'Goblin Playground'; Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom Showered in Praise
The demo of The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom captivated journalists, especially those who like to „mess around” and experiment with game mechanics.
The release of the follow-up to Breath of the Wild is approaching. Thus, first opinions on The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom have started appearing on the web. Of course, these are not reviews, but only the impressions of journalists after checking out the demo version of the game provided by Nintendo.
After less than an hour of playing, it's impossible to give a final verdict on any title - let alone a sequel to a massive sandbox, which is expected to surpass its predecessor in size (in various meanings). Nevertheless, journalists are surprisingly unanimous on at least one point - UltraHand alone will provide a lot of fun and will give players a substitute for the Force from Star Wars.
This is a rather strong simplification, but in general, the opinions on the demo of Tears of the Kingdom are in line with praise about this seemingly simple ability, enabling us to lift (usually) inanimate objects (at least those that are not attached to the ground). This is useful for building vehicles (which, as an aside, is said to have been implemented better than in the infamous Nuts and Bolts), but UltraHand can be used in other ways.
It is such experimentation by trial and (many) error that captivated journalists in the demo version of TotK. Already in Breath of the Wild fans were finding ways to creatively "break" the game, but the new Zelda seems to encourage players to gleefully test what effect will come from - for example - attaching a rocket to the tip of a spear or an apple to a sword (which, contrary to logic, is not a nonsensical action at all).
In other words, this is a game for people who enjoy playing with mechanics. That is, as Mike Mahardy from Polygon put it, 'a playground for goblins' and other mischief-makers.
Journalists also praised the greater variety of puzzles (we will come across "puzzles" not only in shrines) and the possibility of placing a "checkpoint" in almost any place (which also facilitates experimentation). Some people also mentioned technical issues - the demo the game ran smoothly in most cases, but individual texts mention rare performance drops (mainly when using UltraHand).
The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom will be released on May 12 on the Nintendo Switch console.
