Hyrule Warriors Age Of Calamity Review (Nintendo Switch)

As an ancient evil threatens to consume everything in its path, the fate of Hyrule hangs in the balance. Lead your forces onto the battlefield, then battle against the might of Calamity Ganon in the ultimate struggle for survival.

Pros:

• Gorgeous graphics.
• 10.8gb download size.
• 3 difficulties-easy, normal and hard.
• Can change voice language to Japanese and European languages.
• Can skip cutscenes.
• Initial fight with tutorial pop-ups.
• Strategy fighting gameplay.
• Invert axis and sensitivity sliders.
• Motion control aiming-on/off.
• Use the Zelda Breath of the Wild universe from characters to locations.
• Fast-paced combat.
• Impressive on-screen enemy count.
• Pack leaders which are bigger and stronger can be locked onto and have a health bar and show button prompts for reversals and weak spots.
• Enemies drop materials and health.
• Overall kill counter.
• Breakable objects.
• Loot chests pop up as you clear out camps.
• Swap between characters and give orders to others like where to attack or defend.
• Runs really well.
• When out of combat you run around.
• Combos are possible and you have all your powers like creating platforms or freezing enemies.
• The minimap will show icons, enemies, allies, and markers. You can have it show the whole current region or zoom in on your location.
• Can cut down the grass, shrubs, and trees with random drops happening.
• End of a battle breakdown showing kills, clear time, and rupees earned.
• Sheikah Slate-use to choose destinations on the Hyrule map.
• Free in-game bonus if you have a Breath of the Wild save on your Nintendo Switch.
• Main missions, Sidequests, challenges, and activities will show on the map.
• Play how you want.
• Activities will show the reward for completion.
• Contributions-do side quests and help people to fill the contribution bar.
• Materials are tied to areas and these are used to do activities and crafting most of the time.
• Can replay levels.
• Feels like an extension to Breath of the Wild.
• Two player mode support.
• Manual and automatic saves.
• Weapons-find and earn in missions and each will have a damage number and maybe a random ability/buff. An easy comparison pop-up happens when selecting a weapon.
• Main stats screen.
• Gallery-unlock art/concept art, rewatch cutscenes, and listen to music.
• Battle preparation-you can edit each party member’s loadout from armor to weapons. Cooking can be done from the recipe and materials list with each meal giving a timed buff.
• Fully voiced cast.
• Real fun to play.
• Gameplays like Dynasty Warriors.
• Can just button mash your way through plus you do get button icons to show for attacks and healing.
• Fast loading times.
• Korok Seeds-hidden Collectibles as seen in Breath of the Wild.
• When you bring up a quick-select menu it will pause the game.
• Pickups and loot will show in a list on the side of the screen.
• Guardians–big huge formidable foes that you should avoid. They have really strong attacks.
• Clear mission markers in-game.
• Each party member plays completely differently like Link is a brawler with abilities but Impa can create duplicates to fight for her and Zelda is so kick-ass with all these amazing magic and abilities.
• The animations and more specifically the animations of attacks are biblical.
• Challenges-set event with a level requirement.
• Blacksmith-fuse weapons together in order to level them up and make them better and maybe add new or better the buffs attached.
• Sell unwanted weapons in the blacksmith.
• High spirits produce–shop to buy and sell materials and items.
• Handy icon to show/help with what to do on the map and which tasks/missions to take.
• Outskirt stables-traveling merchants who can sell rare items.
• Full camera control and lock on.
• Earn and unlock new recipes.
• Drops will come to you.
• Weapons are unique to each character so basically, each character has a set of weapons only they can use or fuse.
• Meditative training-practice temple where you can spawn in any enemy and give yourself a weapon.
• Scanner-click it on materials needed for an activity to track said materials.
• Recruit new party members.
• Perform a perfect dodge to get a flurry opportunity.
• Military training camp-pay rupees to level up party members.

Cons:

• Slight pop in of characters.
• A lot to take in.
• The learning curve with the more complex controls as they are combinations of button presses.
• Activities are just a set of materials you need to collect.
• Using the map and understanding how it works takes a bit of time.
• The camera can get quite erratic especially when using lock-on.
• Can feel a bit button mashy at times.
• Fusing weapons feels like a case of pick a weapon that looks good then just pile weapons into it to make it better.
• No touchscreen support.
• No achievements system in place.
• Cant earn exp in meditative training.