The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom/YMMV

• Main
• Trivia
• YMMV
• Fridge
• Crowners
  • Heartwarming
• Wikipedia
• All Subpages
• Create New

Given how its reveal was controversial, The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom might just be one of the most divisive games in the series yet.

• Ass Pull: Despite being talked up as a truly horrific transformation that can't ever be undone and a major sacrifice on Zelda's end, her transformation into the Light Dragon is easily undone at the end of the game and Zelda walks away from it as chipper as ever.
• Award Snub: Nominated in five categories of the TGAs of 2023, won one, for best action/adventure game. This obviously generated a lot of attrition between Zelda fanbase and the journalists who voted on the award, since the winner of the main award, Baldur's Gate III, despite critical acclaim, is a very Contested Sequel between fans of the series for questionable humour and what happens towards characters of the first game.
• Base Breaker: While he was more of a gameplay-related Scrappy who was liked for his characterization in Breath of the Wild, Yunobo's a lot more contentious in general here. Fans like him for being a friendly Cowardly Lion who has Taken a Level In Badass since the original game, but his detractors hate him for the crime of not being a confident, manly badass and view him as a whiny coward. And as far as his Sage ability goes, no one can really decide if it's actually one of the more useful ones or one of the more useless ones, not helped by him often being singled out as one of the more uncooperative sages to work with.
• Big Lipped Alligator Moment: The trek to Death Mountain with Yunobo is suddenly interrupted when "Zelda" summons Moragia, a kaiju-sized draconic monster from the volcano's crater. While an imposing threat that can likely be seen all throughout Hyrule, it's easily killed and dies in a minute, with no one commenting on it afterwards. It's such an inconsequential and ultimately pointless fight that Moragia may as well have just been a giant pile of rocks for Yunobo to destroy.
• Breather Boss: Marbled Gohma, whose fighting style is a lot simpler than the other temple bosses. It'll either try to stomp on you with one of its massive legs, or try to blow you up with the giant rocks it summons. Both are slow, heavily telegraphed, and overall easy to avoid.
• Broken Base: Oh yeah.
  • For starters, a question that's plagued this game since we got our first look at its gameplay: does it improve off of Breath of the Wild's mechanics and change things up enough to stand out as its own game, or is it a glorified overpriced DLC? Those in favor of it argue that the Zonai abilities, the sheer amount of constructs you can build and weapons you can fuse, as well as the sky and underground-based exploration do more than enough to give Tears of the Kingdom its own identity, and point out that being a sequel set in the same place, it's natural to look and play very similarly. Those more critical of it however feel that the new mechanics feel less like something genuinely new and unique and more like assets flipped around and repurposed with a shiny new coat of paint (with Ultrahand feeling like Magnesis if you could apply it to non-metal objects, Recall just being an upgraded Stasis...). Likewise, weapon fusion gets criticized for not only adding extra steps to acquiring a better weapon, but for fused weapons often looking ugly due to the mish-mashed parts being fused together. And as for the sky and Depths? Both are criticized for feeling empty and lacking in fun, unique stuff to do.
  • Many were hoping that Zelda would be playable since the first teaser showed her exploring with Link and sporting an Important Haircut that would lend itself well to her taking on a more action-oriented role, and those people were disappointed when it became clear that yet again, she'd be relegated to an NPC role. However, just as many are adamantly opposed to Zelda being playable for a number of factors: they don't think she'd add anything new to table, she could potentially derail the gameplay with a unique playstyle, it's series tradition, or they just don't like her given that this incarnation is quite the Base Breaker.
  • While his return's been well-received overall, Ganondorf's motivation and characterization is subject to quite the debate. Some were disappointed that he's a purely evil psychopath and feel that it makes him feel lacking in characterization, but others like him because of it, feeling that it's true to the character and that attempts to make him more sympathetic would cheapen his long-awaited return. There's a third camp, of course, that agrees with the second, but aren't happy that many lines emphasizing his Social Darwinist nature were lost in translation.
  • Players are fairly united on the opinion that the Sky Islands are underwhelming and repetitive, but opinions on the Depths are where they get a bit more opinionated. Much like the sky, it gets plenty of flack for feeling empty and repetitive. Its defenders however argue the opposite: thanks to Master Kohga's sidequest and the funny and memorable boss fights associated with it, the Yiga Clan hideouts, the fun and surprisingly difficult rematches with the temple bosses, all the rare armor and weapons you can find, the challenge of fighting Malice-tainted enemies, and the various grueling coliseum challenges, there's certainly plenty to do down there as opposed to the Sky Islands. Other positives are its ominous and oppressive atmosphere, as well as all the interesting ways it connects and contrasts with the surface world.
  • The Demon Dragon: Best Boss Ever, or just as big of a disappointment as Dark Beast Ganon? It all depends on if you think the spectacle of the fight is a good trade-off for challenging gameplay or not.
  • The announcement that there are no plans for DLC was met with praise from players who felt that the game already had plenty to do, and that releasing a full game from the offset was a nice show of goodwill from Nintendo. Given how divisive the DLC for Breath of the Wild was, there's also a popular sentiment that this game's DLC would have run into similar problems of overpriced and underwhelming content. However, the opinion that the game doesn't have enough to do is far from unheard of, with people sorely missing challenges like the Trial of the Sword, the fifth Divine Beast, and Master Mode. Others feel that there's plenty of room to expand upon undercooked aspects of the base game such as further developing the sky islands and the Depths, introducing more Zonai Devices, fleshing out the Zonai and the ancient sages, and learning more about the Spirit Dragons and potentially undoing their draconification. Some also feel that potential DLC could give some of the game's wasted characters more to do, such as having Yona take you on a trip to the domain that she hails from, Kass returning to shed new light on the history of the Zonai, and Koume and Kotake running their own schemes to further empower the newly-resurrected Ganondorf.
• Common Knowledge: No, the backstory of this game does not retcon or replace the events of Ocarina of Time despite what many a jilted fan (or merely a confused one) would tell you. There are deliberate parallels and references to Ocarina, but nothing in this game overrides the events of the other.
• Contested Sequel: Depending on who you're talking to, Tears of the Kingdom is either an Even Better Sequel to Breath of the Wild, a big victim of Sequelitis, or an overpriced, glorified DLC.
  • The first camp appreciates the fact that several of the previous game's Scrappy Mechanics have been fixed or mitigated, and enjoy having a far bigger Hyrule to explore thanks to the addition of the Depths and the Sky. The powers given to you by Rauru's hand are beloved for being incredibly flexible and more fun to play with than the Sheikah Slate's runes, with Ultrahand in particular getting a ton of praise for allowing you to experiment with all kinds of fun constructs which allow you to approach exploration, combat, and puzzle-solving in all sorts of unique ways. Also appreciated are the presence of Ganondorf as a deliciously evil and Badass menace as opposed to the Generic Doomsday Villain that was Calamity Ganon, actual party members in the form of the Sages that Link can recruit, and a more hopeful tone that does a good job at showing just how much good Link and Zelda have done for Hyrule after the sheer hell they were put through during Breath of the Wild.
  • The second camp however find the game weighed down by the sheer volume of stuff there is to do, with much of it viewed as repetitive and poorly executed. The Sky and the Depths are often criticized as feeling like empty wastelands lacking in fun things to do and suffer from boring, samey aesthetics. The fact that there are even more shrines to clear and more Koroks to find are likewise a sour spot for people who found them repetitive, tedious, or uninteresting in the first game. Detractors also criticize the Fuse and Ultrahand features as being too clunky and unwieldy for their own good to the point that they drag down the gameplay, with the former requiring you to scroll through agonizingly slow menus to put weapons and Trick Arrows together while the latter often yields results that can be achieved through in more simplistic, yet less-flashy ways. The story has also been criticized for feeling worse than the one in Breath of the Wild due to being rather light on character development, the Zonai-era characters not being as well-fleshed out as they could have been, the backstory generally feeling like a less-interesting abridged version of Ocarina of Time, and the consequences of Zelda's draconification being so easily undone being viewed as a major Ass Pull that robbed her sacrifice of all its impact.
  • The third camp, meanwhile, generally enjoys the new mechanics such as weapon-fusing, construct-building, and the Sage powers, but feel that the game overall doesn't do enough to justify it being a sequel, and one that costs $70 at that.
• Die for Our Ship: Poor sweet Yona developed a small, yet vocal hatedom of angry Yaoi Fangirls practically overnight for daring to be the love of Sidon's life instead of Link.
• Draco in Leather Pants: Somehow, Ganondorf has managed to find himself a pair despite this being one of his most malevolent outings yet. In keeping with Rauru's Ron the Death Eater treatment, a portion of the fandom treats him as a would-be victim of colonization fighting back against an oppressor who hoards powerful magical weapons and tries to threaten him into compliance. The fact that Ganondorf is introduced in the memories as launching an unprovoked attack on Hyrule and shortly afterwards, is shown openly holding Rauru in contempt for being too benevolent and being unwilling to abuse his powers to hurt and kill others tends to be ignored by those people.
• Ensemble Darkhorse:
  • Mineru, Rauru's sister. While her presence in the story is minimal even when you factor in her role as the past AND present Spirit Sage and she's ultimately a glorified Ms. Exposition, her attractive design was a hit with the fandom.
  • While hated by a vocal minority of rabid Yaoi fangirls, Yona is otherwise beloved for being a Cute Monster Girl and an absolute sweetheart to boot.
  • As far as non-character examples go, there's Yunobo's Evil Costume Switch, with its badass luchador mask, leopard-skin vest, and Bling of War. While the mask itself was hypnotizing Yunobo into being evil, fans were still disappointed to see him ditch the ensemble once he returns to his senses.
  • The Light Dragon, Zelda's draconified form. Her mysterious nature, ethereal beauty, role in the final boss fight, and the tragic nature of her backstory has made her a fandom darling to the point that it's far from unheard of for players to wish that Zelda remained stuck as a dragon forever, or at least retained traits from her transformation.
  • While something of a Suspiciously Similar Substitute for Kass, Penn manages to avoid being a Replacement Scrappy due to his interesting chain of sidequests and unique hook as an investigative journalist.
  • Just like in Age of Calamity, Master Kohga totally steals the show once he shows up. Not only is he even funnier than before, but all four of his boss fights are some of the game's funnest and most memorable thanks to all the creative ways he uses his own Zonai Constructs against you.
  • Violynne, the purple-haired violinist of the Stable Trotters, gets a lot of fanboy love for being incredibly pretty.
• Evil Is Cool: Ganondorf's return to the series is a truly glorious one. He's charismatic, Badass, and wonderfully psychotic in the way that he revels in being a vile piece of work. His boss fights are also considered to be some of the best in the series due to being genuinely challenging, yet fun, or in the Demon Dragon's case, an amazing and emotional visual spectacle.
• Evil Is Sexy: Ganondorf. Being a shirtless, musclebound Hunk with a commanding presence and Matt Mercer's menacing, authoritative baritone has led to him attracting hordes of swooning fangirls. And funnily enough, Phantom Ganon has gotten in on this as well, albeit as the imposter Zelda seen causing trouble through most of the game. Zelda's already attractive as is, but when Patricia Summersett's voice takes on a deeper, colder, oddly seductive tone? Woof.
• Game Breaker: Just like Breath of the Wild, there are plenty of tools that can break the game's difficulty wide open. Many of the ones from the previous game are just as potent as before, but as for the new ones...
  • Gibdo Bones are some of the highest damaging monster parts in the game, with the tradeoff being that they break almost instantly meaning that they're Awesome Yet Impractical for fusing with your weapons. But as arrowheads, however? They're some of the best since the durability doesn't mean squat for a one-use projectile. They shred everything you fire them at, especially with a multi-shot bow.
  • Muddlebuds will confuse all non-Lynel enemies caught up in their area of effect, and will cause them to maul each other to death while ignoring you. It's a great way to clear out camps full of dangerous high-level monsters, and finding them's as easy as exploring the Depths for a bit.
  • Another game-breaking plant in the Depths would be the Puffshroom, which sprays a thick cloud of fog that hides you from the enemies caught up in its area of effect. While the confused monsters are trying to get their bearings, you can carve them into ribbons with Sneakstrike after Sneakstrike. The best part is that you can abuse the everloving hell out of these things, and the monsters never catch on to your tricks.
  • Homing Carts are some of the most overpowered of all the Zonai Devices. All you need to do is summon a few carts, stick a couple of emitters on them, and kick back and relax as your army of invincible killer roombas go on the warpath and destroy the monsters that you sic them on.
  • Portable Pots give you access to the game's overpowered cooking mechanics with a single press of a button, anywhere you go. Just keep in mind that they're a one-use item, meaning that you'll need to carry a few at any given time to truly abuse the benefits that they offer you.
• Genius Bonus: Of the five Stable Trotters, Eustace - the French horn player - seems to be the only one whose name is not a reference to his role in the band. Unless, you know enough about religious history to know about Saint Eustace, a 2nd Century Roman saint who is often depicted carrying a horn.
• Goddamned Boss: While not an outright dangerous monster, Mucktorok is an annoying one. His fighting style revolves around running away from you and puking muck all over the ground that you slowly trudge through. If you don't have any Opal Rods, Opal Scepters, or Splash Fruits on hand, get ready for a painfully drawn out boss fight since Sidon's sage ability takes forever to recharge.
• Holy Shit Quotient: During the final boss fight, your jaw is bound to drop when Demon King Ganondorf's health bar starts filling up... and filling up... and filling up until it reaches the very end of the screen.
  • Ditto for when he starts perfect dodging your attacks... which he follows up with Flurry Rushes of his own!
• Like You Would Really Do It: So Zelda's stuck as a mindless, amnesiac, animalistic dragon forever, huh? Yeah right.
• Ron the Death Eater: Rauru (and to a lesser extent, Sonia) has a weird hatebase on Tumblr and Twitter that view him as a selfish, greedy conqueror who strong-armed Hyrule's races into pledging loyalty to him and hoards potent sources of magical power to himself. Of course, this requires you to ignore that he's so ridiculously benevolent and self-sacrificing that it isn't much of a stretch to call him "Zonai Jesus", and that the Sages and the people of Hyrule welcomed him as their king with open arms. And on the topic of his Sacred Stones, he freely shares them with others, only refusing to do so with Ganondorf because he's a murderous asshole who's guilty of every single crime Rauru's hatebase accuses him of committing.
• Superlative Dubbing: The game's English dub is very well-received overall. Highlights including Patricia Summersett having improved a lot as Zelda after her controversial first outing in Breath of the Wild and Matt Mercer pouring his heart and soul into the deliciously evil Ganondorf.
• That One Boss:
  • Just like in Breath of the Wild, the boss of the Gerudo scenario is way tougher than the other storyline bosses. Queen Gibdo is surprisingly agile and hard to hit despite being a gigantic dragon-sized bug, and when she attacks you she hits hard. Her sand tornados are less damaging, but with the tradeoff that she fires them non-stop and when you get hit by them, you're knocked flat on your ass for a while. Oh, and when you get her down to half her health, she'll start summoning hives that spawn endless hordes of Gibdos until you destroy them, and it's all too easy to lose track of her before getting slammed by a bus-sized bug while you're trying to get rid of her babies.
  • Gleeok, unsurprisingly. These guys do a ton of damage with their elemental beam attacks, their heads are tiny and hard to hit (unless you think to attach Keese/Aerocuda eyes to your arrows), and they generate a deadly passive weather effect just from being aggro'd. King Gleeoks are especially awful since each head has its own element, and you can only do so much to protect yourself from a combined assault of fire, ice, and shock attacks. And if that weren't enough, the one in the Depths under the Typhlo Ruins causes Gloom affliction on top of all that! Yipes!
  • If you have played this game, you likely remember exactly where you were the first time you encountered the Gloom Hands, as they are burned into the nightmares of any player who has. With the Wall Masters in Ocarina of Time, you have to hear them before you see them, because if you don’t, they’ll scare the hell out of you; in Twilight Princess, the opposite is true, you’ll see them first, but when you try to fight them, they’re terrifying. These things? You’ll hear and see them all right, but they’re still terrifying. Mostly early in the game, you cannot outrun them, fighting them is almost impossible, so Link’s only recourse is to use the Purah Pad to teleport away. But when you do become skilled enough to fight and defeat them, there’s a cruel twist of fate when you discover they change into a second form, Phantom Ganon. Fortunately, he is not as scary and is easier to deal with.
• That One Sidequest: Gaining and upgrading the Fierce Deity Set is an optional quest that is both long and difficult. Actually getting the set is the easy part; upgrading it, however, is the hard part. First you have to unlock all four of the Great Fairies, which is needed to upgrade armor to begin with, a process that requires mastering the Ultrahand game mechanic and four Escort Missions. Then you need specific materials so the Fairies can upgrade your armor, and for the Fierce Deity set, you need parts from Hinox (15 Toenails, 12 Teeth, 6 Guts), 6 Lynel Guts, and one Fang, Horn, Scale, and Claw apiece from Dinraal, Naydra, and Farosh (the three dragons), and 2,000 Rupees, total. It’s a long, grueling, arduous process, but definitely worth it, as once the Fierce Deity Set is upgraded completely, not even the Final Boss will stand a chance against Link.
• Tier-Induced Scrappy:
  • Mineru, who is unanimously considered to be the weakest Sage and surprisingly unfun to use even though she's a customizable, pilotable mech. Her damage output is terrible if you don't give her any Zonai devices, and when you do, they break so quickly that it barely matters in the long run. Likewise, she moves like she's being suspended through a thick gel, and back-mounted Zonai devices that are supposed to improve her mobility run into the exact same problems as the ones she uses as weapons. And even by the standards of the Sages' inconsistent AI, hers seems to be on a whole different level of awful considering just how rarely she actually attacks if you aren't piloting her. And considering that piloting Mineru basically turns you into a big, slow, meaty target who can't Flurry Rush your enemies, it's not very likely that you'd want to in the first place.
  • Balloons and Wings are considered to be some of the worst Zonai Devices in the game thanks to how quickly they despawn compared to the others. It makes creating flying machines out of them pointless since you can't really get a lot of mileage out of them before they break down, which has led to players gravitating towards less flashy, but more practical ones like the famous "Fan Bike" to explore the skies.
• Tough Act to Follow: Uh, yeah, seeing as this game pretty much had a working title of Breath of the Wild 2 when it was announced. Comparisons of this game to the previous one were unavoidable, given how much a smash hit Breath of the Wild was, most of them covered by the Broken Base examples above. Fortunately, it seems most of the criticism is of the "constructive" type, often focusing on how Tears of the Kingdom could have done even more.
• Ugly Cute:
  • Along with the returning Bokoblins, Moblins, and Lizalfos, we have the newly-introduced Horriblins. While their big, bulbous noses and fat lips give them a grotesque appearance, their ugliness loops back around to a weird cuteness thanks to how goofy they are. They hoot and holler like monkeys, and when they're knocked off the ceilings that they cling to, they cry as they grab their aching buttcheeks for a few seconds.
  • Mucktorok, whose huge eyes and cowardly nature make him an endearingly pathetic little guy.