What am I going to do? Not give this game 5 stars?!?!
Where do I start? I guess I will start by saying that The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is the first Zelda game I ever played (which is tragic!). It is also the first open world, free roam game I have ever played.
Music stands out to me more than anything else in a game. We associate our favorite music with our strongest emotions. This is why my favorite childhood game is โSmash Bros. Brawlโ (I didnโt play Melee. Get over it.) That being said, the MUSIC in this game is ASTONISHING. No detail left out. And itโs better with Bluetooth! Hyrule Castle, Gerudo Town, inside Vah Naboris, the theme that plays when youโre at the tops of mountains not in the Hebra, the battle theme, the ever-so-relaxing theme of the northern most places of the world near Hebra Peak, the mysterious vibe of the Lost Woods, and of course the awe-inspiring glory of โDawn of Twilightโ when Link receives the fully upgraded Master Sword after completing โThe Trial of the Swordโ (or is it the main theme?). I could go onโฆ..oh yeah, the last 40 seconds of the end credits is my alarm that I wake up to every morning.
Moving onโฆ..The plotline is pretty basic. No problem with that. The adventure is REAL. Itโs free roam, so I can go wherever I want when I want. I can find all sorts of things from weapons, to opals, to sticks, to mushrooms. Nothing is repeated. You fight monsters along the way. These monsters are not easy to kill at first either. Weapons break after a while, so you have to be slightly strategic in how you use them. All this on your way to one of four major plot points: the Divine Beasts. I played Twilight Princess after BOTW and while it was very good, I didnโt really like the dungeons. They were too long in my opinion. The dungeons in BOTW are simple and short (especially as you replay the game). I am inside the Divine Beast long enough to admire the Beast and enjoy the music but not so long to get tired, bored, or frustrated with it.
It takes FOREVER to get from one Divine Beast to another, especially if you donโt know what youโre doing. You will get lost for hours on end exploring without even realizing it. But what makes this possible is the next most important part of this game for me: no detail or pixel is wasted. I have played through this game start to finish about 15 times and I have looked almost everywhere. There are VERY few places where there is just nothing to do or see. Even the sides of Death Mountain, though red and baren from a distance, are covered in various flowers like Swift Violet and pigeons.
Ultimately this game sparks my need for adventure. Stand atop any mountain and just look over this glorious continent filled with things I am willing to bet no one that has left a review here has found. Which leads to my last point: that you will NEVER find everything there is to find. Again, I have played this 15 times and I find something new every single time. Brilliant. Masterpiece. Glorious.