In Tears of the Kingdom, cheating with Amiibo is more powerful than ever
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NintendoThe Amiibo system of old has always been extremely mixed in its usefulness. The figures are nice and lovingly presented, but their exact utility has always varied greatly. In The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, however, they might be the most useful they’ve ever been.
For the most part, the series of figures found on my amiibo shelf have mainly acted as decoration for my office. Generally speaking, they are not worth downloading for most games. Or, when it is, it’s a single tap to unlock some tidbit or other and then it’s back on the shelf. It looks pretty and collects dust.
Breath of the Wild was always, I felt, one of the fairest implementations of the figures. Every time you tapped on an amiibo, you’d get a relatively random selection of resources found in Hyrule, plus a chest with a pretty standard weapon or something a little more special. Through amiibo you could unlock things like a version of Wind Waker’s shield, or the classic green robes from Links’ past. It felt fair, though honestly, it never felt like it gave you a significant advantage.
In Tears of the Kingdom, however, it seems that the paradigm has changed. Amiibo are now powerful cheats. And honestly, a great way to ease some of the tension in the early stages of this new adventure.
The way the amiibo feature works hasn’t really changed since BOTW. The difference lies more in how the amiibo manifest and interact with the overall balance and design of the game, than has.
Therefore, each amiibo still has a drop-down table attached to it, listing a variety of items that scanning causes to appear in the world. In fact, we list the most important items that each amiibo can spawn on our TOTK amiibo unlock page. Dropdown tables are barely changed from BOTW, but the way they hit in-game is different.
Specifically, Tears of the Kingdom made a subtle change from BOTW to the way weapon spawns are organized. In the previous game, powerful weapons were scattered to find, but they were rare. Amiibo generally spawned mid-range weapons, but with a few notable exceptions. In TOTK, high-end weapons have more or less disappeared from Hyrule.
The logic is that you should instead be using the Fuse mechanic, picking up low to mid level weapons to increase them by combining them with other items in one of the game’s core systems. Instead of rarely finding powerful weapons, you rarely find powerful fusion materials that can be used to make powerful weapons. Additionally, unrest and encroaching malice have left many weapons ‘broken’, meaning they are weaker and more susceptible to weapon degradation. Non-broken weapons usually have to be found in the depths, which is dangerous, especially early in the game.
This is where amiibo are particularly good. Amiibo can drop useful unique items such as costumes, though they more often drop weapons. And while whether or not they’re rotten seems to be an issue, they’re almost always decent mid-range, better than what might naturally be available in-game any time soon.
Instead of scanning amiibo and simply deciding whether or not a weapon is worth picking up, the equation has changed. Now I’m looking at the weapons and deciding if they’re worthy candidates for fusion, and since you can carry a virtually unlimited amount of fusion materials, you can throw something powerful and fuse something unstoppable pretty much anywhere. If you really wanted to scan an amiibo in the middle of a boss fight… well, it’s not recommended, but you could.
Combine this with the fact that amiibo content feels a bit more democratized now, with a lot of the exclusive amiibo content also available as rewards for some of the more brutal challenges in the deep, and the whole system feels. .. just better. Amiibo pack more punch as shortcuts and cheats if you choose to scan them, and it’s fairer for everyone to have access to those classic outfits. It’s one use of these little figures that I can really get behind.
Buy The Legend of Zelda Tears of the Kingdom
TOTK is now available for Nintendo Switch! Check out the links below to secure your copy today.
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