Echoes of Wisdom, Part Five
Jan. 25th, 2026 07:06 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rynlingLast night I finished my third playthrough of Echoes of Wisdom. I really love this game!
I think it’s super fun to be able to treat each enemy encounter like a puzzle. Though Zelda not having a sword of her own can be difficult during the first hour or so, I appreciate that the game's primary verb isn’t “kill,” especially because it’s such a joy to follow Zelda around Hyrule in the company of all sorts of creatures. It’s neat that defeating Ganon doesn’t really solve anything in the larger cosmology of this world, whose magical nature necessitates constant small acts of maintenance from countless unsung heroes.
Echoes of Wisdom is a simple game for kids, but I feel like director Tomomi Sano was able to get directly at the heart of what makes the lore and gameplay of the Zelda series so compelling.
What a treasure Echoes of Wisdom is, especially when compared to Tears of the Kingdom, which forces the player to spend hours farm-murdering "enemies" for random drops to upgrade armor sets while at the same time retconning Breath of the Wild's lovely ecological optimism in favor of a story that tries to be progressive but fails miserably because of its blatant racism.
If anyone's curious, my ultimate take on Age of Imprisonment is that it's a nothingburger of a franchise cash-in that's not worth getting upset about. Why waste time being mad about a shallow and poorly executed trashgame when you could play Echoes of Wisdom instead?
I think it’s super fun to be able to treat each enemy encounter like a puzzle. Though Zelda not having a sword of her own can be difficult during the first hour or so, I appreciate that the game's primary verb isn’t “kill,” especially because it’s such a joy to follow Zelda around Hyrule in the company of all sorts of creatures. It’s neat that defeating Ganon doesn’t really solve anything in the larger cosmology of this world, whose magical nature necessitates constant small acts of maintenance from countless unsung heroes.
Echoes of Wisdom is a simple game for kids, but I feel like director Tomomi Sano was able to get directly at the heart of what makes the lore and gameplay of the Zelda series so compelling.
What a treasure Echoes of Wisdom is, especially when compared to Tears of the Kingdom, which forces the player to spend hours farm-murdering "enemies" for random drops to upgrade armor sets while at the same time retconning Breath of the Wild's lovely ecological optimism in favor of a story that tries to be progressive but fails miserably because of its blatant racism.
If anyone's curious, my ultimate take on Age of Imprisonment is that it's a nothingburger of a franchise cash-in that's not worth getting upset about. Why waste time being mad about a shallow and poorly executed trashgame when you could play Echoes of Wisdom instead?
