When now there is very little to the next 20st November, the day it will hit shelves and digital stores Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity, was released on the Nintendo eShop di Nintendo switch a full-bodied demo of the title. Prequel of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, the game will propose a new guise for Link and companions, who this time will have to face Ganon in a musou which seems to be very interesting right from the start. The demo opens in fact in a cathartic moment of the main story. Zelda is standing between Link and the Calamity Ganon, and is forced to use all her powers to save the hero. Right at that moment, a small guardian inside the castle is activated, and through a portal he manages to go back in time. So suddenly we find ourselves in the past, 100 years ago, in an equally fundamental moment. The forces of evil are attacking the castle of Hyrule, King Roham, king of prophecies, incites his soldiers, including our Link, to defend the kingdom at any cost. After selecting the difficulty level (choosing between easy, normal, difficult and very difficult), this new chapter of Hyrule Warriors immediately catapult us into the heart of the action, in the first level called "Battle of the plain of Hyrule".
Link against all
As soon as I have taken the controls of Link, we will find ourselves in the most classic of musou: hundreds of Boblin they will launch at us, and we will have to learn immediately i game controls. With the Y and X keys we will alternate light attacks and heavy attacks, which can be chained in spectacular combos (more agile than those of Breath of the Wild), while with B and A we can respectively shoot and use the special move of our champion, after filling a special bar. The dorsal keys will serve to parry with the shield (ZL) and use the special ability (ZR), which in the case of Link is a barrage of arrows, while L and R will be used to use the consumables and the powers of the Sheikah tablet.
Once the first enemies have been defeated, a series of mini boss, among which Grublin, Lizalfos e Shamanx. These fights will offer us the salient features of the combat system by Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity. Each of them will be equipped with an energy bar and shields: after using the lock-on on them by pressing the right stick, these special enemies will have to be destroyed using a specific ability that will allow us to neutralize theirs. defenses and thus be able to use a special move that will allow us to eliminate them, obtaining special rewards.
About halfway through the mission, it will make its appearance IMPA, counselor of Hyrule. Our careless companion shows up much younger how we met her in Breath of the Wild, and for this she will be very agile in battle. Unlike the soldiers of the kingdom, more of the supporting actors than true allies, Impa will give us a big hand during the fights, but above all it will literally throw the Sheikah tablet at us, allowing us to unleash new skills. Directly from the gadgets of the main chapter, we will be able to launch the Bradio-controlled omba, an area attack that will break the enemy's guard, Glacior, which will launch us high allowing us to use the paravela and avoid the attacks of the mini bosses, and from the second battle onwards too Stasis, which will block opponents for a few seconds. Who knows if these abilities will all be present right away in the final game.
In addition to Link, the game will then allow us to control two other characters as well. First he'll make us impersonate Impa. The very agile Sheikah will be a lot faster than Link in combat, and will be able to take advantage of faster swings and much more immediate abilities, albeit at the cost of one lower attack strength. So, from the second mission, we can also take the controls of Princess Zelda. This one will be decidedly slower, but will be able to take full advantage of the abilities of the Sheikah tablet, launching heavy attacks against Boblin's hosts and being able to control in the first place the mysterious guardian who came from the future.
4 champions and a world to explore
At the end of the battle, the entire game world opens up before us. Divided into 9 areas, the game map of Breath of the Wild will give us the possibility to face different types of missions. Battles, Or the main quests, which will allow us to continue with the story; the facilities and shops, places where you can melt and build new weapons, and where to buy new equipment and materials; the regional missionsthat will allow us to donate materials obtained in battle to the citizens of Hyrule, getting new combos for our champions in return; and finally the secondary battles, where we can train in areas already explored, by defeating mini bosses and taking on timed missions. Before each mission we can choose party members, equipment and food to take with us into battle to heal us. By leveling up, in fact, our character will acquire more hearts and will have greater attack power, as well as being able to equip new weapons.
But most of all, the game will introduce the ability to play local multiplayer. In fact, we will be able to face the game together with a friend, who will impersonate a second Champion, in one mode split screen. While it's a really cool feature, the game does suffer a few freeze during the most hectic phases, and the reduced screen makes it difficult to lock the bigger enemies. However, nothing that cannot be fixed in time for the release of the title (remember that it is only a demo).
Although for some to see Link and Zelda fighting in a musou it may seem strange, this one Hyrule Warriors: The Age of Calamity looks very promising. Although it does not innovate the genre, the title Nintendo introduces some mechanics that, related to Breath of the Wild, are more interesting. The graphic style remains that of the main saga while the gameplay, albeit obviously deviating from the action / adventure we have come to know, proves fluid and intriguing, mixing the typical one-on-one fights of the musou with some mechanics typical of the saga. We can't wait for November 20th to be able to unlock the last 4 battles of the demo, the ones that will most likely introduce the 4 Champions.
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