The Legend of Zelda

[Galletea]

I'm not a fussy gamer. Though I can't think of anything quite like the Zelda series, I just found I couldn't really get into it tho I kinda liked phantom hourglass. I like plenty of platformers and several rpgs,
tho I'm into Bioshock and Katamari at the mo, and Chibi Robo on the cube will always be a fave.

 

[Flour]

I was a latecomer to the Zelda franchise. My first one was Link to the Past on the Virtual Console, which I loved. I've since played pretty much all of them except for Wind Waker and Twilight Princess, and I can certainly see why people go crazy for it. While I'm not a big Zelda fan, I have a lot of respect for the consistently high quality of its games. I can understand the main criticism that is leveled at it, which is that you're playing basically the same game over and over again, but then again my favorite series is Metroid and it often gets slammed for the same reason.

The old Nintendo series do not go beyond the series' basic story.

Mario has to rescue the princess
Samus has to clean up the mess of others or hunt down metroids.(only completely played Prime, and some others starting halfway, so I could be horribly wrong)
Zelda is about Robin Hood having to save a princess and stop the king/wizard.

I don't like the zelda series either. I love OoT, because it's the first one I've played, but none of the others can keep me interested for more than 15 minutes. Zelda2 being an exception, having only played that game for 5 seconds before I was sick of it.

 

[tobyornottoby]

I appreciate we can't all like the same things, I just wanted some reasoning to the 'its the best thing ever' theory

For me I think it's that both the gameplay and the story are very, very well executed. Now I mean 'story' in a very broad sense, more the immersion, the 'feeling I am walking in that world'. (As said above the actual story is far from deep)

Sure, there are games with better gameplay, but they lack that sense of immersion. Then there are games that are really immersive but they don't have the thrill of Zelda's gameplay. Half-Life would be another example of this.

This makes the games so.... real. games that focus more on the story will feel more artificial, just like watching a movie, and games that focus more on the gameplay scream 'GAME' are not convincing as a real world, and thus do not trigger my motivation.

example: the beginning of TP: the kids get abducted, and you're in your wolf form chasing the trail. Story: all these weird things are happening in the world of this simple farmboy. Gameplay: you're making your way through a strange shadowy world of which you can only see a few meters ahead. Story: You want to save your loved ones, so you need to hurry. Gameplay: you're a wolf form, in which you can run way faster than you would've could as a human

The two really worked together there. While I'm not a big fan of TP as a whole, that was one of the best game experiences I've had in years.

As someone else said, the Zelda series is a sublime embodiment of the 'hero dream'

Mario has to rescue the princess
Samus has to clean up the mess of others or hunt down metroids.(only completely played Prime, and some others starting halfway, so I could be horribly wrong)
Zelda is about Robin Hood having to save a princess and stop the king/wizard.

To me, both Zelda and Metroid can really convey that immersion, that the world is real, and I can explore it. In that sense the power comes not from the story, but from the world.

Mario is another story. That game screams GAME and wants to have nothing to do with anything near 'story'

I've played just about every Zelda game in the series; hell i even played the original Zelda when it was new! I...don't really care about ANY Zelda game after A Link to the Past. In my estimation, that's the point where Zelda became the same game over and over again.

Now, in defense of the series, I haven't played Wind Waker or Phantom Hourglass, but i found that Twilight Princess was pretty much ALttP again, with a wolf mini-game thrown in for good measure. I'd like to think that Wind Waker is actually GOOD, seeing as how Zelda cultists hate it with such passion. But to be honest, unless something really earth-shattering happens with the Zelda series, I'll not be buying another one.

have you played Majora's Mask? ^^ That's not like other Zeldas... It's not like any other game I'd say

Ocarina of Time is the greatest game ever made.


/thread.

Are you sure? Ok some magazines said it is and it's not that bad and I like it but it's not even in my top ten. If it's really the greatest game ever made it has to be #1 on every list.

http://www.gamerankings.com/itemrankings/simpleratings.asp?rankings=y

http://www.metacritic.com/search/process?ty=3&ts=&tfs=game_all&sb=5&release_date_s=&release_date_e=&metascore_s=95&metascore_e=&x=18&y=10

 

[n01d34]

I never really felt like playing the Zelda series cause I didn't grow up with a Nintendo console and once you reach a certain age playing as a poncy little elf kid loses its appeal. Especially when you're too busy slaughtering imp daemons.

Of course once I got older and heard all the crazy love for OoT I figured I should give it a go. It's good, some things about it are damn good but the hype does feel a little crazy. I think there are other games from the period (and older) that have aged better. But again I'm not really a Nintendo fan.

 

[super_smash_jesus]

It goes down as my favourite game series for sure. I always enjoy the exploration portion of the game, and yes the story is the same everytime, and the fighting is wickedly easy, but I still like it. OoT is probably my 4th favourite zelda game, going Twilight Princess, windwaker, phantom hourglass, then OoT. These games may not be for everyone however, and I certaintly am not a raging fanboy that screams at the world for talking ill of a game, but you have to at least respect the production value of these games, they keep getting better and better where most series fizzle after a sequel.

 

[Graustein]

they keep getting better and better where most series fizzle after a sequel.

Highly debatable; my favourite Zelda games are Majora's Mask and Wind Waker.

I don't know what it is about Zelda that's awesome, suffice to say I consider it extremely so.

 

[TsunamiWombat]

Part of the appeal is the combination of the free roaming gameplay, the "King Arthur" aspect (Legendary Hero, the Master sword, etc), the ROBIN HOOD Aspect (your a lithe guy in green shooting a bow at people and erol flynning your way across Hyrule), and just solid fun gameplay.

Zelda games are high quality and generally fun, if they occasionally have a few glaring design flaws. In the end, the central game is solid and amusing, and the nostalgia factor is strong, so why hate it?

 

[Unholykrumpet]

Majora's Mask is my personal favorite just because of the ability to turn into a Zora. The Zora gameplay was by far the coolest thing I've ever played through to date. Although to be honest, I thought ripping out my fins and throwing them like boomerangs would be a very, very painful task. His magic shield ability is pretty confusing too.

 

[Dance The Revolution]

I think it is an okay series. It's just not as cool as it had been when I was a kid. That being said, I don't think the older ones are better than the newer ones, but that the series lost all of it charm for me.

 

[broadband]

Ocarina of Time is the greatest game ever made.


/thread.

Care to elaborate?

Personally, I enjoyed the game because of the difficult puzzles and the different, albeit same, story. I just thought that OoT had more time spent on the story than the rest of the Zelda games. I do have one reason for people not to buy the game though: Navi. Plain and simple.

i am the only one who never found annoyed by navi? its not that annoyin or is just me...

 

[Gamer137]

I guess you just dont like action adventure games. Noone here can really say anything to persuade you.

As for my opinion, I dont understand why people complain about the series being the exact same thing each time. I think the end of Yahtzee's Phantom Hourglass reviewed summed it up best. Different level design, same story, maybe one-two new tools, etc. Almost any sequal can be summed up like that. Games in a series need to share certain properties or you just make a new type of game that caries the same name.

I really enjoy the Zelda series, but not enough to play every single one of the 15+ games. I have avidly played OoT, MM, OoA, OoS, WW, and TP. the rest I have tried but never got into. The combat is pretty dull to me in most scenarios, though the boss fights are epic, even if they are very easy. Twilight Princess was my favorite mostly because the darknaut fights were the best in the series. simply added the phase 2 of them without the armor made them very exciting. The puzzles are a great balance of thought provoking, and simple enough to rarley look at GameFAQs or something. The stories share similar formulas, but the changes are enough to keep me interested sence just about every story made these days has cliches. Lastly, the environments are very well done. I cant really pinpoint the exact thing that makes me play zelda games though. The combat is the biggest reason I buy any game, and in Zelda it gets older faster then most. Who knows.

 

[broadband]

about the zora gameplay above, liked to jump out of the water like a dolphin.

Zelda is about Robin Hood having to save a princess and stop the king/wizard.

i remember my dad saying that Link looked like Peter Pan.

 

[dukethepcdr]

You're not alone. haven't liked any of them and have given all of them, for the exception of windwaker and phantom hour glass, at least 2 hrs of my time.

The best games of the series so far are the original Legend of Zelda (which you can find ported for Game Boy / Nintendo DS) and Phantom Hourglass. As with most long running series, the first is the best. It may not have the fancy graphics, but the gameplay is fun and the mechanics of how to play are deceptively simple. It's not hard to learn the basics but it's not easy to beat the whole game.

I liked the cartoon look of Windwaker but find that I like the game mechanics of Phantom Hourglass much better. Phantom Hourglass also has the look of Windwaker, but the use of the stylus and microphone on the DS gives you a new experience and is pretty intuitive. The games between Legend of Zelda and Phantom Hourglass are pretty much the same thing over and over only with different looking graphics.

I was really disapointed in the look of Twilight Princess. For a next gen game, it looked pretty bad. It would have been awesome if it had come out about the same time as Ocarina of Time, but as it is, it looks very dated. Twilight Princess had some neat-o gimmicks like fishing, riding horses (which was pretty fun) and turning into a wolf. Otherwise, it was your basic 3-D Zelda game. I hated being the wolf and gave up on the game once I turned into the wolf and got trapped on the roofs of the castle. I couldn't make the wolf stick his landings when jumping well enough.

I've traded in every Legend of Zelda game I've tried (which is most of them) except for the original game and Phantom Hourglass.

 

[n01d34]

i am the only one who never found annoyed by navi? its not that annoyin or is just me...

LISTEN!!!

 

[LV Solace]

LoZ is one of my favorite series. They made a fairly unique hero, left handed? sure it's a basic sotry, ganon's pissed, zelda's in trouble, link gets a sword, link bets on ganon, link wins, zelda is safe.

However, the games have appeal idk know what it really is, idk, i love them, and idk know why, or how to defend them. However they have a strong fan base which is odd for me, most games that have that I dont really like.

One thing irrelivent to the argument but I must mention is, in TP link is left handed in the gamecube version but not the wii version. Nintendo fucked up. yes I know that all the visual data was just flipped to make it easier on people, but damnit nintendo link uses his left hand, you fucked it up before in Link to the past I believe when ever he fased left he was suddenly right handed. Fix this nintendo, next zelda title you release make damn sure he is left handed, I dont care if it's "hard" on the player, we will deal with it, one way or another.

 

[Graustein]

LoZ is one of my favorite series. They made a fairly unique hero, left handed? sure it's a basic sotry, ganon's pissed, zelda's in trouble, link gets a sword, link bets on ganon, link wins, zelda is safe.

However, the games have appeal idk know what it really is, idk, i love them, and idk know why, or how to defend them. However they have a strong fan base which is odd for me, most games that have that I dont really like.

One thing irrelivent to the argument but I must mention is, in TP link is left handed in the gamecube version but not the wii version. Nintendo fucked up. yes I know that all the visual data was just flipped to make it easier on people, but damnit nintendo link uses his left hand, you fucked it up before in Link to the past I believe when ever he fased left he was suddenly right handed. Fix this nintendo, next zelda title you release make damn sure he is left handed, I dont care if it's "hard" on the player, we will deal with it, one way or another.

The whole reason for the flip was to make Link right handed, because the majority of people are right handed and Nintendo thought it would be disorienting to swing his sword with the Wii remote if Link were left handed.

 

[ReepNeep]

Alright. First of all, along with Mario 64, it was the first to do a 3D game RIGHT. Much of the praise also comes for it's excellent Game-play. The Sword combat was top notch, as was aiming in First Person view. The fact that I can go back and play OOT, and it controls better than most modern games is a pretty big thing. The Graphics are beautiful, as is the soundtrack. I stand by the fact that OOT had the strongest soundtrack of any game, ever. And this is all technical. The game had a very cinematic presentation, and the story, while not very original, was good. The boss fights were all clever, and there were very few, if any, fights you could win by hammering the attack button.

All in all, OOT was revolutionary 10 years ago, and has withstood the test of time to remain one of the greatest games of all time.

I remember playing Descent and Quake, both full 3d games (Ocarina used a big 2d texturemap for the world in some parts of the game) which predate Ocarina by a combined five years. They both had tight, intuitive controls while I thought Ocarina's were horribly clunky and awkward (this coming from a guy who finished Tomb Raider). The graphics were absolutely hideous from the perspective of a PC gamer of the era (We had these fancy things called Voodoo Graphics). The music was merely above average and I can name several games offhand that totally smack it down in that department.

Bottom line is, if you weren't relatively new to video games in general (and the LoZ series in particular) and were there when it was released, you really didn't think it was such hot shit. I have similar feelings toward one of my first games, Starcontrol 2, even though I can recognize that the game has a few serious flaws. Ocarina worshipers don't even acknowledge that it has any.

 

[LV Solace]

@ Graustein I know why nintendo did it, I'm just saying they fucked up. I've tried playing LoZ:Tp left handed, it's harder, yes but I also use my hand for the grand total of holding that really hard bread at restaurants while my right hand with a knife cuts it. That and typing about a thid of the letters.

My point being that I think it would have been a more realistic game, if they had just kept link left handed. Even doing so mucha s jut keeping the controls the same, but having link be left handed doing left handed thing to our right handed imputs. It just bothers me how they tooka character with a unique defnging aspect and broke it off to make it more user freindly. Yes it was likely a financialy decision, but it still bothers me.

ANother thing ont hat is.. well Linkis not human, he is Hylian. The transforming bit always bothered me. for the same reasons as above.

EDIT: not realistic, more historically acurate to the games canon.

 

[Digitaldreamer7]

OOT by far has a good soundtrack, but the best sound tracks ever have been from squaresoft. Mainly FF7 and FF8. Even if square puts out a smoldering pile of crap as a game it usually has a great soundtrack. Well that is atleast if Nobuo Uematsu is doing the soundtrack composition.

OOT was a great game and it had its flaws. The flute playing was annoying. I agree with most of what your saying. but it's not the greatist game ever. My favs of the series were deff OOT and A link to the past.