The first game on my list to "try and love popular games I hated the first time I played"........ Zelda breath of the wild.
The general consensus is this is one of the best if not the best game available on the Nintendo Switch. It is also widely reported to be one of the best open world RPGs ever created.
This is one of the first games I've purchased on Nintendo Switch and it's also one of the reasons that the Nintendo Switch went largely unplayed for the best part of a year after the experience.
Apart from the fantastic soundtrack I hated almost everything about this title, even though I forced myself through seven or eight hours trying to like it.
The art style and color palette felt like I was stuck in some kind of lucid dream or the kind of filter used in a '70s movie to simulate the effect of someone's vision while under the effects of narcotics.
I disliked the sound effects which seemed weak and ineffective. Combat felt clunky and unintuitive with the button layout and link always felt underpowered to me. Not to mention his brittle weapons that seemed to have been manufactured in a Guangzhou sweatshop on a Friday afternoon.
I wasn't a fan of the almost constant micromanaging of food, recipes and weapon swaps etc.
A lot of people I spoke to said, "the key to the game success and enjoyment lay in open world exploration". I found the open world to be too open, vast areas of nothingness, nothing to see, nothing to discover nothing to do and then all of a sudden an enemy (that looked almost the same as all the other enemies in the game) would kill you with a nasty look, then you'd have to load up and try all over again.
In short it bored me to tears, it felt labored, playing it was a chore, something I was compelled to do because I paid $60 for the game.
The first time I uninstalled it was liberating. It felt like a great weight had been lifted from my shoulders.
However all of that is now forgotten! I shall look up on this game once more with fresh eyes and a renewed ambition to unlock the key to it's enjoyment.
My mind is once again completely open as I download the game and prepare to adventure back into the land of Hyrule. I shall report back here on my experiences over the next few days.
I'm genuinely interested to see what my experience will be like this time around and honestly hope that I can experience some of the enjoyment that so many seem to have got from this game.
I had trouble with the button layout as well but it got way better after I switched the sprint and jump button. I do agree with the weapon gripe, always thought that was the worst part about this game. If they would just increase the durability by 2 the game would be so much better.