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BotW progression system actively hinder a lot of its good parts

I find it a bit frustrating that the absolutely amazing first parts of the game get so diluted and ruined by you becoming a walking wal-mart food store with armor that make you effectively invulnerable and hp bars in the 40+s of hearts. Past zeldas had basically little progression, but had 0 challenge from the start aside from puzzles. BotW has like the perfect amount of challenge, adjustable to your likes from where you want to go and what you want to do, but give you so much progression that the challenge after a while is even less than traditional "easy-mode" zeldas.
Personally i can't wait for the next zelda where they learn to do progression right (lot of ideas in the right place, like the ability to sell your heart containers which was made with people who like challenge in mind for sure), with the challenging exploration of BotW to go with it. I may as well stop playing right after that.
Nah, brah. I paid my dues in the first 40 - 50 hours. I died A TON. By the time I was 60 hours in, found some good weapons and armor, trained myself up a bit to have several more hearts and another stamina wheel, got better at parrying and all that, the challenge was still there due to enemy scaling but I didn't die as much. In fact, from hour 90 - 140, I was a goddamn GOD. And I loved it. I love becoming OP in these types of games.

But I agree with you here:
HP for monsters shouldn't scale nowhere as much as it does now, with better monsters having betters stats other than just HP (Faster animations/movement/reaction, better aim, better AI, more damage, ability to parry etc...).
That's a really good idea.
 

lobdale

3 ft, coiled to the sky
You can say this about pretty much any game where the goal is to get stronger, the initial stages are the hardest cause you're weak and shitty.
 

Matbtz

Member
Totally agree with you OP. After 80 hours (3 beasts, Ganon already beaten, 54 shrines and 160 koroks) I start to be a little bored because fights are quite easy like you just said, there is not much exploration surprises left.

I would have wanted more unique ennemies, like lynel, hinox and such. This is so cool when you encounter one for the first time.

I hoped for something more than just monsters with more HP for the master mode, like :
When you open the menu to get food the action is not paused / or the use of food is ruled by cooldowns for example.
 
Totally agree with you OP. After 80 hours (3 beasts, Ganon already beaten, 54 shrines and 160 koroks) I start to be a little bored because fights are quite easy like you just said, there is not much exploration surprises left.

Well, part of that is because you played the game for 80 hours!
 

Kuro

Member
I am in complete agreement with you OP. I loved the first 30 hours and exploration was a lot of fun but the repetitive combat, damage sponge enemies, and lack of dungeons really hurt my experience.
 
D

Deleted member 752119

Unconfirmed Member
I was largely the opposite and had more fun once I didn't have to worry about survival so much.

But I'm just not a fan of survival mechanics (dealing with heat, cold etc.) much in general, nor ever played Zelda games for challenge. So I had more fun once I had good gear, tons of food and could just explore and get through the quest worry free.
 
On the contrary, I thought the opening was rather annoying with how little it gives you. The game became much more fun when I stopped dying in 1 hit, and could run for more than 2 second bursts. Scarce resources isn't a fun mechanic at all to me.
 

Yoshi

Headmaster of Console Warrior Jugendstrafanstalt
So make the game even more tedious? No thanks. I am very happy that clothes exist that make you immune to weather effects. I would prefer that just being a permanently carried item instead, but well. For the fighting, do whatever you want, I only used base level armor and bombs + Master Sword anyway throughout the game.

Eh you can just throw your stuff at the shore and get them again.
Why would this be required? I found the island to be one of the easier parts of the game; bombs did decent damage and I didn't need to care about the collected items because I assumed I'd lose thos anyway at the end. There was an enormous amount of supplies on the island.
 

BTA

Member
You could just be like me, where I still have tough fights after 3/4 dungeons because I always forget to make food and cash in my orbs.

I do think some of the progression's a little weird, but it's not that much of a problem for me. If anything, I think cooking needs to be expanded; I would love some kind of recipe book that tracks what food you've made and such. As is I basically exclusively make single item hearty foods and then temperature buffs as needed.

In any case, this is reminding me to try Eventide again. I found it very very early on, and wasn't ready to deal with most of it.
 
The game allows for both under and overpowering your Link, and I appreciate the versatility. Like so many other elements, you can choose or not choose to be super buffed. I'm having a blast staying at six hearts and using certain un-upgraded armors to keep one hit kills intact. It certainly keeps every encounter as tense as the first, especially once enemies evolve into their final forms.

Can't wait for gold varieties though hinted at in DLC additions. Gimme Gold Lynels please!
 

RoadHazard

Gold Member
Didn't read all of OP, but yes, one of this game's only big issues is how the challenge it starts out with completely disappears after a while.

The game allows for both under and overpowering your Link, and I appreciate the versatility. Like so many other elements, you can choose or not choose to be super buffed.

If you play the game as intended, and take your time exploring the world rather than rushing through the main story, you will be vastly overpowered by the end of it (or even much sooner than that). Sure, you can choose not to cash in your spirit orbs, but that's you creating artificial challenge for yourself. The game itself, as it is, is not well balanced in this regard.
 

Afrodium

Banned
Agreed that the beginning us the best part. Due to the challenge of navigating heat/cold/etc. you always want to get armor that offers elemental protection, but then once you do you've realized that you've completely turned off a major gameplay element.
 

Rodin

Member
I am in complete agreement with you OP. I loved the first 30 hours and exploration was a lot of fun but the repetitive combat,
Repetitive combat? Surely you could find another issue in a game that is designed to actively encourage you in using different weapons with different movesets and effects all the time, not to mention the creative ways you can find to take down enemies by using the environment, runes and physics interactions. If you don't do this, it's certainly not the game's fault.

damage sponge enemies,

Like i said in my previous post, high rank enemies aren't just damage sponges.

and lack of dungeons really hurt my experience.
Dungeons are areas filled with puzzles. In this game, there are many, MANY more puzzles and unique challenges than in previous entries between shrines, beasts and overworld puzzles.

Didn't read all of OP, but yes, one of this game's only big issues is how the challenge it starts out with completely disappears after a while.



If you play the game as intended, and take your time exploring the world rather than rushing through the main story, you will be vastly overpowered by the end of it (or even much sooner than that). Sure, you can choose not to cash in your spirit orbs, but that's you creating artificial challenge for yourself. The game itself, as it is, is not well balanced in this regard.
That's a pretty huge strawman. The game absolutely gives you the mean to not use the orbs naturally, in fact you can even give them away.

Agreed that the beginning us the best part. Due to the challenge of navigating heat/cold/etc. you always want to get armor that offers elemental protection, but then once you do you've realized that you've completely turned off a major gameplay element.

No, you just managed to overcome a challenge. There's no reason why those elements should be an issue only manageable with potions for the entire game, especially when acquiring those outfits gives you a new way to fully explore new areas. It would just be awful and unrewarding game design to do oterwhise, it's almost (almost, for obvious reasons) like saying that you shouldn't get the varia suit in Metroid.
 
If you play the game as intended, and take your time exploring the world rather than rushing through the main story, you will be vastly overpowered by the end of it (or even much sooner than that). Sure, you can choose not to cash in your spirit orbs, but that's you creating artificial challenge for yourself. The game itself, as it is, is not well balanced in this regard.
But if the game is built and structured to allow this and accounts for it, how is it not intended?
 

random25

Member
I get what you're saying OP, but that's basically what progression means. You do stuff that makes you improve over time. The ones that was hard to fight the first few encounters you have, now becomes easier because you develop in-game strategies and you learn how things work. If you do things over and over and still feel like you never improved, then that will also give a sense of dissatisfaction.

In BotW, the game offers a ton of options. If you feel your armor is too strong, un-equip them. If you feel that there's too many loot, discard them and stop picking them up. You have too many hearts or stamina wheels, you can sell them in Hateno. Your weapons are too powerful, discard them for lots tree branches and boko bows. Champion powers too OP, disable them all. You basically create your own challenge and your own handicap.

Also, stronger versions of monsters are not just HP sponges. They actually become stronger and wiser.
 

jariw

Member
Shouldn't link be Overpowered though? Literally only him and an elf girl have been killings Ganon for centuries

Yes. Link lost his strengths and abilities during 100 years of sleep (which is described in the diaries), and the game is about regaining his strengths to finally beat Ganon. It's not a survival game as the OP seems to claim.

Monster parts and their drops in general shouldn't be as common as they are now. Make them rarer to avoid just cluttering your inventory and making the game all about picking up thing constantly.

I disagree with a lot of your suggestions regarding balance changes, but here I more than disagree.
Moster parts are RARE as they are, since you need a HUGE amount of them to complete some armor and to get the final pieces from Kilton. Also, moster parts don't clutter the inventory, since they stack. And they are also a good source for rupees, for those not interested in Kilton's offerings.
 

Timeaisis

Member
I mean, you don't have to upgrade at all if you want to continue to have a challenge. It's a type of game that rewards you for putting in the time with being able to crush your enemies later. Many players (including myself) enjoy that aspect of it. Others enjoy a constant challenge, and for that you can limit your upgrading.

I will say HP scaling goes way too far in the latter part of the game, but your solution of "better AI" is just something they likely did not have time to implement, so we are left with what we have.

Instead of saying the progression in BotW is bad, you should be saying you personally don't like it. Because the progressions system does what it seemingly intends to in making Link stronger and more capable over the course of the story. Hell, that's the entire theme of the game: preparation and training to defeat ganon. It makes sense you have an easier time later: you (as a player) and you (as Link) are better.

If you play the game as intended, and take your time exploring the world rather than rushing through the main story, you will be vastly overpowered by the end of it (or even much sooner than that). Sure, you can choose not to cash in your spirit orbs, but that's you creating artificial challenge for yourself. The game itself, as it is, is not well balanced in this regard.

I hate to break it to you but every game is an artificial challenge. It's not bad balance, it's intended balance you find too easy.
 

The Boat

Member
I get what you're saying, which is why a hard mode from the start would be good, but this is to be expected in a Zelda game, you're supposed to get overpowered. Hell, there's even a cutscene in BotW showing how overpowered full power Link is.
 

RoadHazard

Gold Member
I hate to break it to you but every game is an artificial challenge. It's not bad balance, it's intended balance you find too easy.

Well, I've beaten all the Soulsborne games, and they definitely never got unchallenging for me. Sure, scrub enemies that were initially dangerous become a joke later on, but I still felt challenged to the very end in those games (even if slightly less so than when starting out). And I didn't rush through those games either, although I also didn't min-max or whatever. Just played through them in a way that felt natural, and they maintained a reasonable level of challenge without me having to resort to artificially making it more difficult for myself.
 

Timeaisis

Member
Well, I've beaten all the Soulsborne games, and they definitely never got unchallenging for me. Sure, scrub enemies that were initially dangerous become a joke later on, but I still felt challenged to the very end in those games (even if slightly less so than when starting out). And I didn't rush through those games either, although I also didn't min-max or whatever.

Soulsbourne games are designed to be challenging for their entirety. Zelda is not and never has been. We are strictly speaking of personal preference here.
 

Rodin

Member
You can? How? I've played this game for around 125h, and I've never seen that option.

You can give away your hearts/stamina to the statue in Hateno and never get them back if you want.

Well, I've beaten all the Soulsborne games, and they definitely never got unchallenging for me. Sure, scrub enemies that were initially dangerous become a joke later on, but I still felt challenged to the very end in those games (even if slightly less so than when starting out). And I didn't rush through those games either, although I also didn't min-max or whatever. Just played through them in a way that felt natural, and they maintained a reasonable level of challenge without me having to resort to artificially making it more difficult for myself.

Like i said in my other post, Souls/BB part of the appeal and even their marketing is the high level of challenge. Not the case with Zelda, which is a series that is supposed to appeal a broad market, from casual gamers, to kids at their first gaming experience to the seasoned player. Balancing this out perfectly is hard, especially in a game with tons of systems that coexist and actively affect each other and the gameplay in general, and i think that Zelda does it much, much better than other open world games that don't even have those systems.
 

Majukun

Member
You can face Ganon literally after you exit the Plateau. Did that look believable to you?

aonuma said that you COULD go battle ganon immediately,but defeating him was another story entirely

instead apart from the boss rush before him,it's totally doable even from the beginning,especially because you find good weapons inside the arena for some reason.
 

andthebeatgoeson

Junior Member
I could have agreed with OP but the word salad makes it tough to co-sign. Maybe not rely on phrases like, 'absolutely trivalizing' or 'just boring A-fest spam with 0 risk or tactics'.

Yeah, my armor is over powered but that doesn't ruin the combat, it just removes a consequence. And when that consequence is really just restart from a few minutes prior, it's just an inconvenience. I don't lose anything of value, just time. Restarting an encounter can help you, by preserving your best items.

I agree with the idea that the monsters could upgrade with speed. The monsters are not as varied, as RE4 in it's progression. But then again, it strikes me as an exploration simulator and the combat comes secondary. None of the rewards for taking on a group of enemies does much. It's usually just a tool and you could avoid enemies.

Which leads me to my final issue. All of this is optional. How long did it take to figure this out? 20 hours? 50 hours? 100 hours? Which is why i bring up your word choice. It doesn't vibe with what your describing. If it was within a short time, you could have dropped those food items. Or not cooked them. Or not picked them up. Yeah, it's you 'opinion' as everyone says. But every paragraph has some extreme phrasing that detracts.

'First of all, armor need to be fixed in how it scale'. No, not really. Every fairy fountain is obscure except the first one. Maybe the desert one is easy to get to but the game does make an effort to obscure, even that one. You have to do something to upgrade your armor. I feel like all of these things, including farming for items, is your active decision. Would a low heart, upgraded armor run be a better fit for you?

I just feel like i agree with 80% of what you say them i get to a really wrong statement and it throws me off.

Here's one that I'll just adjust for you because it seems extra:'Food is absolutely, disgustingly broken, and in general, it's way too easy to amass. An easy fix is to not pick it up'. The game doesn't force you to do anything, including picking up food, cooking it or consuming it. So i hear ya but some phrases are just extra.
 

RoadHazard

Gold Member
You can give away your hearts/stamina to the statue in Hateno and never get them back if you want.

Ah, thought you could only give one, get one back, etc. Never used him after the inital sidequest. But that's still creating artificial challenge, and really no different than just not using the orbs.
 
This is a really common open world game problem.

For starters, health recovery items without a cool down almost always trivialize difficulty, unless said items are very valuable.
 

Rodin

Member
aonuma said that you COULD go battle ganon imediately,but defeating him was another story entirely

instead apart from the boss rush before him,it's totally doable even from the beginning,especially because you find good weapons inside the arena for some reason.

It's still extremely likely to get killed by Ganon, all you have to do is failing one parry and you're history. Not to mention that for 99% of the players is pretty much impossible to get near him. Still, it had to be doable.

Ah, thought you could only give one, get one back, etc. Never used him after the inital sidequest. But that's still creating artificial challenge, and really no different than just not using the orbs.

Well, i still wouldn't call that an artificial challenge, just like i wouldn't call that not using the orbs. At the end of the day, like i said, there's not even a real need to do that because high rank enemies can still destroy you if for any reason you didn't upgrade your armor to the max. For me for example that reason was not wanting to pay 10000 rupees other than wanting to use the hero of time armor, and i don't even have the materials to upgrade it.
 

jph139

Member
Yeah, it's tough. That first stretch of the game (no money, no armor, no hearts) is amazing, but eventually combat becomes trivial. Why waste my good weapons killing guys? Why fight enemies that can't hurt me? Why spend time getting a reward to help me upgrade things that are already way above par?

Thankfully, for me, the meat of the game was shrines and quest completion, so I still enjoyed it for those aspects. But the "lone man in a hostile world" stuff goes away and that's too bad.

I was hoping that Hard Mode would give a good alternative by nerfing food, making armor weaker, and so on. But it looks like it's just making enemies tougher, which really just delays the inevitable.
 

Kuro

Member
Repetitive combat? Surely you could find another issue in a game that is designed to actively encourage you in using different weapons with different movesets and effects all the time, not to mention the creative ways you can find to take down enemies by using the environment, runes and physics interactions. If you don't do this, it's certainly not the game's fault.



Like i said in my previous post, high rank enemies aren't just damage sponges.


Dungeons are areas filled with puzzles. In this game, there are many, MANY more puzzles and unique challenges than in previous entries between shrines, beasts and overworld puzzles.


That's a pretty huge strawman. The game absolutely gives you the mean to not use the orbs naturally, in fact you can even give them away.



No, you just managed to overcome a challenge. There's no reason why those elements should be an issue only manageable with potions for the entire game, especially when acquiring those outfits gives you a new way to fully explore new areas. It would just be awful and unrewarding game design to do oterwhise, it's almost (almost, for obvious reasons) like saying that you shouldn't get the varia suit in Metroid.

Weapon variety doesn't mean shit when the core mechanics are so sloppy. Souls games have roughly the same archetypes but do so much more with the mechanics. That's plenty but the weapons are all that archetype with just higher attack and a different look. The dodge mechanic isn't very tight and the counter being a spam of attacks regardless of what weapon you use is really repetitive. Now as for tackling enemies using runes and other methods, they really only work in certain areas where the options are available and even then I found the implementation sloppy. Like bludgeoning enemies with metal objects was annoying to do with the controls and later on the enemies have so much health that its a waste of time. Encouraging you to use different weapons is fine but the goddamn problem is that they break all the time so you're stuck using a club sometimes or just the general high attack weapons they start dropping. I would have liked to bring an elemental sword to one shot elemental lizalfos but then the weapon breaks so then what? Back to wacking them over and over with the same tired weapons. I would have liked the combat much more if the enemy variety was better. Even the minibosses minus Molduga were lame. Half way through the game when Silvers started popping up I just plain avoided them because of how much a bore they are.

As for Shrines give me a break. Not only do they break up exploration because you have to go in and investigate, they are made up of mundane little bite sized puzzles that don't really connect to each other except for that one twin shrines. I found myself just trying to cheese through most of the shrines by taking advantage of the physics which I will admit was entertaining. The beasts were so short and simple too the only one I liked was the Gerudo desert one.

I don't really have a problem with the different armors but they really overlooked a lot of things with the food system like instant health refill from easy to find mushrooms rather than having to concoct cool interesting stuff to get that. The problem for me isn't the progression of armors and upgrades, its that the enemies didn't really change much with that progression. They just have more health and deal more damage. For a game as huge as Botw the enemy variety was really lacking.

I also have many more problems with the game like the way they handled the story and pacing with the main quests. The sidequests were also very disappointing. I expect much more from the next game.

For what its worth I really did enjoy the game but only really for the massive world exploration with a Zelda skin over it.
 

NathanS

Member
Didn't read all of OP, but yes, one of this game's only big issues is how the challenge it starts out with completely disappears after a while.



If you play the game as intended, and take your time exploring the world rather than rushing through the main story, you will be vastly overpowered by the end of it (or even much sooner than that). Sure, you can choose not to cash in your spirit orbs, but that's you creating artificial challenge for yourself. The game itself, as it is, is not well balanced in this regard.

There is no intended play style, they were very clear about this when talking about it, the exploring is there if you want to, but they don't expect you to do it if you don't want to. Open end games by their nature leave all of that up to the player.
 

RoadHazard

Gold Member
Well, i still wouldn't call that an artificial challenge, just like i wouldn't call that not using the orbs. At the end of the day, like i said, there's not even a real need to do that because high rank enemies can still destroy you if for any reason you didn't upgrade your armor to the max. For me for example that reason was not wanting to pay 10000 rupees other than wanting to use the hero of time armor, and i don't even have the materials to upgrade it.

Past a certain point (number of hearts) I don't believe there's anything that can one-hit you...? At least if you have decent armor (max upgraded is definitely not needed, I never achieved that). And since you'll also have SO MUCH FOOD at that point (and you can cook certain single items into full health refills), and the eating system is so forgiving (pause, eat, instant refill), there's little actual danger.
 
You are the fucking hero in this game (the hero was OP as seen in sequences, killing hordes of Lynels etc. allone) starting again from zero and regain your strenght at the end of the game. It perfectly fits. The game made a fantastic job in showing you your growth.

At first i ran away when seeing a guardian, or even worse a lynel. Now at the end i go hunting them with ease and thats good as it is. For a harder experience there will be the DLCs, but as of now, i defeated Ganon and silver lynels, why should any Moblin give me a headache anymore? ;)
 

Neiteio

Member
I know this isn't the most satisfying answer, but you can always do one or more of the following:

- Don't wear good gear
- Don't upgrade gear
- Don't equip strong weapons
- Don't cash in your orbs for hearts
- Don't cash in your orbs for stamina
- Don't expand your inventory
- Don't cook potent meals
- Don't use meat

If you treat the items you earn as "trophies," rather than using everything to boost your attack and defense, the game should still be plenty challenging.

But even when I'm OP, I still find certain encounters (silver Lynels) to be challenging endurance tests.
 

RoadHazard

Gold Member
There is no intended play style, they were very clear about this when talking about it, the exploring is there if you want to, but they don't expect you to do it if you don't want to. Open end games by their nature leave all of that up to the player.

Sure. But if you do choose to explore (which is obviously a core part of the experience - I don't agree that they don't expect you to do it) you're likely to become way overpowered "by accident". Yes, you can choose not to explore, but then you're missing a huge part of the experience. There's really no way to get both the exploration and the challenge, unless you, again, deliberately choose to not use your orbs or whatever. If you just play the game in a natural way (to me), mixing exploration with story progression, the balance is such that the challenge disappears after a while.
 

RoadHazard

Gold Member
You are the fucking hero in this game (the hero was OP as seen in sequences, killing hordes of Lynels etc. allone) starting again from zero and regain your strenght at the end of the game. It perfectly fits. The game made a fantastic job in showing you your growth.

At first i ran away when seeing a guardian, or even worse a lynel. Now at the end i go hunting them with ease and thats good as it is. For a harder experience there will be the DLCs, but as of now, i defeated Ganon and silver lynels, why should any Moblin give me a headache anymore? ;)

I don't have an issue with the fact that you grow powerful and really feel that progression. Being able to one-shot enemies that early on were a challenge feels good. The issue is that by the end of the game there's really no challenge left. Facing Ganon should feel like a life-and-death situation. But it was easier than a single Bokoblin was at the start.
 
Even in the beginning the game isn't challenging. Combat is rather trivial except some bigger enemies which are cheap with one-hits. But yes, it really becomes extremly easy later on. Even the boss-fights.

The combat was still fun for me because it was snappy and you have a good arsenal of weapons and possibilities.
 

Cpt Lmao

Member
I think they should have introduced more technical enemies towards the later stages of the game, not quite Guardian/Lynel level, but just below: Darknuts; Iron Knucles; Heavy Lizalfos; and Stalfos, with the Yiga — which were far too easy to fight — getting a significant boost, and enemies that can dish status effects also being introduced.

Penalties to stamina for food spamming could have been good too.
 

RoadHazard

Gold Member
I think they should have introduced more technical enemies towards the later stages of the game, not quite Guardian/Lynel level, but just below: Darknuts; Iron Knucles; Heavy Lizalfos; and Stalfos, with the Yiga — which were far too easy to fight — getting a significant boost, and enemies that can dish status effects also being introduced.

Penalties to stamina for food spamming could have been good too.

Yeah, the Yiga are odd. So easy. Never once did they pose any challenge whatsoever. Thought they would evolve into something actually dangerous eventually, but that never happened.
 
Uh... I don't think any of this is a problem with the game. The story and the dungeons are not so great, but the gameplay in general is very good.
 

foxdvd

Member
Another game that for me had the same problem is the otherwise brilliant Shadow of Mordor. Too this day, I have still not finished it. You become so stupidly overpowered, that any real challenge is gone no matter what the game throws at you. I got to the point that I was just not having fun.

It is strange because some games are able to make you feel overpowered but not take away the fun. I am not sure what it is about Horizon..another game you become stupid OP in by the end...but I did not get bored of that experience.
 
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