Whither Link?
October 29th, 2007N’Gai Croal sends word* of a recent conversation he had with Stephen Totilo on the subject of Phantom Hourglass. Interestingly enough, neither of them were particularly taken with the game, which surprised me considerably considering how much I was enjoying it.
Their complaints seem to be somewhat distinct. Croal will no doubt shock many by noting that he’s never actually played a Zelda game before PH, with the exception of some early tests on Twilight Princess. During his play-through, Croal found himself enjoying the controls a lot, but says that he “admires” PH more than he really enjoys playing it: the difference is attributed to the fact that he prefers linear games, rather than those that require exploration, backtracking, and all the other core elements of a Zelda title. In other words, God of War is more up his alley than Zelda.
Totilo, on the other hand, has played every game in the mainstream series. His concern is that this Zelda just doesn’t measure up to its predecessors: it tries to be too many things to too many people, and eventually can’t please anyone. As evidence, he cites the appearance of typical Zelda paraphernalia, such as items/dungeons/bossets, but also the introduction of more complex puzzles, the “dumbing-down” of core mechanics such as bombable wall location, bad rolling, and so on. In short, he says, PH spent too much time refining previous mechanics (sometimes, poorly) and not enough time venturing wholeheartedly into new areas.
My reaction to both critiques is mixed, but I find myself agreeing more with Totilo than Croal. This is because latter’s criticism is essentially non-responsive: it’s difficult to debate the merits of a title whose fundamental design doesn’t interest you. (This is of course not to say that disliking the Zelda blueprint makes you a bad gamer, by any means. But it does mean that even a “perfect” iteration of the series wouldn’t impress you very much.) I do think Totilo might be onto something, though.
Part of my earlier speculation around the essence of a Zelda game hinged on the implicit assumption that Zelda games were getting too layered with extraneous stuff - too many things stuffed in just to signify the fact that yes, you are now playing the next Zelda game. But there’s another side to this argument. PH felt, too a certain extent, like a Lite version of a Zelda title. The new controls provided an interesting twist on these older mechanics, and I enjoyed another opportunity to venture into the Wind Waker world. But push come to shove, there wasn’t that much that was truly new, and for all the interesting little innovations, the game took steps backward in difficulty, world size, and side quest opportunities. When I compare it to Link’s Awakening - possibly my second favorite title in the franchise - there’s not much of a contest. The latter title felt enormous, challenging, and eminently satisfying. PH felt like an interesting diversion into a familiar world.
What then is the solution? Totilo argues that Nintendo has felt too compelled to churn out new entrants in the series in order to satisfy demand for core Nintendo franchises. This may in fact be part of the issue. But it’s fairly rare for a single platform to receive more than one truly new Zelda game… the 64 had Ocarina (Majora’s Mask was more of a spin-off than a true sequel), Gamecube had Twilight Princess, the DS gets Phantom Hourglass. The games just don’t come out all that frequently. I would suggest that rather than too much supply, Nintendo just needs to divorce itself from its commitment to Zelda continuity. Trying to cram everything from older games in, regardless of their quality, makes Zelda titles strain at the seams, and older ideas crowd out innovative new alternatives due… they act as creative crutches. If Tingle doesn’t need to be in the next game, leave him out. If Gorons aren’t natural fits in the world, omit them. If you can’t do something interesting with an old item - and single-shot gimmick uses don’t count, even for bread-and-butter items like the bow and arrow - don’t give it to Link.
Finally, I’ll end by noting that this doesn’t mean killing Zelda games, nor completely reinventing them. While handheld games without Ganon are fine, I do not want to see a main Zelda game without Ganon, Link, Zelda, and some form of Triforce. These are core, non-negotiable elements of the series to me, and if you can’t think of a new twist on them, you’re not thinking hard enough. But that doesn’t mean that Ganon always needs to be some form of a thief named Ganondorf from here on out. Again, use that creativity.
* N’Gai Croal has recently started including us on e-mail updates of his recent posts. This is a service that I find helpful enough in pointing out stories that I may have missed to forgive myself for taking part in what is obviously a pretty good PR strategy. I’m joking, but I have to confess at least a little discomfort with the notion that we’re being co-opted by the game journalism machine, even though we’re still a pretty small site. Fortunately, most of the links N’Gai sends tend to be pretty interesting, so it’s easy to forgive ourselves.
Posted in DS, Geoff, Journalism, Nintendo |
October 29th, 2007 at 5:25 pm
Don’t give in to the forces of PR, Geoff! And thanks for agreeing with me more than you did with N’Gai. That’s the kind of reinforcement I need to get through my day.
And, seriously, thank you for reading the exchange and putting so much thought into your post.
Lastly, I’ll second you on something: Gorons are NOT essential.
-Stephen
October 29th, 2007 at 6:28 pm
I found PH refreshing mostly because it lacked so much of the chaff that the series has accumulated since the SNES days. I would love to see a new game in the vein of A Link to the Past, but for the time being, if it’s going to be Twilight Princess or Phantom Hourglass, I’ll take Phantom Hourglass.
I’m sure I’ve said this before, but for some reason the jump to 3D brought with it all kinds of other nonsense that I felt was to the detriment of the series. Gorons are one, and indicative of a bizarre need to have everything fall neatly “into place” — if they were going to make the Zora into a race that you could talk to and interact with, they had to also add another race so that there would be a nice, neat set of three. But more importantly, it brought interminable dialogue full of terribly contrived drivel, inexplicable giggling characters and all sorts of pretension — and you can’t skip any of it.
That’s why I was glad to see Phantom Hourglass get back to basics, even if it does feel “lite” in comparison. I haven’t given up hope for a “proper” 2D sequel, and I think PH is a step in the right direction.
October 29th, 2007 at 9:45 pm
A few minor points of disagreement:
1. Majora Mask is NOT a spinoff, it is a sequel. Not only that, it is the most refreshing, atmospheric and also the GREATEST of all 3d zelda. This fact is one handed down by the word of God him/her/itself.
2. “Croal will no doubt shock many by noting that he’s never actually played a Zelda game before PH” WAIT WAT!!!!!!!!!!
3. “I do not want to see a main Zelda game without Ganon, Link, Zelda, and some form of Triforce.” Strong disagreement here. Don’t let Zelda fanboyism get you. We have to admit here: Ganon and Triforce, even Zelda are all getting long in the tooth, tiresome.
Just look at mario, which is my favorite series of all time: they tried various quirks and innovations, some failed and some worked [the FLUDD was damn awesome, you fools!!!] but in the end, the series always felt different each time.
My point is, what makes a game “Zelda” or “Mario” is nothing but narrowminded fanboy goggles crowding your vision. How about we get rid of Zelda - if only for temporarily, what’s wrong with that? ANswer: Nothing.
4. I’ve said this many times and I’ll say it here again: Link’s Awakening, while a damn good game, and a fine accomplishment given the hardware limits, is still OVERRATED. It was like Link to the Past Lite [FYI: Lttp is the greatest Zelda or at least the greatest 2d Zelda, a fact acknowledged through the annals of time by God him/her/itself.]It was a ripoff of Lttp, and the NES-graphics-on-tiny screen with 4 channels of 8bit sound destroyed by enjoyment of the series. ALso, the A+B button control, while innovative, is clumsy as hell.
To summarize: Majora Mask is the greatest 3d zelda, Lttp is the greatest 2d zelda. Seriously, check the bible or koran or whatever, it’s clearly written there.
October 29th, 2007 at 10:06 pm
Stephen - thanks for the kind words!
Rob - I don’t know that getting back to basics is a bad thing, but I wouldn’t throw the baby out with the bathwater, either. I think New Super Mario Bros. might be a good analogy here. As much as I loved it, it rejected almost all subsequent innovations in the series, good and bad alike. Sure, I didn’t have to worry about a crappy frog suit; but neither did I get to enjoy something great like the cape, either. Basically, my argument: cutting fat good, cutting flesh, bad but not infrequent side effect.
Laesperanzapaz: I’ll give you Majora’s Mask as a sequel, but I don’t know if it really makes much of a difference to my argument. I still am not willing to concede #3, though… at a certain point, Zelda games do need to have something that makes them Zelda games, and cutting out the title character strikes me as one step over that line. I don’t think we’re disagreeing that much on #4 though - I said second favorite (behind Link to the Past), so if you put it third or fourth we still think pretty highly of it.
October 30th, 2007 at 10:04 am
Interesting to see NSMB enter the discussion. I began to flesh out some ideas in the comments section on my site and will probably turn it into a full post.
Basically, what I’m realizing is that the 2D “Mario” games feel distinct from the 3D ones in terms of pacing, linear vs. open design and even the frequency of enemy encounters. The 2D and 3D “Zelda”s, for better or worse, feel and play much more similarly to each other. And that, I think, is contributing to my and other gamers’ sense of “Zelda”-fatigue.
October 30th, 2007 at 7:34 pm
@stephen:
Great minds think alike!
This is also why there are ‘mario 2d fans’ and ‘mario 2d + 3d fans’….
I fall in the latter categories, but the point is, the two categories are so different, that a] some people can only play the 2d games and not the 3d games, mostly casual people, and b] it elicits [in my opinion, rather narrowminded-yet-obvious] complaints that mario 3d ‘lost’ the mario 2d feel [duh!].
So how about the next zelda, we kill off the princess, rid of Ganon, and leave Link into Young Link with a cool array of swords and LITTLE TO NO PERIPHERAL ITEMS - cool idea, yes?