The more time I spend with The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, the more I notice its imperfections. There are lots of little niggles - I've got issues with the way saves work, with the camera and aiming, how easy it is to accidentally crouch or use your zoom scope in the middle of a battle, and how a completely left-field style of play will be thrown at you without warning (yeah, I'm looking at you, occasional tilt-sensor Shrine puzzles).
It's inevitable, of course; even in the most idyllic relationship, there'll be things which wind you up about your partner. By the same token, when things are great in every other respect you'll be able to overlook the things which don't work. It's when the fundamentals are broken - love, trust, respect - that it's harder not to sweat the small stuff.
However, my biggest stumbling block when it comes to BotW feels personal, rather than a flaw of the game - because I'm most likely in a minority regarding it. It's about me. It's my issue to overcome or accept, rather than demand that the game change its behaviour. And that issue is this issue: I hate the bosses.
Furthermore, I've come to accept that I've always hated bosses in games. It's only because I love so much of BotW that I've come to realise just how much I hate them. I've realised just what I'm prepared to put up with to revel in the good. But... man... it has been touch-and-go at times.
In shoot 'em ups, platform games, survival horror... the second that big, end-of-level, end-of-chapter, monster, or spaceship, or egg-shaped scientist appears... it has always acted like a brick wall to my enjoyment. I don't enjoy any aspect of a boss, beyond - maybe - its aesthetic qualities. They're something I have to suffer through in order to get to the stuff I really buy a game for.
And, in the latest Zelda, in at least one instance, I was suffering through a boss FOR DAYS.
It's inevitable, of course; even in the most idyllic relationship, there'll be things which wind you up about your partner. By the same token, when things are great in every other respect you'll be able to overlook the things which don't work. It's when the fundamentals are broken - love, trust, respect - that it's harder not to sweat the small stuff.
However, my biggest stumbling block when it comes to BotW feels personal, rather than a flaw of the game - because I'm most likely in a minority regarding it. It's about me. It's my issue to overcome or accept, rather than demand that the game change its behaviour. And that issue is this issue: I hate the bosses.
Furthermore, I've come to accept that I've always hated bosses in games. It's only because I love so much of BotW that I've come to realise just how much I hate them. I've realised just what I'm prepared to put up with to revel in the good. But... man... it has been touch-and-go at times.
In shoot 'em ups, platform games, survival horror... the second that big, end-of-level, end-of-chapter, monster, or spaceship, or egg-shaped scientist appears... it has always acted like a brick wall to my enjoyment. I don't enjoy any aspect of a boss, beyond - maybe - its aesthetic qualities. They're something I have to suffer through in order to get to the stuff I really buy a game for.
And, in the latest Zelda, in at least one instance, I was suffering through a boss FOR DAYS.
NO FREEDOM
The bosses - for want of a better term - in Breath of the Wild seem particularly at odds with the rest of the game. There's such a sense of freedom, of empowerment, and experimentation, to BotW as a whole, that when a boss comes around, the game suddenly contracts down to a narrow set of rules.
That's not the fault of the game as such. It's more an issue with tradition - this is how it has always been in games, and presumably there are bosses in BotW because some people relish that chance to utilise all the powers and skills they've acquired in the rest of the adventure.
That said, I had perhaps hoped that given the nature of the rest of the game, some sort of fresh approach might've been found when it came to bosses, that it would be a convention that Nintendo would try and subvert. Unfortunately... for the most part we get that same tired video game trope: Here's a boss... learn the patterns... repeat.
In fact, that pattern-learning is probably why I don't much like Bloodborne or Dark Souls. I can't be bothered with them, because that isn't what I want out of a game. To me, it's anathema to enjoyment, like doing maths revision, or reading a contract; such beautifully, horribly, realised worlds which are only open to me if I'm prepared to put in hours and hours of tedious grind.
Making that connection between what I do and don't want from a game, it got me to wondering what this says about me.
Shatter a hologram, and the image will be preserved on all of its facets. Usually, you can do the same with a person - even something as seemingly removed from real life as how we play games is distinctly individual. That's becoming ever more clear, as games offer more and more freedom, and increasingly reward a person's own style of playing.
When you're then expected to play in a prescriptive fashion, it becomes jarring.
The bosses - for want of a better term - in Breath of the Wild seem particularly at odds with the rest of the game. There's such a sense of freedom, of empowerment, and experimentation, to BotW as a whole, that when a boss comes around, the game suddenly contracts down to a narrow set of rules.
That's not the fault of the game as such. It's more an issue with tradition - this is how it has always been in games, and presumably there are bosses in BotW because some people relish that chance to utilise all the powers and skills they've acquired in the rest of the adventure.
That said, I had perhaps hoped that given the nature of the rest of the game, some sort of fresh approach might've been found when it came to bosses, that it would be a convention that Nintendo would try and subvert. Unfortunately... for the most part we get that same tired video game trope: Here's a boss... learn the patterns... repeat.
In fact, that pattern-learning is probably why I don't much like Bloodborne or Dark Souls. I can't be bothered with them, because that isn't what I want out of a game. To me, it's anathema to enjoyment, like doing maths revision, or reading a contract; such beautifully, horribly, realised worlds which are only open to me if I'm prepared to put in hours and hours of tedious grind.
Making that connection between what I do and don't want from a game, it got me to wondering what this says about me.
Shatter a hologram, and the image will be preserved on all of its facets. Usually, you can do the same with a person - even something as seemingly removed from real life as how we play games is distinctly individual. That's becoming ever more clear, as games offer more and more freedom, and increasingly reward a person's own style of playing.
When you're then expected to play in a prescriptive fashion, it becomes jarring.
HOW YOU PLAY
I've listened to people talk about the sense of achievement at defeating a boss, that there's a big dopamine hit... but I only ever feel relief - thank God that's out of the way, now I can get on with the game again - and irritation that I had to endure it in the first place.
Similarly, I struggle with games where I'm asked to be stealthy. Zelda has moments like this - and it's as tiresome as it was in, say, Watch Dogs 2, or Far Cry, or Dishonored, or... y'know any game where I'm suddenly expected to go from making as much noise as possible, to hiding behind crates and lurking in shadows. All too often in these instances, there's only one path to real success.
I seem incapable, no doubt due to my impatience, of sneaking past enemies without setting off an alarm, and alerting all their friends to my presence. I try - oh, how I try - but subtlety is clearly not my forte. I know in life that I put off the boring jobs - the paperwork, the dump trips - and the stuff I know I'll suck at - the DIY - to focus on the stuff that I know I'll enjoy.
When games thrust a boss at me, that's how it feels; like I've got to fix a shelf, or a light switch, so I can go back to watching telly or playing a game.
Most of the time, I'll get there in the end, but not until after I've destroyed half the house. No joke; I once tried to knock down a connecting wall, and - because my brain melts when faced with home improvement - I decided this would be best done with a big axe. On my first swing, the axe bounced off the wall, and ended up in the ceiling.
On another occasion, I spent four hours of swearing and sweating while trying to put a barbecue together. When I'd finally finished, I stood the thing up, and realised I'd put the legs on back to front, and the whole thing was at a slant. I nearly broke down in tears.
In short: I don't do finesse.
I've listened to people talk about the sense of achievement at defeating a boss, that there's a big dopamine hit... but I only ever feel relief - thank God that's out of the way, now I can get on with the game again - and irritation that I had to endure it in the first place.
Similarly, I struggle with games where I'm asked to be stealthy. Zelda has moments like this - and it's as tiresome as it was in, say, Watch Dogs 2, or Far Cry, or Dishonored, or... y'know any game where I'm suddenly expected to go from making as much noise as possible, to hiding behind crates and lurking in shadows. All too often in these instances, there's only one path to real success.
I seem incapable, no doubt due to my impatience, of sneaking past enemies without setting off an alarm, and alerting all their friends to my presence. I try - oh, how I try - but subtlety is clearly not my forte. I know in life that I put off the boring jobs - the paperwork, the dump trips - and the stuff I know I'll suck at - the DIY - to focus on the stuff that I know I'll enjoy.
When games thrust a boss at me, that's how it feels; like I've got to fix a shelf, or a light switch, so I can go back to watching telly or playing a game.
Most of the time, I'll get there in the end, but not until after I've destroyed half the house. No joke; I once tried to knock down a connecting wall, and - because my brain melts when faced with home improvement - I decided this would be best done with a big axe. On my first swing, the axe bounced off the wall, and ended up in the ceiling.
On another occasion, I spent four hours of swearing and sweating while trying to put a barbecue together. When I'd finally finished, I stood the thing up, and realised I'd put the legs on back to front, and the whole thing was at a slant. I nearly broke down in tears.
In short: I don't do finesse.
HOW WE PLAY
The constraining nature of most boss battles are the busy work I seemingly must suffer through to get to the stuff in Breath of the Wild that I really want to be spending time with - like hating the chorus to an otherwise great song, or struggling through the working week to be able to enjoy the weekend.
I'd have hoped that Zelda might have encouraged the same sort of experimentation towards bosses as it does everywhere else (admittedly, a mate of mine did finally defeated the same Zelda boss simply by lobbing bombs at it...). It seems like a rare, narrow-minded, restricted, out-of-place throwback to earlier instalments of the series.
I get enough of tedious repetition in real life. Yes, some of us need rules and order and predictability to feel safe, but some of us want to be surprised by freedom, by doing things our way, and to hell with society's decrees.
I know that, as I get older, the more I think that rules and regulation should be questioned, that we all deserve to live life our way, and why should we have to do something a certain way just because it has been drummed into us from birth?
That instinct has always been there in me - and it has taken Breath of the Wild to make me confront it. If we didn't question the conventions and rules, and accepted wisdom, we'd still be boring holes in people's skulls to release evil spirits.
There's too often a disconnect between how I want to play a game, and how a game wants to be played - just as there's abstraction between how I want to live my life in a fashion that feels right and comfortable for me, and how others tell me I have to live it.
What does the way you play games say about you?
The constraining nature of most boss battles are the busy work I seemingly must suffer through to get to the stuff in Breath of the Wild that I really want to be spending time with - like hating the chorus to an otherwise great song, or struggling through the working week to be able to enjoy the weekend.
I'd have hoped that Zelda might have encouraged the same sort of experimentation towards bosses as it does everywhere else (admittedly, a mate of mine did finally defeated the same Zelda boss simply by lobbing bombs at it...). It seems like a rare, narrow-minded, restricted, out-of-place throwback to earlier instalments of the series.
I get enough of tedious repetition in real life. Yes, some of us need rules and order and predictability to feel safe, but some of us want to be surprised by freedom, by doing things our way, and to hell with society's decrees.
I know that, as I get older, the more I think that rules and regulation should be questioned, that we all deserve to live life our way, and why should we have to do something a certain way just because it has been drummed into us from birth?
That instinct has always been there in me - and it has taken Breath of the Wild to make me confront it. If we didn't question the conventions and rules, and accepted wisdom, we'd still be boring holes in people's skulls to release evil spirits.
There's too often a disconnect between how I want to play a game, and how a game wants to be played - just as there's abstraction between how I want to live my life in a fashion that feels right and comfortable for me, and how others tell me I have to live it.
What does the way you play games say about you?
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