Zelda has had a long gaming history. I first remember the game on the original Nintendo, 8-bit Link with his little sword and shield setting off to face the evil Ganon and save the beautiful princess Zelda. I haven't played every Zelda game in between but I have played the majority of them. Previously my favorite in the franchise was Ocarina of Time, and before that A Link the Past. I feel that a truly great Zelda game adheres to a rather basic formula set for in the original and when the franchise deviates from this standard the resulting game suffers. That said, it is my opinion that Breath of the Wild is easily the greatest Zelda game to date, and may in fact by the best game currently on the market.

I am not a fan of cell-shading in general but it feels appropriate to this game and does not detract from the breath taking visuals at all. The game is simply beautiful to look at it. I often find myself getting side tracked between quest objectives because I got caught up watching the scenery roll by, or else I will spend five minutes standing at the top of a cliff just looking out over the scenery. Having your weapons break on your constantly is annoying and I feel could have been made less so by expanding the system to allow you to repair and maintain your favorite weapons, as well as the ability to craft weapons from materials.

The introduction of the Spirit Orbs, and the Shrines was quiet interesting. I thoroughly enjoy scouring the landscape searching for hidden shrines to help get those extra hearts and put another piece of my next stamina wheel up. I do miss the deep dungeons though. As frustrating as The Water Temple (and Shadow Temple) could be, it made them very satisfying to complete. The Shrines in BotW have fun puzzles but each individual Shrine doesn't take much time to complete, which means you don't get that larger sense of of accomplishment until you liberate one of the Divine Beasts.

The progression of the game is very nonlinear and I enjoy that very much as well. With some exceptions the previous Zelda games were pretty much on rails, with the items from one dungeon needed to access and beat the next dungeon. BotW is not like that at all. Once the player receives the paraglider they are free to explore the entire game map, or even (try to) march straight up to Calamity Ganon and fight him. It gives the player a sense of freedom to explore the game on their own terms that I found very refreshing for the franchise.

I have not beaten the game yet (I will update this post when I do) but so far I am thoroughly impressed with everything I have seen and if anyone out there is looking for a new game to sink their teeth in to I can not recommend this one strongly enough. A must play!!