Make the boomerang an actual item again with similar functions of Wind Waker and Twilight Princess.
Honestly just having this in the game would make me so happy alone! I LOVED the gale boomerang of TP especially! Spirit Tracks had a great mechanic with the ok boomerang too.
More linear storyline. Sorry but with the way how BotW operated it is impossible to implement a fully functional story. It's simply not possible because the gameplay usually dictates you to make everything optional. A good story needs to be linear. It is good for the game which fit its core themes - there is a reason why it is named BREATH OF THE WILD after all - but it doesn't mean that they always have to use this kind of concept for all future Zelda games. It is very unlikely imo. They always used specific and individual core elements for any Zelda game. Hence, it is highly likely that Tears of the Kingdom is story focused, in a more linear way. After all, the player already explored Hyrule, so where is the point of exploring everything again like that? Connect the world with the story and it should already be good enough to have a more valid story.
Completely agree too, I LOVE the carefully crafted, lovingly designed worlds and narratives of the Zelda series, their linearity worked so well in that regard. Semi open world would probs be better like Sonic Frontiers has done, where you have "zones" to unlock and explore and its still a massive world to explore too.
I've always wanted a typical Zelda game but with the biggest, most complex world possible, with all kinds of crazy mechanics to get around the world, interact with it and all kinds of enemies, dungeons and such.
BOTW made some very controversial and signficant changes to the series, some positive ones too ofc but also sacrificed some truly iconic features of the series and thus not for the better either.
That sounds pretty logical about Tears too, I really hope you are right about that, I would love that so much too. Even though I've not played BOTW yet due to some of the design choices made which I HATE, first time I've not wanted to play a Zelda game ever before but this current iteration of Zelda herself, the setting, characters, world and such do really fascinate me and I'd love to see them get the true narrative fulfilment they deserve, with a specifically crafted linear story too.
I was so underwhelmed with what they did to Ganon in BOTW, I love facing him in every game I can and him being part of them so that was a huge let down for me too. I've not kept up with Tears since the initial trailers but that mummified Ganondorf that came to life left me very hyped and intriguied and I'd love to see more of this version of Princess Zelda too.
God knows I just want another OOT, Majoras Mask, Twilight Princess, Wind Waker etc I can only dream how amazing a modern day Zelda with the magnificent creativity of Nintendo would be like and what is possible with current technology.
My general ideas what Tears of the Kingdom could make better than BotW:
- Make the boomerang an actual item again with similar functions of Wind Waker and Twilight Princess. If possible even better. Thus:
- Bringing up more traditional items in general, not just those being similar to the runes. Technically, Nintendo already worked for a lot of traditional items but they had to cut lots of this content. So I see a possibility of these items appearing again, there is a good chance. I mean, Link already used a flamethrower shield on a new enemy.
- Actual dungeons but considering the recent trailer, I believe we might really get 7 amazing traditional dungeons again. Yet again, if possible it could be designed even better (ie. having larger scales than those of Twilight Princess). And please, PLEASE, proper epic dungeon bosses! I will immediately quit this game if I see two individual comparable bosses ever again. Blight ganons are the biggest mistake of the entire game. The sequel definitely needs to fix this or there is one player less playing this game (not that they will care tho).
- Exclusive and individual combat for each weapon. Why don't they use concepts of Twilight Princess combat battle? It baffles me how they threw this amazing gameplay in Skyward Sword away as well. Personally, I'd have liked to have a primary and secondary weapon system; the primary being your sword which is totally unbreakable and the second one the weapons which you're able to collect. Now the next point regarding weapons:
- Weapon durability. With the primary and secondary weapon system, it'd be already handled a lot better than Breath of the Wild considering that Link's weapon of choice is always his sword - that's his signature weapon. It was always like that. Making this or other primary weapon swords unbreakable is a really good start to balance things even further. Just make the secondary weapons more powerful but breakable (with the options of repair and forging your weapons to make weapon crafting). It'd also give players more reasons to invade enemy camps and taking their weapons if these weapons give the player a good advantage in damage output. This was already a huge issue and mistake which BotW - rarely rewarding the player with useful stuff which is worth for the 2 - 3 broken high weapons in your inventory. Besides, with breakable I don't mean the previous durability that of a glass jaw. If you use a precious weapon like the king swords or sth like that, it's utter nonsense to give it a durability of 30x hits. Most enemies later on have high HP and in BotW, you had to waste 2 - 3 for one or two enemies mostly. It broke the flow very often which I hated. And with the blacksmith repairing your weapons, there is also no risk of losing rare weapons with rare stats forever. Where is even the issue in collecting rare weapons? Just make the drop rate for them lower and it should be okay.
- As others mentioned, more enemy varieties. With more battle combat abilities there should be a huge variety of monsters, not just humanoid enemies. I really grew tired of fighting the same bokoblins, moblins and so on with different color. That's just lazy design, nothing more.
- More linear storyline. Sorry but with the way how BotW operated it is impossible to implement a fully functional story. It's simply not possible because the gameplay usually dictates you to make everything optional. A good story needs to be linear. It is good for the game which fit its core themes - there is a reason why it is named BREATH OF THE WILD after all - but it doesn't mean that they always have to use this kind of concept for all future Zelda games. It is very unlikely imo. They always used specific and individual core elements for any Zelda game. Hence, it is highly likely that Tears of the Kingdom is story focused, in a more linear way. After all, the player already explored Hyrule, so where is the point of exploring everything again like that? Connect the world with the story and it should already be good enough to have a more valid story.
- Last but not least, filling up the overworld with more useful content and more memorable places. Don't get me wrong, the game's atmosphere immediately sucked me in and everything was just amazing and beautiful but honestly, that's it. If I remember certain places, it's mostly difficult since there weren't that many special ones. The Lost Woods are the worst version imo. Phirone region had a cool jungle theme but unfortunately, it was also neglected a lot. In the first trailers, I legit thought there was a dungeon but unfortunately, there was just another shrine. I hope this changes in the sequel. Well, it has to change, they had almost 6 years of development.
- Underwater exploration. Do I need to say more? Besides, a cool underwater dungeon/temple like the Ancient Cistern would be also nice.
I hope so too. Apparently, some Zeldatubers already found another new enemy in the trailer which is a rather small dragon.
Overall, I could not have said it better myself, you've said everything I have a gripe with and put forward ideas I would LOVE and have wished for too. I really cannot emphasise how much I appreciate your post!
:cheers:
