Certainly.

What’s also interesting is that you missed the point. The rain is not esthetical, nor just there to annoy you. Curl already explained how the rain effects a plethora of other game mechanics, and he didn’t even mention everything, making it a crucial part of the workings of the game. Removing it would break a whole bunch of things. So where’s the line? Why is it okay for you to disable rain but not for me to disable enemies? Or you can ask just for an option to remove the inability to climb in the rain, but if you want options in games that specific I might as well ask not to get rid of all enemies, but just Lynels, since those are the ones that kill me.

Obviously from the developer’s standpoint the rain is meant to be something you’ll “have to deal with”, because their vision for the game is to inspire people to be creative in ‘the wild’ and for them to find their own ways to their goal. That’s why Vivster’s again dramatizing, you don’t have to “sit around and wait” at all, you just have to look around and come up with something else; the point of the game. Something I always did at least.

Anyway, nobody would be talking about this if the Climbing Gear’s special power was being able to climb in the rain, something I also expected it to have initially, I agree to that.

Okay. That's certainly one approach, all I disputed was the suggestion that it's the "only in-game option".

If I just had to wait, I'd hate it, as I'm not a patient person, but I guess I don't really think of it as waiting as in searching for an alternate route I was still exploring and hence the gameplay never stopped for me. Not only did I usually get where I wanted to go, but I very often stumbled across something new along the way that I might otherwise have missed.

I don't agree having more options is always a good thing but I understand your point.

That said, I don't think rain and weapon degredation were meant for "realism" purposes but rather because the gameplay encourages adaptation rather than planning. And since the game always gives you more potential objectives I don't think rain has ever stopped my progress.

Maybe shouldn't have been a complete open world game then. Open world games always come with the promise of freedom. The freedom here is arbitrarily limited. This mechanic doesn't force you to adapt, it forces you to wait, because it's nothing but a temporary obstacle. And it's absolutely random and can hit you out of nowhere, that's not challenging because you had no chance to adapt. It just punishes you for playing the game.

If it's about adaptability they should've implemented raining seasons, where it is gonna rain for days and you can actually prepare for it. Starting to rain while I'm just in the process of climbing a big mountain isn't challenging me to adapt because there is no way to adapt. I'm in the middle of nowhere and suddenly I'm forced to stop doing what I'm doing for 5-10 minutes. How is that in any way challenging or engaging? It's just annoying. Imagine if they had done the same with winter. Suddenly it gets cold and you're fucked because you don't happen to carry the right items.

If there is a mechanic that has zero benefits other than annoying people, it's probably not a good thing to include. The game wouldn't have gotten a single point less on metacritic if it wasn't in the game, now imagine how many points it would've gotten more if it never existed. People love to overlook the flaws in the game because it's otherwise great, but that's not how things work. It's not great because of those flaws, but despite of them. They're still flaws and any attempt to excuse them is just silly.

Hopefully the sequel will fix this flaw also, a map where you can actually tell where you've been would be nice.

Given that I think climbing is badly implemented at core level in the first place, rain on top of that just augments that.

Early in the game though, with almost the whole world to explore, even if I didn't find a way up I'd still be constantly covering new ground, and at the very least likely to find somewhere to start a campfire and skip the storm. I dunno, I guess I was just so involved in the game world that rather than seeing the rain as a stop sign I saw it as something to plan around. Later on of course, I not only got Revali's Gale, which meant it wasn't even a hindrance anymore, but also discovered the mean-spirited joy of taking advantage of the rain to stealth and electrify enemies.

I don't think I'm justifying anything because I don't consider rain an issue in the first place.

I agree the game has a fair share of flaws or mechanics that could be improved upon, but I don't consider rain one of them.

Rain is an impediment but it doesn't stop your progress since in most cases you can reach your point of interest by an alternate route. Even in the ulikely event you can't reach a specific place can always point it on map and come to it later.

As I said there are always multiple objectives and point of interest to visit at any time, plus everything in the game is optional so you don't have any incentive to focus on a single objective while excluding the others.

I didn't mind the rain in BotW really. I would always find another path to use, hunt for some food, stumble unto Korok seeds I wouldn't have found if I had gone the way I intended at first. Also, I think it's used brillantly on the way to Zora's Domain, the constant rain guides you seamlessly to use the road where you get some lore from the big stones and some great fights against Lizalfos using lightning arrows. It makes the trek to Zora's Domain almost feel like a dungeon.