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The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time is 20 years old

Started by Blinder Data, December 11, 2018, 04:23:07 PM

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Blinder Data

On this day 20 years ago, OoT was released in Europe.

Best game ever?

Yes.

Cuntbeaks

I was up at Currys for it opening, got a copy for me and my brother in law.

He paid me back with hash.

Kelvin

I remember thinking it was massively over-rated at the time, and arguing with my friend's little brother that Rare were miles better than Nintendo. I wish I could go back in time and kick my teen self hard in the bollocks for that.   

Looking back, Ocarina has aged badly on a technical level, but brilliantly as a piece of game design, It's perfectly paced and structured, with a decent story, memorable characters, and excellent world/level design.

Ganondorf's final transformation into beast Ganon remains my favourite moment in all of gaming.


madhair60


thraxx


The only thing I can remember about this is di-di-di di-di-di di-di-di-di-Dee di-Dee-di-Dee-dee

popcorn

Quote from: Kelvin on December 13, 2018, 05:45:42 PM
It's perfectly paced and structured, with a decent story, memorable characters, and excellent world/level design.

This is it for me. It remains the sort of platonic ideal of Zelda, with best iteration of the two-worlds thing and the way each piece connects to another. It's all just very sensible in the best way.

madhair60

yeah that sounds fun. "it's very sensible". that sounds funner than fuck. where's my wallet

popcorn

I wish your posts were sensible madhair60. I wish you were called sensiblehair60 and all your posts were less full of NONSENSE.

madhair60


popcorn

Well now you've gone and posted something sensible which has undermined my premise entirely.

Bazooka

Its a piece of art, not just the best game ever made.

madhair60



Claude the Racecar Driving Rockstar Super Sleuth


Lemming

Wasn't going to shit on the parade, but as long as other people are ripping on it, yeah. I really never understood the game as a kid, it just seemed like Tomb Raider with worse dungeons, worse controls/camera issues (which is really saying something) and being forced to run backwards and forwards through a massive boring empty field between levels. Replayed it more recently and my opinion hasn't shifted a huge amount. No doubt it suffers from its reputation these days, there's no way any kids today going back won't just spend the whole game thinking "this is the best fucking game ever?"

Happy 20th Anniversary!

Kelvin

Worse controls than Tomb Raiders tank controls? In an adventure game?

I disagree with the rest as well, but that seems particularly odd.

Lemming

The camera controls are probably the least controversial to complain about, so I'll bitch about movement instead:

It's been ages, but the main problem I remember is that the A button is contextual, used for combat, movement and interaction, and in a game that occasionally calls for some precision platforming, that's crazy to me. I really don't get why there couldn't just be a dedicated jump button, dedicated roll button, etc. The ledge climbing is awkward too, again in a way that could be solved by just having a dedicated jump button.

The movement itself has stuff to gripe about too - very limited air control while jumping being one that sticks in the mind.

Combat controls with the lock-on system pissed me off too, but it's been so long since I played that I doubt I could make a proper case as to why.

Kelvin

I mean, the controls have obviously dated, but not like tank controls. It was that comparison that puzzled me.

Lemming

It's probably just me having a fringe opinion on TR's controls - I've always found them really well-suited to the games (at least, the first two games). The tank-iness lets you line up weird jumping angles perfectly, and the action button being used to reliably perform platforming actions like climbing and ledge-grabbing is a feature that's notably and inexplicably missing from a lot of post-TR 90s/2000s platforming games. I'm playing Star Trek DS9: The Fallen right now and it's basically random chance whether or not you'll grab any given ledge or plunge to your death.

Tank controls in Resident Evil and other games still drive me crazy.

Kelvin

For me, the thing that elevates Ocarina structurally above most modern games is just how well it's paced by AAA standards. Every dungeon feels unique, the difficulty has a clear and steady curve, the plot doesn't obstruct the gameplay. The whole thing feels incredibly refined and disciplined, compared to the flab of many later AAA open world titles.

With the exception of the jogs across Hyrule field as a kid, not one part of the main quest feels surplus to requirements or like padding. It's a constantly escalating sequence of fun overworld tasks and sensibly sized temples, all of them using different gameplay concepts at their centre. It just feels like such a complete, honed package in hindsight. The technical aspects have aged, but the fundamental design still remains a gold standard.           

PlanktonSideburns

love the bit where you bully a chicken then it suddenly goes mental and loads of chickens fly at you, its raining chickens, and if you dont get the FUCK out of the village pronto, they kill you

madhair60

I tried to play it on 3DS fairly recently and there's a bit where you're supposed to stand on a specific point and play a certain song on the Ocarina to open a door. Had to look it up and got fuckin angry. If there was a clue I missed it. Internet said "there's a triforce on the spot you need to stand on". That's not a clue. it's Zelda mate there's Triforces everything. Triforce a fucking dildo up your japs.

colacentral

It's brilliant, nuts in here.

I wouldn't describe any section as "precision platforming," and the control scheme is quick to get used to. It's incredibly simple and intuitive. The Tomb Raider comparison doesn't hold up outside of the superficial element of there being dungeons and some blocks to move around. Tomb Raider is clunkier, uglier, and has less interesting puzzles, characters, level design, music... it's inferior in every way.

I remember the people I knew who slated it at the time and to a man they were all people who owned a playstation instead of an N64, except for one person who asked for it for Christmas but whose parents couldn't find a copy, so he took to saying "it's shit anyway." If you actually played it on release, and immersed yourself in it, it was faultless.

It still is today, really - it's simple to pick up and play, the puzzles and dungeons are still fun, and for its era it still looks good. The story is decent - exactly as much as you want in order to stay engaged, a little twist here and there, without overtaking the gameplay and bogging you down in cutscenes, and it's well paced.

This article in The Guardian was a nice little read by the way:

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/games/2018/dec/11/zelda-ocarina-of-time-at-20-nintendo-masterpiece-changed-games-forever

It's one of the few games that I could play over and over again.

colacentral

Quote from: madhair60 on December 14, 2018, 08:47:46 PM
I tried to play it on 3DS fairly recently and there's a bit where you're supposed to stand on a specific point and play a certain song on the Ocarina to open a door. Had to look it up and got fuckin angry. If there was a clue I missed it. Internet said "there's a triforce on the spot you need to stand on". That's not a clue. it's Zelda mate there's Triforces everything. Triforce a fucking dildo up your japs.

You were playing it 20 years after the fact, and on a tiny screen. And there aren't triforces everywhere. I remember doing that as a child with no issues - it's obvious for fucks sake. You're just shite and pay no attention.

Lemming

Quote from: colacentral on December 14, 2018, 09:42:10 PM
I wouldn't describe any section as "precision platforming," and the control scheme is quick to get used to. It's incredibly simple and intuitive. The Tomb Raider comparison doesn't hold up outside of the superficial element of there being dungeons and some blocks to move around. Tomb Raider is clunkier, uglier, and has less interesting puzzles, characters, level design, music... it's inferior in every way.

Interesting puzzles like playing songs on the triforces that are scattered around everywhere?

Phil_A

I'm not sure the complaint about the game world being too big really holds water, pretty early on you get the ability to warp to different places. And you get a horse.

Let's face it, compared to most open world games now, it's fucking tiny.

colacentral

Quote from: Lemming on December 14, 2018, 09:52:50 PM
Interesting puzzles like playing songs on the triforces that are scattered around everywhere?

Go on, be honest: did you own it as a child, and how much of it have you actually played?

Lemming

Quote from: colacentral on December 14, 2018, 10:23:28 PM
Go on, be honest: did you own it as a child, and how much of it have you actually played?

I didn't own it as a child, my cousin did and many happy miserable hours were spent playing songs on all the triforces everywhere. I've since finished it twice, once on an N64 and once on an emulator. I also gave the 3DS version a go for about an hour and decided I couldn't be arsed.

To explain the Tomb Raider comparison I made a little further, all I ever wanted was to get to the dungeons because they were the part that most appealed to me. The overworld, and all the shit like fucking about with cuccos, the stealth bit in the castle, pissing around with the day/night cycle and so on just felt like irritating busywork between the real meat of the game. And when the real meat arrived in the form of dungeons, I just wished I was playing Tomb Raider, which had much better box-pushing puzzles and equally bad combat that mercifully ended quicker.

I also hate cryptic shit like madhair describes, but I accept that's an issue of personal taste. If I get stuck, I want the solution to be close at hand and semi-logical, not halfway across the game world in a shit puzzle. I never got on particularly well with any Zelda game (though I've not played all of them) for that reason, but again, personal taste.

Quote from: colacentral on December 14, 2018, 09:42:10 PM
This article in The Guardian was a nice little read by the way

Let's go down to the hop lounge for a session ipa and a halloumi berger


Edit decent article