It is impossible to talk about Tears of the Kingdom without first talking about Breath of the Wild. For the first time since Link’s Awakening we were completely alone, dropped in an inexplicably gigantic Hyrule, filled to the absolute brim with stuff to do and secrets to find, all built upon an impeccably designed sandbox. Their willingness to break from the mold of all past Zelda games was shocking and refreshing, giving you effectively your full power kit in the opening hour of the game, and then just letting you loose to go whatever direction you want, do shrines in whatever order you want, play however much of the game you want, go beat the game in your underwear, that’s valid, go nuts.

And yet . . there were downsides. Some stuff was just excessive, like Koroks and the escalating requirements to unlock item slots. Item Durability was also something I was never able to enjoy. Those combined meant a huge amount of time in the game is spent inventory juggling. Is this Flame Greatsword better than my Frost Spear? Uhhhhh. . . is this Lynel Shield better or worse than my Royal Guard Shield?? The focus shift from 5-8 lengthy dungeons to 120 Shrines and 4 . . weird moving environmental puzzles . . instead of “normal” Dungeons was also A Choice. I liked the shrines, I was not a huge fan of the Divine Beasts.

. . . but those complaints were really minor. The rest of the game was a masterpiece.

Defying explanation, Tears of the Kingdom makes Breath of the Wild look like a shallow tech demo. It takes everything we thought was already done perfectly in Breath of the Wild and makes it more complex, more flexible, easier to use, and just better in every way. It’s set in the same Hyrule of BotW, but it’s enhanced, changed, expanded. It feels the same, and different, and better. Like coming back and visiting somewhere you lived after a decade has passed. Again they give you effectively your full ability kit within the first hour or so, and those powers are also different, but also the same, but better, more flexible, and easier to use.

As stated, one of the biggest and most widespread issues people had with BotW was Item Durability. In TotK rather than caving and increasing durability, or making things repairable, they had the confidence to lean in to it by making all common weapons hot garbage, forcing you to engage creatively with the Fuse skill. This was the push I needed to realize items being ephemeral is good and makes the game more interesting. Need a hammer? Make a hammer. Need a sick sword? Make a sick sword. Want your spear to be Ice now instead of Fire? Great, do it. It’s a power I didn’t know I needed, that solves a problem I previously had by getting me to accept that their original design decision was actually correct.

Pre-Launch, even post the Aonuma Demo, I wasn’t convinced about Ultra-Hand. I was foolishly worried that making Magnesis work on everything would completely break the sandbox, and that being able to construct bespoke machines would be clunky and more trouble than it’s worth. But no, it’s perfect, it’s game-defining. Can you solve probably a few too many puzzles by making a 200 meter long bridge? Ehhhh maybe? But if you don’t like it, don’t do it.

BotW’s sandbox opened up entire classes of puzzles previously impossible for Zelda games, so many puzzles focused on precision physics, or interesting interactions between mechanics that feel natural and not “you put the key in the hole and turned it”. . . And yet, even with how great the vast majority of those puzzles felt, it still felt like most shrines had an “intended” solution and anything else was cheezing it. TotK’s sandbox is so incredibly expanded that at all times you have so many options open to you that everything feels “valid”. Just used your wits and basic combat? Valid! Built an elaborate death machine? Valid! Cobbled together a death robot and let it eradicate your enemies for you? Valid! Snuck around and confused your enemies to fight each-other? Valid! And, admittedly, built a 200 meter long bridge? Valid! If they didn’t want me to do it, why’d they leave all these wooden pallets sitting around?

Nothing feels unintended, and even with another 100+ shrines it STILL feels fresh. Yes there were more heavily tutorial-driven shrines, and way more “reward” shrines where the challenge is all about getting to the shrine and not completing some puzzle “in” the shrine, but there’s also straight up more shrines so it doesn’t matter.

The Temples are an incredible upgrade. They’re still non-linear, they’re still smaller than “traditional” Zelda dungeons, but they’re just so much more involved and satisfying than BotW’s Divine Beasts. Instead of being “drag your animal parts around to contort four environments that look basically identical so they flip around or whatever”, Temples in TotK are fully integrated unique experiences that follow a far more engaging formula. You have to find the region’s target champion, do some initial light questing, unlock their special ability upfront, then use that special ability to reach the Temple, then continue to use the special ability throughout the Temple, and finally close it out with a huge setpiece boss fight. TotK’s Wind Temple questline taken as a whole is now one of my favorite Dungeon/Temple experiences across the entire series. The least-inspiring TotK Temple is far far far more enjoyable than the best BotW Divine Beast.

I probably haven’t thoroughly wrung out all side-quest content the game has to offer, but it feels like the balance in the game swung further to the “shrine” side than “quest” side compared to BotW. But that’s fine. It still felt exactly as full, it fell maybe slightly less directed, but that’s Fine.

So that’s a lot of gushing, what didn’t work? It’s really hard to think of much.

Farming materials to upgrade gear still sucks, but it’s not really necessary, and was made way less terrible by really easy dupe methods available around launch.

Using Amiibo still sucks, but they made the truly wonderful decision to put all the Amiibo rewards in-game.

Shrines were largely good, I found about 75% of them naturally, but man that last 25% really sucked to find due to not being visible from the sky, either because they were “unlit” find-the-crystal shrines, or because they were deep in some convoluted cave network . . or both. Caves are awesome, but standing on a giant mountain with your sensor blooping at you saying “Shrine of Light Nearby Below” blows. (I ended up just using a map, but didn’t need any tips for actually completing any Shrines.)

But back to gushing: While I won’t talk about specifics, they even managed to have better narrative than BotW. More Plot. Better Plot. Longer cutscenes. More cutscenes. Actual Ganondorf. Amazing Ganondorf faces. Time Shenanigans. (I am a huge sucker for Time Shenanigans.) The ending, both the narrative and the associated encounters / gameplay, is one of the best sequences across the entire series.

It’s a masterpiece start to finish. It’s a rare direct sequel that perfectly balances respecting the previous work while also improving on it in both all the obvious ways and entirely new ways. Highly Recommended, likely candidate for my Game of the Year.

Addendum: Bonus Kiddo Review⌗

It was the best game. I loved it. I’m sad that it’s over.

Same. I told him we can still visit for as long as we want.