The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild – Nintendo Switch 2 Edition Review

When Nintendo released The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild back in 2017, it was an incredible new direction for the Zelda series. A vast open world, great fidelity, and style in the graphics – and all on Nintendo’s home and portable console hybrid. It was quite the time to be into gaming. Now, eight years later, Breath of the Wild is polished up on Nintendo’s new console, Switch 2. Pitched as the definitive version of the game, it features significant updates to the way it looks and runs, but is it enough to elevate this ageing title to the top again?

Link’s macabre, melancholic and frankly depressing journey in Breath of the Wild is still excellently executed and told. The somewhat risky atmosphere combines with dark subject matter (for a Zelda game), and yet it’s absolutely perfect. Mipha X Link will always be canon in this reviewer’s heart. It’s a thrilling adventure and has some fantastic moments that will really stick in the mind of anyone who experiences them. However, the story is not the focus today!

Hopping straight in, what does this upgrade promise? Players can expect a much higher resolution combined with 60 frames per second gameplay (up from a slightly iffy 30 fps) and a little smattering of high dynamic range (HDR). This visual update takes what was quite a soft-looking game and makes it as sharp as a tack.

Every element that made the game splutter and cough when strenuous effects were on screen is gone, and instead, the game is fantastically smooth. Finally, the HDR adds a bit of extra contrast and colour to the visuals in a way that just makes all the wonderful weather effects and natural vistas pop. It’s a genuinely impressive refresh, making it feel like the game could have released now in this form and held its head high amongst the modern gaming scene.

These upgrades are in place on both the TV and in handheld mode, so there is a brilliant consistency when moving between the two. Nintendo Switch 2’s hardware (and maybe a bit of extra tweaking) also means that Breath of the Wild‘s loading times are dramatically improved; the longest load that can be expected is when the title is booted up, and subsequent loads are seconds long. This removes a lot of tedium from the more experimental segments, as dying and retrying is far less intrusive. Fast travel is also way faster, although with less time spent on loading screens, the hints don’t really get to shine anymore. Travel is so quick that the icon that is meant to disappear from the current location and then appear at the chosen location doesn’t get to complete its animation!

The last additional feature that is really cool (although many people will not want to partake in) is Zelda Notes. It adds a bunch of audio logs from Princess Zelda herself that help fill in further lore and give more areas a bit of extra flavour. Unfortunately, it has one big downside: it is only accessible through the Nintendo Switch App on mobile phones. This means that all of this content is technically not integrated into the game, so there is a risk that once the app servers go down, that content will cease to exist. That aside, the voice notes are excellent and really add some nice insight and extra depth to Zelda as a character.

The app also allows for some neat extras, such as navigation, meaning players can get vocal directions to a quest or point of interest. It can get a bit grating, but it is definitely helpful if lost in a story quest. There are also a few mission-type achievements that can be unlocked in the app, essentially an extra content list. It’s actually very interesting, and it is a shame it’s not all integrated into the game content.

The base edition doesn’t include the Master Trials and Champions’ Ballad download content, but players who own the DLC on Switch will see the same visual and performance changes across that content too once reinstalled.