Six years ago the Nintendo Switch launched with what could only be considered one of the greatest videogames ever made Breath of the Wild.

This year we got gifted a glorious sequel which some how managed to to give us an ever better experience that expanded upon the original.

It’s no surprise that TOTK is easily one of the best games of 2023 but the question is why?

Years after the events of BOTW princess Zelda and her personal guard Link are exploring an underground cavern which has been corrupted by a poisonous substance known as gloom.

At the end of the cave is a rotting corpse of Ganondorf a Demon King from an ancient war.

The Corpse comes to life and uses the power of Gloom to destroy the legendary master sword, severely damaging Links right arm and almost killing him in the process.

Princess Zelda falls further into the depths beneath Hyrule Castle and link is rescued by an ancient disembodied arm which replaces his own right arm giving Link access to new abilities.

After awakening in the sky kingdom Link dives back into the world of Hyrule ready for a new adventure and to save Princess Zelda once again.

BOTW was developed to give the player unlimited possibilities about how they played the game, you could go anywhere from the very beginning.

TOTK takes what Nintendo did back in 2017 and somehow manages to triple it pushing the system to its absolute limits and giving us 3 entire worlds to explore Land, Sky and the Depths.

The world’s are massive and full of immersive and memorable content.

Starting with the land being where you will likely spend most of the your game time.

The land of Hyrule is the same basic layout we got in BOTW but this time is further expanded and has many significant changes to suit the new abilities and gameplay variants that came with this sequel.

I can best describe land gameplay as the Dark Souls of Nintendo. You start off weak and with no weapons, even the most basic of creatures can kill you with only one a couple of hits. After the opening area and tutorial you are left to play the game however you want.

You can freely explore the map and have little direction on where you can go or even where you should go.

The world of Hyrule is dangerous and you the player feel lost and unsure about how to start tackling it. One wrong move and you can find yourself running into giant monsters and secret mini bosses, being overwhelmed by enemy forces and hit with difficulty barriers that in most games would be off putting.

The beauty of TOTK is that during these moments you are free to simply go and explore somewhere else, go through caves, climb towers to unlock more of the map, complete quests, capture wild horses and most importantly conquer the hidden shrines.

The shrines are basically small puzzle dungeons that each offer a challenge based on one of Links unique abilities (more on those later)

Finishing a shrine will award that player an orb of light, you can donate every four of these you collect to shrine statues hidden throughout the game to upgrade either your health or your stamina allowing you to have a better chance of surviving those more difficult areas.

Another really important thing to consider is creating meals and elixers in order to recover hearts and enhance your resistance to certain elements, there are hundreds of variants you can create using the many ingredients and monster parts you collect in the game but the best recipes involve meat and fish allowing you to get the most out of heart recovery.

I actually have the cook book from BOTW it was a Xmas gift from my brother it’s custom made and generally a very cool collectors item let me know if you want to see me make and review some of these recipes in the future !

Side quests are of course one of the best parts of the game and are a nice distraction from all of the exploration you will be doing, always bringing a narrative as you progress through the main campaign.

AI in the game are much more immersive this time around commenting on in-game events as the main campaign progresses and the story moves forward.

You once again get a house but this time you actually get to fully create the thing including the layout. I never really got into this but I know a lot of players really enjoyed having a part of the game that was solely unique to themselves.

Modifications can also be made to your outfits by visiting great fairies who can increase defence and elemental resistance by offering them specific ingredients you collect throughout the game.

Horses can now be modified with the new stable points system, everyone you coat a stable you get one point and over time this will unlock rewards such as new saddles and other enhancements.

With its fully immersive map, challenging mini bosses and an entire world to explore full of secrets and other goodies the Land of Hyrule was for me the best part of TOTK but that doesn’t mean that the other tiers didn’t have anything special to offer as well.

The Sky was in my opinion a little underwhelming especially compared to the rest of the game as it is the smallest area but there is still plenty to uncover in regards to exploration, some hidden shrines are up here and certain quests to rely on the sky area for completion such as finding the slabs with ancient hyrulian text and of course the Sky Labyrinths which are connected to the on Land variant as well as the boss battle that follows ok the depths. The sky is also where you can find the majority of sundelions a flower which when used in recipes can give Link gloom resistance.

The Sky is also where you can use your new build ability to create useful flying machines but again more on this later on.

Finally let’s talk about Nintendo biggest kept secret in regards to this games development. the Depths!

So the Depths is basically an entire new map the exact the same size as the land.

When players enter the Depths they are surrounded by complete darkness, there is every eating gloom everywhere and enemies creeping through the pitch black and eerie atmosphere.

At first the Depths may seem almost empty when it comes to new discoveries but in reality it’s where you come across not only important plot content Including master Khoga and the impressive auto build ability but also fantastic outfits celebrating the legacy of past games. This is of course a massive celebration and some great nostalgia for fans of the series.

From speaking with a lot of gamers the depths is often considered the best part of the game and holds the most hidden secrets, unfortunately for me I just really couldn’t get on very well with depths, I found navigating the vast area really frustrating mostly due to high cliffs across the map blocking me off from reaching certain treasures, having multiple entry points and not much indication on the best ones to use for specific goals only added more complications for myself. But as I said I think this is more of a me issue as most players loved the depths so take my opinion on this with a pinch of salt as you very well may feel much different than I did.

Due to Links new hand a whole range of special abilities are available to help him on his quest through the layers of Hyrule, these all come in very handy especially when taking on the many shrine puzzles, my most useful ability was Ascend, originally staring out as a developers tool but later added into the game for players ease, you can now easily travel up through surfaces to reach higher platforms, this came in specifically useful for quickly exiting caves.

Other abilities include rewinding time, combining items to weapons in order to enhance and power them up, build is the first and most needed ability using this Link can pick up items and combine them to build structures and vehicles, early on this is pretty limited but in the late game creativity is encouraged and basically if you spend enough time you could build anything, it is really fun to build a motor vehicle and race throughout Hyrule providing you have enough battery power that is.

Fuse made the weapons last longer but also increased strength and was able to use elements to give us more damage against specific enemies, Fuse could also be used on your arrows and shields giving players plenty of ways to defeat difficult enemies and mini bosses.

Puzzles can now be solved in many different ways taking a whole new direction from the usual linear solutions we are used too from the past, with the new abilities and build mechanics this is truly the first Zelda game that can be played in anyway you wish, there is no correct way to do it making the players adventure much more personal and memorable.

TOTK is definitely an ambitious game when it comes to things to do and areas to explore, many players may even find it overwhelming, the beauty of the two most recent Zelda entries BOTW and TOTK is that you are encouraged to play and explore how ever you want too, with this is mind it should be noted that the game basically leaves you to discover areas and commit to your journey with very little guidance. It gives players a real sense of adventure and independence being able to commit to this in many different ways but on the flip side can also be frustrating and difficult if you prefer more linear videogames such as the Zelda home console games released between Ocarina of Time and Skyward Sword.

In between side quests and Korok hunting it is still really satisfying and fun to capture horses and register them at the stables, stables have had a big upgrade here now offering multiple side quests and also unlockable upgrades for your horses including new saddles, hairstyles and other improvements.

Visually the game is absolutely gorgeous and really pushes the Nintendo Switch to its limits, it stills uses the anime inspired look from BOTW but enhances the colours and has a lot more details shown on weapons and armour.

TOTK makes many smaller improvements such as its use of shadows and water physics being a little more realistic on top of that a higher frame rate and faster loading times are extremely impressive in a game of this size.

The music is just as memorising and beautiful as before, orchestrated to perfectly suit the games fantasy setting and the sense of adventuring across the vast and dangerous world that is infected with gloom. Manaka Takaoka returned to compose the soundtrack for the game and they did an outstanding job of using music and sounds to bring so much more character and immersion to the games setting.

It’s really difficult to cover everything the game has to offer because there is just so much content here, I have only just managed to finish the immensely challenging final boss fight and haven’t got 100 percent completion with a final time of 150 hours! I feel I’ve barely even scratched the surface with exploration and finding secrets I’ve sunk so much time into the game but there is still so much more for me to discover, that alone should speak for itself in regards to replay-ability.

I only really have one true complaint with the game and that’s the sages. After finishing temples you get a companion which joins you for the remaining adventure, they each have a unique power so are useful during particularly complex battles. My issue was that it was rather difficult getting them to actually activate , they move around a lot and you have to get close in order to trigger them, if you take a hit while activated you got to start process over again. A simple fix would be to simply call upon them to activate perhaps from the character menu or with a controller shortcut, a nitpick for sure but still frustrating to say the least.

What else can I say about Tears of the Kingdom other than you need to play it!

Not only is this easily the best Zelda game ever made but I would argue it may be one of the most ambitious and well made video games of all time.

5 years ago we thought Breath of the Wild was going to be hard to top but we have been proven wrong.

What I would like to see in a future installment would be a new location and setting, Improved navigation for and mapping for the depths and easier use of the sages.

When it comes to rating it’s been quite difficult for me, so many call this game flawless but I did manage to find some issues even if they were somewhat personal.

The sages definitely needs work and I think many would actually agree if they played the game so we will keep that criticism.

The Depths is an area I didn’t enjoy, it was too empty and I found it frustrating to navigate due to how dark it was, I felt lost and with very little guidance but when you think about it that is the whole point of the depths.

I agree that I think me not enjoying the area is definitely a me issue than anything to do with game design or quality and most people I know it’s their favourite part of the game so I’m going to accept it for what it is.

With all that said and done I’m going to give a final rating of 9.9/10 for what is an almost flawless video game that came feel a little overwhelming at times but if you keep at it you are almost guaranteed to absolutely fall in love with it, I can’t wait to see what Nintendo does with the next major installment!

In the mean time there are still more of the older games in the series to cover and next up the Spirit Tracks so look forward to that when I get around to it!

If you would like to help support the website please use the donation button at the top of the page, your donations will help to improve the website by allowing me to afford products to review and to be able to execute any costly updates and changes, any amount in donations are welcome.

Thank You for all of your support.

Want me to review a specific game/movie/product or do you have a general question you would like me to answer? if so please email me at ragglefragglereviews@gmail.com