Topic: Zelda General Discussion

[crisis]

all you experts are WRONG
there is actually another timeline, a FOURTH timeline

that consists of the cd-i zelda stories & the zelda television series BOOM *high-five*

[RichterB]

I guessed most of the timeline correctly. The only placements that I got wrong were Four Swords Adventures and the Oracle games...

The current placement of the Oracle games really only makes sense for one reason. At the end of a "linked" game that's been cleared, it shows Link leaving on a boat not unlike the one that gets struck by lightning in the opening of Link's Awakening. Outside of that, I'm not so sure. If not for that scene, which I admired Capcom including to allude to some continuity, one would more logically place the Oracle games after Majora's Mask given the game's cast, Link's visual age, and the fact that he still has a horse and visits a version of Hyrule Castle in the opening very similiar to that seen in OoT/MM. Then again, the version of Impa in these games wouldn't make sense. Ugh.

Was anybody else disappointed in Skyward Sword? I really hated how there are only three areas in the game that you have to revisit three times. I like Twilight Princess way better.

     

As I wrote above in this thread, I haven't been fully satisfied with a Zelda game since The Minish Cap (which was a surprise in of itself). The Wind Waker, Twilight Princess, and Skyward Sword are all around the same level in the way they make some improvements while taking many steps each in the wrong direction. I am very thankful that both Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword tried to present us the older teen Link again, but neither did the idea justice compared to, say, Adventure of Link or A Link to the Past.

*The Wind Waker was too empty, tedious, and cutesy; but it did a nice job mixing up the formula a little bit.

*Twilight Princess was too empty and pulled far too much from Ocarina of Time. It's central mechanic of the Wolf Link, it's emphasis on Midna over Link, and insistence of cramming in an uninspired Light World/Dark World mechanic really hurt it. To a similar degree to Wind Waker, or maybe worse, it takes too long to get on the adventure and too much time fooling around with Link as Mr. John Q. Public. Plus, the art style, as close as it was to where I want the series to go, tended to feel a bit too drab and lifeless. On the other hand, it did give us some nice new items (used infrequently), and again, tried to age up the series and its world a bit.

*Skyward Sword was too much on-rails and repetitive, and its surface world felt rather plain, more inspired by real-life motifs than Hyrule. Once more, it took too long for the real adventure to begin and open up. One the whole, there was no great sense of tension/threat, and the relationships were overplayed for limited payoff in the end, particularly in a timeline sense. Again, goofs like Groose took away from the importance of Link. The art direction still needs work and balancing, as it went too far the other way from Twilight Princess. On the other hand, Skyward Sword did a good job making Link a little more versatile with environmental running and swinging and such, and it had some of the better side-quests and sense of community in a home console release since Majora's Mask. The upgrade system was a little sloppy, but fixed the Rupee usefulness problem of Twilight Princess. Also, it tried to be unique in its items, but many of them, aside from the Beetle, were less interesting or useful iterations of items newly introduced in The Minish Cap or Spirit Tracks. I liked that it tried self-contained, contextual transportation systems, which was a positive throwback to how the raft item was in earlier games. Skyward Sword didn't try to focus too much on one single item/mechanic gimmick, which was step in the right direction. The real standout concept from Skyward Sword was the motion controls and how they were used in combat. They could be iffy at times, and the enemies and world could have been far more integrated into those controls, but it resulted in a fresher experience with some of the better combat since Adventure of Link.

I still say that in terms of design, mechanics, and the introduction of new items/features, the Oracle games and The Minish Cap have done the most positive work for Zelda. Moreover, Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask remain head and shoulders above any of the home console 3D releases made since. This isn't nostalgia talking, either. It's a matter of start-to-finish compelling design and atmosphere.

Now, about those other games...

Phantom Hourglass was a streamlined and perhaps improved take on The Wind Waker, and a pretty solid game, though not as memorable as previous portable entries.

The Spirit Tracks has perhaps the longest setup time in getting to the adventure, and is very limited in overworld exploration with its rail system; and yet, on the whole, it ends up a very entertaining and a solid entry with some nice innovations mixed in and a memorable world of characters.

I think that Phantom Hourglass and The Spirit Tracks, despite their limitations, were more complete and thought-through-solid than any of the home console releases post-N64. That said, they don't even rival any of the GB/GBA entries.

Hopefully Zelda will come through on Wii U. The Wind Waker HD has only mild curiosity interest for me. Zelda Wii U is said to be open like Zelda 1 and feature co-op (perhaps like Nintendo Land, or Four Swords, or Spirit Tracks?) That latter part has me nervous, but I like the idea of opening it back up, so long as it's done in a balanced way.

[Ratty]

Twilight Princess is possibly my favorite game in the series personally. Great art style and mood in that game. And Midna rocks. (Not sure why you don't like Midna being the story focus RichterB, she is the titular character after all. Link is the silent hero avatar, not much you can do with him story-wise that hadn't already been done a dozen times. With Midna the series finally had a companion with an actual personality to play off of.) Never have managed to get through OoT, everything in it was improved in TP and the strongly implied anti-Arab racism (or antisemitism since Arabs are semites) always puts me off.

[RichterB]

Twilight Princess is possibly my favorite game in the series personally. Great art style and mood in that game. And Midna rocks. (Not sure why you don't like Midna being the story focus RichterB, she is the titular character after all. Link is the silent hero avatar, not much you can do with him story-wise that hadn't already been done a dozen times. With Midna the series finally had a companion with an actual personality to play off of.) Never have managed to get through OoT, everything in it was improved in TP...

I think you read too much into the anti-"anything" in OoT, personally.

As far as an interactive partner, did you skip Ezlo's story and "actual personality" before TP? That was actually fun to play off of. Midna totally belittled the hero and just drove him onward rudely for way too long. Not to mention her design seemed off in such a dark/serious worldview, and the story just seemed crammed in with Ganon and all that. I don't want to get into this any further on my end, because TP ended up a particularly painful letdown (because of how much promise it had), but here were some of my archived thoughts I could find on this site. Unfortunately, my full review on this site is no longer here. So...

POST 1: "Now, Twilight Princess tried TOO HARD to be the mother of all Zeldas. It took something from every Zelda game and tried to tie it together with what I felt was a disjointed/half-hearted story where Link was basically second fiddle to Midna. TP had good production values, and moments of inventiveness, but if OoT was inspired by AlttP, TP was trying to be OoT 2.0. It had its fun, but it failed to evoke a cohesive Zelda-like spirit. It felt [unintentionally] hodgepodge in design. The Wolf idea was fairly disastrous as far as I'm concerned. It was too distracting, cutting up the quest...at times doing so in a Metroid Fusion sort of way. And, as said earlier, the world was made bigger, but there wasn't an equivalent increase of things to do in it, really. Most times all you could find were rupee prizes that you couldn't even carry because your wallet was maxed out.

POST 2:...Twilight Princess was a tad drab and its art design a tad too goofy/sci-fi (IE: Midna and the Shadow Beasts[IE: Predator braids, digital warp-holes]). Moreover, it's game design with the Wolf and Twili realm were derivative* and distracting, hurting from the stronger points of the game, which also suffered from emptiness. However, I liked that it was trying to go with a more serious/darker tone--which I think older Zeldas (particularly #2 and #3, but also the more recent OOT and MM) had. It wasn't really a question of 'realism' as Miyamoto and others say, but rather a question of 'how much stylization.'

*overly derivative, as in Shadow of the Colossus, Okami, and ALttP Dark/Light world ad-nauseum.

Honestly, I'm looking for a 3D Zelda with the atmosphere of Adventure of Link. Medieval/Greco-Roman with lots of towns and a land threatened by a real and visible danger.

As far as game-changers, it's time for Link to learn to jump on command in 3D.

[Ratty]

I think you read too much into the anti-"anything" in OoT, personally.

It's not something I want to debate on right now, but I don't think it's that much of a stretch.

Midna totally belittled the hero and just drove him onward rudely for way too long.

I thought she was a fun tsundere ( http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Tsundere ) myself. And being rude and bossy (kind of like, you know a Princess who was going through a lot of shit) her more memorable than a random Navi clone would have been. Even if it had been one with the same character design.

Not to mention her design seemed off in such a dark/serious worldview, and the story just seemed crammed in with Ganon and all that.

Hey I found the art direction and story all great and satisfying, but like the old latin proverb says there's no accounting for taste.


This though

Twilight Princess was a tad drab and its art design a tad too goofy/sci-fi (IE: Midna and the Shadow Beasts[IE: Predator braids, digital warp-holes]).

So you think it was too dark/serious and too goofy? Again though that's just a matter of taste.

*overly derivative, as in Shadow of the Colossus, Okami, and ALttP Dark/Light world ad-nauseum.

The light/dark mechanic is an interesting gameplay and story device that adds further possibilities in both areas. It was being played around with a lot by many series at the time no doubt, but it's a mechanic that I personally feel belongs with Zelda because of LttP.

all you experts are WRONG
there is actually another timeline, a FOURTH timeline

that consists of the cd-i zelda stories & the zelda television series BOOM *high-five*

Does this mean the terrible representation of the Castlevania universe and Simon Belmont from Captain N are canon to that continuity of Zelda to? Now there's an unholy yet perfect match.

[Pfil]

About the topic...

The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess is one of my favourite games, and I think it will remain that forever.
The world was so beautiful, the gameplay so intuitive and fun, and the music from the intro, oh my God! That must be the best Zelda theme ever!
Characters were loveable, many of them made me care about them, and the story was wonderful.

[Lelygax]

To me almost all of these games mentioned above can't even be called Zelda games. Shigeru Miyamoto seem to have a screw loose lately. The best thing that came from this series are from the CD-i, its a shame that they dont do games with such good plots like Hotel Mario or good mechanics like in Zelda's Adventure, truly a shame that Miyamoto forgot to add them in compilations and timelines, I think its because he is afraid that it obfuscates the more humble titles.

(click to show/hide)

If you thought that Im being serious, just LOL
The only Zelda that I played until the end is TP, pretty cool game.

[X]

Never have managed to get through OoT, everything in it was improved in TP and the strongly implied anti-Arab racism (or antisemitism since Arabs are semites) always puts me off.

To be honest I don't believe for a second that OoT was being anti-Arab in any sort of way. My brother owns the gold edition of OoT and I actually enjoy going through that death mountain fire temple with the chanting in the background playing. The only reason why they changed it in the regular OoT release is because they didn't want to offend the Arabs because the chanting and symbolism was very similar if not identical. Personally they should have stuck with it no-matter what the backlash would be. If the Arab religion can't get over their egos then that's their problem, not Nintendo's.

[Ratty]

To be honest I don't believe for a second that OoT was being anti-Arab in any sort of way. My brother owns the gold edition of OoT and I actually enjoy going through that death mountain fire temple with the chanting in the background playing. The only reason why they changed it in the regular OoT release is because they didn't want to offend the Arabs because the chanting and symbolism was very similar if not identical. Personally they should have stuck with it no-matter what the backlash would be. If the Arab religion can't get over their egos then that's their problem, not Nintendo's.

Arab religion? I assume you mean Islam but Arabs, being a very large and diverse ethnic group, do not have a set religion. Many are Christian for example. I suppose some of the confusion is born from the origin of Islam and the fact that another prominent group of Semites, Jews, are identified with one religion. But it doesn't always follow that an Arab is a Muslim, or that a Muslim is an Arab. The most populous country for Muslims is Indonesia for example.

[X]

True enough so I'll just say the Muslim faith then.

Honestly, I'm looking for a 3D Zelda with the atmosphere of Adventure of Link. Medieval/Greco-Roman with lots of towns and a land threatened by a real and visible danger.

This, this aaaaaaaaaaand this. I want the Zelda series to move forwards rather then continuing to move backwards. I wish to see what happens after the events of Zelda II: The Adventures of Link.

[KaZudra]

I just wanna see experimentation and Innovation in the series, Skyward Sword shows a bit, but I wanna see something Daring and doesn't force the Motion controls but makes it an option in case you just wanna play with a real controller.

Why not a western cowboy Zelda game?

[Lelygax]

Since Spirit Tracks had trains, we can be more near from that becoming reality than you think xD