Ever since it launched,The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wildhas been a hot topic of conversation in the gaming community. The game is huge, so there’s plenty to talk about when it comes to the title itself. However, one thing has permeated gaming conversation when it comes toBreath of the Wildin a way that seems to bother some and excite others: The common comparison betweenThe Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wildand countless other titles.
It seems like nowadays, games are frequently gettingBreath of the Wildcomparisons when they’re revealed: Some potentially intentional, and others purely by coincidence. Either way, the sheer number of comparisons to the game has made plenty of people ask why it’s become such a common point of video game discussion. Withthe currently untitledBreath of the Wildsequel sitting expectantly on the horizon, there’s likely to be another resurgence of comparisons made to the series, so it’s important to understand whyBreath of the Wildis such a major point of comparison in the industry before a new entry releases.
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What Sets Breath of the Wild Apart
After its release and instant popularity, a lot of studios were likely looking at whatBreath of the Wilddid right to cause such a surge in popularity for a franchise that’s been around for over 30 years. While there have been plenty of games that have tried their hand at capturing the same magic, it feels as if every title that’s attempted tofollow inZelda’s footstepshas come short in one way or another.
It’s simple to look at the game and deduce that a truly open-worldZeldagame is what fans had been wanting. The shift in focus towards the open world was what made the game popular, but that’s not the full picture. Simply being an open world isn’t what makesBreath of the Wildspecial: It’s the way that the game revamped just about everything in theZeldaseries from its dungeons to its story to its minute-to-minute gameplay, and centered all of those changes around player freedom in an open world. Each of those individual changes are fun and work on their own, sure, but it’s the collective experiencethat makesBreath of the Wildsuch a success.
Following The Breath of the Wild Format
Because of its major popularity, it seemed like only a matter of time untilBreath of the Wildmade a true influence on the gaming space and it can be seen in all corners of it now. FromHalo InfinitetoSonic Frontiers, it seems like game trailers simply can’t get enough of the main character walking towards a cliff and overlooking the vast and luscious world below.
This isn’t something thatBreath of the Wildinvented, but that final moment in the original trailers for the game signified everything that was going to be different about the series moving forward. Looking out over a vast world shows the seemingly endless possibilities in store for the protagonist and a feeling of wonder and excitement, two feelings essential for selling games.
That’s not to say that all games taking influence fromBreath of the Wildonly see it as a title to follow behind in hopes of grabbing some easy cash, far from it. However, those feelings are exactly the kinds of things that studios want fans of their legacy franchises to feel when playing a new entry. For example, it seems like a safe thing to say thatifHalo Infinitewere simply a standardHaloentry, and not attempting to shake up the franchise in a similar way to howZeldadid, it may not have seen the sweeping success that it’s seen since its release.
However,copyingBreath of the Wild’s approachto design by taking a franchise and making it open world isn’t always enough to ensure success. After all, as stated above,Breath of the Wildis much more than its open-world which is why studios that seem to be pivoting towards an open world becauseBreath of the Wilddid it haven’t always seen the success that they might have been hoping for. 2022 is full of games that seem to be taking inspiration fromZeldain one way or another and that’s a great thing, but it’s still to be seen if that’s the way that titles are going to be successful.
Pokemon Legends: Arceus, for example, seems to be taking a lot of inspiration from the game, but makingaBreath of the Wild-stylePokemongamemight not be exactly what the series needs to feel fresh and new. The mechanics worked forZeldabecause they were derivative of the gameplay that the series has always had so doing a one-to-one version of that forPokemon, a series with drastically different mechanics, might not be the best move to make a qualityPokemontitle.
At the end of the day, because of how greatBreath of the Wildis, there were bound to be plenty of games following it that take inspiration from it. However, not every open-world title is necessarily “likeBreath of the Wild” simply because of the open world.
Games likeHalo InfiniteandSuper Mario Odysseyhave aBreath of the Wildair to them because of the way they reinvent their respective franchises by followingZelda’s lead, boiling these franchises down to their mechanical foundations and what makes them fun. That’s the kind of game design that sees success when dealing with a long-term franchise, simply doing everything thatBreath of the Wilddid because the game was popular is not.
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wildis available now for Nintendo Switch.
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