Chapter 889: Gameplay Explosion
The reason he was so decisive was that *The Legend of Zelda* truly fit Zhao Lei’s needs perfectly. The Switch allowed for multiplayer same-screen gaming, so he could play at home with his wife and kids. *The Legend of Zelda* itself was suitable for all ages. If there was any console that wouldn’t make his wife lose her temper, the Switch was the best choice.
The VR gaming pod was good, but it was expensive and only allowed one person to play, which could easily spark marital conflicts.
“All you do is play games! Spending tens of thousands on a big toy—how are we supposed to live like this?”
To avoid such arguments, buying a Switch was the optimal choice given their current financial constraints.
As for whether to get the flagship version of the Matrix Glasses, Zhao Lei was still hesitating. Without them, he could play *The Legend of Zelda* on the TV, and the 4K graphics were actually decent, but the immersion was far inferior to VR. With the Matrix Glasses, he could enjoy the best experience of *The Legend of Zelda* anytime, anywhere—after all, you couldn’t carry a TV around the streets.
Zhao Lei found a seat in the rest area, pulled out his phone, and scrolled through the forums to see what everyone thought of *The Legend of Zelda*.
Since the trial had started, a large number of players had already gone to experience stores in various cities to try *The Legend of Zelda*. Most of these people were Chen Mo’s core fans, and they immediately posted on the forums to discuss their thoughts and feelings about playing the game.
“Played *The Legend of Zelda*—totally blown away! This game is so awesome it’s unreal, so much fun!”
“Yeah, I don’t even feel like I did anything. Close my eyes, open them, and a whole day’s gone!”
“Really? Is it that fun?”
“It’s Chen Mo’s work after all. I could guess your reactions without even going to the experience store.”
“No, this game is really different! It’s nothing like anything Chen Mo’s made before. Hard to describe—you have to play it to know!”
“Every minute in this game, you find something new and exciting. It’s non-stop fun from start to finish!”
“For those who haven’t played, I recorded a short video. Watch it and you’ll see how fun this game is.”
A player posted a short video on the forum, recorded while playing on the Switch. In the video, the player hid inside a large barrel, slowly approaching a Bokoblin camp. While hidden in the barrel, Link wasn’t spotted by the distant Bokoblins, but once he got closer, that changed.
The player moved to a close distance, waited until the Bokoblin on watch duty on the lookout tower turned its back, shot an arrow into its head, and killed it in one hit.
As night fell, the other Bokoblins in the camp lay on the ground, dozing off.
The player crept over, first stealthily stealing all the weapons they had set aside, then performed a sneak attack, taking out one with a single blow.
Two others jolted awake, but the player quickly finished them off with a few more strikes, clearing out all the Bokoblins.
Then, the player took a Bokoblin club, lit it on a campfire, and threw it at the wooden door of the Bokoblin’s storage hut.
“Whoosh!”
The wooden door burst into flames and was soon burned to ashes.
Link picked up the club from the ground, used it to drive away the bees from a hive inside the cave, shot the hive down, and opened a treasure chest in the cave.
After watching the video, players on the forum expressed their shock.
“Holy crap, you can steal the monsters’ weapons? That’s so sneaky!”
“What kind of move is that? Light a wooden stick on a campfire, throw it at a wooden door to burn it, then use a torch to chase away the bees?”
“Just play it yourself and you’ll see. There are even more crazy tricks, like setting the forest on fire and then using the wind to burn all the nearby monsters to death.”
“I also found a diary that hinted at a recipe to trade with that mysterious old man for a cold-resistant outfit. The recipe mentioned needing a warm herb, meat, and something else. I tried several combinations, and it turned out to be bass! After cooking that dish, I waited by the wooden hut until night, talked to the old man when he came back, and traded it for the cold-resistant outfit!”
“Yeah, on the Great Plateau, there are several Koroks, treasure chests, and even grasshoppers you can use to make stamina potions…”
“Speaking of that, I discovered a special trick with Stalkoblins. They pick up their own heads to revive, right? If you grab their head and kick it away like a ball, their body gets so mad it stomps its feet, and then it dies. It’s hilarious!”
“Whoa, you guys up there—are we playing the same game? I don’t understand half of what you’re saying!”
“Same here… Looks like we missed a ton of stuff…”
After a bit of discussion, the players realized that everyone’s experience of *The Legend of Zelda* seemed different. Some players approached it with a conventional mindset—just killing monsters, picking up weapons, and progressing the story. They were baffled by others’ discussions: Grasshoppers? Cooking? Bird eggs? What the heck is a Korok?
There was also a gap on the Great Plateau that was too wide to jump across, and many players gave up on it. But after talking, they found out you could cut down a tree on the cliff edge to make a bridge!
Players were all marveling: the gameplay was absolutely explosive!
Many people might ask, “What exactly is ‘gameplay’?” Just show them a random clip from *The Legend of Zelda*, and they’d understand.
One designer even did a detailed analysis of the early game flow in *The Legend of Zelda*, concluding it was “absolutely perfect”!
“The map design in *The Legend of Zelda* is incredibly interesting. I did some research. First, the map is divided into many regions, each with a tower. After climbing a tower, players can mark nearby shrines. On the way to a shrine, they encounter monster groups, collectible elements, and other gathering items. The best part is how well-distributed everything is. The tower-shrine-puzzle elements form three tiers, breaking the map into countless small sections, ensuring each one gives players a fresh and completely different experience.”
“Especially the puzzles—*The Legend of Zelda* takes puzzle-solving to the extreme. From catching grasshoppers and finding Koroks to completing shrines, the entire world is full of mysteries waiting for players to solve one by one. The scariest part is that the Great Plateau is just the beginning of the game, and it’s already this rich. The whole map is still huge! If the rest of the map maintains the same quality as the Great Plateau, or even surpasses it, then this game… is definitely the best game of the year!”
Online, every player who tried *The Legend of Zelda*, whether on the game pod or not, was full of praise for it.
A few players started off impatiently, which affected their first impression, but after seeing others’ crazy tricks and truly diving into the game themselves, they immediately turned into die-hard fans, singing the praises of *The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild*.