on! The river awaits us!”

Link can’t help but laugh at your excitement, allowing himself to be pulled along by you. The sound of running water is quickly heard as the two of you make your way past the trees, revealing the river.

You quickly dropped your backpack and Link did the same, squatting down to look for ingredients for tonight’s dinner. “Craving anything specific tonight?” He asked.

“Mm, not really. I’m fine with anything you cook! It always comes out amazing.” You replied, clumsily taking off your shoes before running off to the water.

Link is shocked for a moment but plays it off by laughing. He never got used to you complimenting his cooking, no matter how many times you told him. He’d gladly cook you any meal if you wished it.

Nearing the river you noticed the water was crystal clear enough to see a couple of tiny fish swimming by. You could also see various small stones littering the riverbed, painful for your feet but it was a small price to pay to cool off.

Cautiously dipping your toes in the water you nearly scream at the cold feeling. Although it was cold you gladly welcomed it. You take a few steps, slightly wincing at the feeling of sharp rocks digging into your feet. You were about ankle-deep when you heard Link clear his throat from behind you. Turning to look at him you see him standing a few feet away from you, quiver filled with arrows and a bow in hand. “I’m gonna go hunt, we don’t have much and I doubt you wanna eat mushroom skewers again.”

You made a disgusted face. “You’re right, as much as I love your cooking, if I have to eat one more mushroom I think I’ll vomit, no offense!”

Link merely laughs, shoulders shaking slightly as he does so. “None taken, I won’t be long.” He begins to walk away from your temporary camp.

“Stay safe!”

For a moment you think he’s too far to hear you, but to your surprise, he turns around and gives you a small wave. It’s a small gesture, but it’s enough to make you feel butterflies.

Once he’s out of sight you continue to walk into the river, bending down to roll up your pants so they wouldn’t get too wet. You’re about knee-deep when you stop, looking up to admire the scenery around you.

The branches from the trees extend about halfway across the river, if you walk any further you’d be in the sun. Despite the branches being long beams of sunlight manage to peak past the leaves and create patches of sunlight that reflect off the water. You look down, feeling the water rush past your legs. Beneath the surface, something catches your eye. Reaching down into the water you pull out a dark blue rock that shines once it catches the light.

Suddenly, an idea hits you.

To say Link was surprised was an understatement.

He knew you were going to cool off in the river while he was out, but he didn’t expect to come back and see you fully drenched from head to toe while digging around in the river looking for something.

When you notice him you’re quick to stand, greeting him with a giant smile. “Oh, you’re here! Welcome back Link! Did you catch anything good?”

Link dropped his quiver and bow and walked towards you. “What happened?”

“I stepped on a big rock that wasn’t sturdy so I ended up slipping.” You shrug. “You should get in! I promise the water feels amazing!”

Before Link has the chance to respond you’re quick to splash him, a giant grin making its way onto your face when you see his pants had gotten soaked. He smirks before quickly kicking off his boots. “It’s on!”

He quickly ran into the river and chaos ensued. The two of you splashed around for a couple of minutes before you noticed the day was nearing its end. Knowing there was no way the two of you would be able to dry off properly in the dark, you both walked out of the river.

You get a fire started as Link rummages through his backpack for a towel. Once he finds it he walks over to you and crouches, placing the towel over your head and ruffling your hair. You can’t help but laugh at the action. “You don’t need to do that you know, I can do it myself.”

“I want to do it.”

His response is quick, which catches you off guard. You look down, feeling your cheeks and ears begin to heat up. If Link notices (he does) he doesn’t comment on it.

He leans down to catch your eyes, intentionally leaning in closer so you can’t escape his gaze. “You’re shaking, are you cold?”

It’s then that you notice a teasing smirk on his face. You punch his shoulder and he dramatically grabs it. “Ouch!” He pretends to cry out in pain.

“Stop teasing! Aren’t you supposed to be cooking?” You quickly try to change the subject.

“Yes yes, I’m on it. Are you ok with meat skewers?”

“Yeah, that’s fine.” You say and stretch your legs by the fire. You place the towel over your shoulders and wrap it around yourself. Link was right, you are cold.

As Link throws ingredients onto the fire you fish around in your pocket, momentarily panicking when you don’t feel it. When you find it you breathe out a sigh of relief.

“Hey, did you lose something today?” Link asks while placing the cooked food on a plate.

“Mm? No, why do you ask?”

“Earlier in the river, when I came back it looked like you were looking for something.”

“Oh! I was actually looking for something for you!”

Link raises an eyebrow. “Me?”

You nod your head enthusiastically. “Hold out your hand.” He looks at you confused for a second before doing what you asked. You pull out what is in your pocket and place it in his palm.

Link immediately feels the wet and rough texture of the item. When you pull away he sees a blue rock in his palm.

“Tada! I found a rock that’s the same shade as your eyes!”

Link’s eyes widen upon seeing the small stone. “This is what you were looking for while I was gone? The whole time?” He questioned.

You sheepishly rubbed the back of your neck, thinking he was mad at you for wasting your time looking for a rock. “Well, yeah, but if you don’t like it that’s fine I just thought—”

“No!” Link quickly cut off your rambling. He clears his throat and you swear you see a hint of blush on his cheeks. He holds the rock close to his heart and looks at you, eyes overflowing with an adoration you thought only existed in fairytales.

“I love it, thank you. I’ll cherish it forever.” His tone was serious, you knew he wasn’t lying.

You quickly look away in embarrassment and grab the bowl of food he placed down. “You’re welcome..” You mumble, eyes refusing to leave the bowl.

He only chuckles before the two of you eat in a comfortable silence.

You wake up to the sounds of splashing.

Groaning, you slowly sit up while attempting to rub the sleep out of your eyes. “Ugh.. Link?..” You call out, expecting him to respond.

When he doesn’t you look around and see his sleeping bag is empty and the fire has long been put out. “Link?” You call out again, this time a little worried when you don’t immediately spot him.

The sound of a yelp followed by a giant splash is heard and you immediately head to the river, sword in hand. You half expected to see him fighting a bokoblin or some other sort of enemy, but when you spotted him he was nearly fully submerged in the river. The only thing peeking out was his head, and judging by the look on his face he had taken a nasty fall.

You immediately run into the river, not caring if your shoes or pants got wet. “Are you ok?” You ask, holding out a hand for him to take. He nods and accepts your hand, allowing you to pull him up. You couldn’t see before, but now you can see he was completely shirtless. You clear your throat and quickly pretend to inspect him for any injuries. “What happened?”

“I stepped on a rock and.. ended up slipping..” He sighed, keeping a hand on his lower back.

You hold back a giggle, but Link spots your (very obvious) smile and pouts. “It’s not funny..” He grumbles while you walk him out of the river and back to camp. “It’s kind of funny..” You snicker.

He rolls his eyes and playfully pushes you away while you laugh. “What were you even doing in the river? If you craved fish you could’ve woken me up and I would’ve gotten some for us.” You asked while handing him a towel.

Link accepts it and wraps it around his body. “I wanted to get you this.” He says, fishing something from out of his pocket and holding his hand out for you to take it.

Hesitantly, you accept what’s in his hand and gasp when you see a rock. The color was scarily accurate to your eye color, with patterns swirling beautifully all over the rock. You wonder how long it took for him to find it. “Link, you didn’t need to!—”

“I wanted to.” He says while turning away, pretending to look for something in his bag so you wouldn’t see the very obvious blush on his cheeks.

You smile, holding the rock close to your heart. You felt warm inside, almost like holding the rock close to you was causing the feeling, but you knew better. Link always made you feel this way by doing the simplest of things, but for some reason, this gift had a bigger impact.

Walking over to him, you lean on his back and wrap your arms around his neck. “Thank you, Link.”

He turns to look over his shoulder, seeing you smiling against his back. If it meant seeing that look on your face again he’d find you a million rocks just like the one he’d given you. Anything to see you smile like that again. Chuckling he fully turns around with a flint in hand, not even attempting to hide his blush now. “Don’t mention it, now, how about you catch us some of those fish?”

Extra (because I had I cute thought last minute)

“Hey, you still have the rock I gave you?” Link asked, turning to look at you from over his shoulder.

“Of course I do! Why?”

He held out his hand and made a grabby hand motion, wordlessly asking you to hand it over. Confused, you pull out the rock from your pocket and hand it to him. He gently takes it from your hand and turns around so you don’t see what he’s about to do.

You try peaking over his shoulder. “Link, what’re you doing—”

“Don’t look, I’m almost done.”

Still confused, you take a step back and let him do whatever it is he’s doing. After a few seconds, he looks over his shoulder. “Close your eyes.”

You do as told and close your eyes, feeling him get closer to you. You feel something go over your head and your heart begins to beat faster at the thought of what it could be. “Alright, open them.” Link tells you.

Your hand immediately reaches to touch your chest and your previous thought is proven correct when you look down and see. The rock he had given you was now wrapped in thin rope, being held together at the top by a small knot and the rope continued upward around your neck. It had turned it into a necklace.

“Look, now we’re matching.” He grinned, showing you his own necklace.

Having no words, you could only stare at him in awe. He laughed at your reaction, tugging you forward so the two of you could continue your journey together.

thank you for reading till the end! reblogs are greatly appreciated :D

masterlist

[ganondoodle]

so, after this phase of depression, i am back at too many ideas at once and getting overwhelmed by all of it bc i cant do it all and dont know how to decide which one to focus on or which ones actually good and not just a brainfart

(so, some more botw2/totk rewritten ideas-

mostly text but i am unsure what to actually work on and draw or if its even any good, so id be very happy to hear your opinion on some of this qoq)

-was thinking about designing the sonau even though they might not show up physically, to keep their mystery alive, but i am playing with the idea of a dead one preserved in crystal in a larger cave, perhaps their last stronghold, i like the thought of them being rather small monkey like creatures with long tails that end in a light fern looking thing

--been also thinking more about the ancient queen zeldas and ganondorfs relationship bc i feel its compelling for them to have had a much more personal grudge agaisnt each other than i previously planned, gives more weight to everything-

though it is mostly background stuff that is not directly shown in the game, except for environmental storytelling -which botw was pretty good at- and diary entries you can discover (perhaps finding it and then telling riju and a gerudo researcher about it since it would be in ancient script zelda hadnt encountered before?), current thought was to have there be a secret lair that one of ganondorfs daughters used to live in after the sealing disaster sent both kingdoms into conflict, and with their mother dying in battle the eldest daughter would surrender and agree to whatever the princess of hyrule demanded, while the younger one would not bow down and those that followed her split off to live in the gerudo highlands, like another reoccuring theme with this being the prescursor to what happens with the shiekah and yiga later- of those are none left by this time (or should there?) and the diary of the younger daughter talks about her fathers secret hideout having being sealed shut as a sign of respect- it is inaccessible due to the structures beign damaged, but its serving as a hint there will be more; it will be made accessible after the mid game fight with ganondorf, in which you see the scene of the sealing, and he changes his position from hyrule castle that fell into the underground to the innards of the plateau- that being the final dungeon- in his room, might also be a part of his diary, at least from his younger days, and a bracelet of obviously hyrulian origin, which is meant to imply-

that the ancient queen zelda and him were in love once when they were both younger, though neither really acted on it (noble families pressures and conflictions yippie) until it was decided she would be married to a young knight of a noble hyrulian family, as it had been per tradition, after which they would not be able to visit each other anymore in the way they sued to as her father wanted her to prepare to take the throne and was way more strict than before, with one last meeting in that secret chamber and her leaving a bracelet there as a gift-

now heres the problem i ran into, that they had feelings for each other and used to be very close, as well as both having their own families later on is pretty solid and i want to keep all that but i also randomly thought about weaving the drama further (in that noble families kind of way especially, though again this would only be mentioned in his diary entry from the secret room you unlock, and since his younger daughter doesnt mention anything at all save for makign a point about not rummaging through her late fathers things out of her deep respect for him, its pretty clear she didnt know and neither did anyone else except for ganondorf himself and perhaps his mothers, this is all meant to make all of these characters have more depth even with getting little to literal no screentime, not to be a big focus)- so there was the stray idea of the ancient queen having a daughter 'just' after being married to that hyrulian knight.. and it being obviously not his, but gerudo, as gerudo traits are rather dominant(i think?) and the knight and ganondorf look nothing alike, so to avoid any sort of royal disaster that daughter would be secretly given to ganondorf to raise instead (which he would gladly do), and the official story being it was stillborn (the whole thing being worked out by a few maids sworn loyally to their queen .. im torn about the queen herself knowing or not tbh or if that even matters in the grand scheme of things (though i do like the idea of her knowing but acting like it is nothing to live up to being a wise and proud queen now thats shes under that pressure, she would change alot during her time of reign, going from that more typical unsure of herself but trying her best princess to a self confident cold and calculating queen, maybe he could even make a short remark about it), again this is still just vaguely implied background details most wouldnt even find out about, i just .. like to think about the background of things that make sense and give more weight to it all but arent what it revolves around and its neither essential to know, might as well be one of those things people would likely hear about in youtube videos)

i didnt find or dont know if theres any rule that princess zelda cant have siblings (i think she had a brother once but idk that may be different about sisters is the question) bc ganondorfs older daughter then not awakening any special (zelda reserved) powers could be simply bc she wasnt trained to do so (perhaps she would be able to hear things like zeldas often do but that too being only mentioned offhand) and him just not putting any focus on royal hyrulian traditions, it could be a secret rite too and honestly .. why would he try to train her to be the traditional princess of hyrule, awakening powers that are reserved for the hyrulian royals would make everything go haywire in terms of the secret about her mother, though im worried it would seem like her being gerudo is seen as 'tainted' instead, like she isnt a 'real' or 'pure' zelda and that being the reason, which somethign i do not like at all

either way that second part is purely an idea that i am 50/50 about using since its really not a big deal in the end and ultimately doesnt change much except make their relationship a bit more messier

---ahem, anyway, i also decided i wanted to model most sky islands after this one photo in my collection since it looks cool and would make sense to have these island be worn down by constant winds

---- i also want to flood the tabantha canyon with the forgotten temple and considered actually breaking of some pieces of landmass, like it is now a giant island, imagine akkala a kilometer away from the mainland for example, it wouldnt inherently change much about the structure but it would make it feel alot more different and provide good ground for different kinds of interactions since the people there would need to adjust to that, you can melt ice around the riot region easier than you can reattach a broken off giant piece of land after all

[beevvy]

Guys

I was thinking up some dark world forms for the lu cast and came up with some good ones plus backstory and reasons supporting my choices

I wanted to keep them all as mammals for the continuity (legends bunny and twi's wolf are both mammals) and its just easier to create limitations for myself to be more creative!

((and i tried to pick animals that existed in their original games,

But some games ( zelda I & II, I'm looking at you ) didn't really have any passive animals to choose from, so i'm following this rule only for some/most of them))

here are the results: ( warning: very long)

Twilight:

Wolf

(kinda obvious, no explanation needed)

Legend:

Pink rabbit/hare (he seems more rabbit/hare then bunny in my mind?) but i thought, what if i had to choose a realistic animal?

I think he would still be a rabbit, but an albino rabbit, his eyes red and with white fur, at least thin enough that you can notice a little pink from his skin to have a slightly visible pink-ish hue.

Time:

(ghost?) Wolf; i think being a ghost wolf after death, he probably still have the same form when he was alive too?

he never uses it in any game he's in (like Oot or Mm) other then Twilight Princess (taking place after he died)

I couldn't find any better leads or clues suggesting any other form, so I'll stick with this, maybe for a realistic animal he would be some kind of like timber wolf ( just a big kind of wolf) that is a golden/ light brown colour with white underbelly.

Hyrule:

(the idea that created this list in the first place...)

Sheep!; the sheep would have brown wool like Rulies hair, (my hc is his hair is curly, or at least wavy, like a sheep, but anyway) he's innocent and quiet like a sheep, and the main selling point: the blood of a lamb. Lambs blood was often used in (very) olden times, on an altor as offerings to God.

(also link in these games was originally religious ( specifically Christian), and the lamb is a religious symbol( Christian at least))

Hyrules blood is sought after by Ganons underlings as a way to resurrect Ganon, using hyrules blood as an offering / way to resurrect ganon, the reincarnation of a god, in a ceremony on an altor.

Wind:

Winds animal was a harder one to choose because there arent much mammals in his games, other than the ones you dont see but are mentioned or hinted at existing still even after the great flood.

Cats, think about it, he makes those cat meowing noises when hes stalking that girl at night in Wind Waker., so they must exist for him to know what meowing is ( there might actually already be a cat in one of his games but i never played phantom hourglass (😭) and haven't seen any in my playthroughs of Wind Waker)

Supporting facts to back up my reasoning: He was taking a nap during the day, even if it was his birthday. Big black eyes that are vaguely cat-like, and just the generally goofy feeling i get from him in-game and especially LU. ( HES SO SILLY AND CUTE AND AAA-)

Wild:

Highland Fox; sometimes people chose a deer for his dark world animal form, while i think it fits, i wanted his form to have more resemblance to Wolfie (who is in Botw, as a companion) sort of a cool representation of his mentor/guide?

Foxes and distinct enough but also close enough to fit the bill of 'close enough' (and foxes are more on the dog/wolf side than cat side, apparently)

Also, highland foxes exist in Botw + Totk, and the bright orange of their fur is similar to Wilds blonde hair, in its bright, almost unnatural boldness, opposite the lush green of the landscape.

Warriors:

Lion; fights in groups, lion mane is like his blue scarf, golden fur is like his hair, you know that like personified stereotype that lions are egotistical and self centeredness? reminded me of him.

sorry for the short answer, i don't know much about Wars, never played *any* of his games (😭😭😭) so I'm just going of LU, and the majority of what people portray him as in the fandom ( I DON'T OWN ANY OF HIS GAMES NOOO-)

Sky:

Remlet; Sky seems to like them, their native to his home, Skyloft, and they nap all day. They are cute and cheerful, and when their angry, they can be vicious and frightening, like Sky.

Realistic animal: Siamese, they share lots of similarities with remlets, their light brown and dark chocolate fur match and the bright round eyes are identical to a remlets.

Four:

i would've chosen Picori, but thats not really an animal, thats a whole race of small centient beings! so I'll have to go with a chipmunk.

Small, lives in forestry, multiple different colours, has a tail like minish, dexterous small hands good for holding things, smart, agile, and similar in shape to Minish.

woah. just let my acoustic ahh ramble for a second there.

[hetacon]

So you guys know how the most recent thing I posted was a Sidlink fic? That was because I actually got into BOTW about a year ago (it’s been one of the fandoms that kind of just simmers in the back of my brain at all times), and that was pretty much my only knowledge of Legend of Zelda, just that one game…

Oops, now it’s all of them!!

Somehow I wound up getting invested in Linked Universe because of a Sidlink fic and now it’s the only thing on my brain as of the past month and a half! Unsurprisingly given how I got into it in the first place, Wild is my favorite, but I must say that they’ve all weaseled their way into my heart, particularly Twilight and Legend (and outside of the chain, Ravio as well)! The LOZ mania has gotten so intense that I actually bought and am playing through A Link Between Worlds right now and am legit making a Ravio cosplay, help-

All of the poses I drew here were from @mellon-soup’s wonderful references, I love using them for inspiration when I’m not quite sure what to draw, and when I saw the first one, I just knew I had to draw Legend and Ravio!

I’ll put a few of my thoughts on the drawings under the cut if anyone’s interested in hearing about them

1) I love Ravioli so much, their dynamic brings me much joy. I’m very proud of how Legend’s expression turned out

2) I’m absolutely obsessed with the fairy Hyrule headcanon, there are so many cute pieces of art people have drawn of him! I’m surprised I managed to get so much detail on his face given how tiny he is. Also Sky is a total sweetheart and the thought of him protecting Hyrule from the rain was simply too adorable for me not to draw the two of them!

3) I am very emotional over Twilight and Wild’s sibling dynamic! The idea of Twi getting caught sneaking food while Wild’s cooking dinner was very funny to me and so I drew it! I really like all of the little details in this drawing, Wild’s scars are probably my favorite detail. And though I’ve never drawn a wolf before, I think I did pretty good! Originally I was just going to draw Twi taking a small piece of meat or something but then I thought “Nah, it’s gonna be an entire fish!” I headcanon that whenever he’s in wolf form, his metabolism increases and so he needs to eat more food to maintain his energy. Since he mainly transforms to fight, track, or comfort Wild, he’s earned an entire fish! Also it’s important to me that you know that the fish is specifically a staminoka bass :))

4) If you find the pose reference I used for Wind, you probably will notice that I actually flipped it so that he was holding the Wind Waker in his left hand. As a leftie myself, I really love it when characters I love are also left-handed!

Also on the topic of hands in general, can I just say how proud I am of all the hands in these 4 drawings??? They’re so good, we love good hand days

[ladycremecaramel]

My BOTW/TOTK OC Ideas and personal rambles

I'm dumping all of my oc loz ideas here for my sanity because they've been bouncing around in my head for a long while.

My Zora OCs

So, I still can't draw very well, and ZoraMay is over, but I have an idea for two Zora oc's. One is inspired by @gargoylesister 's OC Littol. I never once thought about the possibility of tiny zora and I thought "Omg I wanna make one too!"

Zora OC 1's design is based off of a neon tetra. I always loved neon tetras since I was a little girl. I remember growing up with a freshwater fish tank with many fish and one that was a constant were neon tetras. They didn't always last long, but they were so pretty swimming in a school and how their scales reflected in the light. No name rn

Zora OC 2's design is based on my favorite fish. The red wagtail platy. I dunno what it is about this simple fish but they make me so happy. They were also common in the big fish tank my family had growing up. I vaguely remember always watching one swim up and down in a corner of the tank like it was trying to find a way to escape.

Also no name and might be full size or just as small or bigger than the Tetra Zora.

My Rito OCs

Some of you remember me talking about Rito OCs. I still have 2.

Rito oc 1 is Leela. Obviously I still want to keep the shadow puppeteer idea. And i like the idea of her pairing up with Harth. :>

Same bird design. The Chinese bulbul

Rito oc 2. This one would be my Ritosona. An Atlantic Puffin.

I always liked puffins. They're kind of the best of both worlds. They can fly AND swim.

My Hylian OC

My last OC . Besides my Hyliansona, Tabitha (not my real name), I have one other OC that isn't from Hyrule at all. I see her as one that can be easily put in most if not all fandoms.

I've talked about her before on my tumblr page as a potential character for the dragon age fandom and I nicknamed her Puddles.

Let's see...🤔 also I'm word-dumping big time here since she is the only OC that is technically fully developed with a backstory so I'll put this little cut-off for those who aren't interested in her and want to scroll past.

She was made for an original role-play forum that was freeform combat and the story is X-men inspired/superheroes teenagers going to a school in NYC. I think the RP was called Zankoku. This was in 2010

When I was invited to play, I knew next to nothing about how superpowers would work irl or the physics...stuff like that. So they told me to RP with a style I would be most familiar with and I chose water bending from the Last Airbender.

If I had to pick an image for what she would look like, it would be based on the cheerleader from the TV series Heroes, Claire Bennet.

Long curly blonde hair (curlier than the gif), gray eyes, tanned skin, thunder thighs, and was pretty tall for a 15-year-old teen. I think I made her height 5'7''.

Her name is April May Mickadoo and she had the powers to control water and ice (hydro and cyrokinesis). She was my most extroverted and emotional OC I think I ever created. Out of all of the characters that were created for the RP forum, she was one of the more friendly (if not the friendliest) of the Xhuman teens. She was definitely the most extroverted. Especially in the beginning. A lot of the Xteens were loners or generally stuck with one or two other characters to interact. April however, spoke with everyone thus giving everyone a reason to interact with each other in the story.

Compared to the rest of the Xteens, I think she had the most "normal" childhood. By that, I mean divorced parents, mostly raised by a single parent, moved because of their parent's work. That kind of stuff (from her POV at first). Others who discovered their abilities early in their backstory were subject to racism, bullying, being shunned, harassed in public, taken away by the government, and/or killed.

She wasn't consciously aware of her powers until the start of the RP. I was not very good at writing out combat/ fight scenes with my character in a balanced way (either god mode or weak and the RP didn't have stats, it was freeform). So because she learned of her powers much later than others, she was pretty weak with them. Physical fighting was average at the start. She did have power surges when she became distraught. In the beginning, she could only control water until a lucky roll from the mods and a very traumatic event, that she unlocked cyrokinesis. Due to other events during the RP before it suddenly died off, she obtained a 'break the cutie' trope under her belt and depression (or grieving). Depending on how things would've gone, there could've been a sanity slippage episode at some point.

There were perks with her powers. Underwater breathing, can handle the cold very well, and can turn her whole body to water and/or ice (hence the nickname Puddles). Those are the ones I can remember.

Her personality: when I say emotional, I mean she had pretty much all of her emotions on her sleeve. You knew when she was happy, sad, angry, etc. If I had to pick an alignment for her, I would say neutral/lawful good. She LOVES music. She was always ready to dance, sing, or play the piano (later on, she started learning acoustic guitar) when it came to music.

there is more of her backstory and events of the RP I'm not revealing because I want to weave it into whatever story I add her in and it would be post-events after what I could imagine more trauma that the mods had in store. For her, the rp was pretty much a trauma conga line.

[blueskittlesart]

I've heard that while most people really really love BotW and TotK, some people hate those two for going open-world, and some people hate TotK specifically for something about the story. As the resident Zelda expert I know of, what do you think of those takes?

"something about the story" is a bit too vague for me to answer--if you look at my totk liveblog tag from back when the game was newly released or my general zelda analysis tag you may be able to find some of my in-depth thoughts about the story of totk, but in general i liked it.

the open world thing though is something i can and will talk about for hours. (I am obsessed with loz and game design and this is an essay now <3) breath of the wild is a game that was so well-received that a lot of the criticism from older fans who were expecting something closer to the classic zelda formula was just kind of immediately drowned out and ignored, and while i don't think it's a valid criticism to suggest that botw strayed too far from its origins in going open-world, i am more than willing to look into those criticisms, why they exist, and why i think going open-world was ultimately the best decision botw devs could have made. (totk is a slightly different story, we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.)

Loz is a franchise with a ton of history and a ton of really, REALLY dedicated fans. it's probably second only to mario in terms of recognizability and impact in nintendo's catalog. To us younger fans, the older games can sometimes seem, like, prehistoric when compared to what we're used to nowadays, but it's important to remember just how YOUNG the gaming industry is and how rapidly it's changed and grown. the first zelda game was released in 1986, which was 31 years before botw came out in 2017. What this means for nintendo and its developers is that they have to walk a very fine line between catering to older fans in their 30s and 40s now who would have been in nintendo's prime demographic when the first few games in the franchise were coming out AND making a game that's engaging to their MODERN target demographic and that age group's expectations for what a gaming experience should look like.

LOZ is in kind of a tough spot when it comes to modernizing, because a lot of its core gameplay elements are very much staples of early RPGs, and a lot of those gameplay elements have been phased out of modern RPGs for one reason or another. gathering collectibles, fighting one's way through multilevel, mapless dungeons, and especially classic zelda's relative lack of guidance through the story are all things that date games and which modern audiences tend to get frustrated with. for the last few releases before botw, the devs had kind of been playing with this -- skyward sword in particular is what i consider their big experiment and what (i think) became the driving force behind a lot of what happened with botw. Skyward sword attempted to solve the issues I listed by, basically, making the map small and the story much, much more blatantly linear. Skyward sword feels much more like other modern rpgs to me than most zelda games in terms of its playstyle, because the game is constantly pushing you to do specific things. this is a common storytelling style in modern RPGs--obviously, the player usually needs to take specific actions in order to progress the story, and so when there's downtime between story sections the supporting characters push the player towards the next goal. but this actually isn't what loz games usually do. in the standard loz formula, you as the player are generally directly given at most 4 objectives. these objectives will (roughly) be as follows: 1. go through some dungeons and defeat their bosses, 2. claim the master sword, 3. go through another set of dungeons and defeat their bosses, 4. defeat the final boss of the game. (not necessarily in that order, although that order is the standard formula.) the ONLY time the player will be expressly pushed by supporting characters towards a certain action (excluding guide characters) is when the game is first presenting them with those objectives. in-between dungeons and other gameplay segments, there's no sense of urgency, no one pushing you onto the next task. this method of storytelling encourages players to take their time and explore the world they're in, which in turn helps them find the collectibles and puzzles traditionally hidden around the map that will make it easier for them to continue on. Skyward sword, as previously mentioned, experimented with breaking this formula a bit--its overworld was small and unlocked sequentially, so you couldn't explore it fully without progressing the narrative, and it gave players a "home base" to return to in skyloft which housed many of the puzzles and collectibles rather than scattering them throughout the overworld. This method worked... to an extent, but it also meant that skyward sword felt drastically different in its storytelling and how its narrative was presented to the player than its predecessors. this isn't necessarily a BAD thing, but i am of the opinion that one of zelda's strongest elements has always been the level of immersion and relatability its stories have, and the constant push to continue the narrative has the potential to pull players out of your story a bit, making skyward sword slightly less engaging to the viewer than other games in the franchise. (to address the elephant in the room, there were also obviously some other major issues with the design of sksw that messed with player immersion, but imo even if the control scheme had been perfect on the first try, the hyperlinear method would STILL have been less engaging to a player than the standard exploration-based zeldas.)

So when people say that botw was the first open-world zelda, I'm not actually sure how true I personally believe that is. I think a lot of the initial hype surrounding botw's open map were tainted by what came before it--compared to the truly linear, intensely restricted map of skyward sword, botw's map feels INSANE. but strictly speaking, botw actually sticks pretty closely to the standard zelda gameplay experience, at least as far as the overworld map is concerned. from the beginning, one of the draws of loz is that there's a large, populated map that you as the player can explore (relatively) freely. it was UNUSUAL for the player to not have access to almost the entire map either immediately or very quickly after beginning a new zelda game. (the size and population of these maps was restricted by software and storage capabilities in earlier games, but pretty muhc every zelda game has what would have been considered a large & well populated map at the time of its release.) what truly made botw different was two things; the first being the sheer SIZE of the map and the second being the lack of dungeons and collectibles in a traditional sense. Everything that needs to be said about the size of the map already has been said: it's huge and it's crazy and it's executed PERFECTLY and it's never been done before and every game since has been trying to replicate it. nothing much else to say there. but I do want to talk about the percieved difference in gameplay as it relates to the open-world collectibles and dungeons, because, again, i don't think it's actually as big of a difference as people seem to think it is.

Once again, let's look at the classic formula. I'm going to start with the collectibles and lead into the dungeons. The main classic collectible that's a staple of every zelda game pre-botw is the heart piece. This is a quarter of a heart that will usually be sitting out somewhere in the open world or in a dungeon, and will require the player to either solve a puzzle or perform a specific action to get. botw is the first game to not include heart pieces... TECHNICALLY. but in practice, they're still there, just renamed. they're spirit orbs now, and rather than being hidden in puzzles within the overworld (with no explanation as to how or why they ended up there, mind you) they're hidden within shrines, and they're given a clear purpose for existing throughout hyrule and for requiring puzzle-solving skills to access. Functionally, these two items are exactly the same--it's an object that gives you an extra heart container once you collect four of them. no major difference beyond a reskin and renaming to make the object make sense within the greater world instead of just having a little ❤️ floating randomly in the middle of their otherwise hyperrealistic scenery. the heart piece vs spirit orb i think is a good microcosm of the "it's too different" criticisms of botw as a whole--is it ACTUALLY that different, or is it just repackaged in a way that doesn't make it immediately obvious what you're looking at anymore? I think it's worth noting that botw gives a narrative reason for that visual/linguistic disconnect from other games, too--it's set at minimum TEN THOUSAND YEARS after any other given game. while we don't have any concrete information about how much time passes between new-incarnation games, it's safe to assume that botw is significantly further removed from other incarnations of hyrule/link/zelda/etc than any other game on the timeline. It's not at all inconceivable within the context of the game that heart pieces may have changed form or come to be known by a different name. most of the changes between botw and other games can be reasoned away this way, because most of them have SOME obvious origins in a previous game mechanic, it's just been updated for botw's specific setting and narrative.

The dungeons ARE an actual departure from the classic formula, i will grant you. the usual way a zelda dungeon works is that link enters the dungeon, solves a few puzzles, fights a mini boss at about the halfway point, and after defeating the mini boss he gets a dungeon item which makes the second half of the dungeon accessible. He then uses that item in the dungeon's final boss fight, which is specifically engineered with that item in mind as the catalyst to win it. Botw's dungeons are the divine beasts. we've removed the presence of mini-bosses entirely, because the 'dungeon items' aren't something link needs to get within the dungeon itself--he alredy has them. they're the sheikah slate runes: magnesis, cryonis, stasis, and remote bombs. Each of the divine beast blight battles is actually built around using one of these runes to win it--cryonis to break waterblight's ice projectiles, magnesis to strike down thunderblight with its own lightning rods, remote bombs to take out fireblight's shield. (i ASSUME there's some way to use stasis effectively against windblight, mostly because it's obvious to me that that's how all the other fights were designed, but in practice it's the best strategy for that fight is to just slow down time via aerial archery, so i've never tried to win that way lol.) So even though we've removed traditional dungeon items and mini-boss fights, the bones of the franchise remain unchanged underneath. this is what makes botw such an ingenious move for this franchise imo; the fact that it manages to update itself into such a beautiful, engaging, MODERN game while still retaining the underlying structure that defines its franchise and the games that came before it. botw is an effective modern installment to this 30-year-old franchise because it takes what made the old games great and updates it in a way that still stays true to the core of the franchise.

I did mention totk in my opening paragraph and you mention it in your ask so i have to come back to it somehow. Do i think that totk did the gigantic-open-world thing as well as botw did? no. But i also don't really think there was any other direction to go with that game specifically. botw literally changed the landscape of game development when it was released. I KNOW you all remember how for a good year or two after botw's release, EVERY SINGLE GAME that came out HAD to have a massive open-world map, regardless of whether or not that actually made sense for that game. (pokemon is still suffering from the effects of that botw-driven open world craze to this day. rip scarlet/violet your gameplay was SUCH dogshit) I'm not sure to what degree nintendo and the botw devs anticipated that success, (I remember the open world and the versatility in terms of problem-solving being the two main advertising angles pre-release, but it's been 7 years. oh jesus christ it's been SEVEN YEARS. anyways) but in any case, there's basically NO WAY that they anticipated their specific gameplay style taking off to that degree. That's not something you can predict. When creating totk, they were once again walking that line between old and new, but because they were only 3ish years out from botw when totk went into development, they were REALLY under pressure to stay true to what it was that had made botw such an insane success. I think that's probably what led to the expanded map in the sky and depths as well as the fuse/build mechanics--they basically took their two big draws from botw, big map and versatility, and said ok BIGGER MAP and MORE VERSATILITY. Was this effective? yeah. do i think they maybe could have made a more engaging and well-rounded game if they'd been willing to diverge a little more from botw? also yeah. I won't say that I wanted totk to be skyward sword-style linear, because literally no one wanted that, but I do think that because of the insane wave of success that botw's huge open world brought in the developers were under pressure to stay very true to botw in their designing the gameplay of totk, and I think that both the gameplay and story might have been a bit more engaging if they had been allowed to experiment a little more in their delivery of the material.