Game – The Legend of Zelda - Breath of the Wild [Wii U - Cemu]

Games Nov 22, 2019

Time to complete – Unknown

No time counter through Cemu when I first started the game. When I came back to it, there was one built in, clocked in at 53 hours. In this time, completed all 90 side quests, couple main quests and about 20 shrines.

Guessing the amount of time put in initially was ~75 hours. Overall time spent to complete includes all DLC with amibo rng drops is ~128. ~~refuse to collect the carrot seeds for the golden shit so not a true 100%, more like 95+% lol~~

The Main Game:

Main story of Breath of the Wild [BotW] is Princess Zelda has been captured again but this time around they do a time skip so that leads us to the awakening of the main character we play as Link or Linkle with the mod hehe.

The entire premise of the story is a simple one, either take Ganon head on the moment you awaken or recruit some old acquaintances that you can learn about through quests which will also unlock special abilities. These abilities both help with taking on Ganon or around the world map doing various tasks.

Everything is optional except the inevitable fight against Ganon. Once he is defeated the game is over and resets back before he was beaten so that you can finish up anything else that was potentially missed or forgotten. This is typical for a lot of JRPG or RPG games in general.

Shrines and Side Quests:

All of the shrines felt unique to an extent. The layouts have a similar vibe to them which is good but the trials inside them or around them do not feel repetitive and offer a wide variety of tasks. Main shrines that could feel repetitive is when there is a single enemy to beat. These ones are not too difficult and stand as more of a test of how well the player is adept with the controls and usage of environment.

Shrines all had the same look due to the background behind them. Some of the trials that should have been very easy… due to the cemu version I was using in early 2018 made it quite cancerous to say the least. Motion controls with a mouse by having the scroll wheel the Z axis… the nightmares and hours spent on trying to flip the ball from one spot to the other. Current version of Cemu 3^rdquarter 2019 have gotten way better but can still be pretty bad, especially for those with notched scroll wheels. Getting it into the perfect position with the notches is at times near impossible.

Most creative alternative was maneuvering the platform just right so the ball bounced and I flicked the mouse to 180 the platform so the ball was on top… then having the ball flow down, bounce it up and swing the platform as if it was some shit version of T-ball worked quite well… after the nth time of failing. Or having the platform set so that when you interact, and it resets it will hit the ball just right into the area needed. If this sounds fun, welcome to probably 10 shrines or situations like this lol. It is way more doable with the current version of the controls than the old ones though but still :salute:

Sound and Visuals:

Onto the more lackluster parts of the game, the sound. Sound effects are not the problem since they are spot on and never felt they were out of place or sounded bad. Sound effects are solid. It is the OST as a whole. A lot of time there is nothing playing when you are exploring this vast empty world. It could be considered symbolic for how Link doesn’t remember the past or who he is ect but that is quite the stretch and cop out for what should be there. If that was the case the closer you got to beating the game quest wise should have expanded the OST but it didn’t.

Even in cutscenes the OST’s felt out of place at times and didn’t really give the player a very immersive feeling. 99% of the time I just ended up throwing on some tunes in the background… didn’t have to mute the games personal music volume since it is rarely there to begin with. It is a very quiet game, even when outside of main quests. Some may like this, but those some are the people who would mute for their own music or silence to begin with.

The visuals overall are very well done. Especially when considering this was crafted for the Wii U and not Switch. Textures and map size itself is huge. Zoom into the grass and each piece may not be realistic texture but that wasn’t what the game went for. There is detail everywhere with life buzzing all around from little crickets to butterflies and enemies popping out of sometimes nowhere. Simply going to the top of any hill or mountain in the game will suffice the player when looking around since there are plenty of opportunities for background quality pics. Its simply put a beautiful world that has been created and with the next iteration of BotW being created and to be on the switch solely, can’t wait to see what this engine is capable of generating without the constraints of Wii U. ~~not that the Wii U is a bad system, but comparing it to the Switch and there is a league difference in power/performance~~

Main thing that was bad is the character models. They are too blobbed down and lack the same quality of detail that the world around it had. There is reason for it but its something to point out. With better character models that meld with the world better there would be no downsides to the style that was taken for the game.

Overall and Final Thoughts:

BotW is a very enjoyable game that one can sink easily 100+ hours into. There is a lot to do and a lot of fun that one can create on their own. From just fighting random mobs or trying to level up all equipment to even collecting and taking pictures of all the various items to complete the optional nock off pokemon esque collection log. ~~log is useful for finding materials at times ngl, but there is also google which is a lot faster and more efficient hehe~~

The main character Link is pretty bland and with a mute character it is a lot harder to craft them into something people care about but it can be done. Same goes with the sub characters, they are interesting but that’s about as far as they get. They are better than the main man link but that isn’t saying much. They have their own distinct personalities and history one can learn but for me there was no emotional connection. Didn’t even feel as if they cared to get the person emotionally attached in any way to the story. The game focused mainly on the world and gameplay and in that aspect its an amazing game. Having all the focus on one aspect though takes its toll on the rest.

Many claim this to be a perfect game but a perfect game to me is something that brings forth a story that gets the player immersed and truly caring for the characters involved with a strong sense of care for the characters involved. Throughout the entirety of the game, the characters are what I cared least for though. They are not bad characters just nowhere near good or great. Characters need to be fleshed out and better than `good enough`.

I would highly recommend the game to any interested in an open world exploration game with great combat and lots of content to complete. Don’t look for a great story though since the story that is here is not the focus, the focus is about the world and gameplay around how you interact with it.

Characters (main) – 3/5
Characters (sub) – 3.5/5
Enjoyment - 5/5
Gameplay – 5/5
Visuals – 4/5
Music – 2/5
Story – 3/5