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Oct. 17th, 2014 10:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dolariJenn's I-Don't-Want-To-Say-Worst-Zelda-Games-As-They-Weren't-Completely-Terrible-But-Definately-Bottom-Tier Zelda Games:
#13 - Minish Cap
-The Story: During the Picori festival, Vaati uses his position as winner of a sword tournament to turn Princess Zelda into a statue, and to flood Hyrule with monsters. He then takes off to find the Light Force, a power the previous hero of Hyrule wielded.
-The Good: Really the only one of the Four Sword games I really enjoyed. Even one more step up from Four Sword Adventures, by removing the "collect everything you can to power up" mechanic, it's the only one that really feels like a Zelda game. It's got a vast overarching and deep story that the other Four Sword games are missing. The shrinking and growing mechanic are really well done, and integral to the game.
-The Bad: It's probably just me, but the Picori, while a lot of fun, didn't work for me. There was too much of a disconnect between them and the Hyrulians above.
-The Ugly: The Kinstones. So so so many kinstones. Too too many kinstones.
-Jenn's Fave Music Track: Not so much a fave, because a lot of the music is based off Link to the Past, but one I hear in my head when I think of Minish Cap - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89AYwg2CK_A
-Final thoughts: A great little portable Zelda game
#14 - Four Swords Adventures
-The Story: A far-off sequel to the multiplayer Four Swords, Zelda is worried that the Four Sword seal is failing. She calls six sages to check on the seal, when Dark Link shows up, traps them all in crystals, and takes off. It's up to Link to rescue all the maidens.
-The Good: They took everything that was good about Four Swords, and added some great stuff to it (like "story" and "puzzles"). It was also a serious flashback to Link to the Past (considering it's almost all recycled sprites and textures from that game), which is always a nice thing.
-The Bad: It's definintely a game made for multiplayer, and while you can play it as a single player, much like Four Sword Anniversary Edition, you can play as one person. It can be a chore, though...only so many ways one person can control four Links and not have your brain fry. And like Four Swords - the game doesn't "feel" like Zelda. But it feels it a whole lot more Zelda than Four Swords.
-The Ugly: Good luck playing this using the Game Boy as a controller. I tried with my original GBA, and the lack of backlight made it horrifyingly bad to play. Playing on a GameBoy Advance SP with backlight made it much easier, but I always found those systems too small for my monstrous hands. Good thing, though - you can play without the Game Boy systems. I just wanted the full experience.
-Jenn's Fave Music Track: As with all Link's Awakening based games, it's https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eErXCCYm1l
-Final Thoughts: A much needed step up from Four Swords.
#15 - Four Swords Anniversary Edition
-The Story: Zelda shows Link the Four Sword from it's own game. He grabs the sword releasing Vaati and splitting link into four seperate Links. Link has to collect a whole lotta rupees to get to Vaati and rescue Zelda.
-The Good: It's just...well...collecting rupees, and hoping you get enough to move on. Once you get to the bosses, it turns back into a portable Zelda game. Some of the themed levels are neat, like the NES/SNES and Game Boy themed levels were clever...but really more of the same.
-The Bad: It's just...well...collecting rupees, and hoping you get enough to move on. Also, it's built really to be a multiplayer game, and with some kajiggering made it into a one player game. I think it'd have been more fun as a multiplayer thing.
-The Ugly: It uses randomly generated levels, and more often than not, I found myself locked out of my objective and having to restart the level so it would regenerate a whole new randomly selected level.
-Final Thoughts: It really doesn't feel like a Zelda game. It feels more like Crystal Castles, with Zelda theming. In fact, it felt so "other" that I'm surprised it's on the official timeline. While I defeated Vaati, there was much much more to do after that. I was so bored, though, that I felt I'd finished the game and left the extra levels for some other time.
#16 - Phantom Hourglass
-The Story: A direct sequel to The Wind Waker, Link and Tetra are on a quest to find The Ghost Ship, an unruly band of lawless pirates to teach them a thing or two. Instead, they kidnap Tetra, and it's up to Link to save her.
-The Good: This is definitely one of the funnier entries in the series. Linebeck's cowardice isn't just hilarious, but becomes a nice plot point and character development point near the end of the game. It sort of comes out of the blue, but is handled really well, otherwise.
-The Bad: The overuse of the stylus controls. While it's neat to be able to draw ont he screen, and make paths on the screen...using it for attacking and moving is problematic in action scenes, often because the game sometimes confuses an attack with a directional move. Many times, I'd end up rolling right into an enemy instead of attack it. Having to use the stylus to control the path of the boat, the camera angle AND the canonfire all at once really hampers the game play. Other than the controls, the enemies were fairly weak...this game REALLY likes ChuChus. Even the music was mediocre. There's not one track off this game I want to listen to again.
-The Ugly: The Temple of the Ocean King. Having to go back and replay this dungeon over and over and OVER again really pushed one of my gamer buttons. I'm not a fan of repeating things over and over again, especially with little to no progress being made each time. Which was how this dungeon was freakin' designed. Speaking of repetition, the battles with Jolene, repeated and over and over again, became tedious. I was actively trying to avoid her, because she just got in the way of an already very long trip between islands.
-Final thoughts: Not a terrible game. It's an ANNOYING game.
#13 - Minish Cap
-The Story: During the Picori festival, Vaati uses his position as winner of a sword tournament to turn Princess Zelda into a statue, and to flood Hyrule with monsters. He then takes off to find the Light Force, a power the previous hero of Hyrule wielded.
-The Good: Really the only one of the Four Sword games I really enjoyed. Even one more step up from Four Sword Adventures, by removing the "collect everything you can to power up" mechanic, it's the only one that really feels like a Zelda game. It's got a vast overarching and deep story that the other Four Sword games are missing. The shrinking and growing mechanic are really well done, and integral to the game.
-The Bad: It's probably just me, but the Picori, while a lot of fun, didn't work for me. There was too much of a disconnect between them and the Hyrulians above.
-The Ugly: The Kinstones. So so so many kinstones. Too too many kinstones.
-Jenn's Fave Music Track: Not so much a fave, because a lot of the music is based off Link to the Past, but one I hear in my head when I think of Minish Cap - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89AYwg2CK_A
-Final thoughts: A great little portable Zelda game
#14 - Four Swords Adventures
-The Story: A far-off sequel to the multiplayer Four Swords, Zelda is worried that the Four Sword seal is failing. She calls six sages to check on the seal, when Dark Link shows up, traps them all in crystals, and takes off. It's up to Link to rescue all the maidens.
-The Good: They took everything that was good about Four Swords, and added some great stuff to it (like "story" and "puzzles"). It was also a serious flashback to Link to the Past (considering it's almost all recycled sprites and textures from that game), which is always a nice thing.
-The Bad: It's definintely a game made for multiplayer, and while you can play it as a single player, much like Four Sword Anniversary Edition, you can play as one person. It can be a chore, though...only so many ways one person can control four Links and not have your brain fry. And like Four Swords - the game doesn't "feel" like Zelda. But it feels it a whole lot more Zelda than Four Swords.
-The Ugly: Good luck playing this using the Game Boy as a controller. I tried with my original GBA, and the lack of backlight made it horrifyingly bad to play. Playing on a GameBoy Advance SP with backlight made it much easier, but I always found those systems too small for my monstrous hands. Good thing, though - you can play without the Game Boy systems. I just wanted the full experience.
-Jenn's Fave Music Track: As with all Link's Awakening based games, it's https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eErXCCYm1l
-Final Thoughts: A much needed step up from Four Swords.
#15 - Four Swords Anniversary Edition
-The Story: Zelda shows Link the Four Sword from it's own game. He grabs the sword releasing Vaati and splitting link into four seperate Links. Link has to collect a whole lotta rupees to get to Vaati and rescue Zelda.
-The Good: It's just...well...collecting rupees, and hoping you get enough to move on. Once you get to the bosses, it turns back into a portable Zelda game. Some of the themed levels are neat, like the NES/SNES and Game Boy themed levels were clever...but really more of the same.
-The Bad: It's just...well...collecting rupees, and hoping you get enough to move on. Also, it's built really to be a multiplayer game, and with some kajiggering made it into a one player game. I think it'd have been more fun as a multiplayer thing.
-The Ugly: It uses randomly generated levels, and more often than not, I found myself locked out of my objective and having to restart the level so it would regenerate a whole new randomly selected level.
-Final Thoughts: It really doesn't feel like a Zelda game. It feels more like Crystal Castles, with Zelda theming. In fact, it felt so "other" that I'm surprised it's on the official timeline. While I defeated Vaati, there was much much more to do after that. I was so bored, though, that I felt I'd finished the game and left the extra levels for some other time.
#16 - Phantom Hourglass
-The Story: A direct sequel to The Wind Waker, Link and Tetra are on a quest to find The Ghost Ship, an unruly band of lawless pirates to teach them a thing or two. Instead, they kidnap Tetra, and it's up to Link to save her.
-The Good: This is definitely one of the funnier entries in the series. Linebeck's cowardice isn't just hilarious, but becomes a nice plot point and character development point near the end of the game. It sort of comes out of the blue, but is handled really well, otherwise.
-The Bad: The overuse of the stylus controls. While it's neat to be able to draw ont he screen, and make paths on the screen...using it for attacking and moving is problematic in action scenes, often because the game sometimes confuses an attack with a directional move. Many times, I'd end up rolling right into an enemy instead of attack it. Having to use the stylus to control the path of the boat, the camera angle AND the canonfire all at once really hampers the game play. Other than the controls, the enemies were fairly weak...this game REALLY likes ChuChus. Even the music was mediocre. There's not one track off this game I want to listen to again.
-The Ugly: The Temple of the Ocean King. Having to go back and replay this dungeon over and over and OVER again really pushed one of my gamer buttons. I'm not a fan of repeating things over and over again, especially with little to no progress being made each time. Which was how this dungeon was freakin' designed. Speaking of repetition, the battles with Jolene, repeated and over and over again, became tedious. I was actively trying to avoid her, because she just got in the way of an already very long trip between islands.
-Final thoughts: Not a terrible game. It's an ANNOYING game.
