Skyrim or Breath of the Wild...?

Who does it better...?

Gameplay, Open world, setting, missions.... I just got done with back to back 100 hour gameplay sessions of both of these games on switch and breath of the wild is, for lack of a better way to say it, Nintendos take on Skyrim. So much shared soul it simply cannot be denied.

My personal take is that where Skyrim goes deep on its many systems and density of world, ie. Factions, missions possibilities of outcomes, Zelda makes up for with a highly enjoyable gameplay set and physicality of the world. It's a more inviting game and has a seemingly perfect blend of combat, unobtrusive woven story, systems to play with and missions/exploration.

Tough to say for me... Both games are freakin incredible... Still I think, Botw's near perfect execution puts it over the top for me.

Skyrim sucks balls and Zelda is awesome

@Chutebox: I can't believe how similar they are... They suck eachother balls?

Zelda easily, without mods Skyrim is a pretty mediocre game

@TheEroica: combat and gameplay in skyrim is downright terrible

I really don't like it when gamers want to compare both Skyrim & Breath of the Wild for no reasons other then the fact there both good Fantasy games and this is coming from a guy who loves both of these games. (Witcher 3 still destroys both of these games) But for the sake of this thread.

When I first played Skyrim on PC, I couldn't believe how beautiful and open it was. Just mind-blowing, wasted hundreds of hours on it. Breath of the Wild gave me that same exact feeling, but tenfold.

• Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild - better over world, theoretically better combat, better exploration mechanics
• The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim - more visually interesting dungeons, better lore, better progression systems and sense of character growth, better event variety.

I have about 50 hours in both games back to back. I like Skyrim more I like being able to make upgrades to weapons and gear. Also Skyrim has more enemy variety. Zelda felt shallow in that regard.

I like the art style of Zelda and the climing mechanic but I just wasn't satisfied with the experience.

Skyrim was bland and BotW disappointed me beyond belief. I'm going to cheat and choose the Witcher III.

Well Skyrim isn't hard to beat

Bethesda sucks and BOTW is awesome.

I love Skyrim but it’s a great mod platform, not a great game. Skyrims crafting cheese and spell spam level up is broken. Almost everything in the entire game can be grossly cheesed. I can level block at the first giant camp to 100 in about an hour and once you unlock shield charge, the game is broken. Sneak archery is stupidly OP and so is sneak crouch spam at 100.

@davillain-: I think the reason people compare it is because the developers of botw state that Skyrim was one of their primary influences.... And honestly, it's pretty easy to see that when you play the game. I actually can't think of a better game to compare it to.

Also, and this is personal preference, Skyrim was a more consistently enjoyable game than Witcher was for me.

Both are great games but Zelda BOtW its little overrated

Most of skyrim's depth is an illusion. The combat is shallow and clunky, the magic system is an enormous inexplicable downgrade over its own predecessors, and the factions are meaningless. There is almost no choice or tension between them - with literally a couple of exceptions the factions are "collect-em-all" and pointless. This is again something its own series did better in the past. Skyrim's worst enemy isn't even BotW - it's the fact that it's shallow compared to its own series!

One thing Skyrim does offer is multi-stage quests and a more cohesive sense of both narrative and character progression. Zelda dropped the ball on this big time and it does hurt it

Joke thread? BOTW ofc

BoTW. As story-lite as it is, it's still better than Skyrim's. Plus, the whole world and gameplay loop is just outstanding.

That being said, I really did enjoy exploring Skyrim, so hopefully ES6 takes some notes from BoTW.

Zelda is more of a playground world. Skyrim is more engrossing and immersive and I enjoyed playing it more. The Witcher 3 owns both of them. Also, LOL at playing Skyrim on the Switch. PC is only the way to play.

Well, Zelda is a kids game, so why compare it with a real game? Skyrim gameplay sucked, but atmosphere was great. So Skyrim wins.

@metalboi: I agree... The gameplay is perfectly serviceable despite it not being overly precise hack n slash fare....

When I played the game as a one handed, one hand magic player I really didn't enjoy it, but switching to a one handed sneak, stealth bow approach really made the combat and gameplay enjoyable...

@themajormayor: Mr. JS Bach... Your comments on Zelda are egregious.

Not really a fair comparison. Zelda was inspired by Skyrim which came out in 2011.

Skyrim is a vastly superior game in every way possible.

Zelda’s biggest flaw is game breaking. The weapons should not break after 3 hits. This defeats the entire purpose of the game.

Why bother with ANY of the dungeons if all the weapons break? Might as well just go straight to ganon and kill him....which you can do. 1-2 hour game at most LOL

And since there is no story....well, there really is no reason to play it. Go to ganon and end it.

There are not really comparable in my opinion.

@themajormayor: I’m 39 and loved BotW. You know who makes a point of saying any colorful game is for kids? Kids...

BotW and it's not even a competition. Skyrim is barely playable without mods

Winner: Dark Souls

I've avoided Skyrim thus far so I'm going with Zelda.

Ouch...

Why are you bothering with the worst sony fakeboy?

@MonsieurX: Shits and giggles lol

Skyrim is vast and there's so much to find in that world, but the story and NPCs are mostly unmemorable and as mentioned the "choice" in the faction system really makes no difference.

In the end, it's like all the Elder Scrolls games going all the way back to Arena. Although unlike Arena and Daggerfall, the world itself is at least interesting to explore. Different parts of the world look wildly different from each other at least.

BotW, on the other hand, has a "Zelda" like story, but the world is so much more involved and interactive than previous Zelda games. Experimenting with how you can use and combine your abilities to interact with the world is half the fun.

Zelda games are good, but I never really enjoyed most of them enough to finish them, but BotW is a really solid game that's fun to explore and experiment with. That plus it's far less dated than Skyrim at this point, so I'd have to give the edge to BotW.

-Byshop

Pffffftttttt.... Ghost Recon: Wildlands.... It does it even better than Red Dead Redemption. :O

Zelda is too vast and polished to not be my pick of the two. Both are amazing games. Zelda has the better gameplay, Skyrim has the better story/lore. Gameplay > story. To think that Zelda, of all series, is what perfected open world gameplay is really fucking awesome.

I put 100 hours into Skyrim.

I put 55 hours into Zelda and couldn't stomach any of the DLC.

I actually think Zelda is the better game but I had a more satisfying journey with Skyrim. But Skyrim becomes a really dumb game when you can't climb mountains.

Skyrim is still relevant after all these years and that should speak for itself.

BOTW hands down. Skyrim has nothing on zelda. Does Skyrim even have a physics engine? I can't recall if it had a weather system that was even meaningful, and skyrim character animations were shite cakes.

I've restarted Skyrim 5 times now. The world and gameplay was never interesting enough to keep me entertained.

BOTW on the other hand grabbed from the get go and still hasn't let go 130 hours later. It's easily one of the most impressive video games I've ever played. It's one of those rare games in which the journey to the destination is so rewarding. It's not just space between destinations.

It's a hard question to answer. Both games excell in certain things, while being lackluster in others.

They're the only two games I currently own on Switch and I find myself switching back and forth between the twos rather often for different reasons. Sometimes I miss Zelda's combat and superior exploration, sometimes I miss Skyrim's more interesting world. Let's be honest here : Zelda's world is a little shallow. It's pretty, but Skyrim manages to be pretty too while being more interesting. Zelda's shrines are also a little disappointing. Not enough towns, and not enough to do in what they have. But, Zelda's spontaneous and random encounters in the wilds, plus the incredible gameplay involved behind everything you do, makes the adventure more exciting than Skyrim. I would say that Skyrim seems more intellectual than Zelda, who seems to be focused on being a fun and engaging adventure. No weapon upgrading in Zelda, no guilds, no books laying around you can read, no leveling up your abilities... everything is centered around gameplay in Zelda.

They're about even to me. I like both immensely for different reasons.

Tough call, both are awesome games which I loved for a variety of reasons. I would go with Breath of the Wild though if I really must pick one. Thankfully I have both to enjoy.

If BOTW can be compared to Skyrim, I'm not sure how much I would actually enjoy it. Skyrim was just so bland after a few hours of exploring.

Skyrim does not hold up any more for me. Its inspirational huge world and interesting setting but overall everything ends up being very shallow. Initially it felt epic but now it just seems so shallow to me. Factions are all set up the same side quest sucks, titles don't fucking matter. F***in dragons suck waste of potential. You can put up with not steller gameplay but when you don't get any joy of exploring and questing then whats the point lol. I would vote for Zelda it overcomes that shallowness with great gameplay design. Playing zelda write now boy if you come at it and all your looking for are interesting dungeons and stories especially after that beginning you will be disappointed. But if you are looking for a playground with good enough story setting and everything design to enhance your gameplay its a masterpiece.

@DragonfireXZ95: they share a similar openness and their varied environments are hard to not compare as similarities... Playing both games back to back, it's really hard to not see the inspiration Nintendo was taking from Skyrim, but make no mistake, botw has a particular refinement in its gameplay systems that when coupled with the huge inviting open world make it god tier.

Both are great imo. Skyrim was very enjoyable back then, and even is now when playing it on Switch.

BOTW is on a whole different level though. Quite a bit better.