New Hyrule Warriors Game Hits Nintendo
Prequel to Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild travels back a hundred years to the Age of Calamity
By Jocelyn Cosgrove
Prequel to Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild travels back a hundred years to the Age of Calamity
By Jocelyn Cosgrove
Fans of the Legend of Zelda games were surprised on Sept. 8, when Nintendo dropped the first trailer for Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity, a sort-of prequel to Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. Hyrule Warriors is a part of Koei Tecmo’s Dynasty Warriors series, but its plot is still connected to Breath of the Wild. This prequel has successfully engaged players with its many fighting quests and a longer storyline, one that may not make sense at first, but will have everyone jumping up and down with excitement like I was at the end of this game.
The events of Age of Calamity are set a hundred years before Breath of the Wild, with the story following Terrako, a little Guardian that was kept in a box in the corner of Princess Zelda’s study at Hyrule Castle. Guardians are eight-leg pieces of ancient technology that were uncovered to help stop the villain of both games, Calamity Ganon, but were magically turned against the Champions of Hyrule in an apocalyptic event known as The Great Calamity. This particular Guardian is much smaller than the other Guardians and is able to open time portals, which it does at the beginning of the game in order to prevent The Great Calamity.
Age of Calamity was developed by Omega Force, published in Japan by Koei Tecmo and internationally published by Nintendo. The game is a combination of the hack-and-slash gameplay of Dynasty Warriors and the storyline from the Legend of Zelda series. The general gameplay consists of fighting in large battles against monsters, but also completing specific tasks, capturing bases, and commanding other playable characters. The developers put a lot of time and emotion into every cutscene, while also making every character's fighting skills uniquely different. Every character has multiple moves; their normal attacks, combo attacks, and special attacks. There are also the Wizzrobe wands and the Sheikah rune attacks that make defeating some of the enemies easier.
One of the biggest differences and downsides coming from Breath of the Wild is that Age of Calamity has a greater focus on the storyline, giving no chance to explore Hyrule. Not being able to explore the world has been something that I have greatly missed, and it has removed that central choice of freedom that defined Breath of the Wild where the map is entirely open to discover almost right from the bat and players can choose what side quests or shrine quests to go on. In the Age of Calamity, players do training to boost character levels and weapon levels, but they can’t explore or roam around Hyrule.
A definite improvement but another difference between both games is that players can pilot and attack enemies with the Divine Beasts which are ancient technology similar to Guardians and are piloted by the Champions from the four main regions of Hyrule. Being able to control Divine Beasts in this game has really been a game changer for me. They have a series of attacks like all of the characters, one being a shot of blue light that burns up the toughest enemies with a snap of your fingers, or really just by pressing the A button when it's powered up.
Legend of Zelda fans who have played Breath of the Wild have already seen the decimated world of Hyrule 100 years after The Great Calamity has happened. Now fans have the opportunity to experience Hyrule at its peak and are able to change the timeline before Ganon wreaks havoc. Age of Calamity is a great game to keep fans on their toes while waiting for Breath of the Wild 2 to come out. All and all, this game is one I would recommend to anyone even if they have not played Breath of the Wild and are new to Zelda games. Age of Calamity was released to buy and play on Nintendo Switches on Nov. 20.
The events of Age of Calamity are set a hundred years before Breath of the Wild, with the story following Terrako, a little Guardian that was kept in a box in the corner of Princess Zelda’s study at Hyrule Castle. Guardians are eight-leg pieces of ancient technology that were uncovered to help stop the villain of both games, Calamity Ganon, but were magically turned against the Champions of Hyrule in an apocalyptic event known as The Great Calamity. This particular Guardian is much smaller than the other Guardians and is able to open time portals, which it does at the beginning of the game in order to prevent The Great Calamity.
Age of Calamity was developed by Omega Force, published in Japan by Koei Tecmo and internationally published by Nintendo. The game is a combination of the hack-and-slash gameplay of Dynasty Warriors and the storyline from the Legend of Zelda series. The general gameplay consists of fighting in large battles against monsters, but also completing specific tasks, capturing bases, and commanding other playable characters. The developers put a lot of time and emotion into every cutscene, while also making every character's fighting skills uniquely different. Every character has multiple moves; their normal attacks, combo attacks, and special attacks. There are also the Wizzrobe wands and the Sheikah rune attacks that make defeating some of the enemies easier.
One of the biggest differences and downsides coming from Breath of the Wild is that Age of Calamity has a greater focus on the storyline, giving no chance to explore Hyrule. Not being able to explore the world has been something that I have greatly missed, and it has removed that central choice of freedom that defined Breath of the Wild where the map is entirely open to discover almost right from the bat and players can choose what side quests or shrine quests to go on. In the Age of Calamity, players do training to boost character levels and weapon levels, but they can’t explore or roam around Hyrule.
A definite improvement but another difference between both games is that players can pilot and attack enemies with the Divine Beasts which are ancient technology similar to Guardians and are piloted by the Champions from the four main regions of Hyrule. Being able to control Divine Beasts in this game has really been a game changer for me. They have a series of attacks like all of the characters, one being a shot of blue light that burns up the toughest enemies with a snap of your fingers, or really just by pressing the A button when it's powered up.
Legend of Zelda fans who have played Breath of the Wild have already seen the decimated world of Hyrule 100 years after The Great Calamity has happened. Now fans have the opportunity to experience Hyrule at its peak and are able to change the timeline before Ganon wreaks havoc. Age of Calamity is a great game to keep fans on their toes while waiting for Breath of the Wild 2 to come out. All and all, this game is one I would recommend to anyone even if they have not played Breath of the Wild and are new to Zelda games. Age of Calamity was released to buy and play on Nintendo Switches on Nov. 20.