I was finally able to obtain the 4-Zelda “collector’s” game pack for GameCube. This includes all the important, non-gameboy Zelda’s except Windwaker. Quite a trip to see the original Zelda now, when the battery must have died on that gold cartridge back in 1993.
Anyhow - now that the “important” Zelda’s are all somewhat available - and as we wait for Wind Waker II - here’s where they stand for me:
Zelda: Well, it was the first. It raised the bar for games of its kind, and it has been surpassed long ago. Playing it now, it was a surprise how hard survival is outside the dungeons. It has more of an old-school video game quality - a continuous onset of things trying to kill you. The octorocs and the dudes with spears aren’t as much as a bother later in the game, but since you do start out very weak…
Zelda II: The hardest. Not really tops in the way of puzzles and discovery, but the combat is brutal and relentless. One of the things that makes this one hard: nobody drops any health points when you kill them.
<skipping a number of Gameboy items, plus a SNES Zelda that I understand did exist but if we haven’t played them by now, unlikely we ever will>
Ocarina of Time: The best. The final boss battle is the most dramatic in a Zelda series, we get to know the characters better, and as a grownup the idea of being able to become a kid at will isn’t without its appeal. I’ve got nothing bad to say about this one. Survival becomes much less of an issue between dungeons, as we’re no longer in a purely hostile world. So you live a bit longer, even though there are more than enough tough sticking points. And by the way, I want to retire in the Gerudo desert.
Majora’s Mask: The weirdest. This is the only one that I’ll mention that I haven’t beat yet. Forget for a moment the rather alien game-save system, somewhat necessitated by the time travel element. Also forget about the somewhat illogical way you can take some things with you into the past, but not others. Very few of the familiar elements are here - the only enemies I recognize so far are the bats and octorocs (those shadow-pillar things in the first temple give me the creeps). NO BOOMERANG. That looming moon is genuinely disarming; this is a Zelda for people with a dark streak. Playing this, I wonder what they were smoking over at Nintendo. Which is not to say that I don’t like Majora’s Mask; quite the opposite.
Wind Waker: The easiest. Also the smallest step forward (and in a way, a step backward). I’ll admit, it’s technically outstanding in terms of graphics, animation, etc. But chalk me up as one who doesn’t care much for the cell shading. And there’s not a whole lot of innovation in gameplay beyond OOT. The greatest weakness, though, is that long stretch of time you have to spend dredging up tri-force bits (and this is only after you’ve sailed the seven seas looking for 8 maps that you have to pay somebody else to read for you). And the final boss battle’s an anti-climax. And who here hasn’t been able to get through it without dying even once? Even I could do that.
But I do love that fish that says “Shmae?” And somebody on their team has been reading their Joseph Campbell.
For the next: They can’t call it Wind Waker 2 in final release. People would then call it WWII on message boards, which strikes me as some sort of violation of, well, a sacred memory (Zelda’s just good, but it isn’t a defining moment in history). I hope it doesn’t involve sailing, but I hope it keeps up the trend for greater expansiveness. It’s gonna be cell-shaded again, ok. Let’s hope Link looks a little older, I can’t take a five-year-old with a sword seriously as a hero. I’m hoping that this will be more than another iteration of OOT, even though that’s a tall order for something to be released only about 20 months after Wind Waker. And finally, since I’m not the only grown-up in the audience (I’m not, am I?), I hope they follow the trend of increasing thematic maturity.
I lucked up and got two of them.
Just try calling around maybe.