Playing.
May 24, 2023 5:02 AM Subscribe
What watching my daughter play ‘The Legend of Zelda’ taught me by Tom Bissell [The Washington Post] Bissell contemplates how Tears of the Kingdom offers the sort of unstructured play his daughter might not be able to get elsewhere in Hollywood.
“When we found the abandoned mine carts, the question for my daughter became how many she could glue together and still get them moving along the rusted tracks. Between all the Ultrahand R&D, my daughter was also chopping down trees and fusing together the resultant logs to make lean-to structures, just in case she came back to an area later and it was raining and she wanted to “cook something.” (God help us all, you can cook in “Tears of the Kingdom,” too.) At one point, sensing my impatience, my daughter invoked the Wright brothers as her mathematical proof for the necessity of experimentation. What about all the monsters, I asked, the beasts and creatures she was duty-bound as Link to strike down with sword and bow? “Meh,” she said, shrugging. “Pass.””
Also, Bissell's daughter being like, “Meh....Pass.” is so relatable. There's too many other hilarious things to do, sorry Zelda, you can chill and wait, Link and I are just too distracted by the playground.
posted by Fizz at 5:35 AM on May 24, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by Fizz at 5:35 AM on May 24, 2023 [6 favorites]
People are starting to discover that Nintendo have managed to do things with rope physics in the game that have destroyed lesser companies. You can build pulley systems with chains and Zonai wheels that lift doors by wrapping the chain around the wheel as it rotates, which sounds like nothing but there's a reason why you never see any other game do it, it's bonkers. Objects fall in a way that's clearly physics driven but also always looks aesthetically pleasing, sometimes even with perfect comic timing? The expectation is to see things just kind of vibrating in a slight incline, and Nintendo's just solved physics so casually.
Breath of the Wild was a tremendous dunking on open-world game design, they came in with their own way of doing things and absolutely clowned on the tedious icon hoovering of Ubisoft's output, and it's astonishing to see Nintendo turn around and clown on the rest of the gaming industry by making a construction kit so seamless and intricate that it handily outdoes anything the finest developers in the industry have been able to do when they've been able to special-case it. Sometimes people complain that Nintendo games are only available on Nintendo devices, but this why they can get away with it: they're that good.
posted by Merus at 5:49 AM on May 24, 2023 [27 favorites]
Breath of the Wild was a tremendous dunking on open-world game design, they came in with their own way of doing things and absolutely clowned on the tedious icon hoovering of Ubisoft's output, and it's astonishing to see Nintendo turn around and clown on the rest of the gaming industry by making a construction kit so seamless and intricate that it handily outdoes anything the finest developers in the industry have been able to do when they've been able to special-case it. Sometimes people complain that Nintendo games are only available on Nintendo devices, but this why they can get away with it: they're that good.
posted by Merus at 5:49 AM on May 24, 2023 [27 favorites]
Nintendo is terrible at a lot of things: IP law, online infrastructure, but the one thing they never miss on is the idea of PLAY and that goes all the way back to their origins as a toy/card company. It's the one through-line in all their shit and in all their franchises, that sense of play and do and try.
posted by Fizz at 5:52 AM on May 24, 2023 [11 favorites]
posted by Fizz at 5:52 AM on May 24, 2023 [11 favorites]
that sense of play and do and try
You can really feel that sense of experimentation in the hardware design, too. Like, trying to get all the buttons on the controllers to stay consistently functional is a sweet puzzle you get to solve as you play, wondering just why they built a wireless communication setup between two halves of a controller that is easily disrupted by HOME WIFI ROUTERS aaaaagh
posted by FatherDagon at 5:56 AM on May 24, 2023 [1 favorite]
You can really feel that sense of experimentation in the hardware design, too. Like, trying to get all the buttons on the controllers to stay consistently functional is a sweet puzzle you get to solve as you play, wondering just why they built a wireless communication setup between two halves of a controller that is easily disrupted by HOME WIFI ROUTERS aaaaagh
posted by FatherDagon at 5:56 AM on May 24, 2023 [1 favorite]
Metafilter is The Zelda Times
posted by BlunderingArtist at 6:05 AM on May 24, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by BlunderingArtist at 6:05 AM on May 24, 2023 [2 favorites]
Metafilter is The Zelda Times
Surely it's The Clover Gazette
posted by synecdoche at 6:52 AM on May 24, 2023 [16 favorites]
Surely it's The Clover Gazette
posted by synecdoche at 6:52 AM on May 24, 2023 [16 favorites]
:watches all the discussions of TotK with glee: :returns to building railways across my primary Minecraft world:
posted by Quasirandom at 7:32 AM on May 24, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Quasirandom at 7:32 AM on May 24, 2023 [1 favorite]
I haven't played recent Zelda, but really enjoyed this article. (The author's books are good, too.)
posted by doctornemo at 7:41 AM on May 24, 2023
posted by doctornemo at 7:41 AM on May 24, 2023
This article brought out a strange parental nostalgia in me, perhaps even a little grief at the passage of time.
My kid and I have been playing Tears of the Kingdom but separately which was very different then how we played Breath of the Wild (6 years is a long time in a young kid's life). While my playstyle has largely remained unchanged, I prefer playing on a larger screen, the kid has moved entirely to handheld mode and although we talk extensively about the game (strategies, secrets, building techniques) we're missing out on each other's spontaneous discoveries. They aren't getting me to solve a hard puzzle, or to watch a ridiculous stunt or to teach me how to flurry rush for the umpteenth time.
The game is awesome and I have a hard time not spending time in that world and marvelling at the weird things I can build that actually work. But... I'm definitely recognising my kid has changed in the interim which is something I hadn't entirely been cognizant about.
posted by Ashwagandha at 7:47 AM on May 24, 2023 [14 favorites]
My kid and I have been playing Tears of the Kingdom but separately which was very different then how we played Breath of the Wild (6 years is a long time in a young kid's life). While my playstyle has largely remained unchanged, I prefer playing on a larger screen, the kid has moved entirely to handheld mode and although we talk extensively about the game (strategies, secrets, building techniques) we're missing out on each other's spontaneous discoveries. They aren't getting me to solve a hard puzzle, or to watch a ridiculous stunt or to teach me how to flurry rush for the umpteenth time.
The game is awesome and I have a hard time not spending time in that world and marvelling at the weird things I can build that actually work. But... I'm definitely recognising my kid has changed in the interim which is something I hadn't entirely been cognizant about.
posted by Ashwagandha at 7:47 AM on May 24, 2023 [14 favorites]
Yeah, the difference in playstyles is really brought home to me, when me and my younger kid talk about what's happening in the villages. She knows everyone, knows who was in the first game, is dreadfully offended when someone from the first game doesn't remember Link, or the Champions. She also spent a lot of time in BOTW making friends with bokos for photo-ops. Meanwhile I'm just trying to get to the next tower before I have to give her the cartridge back, and praying I don't have to build anything or kill anything in that time. All I want to do is run and fly, alone and quiet.
posted by mittens at 7:55 AM on May 24, 2023 [9 favorites]
posted by mittens at 7:55 AM on May 24, 2023 [9 favorites]
She knows everyone, knows who was in the first game, is dreadfully offended when someone from the first game doesn't remember Link, or the Champions.
https://twitter.com/historygf/status/1659033627957633024
https://twitter.com/historygf/status/1659033627957633024
posted by Merus at 8:11 AM on May 24, 2023 [20 favorites]I think Link is experiencing a Tony Hawk kind of situation. Everyone has heard of him but no one knows what he looks likenpc: oh hey! whats your name?
link: link
npc: oh, like princess zelda’s swordsman? i wonder what he’s up to these days
link: this
I prefer playing on a larger screen, the kid has moved entirely to handheld mode and although we talk extensively about the game (strategies, secrets, building techniques) we're missing out on each other's spontaneous discoveries. They aren't getting me to solve a hard puzzle, or to watch a ridiculous stunt or to teach me how to flurry rush for the umpteenth time.
This has been my experience, too.
(I'm not helping matters, though, because I want to avoid spoilers and we go about the game in very different ways.)
He's going through the main quest and using YT walk-throughs sometimes for certain fights and puzzles. I am spending more time wandering and exploring and looking for tears rather than the "regional phenomena," and avoiding hints from the Internet. There have been a couple of places where he's given me some hints about how to tackle a particular problem. I don't mind his advice as much as YTers'.
He is playing more handheld, too, I think partially to minimize the risk of me seeing a spoiler, but mostly because he prefers to play that way.
It's funny though: neither of us have gone too deep into the building parts of the game. My favourite thing to do is to figure out different ways to take out monsters without getting seen. I could do that in BotW but there are a lot more options for sneaking now.
posted by synecdoche at 8:13 AM on May 24, 2023
This has been my experience, too.
(I'm not helping matters, though, because I want to avoid spoilers and we go about the game in very different ways.)
He's going through the main quest and using YT walk-throughs sometimes for certain fights and puzzles. I am spending more time wandering and exploring and looking for tears rather than the "regional phenomena," and avoiding hints from the Internet. There have been a couple of places where he's given me some hints about how to tackle a particular problem. I don't mind his advice as much as YTers'.
He is playing more handheld, too, I think partially to minimize the risk of me seeing a spoiler, but mostly because he prefers to play that way.
It's funny though: neither of us have gone too deep into the building parts of the game. My favourite thing to do is to figure out different ways to take out monsters without getting seen. I could do that in BotW but there are a lot more options for sneaking now.
posted by synecdoche at 8:13 AM on May 24, 2023
THE ONE PERSON NINTENDO PROGRAMMED TO NOT REMEMBER LINK IS BEEDLE AND THAT BREAKS MY BRAIN.
I mean come on Beedle!!! I've sold you thousands of items over years and gladly handed over any special bugs that you're looking to collect (never asked why or what for) but you DON'T remember me. Ugh.
posted by Fizz at 8:14 AM on May 24, 2023 [9 favorites]
I mean come on Beedle!!! I've sold you thousands of items over years and gladly handed over any special bugs that you're looking to collect (never asked why or what for) but you DON'T remember me. Ugh.
posted by Fizz at 8:14 AM on May 24, 2023 [9 favorites]
Some of the encounters are kind of funny - I was in Zora's Domain recently and one of the fish people Link met as a child is grown and still insists on calling you Linny. I guess I met you? I honestly didn't spend a lot of time in Zora's Domain in Breath of the Wild once I got the divine beast unlocked.
posted by Ashwagandha at 8:21 AM on May 24, 2023
posted by Ashwagandha at 8:21 AM on May 24, 2023
The thing that I've sort of reconciled myself about spoilers is that if I were a kid playing it with a peer group, they would _absolutely_ be saying shit like "hey did you see this cool thing?!?"
So my peer group is youtube and polygon. I still try to limit myself a bit, and I'm trying to avoid learning much about the story or the endgame, but various shrine puzzles or ultrahand tricks? You betcha.
posted by Kyol at 8:40 AM on May 24, 2023
So my peer group is youtube and polygon. I still try to limit myself a bit, and I'm trying to avoid learning much about the story or the endgame, but various shrine puzzles or ultrahand tricks? You betcha.
posted by Kyol at 8:40 AM on May 24, 2023
(and lorrrrrrrrrrrrrrrd you need to clean up your viewing history in youtube, otherwise the algorithm goes all "oh you like tears of the kingdom? I've got EIGHTY BILLION VIDEOS about that!" and next thing you know that's all you're seeing.)
posted by Kyol at 8:43 AM on May 24, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by Kyol at 8:43 AM on May 24, 2023 [2 favorites]
All I want to do is run and fly, alone and quiet.
Me too! That's my favorite part of these games. When I used to play World of Warcraft, all I wanted to do was explore the world. That's all I want to do here, and fortunately it's easier than in WOW. And so much more fun. I only do quests, etc. when I need more hearts or stamina to get to where I want to go. And I prioritize stamina so I can fly/climb farther. Right now in TOTK (about 20 hours in) I'm up against a heart barrier, though. Everything is killing me in one shot. Time to spend some time getting hearts.
posted by jdroth at 8:49 AM on May 24, 2023 [1 favorite]
Me too! That's my favorite part of these games. When I used to play World of Warcraft, all I wanted to do was explore the world. That's all I want to do here, and fortunately it's easier than in WOW. And so much more fun. I only do quests, etc. when I need more hearts or stamina to get to where I want to go. And I prioritize stamina so I can fly/climb farther. Right now in TOTK (about 20 hours in) I'm up against a heart barrier, though. Everything is killing me in one shot. Time to spend some time getting hearts.
posted by jdroth at 8:49 AM on May 24, 2023 [1 favorite]
My teens are playing on 2 save files and mostly just having a blast. They aren’t looking online for spoilers but definitely watch each other a bit. I don’t play but I knew it was cool when I saw how the cold zones work and my son’s solution. You are supposed to get cold weather clothing or you take damage over time, but he just built a campfire in a mine cart and brought it along, and it worked!
posted by caviar2d2 at 8:53 AM on May 24, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by caviar2d2 at 8:53 AM on May 24, 2023 [5 favorites]
I have been playing a truly unconscionable amount of TOTK this week, and it's my favorite game in a long time. I got a switch late, and BOTW never really hooked me, but this sure has.
I am doing my best to avoid looking up things in guides and just wandering around and exploring. Somehow, where Ubisoft-style open world games make me feel exhausted like I'm doing a list of chores, this game is all about discovering stuff, and there's SO MUCH of it.
I think it helps that stuff doesn't show up on your map until AFTER you discover it. You don't have a list of here is every shrine in the game. You have to go explore for them. So it never looks like an overwhelming to-do list. And there's no % meter--you'd have to go out of your way to 100% this game, where Ubisoft encourages thinking of it that way.
Plus there's a truly impressive amount of software engineering in this game. I don't notice any lag, and the physics engine is remarkably well done, running perfectly on six year old hardware that was on the budget end even then.
posted by JDHarper at 9:00 AM on May 24, 2023 [2 favorites]
I am doing my best to avoid looking up things in guides and just wandering around and exploring. Somehow, where Ubisoft-style open world games make me feel exhausted like I'm doing a list of chores, this game is all about discovering stuff, and there's SO MUCH of it.
I think it helps that stuff doesn't show up on your map until AFTER you discover it. You don't have a list of here is every shrine in the game. You have to go explore for them. So it never looks like an overwhelming to-do list. And there's no % meter--you'd have to go out of your way to 100% this game, where Ubisoft encourages thinking of it that way.
Plus there's a truly impressive amount of software engineering in this game. I don't notice any lag, and the physics engine is remarkably well done, running perfectly on six year old hardware that was on the budget end even then.
posted by JDHarper at 9:00 AM on May 24, 2023 [2 favorites]
(i tell myself that Beedle is just high all the time and so everyone he meets is a new friend.)
posted by mittens at 9:10 AM on May 24, 2023 [13 favorites]
posted by mittens at 9:10 AM on May 24, 2023 [13 favorites]
I feel like the shift from quasi-linear storyline in BOTW to endless-hilarious-physics-insanity in TOTK is actually giving me ADHD. On the way to a tower that’s right there I’m on my like fourth distracted side investigation and I forget what it was I was heading for anyway.
posted by gottabefunky at 9:11 AM on May 24, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by gottabefunky at 9:11 AM on May 24, 2023 [6 favorites]
>I mean come on Beedle!!! I've sold you thousands of items over years and gladly handed over any special bugs that you're looking to collect (never asked why or what for) but you DON'T remember me. Ugh.
This one makes total sense though. Link is not a beetle. Beedle has no brain space for nonsense like non-beetles.
posted by GoblinHoney at 9:25 AM on May 24, 2023 [4 favorites]
This one makes total sense though. Link is not a beetle. Beedle has no brain space for nonsense like non-beetles.
posted by GoblinHoney at 9:25 AM on May 24, 2023 [4 favorites]
You can build pulley systems with chains and Zonai wheels that lift doors by wrapping the chain around the wheel as it rotates, which sounds like nothing but there's a reason why you never see any other game do it, it's bonkers.
Technical designer/gameplay programmer perspective: what the actual fuck?
Ropes are madness. Essentially a *heavily* subdivided spline mesh where each individual subdivision (and seriously: you want a lot of them) is controlled by a unique spring, and that spring has complex rotation and tension/load-based z-scale soft constraints both absolute and per-frame delta, usually governed by some kind of logarithmic falloff curve. If you’re solving this async (and you really, really want to from the computation costs) there are all kinds of potential issues with segment order in the solver.
Bonus round: if you want to really hate your life, toss in breakage at arbitrary points on the spline. Enjoy cloning all spring components and then adding segment-weight-appropriate force vectors from the tension release if the rope was under load. Bonus bonus: mid-spline anchors for pulleys, rather than just anchoring one or both of the endpoints.
You can’t offload the computational costs for any of this to GPU if it affects gameplay sim, which it sounds like is the case here. Async is a doable pain if you force sane eval order in the solver code, but it’s gotta be on CPU.
(This is also why cloth is almost always a non-sim-affecting, pure GPU visual effect: it’s a two-dimensional spring grid version of everything above)
I would sincerely love to get a glimpse of the code for this one, because it’s either some nextfuckinglevel/blackmagicfuckery or something very simple and profoundly elegant the industry’s been overlooking for years.
Either way they are really saved by the lack of multiplayer, because while I’d believe there’s a better overall solution or just an incredibly precise set of magic number constants that make it smooth and computationally efficient, managing to replicate all the spring data would absolutely be grounds for calling bullshit.
posted by Ryvar at 9:40 AM on May 24, 2023 [9 favorites]
Technical designer/gameplay programmer perspective: what the actual fuck?
Ropes are madness. Essentially a *heavily* subdivided spline mesh where each individual subdivision (and seriously: you want a lot of them) is controlled by a unique spring, and that spring has complex rotation and tension/load-based z-scale soft constraints both absolute and per-frame delta, usually governed by some kind of logarithmic falloff curve. If you’re solving this async (and you really, really want to from the computation costs) there are all kinds of potential issues with segment order in the solver.
Bonus round: if you want to really hate your life, toss in breakage at arbitrary points on the spline. Enjoy cloning all spring components and then adding segment-weight-appropriate force vectors from the tension release if the rope was under load. Bonus bonus: mid-spline anchors for pulleys, rather than just anchoring one or both of the endpoints.
You can’t offload the computational costs for any of this to GPU if it affects gameplay sim, which it sounds like is the case here. Async is a doable pain if you force sane eval order in the solver code, but it’s gotta be on CPU.
(This is also why cloth is almost always a non-sim-affecting, pure GPU visual effect: it’s a two-dimensional spring grid version of everything above)
I would sincerely love to get a glimpse of the code for this one, because it’s either some nextfuckinglevel/blackmagicfuckery or something very simple and profoundly elegant the industry’s been overlooking for years.
Either way they are really saved by the lack of multiplayer, because while I’d believe there’s a better overall solution or just an incredibly precise set of magic number constants that make it smooth and computationally efficient, managing to replicate all the spring data would absolutely be grounds for calling bullshit.
posted by Ryvar at 9:40 AM on May 24, 2023 [9 favorites]
>All I want to do is run and fly, alone and quiet.
There are cheats for the game on github, and that's how my miscoordinated fingers have played the game. One of the cheats is the jump cheat, which lets you hold x and keep going up, even while gliding and diving. I did not get the paraglider (or unlock the sky towers) until way, way late. It was great just to jump up, tap R and fly around with the glide set all over the place, like I was Christopher Reeve in the first Superman movie. Great to just zone out and fly into the sky, a childhood dream.
posted by Catblack at 9:46 AM on May 24, 2023 [1 favorite]
There are cheats for the game on github, and that's how my miscoordinated fingers have played the game. One of the cheats is the jump cheat, which lets you hold x and keep going up, even while gliding and diving. I did not get the paraglider (or unlock the sky towers) until way, way late. It was great just to jump up, tap R and fly around with the glide set all over the place, like I was Christopher Reeve in the first Superman movie. Great to just zone out and fly into the sky, a childhood dream.
posted by Catblack at 9:46 AM on May 24, 2023 [1 favorite]
Also: my kingdom for a “NO I WILL NEVER SELL YOU MY INCREDIBLY RARE BEETLES, BEEDLE.” never-ask-me-again checkbox.
posted by Ryvar at 9:46 AM on May 24, 2023
posted by Ryvar at 9:46 AM on May 24, 2023
I asked a 20-something longtime Nintendo fan if they had purchased TotK, and they said if they wanted to play Minecraft, they would just play Minecraft.
posted by fairmettle at 9:48 AM on May 24, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by fairmettle at 9:48 AM on May 24, 2023 [2 favorites]
Beedle has no brain space for nonsense like non-beetles.
Anyone unfamiliar with the Japanese love of beetles, and insects in general, should check out the documentary, Beetle Queen Conquers Tokyo.
posted by Ashwagandha at 9:55 AM on May 24, 2023 [3 favorites]
Anyone unfamiliar with the Japanese love of beetles, and insects in general, should check out the documentary, Beetle Queen Conquers Tokyo.
posted by Ashwagandha at 9:55 AM on May 24, 2023 [3 favorites]
Speaking of Beetle Queen Conquers Tokyo, I haven't seen it, but the director runs a little "museum" of tiny objects in Las Vegas that you can visit (for free), and use the materials to create a flatlay (for a price). It's wonderful. Highly recommended as a non-Vegas thing to do in Vegas.
OK, derail over.
posted by mrphancy at 10:06 AM on May 24, 2023 [5 favorites]
OK, derail over.
posted by mrphancy at 10:06 AM on May 24, 2023 [5 favorites]
I asked a 20-something longtime Nintendo fan if they had purchased TotK, and they said if they wanted to play Minecraft, they would just play Minecraft.
I mean if they meant Minecraft with the CREATE mod I can kind of see it. But vanilla Minecraft? Yeah no.
posted by Ashwagandha at 10:18 AM on May 24, 2023
I mean if they meant Minecraft with the CREATE mod I can kind of see it. But vanilla Minecraft? Yeah no.
posted by Ashwagandha at 10:18 AM on May 24, 2023
You are supposed to get cold weather clothing or you take damage over time, but he just built a campfire in a mine cart and brought it along, and it worked!
I fused a ruby onto one of my weapons to deal with some brambles and found that just carrying the weapon kept me warm so I didn't have to waste any food for as long as I was using it.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 11:49 AM on May 24, 2023 [5 favorites]
I fused a ruby onto one of my weapons to deal with some brambles and found that just carrying the weapon kept me warm so I didn't have to waste any food for as long as I was using it.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 11:49 AM on May 24, 2023 [5 favorites]
Any rubyswordmanteau in a storm, amiright?
posted by mrphancy at 11:53 AM on May 24, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by mrphancy at 11:53 AM on May 24, 2023 [3 favorites]
I asked a 20-something longtime Nintendo fan if they had purchased TotK, and they said if they wanted to play Minecraft, they would just play Minecraft.
The age of the fan is a clear reason they're not name-checking The Incredible Machine instead of Minecraft. TotK's *cooking* system has more in common with Minecraft recipes than anything related to actual building.
posted by FatherDagon at 12:08 PM on May 24, 2023 [2 favorites]
The age of the fan is a clear reason they're not name-checking The Incredible Machine instead of Minecraft. TotK's *cooking* system has more in common with Minecraft recipes than anything related to actual building.
posted by FatherDagon at 12:08 PM on May 24, 2023 [2 favorites]
Ashwagandha, my kid and I have a similar experience. BOTW was on one save but for TOTK we each have our own. We'll talk about what we're up to in the morning which is nice. He's getting tips and ideas from his friends at school and I bet he's watching videos too because he had suggested doing that over the weekend and I said that we could figure it out without it.
How much have y'all upgraded your Links? I've added 2 hearts and 3 stamina portions and always feel that I should solve some more shrines but there's too much else to see and do. It sucks being one-shotted by various enemies though.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 12:36 PM on May 24, 2023
How much have y'all upgraded your Links? I've added 2 hearts and 3 stamina portions and always feel that I should solve some more shrines but there's too much else to see and do. It sucks being one-shotted by various enemies though.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 12:36 PM on May 24, 2023
I've gone hard on hearts, I think I'm up to 9? Haven't added any stamina at all, it hasn't felt obligatory in a "the only way I can see to get there it climbing up a cliff" way that BotW was. I'm sure I'll find some shrines I can't reach without extreme climbing or gliding, though.
posted by Kyol at 12:41 PM on May 24, 2023
posted by Kyol at 12:41 PM on May 24, 2023
I spent a lot of time running around activating towers, solving shrines as I found them, and hunting down geoglyphs. During that process I cashed the shrines in for about 12 hearts right now, and an extra 1.25 wheels of stamina. I've also been trying to find (or remember from the first game) all the stables and have been doing the side quests there. Got the frog suit top so far. At some point I realized I wasn't getting immediately killed by monster (which I generally try to avoid), so I just finished the four temples. During all of this I am, of course, obsessively taking pictures of everything for my compendium.
posted by mrphancy at 12:47 PM on May 24, 2023
posted by mrphancy at 12:47 PM on May 24, 2023
People are starting to discover that Nintendo have managed to do things with rope physics in the game that have destroyed lesser companies. You can build pulley systems with chains and Zonai wheels that lift doors by wrapping the chain around the wheel as it rotates, which sounds like nothing but there's a reason why you never see any other game do it, it's bonkers. Objects fall in a way that's clearly physics driven but also always looks aesthetically pleasing, sometimes even with perfect comic timing? The expectation is to see things just kind of vibrating in a slight incline, and Nintendo's just solved physics so casually.
So far I've only been a spectator (both kids and my wife have save games, and there's only one Switch), but my reactions have been really similar. Someone was figuring out a shrine puzzle, involving a raft with some weird stuff grafted to it, and goddamned if it didn't float in *just the right way* to make me suspect something. Five minutes later, having commandeered the controller to make my own awkwardly heavy raft, I confirmed it: there's functioning fluid dynamics, and buoyancy, at work with every flamethrowing murderraft you build. The water physics in particular are absurd; I've never seen anything like it in an open-world game. If rope physics work similarly, we're going to see some seriously crazy shit being built in the next few months.
posted by Mayor West at 12:48 PM on May 24, 2023 [7 favorites]
So far I've only been a spectator (both kids and my wife have save games, and there's only one Switch), but my reactions have been really similar. Someone was figuring out a shrine puzzle, involving a raft with some weird stuff grafted to it, and goddamned if it didn't float in *just the right way* to make me suspect something. Five minutes later, having commandeered the controller to make my own awkwardly heavy raft, I confirmed it: there's functioning fluid dynamics, and buoyancy, at work with every flamethrowing murderraft you build. The water physics in particular are absurd; I've never seen anything like it in an open-world game. If rope physics work similarly, we're going to see some seriously crazy shit being built in the next few months.
posted by Mayor West at 12:48 PM on May 24, 2023 [7 favorites]
Also, to layer all these new systems on top of an already stellar game that had near-perfect physics continues to astound me. I hate Nintendo for all the reasons most of us hate Nintendo, but god damn, when they get it right, they truly make magic. I fucking love and hate them so much.
posted by Fizz at 1:08 PM on May 24, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Fizz at 1:08 PM on May 24, 2023 [1 favorite]
This morning before work I finally capped Energy Cell #16.
45 upgrades * 15 Large Zonai Ore per = 675 Large Zonai to cap your battery, plus another 300 are needed for Great Fairy armor upgrades …at what point does duping become an ethical imperative for people with friends and families?
It took me hours using the new, vastly more efficient dupe bug. But hey - at least my hoverbike now has functionally infinite fuel, and my light bomber bike does passably well (enemy killcount-based leveling means single cannons no longer really cut it). Flipside, any kind of “going ham” Death Star build still gobbles up my power near-instantly, so it’s all autobuild Zonai batteries/Zonai charge temporary infinite power for MEGA DEATH BEAMS.
Still loving it. I can’t believe how much needless time and swearing I spent on horses earlier, before I knew about autobuilding hoverbikes. Fuck horses. Fuck everything horse-related or horse-adjacent in this game. Fuck the cart building miniquest, where I wandered into a new stable with a freshly caught horse, registered it…and then the cart-assembly miniquest lady next to the counter asked me to go catch her a fresh wild horse.
I honestly would’ve preferred a single swift kick to the nuts in real life. My response was transcendently profane. Just… FUCK all horse-related mechanics and quests in this game. Worse than the weapon degradation that constantly sets off all my childhood complex PTSD “but I need to hold on to the things I love!!” triggers.
It’s a mixed bag. A 10/10 life-altering genre-redefining mixed bag.
On preview:
I hate Nintendo for all the reasons most of us hate Nintendo
As anyone who loves anime/manga will tell you, the business culture of large and established Japanesemedia companies reads like freakish, reactionary obsession with control from a Western perspective …and I am reliably informed it’s actually no better from a Japanese perspective, either. Nintendo isn’t actually that bad when compared to their peers in other media sectors, but compared to what gamers are used to Nintendo’s every move regarding how their properties are depicted or displayed is still going to seem like a wild overreaction. Their design team is relinquishing control of the game systems to an admirable degree, but that doesn’t mean their marketing or legal departments will follow suit. Just polar opposite corporate cultural norms from the “it’s free advertising” mindset, basically.
posted by Ryvar at 1:24 PM on May 24, 2023 [2 favorites]
45 upgrades * 15 Large Zonai Ore per = 675 Large Zonai to cap your battery, plus another 300 are needed for Great Fairy armor upgrades …at what point does duping become an ethical imperative for people with friends and families?
It took me hours using the new, vastly more efficient dupe bug. But hey - at least my hoverbike now has functionally infinite fuel, and my light bomber bike does passably well (enemy killcount-based leveling means single cannons no longer really cut it). Flipside, any kind of “going ham” Death Star build still gobbles up my power near-instantly, so it’s all autobuild Zonai batteries/Zonai charge temporary infinite power for MEGA DEATH BEAMS.
Still loving it. I can’t believe how much needless time and swearing I spent on horses earlier, before I knew about autobuilding hoverbikes. Fuck horses. Fuck everything horse-related or horse-adjacent in this game. Fuck the cart building miniquest, where I wandered into a new stable with a freshly caught horse, registered it…and then the cart-assembly miniquest lady next to the counter asked me to go catch her a fresh wild horse.
I honestly would’ve preferred a single swift kick to the nuts in real life. My response was transcendently profane. Just… FUCK all horse-related mechanics and quests in this game. Worse than the weapon degradation that constantly sets off all my childhood complex PTSD “but I need to hold on to the things I love!!” triggers.
It’s a mixed bag. A 10/10 life-altering genre-redefining mixed bag.
On preview:
I hate Nintendo for all the reasons most of us hate Nintendo
As anyone who loves anime/manga will tell you, the business culture of large and established Japanese
posted by Ryvar at 1:24 PM on May 24, 2023 [2 favorites]
What about all the monsters, I asked, the beasts and creatures she was duty-bound as Link to strike down with sword and bow? “Meh,” she said, shrugging. “Pass.””
The blood moon teaches us that any military victory is fleeting at best, and will be unwound at a unpredictable moment's notice. But schematics are forever.
Five minutes later, having commandeered the controller to make my own awkwardly heavy raft, I confirmed it: there's functioning fluid dynamics, and buoyancy, at work with every flamethrowing murderraft you build.
BoTW also had floating objects. But you could also wave a leaf fan at a sailboat you stood on to make your own wind, which they appear to have patched out. Or maybe I didn't test right -- Zonai fans impart momentum in the opposite direction they blow, so it makes sense to cancel out any gain from a sail.
Also worth mentioning: you can't make cyclic constructs, which presumably simplifies the simulation. I've seen chains (again in BoTW) but don't recall rope, will keep an eye out. I wouldn't be surprised if the rope behaves like a chain as a simplification. I dont think chains can break and they've always been anchored in to an immovable object. Except the Korok puzzles I guess but those are very short.
FUCK all horse-related mechanics and quests in this game. Worse than the weapon degradation
For anyone who isn't Ryvar and is only on the fence: horse wrangling isn't that bad. Equipping stealth gear makes your footsteps quieter, and you can tell which horses are easier to catch by their coats -- the ones with spots are gentler. I haven't tried it but apparently you can feed them carrots too. Of course the cart lady only tells you horse facts like this after you get her a cart horse IIRC.
Basically, Nintendo seems to have crammed in engineering, physics, and biology into a mideval era "save the princess" game about swords and dragons.
posted by pwnguin at 3:16 PM on May 24, 2023 [3 favorites]
The blood moon teaches us that any military victory is fleeting at best, and will be unwound at a unpredictable moment's notice. But schematics are forever.
Five minutes later, having commandeered the controller to make my own awkwardly heavy raft, I confirmed it: there's functioning fluid dynamics, and buoyancy, at work with every flamethrowing murderraft you build.
BoTW also had floating objects. But you could also wave a leaf fan at a sailboat you stood on to make your own wind, which they appear to have patched out. Or maybe I didn't test right -- Zonai fans impart momentum in the opposite direction they blow, so it makes sense to cancel out any gain from a sail.
Also worth mentioning: you can't make cyclic constructs, which presumably simplifies the simulation. I've seen chains (again in BoTW) but don't recall rope, will keep an eye out. I wouldn't be surprised if the rope behaves like a chain as a simplification. I dont think chains can break and they've always been anchored in to an immovable object. Except the Korok puzzles I guess but those are very short.
FUCK all horse-related mechanics and quests in this game. Worse than the weapon degradation
For anyone who isn't Ryvar and is only on the fence: horse wrangling isn't that bad. Equipping stealth gear makes your footsteps quieter, and you can tell which horses are easier to catch by their coats -- the ones with spots are gentler. I haven't tried it but apparently you can feed them carrots too. Of course the cart lady only tells you horse facts like this after you get her a cart horse IIRC.
Basically, Nintendo seems to have crammed in engineering, physics, and biology into a mideval era "save the princess" game about swords and dragons.
posted by pwnguin at 3:16 PM on May 24, 2023 [3 favorites]
My biggest (very minor) problem with the game is that when you get your spirit friends following you, when they materialize near you, there is the sound of someone gently coughing, like someone is behind you trying to get your attention. It's unnerving with my headphones late at night.
This game is a classic though, they got it right with this one.
posted by Catblack at 4:19 PM on May 24, 2023
This game is a classic though, they got it right with this one.
posted by Catblack at 4:19 PM on May 24, 2023
Zonai fans impart momentum in the opposite direction they blow, so it makes sense to cancel out any gain from a sail
You can still use the sail/leaf combination to steer your raft, while the fan does the work of driving you, it's just a little clumsy since waving the leaf turns off the fan. But having shipwrecked and drowned halfway to Eventide Island yesterday, I suspect there's a better way than fan+leaf+sail.
posted by mittens at 5:52 AM on May 25, 2023 [1 favorite]
You can still use the sail/leaf combination to steer your raft, while the fan does the work of driving you, it's just a little clumsy since waving the leaf turns off the fan. But having shipwrecked and drowned halfway to Eventide Island yesterday, I suspect there's a better way than fan+leaf+sail.
posted by mittens at 5:52 AM on May 25, 2023 [1 favorite]
Nintendo have managed to do things with rope physics in the game that have destroyed lesser companies
There was a some scuttlebutt about Naughty Dog's impressive rope physics back in 2020 with TLOU2, and I remembered that specifically the other night while building my umpteenth TOTK Rube Goldberg absurdity which failed spectacularly in a fluidly believable way. It's an incredible technical achievement.
posted by phong3d at 6:53 AM on May 25, 2023
There was a some scuttlebutt about Naughty Dog's impressive rope physics back in 2020 with TLOU2, and I remembered that specifically the other night while building my umpteenth TOTK Rube Goldberg absurdity which failed spectacularly in a fluidly believable way. It's an incredible technical achievement.
posted by phong3d at 6:53 AM on May 25, 2023
horse wrangling isn't that bad.
I discovered, accidentally, that the horses I had in BotW had been transported over from that game so I hadn't bothered getting a new horse yet. Which I was glad about.
posted by Ashwagandha at 9:40 AM on May 25, 2023 [1 favorite]
I discovered, accidentally, that the horses I had in BotW had been transported over from that game so I hadn't bothered getting a new horse yet. Which I was glad about.
posted by Ashwagandha at 9:40 AM on May 25, 2023 [1 favorite]
PSA that last night’s patch (1.1.2) fixes both categories of duping bug, so disable auto-updates if you don’t want to mine 975 Large Zonai ore (or 675 for max energy cell if you’re not planning to upgrade every armor set).
From what I’ve seen so far, “how many rupees is ‘enough’?” = 40~50K (30K for the Enchanted store quest, most of which you eventually get back, plus some additional for Build Your Dream House). Hitting the 89-stack count soft cap with the shield jump glitch once with diamonds should have you covered for the playthrough.
But seriously: you’re looking at something like 300 goblin encampments in the Depths to cap Energy Cell, and that’s a long fuckin’ grind it might be good quality of life choice to glitch past while you still can.
posted by Ryvar at 8:18 AM on May 26, 2023
From what I’ve seen so far, “how many rupees is ‘enough’?” = 40~50K (30K for the Enchanted store quest, most of which you eventually get back, plus some additional for Build Your Dream House). Hitting the 89-stack count soft cap with the shield jump glitch once with diamonds should have you covered for the playthrough.
But seriously: you’re looking at something like 300 goblin encampments in the Depths to cap Energy Cell, and that’s a long fuckin’ grind it might be good quality of life choice to glitch past while you still can.
posted by Ryvar at 8:18 AM on May 26, 2023
Yeah, lucky me I just ended up in a low grav area, so 20-ish dupes per jump is easy peasy. And I assume you mean Large Zonaite when you say Large Zonai ore?
posted by Kyol at 9:57 AM on May 26, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Kyol at 9:57 AM on May 26, 2023 [1 favorite]
Correct. My terminology’s probably a bit off but I wanted to distinguish from the Large Zonai Charges.
posted by Ryvar at 10:13 AM on May 26, 2023
posted by Ryvar at 10:13 AM on May 26, 2023
(Not to discourage anyone playing however they choose, but in case anyone's scared off by the idea of potential grind, there are multiple other ways of getting a whole lot of these resources at once, including at least a few things you can do in the underground that'll give you 100 crystalized charges in one go. There might be exceptions, but I'm pretty sure the whole thing's designed to let you get enough of this stuff through normal exploration and play, though with -- in my experience, at least -- an accelerating curve that makes it seem early on like certain things will be a lot more scarce than they end up being.)
posted by nobody at 11:19 AM on May 26, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by nobody at 11:19 AM on May 26, 2023 [5 favorites]
The engineering feat that's most impressed me thus far is this 2-axis gimbal. It's crazy seeing what players try to solve using "real-world" physics that the engine just... allows for.
Nintendo was so smart in its design of the Zonai constructs. Each one essentially corresponds to one singular mechanical effect. Building vehicles is like writing a formula out of constituent effects. I loooove Minecraft, but even redstone programming/architecture doesn't have this elegant a language for articulating mechanical result.
(And as a guy who was not always fond of BotW's shrines, I've found myself way more enthused this time around. So many of them function to teach you even more cool ways you can combine pieces. It's like the Zelda equivalent of earning credit towards your Ultrahand degree. Or like The Witness, if The Witness didn't constantly cough self-importantly and remind you how intelligent it is.)
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 10:47 AM on May 27, 2023 [2 favorites]
Nintendo was so smart in its design of the Zonai constructs. Each one essentially corresponds to one singular mechanical effect. Building vehicles is like writing a formula out of constituent effects. I loooove Minecraft, but even redstone programming/architecture doesn't have this elegant a language for articulating mechanical result.
(And as a guy who was not always fond of BotW's shrines, I've found myself way more enthused this time around. So many of them function to teach you even more cool ways you can combine pieces. It's like the Zelda equivalent of earning credit towards your Ultrahand degree. Or like The Witness, if The Witness didn't constantly cough self-importantly and remind you how intelligent it is.)
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 10:47 AM on May 27, 2023 [2 favorites]
Surely it's The Clover Gazette
Oh shit, is this a Zelda thing?
posted by BlunderingArtist at 12:45 PM on May 27, 2023
Oh shit, is this a Zelda thing?
posted by BlunderingArtist at 12:45 PM on May 27, 2023
« Older ALIENS CALLING....okay, not really, darn it. | What do I do if I don't like a book at the library... Newer »
This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments
The best and worst thing about Tears of the Kingdom is that its a game that allows so much freedom and choice that you somehow feel plagued by it, but I find myself leaning into the "play & create" mentality far more than I did with BotW.
I feel like BotW was all about exploration and wonder whereas TotK is about creation & spontaneity. And the two are now kind of layered and pulling at each other in really interesting ways.
The other interesting thing about TotK is that I feel like Nintendo has leaned more into story than many other past Zelda games. There are so many more sidequests and NPC interactions that call back to characters we met in the previous game and yet its so easy to miss how they've leaned into this part of their game b/c the gameplay of it all is so distracting and so easy to focus on.
I know I'll get back to the story eventually, but for now, I just want to connect 24 planks to build a bridge across the sky!
posted by Fizz at 5:23 AM on May 24, 2023 [10 favorites]