What's the best Zelda game then?

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In honour of the stupid amount of time I'm devoting to Minish Cap at the minute, what is everybody's favourite Zelda game?

Greig (treefell), Tuesday, 1 November 2005 14:48 (eighteen years ago) link

My choice would probably have to be A Link to the Past, but Ocarina of Time, Minish Cap and Wind Waker all push it really hard.

Greig (treefell), Tuesday, 1 November 2005 14:50 (eighteen years ago) link

I'm going to be predictable and say Ocarina. With a Link to the Past coming a close second.

Ste (Fuzzy), Tuesday, 1 November 2005 14:57 (eighteen years ago) link

A Link to the Past, today. I love how you can switch between the worlds to solve the puzzles. But on some days I prefer the original Zelda because ALTTP has lots of dumb dialogue you have to sit through.

älänbänänä (alanbanana), Tuesday, 1 November 2005 15:00 (eighteen years ago) link

Mask of Majora is under-rated if you ask me. we had a TS thread ages ago on ILE for the N64 games i think...

oo, here Taking Sides: Zelda, Ocarina of Time or Zelda, Majora's Mask?

Britain's Obtusest Shepherd (Alan), Tuesday, 1 November 2005 15:15 (eighteen years ago) link

I feel almost like the original Zelda and Wind Waker are apples and oranges. Wind Waker was so fucking enchanting, gorgeous, full of good puzzles. Couldn't stand the map navigation. But I found myself waking up early mornings before work to get in a half an hour of gameplay before the grind began.

But it's hard to beat what Zelda the first was at the time. For its context, and in its time and place, it was the best and it doesn't seem fair to ask it to stand up to the later Zelda games.

Ocarina was fun, but I do not worship it as others seem to.

Laura H. (laurah), Tuesday, 1 November 2005 17:13 (eighteen years ago) link

Ocarina never "clicked" with me but it was also the last one I played, annoyingly. Probably LTTP, but honourable mention to the original "Link's Awakening" GB one because that was pretty great too.

Michael A Neuman (Ferg), Tuesday, 1 November 2005 18:09 (eighteen years ago) link

Ocarina then Link to the past. Windwaker is the only zelda i've ever given up on. I think ocarina was just so much tighter than the windwaker tho i'm not really sure what i mean by tighter apart from the fact that ocarina's map is about 1/100th of the size of windwakers but feels like there's just as much to do.

Ocarina's dungeons were better as well, Edge review said something like ocarina's dungeons are more holisitic and you need to think abt how an action in one room would affect the whole dungeon whereas windwakes dungeons were more abt just single-room puzzles. I read that review before i actually played windwaker so it probably clouded/informed my opinion but it seems to be partly true.

I bought minish cap a couple of weeks ago but advance wars DS has kept me away from it.

jeffrey (johnson), Tuesday, 1 November 2005 18:23 (eighteen years ago) link

I'm all for Majora.

the pr00de abides (pr00de), Tuesday, 1 November 2005 18:26 (eighteen years ago) link

LTTP and Ocarina. LTTP was much for depth, Ocarina for immersiveness.

kingfish orange creamsicle (kingfish 2.0), Tuesday, 1 November 2005 19:24 (eighteen years ago) link

Zelda 2 is massively underrated.

Alex in Novosibirsk (ex machina), Tuesday, 1 November 2005 20:20 (eighteen years ago) link

Did anyone else feel like Ocarina was just... too dark? Literally? It was kind of visually depressing sometimes.

Laura H. (laurah), Tuesday, 1 November 2005 20:37 (eighteen years ago) link

Yes!! I never got very far because it literally drove me to tears every time I played it. It's like some post-apocalyptic nightmare, where only a few people, elves and monsters have survived and are in denial that anything ever happened.

melton mowbray (adr), Wednesday, 2 November 2005 01:54 (eighteen years ago) link

I heart you because you are the first person to ever agree with me about this and I feel it strongly.

Laura H. (laurah), Wednesday, 2 November 2005 02:09 (eighteen years ago) link

I didn't feel that Ocarina was too depressing but it is the best videogame I've ever played because it is so moving and so sad. I could break it down to things like "Time will ravage us all but it is the only tool we have" but this does the game no justice -- it "earns" its emotional punch in strange and wonderful ways.

Majora's Mask was very interesting and I didn't get very far in it before I needed to put it down. But I will try it again later. Wind Waker had some nice bits to it but it felt very paint-by-numbers, theme-wise.

Original Zelda is still completely great, especially since it was one of the few games I finished as a kid.

Casuistry (Chris P), Wednesday, 2 November 2005 05:17 (eighteen years ago) link

All you haterz just LOVED the monster dance when you played that dumb happy song, didn't you? DIDN'T YOU?

kingfish orange creamsicle (kingfish 2.0), Wednesday, 2 November 2005 05:36 (eighteen years ago) link

the gorons, that's what they were called, i remember now.

kingfish orange creamsicle (kingfish 2.0), Wednesday, 2 November 2005 07:04 (eighteen years ago) link

LINKS AWAKENING BITCHEZ

lemin (lemin), Wednesday, 2 November 2005 07:16 (eighteen years ago) link

"ocarina of time" is still my favourite game ever... one of the few games I can remember the first time I played it and one of the few I've ever 100%ed... it was such a complete experience and the type of which I'd never had from a video game before (I don't play many RPGs remember)... yeah the innovations are cool but those would all have been useless had they not been so seamless and complete... that's the word for me, complete... as ever the game was an aggregate of its moments: the feeling of finally weilding the goron sword; the sunset and sunrise; epona; z-targeting; saria's song; the goron voice; the MGS-lite gerudo fortress... I mean I can go on and on but I'd just be listing things you already know and would eventually list the entire game... it's the first game I can remember, as I peaked over the threshold of being conscious of my surroundings (it came out what? when I was just heading into my teens, so it caught me on the brink of childhood and the creation of my adolescence... which somehow forged it in my memory, some "loss and birth" nonsense)... it's just a shame that it came out on the N64 and we're forever destined to try and reawake those fond memories by playing that sludgy heap

c7n (Cozen), Wednesday, 2 November 2005 10:14 (eighteen years ago) link

"conscious of my surroundings" in that way of david thomson's where we all write our own histories and memories... I wasn't subconscious until I was 14.. well, not strictly

c7n (Cozen), Wednesday, 2 November 2005 10:17 (eighteen years ago) link

...and melton's description of the game, which I'm not sure is entirely otm, makes it even SOUND like the best thing ever

c7n (Cozen), Wednesday, 2 November 2005 10:18 (eighteen years ago) link

I have to be predictable and say Ocarina too. It was the one that enchanted me most, perhaps just because of the time it came out relative to me. It completely engrossed me for a heck of a long time, and I still go back to it every now and then and love it because playing seems like reliving a great dream.
The Zelda's on GBA/DS etc were all throgoughly enjoyable, especially Oracle of Ages/Seasons, but they always just felt like "fillers" in the gaps while I waited for the next "Real" Zelda game. So I probably didn't really give them the attention they needed to really suck me in, which I'm almost certain they would have had I played them before Ocarina.

Craig Gilchrist (Craig Gilchrist), Wednesday, 2 November 2005 13:11 (eighteen years ago) link

A Link to the Past.

Link's Awakening drives me batty because I always wind up just goofing around with the map warp trick.

Curt1s St3ph3ns, Wednesday, 2 November 2005 22:50 (eighteen years ago) link

Zelda games are all so depressing!

Curt1s St3ph3ns, Wednesday, 2 November 2005 22:52 (eighteen years ago) link

Even Wind Waker? You have to see the world through crap-colored glasses to be depressed by that.

Laura H. (laurah), Wednesday, 2 November 2005 22:56 (eighteen years ago) link

it's just a shame that it came out on the N64 and we're forever destined to try and reawake those fond memories by playing that sludgy heap

Was it included on that GC comp of eight trillion Zelda games?

Jordan (Jordan), Wednesday, 2 November 2005 23:01 (eighteen years ago) link

haha, actually I haven't played Wind Waker. I've only played up through Ocarina.

Curt1s St3ph3ns, Wednesday, 2 November 2005 23:11 (eighteen years ago) link

Wasn't there a jazzed-up version of Ocarina released for the GC early on?

antexit (antexit), Wednesday, 2 November 2005 23:13 (eighteen years ago) link

That's what I'm talking about...it looks like it was available only as a promo and included O.G. Zelda, Zelda II, and the N64 games. One of my friends has it (did it really not include Link to the Past?).

Jordan (Jordan), Wednesday, 2 November 2005 23:22 (eighteen years ago) link

Wow, that sounds like a real life-destroyer of a disc. I remember this thing being on the market, though. Hey, what news of the new Zelda, anyone? Is there a solid release date on it?

antexit (antexit), Wednesday, 2 November 2005 23:33 (eighteen years ago) link

Not before April 2006.

Laura H. (laurah), Thursday, 3 November 2005 00:25 (eighteen years ago) link

What the fucking fuck is that?

antexit (antexit), Thursday, 3 November 2005 00:29 (eighteen years ago) link

It did not include Link to the Past -- that's the disc I played Ocarina on. There's also the Ocarina "Master Game" thing that's out on GameCube.

Wind Waker was so much about being chugged along to your inevitable and easy-to-accomplish destiny that it couldn't possibly have felt upsetting.

Casuistry (Chris P), Thursday, 3 November 2005 00:46 (eighteen years ago) link

didn't include a link to the past because zelda: four swords was still a relatively live title for the GBA at that time and nintendo didn't want to mess w.its revenue stream... also the version of ocarina is weird, because it's not actually ported to GC cube but actually played on nintendo-coded emulators... it doesn't have lens flare when you look at the sun (!) and some of the music is glitchy... not to mention the controls just feel wrong... I keep looking to control the camera with the c-stick but nothing doing... did original ocarina have camera control?

radio pyongyang and the pytlik sisters (Cozen), Thursday, 3 November 2005 06:17 (eighteen years ago) link

no full camera control (except first person mode) but i think you could turn it in a circle (D-pad??) and reset it to the default following position quickly

Britain's Obtusest Shepherd (Alan), Thursday, 3 November 2005 12:13 (eighteen years ago) link

I've heard about this music being glitchy, but I didn't ever notice it playing. The controls felt fine, but I never played it on the N64, so I had nothing to compare it to.

Casuistry (Chris P), Thursday, 3 November 2005 15:36 (eighteen years ago) link

I don't know if I could deal with a 3D game without camera control in this day and age. Is it less annoying than it sounds?

antexit (antexit), Thursday, 3 November 2005 16:28 (eighteen years ago) link

Even Wind Waker? You have to see the world through crap-colored glasses to be depressed by that.

??? The eventual fate of 95% of Hyrule isn't incredibly depressing?

Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Thursday, 3 November 2005 17:45 (eighteen years ago) link

Well, you must admit, it's well rationalized at the end.

Casuistry (Chris P), Friday, 4 November 2005 02:36 (eighteen years ago) link

Any game when your best friend is a talking boat ain't depressing.

kingfish orange creamsicle (kingfish 2.0), Friday, 4 November 2005 18:33 (eighteen years ago) link

Also: any game where you're a little boy who plays songs with his magic baton and has eyes a third the size of his head ain't depressing.

http://www.dailygame.net/Articles/media/screens/zeldaww/zeldaww3.jpg

Laura H. (laurah), Friday, 4 November 2005 20:09 (eighteen years ago) link

OTMX2

Alex in Novosibirsk (ex machina), Friday, 4 November 2005 20:17 (eighteen years ago) link

one month passes...
http://www.progressiveboink.com/archive/hyspace/

Laura H. (laurah), Monday, 5 December 2005 00:39 (eighteen years ago) link

ocarina 4eva. i hated wind waker.

cutty (mcutt), Monday, 5 December 2005 01:06 (eighteen years ago) link

i want a zelda for the DS RIGHT NOW. NOW.

s1ocki (slutsky), Monday, 5 December 2005 04:39 (eighteen years ago) link

Hearing of F. Scott Fitzgerald's wife Zelda, Mr. Miyamoto thought the name sounded pleasant and significant. Paying tribute, he chose to name the Princess after her, and titled his creation The Legend of Zelda, even though she is not the main protagonist.

OMG

s1ocki (slutsky), Monday, 5 December 2005 18:17 (eighteen years ago) link

I've only played the first two NES Zeldas, Link to the Past, and Minish Cap, and of those only beaten LttP. I guess that's my favorite.

Jordan (Jordan), Monday, 5 December 2005 18:44 (eighteen years ago) link

“Superheroes are one of the central myths of the twentieth century,” Whedon says. “People in comics knew this so long ago, they completely deconstructed the superhero and built it up again.”

Keep the juices flowing by jangling around gentleee as you move (Leee), Monday, 5 December 2005 19:23 (eighteen years ago) link

four months pass...
i'm playing wind waker right now. it is awesome. i never played all of ocarina cuz i never had a 64 but... this is kind of all i want from video games.

s1ocki (slutsky), Sunday, 23 April 2006 06:37 (eighteen years ago) link

(i'm guessing that last post from leee was meant for another thread)

s1ocki (slutsky), Sunday, 23 April 2006 06:37 (eighteen years ago) link

of course the correct answer is:

LEGEND OF ZELDA: THE PHANTOM HOURGLASS

...

forthcoming on DS, with wind waker-style visuals (!!!)

cozen (Cozen), Sunday, 30 April 2006 09:12 (seventeen years ago) link

... also replete with sailing

cozen (Cozen), Sunday, 30 April 2006 09:14 (seventeen years ago) link

WHY DOES IT SOUND LIKE A HARRY POTTER BOOK.

Curt1s St3ph3ns, Sunday, 30 April 2006 15:35 (seventeen years ago) link

Curt1s OTFM

melton mowbray's APOCALYPTO! (adr), Sunday, 30 April 2006 16:11 (seventeen years ago) link

Links Awakening is the one on the Gameboy yeah? That's my favourite.

Ronan (Ronan), Sunday, 30 April 2006 20:01 (seventeen years ago) link

Funniest thing evar: playing Super Smash Bros Melee, on the wildcard level (or whatever its called) and selecting as your 2 characters for fite: Link and Zelda.

Proceed to have Link beat the crap out of Zelda: "send ME all around Hyrule slaying monsters because you're always getting kidnapped and locked in dungeons! I'll show YOU who the beeyatch is!" *smack kick bash slash etc etc*

Oh, we did laugh.

Trayce (trayce), Sunday, 30 April 2006 23:09 (seventeen years ago) link

You are a huge loser.

JW (ex machina), Monday, 1 May 2006 00:49 (seventeen years ago) link

Coming from you, that is a compliment! Cheers! :D

Trayce (trayce), Monday, 1 May 2006 04:48 (seventeen years ago) link

PS get one sense of joek.

Trayce (trayce), Monday, 1 May 2006 04:49 (seventeen years ago) link

http://stout.hampshire.edu/~bjk02/princess/

JW (ex machina), Monday, 1 May 2006 04:58 (seventeen years ago) link

you guys are TOTALLY long-lost brother and sister.

s1ocki (slutsky), Monday, 1 May 2006 05:15 (seventeen years ago) link

OMG shutup! :0

Trayce (trayce), Monday, 1 May 2006 05:42 (seventeen years ago) link

as the pirate girl she saves yr ass two-three times, then she's revealed to be zelda, it's taken for granted that she's to be left LOCKED UNDER THE SEA while you go off and have adventures, then gets kidnapped? kinda lame.

x posts bcz i don't check this board v often oops.

tom west (thomp), Tuesday, 2 May 2006 01:28 (seventeen years ago) link

When's the last time you were saved by a princess? OTOH, I can't count how often I've been saved by lady pirates.

c(''c) (Leee), Tuesday, 2 May 2006 02:48 (seventeen years ago) link

two years pass...

Zelda 2 is massively underrated.

― Alex in Novosibirsk (ex machina), Tuesday, November 1, 2005 3:20 PM (2 years ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

^^^ this dude knows what's up

******* (Lamp), Wednesday, 8 October 2008 18:43 (fifteen years ago) link

replayed the first three zeldas this weekend and link to the past is apparently ingrained in my muscle memory now!? total cliche to bemoan remembering where all the keys in the misery mire are but then not remember w/e relevant to yr actual life but, still, true. kind of robbed the game of any feeling of real accomplishment like a doing a crossword puzzle with the answer key in front of you.

zelda 2 rpg elements are clever w/o being too much of a concession to what is a challenging action game. pretty genious level design too.

******* (Lamp), Wednesday, 8 October 2008 18:55 (fifteen years ago) link

I loved having to search the map for hidden p-bags etc -- broke the tedium of level grinding

Kramkoob (Catsupppppppppppppp dude 茄蕃), Wednesday, 8 October 2008 19:40 (fifteen years ago) link

I'm playing through Zelda on the wii. Excellent game so far and I'm a little more than halfway through.
The epicness of flute boy on the classic SNES zelda game has yet to be recreated. I was like damn, the poor kid turned to stone and is doomed to forever be stone. They don't make those kind of subplots anymore. I will always say SNES version is the best Zelda release but the Wii version is definitely worth checking out. It trumps the gamecube and n64 links imo. Well, it barely beats Ocarina of Time and I never played Majora's Mask, but the boss battles are much more fun now.

CaptainLorax, Wednesday, 8 October 2008 21:57 (fifteen years ago) link

five months pass...

So I got a DS lately, included phantom hourglass and i thought i'd opt for Minish Cap which i never played.

PH isn't great, has some nice ideas but the stylus to control the movement isn't doing it for me - especially if i want to move top left and so my hand obscures the screen!

MC on the other hand is a thing of beauty, my fave zelda has always been link to the past. how did i miss this one.

Ant Attack.. (Ste), Saturday, 21 March 2009 14:59 (fifteen years ago) link

Minish Cap is indeed awesome, and it broke my heart. I bought it at a Shanghai bootleg street market for like 3 dollars. I got pretty deep into the game, maybe 10 hours or so, and then it erased my saved game. I'm the kind of person who needs a 4-5 year cooling off period with a game after something like that happens, so I'm on schedule to purchase a legit copy of Minish Cap and play it again around 2010-11.

Agreed with Phantom Hourglass. It was pleasant enough, but not close to Link of the Past style gameplay.

I f'd up the word rear (Z S), Saturday, 21 March 2009 15:07 (fifteen years ago) link

link to the past rules - o.g. zelda is super mystical ultimately

ice cr?m, Saturday, 21 March 2009 15:08 (fifteen years ago) link

five months pass...

minish cap is so great

I think phantom hourglass would have been equally great, were dpad control allowed :(:(:(:(:(:(:(:(

cozwn, Saturday, 22 August 2009 18:41 (fourteen years ago) link

Zelda is the only reason, I bought a DS. I wish I could buy a wii so I could play Zelda on it, but I don't have a television.

Jacob Sanders, Saturday, 22 August 2009 19:12 (fourteen years ago) link

I actually really liked Phantom Hourglass - by the end, I was disappointed there wasn't more. Stylus input was weird, but I got used to it pretty quickly, and I liked the natural mapping/course sailing. That dungeon you had to keep revisiting was a wonderful idea, I hope they expand on it in the sequel.

Nhex, Saturday, 22 August 2009 20:51 (fourteen years ago) link

one year passes...

http://27.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_ljm7b9RKgG1qaw7zqo1_500.gif

ENBB, Sunday, 17 April 2011 02:26 (thirteen years ago) link

some kind of chocolate bar?

if you wanna gamble, take that shit to vegas (Ste), Sunday, 17 April 2011 08:59 (thirteen years ago) link

infinitely more excited for Link's Awakening on 3DS than Skyward Sword

the pussy/butthole addendum (jamescobo), Sunday, 17 April 2011 19:30 (thirteen years ago) link

Well yeah, 6% excited is technically infinitely more than 0% excited, so me too I guess.

JimD, Sunday, 17 April 2011 22:57 (thirteen years ago) link

Well yeah, 6% excited is technically infinitely more than 0% excited, so me too I guess.

no it's 6% more, not infinitely! :/ MATHPEDANTED

Alderaan Duran (Will M.), Tuesday, 19 April 2011 05:02 (thirteen years ago) link

ten months pass...

Lost my copy of minish cap ;_;

Lindsay NAGL (Trayce), Tuesday, 28 February 2012 03:04 (twelve years ago) link

And Phantom Hourglass ended up being kind of crap - those ENDLESS UNBEATABLE DUNGEONS omg.

Lindsay NAGL (Trayce), Tuesday, 28 February 2012 03:04 (twelve years ago) link

The evening breeze
Caressed the trees
Kennerly

sleepingbag, Tuesday, 28 February 2012 03:06 (twelve years ago) link

nerd bonerz

flagp∞st (dayo), Tuesday, 28 February 2012 03:19 (twelve years ago) link

when I'm president I'm going to make a law that goes as follows: all games shipped will be the legend of zelda: ocarina of time. what this means in practice: you and your game development company can work on your game for as long as you want, spend as much money as you want on it, draw those polygons and texture maps real fucking good. but when you send it to the game factory that presses the DVDs, the factory will instead press the legend of zelda: ocarina of time onto your DVD and that will ship to the store. vote for me 2016.

flagp∞st (dayo), Tuesday, 28 February 2012 03:21 (twelve years ago) link

I'm voting for you in 2012, the world needs this powerful message NOW

unlistenable in philly (underrated aerosmith bootlegs I have owned), Tuesday, 28 February 2012 03:30 (twelve years ago) link

five months pass...

I wd play this game
http://i.imgur.com/fG2zu.jpg

skrill xx (cozen), Friday, 24 August 2012 17:57 (eleven years ago) link

is skyward sword worthwhile? have been told that it has some of the best dungeons of any zelda game, but have also been told it doesn't match up to the other 3d ones in general

ciderpress, Friday, 24 August 2012 18:52 (eleven years ago) link

fwiw my favorite zelda games are link's awakening and majora's mask so i'm not necessarily looking for the same things out of a zelda game that all the LTTP&ocarina4ever people are

ciderpress, Friday, 24 August 2012 18:54 (eleven years ago) link

three years pass...

let's get it on:
ILX Plays: The Legend of Zelda for NES

Eugene Goostman (forksclovetofu), Tuesday, 1 December 2015 17:51 (eight years ago) link

one year passes...

Everyone familiar with Link to the Past should really give this a shot. It's loads of fun!

vt.alttp.run/randomizer

Basically, they've developed a way to generate roms (seeds) that randomly redistribute all of the progression items, and you have to figure out where to go based on what you have to work with. Having a complete knowledge of all chest and non-chest significant item locations is key to beating the seed. They also randomize the crystals and pendants, changing the order of the dungeons leading up to Ganon's tower. It's exciting to open mundane chests in Kakariko village with the possibility that you'll find the mirror or the hammer etc. There's a tournament right now in the community around these randomizers where people race the same seed and both have to figure out their route as they go. Gets pretty intense.

Evan, Monday, 16 October 2017 15:28 (six years ago) link

That's a url, by the way. Paste in your browser. Let me know if it doesn't make sense. I'm not a huge fan of the UI layout.

Evan, Monday, 16 October 2017 15:29 (six years ago) link

yeah randomizer hacks are all the rage right now for speedrun races, theres one for super metroid too

ciderpress, Monday, 16 October 2017 15:31 (six years ago) link

Sure is. I find the ALTTP one to be the most exciting, personally.

Evan, Monday, 16 October 2017 17:27 (six years ago) link

Damn I was sure this would excite someone. Assuming everyone's seen the post by now.

Evan, Tuesday, 17 October 2017 17:02 (six years ago) link

it sounds cool but honestly i kind of suck at zeldas in the first place, and then by "Having a complete knowledge of all chest and non-chest significant item locations is key to beating the seed" i knew it wasn't for me.

Karl Malone, Tuesday, 17 October 2017 17:05 (six years ago) link

Well OK true that makes it sound daunting. It's also misleading, because it's no different than any other Zelda game that requires you to explore thoroughly. Also if you get hopelessly stuck you can check the spoiler readout if you want, which is handy.

Evan, Tuesday, 17 October 2017 17:21 (six years ago) link

I replayed ATTP about a decade ago, got about 2/3rds of the way through and had no idea what to do or where to go (old school lack of hand-holding) and dropped it. I probably wouldn't fare well with this

Nhex, Wednesday, 18 October 2017 15:03 (six years ago) link

I watched a speed run with this hack, it was really exciting tbh

fgti, Wednesday, 18 October 2017 15:36 (six years ago) link

Well if anyone gave it a shot and needed a hand I'd be happy to help. Been a bit obsessed myself. Every seed is a fresh experience.

Evan, Wednesday, 18 October 2017 15:51 (six years ago) link


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