Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity (Switch) – Review

I adore the Warriors games. With plenty of franchises getting their own entry, it’s not hard to love what’s been put in front of you. This year alone we got titles like Persona 5 Scramble and One Piece Pirate Warriors 4, which are excellent in their own specific ways. This kind of excellence is what I wanted out of the Nintendo-based Warriors titles, games with grander stories that go beyond the realm of fanservice. Luckily, this is exactly what we got with Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity, which took it further than what I could ever have expected.

Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity tells the tale of Hyrule 100 years before Breath of the Wild and almost immediately rattled my expectations. A little guardian going back in time and spoiling the arrival of the Great Calamity? Right from the get go, the game toys with your thoughts and feelings a lot. You might expect the game to go a certain way and sometimes it will, but other times the route the story takes is surprising, creating new opportunities in this universe. It clearly takes a different path from the things we were told during Breath of the Wild, which I honestly very much like. That being said, there is still room to apply the logic and characterization found to the original timeline, so the scenario and characters don’t feel completely random and unfitting. The game adds to its own insanity over time and ultimately, this creates some of the most story driven moments in any Warriors game ever.

The story highlights in Age of Calamity are the characters themselves. Breath of the Wild gave us a dive into their personalities, but Age of Calamity expands on this to its fullest. We get a stronger sense for how they feel, their relationship to one another and how they hold up in a fight. Urbosa and Zelda’s relationship and understanding of one another is a great example of how the game builds on what was established and it deserves all of my praise. There are plenty of new additions to the roster as well, with a younger Impa particularly given a lot of time to shine.

All of the cutscenes are completely voiced. It adds to the overall sense of world building, far more than the original games cutscenes did. The delivery in English is alright though, just like Breath of the Wild, I am more impressed with other dubs. The German, French and Japanese dubs are pound for pound some of Nintendo’s finest work yet.

These fuzzy feelings I have for the game continue with the gameplay. The game follows plenty of Warriors tropes, with you taking over outposts, destroying large numbers of enemies and overcoming bosses and environmental puzzles. And when I say tropes, I don’t mean it in a negative way. It’s obviously a solid style that is really fun to play. Age of Calamity cleverly builds on these tropes by implementing a lot of unique gameplay systems while on the field. In addition to the traditional regular and strong attacks, which you activate by alternating between the Y- and X-buttons, all characters have access to unique abilities and the full suite of Sheikah Slate attacks. These slate attacks even have different animations or effects depending on the character that you have in play. There is so much packed within each singular entity and a ton of variety in the cast that it becomes hard to really get bored by this journey.

No matter the way you slice it, these are some of the most fleshed out units ever put into a Warriors title. Right from the start, this becomes extremely clear when you start playing Link and, especially, Impa. Even after over 50 hours of playing time, Impa is still my favorite character to play as. Her swift ninja techniques and keen eye to strike are unparalleled by anything else in the game. That being said, there are plenty of characters to choose from and I enjoyed the majority of them. Take Urbosa for example. With her unique ability, she charges up an electricity bar that plays into her strong attacks. Everything that Urbosa does plays into utilizing those electricity attacks and it is really satisfying. When it comes to Link, I heavily prefer his two-handed weapon to his sword and shield or spear. With ZR, you will do a powerful move that drains your health bar but with a quick press of X, you can recover that health, provided you don’t get hit before then of course.

Progression is another element that Age of Calamity rather excels at. The main missions as well as a variety of side missions slowly fill up the map of Hyrule, allowing you to explore numerous environments. Chapter 2, where most demo players will kick off their journey, will guide the players to the farest peaks of the map as they get to know the four champions. Unlocking them gives you quick access to some introduction missions as well as some initial upgrades. Over time, I found myself taking on most of the side missions before carrying on with the main adventure. The variety is so vast across the board that I didn’t really mind going off the beaten path. From defeating certain enemy types to escorting guards, no one side mission feels exactly the same. The perks that you get from these missions will help clear other points on the map, motivating players to keep going and trying out everything the game has to offer. You are constantly encouraged to play more, just to experience more of the sharpest Warriors gameplay seen in awhile. It is telling that I continued to be engaged, far beyond the game’s running time.

That being said, I can’t say that I enjoyed every choice that Age of Calamity has made. The post-game and road to the final few unlocks bumps up the difficulty significantly, forcing you to continuously grind and upgrade characters with the rupees you earnt. The smithy and training camp options help you to reach the end in a reasonable amount of time, but it’s conclusion is something that only the most dedicated of players will get to see. Far more egregious however, are the missions where you play as the Divine Beasts. Frankly, I can’t say that I enjoyed these missions that much. I wouldn’t call them awful, but compared to the rest of the game, I honestly think that they broke the flow of gameplay for me. In the main campaign there are parts where the pure entertainment I am getting is interrupted by one of these segments, and it feels like an absolute bummer. The way that they set up their attacks are, at the very least, creative and not completely void of fun. The bigger sin is that the framerate doesn’t want to give these portions some slack.

That brings up to the presentation side of things. As far as the visuals are concerned, I have nothing but positive things to say about it. Age of Calamity looks like Breath of the Wild, ensuring for parity between both games. No matter if you are playing or watching the cutscenes, the attention to detail put forward by the developers is fantastic. While the framerate isn’t always the best, for the majority of my playtime I could deal with it. Outside of the divine beast sections, it isn’t as big of an issue as I thought it would be.

The soundtrack is, frankly, even better than that of Breath of the Wild. Every stage and cutscene brings with it old and new compositions that help to bring this Warriors based Zelda world to life. And unlike the previous Warriors game, this music falls far more in line with Zelda’s traditional atmosphere, which is a big plus. There are even some classic Zelda tunes that make a comeback here.

All in all, Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity is one of my favorite games on Nintendo Switch to date. The game manages to find a great balance between Breath of the Wild and the Warriors games. It implemented multiple gameplay systems that made characters exciting to play all the way to the end, and even after more than 50 hours of playtime I found myself still having fun. I really wish that the Divine Beasts got a little more time in the oven. The core idea of them is okay, but some structural changes, as well as some framerate fixes, could’ve gone a long way. Even with that little smudge, Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity is still a fantastic game and is a must have for those who want to dive deeper into the history of Hyrule and what happened 100 years ago.