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"[GAME] Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker"

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This thread has been linked to the game 'The Legend Of Zelda: The Wind Waker'.
Sat 01/06/13 at 23:56
Regular
Posts: 261
Recently I have decided to make use of my older model Wii and bought Gamecube games that I wanted to play. The first of which is the Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker, which was released in 2003. There were some outcries about the choice of the game to have a cel-shaded art style but these types of art styles generally don’t age as bad as more realistic art styles and I thought the game still looked fairly easy on the eyes.

The story begins on Outset Island where Link is celebrating his birthday with his sister and his grandma when a bird drops a girl into a woodland area on the island. After link heads into the woods and rescues her, the same bird returns and takes Link’s sister away. The girl that link saved in the woods turns out to be a captain of a pirate crew who decides to help Link find his sister. Events occur and Link is eventually told to find x number of items to make him strong enough to beat his green skinned ginger haired nemesis Ganon who controls the bird that kidnapped his sister.

Nearly every game in the series has its own method of transportation, such as teleporting with the Ocarina, riding Epona, by raft or by train in spirit tracks. The world that the Wind Waker game contains is full of water and I presume that Epona isn’t a good swimmer so instead Link’s companion is a talking boat called the King of Red Lions. The talking boat serves as a guide as well as a means of transportation but Link is also handed a Pirates Charm which gives link advice when the boat isn’t around. Compared to other companions such as Navi and Fi the guides in Wind Waker are far less obtrusive and annoying.

Travelling by boat is more complicated than by teleportation or by horse as Link has to control the direction of the wind using the Wind Waker. The Wind Waker is a magical conductor’s baton that the King of Red Lions gives to Link. Wind control is its first use, but eventually it enables Link to teleport to certain locations and take control of certain people and objects.

The game has the standard Zelda formula where Link traverses through dungeons picking up his typical items such as a boomerang, iron boots, hookshot, bombs and bow and arrows to solve puzzles in the temple and fights a boss at the end. The only unique item in this installment is a leaf that Link uses to glide off cliffs and use the wind to take him to new areas.

The level design in the temples in Wind Waker are very good compared to other 3D installments in the series as they cleverly test the use of Link’s equipment as you bend light beams with the mirror shield and control items and characters with the Wind Waker and more

There are six temples with their own bosses and then Ganon’s Tower. I thought that four of the bosses were too easy to overcome and the two that I liked weren’t very original. One of the bosses was similar to bongo bongo from Ocarina of Time with two massive hands while the other was similar to a genie in Link’s Awakening.

I feel that the developers became lazy in parts and created a fair amount of filler content to pad out the game near the end. Firstly, to access Ganon’s Tower you have to fight four of the six previous bosses again although there are unique levels before you face the bosses and some interesting sections inside Ganon’s Tower. Secondly, near the end of the game you are tasked to find the Triforce of Courage which is cut up into eight individual pieces and scattered throughout the world. This is fine, but on top of that you need to find triforce maps which then need to be translated for over 400 rupees each which means you need to amass around 3300 rupees to complete the game. In hindsight getting these rupees isn't much of a challenge if you find one island which has a boating mini game which practically throws money at you but I never found this island until very late in the game.

Even once you manage to translate the charts you then need to see where those charts are telling you to go. When you start Wind Waker your map is given a select few islands on the map. Your map has a grid of 49 squares each with one main island and one fish. To unlock more islands, you need to buy bait from a salesman and then feed it to the fish located in that square. The fish will then give you information about the island and other related islands and then draw the island on your map. When you open up a Triforce map one of the islands will glow to let you know that is where the triforce piece is if you have unlocked the island. If not then your map doesn't really help you at all.

To end on a positive note, I can see quite a few areas where Wind Waker is better than Skyward Sword. I once thought that Zelda was well characterized compared to previous games in Skyward Sword, but she arguably has more personality in Wind Waker so it wasn't as big a step up as previously thought. Wind Waker has a vast ocean to sail through and each island has noteworthy differences between them. In Skyward Sword, the Sky felt limited in comparison and most of the islands only contained a treasure chest which you had to unlock from areas below the clouds. Only a few sky islands had anything different about them. In Wind Waker, Link is more emotionally animated than in any other 3D Zelda I’ve played as you see him jumping for joy after beating a boss, scowling with anger at enemies and looking sad with his big beady eyes. The only thing Skyward Sword offered were the motion control swordplay fights with Ghirahim and I think it would be unfair to ask that of a much older Gamecube game.

Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker is now my favourite 3D Zelda with interesting dungeons and an epic ocean to explore. It could have had better bosses and been a bit more player friendly, but it is a good game worth experiencing.
There have been no replies to this thread yet.
Sat 01/06/13 at 23:56
Regular
Posts: 261
Recently I have decided to make use of my older model Wii and bought Gamecube games that I wanted to play. The first of which is the Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker, which was released in 2003. There were some outcries about the choice of the game to have a cel-shaded art style but these types of art styles generally don’t age as bad as more realistic art styles and I thought the game still looked fairly easy on the eyes.

The story begins on Outset Island where Link is celebrating his birthday with his sister and his grandma when a bird drops a girl into a woodland area on the island. After link heads into the woods and rescues her, the same bird returns and takes Link’s sister away. The girl that link saved in the woods turns out to be a captain of a pirate crew who decides to help Link find his sister. Events occur and Link is eventually told to find x number of items to make him strong enough to beat his green skinned ginger haired nemesis Ganon who controls the bird that kidnapped his sister.

Nearly every game in the series has its own method of transportation, such as teleporting with the Ocarina, riding Epona, by raft or by train in spirit tracks. The world that the Wind Waker game contains is full of water and I presume that Epona isn’t a good swimmer so instead Link’s companion is a talking boat called the King of Red Lions. The talking boat serves as a guide as well as a means of transportation but Link is also handed a Pirates Charm which gives link advice when the boat isn’t around. Compared to other companions such as Navi and Fi the guides in Wind Waker are far less obtrusive and annoying.

Travelling by boat is more complicated than by teleportation or by horse as Link has to control the direction of the wind using the Wind Waker. The Wind Waker is a magical conductor’s baton that the King of Red Lions gives to Link. Wind control is its first use, but eventually it enables Link to teleport to certain locations and take control of certain people and objects.

The game has the standard Zelda formula where Link traverses through dungeons picking up his typical items such as a boomerang, iron boots, hookshot, bombs and bow and arrows to solve puzzles in the temple and fights a boss at the end. The only unique item in this installment is a leaf that Link uses to glide off cliffs and use the wind to take him to new areas.

The level design in the temples in Wind Waker are very good compared to other 3D installments in the series as they cleverly test the use of Link’s equipment as you bend light beams with the mirror shield and control items and characters with the Wind Waker and more

There are six temples with their own bosses and then Ganon’s Tower. I thought that four of the bosses were too easy to overcome and the two that I liked weren’t very original. One of the bosses was similar to bongo bongo from Ocarina of Time with two massive hands while the other was similar to a genie in Link’s Awakening.

I feel that the developers became lazy in parts and created a fair amount of filler content to pad out the game near the end. Firstly, to access Ganon’s Tower you have to fight four of the six previous bosses again although there are unique levels before you face the bosses and some interesting sections inside Ganon’s Tower. Secondly, near the end of the game you are tasked to find the Triforce of Courage which is cut up into eight individual pieces and scattered throughout the world. This is fine, but on top of that you need to find triforce maps which then need to be translated for over 400 rupees each which means you need to amass around 3300 rupees to complete the game. In hindsight getting these rupees isn't much of a challenge if you find one island which has a boating mini game which practically throws money at you but I never found this island until very late in the game.

Even once you manage to translate the charts you then need to see where those charts are telling you to go. When you start Wind Waker your map is given a select few islands on the map. Your map has a grid of 49 squares each with one main island and one fish. To unlock more islands, you need to buy bait from a salesman and then feed it to the fish located in that square. The fish will then give you information about the island and other related islands and then draw the island on your map. When you open up a Triforce map one of the islands will glow to let you know that is where the triforce piece is if you have unlocked the island. If not then your map doesn't really help you at all.

To end on a positive note, I can see quite a few areas where Wind Waker is better than Skyward Sword. I once thought that Zelda was well characterized compared to previous games in Skyward Sword, but she arguably has more personality in Wind Waker so it wasn't as big a step up as previously thought. Wind Waker has a vast ocean to sail through and each island has noteworthy differences between them. In Skyward Sword, the Sky felt limited in comparison and most of the islands only contained a treasure chest which you had to unlock from areas below the clouds. Only a few sky islands had anything different about them. In Wind Waker, Link is more emotionally animated than in any other 3D Zelda I’ve played as you see him jumping for joy after beating a boss, scowling with anger at enemies and looking sad with his big beady eyes. The only thing Skyward Sword offered were the motion control swordplay fights with Ghirahim and I think it would be unfair to ask that of a much older Gamecube game.

Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker is now my favourite 3D Zelda with interesting dungeons and an epic ocean to explore. It could have had better bosses and been a bit more player friendly, but it is a good game worth experiencing.

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