Play-through: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the wild - Part 1
Chronicle of my play through of The Legend of Zelda BotW on Switch 2.
Play-through: is a new format where I will be writing in more of a diary format for bigger games that I am playing. The first game I am trialing this with is The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild on Switch 2.
Note: this won’t be spoiler free.
Before I start, I have to make sure you know where I stand with the many Zelda games. Namely I haven’t really played any. I briefly played some of Windwaker, and Breath of the Wild. The latter for only 4 hours. I have no nostalgic attachment to the series nor have I ever really been a fan. If anything I watched Tears of the Kingdom being played and was confused by how much there is to do. How do you get that hit of “one more mission” when there is so much stuff to distract and confuse you?
But this is not about Tears of the Kingdom. It is about Breath of the Wild.
Hours 1-4
For this project of “giving the game another go”, because on paper it should be my favourite game, I started a new save file. This was particularly important because I am definitely suffering with the difference of A and B button mappings on the Switch 2 compared to the steamdeck. :D
In terms of a tutorial, I now understand what the game is trying to do early on. It is introducing you to all sorts of mechanics, but at the same time trying to say that you can think outside of the box. The first time round I definitely struggled with the openness of even the tutorial area.
The physics and environmental design is very clever in this games and actually let’s you be really creative as a player in terms of how to solve a puzzle or how you might get from a to b. I struggled with this because I like to do things right and it seems like there might be variation in that.
The tutorial map is already quite large, so the overwhelming feeling of what more there is to come was definitely real for me. I tried to record a little youtube of me going through the next areas after the tutorial, but it is so embarrassing. I cannot read the map, let alone remember what I was meant to be doing as there are so many things constantly wanting your attention. This ranges from enemy camps, to korok seed puzzles, new areas of the map, and shrines, as well as searching for different inventory items.
Hours 5-10
It kind of feels exhilarating when you get the paraglider and can jump off the huge wall and glide into the valley below. But then you are suddenly a tiny dot in a huge map.
“Head towards the path between the two mountains.” OK I will try that!
Well on the way I find enemies and die a bunch of times. Then I run away and end up near another tower. I unlock the tower. Now for players of the game, you may think it is the tower for the area. Nope! It was another random tower. Closer to the swimming people actually, the Zoras.
OK, I try again and try and follow the advice and find the mountain pass, followed by the little village. Here I get distracted by herding chickens and helping a little girl cook. After speaking to Impa, I am torn. Go back to the Zora or investigate the area with the scientists?
I head towards the Zora because I want to fight a boss and unlock a beast. I manage to fight many Lizards, but man those weird octopus beings are killing me. Literally.
Eventually I make it up the path to the Zora headquarters. Energised by my progress and actually finding a main area of the story, I head to find the lightning arrows followed by heading straight to the elephant. The initial battle is weird and confusing, but once I make it inside, the puzzles are interesting.
Unfortunately a way too strong enemy appears and I run away and give up on that idea.
The game is so hard to begin with. I understand you get more hearts and stamina by doing more shrines, but this initial part feels like having to grind. I assume that is what I will be doing for the next ten hours. Finding shrines and grinding and unlocking the map.
Considering I have played for 10 hours I don’t feel like I have progressed much at all. But I have unlocked abilities and I am getting better at using them. I am starting to learn combat moves and I seem to be getting better at fighting. So I guess it is fair to say that the beginning of the game is about the main foundations and then more story is getting unlocked as a goal.
Oh and I nearly forgot. I got my first horse! How many horses do you have in the game? I nearly got distracted again and tried to hunt every different colour. :D
Right onwards and upwards to the next ten hours. Have you played the game? Did you like it? Is it your sort of game?
I am not thinking about it all the time yet but maybe we will get there when I am more powerful.
Oh to be able to experience BOTW for the first time... Lucky for you you get to play it with the power of the Switch 2! As others have said, I'd treat BOTW and TOTK as their own separate things, the experience you will get is vastly different from playing OoT, TP or WW, not better or worse just different. You're in for a treat!
I was a huge Zelda fan since Ocarina of Time, so my first hour of BOTW took some getting used to - I was not expecting to fight my first enemies with a twig and die so many times! 😀
I also had the same feeling you had when I got the paraglider. When I landed outside of the tutorial area, I suddenly became overwhelmed with how large the world is and panicked on what to do first. When you begin to accept that you can take as much time as you want, everything clicks into place. 10 hours doing the main quest is nothing really, it offers lots of pacing - shrine puzzles for being more relaxed, battles for more action. And exploring anything that looks interesting will always produce something worthwhile.
If I could give some advice, it would be to come back to something if it seems too hard. I used written notes and checklists when I spotted something interesting, then I'd look back through it in my own time after I'd got more hearts/stamina/equipment.
I look forward to seeing how many parts to this series there will be, I enjoyed hearing your perspective.