The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom: Difference between revisions

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom is the 20th main entry in The Legend of Zelda franchise, the 7th fully 3D installment, and the direct sequel to The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. It was released on Nintendo Switch on May 12, 2023, after being pushed back two years due to the COVID-19 outbreak.

Several years ago (in Breath of the Wild), Zelda’s loyal guardian and retainer Link woke from a hundred-year slumber, having healed from Calamity Ganon’s onslaught a century ago. Finding Hyrule in shambles with Zelda locked in a continual battle with the villain, he sought out to find and release the souls of his old allies while fighting Ganon’s dark minions in the ravaged land of Hyrule, before finally confronting and slaying the beast in an epic battle.

With hope among citizens finally restored and Zelda resuming her role as ruler, Hyrule has started to heal and rebuild, regaining a semblance of its former majesty.

But evil has a tendency to return… And it seems this time, it never left

Picking up several years after the destruction of Calamity Ganon reconstruction efforts are disrupted when a strange dark substance called "the Gloom" starts seeping up from the deepest depths of Hyrule, causing those who touch it to lose their strength and vitality. Delving into the depths beneath Hyrule Castle, Link and Zelda discover the ruins of a civilization called the Zonai, a people believed to hold divine power who ruled Hyrule ten-thousand years ago. Delving further, they find the cause of the Gloom, a tomb - or rather, a prison - holding the decayed but still-living body of Ganondorf, an ancient Gerudo King who sought to conquer Hyrule and remake the kingdom in his own image, only to be defeated by the King of the Zonai and sealed in this crypt through the efforts of the Seven Sages. But the seal keeping him in this state has slowly been weakening over the last ten millennia, his vile power leaking onto Hyrule, creating monstrosities like the Calamity and the Gloom to spawn from his bottomless well of Hate. As Zelda and Link enter, the seal holding Ganondorf is undone - part of a long-term plan put in place by his jailers, in hope the two heroes would destroy him once and for all… But it all goes horribly wrong.

With only this, the near-useless Master Sword and what remains of the clothes on his back, Link must learn the secrets of the Zonai, rebuild his arsenal, and face Ganondof’s dark minions in order to put a stop to Ganondorf's millennia old ambitions once more. But above all, he must find Zelda!

Like the previous game, Tears of the Kingdom is a Survival Sandbox game, with more emphasis this time on the Wide-Open Sandbox element, with not only an altered world map, but two new places to explore; the mysterious Sky Islands that have emerged above Hyrule, and the dark, Gloom-infested cavernous Depths down below. In addition, there is focus on Item Crafting, where Link manipulates physical objects and the miraculous technology of the Zonai with new game mechanics: Fuse, which can weld objects to Link's weapons, shields, and arrows to strengthen them and imbue them with special properties, and Ultrahand, which can pick objects up bind them together to create a wide variety of structures and devices, simple bridges to elaborate flying machines.

* [[100% Adoration Rating]]: You won't find many Hyrulian citizens with a bad word to say about Zelda. It does seem she has been very active during the Time Skip volunteering her time and spending an impressive amount of funds and resources into the building that rule. Fortunately, it's also leads to a great deal of [[Undying Loyalty]] among the citizenry, never questioning her orders (and often misinterpreting them) and easily falling for the imposter Zelda.