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Game Ramblings #195 – The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom

More Info from Nintendo

  • Genre: Action/Adventure
  • Platform: Switch

The big thing that came out of the pre-release press for this was obviously that you get to play as Zelda for a change. However, beyond it being set dressing that didn’t really make a huge difference to the feel of the game. What did was the core hook for the game – that instead of swinging a sword around (technically, kinda sorta….) you get to make copies of things that do the fighting for you. What you end up getting out of that is a 2D Zelda that feels like it’s Link’s Awakening by way of Tears of the Kingdom, and boy is it a lot of fun.

The thing that made this game work for me so well was the little moments. It’s the same thing that really worked for me about Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom. Sure, the core loop is still fun and classic Zelda – go to a general location, puzzle your way through a dungeon, get a heart container and a shiny upgrade – but the little moments within that are magic.

That screenshot up there is one of those moments for me. You gain nearly immediate access to spawn echoes – copies of things you’ve found or defeated in the world – so my initial instinct for combat was “lol army of bats”. And that is a perfectly valid way to play the game. However, you get to flying things that bats are simply not good against; they’re simply too fast. One of the other powers that you get is the ability to lock onto objects that move and pull or follow them around. They don’t explicitly teach you use it as a combat mechanic, but in typical confounding Nintendo fashion they put the mechanic in front of you so often that eventually it just clicks. I ran into these birds and they were just obnoxious to me because they were fast and swarming, so I locked one down to just stop it for a breather. That’s when the light bulb went off. Lock it down and send an army of whatever after it since it can’t move. And it just works.

Those little moments happen all over. Large gap that you need to clear but is too far to jump? Well, you can use an echo of a classic 2D Zelda flying tile. Or you can build a bridge of beds. Or you can grab a bird echo and float over the gap. Or you can make a chain of spider echoes and climb on their webs. Or you can create a chain of water blocks to swim across it. Swarm of enemies about to attack hiding in grass? Well, you can use your Link transformation and fight them directly. Or you can send a pack of wolves to fight them. Or you can set the grass on fire to kill them. Or you can trap them in water blocks and drown them. Or you can create an elevator block and simply go over the top of them. Need to move a block onto a switch behind a fence? Well, you can use your attachment power and push it along. Or you can use a fan to move it. Or you can create an unnecessarily complicated stack of objects to knock something else onto the switch. Or you can spawn an Armos to path onto it.

If this sounds very much like a “play it your way”, that’s because it is. What I ended up finding the most fun was nearly entirely avoiding using the Link copy powers and focusing entirely on spawning echoes in weird fashions to get through the game. Even on the last fight I went in this direction. My focus there was on spawning echoes to fight for me and avoiding damage, making the experience a defensive dance in minimizing health loss. The game is basically a tool set for you to screw around and find solutions where the end result as a player is laughing because your absurd idea actually worked. In that way, it feels exactly like the building toolset in Tears of the Kingdom.

However, all of these options really gets into what keeps this game in simply “very good” category than being truly great. The UX around selecting your echoes is miserable. The entire selection process is being presented with an enormous growing list of echoes, at least 75% of which are completely useless by end game, and a few basic sorting options (most used, recently used, recently found, category, ….and one I’m forgetting). Finding an echo you haven’t used in a while is a needle in a haystack and there’s really no reason this couldn’t have been at least minimized.

One option they could have taken? Simply reduce the list as the game went on. There’s a whole bunch of spots where you get level 1, 2, 3 variations of the same general monster (ex: Spear Moblin). When you first get the echo, it totally makes sense that they both exist as the newer one is stronger and costs more to spawn. However, one of the upgrades you get throughout the game reduces the spawn cost of specific echoes. Once the level N and N+1 match, there’s no reason that the lower one couldn’t simply be removed from the list entirely.

Another option they could have taken? JUST LET ME TURN OFF SOME ECHOES. There are just so many things you can spawn here, and a lot of them I never found a good way to work into my combat experience. I get that there would probably be some hesitancy that the player would turn off something important to progression, but at the same time Nintendo has shown in the past that they are incredibly capable of tutorializing important things in ways that remind the player that “hey this is important”. But 4 beds? I don’t need 4 beds. I don’t need the 8 or 9 types of moblins that I found. I certainly don’t need the 5 or 6 statues that I found beyond the one dungeon where they were a mechanic.

The game really just ultimately suffers a bit from too many choices that don’t have any impact, and cleaning that up would oddly enough have really elevated the experience, as digging through menus for the thing you want at any specific time is really a grating experience.

That said, the game was still an absolute joy. It’s both a path forward for the 2D entries in the series in terms of overall quality and a great title on its own. It shows that Zelda games can still be full of action without necessarily requiring a sword. It shows that there’s still legs in dungeon-focused experiences instead of an open world. I suppose it also shows that Zelda can be a star on her own, though I’ve never really been convinced that Link being the hero really matters beyond it being set dressing. It’s the perfect title for the Switch where it is in its life cycle, providing something high quality and experimental while we wait for the bigger next console to come out.

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Game Ramblings #194 – Astro Bot

More Info from Sony

  • Genre: Platformer
  • Platform: PS5

I was debating how to really start this because for me the gameplay of the game in a lot of circumstances is not worthy of the Metacritic score that this got. However, I was then thinking of the gameplay under the less normal circumstances and how playing a fully functional Ape Escape or Loco Roco level with its own mechanics ported over was incredible. I was thinking of how the challenge levels, despite their simplicity, brought in a sense of danger and speedrunning that was unique to those sections of the game. I was thinking about how playing a level themed around the Horizon series made me excited not for another title in that mainline – but instead, excitement for the possibility of the Lego Horizon game and how the Lego series typically adapts the various IPs that it uses. I was thinking about how exciting it was to find bots themed around games like PaRappa the Rapper or Space Channel 5 or Resident Evil or Ratchet and Clank or Sly Cooper or etc etc etc. This game really is a perfect example of the whole being better than the sum of its parts.

If I was to just talk about the core game, it’s simply a really good platformer. The jumping is solid. The exploration is solid. You get some occasional powerups that give for some fun changes to levels – for example, a chicken-shaped rocket jump, frog-themed boxing gloves, among others. However, on its own it’s still simply a really good platformer. Still worth playing for fans of the genre? Probably. However, the rest of the experience is what really elevates this to something worth playing for anyone. Lets talk about a few of those examples, because they are really what make this game click.

The most obvious example is the pure themed levels. You get one at the end of each world where the entire level and the powers you get during it are themed after the IP. Sure, the mechanics are simplified, but they’re effective. For example, God of War is reduced to the axe throw and return mechanic; Ape Escape simply has the radar and net; Loco Roco does not have any of the collecting mechanics. However, each level has just enough of the original IP’s mechanics adapted to the Astro Bot gameplay to be effective in really hitting that nostalgia while still feeling familiar within the scope of the core game.

Uncharted, God of War, and Horizon were not surprises. Those are arguably the biggest modern PlayStation franchises. Loco Roco and Ape Escape were absolutely surprises. Sure, those are past storied franchises – Ape Escape was certainly a PS1/PS2 era core platformer for Sony, and Loco Roco was a core franchise for the PSP, but both series haven’t had a new core entry in 15+ years. However, that gets at the real win here for Astro Bot. There’s something for everyone. Older PS1/PS2 fans are going to get a huge kick out of playing these levels because they are past memories. Newer PS4/PS5 fans are going to get a kick out of playing something new to them, and maybe introduce them to some series they should check out on PS Classics or through remasters. It works for both sets of fans because the levels are fun on their own due to the changes in game mechanics, but can still kick at the little nostalgia or curiosity boost for people playing.

Those little nostalgia spikes then extend to the act of simply collecting the Astro Bots. Each one is from some PlayStation game of the past so each one is another little tie to history. In most platformers it’s simply a core mechanic of the game, since you have to rescue them to progress to the end of each world. However, dressing it up like this is another way to open up memories for older players or new games to explore for newer players. It’s the perfect way to elevate a simple mechanic – the act of simply hitting a thing in a platformer – to a new fun height.

The boss fights are also worth talking about as an extension of the idea of the whole being better than the parts. Each world generally has a handful of boss or sub-boss type fights, and it’s here where I would argue the best combat mechanics take place. The boss fights are generally restricted to a small arena space with some power up, so rather than leaning on your core powers you’re leaning on the powerup as the core mechanic. For example, the snake fight above uses the chicken rocket to continuously jump over the snakes tail as it sweeps the arena, while the dinosaur fight above uses the Horizon IP to give you a bow to shoot at moving targets in the fight. They all do a great job of having a high action, fast response environment that still feels fair because of the fact that the actions are obvious. The powerups you bring into the fight will clearly be the main thing used in the fight. The tells by the enemies are well telegraphed, so I never felt like being hit was anything but my own fault. The set theming is all appropriately connected between the boss and its arena. They really are just all well done.

I also think it’s worth noting the challenge levels that are scattered around, because these are the real hard platforming available. However, they aren’t hard because they are being dicks. They’re hard for two reasons – there are no checkpoints and they demand precision. If you screw up, you are going back to the start of the level, regardless of the fact that you may have the end in reach. However, that’s balanced by the fact that complete runs of these levels are all under about a minute long. While these are absolutely testing your ability to execute the mechanics of the games precisely, they very much act like a speedrunning experience – very much a normal person digestable version of a Mario Kaizo game. Because of this, they act as nice breathers between longer levels. You can do a longer exploration, finish it up, then jump out to do a challenge level for a bit. Once you’ve hit a stress limit with these, jump right back into exploration. It’s the perfect way to break up the pace of the game.

If Smash Bros is a celebration of Nintendo’s history, this is the PlayStation representation of that ethos. Similar to later Smash Bros, it’s not just a celebration of Sony’s games, but a celebration of everything that has made PlayStation the brand that it is. It takes that celebration and adapts it to a platformer that is always good and often great. However, it’s absolutely true that the nostalgia is part of the experience and elevates the game beyond being a simply good platformer. The experiences they’ve crafted around specific elements of PlayStation history are incredibly detailed and well put together in a way that would never have happened without the tie in to nostalgia. Do I think that it reaches the heights of something like Mario Odyssey? Not quite, but it’s far closer than it looks on paper. What the team has created here is nothing short of spectacular and will likely be considered my surprise of the year when all is said and done.

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Game Ramblings #193 – World of Warcraft: The War Within – First Couple Weeks

More Info from Blizzard

  • Genre: MMORPG
  • Platform: PC

I’ve been playing mostly the same main since Wrath of the Lich King – a hunter. I’ve played all three specs at various points, including a run for a while raiding as melee survival. For the past couple of expansions though I’ve settled back into playing Beast Mastery. The War Within in a lot of ways feels like a continued push for Blizzard to allow me to play the game in a way that best suits my current capabilities – limited time because of work and kids and really a lack of time to dedicate to high end playing. However, that has come with some early oddities in terms of playing as a hunter.

From a surface level, this expansion really pushes you to play in a way that best fits your lifestyle. The main story line is segregated from other quests in a very obvious way, so you can simply run that. Dungeons are still there so you can simply run those. Follower dungeons where you run normal difficulty dungeons with AI allow you to get the dungeon experience in a less public and more digestable format. The new Delves system brings back a system similar to the Pandaria Scenarios with difficulty scaling that looks like it’s going to continue throughout the expansion. Basically, there’s a lot of options in how you want to play that support any sort of play style.

Delves are probably the thing I was most excited about because they gave me something tied to a dungeon-like experience, but without the need to queue and deal with PUGs in what will ultimately be limited hours to play the expansion. Early runs through all of them show a tremendous amount of promise as there’s a nice mix of objective-based gameplay and normal pack killing, combined with the Brann Bronzebeard AI helper to provide healing for me. Some of the delves slot into the overall story arc of the expansion similar to how dungeons have always kind of existed near the end of story beats. Some of them simply exist to thematically exist within areas. They all feel like they are meant to be there as smaller dungeon experiences, rather than simply replacing existing planned dungeons. However, as difficulty increased and as I hit level 80 some scaling and class-specific issues started to really show up.

Scaling is definitely one of the biggest issues that I’m running into this expansion. I would say from about level 70 to 78 the game was easy easy. Part of that was coming in with gear that I didn’t really replace until about level 75, but part of it was just that it was easy. I could easily kill mobs in a couple of hits, so I was never really getting into any sort of rotation. Elite mobs generally didn’t require me to even heal my pets, let alone do anything other than face roll. Around level 79 things started to feel suddenly appropriate. At 80, it’s like a flip was switched. Delves that I was previously clearing without issue were suddenly rapidly killing me. Non-elite world mobs in level 80 areas were in some cases near unkillable if I got more than two or three leashed to me. It all really caught me off guard.

What it feels like to me is that the automatic scaling system was not given enough testing at lower levels and potentially given too much testing at level 80 with instance gear. For someone that is going to exist on the fringes of gear quality, it does not encourage me to go into the current systems at max level. World quests in these high level areas are fine now with a lot of people playing, but I can imagine they will become frustrating as server populations naturally drop past early expansion stages. Delves giving me trouble now will not be something I want to continue doing when higher level difficulties open up in a few weeks.

Some of this comes down to just weird scaling, but part of it also feels like class issues for soloing content. There’s really two main issues for me – pet threat and lack of AoE – that are really hampering the level cap experience. Ultimately I guess pet threat is the big issue here, in so much as my pets just cannot hold NPC focus which ends up being a huge issue for high end delves. One of the theories I’ve seen floated around is that the Stomp talent is actually redirecting threat to the hunter instead of the pets, and it wouldn’t surprise me very much. It seems like no matter what I do my pets will not keep focus in packs of enemies, so I spend a lot of time in the current tier 3 delves not doing DPS and instead feigning death or running around to save Brann from pulling the pack. This is somewhat exacerbated by Misdirection now being a talent that is tough to justify speccing into over other options on BM hunters. This is even more exacerbated by the lack of AoE damage – and in particular AoE damage that triggers threat generation by the pets. It all leads to a situation where the class mechanic decisions that have been made for this expansion really just reduce the ability to solo content as a BM hunter that should be soloable.

All that being said, the leveling experience and story quest line experience was a lot of fun. Each zone has a very distinct feel to it. The starting area Isle of Dorn is a normal wide open WoW zone to get you situated with the new Earthen race. The second area – The Ringing Deeps – is a huge underground mine that features some of the more fun use of sky riding for me with height being such a constraint in a lot of situations. Hallowfall is a huge human zone that would feel right at home in Classic Alliance areas – even if it comes with some really confusing Arathi civilization timeline stuff. Azj-Kahet then finishes up the base story with a zone that feels like a fulfilled promise of what the Wrath Nerubian areas started to tease. Each area feels like some WoW zone that’s come before, but done to a degree of iterated polish that hasn’t been seen before. I suppose after 20 years that isn’t a huge surprise, as there’s not going to be a whole ton of completely unexplored area left. However, the promise of the expansion is that we’re going to be interacting with the very soul of Azeroth, so I suspect we’re simply waiting on the really weird stuff.

The difficulties with scaling and class balance that I’ve run into so far feel like the typical start of expansion woes. I am disappointed that the scaling is so wonky right now, and I am disappointed by how the BM Hunter currently feels, but this isn’t my first rodeo and I do think that things will be fixed. In the case of hunters, they haven’t really mechanically changed so it isn’t like they are going through a failed fundamental rework. However, they really do need a solution for solo threat generation on pets and that is not a new problem. On the core balance side, a mix of natural gear progression and ongoing balance patches will almost certainly smooth things out, and even at my current ilvl in the mid 570s it’s slowly improving. However, finding a natural balance point for things like Delves is not something I really think they are going to be able to pull off. Ultimately some classes are just going to be more suited to the high end of that content without some significant reworks to Brann as your AI helper.

Overall it’s not a bad first week though. The game works, the main quest line was fun, the solo content shows a ton of promise, and I’m enjoying the lore so far. This is a brave new World of Warcraft where factions for maybe the first time really don’t exist as a core idea of the expansion, and to this point it’s feeling like a compelling situation where both Horde and Alliance will be working together for something bigger than the last 30 years of Warcraft fighting, and I’m hoping that Blizzard ends up delivering on that promise.