In this game the simple act of being around the map is something I already enjoyed so much.

At first I was a little overwhelmed by all the paths I could take and all the things to do, but I decided to turn the shrine detector off, and just pick the path that felt more interesting at any given time. That made it for me, I ended up manually checking every corner, talking to every character and doing every shrine and side quest. The only thing I didn't complete was the koroks.

It's such an incredible game, all the music is art, the colors and textures and animations simply make me happy to witness. The world is full and the things to do fun, entertaining and varied.

I ended up knowing the map completely, I could orient myself in seconds, and I happily journeyed through the same place time after time because I was doing the things as my interest peaked, instead of doing the things that were closer by.

This is one of the few games I have played with my partner backseating me, and it is a fond memory for both of us.

What can I say about Breath of the Wild that hasn't been said already?

This is not only one of the few Zelda games I have actually bothered to beat, but it is also the first and only one so far that I was willing to replay.

It just feels great to have this amount of freedom in a videogame. You can beat this game in like, less than an hour if you know your stuff, or you can also take your time and spend like 100 hours trying to complete as much of the game as possible or whatever.

Sure, the story isn't anything special for Zelda standards but man...This is just a different kind of Zelda game, and I kinda prefer it this way. I enjoy the shrines, the gadgets, the variety of weapons, the divine beasts and guardians...Climbing Hyrule's castle to fight Ganon never felt as good as in this game.

My biggest complains with this one: Weapon durability is kinda wack and a lot of these shrines feel a lot like homework. Luckily, I finally decided to learn how to bomb jump in my second playthrough, and believe me when I say that as soon as I learned to do that shit, I would use it to solve literally every puzzle and problem. Game's too much fun when you can also skip half of it.

10/10 Too much grass.

was my first zelda game and i have sunk HOURS into this.
replayed it a billion times, (consistently get stuck in the same spots) and it stays fun.

i really wish more switch games tried to replicate how this game looks because it is so pretty. like it is very odd to me how this game looks so good but the newer pokemon games look very bad.

this is easily my favorite (and what i think is the best) open world game, as it gives you almost no direction, but you still never get lost. there are INFINITE fast travel points and that is VERY nice to have.

overall this is a huge stepup for nintendo, as this doesn't feel like any other nintendo game. very fun very awesome i like it :D

my Breath of the Wild experience was pretty much split in two :
- the first big chunk of my playthrough happened the year I got my Switch, in 2018. I essentially spent most of my time just wandering around and discovering the whole map by foot. I didn't try to do anything in the main quest except maybe see Impa, I mainly wanted to discover more of the world and I eventually conquered all of the map's Towers without having done a single Divine Beast and not that many shrines (I sucked ass at puzzles).
- the second chunk I did end of 2022/beginning of 2023 cause I was hype for TOTK but still hadn't finished BOTW. I then reimerged myself into the game, locking in to do all Divine Beasts, a good number of shrines, get the Master Sword and beat Ganon.
I think what encapsulates this game's qualities is the fact I had the same amount of fun and discovery for both of these chunks, played years apart. what a game.

Breath of the Wild is a breath of fresh air for the series with its focus on freedom and minimal story, but in that sense it's also a return to form. It perfectly captures the explorative spirit of the original Legend of Zelda more than any Zelda game since.

Open world games tend to bore me unless the core game systems themselves are fun to interact with. This is why I really enjoy the collectathon 3D Mario games (64, Sunshine, Odyssey) despite their often-poor level design and lack of well-crafted discrete challenges. Breath of the Wild follows in the footsteps of Mario 64 and Sunshine by having the most involved mechanics in the series up to this point. The core combat system isn't as advanced as Twilight Princess, but the gaps are made up by how exploration and combat are no longer separate things. Any part of the environment can be used against enemies or against you in some way. The enemy variety feels pretty low for a world this size, but I think the increased number of interactions and behaviors of each of them make up for it.

The world design is beautiful, as usual for Monolith, but they really outdid themselves here. It's amazing to me how every area has it's own distinct look, with dozens upon dozens of intricately-crafted landmarks. The villages are the most fully realized of any in the series aside from Clock Town. It's truly a delight to explore, and the vistas you see are rewarding in and of themselves.

What's most impressive is how they were able to create an open world that truly feels like a living, breathing place. The game doesn't string you along a long, boring story questline, but there are four mini-main quests if you want to do the main dungeons. The scenery isn't just props, almost everything is interactable. Everything exists for you to play and experiment with, as a sandbox should be. That's not to say there isn't any of the typical open-world garbage here like boring sidequests and meaningless collectables, there's just a lot less, and it's not the focus.

It's easy for me to say I am annoyed by the weapon durability system, but it really depends on the context. See, the game is at its best when it pits you against the wild and makes you use limited resources efficiently. The problem is that this scenario happens only twice; the Great Plateau and Eventide Island. If you take any time to explore at all instead of running straight to Hyrule Castle, you're going to easily stock up on resources. There are so many Korok seeds, weapons, and cooking ingredients to be found that you never really feel like you're in danger. And this is when the weapon durability shifts from tense scavanging just to survive into merely an annoyance that necessitates opening the menu to equip something else. It works on the Great Plateau, but quickly becomes balanced way too far in your favor to be a worthwhile or interesting mechanic to consider. You can just intentionally avoid gathering resources to challenge yourself, but the spongy enemies (which collectively get stronger as you keep playing by the way) keep this from being enjoyable. I think a better solution would be to either force more survival moments by limiting resources more, or to have a medium-strength weapon, bow, and shield always be available after a certain point, which could be upgraded similar to gear. The Master Sword doesn't count.

The Shrines and Divine Beasts are interesting concepts in theory, but they're unimaginative aesthetically and contain puzzles so simple that they're unsatisfying to solve even using unintentional methods. I would rather have seen dungeons that are built into the world itself. Hyrule Castle proves you can have seamless open-ended dungeons that still have some defined puzzles and combat encounters. Instead though, we have 120 ugly shrines which don't blend well at all with the environment.

Once you explore everything and do all the shrines, then what? Well, then the game turns into a sandbox. Open this up in Cemu and enable infinite weapon durability, then go do all sorts of crazy stuff. Kill Ganon with a spoon. Build a minecart flying machine that lasts forever unlike anything in Tears of the Kingdom. Again like the open 3D Mario games, this is a game that relies a lot on your intrinsic motivation to find your own fun.

I had a really great time with it, but honestly I don't think I would ever replay it from a fresh save. There's too much grinding and boring resource-gathering, none of it was that compelling the first time, and I'm not doing it again. But on a rainy day, I'll gladly emulate it with all the fun hacks and mods and whatnot that are available now.