Hyrule Warriors is a non-canonical entry in the Legend of Zelda franchise that plays nothing like a zelda game. Instead, it plays like a cool Dynasty Warriors game that tries its best to pay homage to the LOZ universe and manages to incorporate some of its signature gameplay mechanics so it pleases both audiences, and it does!
It is a cool idea, conceived, made and executed by very capable hands that end up delivering the concept it promised to deliver. There's just not enough polish or potential met. Tecmo Koei and Nintendo made a terrific job giving the player the opportunity to play as some iconic zelda characters, they made an even better job making it work whilst implementing ideas foreign to the DW series.
The main thing here is the essence of the game, It is really a dynasty warriors game with the zelda theme on it, and not the other way around. This is important to note because LOZ games have always followed the same formula and metrics so many people might be expecting something else when picking this up, so I think it's crucial that I make this clear. (by making the same statement three times in a row)
you can't tell me that doesn't look cool as fu-
But enough about that, what are the games praises, and what are it's downfalls?
I believe the most compelling feat Aonuma (LOZ director) and the guys at Tecmo Koei accomplished was putting together lore, characters and overall tribute from 3 LOZ games very widely divided by temporal and almost generational gaps. Ocarina of Time, Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword are all very well represented here, with a considerable amount of content from each, including places, characters, items, enemies and lore. I think it's a tall order to expect games released on 1998, 2006 and 2011 respectively to have a coherent and lasting appeal on fans of the series to the point where references to each are basically placed everywhere for the fan's enjoyment.
It is also important to note that there is new content, a new sort of compelling yet simple story with its own new handful of characters and of course a gorgeous yet very faithful redesign for the old ones. but this brings its own problems into the formula.
Now, the bads outweight the goods so let's start with them:
The Cons
here's a formula to calculate how many times the fps drops occur,
the number of shiny things multiplied by number of times you'd like to bang zelda in that outfit = fps drops
Not many warriors for hire in Hyrule I guess. DW games have already set the bar really high when it comes to playable character amount and diversity, nowadays they have like 90 characters or so. Yeah, some of them are similar to others but there are still many more available than what Hyrule Warriors offers. There are only 13 playable characters, at least without dlcs and rumored patches. this is insanely low for the dynasty warriors standard and it could have been at least nice to have mystery characters to bolster that number up a bit, they could´ve have come from other entries like Majora's Mask or Wind Waker even if they dont precisely fit the story .
The triforce is too powerful, sort of. That number we just talked about grows a bit though, with alternate weapons that offer completely different combat styles for some characters the overall number of movesets goes up to 20, but along with this comes another problem. The extra weapons are not evenly scattered across characters. (yeah, you'd have to be a math genius to figure that one out if I didn't tell ya) It's almost laughable how they assigned them, Link has 4 weapons making him the most well equipped warrior in the game but I can understand that, he is the main character of the LOZ and he's had an arsenal of items to use so yeah, we can allow that. Only 3 other characters have an alternate weapon and the new original character specifically designed for this game has frigging 3.
<<SPOILER YET NO SO SPOILER ALERT>>
So Ganondorf, the very representation of evil and demise can only have one weapon but this girl gets 3? It's dumb and there is a case to be made for at least 3 more characters to have alternate weapons.
<<SPOILER YET NO SO SPOILER ALERT>>
Starchilds and Bokoblins don't have a right to protest. Well, performance issues. It's news to no one that DW games are full of enemy troop models and AI to the point that in one special attack you're expected to kill 200 of them. (yeah, that's actually an in-game achievement) Well, Hyrule Warriors looks great, not perfect but pretty good, there is catch here though. Frame rate drops on difficult missions where many enemies appear. Adding insult to injury though, the multiplayer (which is a lot of fun by the way) has a severe graphic reduction to "ensure" the performance is kept, but it fails to do so, it still has many frame rate drops and maybe even more than the single player experience if you ask me. It's cool that they made it so the first player gets a whole screen for him/herself on the gamepad while the second player uses the TV but there is no option for splitscreen which to my knowledge could have been an alternative to alleviate the graphic reduction.
Why. There is no versus mode, no mounts or conquering mode. Why? :/
The Pros
Because it makes sense this nutjob handles
entirely different than the other nutjob below him
Cohesive name for a cohesive game. Even if its not the dungeon lurking, item hunting game the zelda series is known for, items are implemented in a somewhat cool non-intrusive fashion and bosses are included just as you would expect them to be. There is even a creative and fun game mode based on the overworld exploration of the first LOZ game ever, which is a lot of fun to beat.
Visuals: Hyrule Warriors has great aesthetic decisions and designs, it basically brought back pure and unscathed designs from games over a decade old and made them feel true to themselves but not polygonally crippling. It is a huge shame though it underperforms so strongly in fps terms, specially on multiplayer. 7/10
Gameplay: A non intrusive zelda infusion in the dynasty warriors formula makes Hyrule Warriors, the most fun you'll ever have playing a warriors game if you're a zelda fan, that does not mean that you wont enjoy it if you do not like zelda, so it's great it was implemented so brilliantly. It is a shame it feels so cut down, a scarce number of playable characters, lack of VS mode, conquest mode and overall lost potential. 7.5/10
Story: The story is basically not worth explaining, even though some new characters are introduced it's just weird to watch a bunch of people grunt in long cgi cutscenes with text popping up occasionally. The new characters are fitting though and some unexpected situations arise so it's not a complete bore. 5/10
Music: A true saving grace for Tecmo Koei and Nintendo's new venture together. Amazing songs well polished from an already heavily orchestrated library and some cool new tunes all overflowing with dynasty warriors's signature upbeat rock pieces. 9/10
Final Verdict:
A long overdue crossover, fans of both series will love, But, therein lies the problem, fans of any of the two, there is not enough content mode, character and performance-wise to pull any aliens to the series towards making the purchase. It is selling very well, so here's to Hyrule Warriors eventually reaching it's full potential and becoming the deserving symbol of gaming genius to represent both the legacies it is based upon.
7.5/10
**For the native english speakers, I apologize for the grammar errors. I'm still getting the hang of this language, it is in my best interest to write as adequately as possible but please do not let those mistakes take away from the article's meaning and objective.
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PS: I've decided to not excuse myself any longer as no one really reads any of my reviews, now if you'll excuse me, I'll go procrastinate and feel sorry for myself
