That sounds like a criticism that would apply if this were just some generic game that had the Zelda IP slapped onto it. But that doesn’t seem at all the case here, right?

I don't really mean this as a criticism. Yes, I think it is a good game. No, I don't think there are any real lessons others can capitalize on from it.

They did make an amazing game: Breath of the Wild. They’re continuing to reap the profits from it.

This. They made BotW to sell the Switch, and this sequel doesn't add any novel elements to it. This game deserves the success if BotW didn't exist, but as a sequel the hype is pure marketing.

If game of the year awards were reserved for new, non-sequel games, maybe franchises would be discouraged from selling the same game multiple times.

> this sequel doesn't add any novel elements to it

It absolutely does. Have you played it?

I bought and played it the day of release, because of the hype and since I loved BotW. Yeah, they added some new mechanics and items and overall the gameplay seems more refined, but it definitely feels like a sequel with a lot of familiarity. If TotK was a standalone game, it'd be a masterpiece. But in comparison to BotW, it's just more and a little better.

Admittedly, some of my disappointment comes from chasing the thrill of playing BotW for the first time. Maybe those were unrealistic expectations, but for the same price and more hype, TotK just didn't have nearly the same impact for me.

TOTK originated as a DLC for BOTW that quickly outgrew it rather than originating as a truly separate game. The amount of new content absolutely justifies it being its own title, but you might find it less disappointing if you pretend it's BOTW part 2.

>TOTK originated as a DLC for BOTW

Do you have a source? I don't remember any official word saying this

Yes, it came from an interview Kotaku did with Aonuma: https://kotaku.com/breath-of-the-wild-is-getting-a-sequel-be...

Thanks, that was an interesting read.

I love Link's Awakening (it was my very first Zelda, and the remake is just lovely).

The vehicle building is definitely new compared to BotW

fyi, BotW was actually made for WiiU. They ported it to switch and did a double release.

There has basically never been a Zelda game that wasn’t amazing. Also this is a sequel to a game that people were buying before they even had a switch (because switches were hard to get for the first year or so.)

So yeah, everyone assumed it’d be an amazing game and it is.

For your enjoyment, may I present: "Zelda: The Wand of Gamelon"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Legend_of_Zelda_CD-i_games

But for more official games, I find Phantom Hourglass to be the weakest entry in the series. It's... fine? Painfully easy and loaded with padding.

Also the original black sheep of the franchise, Adventures of Link.

Although personally I think it was a good idea that suffered from bad implementation, I've found very few people willing to admit they actually liked it. Notwithstanding it being decades old at this point.

> I've found very few people willing to admit they actually liked it

I did! The combat was fun, the music was great, and down-thrust is one of my favorite platforming abilities, ever.

More rare, is finding folks that can honestly admit to having beaten it. I picked up the "game and watch" recently, and I can't remember crap about how to make progress in that game. It is really really hard to remember where to go next.

Granted, the first game is bad at that, too. Especially on the second play through. Really difficult to have the same map be different in that way. Still have fun playing it, years later. :D

> More rare, is finding folks that can honestly admit to having beaten it.

I did that as well, although I was a kid at the time. Not sure if I could now.

Personally I thought that Spirit Tracks was much worse than Phantom Hourglass. The whole train mechanic and being restricted on how you could move in the overworld really wasn't fun. Between that and the re-implementation of the recurring temple so that you could only temporarily disable the guards, the whole game felt like a semi-stealth mission where you either timed the enemy movement right to slip past them or died instantly.

Yeah I thought of adding this caveat, but I don’t consider it a mainline Zelda game and basically no one has played it.

> Yet... with how fast this is selling, there is literally no way that folks know it is an amazing game ahead of time.

Advanced copies to reviewers, gameplay footage, developer commentary, etc...

> But the lessons to learn from how fast and well this is selling is as much about the power of franchise as it is anything about this particular game/system.

There are plenty of popular franchises that release games that don't sell well.

Certainly some folks are reading the reviews. I guarantee most are not. Heck, I'm interested and I haven't read any. (And, yes, I prepurchased the game.)

There are, certainly, franchises that tank. Usually not after a successful release, though. That said, this one is odd, as the prequel didn't seem to generate near as much buzz?

Discovery unlocked: brand trust

Nintendo first party games are reliably good. Bad Nintendo franchise games are the exception. After 30 years, and six after a huge hit, trust/prepurchase isn't absurd.

Stating the obvious, yes being a sequels helps, and not leveraging a sequel and be bold just for the heck of it is pointless. Also a sequel that sucked and get 65% reviews won’t get you these numbers

While I have no doubt it’s a great game because it’s Nintendo, AAA headliners tend to be sort of immune to criticism. It only becomes possible to determine decades down the line if one of these “10/10” games was actually top-tier or just middling and highly polished.

> More, odds are high that if they had made this as not a sequel, it would not be selling as well.

Probably. I’m not sure by how much though, there really aren’t many original games getting made with similar budgets. The story/dialog/acting definitely would not cut it without decades of nostalgia and backstory.