Got Tears of the Kingdom

Christmas is in May this year! You know that you've reached next level first world problems when you can't play the new video game the whole morning, because you're too busy unpacking all its merchandise and making photos of it...

Actually, I already got a copy of the game yesterday morning, but I had the entire day already planned out with work, chores, and other stuff, so I have the entirety of today for the game, and then there was also a party in the evening. I've never been so lucky to receive a new (Zelda) game one day early, so I did not anticipate this at all, and this has been teasing me all day...

But it was "only" a second copy of the Collector's Edition, where I forgot to cancel the pre-order in time. It will go to a Zelda fan in need of one, and I've been waiting for my order from My Nintendo instead, because they've nailed it this time.

All items arrived around 10AM, everything important was packaged twice to keep it all very safe. And wait until you see the boxes this stuff came in... I was so happy with all of this that I shed some tears, no kidding. But let's show you the goods, before I start playing.

The game inside the Collector's Edition comes both with a clean cover, without the age rating stuff, and a steelbook. Both look lovely, this is the stuff what I mainly want from a Collector's Edition.

Next are the pins, where today I saw all the symbols for the first time. A certain symbol is not part of this box, which confirms a theory I had around them, but we'll get to that when I play the game. There should be a good reason why these four symbols made it into the Collector's Edition and I think I know what it is.

Here is the cursed artbook. I won't be showing any contents, but I had to browse through it quickly to see that the print is fine, which it is. After avoiding spoilers around this thing for months, it does look like it shows a lot already. I will be studying it in detail once I've played through the game.

And finally, the last item from the Collector's Edition is the steel poster, where this is basically just a printed metal sheet. It comes with a big magnet, where you have to be careful not to put that anywhere near the game, your Switch, or whatever... It's something else than the usual stuff you get in these Collector's Edition, but it's not very big, of course, since it had to fit in all those boxes, and I'm personally not sure where to put it yet. At least it should be robust.

Moving on to all the pre-order and bundle items that you could get from My Nintendo. The small coin is something that you got with any pre-order of the game, together with the leather tag (not pictured, see the first photo). It has the game's logo on one side and the corroded Master Sword on the other. But there was also a bigger version of the coin available, which comes in this nice black box and with a stand. In addition, you could a notebook, which isn't very large and only comes with blank pages. It's probably the least interesting item here, but I still wanted to have the whole package.

For the medal and the notebook I actually had to order a normal copy of the game, in addition to the Collector's Edition, because they didn't offer bundles with these items for the latter. But I already have someone who is going to pick up this regular copy in the afternoon, where I'm only going to keep the additional items.

The amiibo. Looks nice, it's like a tiny version of that huge statue that has been going around. I'm happy that they didn't went overboard with amiibo this time, at least not yet, because there has been so much other stuff... Like the Pro Controller and the carrying case:

Both come in the same design. The Pro Controller looks absolutely gorgeous, where it's my absolute favorite so far. It has like these different layers of gold and black on it, while the white handle makes it stand out from a regular Pro Controller (in the menu and in general).

With the case and the screen protector that comes with it, I can finally set up my Nintendo Switch OLED that I got two weeks ago... But I won't be doing that today, I've spent enough time with merchandise already.

Bonus shots of the My Nintendo packaging. This is what I call an amazing online shopping experience! I could even make another poster out of the big box (amiibo for scale)...