Hyrule Warriors: Age of Imprisonment Review
Hyrule Warriors: Age of Imprisonment reviewed by Logan Plant on Nintendo Switch 2.
The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom left a lot of unanswered questions perfect for exploring in a prequel, but Hyrule Warriors: Age of Imprisonment isn’t all that interested in answering them. What it is interested in is weaving together iconic mechanics from its source material to deliver the best musou action the series has seen yet. It constantly rewards your knowledge of Tears of the Kingdom through clever, often hilarious movesets that recontextualize abilities to fit its over-the-top action, as well as smaller payoffs like boss weaknesses that are consistent across the pair of games. Carving through thousands of enemies remains fun throughout the roughly 18-hour campaign and beyond thanks to constant upgrades, smart systems that encourage you to use a variety of characters, and great technical performance. It’s just a shame that Age of Imprisonment fails to tell a story worthy of its potential, choosing to deviate from deepening our understanding of Tears of the Kingdom’s lore in favor of focusing on new characters who are completely unrelated. That direction isn’t inherently bad, but if you were hoping for a prequel that meaningfully pulls on lingering threads like the Zonai, Ganondorf, the Secret Stones, or the Sages, you won’t find it here. But when the prequel we have to settle for in its place is a seriously fun action game with tons of optional content to keep you going, it’s still a trip into the past that’s well worth taking.
