I've now passed the 40-hour mark in The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, and while I'm far from the first person to praise its building mechanics, I'm fascinated by how they might shape the future. Not necessarily just the future of Zelda as a constantly-evolving series, but the future of open-world games of this style moving forward across the board.
Given the fact open-world sandbox games are as popular now than they've ever been, there's a whiff of 2017 about Tears of the Kingdom – of the battle royale craze, and the wave of genre copycats that followed the likes of PUBG Battlegrounds and Fortnite. If open-world games from hereon consider folding in building mechanics, they'll inevitably look to Link's latest outing for inspiration. And if this happens, I worry that Nintendo has set the bar too high for any reasonable competition.
