(originally posted to Twitter on March 28, 2017)

 

I’ll be writing about Breath of the Wild later, but I can say right now: it’s great. A stunning world, a mesmerizing game.

To have that Nintendo substance and friction in an open world (that’s usually so floaty and brittle) is just thrilling.

Its world is so evocative and dynamic that it alters our expectations about game worlds, like Witcher 3 did two years ago. (Poor Zero Dawn)

Most of the other good things people are saying about BotW are similar to my own experiences, so I won’t repeat them here.

That said, there are a few less good things on my mind now that I’ve finished playing. Some mild spoilers ahead…

 

1) The main story betrays Zelda. It recognizes her struggle with her fated role but in the end sides with destiny.

It’s really hard to watch her suffer & blame herself for what happens & then have the game give no response except: yep, just the way it is.

Do your duty and then you can go back to playing the scholar. Sorry you were in an eggsac with evil incarnate for a century. It’s all good.

The game refuses to reckon with Zelda’s trauma (via Ganon, her father, destiny). It uses her pain for pathos but doesn’t take it seriously.

The more real & human Zelda is, the more understandable her struggle, the more ridiculous the larger narrative structure seems (the legend).

The entire worldview of this legend is too small. It can’t contain Zelda as a person without apocalypse. It can’t contain an actual woman.

A strong damsel is even worse than a weak one. It uses her strength against her. It says: you’re cool and all, but don’t forget your place.

The strong damsel is told: this world is not for you, no matter what you do. She’s told: this is not your story. And it never will be.

What appears to be sympathy for Zelda’s plight is actually paternalistic complicity. What can never be questioned is the world itself.

 

2) This Hyrule has no underworld. Barely even caves. This may seem small, but it has real consequences for our experience of its world.

Hyrule has heights & breadth but few depths. It’s the most wondrous surface, a truly stunning topography, but it’s an outside w/ no inside.

Shrines don’t provide this because in a world that is so powerfully continuous, they are discontinuous. Both in space and in their logic.

(I’d still prefer no puzzles, tho these are thankfully flexible & brief. They’re interruptions in the world & too conventionally satisfying)

The game does have a few compelling inside/outside interplays: the resurrection cave opening, the divine beasts, & esp the final castle.

(Imagine a Hyrule w/ final castle type structures strewn throughout/beneath it. Wouldn’t need to be ‘dungeons’, just architecture + threat.)

Mostly though the game resists enclosing, tunneling, trapping you. Even the labyrinths are open air.

Yet the exp. of restriction & panic w/ no immediate escape makes that freedom upon returning to the world outside much more keenly felt.

Also, with an inside or underground, a pervasive sense of the hidden extends beneath every surface. Mystery right under your feet.

A literal underworld isn’t the only way to achieve this, but over time its absence in BotW contributed to my final feeling…

 

3) The world can’t last. It happens in most open world games (when they feel exhausted), and that’s ok.

With Breath of the Wild the problem is more that it is so evocative and yet so not mysterious in the end.

Everything is bite-sized and boils down to shrines & seeds. The game is just too eager to reward you. Over time, Korok seeds become kibble.

You uncover too many fast travel points, which domesticate the wilds. They warp the world logic and tempt you with increasing discontinuity.

Also the game’s difficulty falls away halfway through. You lose your fear and desperate creativity (which makes Eventide Island so welcome.)

I don’t want to discount how I felt most of the time while playing BotW. I was transfixed. The world magic is real and unlike anything else.

But how a game sits with me afterwards matters too. What sticks, or doesn’t, and what resonates over time, or evaporates, really matters.

So it’s striking to me that I’m not being drawn back in. BotW let me go, unpossessed. It’s a remarkable game. But now I’m good.

Still, there’s so much to build on. So many directions to go w/ BotW’s approach to world. I really wonder what it’ll inspire in other games.

Ok, end of tweetstorm.