Video Games : The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess

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Rating: - Have I played this before?
Let me start by saying that my favorite Zelda game is a Link to the Past. It had a light world and a shadow world and a plot I could grasp.

Ocarina of time was a breakthrough. It introduced us to z-targeting and made believer out of me that 3D Zelda could work. I loved the puzzle solving elements, the use of light, fire, frost arrows. It felt like a Zelda game. Majoras mask was a continuation of what was before with many new twists to the gameplay and a compelling story. Also the masks were a hoot.

Wind Waker was quite controversial. I must admit I loved the idea of cel shading on paper, but when I saw video deoms it looked very "kiddie". Since it was still a Zelda game I bought it, and was pleasantly surprised. It was a great game, though it felt less Zelda than OoT or LTTP. I had fun with it and did many of the side quests. The shortcomings of WindWaker were the lack of dungeons with only 5 I can remember and rather long travel sequences.

Enter Twilight Princess. Nintendo heard the Zelda fan base...less "kiddie", more dungeons, less travel time, more action. So they took what was good from LttP, light and dark worlds, mixed in all of OoT. Basically that was it. This game felt like a graphic remake of OoT just without an Ocarina(use blade of grass here). Also Zora and Goron AGAIN!? No deku though, but could they add any new cool races to discover? And no those bird chicken mutant people don't count. Really they were Deku replacements that freaked me out! Also warping was a good idea. It made travel quicker, but it saddened me that I rarely used Epona.

The story of Tilight Princess was the usual fare; evil tries to destroy good, Zelda needs help, you find out that you main character Link is the long promised hero. Shockers! The game played fine and was mildly amusing. I began to force myself to play through it as it was just too bland. The wolf sequences were so unlike anything I wanted in a Zelda game that I began to loathe them. Each dungeon made use of only 1 or 2 weapons to solve all the puzzles. Now that I look back I remeber the weapons and not the main story for each dungeon.

OoT and WindWaker were superior games in story (more origin of the triforce telling), making the villian someone you genuinely wanted to erradicate, and reimagining Hyrule and its residents in fresh new ways not yet told. Really the Zelda series broke gorund in orginality with each new title. WindWaker was a grand experiement. But Twilight Princess was a safe bet and a boring one. It was way too similar to previous titles.

I hope Nintendo works in a new fresh angle for Link, and a story that actually hits some origins of the tri-force and why the triforce embodies itself in the physical forms of Link, Zelda, and Ganon. It has been many years with this franchise with little added depth to the basic triforce mythos. That is what I was hoping this would be like.

All in all the graphics were great for a GC title. The gameplay was responsive, the music was good (where was the overworld theme?), the story was boring with no real twists, the dungeon puzzles were linear and tedious.

I would rent this game before buying to see if it suits you. I had 35hrs in the game and was about to go to the final boss but I found that I didn't care at all. The story never sucked me in to kill this final foe and the staisfaction I would of gotten from it would of been slight.

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