Spoiler warning: In case it was not obvious from the title, this post will contain some spoilers for The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom (a.k.a. “Tears of the Kingdom” or “TOTK”).

For background, I am a die-hard Zelda fan. I have always considered it my all-time favorite game series and have played every main-line game (and some side games) at least once, most multiple times.

That said, I cannot bring myself to continue playing Tears of the Kingdom.

Tears of the Kingdom is a masterpiece of gaming. Whether you like it as a Zelda game or not, it unarguably curates an experience that is unique to each player, driven by player choices and playstyle. Every person has a completely distinctive experience. If you have seen clips on social media of people making impossible contraptions or solving puzzles in ludicrous ways, you have surely noticed this as well.

As far as the story is concerned, I have completed the Wind and Water temples, a great deal of side adventures, and, most recently, the geoglyphs and ensuing quests.

And let me say, the conclusion to the geoglyphs quests took me by complete surprise. So much so that I have not played the game since completing it.

Many moments in this game have made my jaw drop in complete awe and admiration and giddiness: finally leaping off of the Great Sky Island for the first time, first entering the Depths and realizing its magnitude, first being launched into the sky by a skyview tower…. just to name a few.

The conclusion to the geoglyphs quest had my jaw dropped in complete horror and sadness.

To those unaware (or those wanting a recap) the geoglyphs are the primary vehicle of storytelling in TOTK. Much like the memories in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (for those familiar with it), the geoglyphs act as a stationary location in the world that if you go to it, you get a cut-scene that explains what is going on in the world. In Tears of the Kingdom, Impa explains that the geoglyphs are created from dragon tears. When Link finds a tear, he is given a vision of Zelda and how she her story is unfolding.

I initially had a lot of questions about this new storytelling mechanism: Where were these geoglyphs were in the first game? or Why would a dragon’s tear gives Link a vision of Zelda? If you’re anything like me, you probably had these passing thoughts, then promptly wrote them off as “video game logic”, and Nintendo trying to give a good story in a Breath of the Wild format, and just retconning some things to make it work.

Little did I know that upon finding all of the geoglyphs, one more dragon tear would appear. You actually witness the creation of this one as a tear from the Light Dragon, which is a new dragon in this game. The Light Dragon looks/acts similar to the three dragons from Breath of the Wild (Farosh, Dinraal, and Naydra). Again, I ask myself “Where did this dragon come from?” Surely it was just “hiding” in the first game (again, video game logic), and Nintendo added it to TOTK for variety.

What unfolds from finding this last Dragon Tear is a vision of Zelda consuming her secret stone (an artifact that augments the holders innate magical powers) to become an immortal dragon, a practice which she was told was taboo and forbidden (information gathered from an earlier Dragon Tear). It is not explained before this what “turning into an immortal dragon” really means. Well, now we find out as we watch Zelda wretch in what I presume to be unimaginable pain, radiating light energy out of her body as she is paralyzed in the process, and screaming to Link (who, mind you, is in the far future) to “Protect them all”. These are her last words as the Light Dragon is born from her body, and Zelda as we know her is no more. She has sacrificed herself, her mind, her body, everything, so that she can bathe the Master Sword in her light power for thousands of years to come in order to restore its power.

Link then proceeds to jump onto the Light Dragon (which we now know is Zelda herself) to reclaim his Master Sword. He does so by ripping it from the Light Dragon’s head (in what again appears to be an excruciating process for Zelda), leading to one last vision of Zelda laying bare her final hope that maybe, just maybe, her doing all this will be enough for Link to stop Ganondorf.

This. Messed. Me. Up.

Like I said, my jaw dropped. I was speechless. After seeing this, I immediately turned off my Switch and put down my controller. The thought of a person giving up their sentience and free will for millennia, roaming the land as a beast, all based on a last ditch effort of maybe saving the future. Something about it just feels so gruesome (in a non-gory way, of course).

Maybe it feels this way because I wasn’t expecting this from a Zelda game. If I picked up a drama or a sci-fi film, I could probably expect some plot line that fees comparable in magnitude, and that would be ok since I knew what to expect. When I pick up a Zelda game, I do not expect this type of storytelling. And don’t get me wrong, I think the story is GREAT. It just came way out of left field, and it came hard and it came fast.

I haven’t finished the game yet, so for all I know this plot line gets revisited in some way that makes the player feel like everything is actually alright. But whether or not this happens, I am still reeling from the fact that this is even a plot line in the first place. I applaud the writers of the game for making such an impactful story. It’s not easy to invoke these types of emotions with people.

After I give myself some space from the game I do plan to revisit it and complete the story and plenty more side quests and shrines. This is by no means the end of Tears of the Kingdom for me, just a momentary pause.