The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom is the talk of the town after coming out to exceptionally positive reviews from critics, with most of them hailing it as an unforgettable masterpiece. But if God of War creator David Jaffe has anything to say on the matter, the new Nintendo game is being let off easy.
The beloved video game director took to Twitter early today to announce that he’s playing the new Zelda game. Jaffe made sure to point out that he couldn’t care less about “amazing production value and visuals,” but he finds it incredibly odd that a game in 2023 can look so simple and outdated and not even so much as garner a second look at its subpar graphic fidelity.
In fairness, Tears of the Kingdom does look like it came out in 2006, so why is it that Nintendo gets away with it and most other video game developers pay through the nose for even small shortcomings in that department?
People always say “lol ps2 graphics” as a meme but holy shit this ACTUALLY looks like PS2 graphics. Okami had a much nicer art style. Again…on PS2 in 2006. pic.twitter.com/kk16UBxVrT
— Gorilla Position (@gorpo__) May 12, 2023
Yes, The Legend of Zelda is a great game. It does what every other game out there should strive to accomplish, which is to deliver entertainment and fun in an utterly happy-go-lucky manner. But what Jaffe is bringing to our attention is a problem of bias; the fact that Tears of the Kingdom‘s inferior visual quality doesn’t even seem to register with most critics, whereas in other cases they’d jump at the opportunity to criticize a game for what they’d perceive as less-than-adequate graphics for a title in 2023.
Could it be that Tears of the Kingdom does so much so well that everyone is simply willing to ignore Nintendo’s lackluster offerings in this regard? That’s as may be, but we’re still not convinced if the game deserves all the praise it’s receiving, even if it’s for something as trifling as a few extra high-definition pixels on the screen.
