Zelda: Breath of the Wild Has a Sense Wonder and Exploration That Most Games Don’t

 When thinking about open world games, I think about – player agency, beautiful landscapes, discovery, exploration, and freedom. Some games cater to these aspect, though some does it better than others. Massive games like Skyrim, Fallout, and Witcher 3 has those aspects that make them great open world games. Games that don’t and just focus on hammering in on one point falls short, a good example is the Far Cry series. The open world gives the player freedom but not a lot to discover. Ubisoft tries to give the players a sense of discovery and exploration by implementing the tower system – this system allows the player to unlock a part of the map and unveil all the objectives you can do.

The main difference between Breath of the Wild and other open world games is that Breath of the Wild doesn’t give a false sense of Wonder – by that I mean, the game doesn’t handhold you by giving you more objective once a part of the map is unlocked. In Breath of the Wild, everything is on the player – finding every dungeon and shrines, use markers to pin where to go, cooking, and battle preparation.

Just like the Far Cry games, towers are present in Zelda. But in Zelda the towers work a little different – once you get on the tower you unlock a part of the map and nothing else. This is the cool part of discovering Hyrule in Breath of the Wild, looking at the distance you can find many mysteries to explore.

I’ve played a lot of open world games, I love the vast world and everything in it. Sometimes the world can seem too big. When exploring, I tend to get lost and that can be frustrating finding the way back on track. What Zelda: Breath of the Wild does even though its world is one of the biggest I’ve played is that there are so many things in-between my objectives I can tackle whether it be combat, climbing, or shrines I never feel like I’m lost in Hyrule.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is a beautiful, colourful, and lively open world game. The game sense of wonder is player driven – like most of this game. Because almost everything is player driven when I’m lost there are many other objectives I can complete before I get to my goal – these small objectives fill the holes in the open world making me feel like I’m never lost, just taking the long route.