So…anyone else playing this game? I like the way the game handles on the Wii, with the nunchuck/wiimote combo; it’s very natural and intuitive. Fighting on horseback is also wicked cool.
I notice, though, that Link is right-handed in this version (Link has, IIRC, always been left-handed before.)
I don’t have this game yet, but regarding Link’s dominant hand, I recall reading that the developers pointed out that all the dungeons and such are mirrored so that the directions are opposite of those in the GameCube version, and Link’s hands have been mirrored as well.
I just finished it a couple days ago, although there are lots of things I still need to go back and finish. It’s a great game. The Wii control is excellent for the pointing interface, like with the bow & arrow. However I’m not a big fan of the control mechanic of swinging the remote to swing the sword.
The reason Link is a righty in this game is that Nintendo decided that things would feel wrong if players swing the remote in their right hand, but on-screen Link swings with his left. To accomplish this, they actually mirrored the entire game, so if you go back and play on the GameGube version everything is backwards to what you saw in the Wii.
I’ve got the GameCube release. Only played a few hours so far, so I’m still in the intro portion that’s pretty much on rails, but I’m looking forward to getting out into Hyrule and exploring. I’ve blocked out pretty much the whole weekend for Zelda time. 
I can confirm that Link is properly left-handed in the 'Cube version. The game was entirely designed for the 'Cube and only ported to the Wii late in development.
Well, now I’m going to have to get the Cube version as well, to play as the Real Link! 
I was fortunate enough to get a Wii and a copy of this game the day they came out, so I’ve beaten the game a couple of times. It’s the first Zelda game I’ve ever played, and I think it’s fantastic. The sword swinging interface took a little while to get used to, but the more I used it the more natural it became. I think Twilight Princess is a game that really demonstrates the capacity of the new control system. My favorite part was, of course, learning new secret moves for the sword. Some of them are just wicked cool.
If you haven’t played the earlier Zeldas, you might want to take a look at the Super Nintendo version that they just released on the virtual console. That one is an all-time classic. Of course it’s 3 generations of consoles old, but I’d definitely recommend it.
Combine that with the Zelda Collection disc for GameCube (Wii is backwards-compatible with GC discs, right?) and you’ll be all set!
Link hasn’t always been left handed. In the original games they just flipped the sprite depending on which way Link was facing so he’s always been ambidextrous to me.
Besides, for the most part each Zelda game stands alone. It’s not like the one in Twilight Princess is the same guy in any of the other Zelda games.
There are several websites devoted to exploring and analyzing the timeline of the Zelda universe (except the Phillips CD-I games – it’s generally agreed that these never happened). In any case, you’re right…there have been several different Links by this point.
The Wii remote control mechanism seems tacked on, as if you’re initiating button presses rather than making the character move directly. Pretty soon I found myself wishing that I could just press a button instead of waving the remotes around.
I dunno, this is my first Zelda apart from a brief foray into Ocarina of Time, which also failed to click with me, and I just don’t see what all the fuss is about. Collect object A to advance to task B. Then collect object C, and so on, all done through a very awkward control mechanism. Not just the Wii remote, the whole business of aligning the guy so that he’s in just the right spot to interact with the thing you’re interested in. Tiresome.
Yeah, I’ve already downloaded and started playing the original NES Legend of Zelda in just this way. Looks like I was really missing out, and have a lot to look forward to!
It’s pretty clear in the game that it’s set several hundred years after Ocarina of Time.
I don’t think continental shift works fast enough to move Death Mountain to the other side of Hyrule in a couple of hundred years. Plus there’s tons of other differences in culture, history, and geography that don’t mesh up. It may be a few hundred years after another hero existed but trying to fit the Zelda games together into a cohesive story doesn’t work. They weren’t designed that way and can’t be fit together without really stretching things.
Ambidexterous, maybe, but still with a left preference. He’s left-handed when facing north, south, or west, and only switch-hits when facing east. And in II, I don’t think the sprites are detailed enough to distinguish which hand is left or right, only which is above or below, so he could still have been a southpaw.
As for continental shift, etc., remember that Link and Zelda are elves, not human. Even if the games are set thousands of years apart, that doesn’t necessarily mean that they’re different characters. This would also account for why they haven’t gotten married yet: It’s just not that pressing a matter, and they’ve only just barely met (by elvish standards).
Elves? They have pointy ears, sure, but haven’t they always been Hylians?
I thought the terms were interchangable. 
There’s pointy ears but I never got the impression they were elves in the Tolkien sense.
And we’re still talking movement on the order of millions of years, not thousands. Hyrule in each game only superficially resembles Hyrule in the previous games. But leaving that aside, you’d almost have to double the number of adventures that have occurred to account for all the lost civilizations around that bare no resemblance to any of the modern civilizations in the other games other than the fact that they were rescued by a kid in a green tunic wielding the master sword. These civilizations would then have to conveniently have pretty much all of their traces wiped out, pretty much all of the traces of the civilization in the game wiped out, a third civilization get attacked by Ganon and wiped out leaving ruins behind, and then finally the civilization for the next game arise.
Or they’re just games which are built on similar themes but each stands alone. I think that’s the better option.
If you didn’t like Ocarina of Time, I think you should just admit that you aren’t a Zelda person and leave it at that.
I on the other hand loved the game, and will be starting my second round through soon. My one dissapointment is that you didn’t get anything for beating the game. Even just a new tunic would have made me happy.
I’m playing this currently - I’m at the beginning of what I suspect is the penultimate dungeon -
The temple of time, that is.
I find Zelda game dungeons to be excellent but extremely daunting tasks, so when I save at the beginning of one I have to overcome great trepidation to actually start playing again. I’ll get into it one day, maybe, if I have some moral support. I was badly traumatised by the Great Bay Temple from Majora’s Mask though - that’s going to take a while to get over.
I must admit that while I like the fact that the Wii version is in widescreen, I agree that the fighting controls seem rather tacked on (since, after all, they are tacked on due to popular demand at the last minute). It’s kind of regrettable really, but I look forward to what they do with the sword fighting controls on a version of Zelda designed for the Wii from the ground up. Not that swordplay in Zelda games has ever really been very good, but this seems like an opportunity to make things interesting.
Other than that though, I’m enjoying it. I’ve never been so fanatical about Zelda games as some people are - none of them are in my top five - but I still find them enjoyable and well worth playing. Also, I’m loving the art style for this one. The twilight world is even creepier than the aether areas of Metroid Prime 2 - and they were damn creepy.
Oh and about Link being an elf - one datum to the contrary is that when you’re a wolf and you call up Midna, the option says “Transform into Human”. I’m pretty sure they’re referred to as humans, pointy ears notwithstanding.
One last thing. My favourite insane comment I’ve seen about Twilight Princess on the whole internet: “It’s not a true Zelda game, because a heart container has five heart pieces instead of four.”