@Zero

Usually when you use the word prototypical, you're referring to the 'original' form of something. And Breath of the Wild shares a lot in common with the original Legend of Zelda - Aonuma even said that was one of the development goals.

But it's just being pedantic. We understand what Hero of Hyrule means - that the typical version of Zelda as most of us understood it pre-BotW is much more linear, which he clearly prefers. And that's ok. I even understand it, to a degree, as I prefer the Mario series to be more tightly controlled and linear, like in the Galaxy series, rather than full of big, open jungle gyms, Mario 64 style. There's a case to be made for tightly woven, controlled experiences. Zelda just isn't the series I'm looking to make that point with. For me, I'm partial to the more exploratory Zeldas, like the original, Wind Waker and Breath of the Wild. Though I do love the others to various degrees.

Here I'll be even more pedantic: Prototypical: denoting the first, original, or typical form of something.

But actually what I was thinking was more along the lines of you don't have a series until you have multiple games, and Adventure of Link is weird and doesn't quite count, so the original, Link to the Past and maybe Link's Awakening all come together to me to make the early sort of definition of the Zelda series.

Still, even if we take just the first game, I'll still maintain that a large portion of the game is spent in dungeons. It's tough to think back in retrospect, but maybe even like 50/50 time spent in overworld/dungeons? Whereas I'm like 25 or 30 hours into BOTW and I still haven't gone to the first dungeon, lol. The balance is a bit different here.

@Zero

Yeah, but you can't just ignore that big fat overworld in LoZ where you're supposed to walk around fighting monsters and looking for solutions to cryptic environmental puzzles. Sounds an awful lot like B to the W to me. It's not a perfect translation - and I agree, LoZ is more dungeon heavy - but you gotta admit it's a return to some of those values after many, many years getting away from them. That's the real point.

I don't really know about that definition of prototypical, but whatever. Usually a prototype is understood to be the initial version of something - almost a concept demonstration. If it's used in any other way, it sounds like the initial meaning was watered down a bit. (Or, to put it another way, that the 'prototypical' version of 'prototypical' isn't synonymous with typical. Because why bother adding proto to the beginning?)(This has been Semantics With Skippy. Tune in next week for a boring discussion of the words irregardless and agreeance.)

@kriswright

I agree, I love those values, but HoH and Zero have a point with the whole balance being off just wee tad

Did I bring this up earlier? I think so. Too lazy to check. But generally speaking, couldn't we have had BotW exactly as is....but with the dungeons being meatier? It doesn't take away from the world, and keeps dungeon people happy.

As I've stated before, my preference would be for a slightly tighter experience. Make the world a touch smaller (we don't need 500 blasted Koroks!) Keep the cryptic exploration ala the hidden shrines. Make dungeons and items claimed within relevant again. Perhaps a compromise where you can access a handful at once, and you can use any one of the items found within to access a new region with more dungeons. Etc. Even in the original Zelda you couldn't cross the river until you found the raft.

The other option could be to make those necessary items available from multiple locations. The Warm Doublet was a great example. You could do the little mini quest where you cooked up a meal for the Old Man and he gave it to you. Or (as I did when I couldn't figure out how to give him the meal) you could use the spicy meal/torches/campfires to venture into the cold areas yourself. That's where I met the Old Man again on top of Mount Hylia and he gave me the Doublet then. And failing both of those options results in the Doublet simply being for sale later in in your adventure.

Keep a sense of structure, of progress, whilst still retaining the flexibility for people to approach things differently and have their own side adventures.

@Shadowlink

What you're describing would still be a great game, but I wouldn't like it more than what we've got, because you're clearly coming from the position that what BotW needs to be truly great is for it to be more like OoT. And that's not something I'm going to agree about. As I said a few pages back, I don't miss the dungeon crawl aspects of Zelda in BotW - and I definitely don't miss the linear, puzzle to puzzle, item-oriented dungeon style. If your premise is that BotW needs that for balance or something, I say phooey on you. And another phooey for good measure.

Having said that, this DLC is coming and I think it'd be kinda awesome if the dungeons in the DLC are slightly more traditional, if for no other reason than to make the OoT partisans happy, so I don't have to hear whining about no dungeons for the rest of my life. It'd legitimately be a nice addition to the world map and offer a form of play that isn't already in the game (though I think a few locations on the map might get closer to traditional dungeons than they're getting credit for.

Anyway: Structure schmucture.

@kriswright

Maybe I'm saying OoT needs to be a little more like BotW?

...Edit: Actually no, I'm not. OoT is great!

(But more BotW style cryptic quests wouldn't go astray)

@Shadowlink

...a ...criticism... of OoT... from... Shadowlink?

Well, I'm clearly already dead because this would not happen in any living timeline.

I often don't fast travel ;)

Re explore the same areas...

Go slow. Walk. Climb. Ride horse.

DungeonS in the DLC? Is it going to have multiple dungeons then? I thought it was just the one?!

I'm not disagreeing that the overworld in BOTW is a call back to the spirit of the original (I'd also add in Link to the Past, which is maybe a bit more sectioned off, but still has different ways to get from point A to point B), especially contrasted with something like Skyward Sword and its closed off areas, or Spirit Tracks and its... almost completely lack of an overworld to speak of. I just think overall the balance is very, very different from the original in the sense that the original still had a huge focus on dungeons (and boss fights in those dungeons.) And then Link to the Past added this huge focus on puzzle solving in the dungeons.

I do miss that. It's hard to feel dissatisfied when Breath of the Wild is so good. I mean, at this point I'd say it is one of the best games I've played, and much like Metroid Prime, Resident Evil 4 or Super Mario Galaxy 2 I could find things that all of these games don't do quite as well as earlier games in the series did, but they're all so damn good that really, who cares?

But when it comes to what I'd like to see in the next Zelda, like Shadowlink I'd probably like something pushed a tad bit back in the puzzle dungeon direction.

But not another Ocarina of Time, ew.

I have completed the donut, and now I've entered the donut hole.

At this point, I am fully on-board with the idea of finishing the main quest in the next couple nights, and then just leaving the rest of the world to be explored at my own leisure. I feel like I've hit most of the significant spots to this point, but there's no doubt a lot of space in between still to be discovered.

@kriswright

The thing is, I'm a huge "dungeon guy" as well, but the Zelda games have been doing great in that regard for a while. Twilight Princess' were amazing, and Skyward Sword's weren't too far behind. That hasn't been my problem with the series of late. But I really, really missed the exploration and sense of discovery that comes with a great Zelda overworld (and seeing as I disagree with you on Wind Waker in this regard, I haven't really gotten this out of a 3D Zelda since the first one; I say 3D only because ALBW was awesome in this regard).

So, the last thing I'm feeling about BotW is disappointment towards the dungeons being scaled back. Frankly, I think they are pretty cool on their own merits, though the first one I did -- Elephant -- made much better use of its level-altering mechanic than the others did. But overall my take on them is, if they were a little bit more substantial and varied, it only would have made an incredible game even more incredible. Like, I don't feel like the dungeons being what they are in BotW takes away from the game at all. I look at it more like, "this is what they could do better/different in a sequel" and not "this is an area where BotW fell short".

One thing that I'm definitely noticing the lack of though. Caves. Real, honest to god, caves.

Like there's those skull things, and the odd secret alcove stuffed with treasure or a shrine. But I mean an entire system of caves to explore. Maybe with multiple entrances that come up in various places.

Twilight Princess had a couple of those, a series of tunnels that forked a bunch of times and went far deeper than the handful of feet that is normal for Zelda caves. I'm surprised that this game doesn't seem to have any. (Unless they're all in the West/Death Mountain)

@TheBigG753

Your concept of a donut shaped universe is intriguing. Watch out for wheelchair bound physicists, they may try and steal it.

My goodness the Akala Tower is just mean. It's hilarious but it's mean.

Also this game needs more Fi. Like 96% more.

I've loved the two dungeons I've done so far. Yeah, they're a bit shorter and don't have a super unique visual style, but man, what interesting spaces. Much like the game's overworld, I don't think I've played another game (aside from Super Mario Galaxy) that uses 3D level design in such a cool way.

I poked around Hyrule Castle a bit today, and it felt a little too "epic end of the game"ey for me to be there so soon, but I think those of you who want a more traditional feeling dungeon will like it a lot. Some of the shrines I've been playing lately have felt a bit dungeon-ey too!

What the heck is so wrong with OoT anyway? It has a solid number of well-designed dungeons--9, plus 2 or 3 mini-dungeons!--and a rather massive (for the time) overworld (technically two overworlds) that's more open-ended than you might remember. There're a nice little bundle of sidequests immediately available both upon leaving the Kokiri Forest for the first time, and when emerging from the Temple of Time as an adult. I still think it's one of the most balanced Zelda games in terms of overworld/dungeon progression. And it's got a large, lovable and well-defined cast. A very important first for a console Zelda!

I'm veering off-topic though. Or maybe on-topic, since as we've repeatedly discussed, every thread in this forum should be about OoT. Especially BotW threads.

@Zero

To be fair, some of the shrines in BotW could take longer than a few of TLoZ's smaller dungeons, and taken as a whole, you're almost definitely going to be spending more combined time in shrines than a traditional Zelda game's worth of dungeons (if you hit every shrine). But yeah, there's something to be said for the classic map/keys/compass/item/boss appeal of a good Zelda dungeon.

@TheBigG753

That's funny, because for some reason, the Elephant Divine Beast--also the first one I did--was my least-favorite so far (I've now done three as of tonight, all of them besides the one in the southwest). The dungeon concept grew on me more with the other two, which I thought used 3D space and the game's physics in a more clever way.

I think I agree that the series wasn't really hurting for dungeons, so I'm not really missing the traditional ones as much as I would if, say, they downplayed them for a couple console games in a row or something. SS's were fairly easy but also fun and memorable, and TP's pocket was overflowing with 'em.

What the fuck tonight!

Does this game ever stop? I've had a resurgence of my awe for this psychotic game tonight. This us obscene!!!!! What is this game?!?! A devil's plaything??

I hit the 100 hours mark yesterday. I could go fight the final boss/sequence whenever but I'm trying to clean up any open shrine or side quests. The shrine quests have been very rewarding to figure out, particularly the one's from Kass.

Loving this game.

@TriforceBun I'm not sure that is being "fair" though, because the original Legend of Zelda like... obviously, it's a much, much shorter game than pretty much every Zelda since, so obviously the dungeons are much, much shorter as well. But that's not because there wasn't a big focus on dungeons, it's just because the scope of NES games was significantly smaller in general. You could also point to the super awesome explorable overworld in the original Zelda and point out how you could run across the entire map in mere minutes, but that doesn't take away from what it was at the time.

@Hero_Of_Hyrule It's like you're reading my mind with these posts! Get out of my head!

For me, the flurry rush counter makes most battles too easy. It's an easy maneuver to execute for how powerful it is. If the hard mode doesn't nerf or remove it, it'll probably still be easy.

In any case, one thing I've always liked about the Zelda series is how nearly every game feels distinct, and while there are some I like more than others, I wouldn't have wanted them to be more similar to each other. While this game may not be my fave in the series, I'm still glad they once again tried something different with it, and there's nothing major I'd want to change about it. Instead, I think in terms of what they can do with a sequel to this game, not what they could have done differently in this game.

@Shadowlink I'm guessing the lack of caves is due to the 2D top-down map, which would make it difficult to map out cave systems and what's inside or on top of them.

Are you guys good at getting the flurry rush to work? I always dodge too soon!

Combat is easy at this point for the most part, but it's still fun coming up with creative ways to wreck Moblins.