The Legend of Zelda: Tears of The Kingdom, the 20th installment in the Legend of Zelda series and the direct sequel to Breath of the Wild, is an open-world adventure RPG developed by Nintendo for the Switch. It is made for fans of Zelda games who are invested in the game’s lore and mechanics. Many of the mechanics, such as cooking, climbing, combat, item durability, and inventory management, and many of the characters, such as Zelda, Ganon, and Rauru carry over from previous games, especially Breath of the Wild. It is also appealing to players who like games with room for creativity and expression, as Link’s various abilities allow the player to traverse the world and solve puzzles in many different ways. However, Tears of the Kingdom falls short in its worldbuilding. It attempts to invite the player to care about its world by appealing to lore and characters from previous Zelda games, and evoking a sense of wonder through the magical imagery, lands, and abilities of the Zonai people, but ends up causing frustration by relying too heavily on previous Zelda games, interrupting the player’s flow, and not allowing the player to experience the story through their own agency.
Firstly, the prologue of the game consists of heavily railroaded exposition in the form of exploring beneath Hyrule Castle with Zelda. This exposition takes the form of threats to people of Hyrule Kingdom. However, the player only hears about the gloom harming people secondhand; we never actually see the effects of the gloom ourselves. We also hear from talking to Zelda that her father strictly forbade her from exploring under Hyrule Castle. This is somewhat more interesting, but it lacks some significance to the player, because they are already under the castle when the game begins; The player doesn’t have the agency to choose to explore under the castle, and doesn’t have any reason to do so other than the fact that Zelda is dragging them along. Lastly, Zelda uncovers murals of a mythical war between the Zonai and the Demon King. Truthfully, by this point, I was extremely annoyed with Zelda constantly interrupting my progress with random dialogue, so I skipped this cutscene.
This takes us to our second problem, which is that the epilogue does not let the player get into the flow state because of how quickly it alternates between following zelda, dialogue, and cutscenes. After having watched a playthrough, the cutscene is actually somewhat compelling, and the imagery on the murals combined with Zelda’s voice acting is emotionally effective, but the constant starting and stopping of dialogue and being required to follow Zelda in the start makes players, especially those who aren’t already familiar with Hyrule’s lore, likely to skip longer dialogue. In Razbuten’s video, “What Tears of the Kingdom is Like For Someone Who Doesn’t Really Play Games”, their wife is similarly frustrated, remarking, “Am I gonna get stopped by her everytime? Oh my God” (2:50). The player doesn’t get to move around and experience the space at their own pace. This lack of agency is also reflected through the game constraints, because the player is not allowed to leave the space. If they try to go to the entrance of the cave to see where they came from, Zelda stops them. These constraints are required to limit the scope of the game, but they are not integrated into the story; rather, they’re tacked on to prevent the player from investigating the world on their own terms. Similarly, when reaching the lowest room where the big bad evil guy is, Zelda asks the player if they’d like to continue, presenting a false choice. If the player says no, there isn’t anywhere else for them to go or discover, and Zelda just waits until the player comes back and says yes to get on with progressing the story.
[Zelda explaining that the gloom coming from the caverns has been harming the people of Hyrule]
[Zelda revealing that the area beneath Hyrule Castle is forbidden–exciting! And mysterious…]
[Razbuten’s wife complaining about Zelda’s dialogue interruptions]
[Zelda stops the player, forcing them to follow her and her unrelenting dialogue]
[Zelda asks the player if they’d like to continue, but the player cannot progress the game until they say yes]
As a designer, I feel that the introduction to this game could be improved by giving the player a first hand experience of the hero’s “call to action”. For example, in Hollow Knight, the player does not begin underground being asked to find missing villagers. Rather, they begin in a tutorial area, where they can grasp the controls, read runes on the wall themselves. Then, they land in an empty town, where they see for themselves the absence of life, before they encounter the Elderbug, who tells them that villagers have gone missing in the tunnels below. This introduction provides the players with much more agency of movement and personal involvement in story beats. Players can read the runes and dialogue as fast or as slow as they please, without having to wait for dialogue to finish playing. The Elderbug is also always there, allowing players to come back and speak to it throughout the game as the world changes, unlike in Zelda, where Link doesn’t get to interact with Zelda after the prologue. This kind of introduction gives the player freedom to explore the world and see the conflict for themselves, before delving into the tunnels below.
Furthermore, Hollow Knight does much of the storytelling through the environment. Which gives the game arcs some time to breathe between each other. Rather than stopping the player’s movement to provide exposition through dialogue, the player walks by runes that glow as they pass in front, or a town full of lonely buildings with the lights off. This kind of exposition breaks up gameplay into longer arcs and loops. The player gets to move about, jump, and fight enemies–actually play–while experiencing the sad emptiness and mysteriousness themselves. They are stopped in their tracks by dialogue only occasionally and always at their own pace, which keeps them in a flow state.
[in Hollow Knight, the player can read runes themselves]
[the player can see the village of Dirtmouth firsthand. They can choose to speak to Elderbug whenever they please]
The game also invites the player to care about the world by evoking a sense of mythological wonder in the Great Sky Islands and the magical abilities of the Zonai people. However, it often does so through a questionable and one-dimensional depiction of them. Several of the identifying styles of the Zonai people draw on stereotypes about indigenous Mesoamerican art, such as the runes on the buildings in sky island, depictions of Quetzalcoatl-like figures at the entrance of the “Ukouh Shrine”, and the murals that Zelda finds beneath Hyrule Castle. These characteristics serve to make the Zonai people seem ancient, mystical, and other. In doing so, they exoticize real world cultures with similar iconography. Tears of the Kingdom fails to truly imagine a civilization that isn’t a projection of real-world stereotypes. Hollow Knight, again, does a better job of this by depicting an entirely non-human civilization. Hollow Knight still creates a sense of wonder through musical elements, bug-shaped runes, and a wide cast of characters to speak to along the journey.
[stone figures outside the “Ukouh Shrine”]
[a depiction of Quetzalcoatl, the Mayan god of wind]
[murals under Hyrule Castle]
[mural depicting Quetzalcoatl]
[note the bug shaped statue, which draws loosely on sacred statues/totems/icons from may traditions, but has entirely original in-universe]
[other characters, who the character repeatedly encounter, whose dialogue create emotion and provide information about the world]
Overall, Tears of the Kingdom relies heavily on an enacted narrative that depends on familiarity with the Zelda universe, which made me feel very left out as a first time Zelda-series player. I felt that I was constantly interrupted, both in the prologue and by several appearances of Rauru, which prevented me from entering a flow state. I couldn’t really explore the world before Zelda was taken by Ganon, so I have no attachment to whatever I’m fighting for. The Great Sky Islands were a beautiful setting, but the appearance of the Zonai shrines broke my immersion. Ultimately, I think I would have been far more invested in the game if it had begun with me in the Great Sky Islands, with the option of reading the murals that Zelda saw scattered throughout the islands.
