I not too long ago acquired to mess around 20 minutes of the latest Hyrule Warriors sport, Age of Imprisonment, and there is a lot for followers of Zelda and Musou video games to be occupied with. For the previous, it’s going to come as thrilling information that Age of Imprisonment is canon. Whereas Age of Calamity was fairly wishy-washy with alternate timeline concepts, Nintendo goes all-in for its follow-up and making all the pieces you see in Age of Imprisonment true to the mainline story. Everyone knows what occurs in the long run with Ganondorf, however there are, after all, a variety of questions on what occurred earlier than and after.
From a gameplay standpoint, Age of Imprisonment will let gamers get their fingers on number of characters from the canon and, given what I noticed from simply Zelda, Rauru, and Mineru, it is a very good roster crammed with very thrilling prospects.
Throughout my time with Age of Imprisonment, we acquired to go underground with Rauru, Mineru, and Zelda, the latter of whom mentions that it’s her first time within the depths and that she did not comprehend it existed. Mineru explains that the depths have a number of websites of sacred energy and that she’s been gathering constructs for her analysis. She wasn’t capable of examine the depths on her personal till Zelda and her powers of sunshine got here alongside to present them the ole’ beatdown.
Every character, after all, had their distinctive model in fight, with Zelda each slashing with an odd Zonaite sword and wielding magical gentle projectiles; Rauru utilizing spear and beam assaults; and Mineru using a bunch of contraptions cobbled collectively from Zonai gear.
I felt proper at dwelling plowing via Little Frox, Frox, and Constructs, as somebody who performed a complete lot of Age of Calamity, however even these with some expertise with any Musou sport will probably discover it simple to select up. From the primary sport, you continue to have your common and powerful assault combos, dashes, flurry rushes, guarding, weakpoint smashes, crafting supplies; the entire shebang. Assaults are flashy, have large areas of impact, and are all the time enjoyable to dole out punishment with.
The R button menu has modified from the Sheikah Slate to distinctive abilities in Age of Imprisonment. There’s each a robust dashing and vertical assault, and Zonai units to both use everytime you’d like, or, in a greater use case, can be utilized to counter an enemy’s potential and slap ’em again within the face. The Y dashing model counters opponents dashing in direction of you, such because the assemble’s ahead lunge, which has been pulled straight out of Tears of the Kingdom. The X model counters aerial or leaping assaults, such because the Frox’s leap assault. These assaults can be utilized on their very own for further injury, however hitting particular counters appears far more worthwhile as they provide a chance to execute an additional follow-up on the finish. These assaults have a cooldown, identical to earlier than with a profitable use of a slate potential. The attention-grabbing factor is the A and B buttons are customizable Zonai gear, every with particular properties which can be changeable within the directional pad’s proper menu. This allows you to swap your loadout on the fly relying on what the enemies’ weaknesses are. The Zonai gear makes use of Zonai batteries, which have to be replenished, nevertheless.
The cool factor about that is that some gear may be positioned into the surroundings and can function mechanically with out your enter, which may up the damage-dealing potential obtainable. Since there is not any pleasant hearth, there’s a variety of alternative to, for instance, drop a flame emitter and work it into your overwhelming offense–thank Hylia.
Enemies even have traits and weaknesses that carry over from Tears of the Kingdom. Frox eat bombs, for instance, and so they’re nonetheless weak to photographs to the attention or assaults to their bottom ores. That signifies that should you performed Tears, you will have a significant leg up on the overall concept of the best way to tackle what you are up towards.
The place it actually modifications from Age of Calamity although is Sync Strikes. This isn’t simply because it is a highly effective assault that requires two characters, however it’s as a result of it wants two characters, and the character of Musou video games requires you to divide and conquer the map, making you strategize when characters ought to work collectively or go individually. That is an attention-grabbing twist on how these kinds of video games are normally performed.
Sync Strike assaults are the largest game-changer in my view, as a result of within the Age of Calamity, most characters have been enterprise solo ventures and attacking completely different factors of the map. However Sync assaults are so highly effective that having two characters working collectively appears like a dependable strategy to plow via an enemy rapidly and save time. This encourages you to strategize and all the time rethink the place to ship models for absolute best outcomes, particularly since Sync Strike assaults are gradual to cost.
Every Sync Strike assault pair up varies relying on who’s partaking and what you get ranges from multi-directional beams you possibly can management to a totally alternate type like Mineru’s powered-up assemble. Which means a few of these assaults will probably be higher or worse in some conditions, so there’ll little doubt be loads of alternatives to check and experiment to optimize builds and runs. Simply excited about the ultimate doable roster for this sport and designing an interacting Sync assault throughout all characters feels like a really daunting process, however as gamers, which means there’s more likely to be loads of depth.
Whereas the preview was pretty quick, with a little bit teaser on the finish, I acquired a fairly good concept of how good Age of Imprisonment feels, and it feels rattling good. I feel the truth that this sport already has good legs, and I am but to see the characters I actually need to see simply makes me extra excited for its launch on November 6.
