it should go without saying that i know not everyone likes story and i dont expect everyone to do, theres always people that will skip every dialog and ignore NPCs or someone that missed something or literally jsut didnt get it, and thats fine too
but i also think its fine that these and other people may end up confused or not liking a more involved story that expects you to listen and think on your own bc they dont understand it immediately, its not fair either to write them off bc of it, maybe one of them will be intrigued enough to go back and replay it and ends up liking it, maybe not, and i think that is both fine-
i really dislike when a game feels like its afraid of its own audience, when it forces its characters to spill everything out in clear and bold text on the screen, when everythign repeats it to make SURE you get it and theres is no room for misinterpretation (there always is), when it feels like its afraid of ever confusing anyone (there will always be someone)
"totk has nothign to do with botw and they removed everythign important from it and act like it didnt exist bc they didnt want to confuse players that hadnt played botw" is an infuriating argument to me. even though i know most people say this in good faith trying to make any sense of it AND i know i have talked about it before
the biggest problem is with WHY dont they want to confuse people so badly? why make a sequel to a popular game and then not actually make it one bc you are afraid of confusing players that didnt play the game its a sequel to? (i actually think they simply didnt care but thats beside the point) thats not on you thats on them? its okay to be confused! if you read the second book and skip the first one you probably are gonna be, if you then complain about it thats a you-problem, i know its a bit more complicated with long running game series but with the internet you can find you anything about it too!
i! a long time zelda fan have not played every game, whether through circumstances or lack of interest, windwaker is my favorite game even though i never played ocarina of time and they are connected, i did get more context for things over the years but will always be missing something bc of it too, and im okay with that (also a short recap of the previous one is a good trade off)
botw and totk are not even comparable really bc ww and oot isnt a 5 year literally same map and characters kind of 'sequel' (AND does a recap at the start), not to mention they are both playable on the same console, you could even make people give the first game a chance or a second chance bc of it- it is simply, not a valid excuse to explain why totk is the way it is
("can you understand the game without having played part 1?" is a question i often hear when watchign streams and if the answer is "yes" its always used as a flex and i really dont think it should be- i can see it more when its an ancient game getting a revival but even then, whats the hurt of reading a short summary of its plot? whats the hurt of playing something you dont get every bit of context for? why even, maybe you would like the original game if you went back to play it too?)
its in the gameplay too, you designed these things to look like modern devices so people immediately knew what they would do? why? why is that important? even ignoring the fact you will literally know what somethign does if you just hit it once- would it not be more fun and memorable if you DIDNT immediately know? if you had to work with it and puzzle with it? the thing this zelda used to be known for?
why does it repeat the same three sentence 'story' through every single NPCs mouth? are you that afraid of me not getting it? why? do you really think a dude that skips every line and talks over cutscenes will like your game more that way? its not even relevant to understand to play and finish the game, like, at all
i just dont think its fair to put all players of a franchise into a box of "they dont want this", especially with bigger series its downright impossible that there isnt every kind of player playing it, and really, would it be the end if it did one game a little different
i forgot where i was going with this, posting it anyway, i want better writing in games, i think thats my end point
