wavebeem

world wide weirdo

ย 

๐Ÿ’• @hauntedlatte

๐Ÿ  portland, or, usa

๐Ÿ“† mid-30s

๐Ÿ’ฌ here to make friends and chat

ย 


ย 

๐ŸŽฎ video games
๐Ÿ‘ฉ๐Ÿปโ€๐Ÿ’ป web development
๐Ÿ‘ฉ๐Ÿปโ€๐Ÿซ teaching others

ย 


ย 

๐ŸŽจ digital aesthetics
๐Ÿ’…๐Ÿป makeup & jewelry
๐Ÿ‘— gothic fashion
๐Ÿ‘ฉ๐Ÿปโ€๐ŸŽจ making pixel art

ย 


ย 

๐Ÿค˜๐Ÿป progressive metal
๐ŸŽธ video game music

ย 


ย 

๐ŸŸข everything green
๐ŸŒŸ neon colors and transparent plastic

ย 


blog + rss
wavebeem.com/
discord
@wavebeem

im thinking ill try to beat tears of the kingdom this weekend

v v v

what are some games channeling 2D Zelda energy i should know about?

^ ^ ^

look out, here comes some Thoughts about TOTK

like BOTW before this game could obviously be played for hundreds of hours, but i dont think i have the energy. maybe it's too much too soon. maybe my tastes have changed. i can clearly see how nintendo has really analyzed "flow state" and optimized BOTW and TOTK to keep you in them as long as possible.

i miss older zelda games

i just wish this wasn't at the cost of like... what i used to love about zelda. having more rigid puzzle rooms and the intricacies of dungeons. boss fights that were tough and rewarding. constantly earning new abilities. both BOTW and TOTK give you basically everything right out of the gate, and the only thing you could really add later on is... knowledge about how to wield your existing tools. this is cool but not as cool to me. i love collecting the new loot from every dungeon in older Zelda games, and i love how the rigid order of dungeons meant that each dungeon could build upon the last.

linearity...

modern game design is so scared of linearity, but i think a linear level structure connected to a larger world that can be explored is a fantastic formula, and it pains me to see zelda throw out its fantastic formula for another one that doesn't please me as much. im happy for all the people that love BOTW/TOTK but i just keep wishing they were different kinds of games (in particular, 2D Zeldas like LTTP, OOA, OOS, or LA)

indie scene?

we've seen the "metroidvania" genre explode in the indie scene, but i'm not sure there's that many zelda-likes? i was "ok" on Ittle Dew, but not enough to bother with the sequel. and Blossom Tales was pretty good, though i still haven't gotten around to its sequel.


You must log in to comment.

in reply to @wavebeem's post:

but for real. even the "omg so nonlinear" of metroidvania games is nothing compared to just "you can go literally anywhere immediately" of so many open world games including BOTW/TOTK... and i just can't help but feel we've lost a sense of progression beyond "i did this checklist of things" which apparently isn't pleasing my brain the way it used to

there's the continual progression of "oh hey more of the game is available to me" that just doesn't work without the pressure of the game feeling small at first and then opening up. they do this exactly once when you get out of the tutorial area but it's so overwhelmingly big that the impact is kind of squandered

traditional zelda is the katamari loop - your sphere of influence and ability continually expanding so that things that were major obstacles before are just tiny specks now. completely missing from the more flat open world experiences like botw/totk

yeahh this is excellently put and i agree 100%. everything is just "more of the same" and everywhere is just "somewhere you can walk to get to" basically

even the sky and subterranean stuff i thought would maybe push that formula but not really tbh, it's just more wandering you can do since the very beginning of the game essentially.

i honestly feel like some kind of slicing of the world map could be really helpful for the loop you're talking about. areas could open up new areas. and they have the dividing lines for those, but nothing is stopping you from just walking next door and lighting the tower and exploring the whole area...