Zelda Series

[JC'sBarber]

This faggot should be fired, every single Zelda game released under his watch has been a hack-job. Skyward Sword?, one of the worst 'video games' I have ever played in my entire life, Breath of the Wild?, babby's first Skyrim with barebones gameplay, Tears of the Kingdom?, a fan mod that took 6+ years to release. Echoes of Wisdom also bares the stench of his retarded game design philosophies, same with Aonuma. These men need to work on a different franchise, far away from Zelda. If they even set one 'foot' in the Zelda offices they are to be given 40 lashes.

 

[Ash]

So is it safe to say I never need to bother with any modern Zelda? I mean that has always been my estimation, but that delicious gameplay-oriented elitism may just seal the decision. A JC Denton avatar helps also.

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

Maybe he just wanted to smash Zelda in different ways and the games didn't have elf fuck mods.

 

[<3sRichardSimmons]

So is it safe to say I never need to bother with any modern Zelda? I mean that has always been my estimation, but that delicious gameplay-oriented elitism may just seal the decision. A JC Denton avatar helps also.

That dude is kind of full of shit.

I think there are things you would enjoy about BotW/TotK, but you would probably also leave them equally frustrated. They're almost certainly the most gameplay-focused AAA games not made by From from this past decade, but they also make a lot of unforced errors and compromises by catering to the casual Nintendo player.

And that's to say nothing of the criticism that they're "bad at being Zelda games", which is pretty undeniably true imo, but also sort of misses the point because they're really not trying to continue on in the vein previous franchise titles (and honestly thank fuck for that after the disappointing Twilight Princess and the straight-fucking-awful Skyward Sword).

 

[JC'sBarber]

So is it safe to say I never need to bother with any modern Zelda? I mean that has always been my estimation, but that delicious gameplay-oriented elitism may just seal the decision. A JC Denton avatar helps also.

If you like games with depth, no. BOTW and TOTK are exercises in tedium and frustration, with only the "joy of exploration" being a net positive of playing either. But even that is undermined by the fact that there are no rewards for exploring. You can play the game for hours, exploring every nook and cranny, and nothing meaningful changes about Link. Your weapons still break, your abilities remain the same, etc. If you like puzzles you might get a kick out of the shrines, but after you've played a dozen of them you've seen them all. Everything about modern Zelda is a tired, drab experience. And do you know what the reward is for finding the hundreds of Korok seeds scattered throughout the vast open world?, a golden turd. That sums it all up.

So is it safe to say I never need to bother with any modern Zelda? I mean that has always been my estimation, but that delicious gameplay-oriented elitism may just seal the decision. A JC Denton avatar helps also.

That dude is kind of full of shit.

I think there are things you would enjoy about BotW/TotK, but you would probably also leave them equally frustrated. They're almost certainly the most gameplay-focused AAA games not made by From from this past decade, but they also make a lot of unforced errors and compromises by catering to the casual Nintendo player.

And that's to say nothing of the criticism that they're "bad at being Zelda games", which is pretty undeniably true imo, but also sort of misses the point because they're really not trying to continue on in the vein previous franchise titles (and honestly thank fuck for that after the disappointing Twilight Princess and the straight-fucking-awful Skyward Sword).

Modern Zelda isn't fit to lick the boots of From Software games. Even at it's worst, Elden Ring blows Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom out of the water. There is such a variety of things to see and do, and your weapons don't evaporate into thin-air after ten strikes. There are actual RPG mechanics at work, an incentive to actually play and fight enemies. And as disappointing as Twilight Princess may have been to some, it's worlds ahead of every game that released after it. The very fact I can replay Twilight Princess and still find much to enjoy is something no Zelda game can lay claim to nowadays.

 

[Nifft Batuff]

The point of BotW and TotK is to stimulate creative emergent gameplay. They are nothing like From games where you just have to identify a specific pattern of actions and repeat it to win.

 

[Nutmeg]

stimulate creative emergent gameplay.

And? Do they accomplish that?

 

[Ezekiel]

And that's to say nothing of the criticism that they're "bad at being Zelda games", which is pretty undeniably true imo, but also sort of misses the point because they're really not trying to continue on in the vein previous franchise titles (and honestly thank fuck for that after the disappointing Twilight Princess and the straight-fucking-awful Skyward Sword).

Prior failure is not a good reason to abandon the most important parts of the formula. New leadership is needed. Producer Eiji Aonuma needs to go.

 

[Jaedar]

So is it safe to say I never need to bother with any modern Zelda? I mean that has always been my estimation, but that delicious gameplay-oriented elitism may just seal the decision. A JC Denton avatar helps also.

I think you could find things to enjoy in totk/botw. It's basically nintendo independently rediscovering the basics of emergent gameplay / immersive sim design (or whatever you want to call it). A boulder rolling down a hill will do damage based on weight and speed, fire weapons will set grass on fire creating updrafts, things of that nature. These cool things are chained to some pretty bad decisions and overall casual design. But there is something to be said for the freedom of going to take on endgame enemies immediately after the tutorial ends, and the various cool system-driven interactions.

 

[<3sRichardSimmons]

And that's to say nothing of the criticism that they're "bad at being Zelda games", which is pretty undeniably true imo, but also sort of misses the point because they're really not trying to continue on in the vein previous franchise titles (and honestly thank fuck for that after the disappointing Twilight Princess and the straight-fucking-awful Skyward Sword).

Prior failure is not a good reason to abandon the most important parts of the formula.

*Shrug* Things change and franchises that take risks are more interesting than ones that don't, and this requires a willingness to sometimes throw the baby out with the bathwater. Regardless of whether or not they cater to your personal preferences, BotW/TotK are far superior as games with actual gameplay when compared to TP and SS. I don't begrudge anyone for being mad the 3D Zeldas are no longer following the OoT/MM formula, and you can blame Aonuma for it all you want, but it seems silly to get mad at him for BotW/TotK because it's very clear that he's much better at making BotW/TotK style games than he is at making OoT style games after his attempts at making OoT style games nearly killed the franchise.

 

[Just Locus]

I think people exaggerate the "newness" of BotW's gameplay, If you wanted something similar to LTTP, there are several dozen LTTP-esque experiences out there (Echoes of Wisdom is also similar). Twilight Princess is what happens when they get scared of trying anything new.

I saw BotW's focus on exploration and a massive open world as the next logical step in the series, one of the things that the series focuses on is exploration, and what better way to channel that than an open-world game? the fact of the matter is, the formula has a lot of imperfections that TOTK has more or less cemented further.

Would love to see them bring them tackle this idea again but actually innovate and refine the system instead of bolting new things onto it. Like including more races like the Mogmas, Kikwis, and Maiamais from the previous games, the race design in BotW is great and I'd love to see their rendition/portrayal in an open-world game that's already centered on exploring and discovering things, whether it be mechanical or narratively. (Bonus if they include more original races/refine the existing mechanics) - Another issue is the repetitive nature of the late game, where discovery long loses its luster once you know what's next (that being yet another shrine/Moblin hideout) which is an issue with the open-ended nature of the game itself.

Also, comparing BotW to Fromsoft games.

 

[Butter]

It occurs to me that the biggest problem across all of the Zelda games is inventory management, specifically the limitations imposed by the hardware. It's a pain in the ass that you have to frequently go into the menu and change your equipment because you can only have 2 or 3 things out at a time. PC games solved this problem decades ago by having a hotbar with 10 or more slots. The ideal Zelda game would surely be a PC title in order to take advantage of this, but Nintendo will never make such a product. Is there a PC game comparable to LttP or MM out there?

 

[Ezekiel]

It occurs to me that the biggest problem across all of the Zelda games is inventory management, specifically the limitations imposed by the hardware. It's a pain in the ass that you have to frequently go into the menu and change your equipment because you can only have 2 or 3 things out at a time. PC games solved this problem decades ago by having a hotbar with 10 or more slots. The ideal Zelda game would surely be a PC title in order to take advantage of this, but Nintendo will never make such a product.

Could replace most items with abilities that unlock the new areas, like in Okami. No, I don't want a number row/pad and digital movent in my 3D Zelda game.

Is there a PC game comparable to LttP or MM out there?

No. I would have read about it or seen it.

 

[Shinji]

If they don't do anything new, people will complain that they just release the same game over and over again.
If they do something new, people will complain that it's not Zelda anymore.

Anyway, I think their current strategy is to bring new people and modernize Zelda with their AAA entries, while keeping it traditional with their lower-budget games in order to please the older fans of the franchise (e.g. Echoes of Wisdom, remakes)

This strategy also helps in keeping Zelda fans well fed -- and the franchise's brand relevant -- during the big gap that exists between AAA Zelda releases.

 

[Just Locus]

No, I don't want a number row/pad and digital movent in my 3D Zelda game.

I do think the experience sometimes gets bogged down too much with interruptions.

They could think about including a favorite menu that allows you to switch items on the fly without the use of horizontal menus. BotW's weapons/shields menu becomes cumbersome to navigate once you accumulate too many items (especially during the late game with the expanded inventory) because you could spend half a minute scrolling in either direction looking for the weapon you want to take. The sorting option doesn't help either since you have to cycle through it as well.

The main issue is the amount of screen real estate that's not being used in favor of one single long row of icons when you could easily fit two or three more which would make the interruptions less tedious. And I think if Nintendo isn't going to do that, then yes, they should add a radial menu similar to Skyward Sword except with whatever the player has favorited instead of items, it would cut down on the number of interruptions significantly, and there's no reason to stick to a bad user experience if you aren't going to improve it.

 

[Ezekiel]

No, I don't want a number row/pad and digital movent in my 3D Zelda game.

I do think the experience sometimes gets bogged down too much with interruptions.

They could think about including a favorite menu that allows you to switch items on the fly without the use of horizontal menus. BotW's weapons/shields menu becomes cumbersome to navigate once you accumulate too many items (especially during the late game with the expanded inventory) because you could spend half a minute scrolling in either direction looking for the weapon you want to take. The sorting option doesn't help either since you have to cycle through it as well.

The main issue is the amount of screen real estate that's not being used in favor of one single long row of icons when you could easily fit two or three more which would make the interruptions less tedious. And I think if Nintendo isn't going to do that, then yes, they should add a radial menu similar to Skyward Sword except with whatever the player has favorited instead of items, it would cut down on the number of interruptions significantly, and there's no reason to stick to a bad user experience if you aren't going to improve it.

But you're talking about all the junk in the newest Zelda games. My Link would only wear one tunic that might be replaced with a better one (like the blue and red mail in A Link to the Past), one sword that might be replaced with a better one and one shield that might be replaced with a better one. Artists are not going to be able to make thirty different outfits look as good on the main character as one that they know will be on him all the time, and if you limit it to just a few optional ones, then you're wasting an equipment screen. So better to just design ONE. It's like that in Demon's and Dark Souls as well. Like two or three outfits looked cool and the rest I almost never wore. And Zelda is not even an RPG. Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom lost the directional Z-targeting attacks for the spears and axes. He's the boy with the sword and shield. Build the best combat you can around that one set of weapons.

 

[JC'sBarber]

And that's to say nothing of the criticism that they're "bad at being Zelda games", which is pretty undeniably true imo, but also sort of misses the point because they're really not trying to continue on in the vein previous franchise titles (and honestly thank fuck for that after the disappointing Twilight Princess and the straight-fucking-awful Skyward Sword).

Prior failure is not a good reason to abandon the most important parts of the formula.

*Shrug* Things change and franchises that take risks are more interesting than ones that don't, and this requires a willingness to sometimes throw the baby out with the bathwater. Regardless of whether or not they cater to your personal preferences, BotW/TotK are far superior as games with actual gameplay when compared to TP and SS. I don't begrudge anyone for being mad the 3D Zeldas are no longer following the OoT/MM formula, and you can blame Aonuma for it all you want, but it seems silly to get mad at him for BotW/TotK because it's very clear that he's much better at making BotW/TotK style games than he is at making OoT style games after his attempts at making OoT style games nearly killed the franchise.

What the hell are you babbling about?. "Actual gameplay compared to TP and SS"?. Like what?, running around an empty open world fighting the same dogshit enemies?, finding the same identical-looking shrine just to do an easy puzzle for dogshit rewards?. Finding a cool weapon only to have it break if you so much as sneeze?. And when you're trying to climb a small hill and it rains you have to wait 5 minutes for it to stop before you can continue?. In Twilight Princess I'm accomplishing things, I'm beating dungeons that are well-thought out and with engaging puzzles, fighting monsters and demons, and there is an actual 'plot' with characters I actually care about. This meme that Twilight Princess was in any way disappointing is fake news, it was a great game and continues to be so today. Any faults it may have had should have been improved with a sequel, rather than blaming it on the game design template and throwing everything out.

Zelda was never supposed to be an "open world" franchise, it's an action-adventure series based around dungeons and puzzle solving. With even the open world being a puzzle that you have to navigate through. It was never an emergent sim or Ubislop affair.

 

[Just Locus]

running around an empty open world fighting the same dogshit enemies?, finding the same identical-looking shrine just to do an easy puzzle for dogshit rewards?. Finding a cool weapon only to have it break if you so much as sneeze?. And when you're trying to climb a small hill and it rains you have to wait 5 minutes for it to stop before you can continue?.

The open world isn't empty, I always saw the 1-to-2-minute downtime between locations as a way to pace out the combat/shrine encounters. Just because something isn't happening every 30 seconds, doesn't mean the open world is empty.

Zelda puzzles are at their best when they involve multiple spinning plates that need to be solved in a particular order. In previous Zelda games, these kinds of puzzles were the exception rather than the rule (like the fire arrow puzzle in Ocarina of Time). Most of the time, all you needed was the item you grabbed from that respective dungeon to complete, the decisions make themselves, and for the most part, BotW follows this design trope.

The main reason weapons break so fast in BotW is to encourage players to approach situations in different ways. For example, if my weapon was one hit away from breaking, I could sneak up on an enemy and throw my weapon at them since that'll always guarantee a knockdown.

Imagine complaining in a game as open-ended as BotW that it's "inconveniencing" you. If anything the game doesn't toss enough roadblocks at you, the timescale in the game is super fast, you could easily climb up that "small" hill by creating elevation through fire or using Revali's Gale.

In Twilight Princess I'm accomplishing things, I'm beating dungeons that are well-thought out and with engaging puzzles, fighting monsters and demons, and there is an actual 'plot' with characters I actually care about. This meme that Twilight Princess was in any way disappointing is fake news, it was a great game

"well thought-out and with engaging puzzles"
"fighting monsters and demons"
"there's an actual 'plot' with characters I actually care about"

Imagine complaining about having to wait 5 minutes to get up a small hill, but excusing the 2-hour long drawn-out intro of Twilight Princess in the same breath. Nintendo are better game designers than storytellers, and BotW having the 'plot' be simple, but leaving the details of the characters involved behind memories was a step in the right direction. If players aren't going to bother with it, it's better left in the hands of more curious players instead of bogging the experience down with an unnecessary amount of flow-breaking cutscenes. The rest of the buzzwords you throw without any elaboration tell me you either didn't play the game or haven't played it in close to a decade.

 

[JC'sBarber]

running around an empty open world fighting the same dogshit enemies?, finding the same identical-looking shrine just to do an easy puzzle for dogshit rewards?. Finding a cool weapon only to have it break if you so much as sneeze?. And when you're trying to climb a small hill and it rains you have to wait 5 minutes for it to stop before you can continue?.

The open world isn't empty, I always saw the 1-to-2-minute downtime between locations as a way to pace out the combat/shrine encounters. Just because something isn't happening every 30 seconds, doesn't mean the open world is empty.

Zelda puzzles are at their best when they involve multiple spinning plates that need to be solved in a particular order. In previous Zelda games, these kinds of puzzles were the exception rather than the rule (like the fire arrow puzzle in Ocarina of Time). Most of the time, all you needed was the item you grabbed from that respective dungeon to complete, the decisions make themselves, and for the most part, BotW follows this design trope.

The main reason weapons break so fast in BotW is to encourage players to approach situations in different ways. For example, if my weapon was one hit away from breaking, I could sneak up on an enemy and throw my weapon at them since that'll always guarantee a knockdown.

Imagine complaining in a game as open-ended as BotW that it's "inconveniencing" you. If anything the game doesn't toss enough roadblocks at you, the timescale in the game is super fast, you could easily climb up that "small" hill by creating elevation through fire or using Revali's Gale.

In Twilight Princess I'm accomplishing things, I'm beating dungeons that are well-thought out and with engaging puzzles, fighting monsters and demons, and there is an actual 'plot' with characters I actually care about. This meme that Twilight Princess was in any way disappointing is fake news, it was a great game

"well thought-out and with engaging puzzles"
"fighting monsters and demons"
"there's an actual 'plot' with characters I actually care about"

Imagine complaining about having to wait 5 minutes to get up a small hill, but excusing the 2-hour long drawn-out intro of Twilight Princess in the same breath. Nintendo are better game designers than storytellers, and BotW having the 'plot' be simple, but leaving the details of the characters involved behind memories was a step in the right direction. If players aren't going to bother with it, it's better left in the hands of more curious players instead of bogging the experience down with an unnecessary amount of flow-breaking cutscenes. The rest of the buzzwords you throw without any elaboration tell me you either didn't play the game or haven't played it in close to a decade.

I could complete a 100 shrines in Breath of the Wild and not feel half of the satisfaction I used to get from a traditional Zelda dungeon. There is no catharsis, no moment of triumph when you beat a shrine or a divine beast or any of the dogshit "dungeons" in Tears of the Kingdom. One of the best aspects of the series was entirely lost when they upended it's defining features. They took it all out without bothering to fill the void. They just expect the act of "exploring" to be enough of an intrinsic motivator, and for me it definitely wasn't. I got bored of nu-Zelda very quickly, and there was a point in TOTK where I just decided to stop exploring the dull open world and just get to whatever meaningful, story-based content was put into the game. Of which there was very little.

Games need structure, they need story and they need permanent, well-defined limitations. The Zelda series had it's own style, and all of that was jettisoned for a Ubislop formula done better in other games.

 

[Just Locus]

Games need structure, they need story and they need permanent, well-defined limitations. The Zelda series had it's own style, and all of that was jettisoned for a Ubislop formula done better in other games.

I'm sorry but I want my series to be expanded and experiment with risks.

Imagining a Zelda series that was all just a mechanical retread of OoT or LTTP sounds like a bleak one to me. There are expectations a typical player will have when getting a Zelda game (Swordplay, Dungeons, Exploration, Puzzles/Puzzle-solving), and all BotW does is prioritize the exploration aspect, as opposed to balancing between all of the four (even then, the older games nail some of these aspects better than others) - If you told me pre-BotW that Nintendo was developing a Zelda game centered around Dungeon-crawling instead, I would've been ecstatic.

The main positive of the Zelda series (and Nintendo games in general) is that while these aforementioned expectations will always be present—There'll always be equal amounts of "new" things to keep a veteran player engaged while making sure a beginner understands the ropes properly. The main issue I have with TP is that it retreads too many things narratively and mechanically from Ocarina of Time, and the few things it nails, are ultimately underdeveloped. Besides, all of this is null and void since BotW isn't going to be the template moving forward if Echoes of Wisdom is anything to go by, an "open world" game in the style of LTTP which I would say is nailed quite well, and it also prioritizes puzzle-solving more than exploration even if both are present.

 

[JC'sBarber]

Games need structure, they need story and they need permanent, well-defined limitations. The Zelda series had it's own style, and all of that was jettisoned for a Ubislop formula done better in other games.

I'm sorry but I want my series to be expanded and experiment with risks.

Imagining a Zelda series that was all just a mechanical retread of OoT or LTTP sounds like a bleak one to me. There are expectations a typical player will have when getting a Zelda game (Swordplay, Dungeons, Exploration, Puzzles/Puzzle-solving), and all BotW does is prioritize the exploration aspect, as opposed to balancing between all of the four (even then, the older games nail some of these aspects better than others) - If you told me pre-BotW that Nintendo was developing a Zelda game centered around Dungeon-crawling instead, I would've been ecstatic.

The main positive of the Zelda series (and Nintendo games in general) is that while these aforementioned expectations will always be present—There'll always be equal amounts of "new" things to keep a veteran player engaged while making sure a beginner understands the ropes properly. The main issue I have with TP is that it retreads too many things narratively and mechanically from Ocarina of Time, and the few things it nails, are ultimately underdeveloped. Besides, all of this is null and void since BotW isn't going to be the template moving forward if Echoes of Wisdom is anything to go by, an "open world" game in the style of LTTP which I would say is nailed quite well, and it also prioritizes puzzle-solving more than exploration even if both are present.

So many games retread the same ideas with every installment, yet none of it matters in the long run. Call of Duty is the most infamous example of this, but most games can be considered iterations of earlier ones. You can trace FPS game design back to the original Doom for instance, and Nintendo themselves have many franchises that iterate on the same idea. New Super Mario Bros is the most infamous example. What I'm saying is, we haven't seen a traditional 3D Zelda game since 2006, it is hardly an oversaturated genre and there aren't even any indie games that could be considered spiritual successors to 3D Zelda. It's for all intents and purposes, a defunct genre with a niche that hasn't been catered to in nearly 20 years.

Experimentation is great, of course it is. Without it we would've never had these classic games to begin with. But there is a time and a place for it, and what the Zelda team is doing is damaging to the brand in the long-term. At the very least they could give older fans what they want by creating a 2nd or 3rd pillar of games that have the classic formula.

 

[pakoito]

Besides, all of this is null and void since BotW isn't going to be the template moving forward if Echoes of Wisdom is anything to go by, an "open world" game in the style of LTTP which I would say is nailed quite well, and it also prioritizes puzzle-solving more than exploration even if both are present.

Same as with Mario or Pokemon, the Zelda franchise has mainline games and "yearly" releases. For every Odyssey there is a 3D World, Mario & Luigi, Paper Mario or similar released EVERY. FUCKING. YEAR. They get rated a 7 or 8 and everyone forgets about them as soon as the new version comes out. For every OoT, TP, Skylight or BOTW there is a Four Swords, Phantom Tracks, Crossbow Training, Freshly-Picked Tingle's Rosy Rupeeland, A Link Between Worlds, Hyrule Warriors or re-release of an older game. None of these games influence much the way the next game in the main console is or looks like.