When I saw that twig break in Link’s hands, I felt disappointment creeping in immediately. The hated weapon breaking mechanic that had annoyed practically all players of Breath of the Wildwhich more or less we all hoped would disappear in Tears of the Kingdom, it’s still there. Actually, almost everything is still there. The direct sequel to the latest The Legend of Zelda looks so much like its predecessor that you can easily mistake them for each other, at least as long as you are on the ground, “on the surface”. Exact same aesthetic impact, same game interface, apparently not the same world, but at least very familiar.
But then Aonuma, the producer of the series for the past couple of decades, who guided us in this last (presumably) pre-launch gameplay video, begins to explain a new game mechanic, a Link’s new power. What in the Western subtitles of this video has been called “compositor” is in essence the ability to compose weapons with items, or with other weapons, or with consumable resources… Well, basically combine anything with anything else.
The composition does not seem capable of smoothing out the almost objective defects of the breaking of the weapons
And this is how a branch and a rock together become “a kind of hammer”, a stick and a pitchfork make an extremely long weapon with which to attack from a considerable distance, a set of logs and a couple of fans become a motorboat.
Said like this it sounds somewhere between the absurd and the ridiculous, but that’s exactly what we saw. The least appreciated mechanic of the previous chapter – the breaking of weapons – has not been removed, but another one has been added above it – the composition – which does not seem to smooth out the almost objective defects of the first, but goes to mitigate them the extreme “severity” giving the ability to take a sword about to break and breathe new life into it by combining it with… well, literally anything that comes within range, it seems.
ZELDA CRAFTING EASY EXPLAINED
Wanting to go poetic, he emphasizes the same concept of Japanese kintsugi, the art of repairing ceramic objects with gold. The restoration does not hide the signs of breakage, but enhances the new life of the object. Similarly in Tears of the Kingdom we will be able to give weapons new life without restoring them in the classic sensewithout hiding the composition we had to do.
The next Zelda seems to take up the concept of Japanese kintsugi: the restoration does not hide the signs of breakage, but enhances the new life of the object
Then, from this idea of assembling weapons to prevent them from breaking, a light bulb must have gone on for Nintendo’s game designers. “Yes, let them do what they like, let them indulge themselves, encourage them by showing them that we have made a flying raft out of four scrap pieces, or a sort of wooden car, or a sort of hot air balloon, or a mushroom shield. ”. So much then, as already happened in the first chapter, it will be the players who invent the most absurd and ingenious ways to exploit the tools at their disposal.
In an instant what was supposed to be a mechanic linked to weapons and their wear, aimed at solving one of the most often complained problems of the previous chapter, has become a playful tool that continues the philosophy of freedom of action and experimentation that underlies this “new course” of The Legend of Zelda. At the same time, those strange machines that we had seen Link use in previous trailers, which we thought were built with recipes and materials, will instead be built in the simplest possible way: take the pieces and put them together, however you want.
The next Zelda seems to want to demonstrate how much this series continues to experiment with tools and thus to amaze, making a virtue of necessity
It will probably remain a mystery whether the design process that led to leaving the weapon breaking mechanics completely identical, and from there to building combined weapons first and then incredible automatons. What is certain is the new Zelda upon us, which in appearance is very similar – needless to deny it – to Breath of the Wild, seems to want to demonstrate how much the series continues to experiment with tools and thus amaze, making a virtue of necessity. And even where it would probably have been enough to remove or refine a mechanic, they preferred to play and let people play.
And perhaps the beauty of this more than thirty-year saga it’s all here.
