| mZuzek said: So tell me what exactly about BotW is complex. Nothing? Yeah, that sounds about right. I can't think of a single thing in the entirety of BotW that is complex, in fact that's the reason the game is so good: because it manages to make everything seem simple and easy to understand. Complexity doesn't mean quality. Zelda dungeons were never the most complex stuff ever (though there are some that are quite tricky, such as the Water Temple, Stone Tower Temple, Lakebed Temple, Sky Keep and more), but they were interesting and fun. They were an essential part of what makes Zelda itself, even dating back to the original NES game. I don't dislike BotW at all and I think the excessive hate on its dungeons is a little unjustified, but it is true that they're simply not a replacement for what the previous games had. I commend BotW for featuring loads of physics-based puzzles, because they feel quite natural and intuitive, but ultimately it did lead to 4 incredibly short and easy dungeons which are also sadly devoid of any thematic variety. Thankfully, the DLC Final Trial was an amazing dungeon which managed to bring with it some truly clever puzzles and took longer than 20 minutes. But overall, it is an aspect in which the game is lacking when compared to the likes Ocarina of Time or Skyward Sword. Edit: also, I still think there's plenty of value in BotW's dungeons. Vah Naboris is particularly great, and it left me an amazing impression as it was my first one. The use of darkness in Vah Rudania was pretty interesting. And Vah Medoh, while an absolute joke of a dungeon, is thematically cool. |
There is something complex in BotW though. The way all of the systems interact. It leads to tons of emergent gameplay. No one element is too complex to understand, so people find all sorts of ways to combine different elements to do completely unexpected things. It's elegant in its simplicity. Much like real life, where seeming complexity emerges from elegant simplicity. It's why the game world feels so alive. Sorry, I agree with the rest of what you said here, just thought I'd add that. I think Nintendo knows what they missed in BotW, and I'm pretty hopeful the next game will be a sequel that reuses assets like MM did with OOT, and we'll get all the emergent gameplay of BotW with all the variety and interesting themes, and hopefully length, of other Zelda games.
