There are so many things being tracked all the time in the game for puzzles and the power arm. Yet despites literally tracking sunshadows for some puzzle completion for example it runs almost smoothly with (in my 170h) no crashes. On a 6 yo portable console??
Botw was already impressive but I could grasp it with the shaders and also there weren’t that much physics puzzle. Objects were more static, there wasn’t the two other maps, enemy diversity was limited, same for weapons. There was less of everything overall but I thought it was the limit of the console and the possible engineering around it.
Is there any resources on how they managed to pull this off? White papers, behind the scenes, charts, …?
Yes, you worded how I feel quite well. It’s a shame and I, too, long for another A Link to the Past styled Zelda (hell, Link Between Worlds was fantastic, please give us more of that while waiting for the next 3d entry).
Don’t get me wrong, I really did love BotW. I was floored when I first played it and truly appreciated the design concepts they were aiming for (especially since, as the name suggests, the wild is your main obstacle so it fits thematically). The open world tedium in that game didn’t feel, well, quite as tedious for some reason (I wager because it was fresh at the time). The dungeons were weak and disappointing, but the novelty of the shrines helped offset that. However, it no longer feels novel, to me at least.
I have plenty of nieces and nephews that got turned onto Zelda starting with BotW, so it’s all they’ve ever known. They absolutely love TotK and think it’s the greatest game ever (I’m happy for them and I do enjoy seeing the whacky contraptions they make). The game sold like hot cakes and received near universal acclaim. So, that’s why I am beginning to wonder if I’m just “too old” and no longer the target demographic. The lead designer did say they have no plans of ever going back to older Zelda formats, as they much prefer the current style of design and gameplay. If that’s truly the case, I just need to retire my investiture into the franchise and move on.