SPECIAL: The Legend of Zelda (Article/Review)

Recently there have been many special (20th or 25th) anniversaries of treasured videogame franchises. Some, such as Metroid, went completely unnoticed while others such as Metal Gear and Kirby had a bit more fanfare. None more so though than The Legend of Zelda, which despite celebrating it's 25th birthday in 2011 is still going stronger than ever thanks to the designers ability to embrace new technology and changes in design. Zelda games have been some of the most influential and mimicked throughout the history of videogames, and Nintendo's franchise commands a massive worldwide cult following, largely due to it's appeal across different ages and genders. In this article I want to discuss and review four Zelda games from the modern "3D" era: Ocarina of Time, Twilight Princess, Spirit Tracks and Skyward Sword.

My own history with The Legend of Zelda began when I was just 10 years old. I remember picking up an original Game Boy in 1993 specifically for Link's Awakening, as I had played A Link to the Past on a friend's SNES and really wanted to experience it myself - I was a Sega fan personally and owned a Mega Drive, something that I absolutely do not regret. Link's debut on the Game Boy was an astounding game at the time, and one of my childhood experiences that I still cherish and remember fondly; especially long holidays away camping and playing Zelda on the long car journeys down to Devon. Because I was young and used to playing platformers, racing games and beat-em-ups I remember the difficulty of Link's Awakening being far too much for me - I don't think I have ever actually finished the game, despite playing it numerous times! As the years rolled on, and I stuck with Sega consoles before switching over to PlayStation, I missed many entries in the series and Zelda really dropped off the list of franchises that I considered myself a fan of (replaced with things like Final Fantasy and Silent Hill).

Over a decade after Link's Awakening (which I still own along with my original Game Boy), I got my hands on a Wii, the first Nintendo home console I had ever owned. With this came access to all those games that I'd only ever played around other people's houses and at school/college/uni on their portables, such as Mario Kart, Metroid and of course... The Legend of Zelda.

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After an extended absence, my first foray back to the land of Hyrule was with the dark and epic Twilight Princess, which was also my first hands on experience playing a "3D" Legend of Zelda. First impressions were of an incredibly slow start and a slightly muddy graphical presentation - Twilight Princess was designed to "give fans what they wanted" and update Zelda with a more modern and realistic art style, which didn't quite suit the aging GameCube hardware and the Wii only marginally better. However, after getting hooked by the story and progressing past the first couple of hours, the game starts to come into more of it's own and the art style starts to become more in keeping with the aesthetic of a Zelda title; albeit with Twilight Princess's own bloom-lighting-smothered atmosphere and mature design choices. What we essentially have here, although I didn't know it at the time, is the "grown up" version of Ocarina of Time - a game widely considered to not only be the best Zelda, but also one of the more influential and well designed games of all time. In many ways Twilight Princess improved upon it's predecessor, swapping out the annoying fairy Navi with the titular Midna (who is still my favourite of the "sidekick" characters aside from  Princess Zelda herself... more on that later), and making the world of Hyrule actually seem huge and epic in its proportions - the prior entry Wind Waker had probably been slightly bigger, but was a vast empty ocean populated by islands, not an actual open world.

Twilight Princess grabbed me and dug it's claws in like no other game had for a long time, which was down not only to the fantastic story, characterisation and atmosphere, but also the air-tight gameplay and level design. In my opinion, the temples in Twlight Princess are some of the best to ever grace a Zelda game - they're large, complicated and require a fair bit of puzzle solving to get through. There are also a LOT of them, and this constant variety really helps keep the game moving. There is a lot of backtracking in the over-world of Hyrule, as you go about completing various side-quests and errands, but the temples/dungeons sequentially only ever move forward driving you towards the epic conclusion. The sheer epic scale and differentiation of the environments has never been seen or matched in a Zelda game since, and the addition of the twilight realm makes this entry stand out from it's peers. All this would already make it one of the best Zelda  titles, but the truth is what really makes this entry stand out for me is the conclusion - I've never been so moved by a Zelda game. Along with Final Fantasy X, I found the ending of Twilight Princess to be simultaneously uplifting and overwrought with sadness to the point where I felt moved to tears; for me this cathartic release is something very special and only captured by a select handful of videogames. This alone makes Twilight Princess very special indeed. I just wish that the graphical style had been left for a HD Zelda - obviously Nintendo felt the same way.


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Skyward Sword is the first Zelda title specially made for the Wii, and with the Wii U now out, this is likely to be the last. Whereas Twilight Princess was really designed around the hardware (limitations) of the GameCube, Skyward Sword was built from the ground up to not only take advantage of the increased processing power and graphical output of the Wii, but also it's unique motion controlled interface. In short, while in the previous game you flicked the Wii remote back and forth to perform attacks, they didn't match your actions in real life. Skyward Sword tracks your motions 1:1 and the entire game is built around this; obviously this polarised gamers worldwide as some people just weren't ready to ditch analogue sticks and buttons. They're idiots. The whole design of this game is incredible and changed my opinion regarding motion controls so much that I immediately went and bought a move controller for my PS3 too (so that I could play Resident Evil 5 like a Wii). Combat in a Zelda game has never been better than when you actually have to strike your sword in certain directions to get around an opponent's shield, or chop the limbs off of bosses, or throw things, roll things or move things in precise directions. This extended to the puzzles as well and the temples are designed to make good use out of the precise control that the Wii Motion Plus affords. Not only in the gameplay top notch, but the graphical presentation this time around is also designed for the hardware and accepts its limitations; instead of the realistic and modern look that Twilight Princess tried to capture, Skyward Sword utilises a faux-water colour semi-cell shaded art style that looks beautiful.

Probably my vote for the best looking game of 2011, Skyward Sword worked with the SD visuals of the Wii and made that technological limitation seem unimportant. With the previous game I always had the nagging feeling that it would look so much better in HD and with larger textures, where as this latest entry looked perfect as it was. This was a triumph for Nintendo, and proved that artistic direction beats raw technology every time. However, Skyward Sword was not without it's faults. If the previous game seemed like it took a while to get going (story-wise) then this one is an absolute crawl. This story is a prequel to every other Zelda that has come before it, and so it has a lot of set up and a slightly alien setting from a series viewpoint; there's no Hyrule overworld because it doesn't exist yet, instead we have a massive expanse of sky and islands in Skyloft. Once the story gets going, is is very engaging and has some fantastic cut scenes for a Zelda game, however it does seem to drag on a bit. The major problem with Skyward Sword is pacing and padding, as there are only really a few areas and a few temples that you are asked to revisit several times over. Towards the end of the game it is not uncommon to feel fatigued as you are asked to fight the same boss for the third time and save the forest region again! Luckily, the outstanding quality of actually playing the game (as well as the visual splendour) overrides these faults to a large extent and Skyward Sword is still an excellent video game - innovative, beautiful, and one of the best released that year.

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Link's Awakening marked the last time I played a handheld Zelda title and it wasn't until fairly recently that I got access to a Nintendo DS and had a go at a more recent one. Spirit Tracks is the second of the two sequels to the GameCube's Wind Waker; a controversial entry in the Zelda franchise that switched the graphics to an anime inspired cell-shaded art style and dropped Hyrule for a flooded diluvian overworld. I've not played Wind Waker and so gave the first (directly connected) sequel, Phantom Hourglass, a pass for now - I've got it lined up for later - and instead hopped in this stand-alone tale. Like Skyward Sword, Spirit Tracks has been tailored perfectly to utilise the hardware that it runs on, namely that the entire game is controlled almost exclusively through the touchscreen and stylus, which actually provides a very precise level of control. Because the game was designed this way from the ground up, it feels very intuitive and comfortable moving, fighting and puzzle solving without ever touching the d-pad or a face button. In fact, many of the standard gadgets used in Zelda games such as the boomerang are at their best here, as you can quickly use the stylus to trace a path across the screen and around objects.

Also like the previous game, Spirit Tracks has graphics that seem very much at home on its native console. The cell-shaded graphics, simple textures and overhead perspective suit the game well and in my opinion is looks great, especially for the Nintendo DS, a console not famed for its power. I think a special mention must also be made of the train riding sections, which replace the usual open world Hyrule (or Skyloft, or ocean, etc.), they are just so much fun and intuitive to control. I really think that people who dismissed the idea as being crazy and not-very-Zelda never really gave it a go, or opened their mind to new things - especially from a franchise constantly innovating and experimenting with it's own formula. The soundtrack in these sections also has one of the catchiest tunes ever in a video game. Overall, I really enjoyed Spirit Tracks, as I found the story incredibly engaging, the new concepts that it introduces are fun and help it stand out, and the temples were really challenging to solve. There is a little backtracking in the main quest, but never to temples/dungeons (always just in the overworld - like Twilight Princess), and the variety in the game is excellent. Also, for Zelda geeks, its worth mentioning that this is the only game were Zelda herself is your "sidekick" character, and the interaction between her and Link is what drives the charming and affecting story along. One of the most fun and charming Zelda games, Spirit Tracks is just a fantastic game - and it caused me to invest in my own 3DS console, which brings me on to the final game in this article, and one that was definitely overdue for me to play.

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I mentioned above that one of the most widely praised and influential Zelda games ever made was Ocarina of Time, well... since I never owned an N64, I'd completely missed out on playing it. I toyed with the idea of picking the original up on the Wii's Virtual Console, but then the 25th anniversary of the franchise hit and with it Nintendo revealed Ocarina of Time 3D on the 3DS - not only the original game with a 3D "gimmick", but instead a complete graphical and gameplay overhaul. It was worth the wait. Booting up this game for the first time you would never in a million years think that it was an old remastered game, as it not only controls like it was designed for the 3DS, but it looks like it too. The graphics have been completely redone, with improved textures, character models and animation - as well as a new interface to streamline it and make use of the added touchscreen. I used the word "gimmick" above, but the 3D is anything but, as it genuinely adds depth and clarity to the overall presentation; as well as having gameplay functions when volleying magical energy at bosses, or avoiding projectiles, etc. I played with a combination of it switched on (at different levels of 3D) and off if my eyes got tired, but loved every minute of it. I also mentioned that the gameplay has been given an overhaul, well this is still the same Ocarina of Time that graced the 64-bit system all those years ago, but the interface and control scheme have been tweaked to make use of the 3DS's hardware. Aiming, for instance, has built-in motion control like Skyward Sword using the 3DS's gyroscope, and this works wonderfully throughout but especially in some of the arrow-shooting mini-games. Accessing the menus and switching items is also effortless using the bottom touchscreen.

At the time of its release, Ocarina of Time really defined what a modern "3D" Zelda game would be like for years to come- as well as influencing countless other videogames such as God of War and Okami. So, you would think that after all these years of advancements and modern successors that it would show it's age, but it really doesn't! A true timeless classic, Ocarina of Time is as outstanding now as it ever was; the story that it tells, as it bounces back and forth through time and over many varied locations, is still absolutely riveting and the pace of the game is perfect. Even when you're going back and forth to the Temple of Time and revisiting certain locations, you never get that "backtracking" feeling that you do in later installments, and this is helped considerably by the game providing fast travel via the titular ocarina itself (which is easy to play on the 3DS either via the face buttons or touch screen interface). Obviously, Nintendo has made some improvements over time to things like temple design, and the ones in Ocarina of Time do feel quite brief in comparison to those in Twilight Princess. As modern three dimensional gaming was still finding its feet, some of the bosses are also a little on the quick-and-easy side, however both of these points don't detract from the game at all. Sure, temples could be bigger and bosses could be harder, but then that's what the included Master Quest version is for; which is unlocked after beating the game.

In summary, Ocarina of Time has a reputation for being one of the best games ever created, and Ocarina of Time 3D reinforces this fact. An absolutely stellar update of an already solid title, this is the definitive Legend of Zelda game and probably still the best entry point for anyone looking to get into the series. It may have been Link's 25th birthday, but Nintendo have given all of us the best present you could possibly ask for.

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I'm in a real Zelda mood at the moment and still have several games lined up to play, this includes: Majora's Mask (Wii Virtual Console) and Phantom Hourglass (DS). So, expect a follow up to this article at some point with my thoughts on those games. Thanks for reading!