The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker - A Retrospective Discussion (Spoilers)

GameInformer done a retrospective video discussing The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, as part of their own Zelda 25th Anniversary celebrations . You can't embed the 10 minute video, so here's a link:

http://www.gameinformer.com/b/features/archive/2011/09/26/spoiled-the-legend-of-zelda-wind-waker.aspx

I agree entirely with their sentiments regarding not being able to explore the Hyrule below the sea, I personally found that aspect very disappointing, simply because the game could have done with being a touch longer. Also, if they had done it would have mirrored the whole light and dark world thing, in a particularly unique way.

Did the face stabbing at the end seem shocking to you?. To be perfectly frank, I didn't even bat an eye-lid, fact is I found Zelda's face slap more of a shock. I thought the scene looked great from a cinematic perspective, it's very dramatic and stylishly composed. Nintendo knows how to make stabbing dudes in the face look cute.

For those that need their memory banks sparked...Final Battle (Spoilers)

https://youtu.be/I48RGtVm5KI


According to Miyamoto, memory size put an end to quite a few ideas they had at the time, although I do recall the DS games included a few of these ideas, albeit in considerably stripped down form. I hope the rumoured dungeons they removed, due to memory consraints, are reintegrated into WW: Reborn, along with everything else that was cut.

I would like to see the following done:

• Include Tetra's Trackers with 3DS support
  Include all the islands that were cut.
  Include a floating island which is as big and as populated as Windfall.
  Include a new collecting quest via one of the inhabitants on this island.
  A few more NPC's on Windfall.
  Make far better use of the Camera (GamePad), assign it to a new adventure-wide photo quest with better rewards.
  Fill the seas with more NPC interactions, more ships and random encounters - make sailing more eventful and treacherous for heart depletion.
  Retain the Tri-Force quest, but make it a lot more fun and eventful on the way.
  New Items/weapons.
  Include the missing dungeons and their bosses.
  Change the structure of events under the sea radically.
  Orchestrated musical track

Your own, and where do you rate The Wind Waker in the Zelda franchise?




Wind Waker Symphonic Movement

https://youtu.be/J7yZ-jAj7Zk

I'm kind of glad we didn't explore more of the Hyrule below sea level - it's what sets the game apart from the rest. Playing a game where the landmasses are dotted around as islands was so unique, it'd have spoiled it by including a by-the-numbers "explore Hyrule Field" section.

As for the final battle, I absolutely love it. It's quite possibly my favourite final battle of any video game. Everything about it screams cinematic - the rain, actually fighting Ganondorf with a sword for the first time in the series (as opposed to firing magic bolts at him or him transforming into Ganon), teaming up with Zelda - all amazing. The facestab just added to the cinematic quality of that fight.

I'd obviously like to see the cut content returned to Wind Waker: Reborn. I'd also like the triforce hunt tweaked, and perhaps a way to incorporate the Tingle Tuner using the Wii U controller. I guarantee only about 3% of people who played Wind Waker got to use the Tingle Tuner, because of the sheer unpopularity of the GBA to Gamecube link cable. Using that feature with the Wii U controller just seems like a naturally progression to me.

There's already a thread about the remake (link), but I see no problem with having another thread focused on retrospectively examining the GC game. I'd suggest ideas for how to improve the remake go into the thread in the Wii U forum, though.

Soooo, Wind Waker. The most divisivest Zelda of them all, except maybe for Majora. I'm going to repeat something I said in Music Week 20 (plug plug plug): "There are some games I feel would be better off as films. They put noticeably less effort into gameplay than they do into spectacle, ambience or story. Wind Waker... isn't quite one of those, but it's close. The pains of the Triforce Hunt, the obviously missing dungeons and a misguided early stealth section are counterbalanced by the most moving story (and most sympathetic Ganon) in a Zelda game, the most expressive and beautiful Link, and some of the best musics."

That still pretty much sums up my opinions on the game. It sacrificed gameplay for atmosphere, and its atmosphere was beautiful. That first time when, wind at your back, you take off from Windfall Island, with the wind in your sails and the seagulls flying and that beautiful piece of music... it's a wonderful moment. It makes you feel like an adventurer in the way no other Zelda has managed since taking your first steps out into Hyrule Field in OoT. And the feeling of epic as you traverse the enormous ocean is immense. Just a shame, then, that it gets so dull! Especially if you're trying to pick up everything from every island.

As for the questions asked in the OP, I'd have loved to explore a mysteriously empty sunken Hyrule, but as Jay says it's at odds with the game's main mechanic. Which... says something about how I feel about the game's main mechanic, I suppose. The final stabbing is great, even if the final battle itself has nothing on OoT's or TP's (personal divisive opinion); and the ending sequence and credits are excellent too.

Where do I rate it? Above MM, below OoT (and hence TP), in a sort of confusing limbo around where SS sits, but probably slightly higher due to EPIC FEELS.

I never actually finished it (There was a battle near the end where it was like a big caterpillar and you had to shoot its tail with an arrow that I couldn't do) but while I'm not sure where I'd put it in the wider franchise I did enjoy the game up to that point.

That being said, I don't like how I'm pretty much obliged to like it owing to the art style, and feel that the people shouting down anyone accusing it of 'looking kiddy' were far, far worse than the people criticising the game for 'looking kiddy'.

Reborn aside, I'd like to see the next toon Zelda take a different approach graphically- the 'realistic' Zelda of OoT has evolved through Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword, but toon Zelda in Wind Waker looks the same as it would be in Phantom Hourglass, which looks exactly the same as Spirit Tracks turned out to look.

To me, if Mario is where Nintendo experiment with play, and Metroid is where they experiment with Story, then Zelda is where they experiment with art, and it's a shame to see one style kind of stagnate within it.

There's a difference between disliking an art style, and disliking an art style for looking childish. Nobody should feel they have to like the Celda style, but if they dislike it because "its 4 teh kidz" then they deserve every last slop in the scorn bucket descending upon their heads.

I'd say that SS' style was actually toon-graphics and real-graphics meeting each other halfway, and I loved it. But that's a different game.

I find Wind Waker's art style far more appealing than any other. I think It's more emotionally engaging, the huge eyes in Wind Waker are used excellently to convey a wide range of emotions, they along with all the quirky animations do a fantastic job of telling the story and making you warm to characters.

With nothing in the way this time, I want to see how Nintendo originally imagined the game.

I think it would be hard to ruin by simply adding more content and making the adventure richer. Just being able to walk around a frozen Hyrule before the final battles would be enough for me. I don't want any major story changes, I just want that underwater section filled out properly. It felt intentionally depleted.

Balladeer wrote:

There's a difference between disliking an art style, and disliking an art style for looking childish.

That's the thing, though. Anyone with any criticism of WW at the time, and I mean any- art or not- was immediately accused of the latter, usually coupling said accusation with a sarcastic "OMG you're so hardcore" and a more sincere condemnation for any graphical style closer to the 'realism' end of the scale, which is just as bad, if not worse.

At least that small minority that didn't like it for looking a bit childish weren't claiming that not liking it made them superior or behaving like it gave them some moral high ground.

It's unfortunate really that it played into this irritating faux-underdog inferiority complex thing which games still really haven't got out of, which you can see around things like Ni No Kuni, where a lot of the narrative surrounding the game is about how it's amazing because someone's done a game that isn't a grey-brown FPS for a change, despite that in the real world the vast, vast majority of games aren't grey-brown FPSes, or how games like Heavy Rain get far more praise than they should for simply alleging to have a story, rather than actually having a good story.

beemoh wrote:

get far more praise than they should for simply alleging to have a story, rather than actually having a good story.

I agree with this so much, Im not sure why some people think a poor story is acceptable in a game. I mean, having a great story for me is just as important, maybe even more so than the gameplay. Of course some genres are exempt to this rule.

In relevance to Wind Waker, the most influential part for me was the subdued music in underwater Hyrule and the transformation into life. Or when you do a duet with one of the sages.

Also the re-deads were pretty friggen scary.

Wind Waker is my favourite of the 3D Zeldas. I don't remember much of it now but I loved being on the waves, so much so that not even the Triforce hunt could dent the feeling - any excuse to set sail was welcome! It felt refreshing compared to Ocarina of Time - which I felt took itself too seriously - to be trotting around as this expressive little lad. Also, Link speaking for the first time (if I remember rightly)! Amazing.

Looking forward to going over the experience again, just to see if playing through it revives some more specific memories...

I think the reason I love the original Wind Waker so much is because of the art style.

I was (still am) a huge fan of LttP, but when I saw Ocarina for the first time I admit that I loathed the move into 3D. I thought Link himself looked horrid, and suddenly having lock-on combat/camera mechanics and a third-person perspective made the game feel like an impostor mascquerading as a Zelda game.

Then Wind Waker happened. It polished everything seen in Ocarina alomst beyond recognition, and it was given the gorgeous art style that so divides fans of the series. Wind Waker finally looked like a Zelda game should to me, and my understanding of how a 3D Zelda game worked finally clicked into place.

I wouldn't mind these being included...

at GC Island!

It would be genuinely funny as an Easter Egg - some sort of weight/switch puzzle involving the disk tray open button, to take you into the island's innards to get some rupees or some fun reward.

JayMoyles wrote:

It would be genuinely funny as an Easter Egg - some sort of weight/switch puzzle involving the disk tray open button, to take you into the island's innards to get some rupees or some fun reward.

Yea I was thinking along the same lines. It could move around like the ghost ship making it hard to find.

Please no. That thing was an utter pain.

Zelda Box Wind Waker Images

Further Reading (check end of link for contents)


5}http://www.glitterberri.com/the-wind-waker/zelda-box/character-commentary/the-windfall-islanders/

4)http://www.glitterberri.com/the-wind-waker/zelda-box/character-commentary/the-outset-islanders/

3}http://www.glitterberri.com/the-wind-waker/zelda-box/character-commentary/the-sages/

2)http://www.glitterberri.com/the-wind-waker/zelda-box/character-commentary/the-secondary-characters/

1)http://www.glitterberri.com/the-wind-waker/zelda-box/character-commentary/the-main-characters/