Zelda is 25 years old

[uglybob1986]

According to Metro's gaming pages, the Legend of Zelda series is 25 years old[nb]Older than me for fack's sake![/nb]. They're doing a letters feature on it this weekend (http://www.metro.co.uk/tech/games/856477-weekend-hot-topic-part-1-zelda-s-25th-anniversary), but I thought some good discussion could be had on here.

My favourites?

Ocarina of Time

This is the game that introduced me to 3D gaming, and what an introduction! Right from the start it's easily the most compelling game I've ever played. From fighting huge spiders inside a massive talking tree, to the final confrontation with Ganondorf, it bleeds excellence. I've played it from start to finish more than any other game, and I may yet play it through again some day. It also encouraged me to seek out the older games including a Link to the Past and...

Link's Awakening

I've no idea how many batteries I used up on my Game Boy Pocket[nb]Remember them?[/nb] playing this game. Even though I'd played a 3D Zelda before I got LA, I was still absorbed by its 2D world. Opening the Wind Fish's egg with all the instruments is one of my most treasured gaming memories.

Majora's Mask

It would have been easy for Nintendo to dress OOT up in new clothes and put it out as a "new" Zelda, but thankfully they took the high road and made MM a game in its own right. MM introduced an entirely new game world and expanded on OOT's real-time system, and gave us a story and atmosphere of bleakness and despair, in contrast to OOT's epic feel.

So what Zeldas do you verbwhores claim as your favourites? Or any games/moments you hated, or anything else you have to say about the series...

[jutl]

Link's Awakening

Still my favourite Zelda game, despite many subsequent entries that I've loved. 1MB of pure joy.

[The Boston Crab]

Twilight Princess, despite being frequently irritating, boring, constrained by frustrating design choices and completely derivative of previous titles, is my favourite Zelda game. It's symbolic of my rediscovery of gaming through the Wii, after a good five/ten years of being completely bored by games. It reminds me of some wonderful times when I was living in China, a completely free man, wrapped in blankets in the bitter winter, with some ludicrously spicy noodles and barbecued lamb skewers and a bottle of rice wine, playing into the small hours, enjoying the side quests and soaking up the vibe through to completion, then meeting a wonderful girl who was into Nintendo and doing it again together, watching the surprise and delight on her face. You just don't get that with the vast majority of AAA games. In fact, one of the great regrets of my gaming life is that we were living apart for so long, we never quite had chance to finish it before we broke up. The saved game is still there...Only about an hour or two to go. It's very likely it'll never happen but I won't delete it. As I said, it's symbolic...

<3 u zelda xx

[Still Not George]

A Link To The Past is the peak of the Legend of Zelda games for me. Every single LoZ title since has felt... wrong, somehow.

[Zero Gravitas]

He's 25 years old? That's a cute way of putting that they developed an item of intellectual property a quarter of a century ago and are still milking it.

[Consignia]

He's 25 years old?

She.

[Lookalike Mark Chapman]

He's 25 years old? That's a cute way of putting that they developed an item of intellectual property a quarter of a century ago and are still milking it.

1. Zelda is a she!
2. Shut yer face.

I'm playing through Ocarina of Time with the wife at the moment (slowly, over several visits). Love, love, love it. I've spent more time in that fishing minigame than I have in a lot of 'proper' games I own.

[El Unicornio, mang]

I think ZG is referring to Link, not Zelda

[Lookalike Mark Chapman]

If I assume he's referring to the thread title then I can make him look stupid, and thus undervalue his subsequent statement.

[Little Hoover]

Twilight Princess, despite being frequently irritating, boring, constrained by frustrating design choices and completely derivative of previous titles, is my favourite Zelda game. It's symbolic of my rediscovery of gaming through the Wii, after a good five/ten years of being completely bored by games. It reminds me of some wonderful times when I was living in China, a completely free man, wrapped in blankets in the bitter winter, with some ludicrously spicy noodles and barbecued lamb skewers and a bottle of rice wine, playing into the small hours, enjoying the side quests and soaking up the vibe through to completion, then meeting a wonderful girl who was into Nintendo and doing it again together, watching the surprise and delight on her face. You just don't get that with the vast majority of AAA games. In fact, one of the great regrets of my gaming life is that we were living apart for so long, we never quite had chance to finish it before we broke up. The saved game is still there...Only about an hour or two to go. It's very likely it'll never happen but I won't delete it. As I said, it's symbolic...

<3 u zelda xx

That's quite sweet and better than my reason for liking TP which is mainly just because I like the character of Midna,  because she's a bit of a sarcastic dick. Which is so refreshing in Zelda's Universe.

[Treguard of Dunshelm]

Majora's Mask is my fave, Clock Town and the three day cycle were brilliant. Games where you're responsible for the fate of the world are legion, but MM is one of the rare few were I really did feel like I was saving people. Seeing them on their daily routines and helping them with their romantic, businesss or personal problems made me feel I knew them and was responsible for them.

The Wind Waker could have been great, but was let down by the repetitiveness[nb]has there ever been a worse Zelda character than Tingle?[/nb] and scrapping of whole dungeons. Still enjoyed it, but it was an experience tinged with disappointment.

I really liked Twilight Princess, I didn't find it "irritating, boring, constrained by frustrating design choices" at all (I agree it was somewhat derivative of previous titles, but that's to be expected of franchises, surely?). Some of my favourite bosses, particularly the final one. Only played it once however, and that was the Gamecube version.

I've just realised I never completed A Link to the Past - will have to download an emulator methinks, that game is possibly up there with Ocarina and MM.

[jutl]

He's 25 years old? That's a cute way of putting that they developed an item of intellectual property a quarter of a century ago and are still milking it.

Franchises die when they cease to appeal to an audience. Look at Guitar Hero - Activision fucked it into the ground with six years of rehashing. Nintendo is careful with its IP and rarely missteps in terms of quality. If producing high quality, popular games at longish intervals is 'milking it' then what do you call what Activision did to Guitar Hero?

[The Boston Crab]

I really liked Twilight Princess, I didn't find it "irritating, boring, constrained by frustrating design choices" at all (I agree it was somewhat derivative of previous titles, but that's to be expected of franchises, surely?). Some of my favourite bosses, particularly the final one.

You enjoyed all those bits were you were stuck as the wolf, running across fields in a straight line tracing a scent and finding bugs? Those bits were irritating, boring and frustrating, due to design constraints. Padding of the worst kind...and yet, the beautiful gloomy atmosphere got me through them and when I think back, that vibe completely outweighs the uncharacteristically clunky repetition, which was my point.

[Treguard of Dunshelm]

You enjoyed all those bits were you were stuck as the wolf, running across fields in a straight line tracing a scent and finding bugs?

i don't remember there being many of those bits, I'm certain they were a tiny part of the game compared to the dungeons etc. I could be misremembering though, like I said I only played it once.

Those bits were irritating, boring and frustrating, due to design constraints. Padding of the worst kind...and yet, the beautiful gloomy atmosphere got me through them and when I think back, that vibe completely outweighs the uncharacteristically clunky repetition, which was my point.

And perhaps that's why I don't remember those bits, it does have a great atmosphere, as Zelda games usually do.

[jutl]

Talking of annoying parts, I don't get the frequent criticism of Water Temple in Ocarina of Time. Now that they're releasing it on the 3DS they're making a big deal of the fact that the lower touchscreen makes switching in and out of the iron boots easier. It never seemed much of a chore to me in the first place, but to read some critiques online you'd imagine you had to strike your bellend with a geology hammer to affect the swap.

[The Boston Crab]

i don't remember there being many of those bits, I'm certain they were a tiny part of the game compared to the dungeons etc. I could be misremembering though, like I said I only played it once.

I think that's a factor. The first time I played it, I was just a bit miffed at being forced to be the wolf for long stretches of the first two-thirds of the game. Subsequent play-throughs made me realise that not only were you forced to be the wolf, you had three separate examples of following a scent to a village and then hunting 15 bugs in order to see a guardian/whatever in order to progress. Pure fetch quest padding.

Maybe I expect too much on the replay but even within that tried-and-tested Zelda/Metroid fetch/retrace/boss/new item formula, the design seams are usually very well masked by Nintendo flourishes. It's kind of why Phantom Hourglass, which could have been my favourite Zelda ever, ended up being one of the few I never even finished, so clunky was its structure.

[Treguard of Dunshelm]

hunting 15 bugs in order to see a guardian/whatever in order to progress. Pure fetch quest padding.

Sorry, I thought you were talking about the bugcatching side quests earlier! Yes, I remember those bits now and I can see why you'd find them dull. I don't mind a bit of find-me-do myself, but different strokes etc.

[madhair60]

Link's Awakening is best, Minish Cap second, rest I've never enjoyed.

I made a series of comics about Zelda once, they were brilliant, obviously.

[mikeyg27]

I think I'm cursed when it comes to playing Zelda games on emulators. I was on the second to last dungeon of Link to the Past when my laptop's hard drive when kaput, and I was quite far into Ocarina of Time when we got a new home PC and I forgot to transfer the save state before getting rid of the old one[nb]I've just started this again since I bought an N64 to USB adaptor[/nb]. You could very well point out that I should be playing the games in their original form and would probably have avoided all this if I'd done that, but why kick a man when he's down?

[uglybob1986]

Title: Legend Of Zelda: Ocarina Of Time Theme
Aritst / composer: Koji Kondo

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00yj887

[Barberism]

Talking of annoying parts, I don't get the frequent criticism of Water Temple in Ocarina of Time. Now that they're releasing it on the 3DS they're making a big deal of the fact that the lower touchscreen makes switching in and out of the iron boots easier. It never seemed much of a chore to me in the first place, but to read some critiques online you'd imagine you had to strike your bellend with a geology hammer to affect the swap.

I did it on my first play through without the blue tunic. I felt like a complete berk when I found out.

[jutl]

I did it on my first play through without the blue tunic. I felt like a complete berk when I found out.

I had no idea that was even possible.

[momatt]

I made a series of comics about Zelda once, they were brilliant, obviously.

Scan and post or you never did them. 

Never finished Minish Cap, it's bloody massive!

[Barberism]

I had no idea that was even possible.

I spent days searching the map for heart containers so that I could last longer underwater. I was loaded up with fairies in bottles for when I ran out of hearts. It wasn't that bad. You only really needed to do each underwater section for a few minutes. But it was a lot harder than it needed to be.

I got Oracle of Ages and Seasons off ebay. Can anybody recommend which one to do first?

[jutl]

I spent days searching the map for heart containers so that I could last longer underwater. I was loaded up with fairies in bottles for when I ran out of hearts. It wasn't that bad. You only really needed to do each underwater section for a few minutes. But it was a lot harder than it needed to be.

I got Oracle of Ages and Seasons off ebay. Can anybody recommend which one to do first?

I like Seasons best, but they're both mid-grade Zelda, I'd say.

[madhair60]

Scan and post or you never did them.

I'm OK with that dismissal, they're really very bad

[TIAL]

I've completely missed out on Ocarina of Time, so have purchased that today. Hope it's as good as the reviews make it out to be.

That should pass the time between now and the release of Skyward Sword, which looks like it'll be more 'cartoony' than Twilight Princess.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2dYgrMz_XBI

I'm also looking forward to the use of the MotionPlus, especially with the swordplay.

[madhair60]

I've completely missed out on Ocarina of Time, so have purchased that today. Hope it's as good as the reviews make it out to be.

It isn't.  Like a lot of relatively early 3D games, it's aged very badly, and you really have to have played it back then to appreciate it.

Just my opinion though, lots of mentlers seem to love that shit.  However, they are wrong and mad.  Like all 3D Zelda, it is toss.

[TIAL]

I'm enjoying it so far, a great way to pass the time. But I do agree with you, this would only have been 'THE BEST GAME EVER!!' if I'd played it in it's day.

Don't regret buying it, though.