Do You Have Any Unpopular Gaming Opinions?

[BogusMeatFactory]

Bah! The plot of link to the Past is save wise men. save princess, fight bad guy. There is no segue into your tasks. Heck there is even a map that tells you where to go there is that much hand holding.

No character is memorable. They do not have remotely the same mark as The Windmill guy, The Mask Vendor and yes, even Tingle.

If you don't think there are things to explore and find in 3d Zelda games, you didn't try to enjoy them.

[Reprise]

I am confused about the, "Linearity," of the 2d and 3d Zelda games. They all seem very linear to me, with side quests for heart pieces and the like along the way.

Also to add to the unpopular game opinions, A Link to the Past is average. I beat it last year and found it to be lower on my list of favorites due to its lack of story and characters. I really would to know why it is number 1 on most people's list with nostalgia taken out of the equation.

Bah! The plot of link to the Past is save wise men. save princess, fight bad guy. There is no segue into your tasks. Heck there is even a map that tells you where to go there is that much hand holding.

No character is memorable. They do not have remotely the same mark as The Windmill guy, The Mask Vendor and yes, even Tingle.

If you don't think there are things to explore and find in 3d Zelda games, you didn't try to enjoy them.

Yes, thank you!

[Sarge]

Memorable? Sure. Deep characters that really tell a story? Not really, unless you delve into crazy fanfiction territory.

Plus, the reason those guys stand out is that they're just... weird. It's easy to remember weird.

[Xeogred]

Zelda discussions are so crazy. Link to the Past is all about the atmosphere and serenity of exploring and being alone.

I only truly hate Phantom Hourglass, enough to be the only Zelda game I've started and did not want to finish. Never bothered with Spirit Tracks.

[marlowe221]

Bah! The plot of link to the Past is save wise men. save princess, fight bad guy. There is no segue into your tasks. Heck there is even a map that tells you where to go there is that much hand holding.

No character is memorable. They do not have remotely the same mark as The Windmill guy, The Mask Vendor and yes, even Tingle.

If you don't think there are things to explore and find in 3d Zelda games, you didn't try to enjoy them.

Oh, I tried to enjoy them. It's just that most of the later entries in the series put a LOT of obstacles in your way on the path to doing that.

You bring up the map in ALttP - sure, it tells you where the dungeons are. The Dark World dungeons are even numbered (though like I said, sequence breaking is SUPER easy in that game). But being hyper focused on the dungeons misses half the point of the earlier titles in the series. Meanwhile, in later games, the dungeons are designed to be the focus - and that's cool, but the series definitely changed and not all of us think it was for the better.

If you ask me the original title was a little TOO open-ended. I think ALttP struck the right balance. It gave you some direction, but you were free to explore the world, with comparatively few restrictions, as you went along.

Plot - Which Zelda games have the good plots again? Hell, the summary you gave of ALttP's plot could apply to half the games in the series if you change a noun here and there.

Plot is more important to some people than others, but either way I'm not sure the Zelda series is the place to scratch that itch at ANY point in its history.

[BogusMeatFactory]

Man, I don't think you give the 3d zelda games enough credit, but that is fine. I just feel like all the games are good and offer the same level of side activities and dungeons. You seem to think the 3d games are inherently inferior in ways that just aren't true. There are tons of secrets and side activities in all the zelda games. I don't know why you seem to think that it is more the case in A Link to the Past over others. That is just not true.

[marlowe221]

Man, I don't think you give the 3d zelda games enough credit, but that is fine. I just feel like all the games are good and offer the same level of side activities and dungeons. You seem to think the 3d games are inherently inferior in ways that just aren't true. There are tons of secrets and side activities in all the zelda games. I don't know why you seem to think that it is more the case in A Link to the Past over others. That is just not true.

Hey don't get me wrong - even the worst Zelda games are better than a LOT of other games. The series as a whole has earned the respect it carries in the gaming community, no doubt about it.

But I do think that, with a couple of exceptions, the series has generally gotten worse with each new release. Forget the whole 3D vs. 2D thing; that's just a function of the time the games were released and doesn't really affect my opinion of them much - it's just an easy way to refer to the later console games as a group. Hell, I love me some Skyrim and Oblivion and they are just as 3D as Skyward Sword or Twilight Princess.

What I have never understood is the crazy amount of praise that OoT gets; it just doesn't make sense to me. Even if you prefer the design and style of that game, which I have argued is very different from the games that came before it, didn't some of its sequels do it better in almost every way? How is Twilight Princess not a better game than OoT, for example? It's better designed, the story is lower on the nonsense scale, the controls are better (on the GCN version anyway...), the dungeons are more fun to explore...

But I don't ever seem to hear/read anyone claiming that TP is the "best video game of all time" the way a lot of people will talk about OoT. Why is that?

[Xeogred]

I disagree with Bogus on LTTP (we're talking about my favorite game of all time next to Super Metroid), but also disagree with marlowe's thoughts on the 3D entries.

But being hyper focused on the dungeons misses half the point of the earlier titles in the series. Meanwhile, in later games, the dungeons are designed to be the focus - and that's cool, but the series definitely changed and not all of us think it was for the better.

I'm not sure I follow here though, because I pose the exact opposite argument as to why I like OoT the most against the other 3D entries. If you count the Well, Ice Cave, and Ganon's Tower, OoT has somewhere around 11 dungeons. That's a lot and and showcases the game obviously has a huge focus on them. That's how I love it. The previous games were all about world exploration and the dungeons, they always had a ton of them. The progression of the previous games is a lot simpler and purely gameplay driven. You explore to find new dungeons to get through them to get to other dungeons.

Then there's Majora's Mask... with 4 dungeons. The game design takes a huge turn and is chalk full of triggered events, fetch quests, NPC quest lines, and more interaction, etc, these tropes basically stuck with the series from this point on. Even in Minish Cap and Phantom Hourglass, those didn't seem as purely gameplay driven (unrestricted, I generally have full control and am constantly in control, like Link's Awakening or the Capcom Oracle games). Outside of the stretched out Bigoron Sword quest in OoT, nothing else really comes to mind. You're free to just run around and keep moving forward through the story, dungeons, and new areas as you get new equipment. There are far more roadblocks in the later games. But thankfully Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword loaded up on the dungeons again and it's no surprise, those are some of my other favorites.

But it really comes down to pacing and I think OoT did it best, for the 3D ones.

But I don't ever seem to hear/read anyone claiming that TP is the "best video game of all time" the way a lot of people will talk about OoT. Why is that?

OoT has the strongest nostalgia goggles next to FF7 probably. But as I keep defending it, I've probably beaten it like 10 times and still standby my claim that it is my personal favorite of the 3D games, because it's closest to the older games in design (we'll have to agree to disagree)... it's a simple straightforward game and a case that, less is more.

Twilight Princess is incredible, but it's always been one of the dark horses. WW fans were pissed because of the return to a darker and more serious look and take out the Wolf stuff and you could argue it's very formulaic.... which the same can be said for OoT which feels like 3D LTTP basically. I'm not complaining here and can play Zelda following the same blueprints forever (once saw people say it's like all cultures have their own flood story, it's like every Zelda game could be the same general story but told differently! works for me), but that's a big argument I've seen about the game at its release and up to now. I don't know man. Twilight Princess is a 10/10 for me. OoT is an 11/10.

[BogusMeatFactory]

I want to make it clear that I am not arguing that a game is bad. My views on A Link to the Past have a lot to do with me playing it so late in its life compared to other titles. I am nit saying people shouldn't like it or that it shouldn't be experienced.

My all time favorite goes to Majoras Mask for the intimacy of story and the very memorable characters. We all have our criteria as to what defines our favorites and that is absolutely acceptable but to say something is lacking in a field that so many people say is not is folly.

I am not saying Ocharina of time is the best. It isn't. For me, my top 2 favorites are Majoras Mask and Links Awakening and again, I am not saying they should be the be-all-end-all for people.

[Xeogred]

It's all good. The one IP Nintendo experiments a little more with. There's something for everyone.

Link to the Past is perfect though.