Today’s article contains game-long spoilers for The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom. If you are someone who cares about the plot of this game that is all about gameplay, I understand completely. Right there with you, buddy. So, please be aware, spoilers and all that riot. You have been warned.
Zelda, I’m really sorry you missed this one.
I have been gaming for all of my life, and I have learned one important fact in that time: never listen to fan theories on a game before its release. To be clear on this rule, it is not because fan theories are often bad or wrong, it is because they can be too good. For an easy example, consider that nearly every fan theory for a future Metroid game has consistently been better than anything Nintendo has ever released (who played Super Metroid and thought “this woman needs a condescending AI buddy”?). For another obvious example, before The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom was released (or even named), many people put forward the theory that Zelda would be playable in “Breath of the Wild 2”. This speculation was predominantly based on the initial trailers emphasizing Link and Zelda exploring a cave, and apparently the reason Zelda had short hair now was that she was going to be Player 2. After all, this has always been The Legend of Zelda, we were bound to have a playable titular character one of these days. Oh! And the whole thing was already referencing The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword heavily, and that was a game where Zelda had her own active adventure parallel to Link. Just as surely as we would see Link diving off sky islands onto the ground, here we would see Zelda’s “lost time” when the traditional swordsman wasn’t around.
Today’s article contains game-long spoilers for The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom. If you are someone who cares about the plot of this game that is all about gameplay, I understand completely. Right there with you, buddy. So, please be aware, spoilers and all that riot. You have been warned.
At the age of 30, a man named Sigmund had become the Kaiser of Kislev. Sigmund had had a hard life, being one of the last survivors of the nation of Elru. As a result of his heritage, Sigmund was a demi-human, complete with elven ears. However, he could pass as a “normal” human, as pointy ears are easily hidden by a bright orange hat, and you barely even notice that hat when a guy owns a pipe organ the size of a giant robot. Kaiser Sigmund was very successful as a soldier and politician, and much of that can be attributed to his apparent normalcy.
Sigmund’s son… not so much.
When Sigmund’s wife Anne was pregnant, malevolent doctors in the employ of Solaris administered some nasty drugs. This caused the beastly traits of Sigmund’s genetics to present themselves harder, and, when Rico was born, he had a skin color only a Blanka could love. Anne and Rico were banished (Sigmund was unaware, of course). Anne was left to raise Rico alone in the slums, and, a mere decade after losing her position as empress, Anne had wasted away into death. Rico was now all alone in the world.
Even when Anne was alive, Rico did not have a good childhood. Racism against demi-humans was always on the rise, and being an orange haired freak did not help Rico’s reputation. After his mother passed, Rico was forced to steal to survive as a poor orphan, and the local law enforcement did not turn a blind eye to this undesirable’s undesirable actions. Rico, son of a kaiser, had a mere ten years as a free child, and was then sent to prison for the next twenty.
But despite being a detainee of a discriminatory system, Rico was able to succeed. Rico grew into his beastly strength, and was able to learn how to fight with all the intensity of a man that is 90% muscle. By the time Rico was 20, he had been accepted into the Battler tournament, and was granted his own Gear. A year later, he was the victor, and reigned as the undefeated champion of all prisoners in Kislev D-Block. His Stier Gear was S-tier, without peer.
Rico may have reigned forever had it not been for the arrival of Fei Fong Wong. No one can say if it was the power of the Slayer of God, his inclination toward not fighting brute strength with brute strength, or the fact that Rico had been injured previously while skulking through the sewers that caused Rico to lose. But Rico did lose, and, after so long as the undisputed champion, Rico was robbed of his identity. Shortly thereafter, a despondent Rico attempted to assassinate the Kaiser by crashing his Gear into Sigmund’s skybox during a fight. When that attempt failed, Rico attempted to raid the Kaiser’s home, but was unsuccessful and imprisoned once again. This time, Rico was to be executed via being dropped into a terrarium with a dinosaur. That is enough for most people…
But Rico survived! Rico was rescued by his rival, Fei. But Fei was only there because of the other prisoners that Rico had led in his time in D Block. Rico may have been a downtrodden prisoner, but he was still a good man who inspired others, and ultimately his soul was saved because those others decided to repay the favor. And, from there, Rico realized how his hometown was important to him, and decided to pilot Stier in an effort to save everyone. Rico was instrumental in protecting the nation that had treated him poorly for nearly his entire life.
Rico, despite everything, triumphed over his own adversity, and became a leader and liberator on par with his father.
And then he is never mentioned in the scripture ever again. Let’s assume he had a good time.
Even Worse Streams presents Xenogears
Night 6
Original Stream Night: February 16, 2021
Night of the Breath of Fire (4)
Random Notes on the Stream:
Starting by talking about potential Nintendo Direct announcements (the one that would premiere 2/17/21). Rumors of Zelda games are forever!
My Link is always Chaotic Lazy.
We have it on official recording that none of us ever believed Sora would be in Smash Bros. Ever. I predicted Xenoblade 2 characters. Pyra and Mythra were announced the next day. I am a genius.
“His name is S-Tier?”
Fei wins the tournament, Dominia is introduced, and we talk about the Smash Bros that canonically f$&@.
As Rico has a flashback to his childhood, let us talk about Namco Webcomics involving Chis Hastings.
Time to hate on Donkey Kong 64. Platforming can never be fun (according to Rare).
Big Joe is skulking around the alleys while we discuss Conker’s Bad Fur Day and the impossibility of it having a sequel. Oh, and Caliscrub arrives.
We have to rescue Rico while Caliscrub begs to know when Hammer will announce his mad skillz. Gonna be a while!
“Please, videogame. I just want to play videogame.”
Finally! Gameplay! With trains! And discussing Street Fighter launches!
Sodom should appear in more Street Fighter games. And, hey, we have a dungeon here.
The “just had an article about this” mentioned refers to Rockin’ Kats.
We almost have the Weltall back! And Balrog and Ed are dicks.
We rescued Rico! And we haven’t talked about Xenogears actually on the stream at all. All fighting games! All the time!
“Wait. They’re star-crossed lovers and they both have a robot?”
Yes, Fei and Elly take a moment to hop out of their Gears to survey their own destruction.
Please do not get me started on the Xeno-timeline. We are trying to fight a giant robot boss here!
Fanboymaster claims he would be inordinately surprised if Fatal Frame 5 ever left the WiiU. Guess what was released across all consoles the following October!
Elly is saved by Grahf while we discuss Punch-Out and Ashita no Joe yet again.
“Hit ‘em with the Blanka ball!”
“There’s a lot I like about this game, but I’m glad I’m not playing it” is the final significant thought before we call it a night.
Next time on Xenogears: Back to committing war crimes.
This article may contain spoilers for Infernax, a title released within the last few months. Mind you, it isn’t exactly a “plot driven” adventure, but, if you’d like to go into this new game fairly clean, please keep it in mind. Additionally, speaking of “clean”, some of the images in today’s article may be on the bloody side. It’s that kind of game. Just letting everyone know!
Infernax is a “retro” action platforming title released in 2022. It started as an Adobe Flash game back in the elder days of the internet, and has now been upgraded to the crispest pixels available on Switch, Steam, and other advanced systems. But while the production of Infernax technically traces back twelve years, its origins go even further back than that. Infernax is heavily influenced by two prominent NES titles from 1987: Castlevania 2: Simon’s Quest and The Legend of Zelda 2: The Adventure of Link. And that is fascinating to this blogger, because Infernax is my favorite game of 2022 so far, and those two “biggest influences” on the game absolutely suck ass.
What the infernax happened here? What marks the difference between a-bear-to-play actual retro games and surprisingly fun faux retro titles? Well, a significant factor here seems to be…
Infernax has direct documentation
Pop quiz, hot shot: what do all the spells in The Legend of Zelda 2: The Adventure of Link actually do? You likely remember how Shield could cut damage, or Reflect is necessary for bouncing magic spells back and forth, but what about the fire spell? Does it simply hurl fireballs from Link’s sword, or do you actually need it somewhere? The Thunder spell is very similar: is it just a screen-clear, or something you need for defeating an appropriately named bird boss? And the Spell spell? Get the hell out of here, no one has ever remembered how and where that works without a FAQ. And, since we are looking at two games with very similar, confusing systems, go ahead and look up all the dead ends that require garlic in Castlevania 2. Do it, I’ll wait and get the article going again as soon as I hear the screaming stop.
But you know what Infernax has? Spell descriptions. Answers as to what exactly happens when you level up. Clean, immediate justifications as to what happens when you agree to make a choice that could either be deemed “good” or “evil” (the usual indicator is whether or not someone is bleeding/twitching on the floor). Yes, it diminishes the fun of discovering “secrets” for yourself, but should “what does the shield spell even do” be a secret in the first place? You want to play a game where you have to sus out the answers to difficult mysteries, you can play Phoenix Wright; I am playing a game where I hit monsters in the face with a blunt object, and I want to keep doing that without worry that I am doing something wrong.