Among many other Zelda firsts, Breath of the Wild is the first Legend of Zelda game to feature voice acting. As with every Zelda game, the presence or absence of voice acting has been a little controversial. But I’m delighted to report that the voices in Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild are, honestly, just fine—sometimes quite good. The voice acting, to this skeptic’s surprise, adds genuine value to the game… even though you can’t get the Japanese voices, unless you can either read Japanese or don’t care what anyone is saying.

Breath of the Wild Voice Acting: From Perfectly Serviceable To Quite Emotional

The first thing you’ll notice about the voice acting in Breath of the Wild: there isn’t actually all that much of it. The voice acting is largely limited to cinematics, cutscenes and other important moments. Even important characters who are voice acted will often have plenty of lines that aren’t said aloud if you approach them outside of a cinematic. Link himself isn’t voice acted—although he does clearly answer questions verbally or ask questions in text form, so he isn’t a totally silent protagonist, vocally he remains a cipher. And most regular NPCs along the way aren’t voiced—except for frequently hilarious mumbles, murmurs, hemming and hawing, as you would expect for a Zelda game. But overall, there’s a lot less voice acting than Skyrim or Witcher.

But what’s there is good quality, sometimes great. A few characters have a bit of a hammy quasi-British quasi-royally-serious accent, but even that isn’t painful. Most of the voice acting is playful and a little over-the-top, which in all honesty is probably the right way to deal with it. If you were worried that you couldn’t turn the voices off or that they’d detract from the experience, set your fears to rest. Breath of the Wild treats voice acting as more of a seasoning or spice than a main course, and what’s there simply adds flavor. And especially in certain cinematics, being fully voice acted really does add extra emotion to a scene.

My biggest vote of confidence in favor of voice acting in Breath of the Wild: I actually wish there was more of it. If you’re just tooling around in the wilderness or a town you’ve explored before, you can easily go hours without hearing any voice acting besides for yelps and grumbles and “hi-yas.” And then when the voices do show up, it’s a real treat.