Tears of Kingdom sent Wolf Link to the dog pound and I miss him
If you read my past articles you might know I’m a huge amiibo collector. I currently have around 80 of them.
In addition to Amiibo being amazing little statues of famous Nintendo characters, they also have a tendency to unlock things in other games. The purchase of one little cool piece of merch guarantees an unlock in other games. Instead of every game with Mario in it throwing out tons of micro-transactions, you can have the knowledge that your little Mario statue will give you some interesting cosmetic or item.
In the first Super Mario Maker you could actually unlock an 8-bit version of almost every character you scanned with their own signature sound. It was amazing playing as Pikachu running through the Mushroom Kingdom and was heartbreaking when they removed this from the second.
Yoshi’s Woolly World would reknit the Yarn Yoshi so it had a pattern based off who you’re scanning. The Yoshi in Mega Man armor was exceptional.
Scanning Pac-Man into Mario Kart gave you an outfit for the Mii Racer that looked like a Tron Suit made of Pac-Man maze and the helmet had an animated chomping Pac-Man on the back.
In Legend of Zelda: Hyrule Warriors, scanning Link would get you the Spinner from Twilight Princess allowing Link to go into battle skating on a large top that allowed him to do crazy combos. Speaking of Legend of Zelda, my all time favorite Amiibo perk came with Breath of the Wild. While many of the Amiibo gave you some cool stuff, there was one in particular that was the best (or in this case “goodest”) of all.
Scanning the Wolf Link Amiibo would actually summon Wolf Link into the game.
Not only did it look absolutely incredible, but this good boy followed you and attacked enemies with you. Sure, sometimes it would take stealth, wrap it in flames and throw that ish out the window, but that’s fine. Small price for doggo.
It made the world feel significantly less lonely. Plus, when my younger kids got into Breath of the Wild it was REALLY helpful for them to have that extra back up and made them feel a lot more confident going up against particular enemies.
Now, in Tears of the Kingdom, however…Wolf Link is no more. Epona (who is an Amiibo unlockable horse) is still there, thankfully. I was really happy to see Epona brought over to the new stables. But Wolf Link. Gone.
It’s a shame because, honestly, Amiibo support needs to be brought back hard. A lot of people gave it a bad wrap but I always that that was foolish. You’re basically trading an ugly micro-transaction shop for a small, real world statue, that was supposed to pretty much guarantee you’d get something fun and extra in games starring your favorite character. So it’s a shame to see this gone.