Games
Zelda fans fear TotK is becoming gambling hell – but I can reassure you
Tears of the Kingdom offers gacha machines, but that sounds worse than it is.
It sounds strange at first: The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom introduces a kind of gacha machine that provides us with certain items that we need to craft and thus progress in the story.
For some players, the term “Gacha” immediately rings alarm bells: These are Japanese slot machines that, after inserting real money, spit out random objects in capsules.
Some video games such as Genshin Impact have made such machines their own monetization mechanisms and have received a lot of criticism as a result. “Gambling!” is the accusation. Because Genshin’s gacha system is nothing more than a loot box mechanic with shockingly low drop rates for really good characters.
And what about Zelda? Will Hyrule become gambling hell in Tears of the Kingdom? The short answer to that is: no. I can give the all-clear.
This is behind the “gacha machines” in Tears of the Kingdom
This is what ‘Gacha Machines’ look like in Zelda Tears of the Kingdom.
Zelda’s “Gacha Machines” are special devices (see image above) that we can find scattered throughout the game world. From these we then pull capsules containing random Zonai items. We need these in turn for crafting via Ultrahand, you can read more about this in my preview:
To get Zonai items from the vending machineswe in turn have to collect certain items that serve as in-game currency for the “Gacha Machine”, the so-called Zonai Charges.
The emphasis is on “ingame”. Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom does not require the use of real money at any point.
Zonai charges are purely in-game items that we find at certain spots in the open world or get as loot when we defeat Zonai guards. When I played it, the charges were thrown after me: Zonai guards appear in droves on the sky islands of Hyrule and drop at least one unit. So it looks like we don’t even need to grind.
In short: Don’t be afraid of “gacha machines” in Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom. This is just a pure in-game gimmick.
You can rewatch the Tears of the Kingdom launch trailer here:
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The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom – It gets epic in the final trailer before release
The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom will be released on May 12, 2023 exclusively for Nintendo Switch. You can of course find out in the big GamePro test whether the successor to Breath of the Wild can build on the great success of the first game and perhaps even raise the bar a little higher in the open world genre.
What are you most looking forward to in Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom?
