After waiting almost a year after its formal reveal, Sonic Frontiers is finally here. Players around the world have been enjoying exploring the ever mysterious Starfall Islands and unlocking their secrets. Ever since Kronos Island was shown off in the first Game Awards trailer, fans had been making comparisons with it and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild's starting area as the tower structures, artifacts, and wide open fields give it a similar feel.

Sonic Team has since pushed back the comparisons that its latest game is anything like Breath of the Wild. Fans, however, could argue that there's a fair bit of inspiration at work between the two games. Now that players can explore both titles freely, it's worth looking at them and seeing how their open worlds compare to one another. Once giving them a glance side by side, it's easier to see what Sonic Frontiers could have taken away from Link's last adventure, and there's quite a lot there.

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Sonic Frontiers' Starfall Islands

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To start, it needs to be said that the Starfall Islands aren't on one big map altogether. The islands are their own separate pieces which helps get around some technological limitations. After all, with how Sonic is known for going fast, in order for an open world game to keep up, that map would need to be so large that it might not be possible in this current console generation. Even still, Sonic Frontiers manages to evoke that same freedom as Breath of the Wild with ease by how large the islands are by themselves.

Each of the islands are large enough to feel like their own worlds. This is in part due to how Sonic Team aimed to give the first three islands their own feel, whereas the final two islands are more aligned with Kronos Island to act as a bookend to the adventure. Fans can even find Kronos Island close by on Rhea Island if they go to the right spot. Part of what makes these maps feel so special is the unique music that highlight their themes and aesthetics. This is only elevated by how each island has plenty to do, and fans can easily revisit some for a break from newer ones.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild's Hyrule

Blood Moon as it appears in Breath of the Wild, changing Hyrule's aesthetic

Once fans clear Breath of the Wild's Great Plateau, they'll be taken away by the expanse of the large map that makes up the kingdom of Hyrule. All of it is there to be explored with no limits once the tutorial is out of the way. As fan make their way through, they'll encounter batches of enemies like Bokoblins around chests and even mini bosses like the Stone Talus. The overall goals are to obtain all the upgrades for Link's Sheikah slate, reclaim the Divine Beats, and gather Spirit Orbs to get stronger to defeat Ganon.

Players can find towns scattered all throughout Hyrule for support as they explore a world that's large and vast with no loading times. Link can help the civilians with side quests in-between the lengthy story quests that involve multiple goals throughout in order to reach the end. Different areas feature specific damage from the Calamity 100 years ago, and multiple different biomes are featured.

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Comparing the Starfall Islands and Hyrule

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Comparing the size of the Starfall Islands against the size of the map exactly would be a bit tricky, since both games have different gameplay styles that affect just how big their areas are. However, Hyrule offers a few more interesting places for fans to go to than Frontiers, so there's a chance that Breath of the Wild may dwarf Sonic Frontiers. However, that doesn't mean the Starfall Islands aren't filled to the brim with things for players to see and do. The one argument that might lean in Frontiers' favor is that the islands were designed with Sonic's speed in mind.

Ultimately, there are plenty of similarities between the Starfall Islands and Breath of the Wild's Hyrule. For starters, both are lands ravaged after war with incredible technologies left behind. In a sense, the Ancients' Cyber Space portals could easily be seen as Sonic Frontiers' shrines. Frontiers also features the Koco, but despite them being based from the same Koropokkuru spirit as the Koroks, but they're incredibly easier to find and in much bigger numbers. It could be argued that the Koco cuter, but also sadder, if one takes the lore behind them into account. Breath of the Wild's Blood Moons also are replicated in the form of the "Starfall" event that may be how the islands get their name.

However, the only similarities that the Blood Moons and the Starfall phenomenon have is that it respawns all the enemies that have been defeated, and it happens every few in-game days. The Starfall event in Frontiers gives players limited time star shards to collect for a special in-game currency. Other differences the two games have regarding their dynamics is that the Cyber Space levels aren't the only puzzles Sonic has to offer as the Starfall Islands are full of them, whereas the majority of Breath of the Wild's puzzles are kept in shrines.

In the end, even though these games may be rather similar, they function as entirely different titles, which explains why Sonic Team has said that in the end, Frontiers is not like Breath of the Wild at all. After all, they're meant to focus on different genres. Sonic has always been about action and fast-paced platforming, whereas Zelda blends action with puzzles and slight role playing. However, the similarities do make it rather clear that Breath of the Wild was a big inspiration for the game that Sonic Frontiers became.

Sonic Frontiers is available for PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.

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