On March 3, 2017, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild launched right alongside the Nintendo Switch. The game launched to a storm of rave critical acclaim and great reviews that hadn't been seen to this degree in years, and single handedly propelled the Switch to a fantastic launch. And with good reason—Breath of the Wild is one of the best games ever made (if you ask me, it is the best game ever made). Nintendo's first take on the open world genre is staggering in its scope and its sheer inventiveness. It deconstructs open world tropes and dismantles long-standing assumptions about its own series thoroughly to create a game that's felt like nothing else at launch.
It's been two years, and there has still been nothing else quite like The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. Two years later, I still return to it, and even with 170 hours logged into the game, I am still playing it (I was playing it just now!), and finding brand new things about it that I hadn't stumbled upon before. It's a masterpiece of exploration and discovery, and the game I had waited on for all these years, and I can't wait to see where Nintendo goes with the sequel. And that's the most exciting thing for me—even with how much I love Breath of the Wild, there are so many obvious areas of improvement, I can't wait to see Nintendo build on it.
So happy two birthday to Breath of the Wild. Feel free to share your own stories, opinions, videos, GIFs, and more on the game here.
