#i want a game with playable zelda but i also want it to be fun

[kurozu501]

Hate to be a pessimist, but as excited as i am to finally get a game with playable zelda, the game play they showed… worries me. I really, really hope zelda also gets some kind of basic magic attack you can use to damage enemies normally with a simple button press. If you have to constantly pause the action to scroll through a stupidly long menu of every single item/monster you can copy every single time you want to do anything that's going to get old real fucking fast.

[pcktknife]

Danganronpa/Another Episode.........TWO

[funsizedcrow]

had a dream that i played echoes of wisdom last night...

[faelapis]

okay look, calming down - i understand why some people would want zelda to be a protagonist in like a totk-style 3d zelda. that would be great! the reason i predicted 2d for playable zelda is because its a smaller gamble for nintendo - imo, its realistically what we could get. especially at the end of the switch' life cycle AND so soon after totk.

BUT i'm very happy, for a few reasons:

1. it IS mainline zelda. its not called "triforce heroes" or "tingle's rosy rupeeland", its not a peach-style spinoff or side game. its a real zelda game. its called THE LEGEND OF ZELDA: ECHOES OF WISDOM. that alone, giving the mainline zelda brand prestige to this, IS a risk. and its one i super appreciate nintendo taking!!!

2. i disagree that just because it has the links awakening toy-style aesthetic, that automatically makes it a "lesser" or unserious game. links awakening IS a good game! its some peoples favorite! it added interesting lore to the zelda series, its a canon part of the timeline, its mechanically fun, and it has the fun psychological element of analyzing it in terms of links feelings about the dream. like how even the boss monsters are fearful of "dying", begging link not to destroy the island. which of course isn't "real" since its a dream, but its interesting that link would THINK that. also, marin 💔

3. like i said in the prediction post, this could be understood as a testfire for the concept. IF its as successful as any other 2d zelda game (and thats a big if! i already see people calling it more niche or for babies. i hope that doesnt catch on too much and depress hype 😞), maybe nintendo WILL see it as less of a gamble to make zelda the protagonist in a full-on, "serious" 3d title. nintendo is, after all, a business. trying it out with a smaller game makes total sense.

also... it looks like a good game? when a link between worlds was released, everyone thought the wall merging ability was brilliant and a great way to turn 2d zelda into a more unique experience.

this, to me, looks to have similar potential!! the fact that zelda can essentially order enemies to fight for her and use her environment to think of intelligent solutions to any problem is very in-character! it's fitting both for a princess and for the bearer of the triforce of wisdom.

also, its not just building/environment traversal! she does fight!

idk y'all, this looks like a great time to me! i don't know why people would presume its any "lesser" than any other 2d zelda... when we've literally seen another 2d zelda with this exact artstyle. and its an original game!! its not a remake!! :D

[gaylactic-fire]

Now that the dust has settled, I do definitely think there is some cause for concern over the trirod gimmick. One of my bigger complaints about TOTK is that it cannot strike a balance between creative freedom and challenge. Making machines that violate the Geneva Convention is very very fun, but if it means you can clear a Bokoblin camp in two minutes, ultimately the novelty wears off. To make Echoes Of Wisdom fun AND challenging the devs are definitely going to have to add limitations - especially in terms of creating echoes of enemies to fight alongside you. I'm hoping because of the top-down nature it won't delve too far down the path of TOTK.

That being said, all the people complaining that Zelda doesn't get classic sword combat in this game are laaaame. In almost every single instance of playable Zelda she DOES get either sword combat or magic attacks. I understand why (Hyrule Warriors and Cadence Of Hyrule are fast-paced and combat focused) but honestly, I have to ask, does that fit Zelda as a character? Does giving her a rapier and some random magic tie her in any way to the triforce of wisdom? No. It doesn't. (You'll never hear me say this again, but Age Of Calamity did it right). Personally, I LOVE that Nintendo have actually considered Zelda as a character. I love that they want to make her stand out with her own unique puzzle solving and combat in comparison to Link. Even though I have reservations about the trirod, the fact she is getting such a thought out treatment make me hand an uncommon W to the Zelda devs.

Also EoW Zelda can kill people with rocks. What's cooler than killing people with rocks?

[skyward-floored]

I'd like to hear about your hw rewrite ideas 👀

- hero-of-the-wolf

*cracks knuckles* gladly!

I mostly just have notes on fleshing out the story, changing a few characters, actually fitting the game and other era stuff in with canon in a way that might make sense and things like that. And I only really have stuff about the base game since that’s the one I own, so I’m not going to go into dlc/definitive edition stuff as much. I’m going to focus on the three different displaced eras mostly in this post just because that’s what I’ve mostly got fleshed out the most :)

But first I also have to mention a couple other things first:

Kid Link has been upgraded to story mode character, instead of merely unlockable in that one mode. Sheik has a much more legitimate reason to exist and Impa realizes much earlier that this random Sheikah warrior is actually the missing Zelda. Cia still looks suggestive, but has clothes that look more like clothes and not just underwear. She and Lana have the same skin tone. And I’m sure there’s more I’m forgetting but that’s the main stuff. Moving on!

Skyward Sword

I’m placing this one about... hm. I actually have two ideas here about that.

The first is to have this take place a few hundred years before skyward sword, and be only a distant history lesson by the time sksw itself rolls around, which would make sense but for the fact that Skyloft looks a little too much like it does in sksw to be that far off.

The other idea is to make it be fifty or so years before sksw, and be part of the reason Skyloft isn’t all that populated. The bit of war that touched them took out a fair amount of the population, and Gaepora was a kid around when this all went down, which inspired him to start the knight academy when he was older. Both have their pros and cons, though I think I’m leaning towards the second.

That’s the biggest thing I’m changing for this era, though I will address the Groosenator paradox, being “how can the Groosenator be around to stop the imprisonef if this is before Groose is even born”. Well you see, canons in loz have two names: canon, and Groosenator. The army from hw brings their canons along with them when they go to sksw’s era, and they call them groosenators because they’re from an era after they were invented. Bam.

Ocarina of Time

Placing the time for this one is tricky, since Ruto is an adult, but I don’t know if she’s like... gone through oot..? Is this the mm/tp timeline where Link is still around? Is this the ww timeline where Link left? I do not know. And I don’t know which makes more sense.

Aside from the Sheik stuff I’m largely leaving this bit untouched. I think it would be fun to include more sages, maybe even oot Zelda, but admittedly I haven’t thought this one through quite as much (except for the sheik stuff).

Twilight princess

I’m placing the era of twilight in this game as happening after tp itself. “But Peggy where’s tp Link then” he’s either on vacation so far away he didn’t realize what was happening until it was too late or Cia accidentally yeeted him to botw as a wolf. Don’t worry about it.

Anywho this part begins with Lana heading to twilight-era Hyrule, finding it absolutely covered in twilight, and later meeting Agitha and Midna. In my version I’m kicking out Agitha as a main playable character, because out of all the cool characters in twilight princess they picked her?? The bug girl?? She’s nice and all but no. Sorry. She can still be around as part of the story (saving her makes a good level mechanic), but not as a major player. She can even be playable still, but not as a major person.

I’m replacing her with the Resistance. Lana gets to the era of twilight and finds Rusl, Shad, Ashei, and maybe Auru (don’t know if he’d be active enough to want to fight) trying fruitlessly to protect Kakariko, figure out what the heck is going on, where the huge influx of monsters came from, and how the heckin twilight is back. Lana explains about the monsters, but can’t tell them much about the twilight. Somewhere in here Midna shows up on her hunt for Cia, furious at being an imp again, even more furious about the twilight spread over Hyrule again, and especially majorly furious that Zant is somehow back. The game never explains this, but I’m saying that Cia somehow brought him back. Or he was secretly not dead and laying low. One of those.

The Resistance goes along with Lana (and Midna once they convince her they’re on the same side) to stop Zant (Zelda maybe shows up for a bit, but she’s holding down the fort in Hyrule, so after a quick “oh crap Midna’s here that’s bad”, she’s not around as much). I figure the Resistance members are all one “character” in that each combo is like, a different one of them or something. Or they’d all be different lol idk. This is getting really long and I’m running out of steam haha.

But yeah those are my thoughts on those parts at least— I have more thoughts about character interactions and some other random things, but like I said this is really long XD hopefully that answers your question at least a little :)

[leaf-miner]

I have mixed feelings about the swordfighter form in the new Echoes of Wisdom footage. It felt like they were showing it like "Look, Zelda can fight with a sword! We're not being sexist!" But then it's a limited time transformation that essentially turns her into Link.

Worst thing is I do think playing as Zelda should feel distinct from Link, but it would be so easy to incorporate weapons too. Zelda has so often been associate with the bow of light, she really should be an archer. In addition, I think it would be cool to give her a dagger that she can use only if she's sneaky and gets a back strike. That would double as kind of a reference to her role as Shiek in OoT and emphasise the "Wisdom" bit with Zelda as more of a ranged/sneak attack fighter. It also wouldn't make echoes redundant since the weapons have obvious limits, and you could use them to distract enemies to get back strike etc. Maybe we'll get something along the lines of this in a future playable Zelda game (hopefully this is only the first of many).

Also other than making the gameplay different to other Zelda games there's really no reason she shouldn't be able to use a sword. She's used one multiple times in the past. You could even give her a different type of sword and have her use it differently to Link. It just feels a bit weird to force her to go around without a weapon or way of directly attacking outside of “throw rock” or “turn into Link”.

On the plus side though, this game does look really fun! I definitely want to play it, and I'm glad we are at long last getting playable Zelda.

[nrwynter]

I haven't done one of these in forever! I think the last one I did was... four years ago? I thought it would be fun to make one again with my improved art skills and show the work that was put into this piece.

The final piece was one of three idea prompts I submitted for the zine. I was already sketching out thumbnails while I was waiting for approval, but I did draw for one of the rejected prompts as well. (Unfortunately I don't have access to them at this time but I'll add at a later date).

Once the weapon prompt was approved, I got started on a rough sketch. (The sketches were drawn cleaner than what I would normally do to make sure it was readable haha). The toughest part of the piece was its composition. Scattering the weapons was hard because I needed to make sure everything looked balanced and focus was placed on the master sword.

What ended up working for me was I managed to grab as many weapon models from the game as I could find, threw them into Blender, and arranged them until it looked good. A bonus of doing this was having good references for both the piece and the individual weapons themselves (which came in handy when I had to draw some of the detailing). The models were also size accurate so that helped a ton too. I did have to upscale the smaller weapons so they'd be more visible on the cover.

Some of the weapon placement was deliberate, others were put there to fill in space or for another reason. The majority of the characters wielded some variation of a sword so I sprinkled in different weapons and other things to break up the repetition. That includes stuff like the Fierce Deity Mask and Toon Zelda's helmet. The more sillier weapons like Tingle's balloon and King Daphnes' sail were placed in the back so they wouldn't clash too much with the other weapons.

I'll talk about some of the more of the symbolic stuff further down the post.

I also drew an alternative version of this piece with Link being in the center instead of the master sword.

Fun fact: at one point I did consider including Ganon since he's technically playable, but realized he doesn't have a weapon. This would have meant I would also had to include the big Cucco from the cucco mode so neither were ever conceptualized.

I intentionally left the art's tone ambiguous just in case the mod team had something in mind. I did picture it having a dawn color scheme though, and the mods wanted the cover to have a peaceful/hopeful vibe so that worked out. I did however add some sunset choices in my color concepts for more options. The four I made also had sepia versions to fit with the aesthetics of the game.

8 was the one the mods chose. However, I did end up slightly adding 6's colors into it to make the sky pop. This ended up being the finalized color concept.

(It looks a little fuzzy because I ended up layering 8 and 6 on top of each other and I didn't position them correctly fghj).

When I do illustrations I start with the background first so I can use its colors for the foreground and midground. I normally don't draw clouds this big and up close so I had to be pretty delicate with how I rendered it. I'm glad I only had to do one side and just duplicate it to the other. Also I made the oranges in the sky and clouds subdued.

After the background was done, I tried rendering the ground and it was a disaster. This was early on in the rendering phase, but what was meant to be dirt started to look like sand. I tried to see if adding textures would help but it made the problem worse. I ended up taking a break from the ground and moved on to the weapons.

Next was the most grueling part of the piece: linearting. I am not kidding when I say doing the lineart took three whole days. I was also juggling with my other illustration I was working on for the zine so the timeline ended up stretching to a week. I'm a detail-oriented person and stuff like this isn't usually that bad for me but this one was pretty rough. The sweat and tears paid off, I think!

After lineart was done, I went back to render the ground again. It was becoming more polished and included more small rock formations, but the dirt-looking-like-sand bit wasn't improved. I opted to add grass instead since that would be easier to render. That was probably the right call because I think that helped with the desired tone for the cover.

I flipped-flopped between working on the grass and the weapons. This screenshot was when I had added the shading, textures, and some highlights. Oh, and I slightly tweaked the sky a bit.

With the grass and rendering done comes my favorite part: color editing. Started throwing overlays, soft lights, what have you on everything and used color balance to level out the colors. Also added light reflection on the ground for some of the weapons.

Something was missing from the illustration and I had no idea what it was. A friend had suggested particle effects and that did the trick! Everything was set and done and I submitted my illustration. When I saw the cover with the title for the first time, I noticed that the illustration was made a bit brighter than what I originally had (likely so the title stuck out better). I actually really liked that change and edited my own copy of my illustration accordingly.

With that said, now I want to talk about some of the more subtle details in this piece. You guys probably noticed these already, but I want to talk about them anyway! I mentioned deliberate weapon placements some ways up so let me go over that first.

Ghirahim's sword, Zelda's rapier, and the master sword are placed in sort of a triangular way meant to represent the triforce (although I think I messed up on the distance between them). I originally wanted Ganondorf's swords being in Ghirahim's spot but I was worried about contrast issues with the swords' darker color scheme and battling attention away from the master sword. I think the idea still works considering Ghirahim is Demise's sword (and Demise is like the Ganondorf of that game). Though Ganondorf's current placement can be viewed as him being a looming threat, for Hyrule Warriors and other Zelda titles.

I have Lana's tome and Cia's scepter close together to symbolize them being two sides of the same coin. Toon Link and Toon Zelda's were placed on opposite sides of the piece but slightly facing each other. Toon Link's and Tetra's are also diagonal from each other, both also representing a type of connection to each other. It's a similar deal with both forms of Midna's weapons as well as Yuga and Ravio. Speaking of Ravio, his weapon is the only one partially buried, sort of peaking over at the master sword to reflect his cowardice natureand being Link's Lorule opposite (at least the Link from a Linked Between Worlds). A similar idea with Fi is that she is somewhat of a silhouette behind the master sword to reflect her growth in Skyward Sword. (I know technically Fi is represented twice here, but her "weapon" in Hyrule Warriors is a different blade so that's why).

Like I said before not all weapons have symbolic placements like this, but a number of them do.

One more weapon detail I wanted to point out is on the master sword. I had this planned from the very beginning but I intentionally draped Link's scarf over the master sword so that the triforce of courage on the blade is the only one visible. I also intentionally highlighted the engraving to make it more prominent.

In the background, the sky is shaped in a way to resemble the Hyrulean royal crest. With the gap in between the clouds looking like the wings, the Master sword acting as the body, and the three visible stars as the triforce (but I messed that up slightly). Only thing I didn't include was the feet of the crest. It's not an exact 1-to-1, but here's an outline for a better visual:

On the topic of stars, there are 29 in total to represent all 29 characters. The brightest star above the master sword is meant to represent Link, but the other 28 are scattered around. Some are more visible than others so it may be hard to spot them all, but they're there.

Saving this last detail because it doesn't really have anything to do with Zelda and more to do with my art. I have always wanted to do this with my work for a while but haven't implemented it until now so I wanted to bring it attention.

From now on, all of my illustrations will have a hidden little angler fish blended into the scenery. I got the inspiration from Adventure Time's snail that appears in almost every episode incorporated somewhere and thought I could do something similar with my art. I'll show you guys where I placed this one, but you'll have to find the next ones on your own.

Not the clearest, but I promise in the future it'll be better drawn (and in case you're wondering, yes there are also little anglerfish in the other zine illustration too!). I just thought this would be a fun way people can interact with my art (and also act as an additional signature).

And that's it! If you have read all of my rambles, thank you!

[gemsofthegalaxy]

As a new Zelda fan, do I think Tears of the Kingdom and Breath of the Wild are better than the older games, Ocarina of Time, Twilight Princess, etc.? No. I can absolutely respect and understand why people love those games so much, I played a decent amount of Ocarina of Time myself and while it was frustrating to play it was also very intriguing and fun. After quitting it, I watched a whole 13 hour or something gameplay no commentary video so I could still see the rest of it played out, because it's a great fucking story.

I do not think recent Zelda games are better than the older ones. I simply think they're more playable to me and, presumably, a wider audience. Some people complain about how easy the combat has gotten, others, like myself, still find it more than challenging at times. I think it's partially because I've now gotten used to the language of Zelda puzzles, but I've found the ones in TotK the most enjoyable yet, because I have to look it up so much less than I used to- I don't know if they've made the solutions easier, too, but I have a much better grasp on how to read the hints both the characters give you and the situational ones.

I personally and perhaps selfishly hope they continue to make Zelda games that I find accessible, whatever that means. I know some people want them to move back towards older formulas because they miss that style and I don't begrudge them at all, I can understand why they like the traditional dungeons and more linear story, but I personally like the open world. I also like the more lighthearted settings, even for the sorrowful storytelling, so while I know people want a really "dark" Zelda, I don't care much for that.

Ultimately... which side Nintendo will choose is not something any of us actually have control over, so I don't see the point in fighting about it.

[loz-furbies]

Hyrule Warriors Zelda

(While the characters have some dialogue during gameplay, this is based on just the cutscenes because I'm not replaying the whole game for this)

Design

I’m not a fan of HW Zelda’s face, while Zelda in all her incarnations has a rather generic anime pretty girl face, for some reason this one feels bland and barbie-like to me. And in general the aesthetic this time is a lot more fanservicey than usual, with the bikini armour and mini shorts. Which I guess is in line with the overall HW character design but I don’t have to like it. Even more than the bikini breastplate I’m bothered by the fact that her shoulder armour doesn’t seem to be properly attached to anything.

That aside I think this works well as a more action oriented Zelda design, with all the extra armour, while it retains her well known pink/purplish colour palette and the Hyrule crest. I also like her hairstyle with the little weight at the end of the braid.

Like most of the other characters, Zelda also gets unlockable alternate skins, some change her to look like the other Zeldas (and Ilia for some reason) in the franchise, while others are palette swaps of her HW look. So they aren't particularly interesting design-wise, but still a fun gameplay addition regardless.

Sheik again has a perfectly serviceable mysterious ninja design. The scarf doesn't look as awkward and I like the addition of the long braid.

I'm a huge fan of how the weapons in HW get progressively more ornate and impractical, and Zelda's lvl 3 rapier is exactly the type of magical girl weapon I'm into.

Character

Hyrule Warriors Zelda is a mature and competent leader, who also joins the battles in the front lines. Unfortunately there's not much else to her, like sure she's the nice and polite princess again, but she doesn't get that many interesting character moments and a lot of the story is just spent going through the plot.

As Sheik she has the same issue as in OoT, in that she doesn't have in common with her regular self. So Sheik's inclusion does feel a bit like waste and I would rather that they spent that time developing even one persona properly.

I have some issues with how women are depicted in this game, in that at times they feel sort of overly cutesy and infantilised and made specifically to be waifus. Like giggling a lot, doing specific kind of cute poses, staring lovingly at the camera in victory animations and stuff like that. It's not a huge problem with Zelda (or Sheik) and more prominent in characters like Lana or Linkle, but even with Zelda there is this feeling that the target audience is the kind who spends hundreds on bikini DLC.

Role in the story

For the first time in this review series, Zelda isn't kidnapped or cursed at any point of the game so good for her for that! She is a playable character and uses a rapier to fight, which ought to fill the needs of those who want a badass combat Zelda. Though I feel that is less meaningful in this game, since you can level up Agitha to lvl 100 and destroy all enemies as her.

However Zelda not being the target of a rescue mission does make her less important to the story though, since there's not much that replaces that. This is more about the game's character writing in general and not a flaw for Zelda in specific, but for the most part the characters just go through the motions. The story starts with Zelda having a prophetic dream that doesn't amount to much, and in between chapters the narrator tells how Zelda leads her troops to new battles, but I don't get much out of her as a character from that. She has a similar role to Link in that Ganondorf is after the Triforce that is in her possession, and in the grand finale she does some Triforce magic as a group, but otherwise doesn't stand out or do any interesting character driven actions.

Sheik's inclusion in the story feels incredibly superfluous and just there to check the box of having her as a playable character. Zelda disappears after chapter 1 and the beginning of the game is spent looking for her, even when she reappears and joins the group as Sheik in chapter 2. When her disguise is eventually busted, the whole thing is brushed aside in like one sentence of how she had to hide her identity from her enemies for... some reason. This is definitely a "don't think too hard about it" situation and it's better if you just roll with it and accept that since this is a multiverse crossover game, they just need to come up with ways to bring the characters from different games together and it's just easier to get done with it as fast as possible. Though the Sheik reveal wasn't as fast as possible and we spent several chapters looking for Zelda, which I think was a waste of the player's time, since this was clearly marketed to existing Zelda fans so many probably were already familiar with the Sheik thing. Story-wise the most we get out of Zelda's disappearance is some character moments from Impa and enemy-disguised-as-Zelda doing villainy things for such a short time that it barely warrants a mention.

Gameplay-wise her rapier moveset is alright and one of my more commonly used characters, but does feel a little flighty. Now with the new LoZ game on the horizon there has been talk of if it's problematic if Zelda doesn't get to have a sword, or is it problematic to think that a girl can't be a hero if she doesn't use one, and this game's solution of giving her a dainty rapier with pink decorations is somewhat of a compromise. Her alt weapons, the baton and dominion rod, are more traditionally princessy options though I don't use them much since they feel a bit slow or hard to control. And Sheik of course has an agility-based moveset and is therefore highly useful in the "don't get hit" missions.

Relationships

Zelda and Link's potential romantic relationship is at the core of this game's plot, but the whole thing falls flat when it's not developed at all. The story is about a sorceress who split in half, and both halves (the villain Cia and the new ally Lana) are in love with Link, and struggle with the fact that he is "soul bound" to Zelda. So a love triangle (or square) story then huh? Except there is practically nothing between Zelda and Link so Cia and Lana's drama feels so out of proportion.

Zelda and Link don't know each other before the story starts and only see each other for the first time when Zelda inspects her troops' training session from afar. Then she disappears before they get any development, and Link has nothing to do with Sheik either. But even once Zelda is back as herself, they just don't share any meaningful scenes together. Link doesn't talk, but it doesn't make much difference since Zelda doesn't have anything interesting or personal to say to him anyway, they don't show interest in each other beyond rudimentary plot stuff, and there aren't even any basic "they are staring intently at each other" moments after the first one in the training grounds when they hadn't even met yet. Zelda isn't even the one to give Link his green tunic, nor does she take any part in the one character moment Link has when he lets the power of the Master Sword go to his head and needs to be bailed out.

The only actual character moment between them that I can think of is when Zelda compliments Link on his courage and says she believes in him, which is absolutely not enough when the possibility of them becoming a couple is the main driver of the plot (or I mean Ganondorf is ultimately behind everything doing his usual business and he doesn't care, but Cia is the unique villain of this game). The scene where Lana admits defeat and bows out of the competition for Link's love is so nothing because neither Zelda and Link are aware at all that they're even players in this. Like go talk to him girl, he is clearly available!

In the final scene of the main story Link places the Master Sword to its pedestal to seal the remaining darkness, and Zelda joins him to help push it to the ground. Which also doesn't feel like a "we made it to this point together!" moment due to the lack of development, but their fingers do touch during it so if you're desperate enough, that's a sort of hand holding moment.

Despite being a rival in this supposed love triangle, Lana and Zelda don't have any character moments together. Thus Impa as the devoted body guard is the only other relationship Zelda has, and even that doesn't have much else to it than this description of Impa. But I'd say you're still better off shipping Zelda with her, because they do know and trust each other already in the beginning, and at least one of them is passionate about the relationship. And Impa and Sheik have some sparking chemistry when Impa tries to figure out what Sheik's deal is.

[blueskittlesart]

out of curiosity, what would you think of a game that had the player start as zelda? zelda with a distinct personality, headstrong as you said for example. imagine the player saw the world through her eyes, understanding everything from her point of view. i ask this because i'm a fan of games that uses potentially warped viewpoints from characters with strong personalities as storytelling material and i really just wanted to hear your take on this kind of thing

Yeah i think this is the only way to do a playable zelda! the game would need to be told entirely with her as the playable character so as not to break the immersion, but i ALSO don't think zelda should ever be a silent protagonist as that feels a bit too much like agency-stripping to me. my ideal playable zelda would be one who still clearly has a personality and thoughts and opinions WHILE being the player character, which. is not an easy feat to accomplish. I think it can be done but it would take a lot of thought and care to make it well-written and a fun gameplay experience.

[nightmare-nostalgia]

★Video Game Instruction Booklets: Gone But Not Forgotten

Ever since I contemplated on making a blog for nostalgic ramblings and thoughts, I've been wanting to discuss those weird paper books you'd get in old games.

Nowadays, console games only come with a plastic box and the game cartridge/disc inside. Why? To cut costs of course! But there's a certain art to these flimsy paper books that I've grown to love and want to discuss...

The table of contents for Fatal Frame II: Crimson Butterfly.

Obviously, the purpose of these manuals was to teach you how to play the game. Additionally, they might tell you about the story, characters, and/or the goal of the game. They were pretty much guidebooks for anyone who needed a quick reference on something.

Each and every byte counted back in the early days, so something as mundane as a prologue or a thorough explanation of the controls were put into the manual for you to read before starting the game.

Diddy Kong Racing for example, throws you right into the game, but there is actually a backstory to the game and it's characters.

These days however, games hardly require a lengthy set of exposition text to tell it's story or elaborate on it's characters. The most modern example I can think of would be the Sonic Team releasing prequel digital comics to elaborate on it's story. (See: Sonic Forces and it's digital comics). And while Nintendo offers digital and printed copies of it's old games for virtual console, you don't get them when you purchase a physical copy of a modern game these days.

I get why, of course.

If games are getting more advanced and thorough, the budget is gonna keep going up. And the game itself does all of the explaining for you, so why invest into a thick wad of paper? I don't necessarily think that games should get back into the habit of investing their triple A funds into printing books again. The trees have had it enough as it is. But I do think that instruction manuals of the old days were quite fun and charming to look at! Even for games I've never played.

Many video game manuals have been scanned and preserved forever thankfully, allowing anyone to read them at any time. Vimm's Lair has an entire project dedicated to preserving them, so I insist you give your favorite games a quick read if you're ever bored. I'll be taking screenshots, sharing them here, and discuss my thoughts.

Mario Golf: Toadstool Tour is a surprisingly complicated game.

This explains the controls of this beloved (and agonizingly hard imo) Mario sports game, and I love how colorful and precise the manual is. If you've played this game, you should know that bar depicted in the image fills up rather quickly. So, it's nice the designers took their time in trying to explain the preciseness required to perform a good shot. The game also does feature a tutorial mode, so you can also watch it in person, perhaps making the guide obsolete and a waste of paper. But I still really do admire it.

Next, I want to show you all the character introductions pages.

These pages were missing on Vimm's Lair, so I had to find them the Video Game Museum's PDF archive.

These three pages feature the renders for the playable characters in the game, as well as advertising that Mario Golf: Advance Tour (GBA game) would have support for the game and allow you to connect and develop your character in that game too. The quotes next to each character are what they say to you when you challenge them in a Character Match.

I think there's something just so charming about it, but maybe that's just me? Maybe I'll make a separate post featuring these pages exclusively.

Sometimes though, guides were more than just an explanation of how things worked. They were tools to be used for gameplay progression, which is genius.

The original Legend of Zelda for the NES gave you a map that you could use to reference where you might've been. You can also check off where you find certain items. This page was also not on Vimm's lair, but was found on Nintendo's website.

Of course, by the time the internet became more accessible, walkthroughs on GameFAQs and Youtube became more and more popular. And you were able to follow a guide, making the need for such a tool hardly of use. Not to mention, games by then had evolved to accompany tutorials and maps where you could mark your locations ingame. (See: Etrian Odyssey). Guidebooks were steadily on their way out, but games were still being published with them. And sometimes, with advertisements.

An advertisement for some figurines of Rinoa, Cloud, Vaan, and Yuna from various Final Fantasy game, found within a The World Ends With Us booklet.

I also loved how the books had notes on the back too for you to make reference of. Of course, most collectors would've probably preferred you not touch them, but did anyone else fill them in ever?

At the end of the day, instruction booklets are a thing of the past. We can easily look up the controls in-game, read about the story online, watch walkthroughs for explanations on how to fix our controls, etc.

But the novelty of these physical items and the thought put into their design are fun to read through and see. And even if you don't have them in your hands, it is a collector's job to preserve the item and share it with everyone.

At least, in my opinion.

[lawyernovelistpersonal]

Robin Hood Legend of Zelda

So I stumbled on @skyward-floored's suggestion of a Legend of Zelda game based on Robin Hood, in which there's a huge monster problem, an evil king (probably Ganon, unless Ganon/Ganondorf is the power behind the throne, which I agree could be fun) taxing the people for everything they have and not using the money to do anything about the monsters, and Link starts doing something about the monsters and gathers a ragtag band of people to help.

This idea has set up home rent-free in my head.

First of all, I love the idea of Zelda as Maid Marian, but as well as being the damsel at court who's interacting with Ganondorf she's also gathering intelligence and working with Link as Sheik - it's been a while since we've had Sheik. She's introduced soon after the inciting incident and she's bringing Link information about the monsters and what's happening at court, but it's not until midway through the game that he finds out what Sheik's deal is. One option could be that the first plot point/dungeon boss fight is actually that Link has to fight Sheik to prove himself. Sheik then concludes that this guy can actually do something and isn't just another poser or some kid who's not actually as badass as he thinks he is.

Ganondorf has some other powerful minions of one sort or another to serve as dungeon bosses - they can have various quirks and powers. One of them could even be holding onto the Master Sword - I like the idea of it being in a vault in the castle and Link finds out about it from Sheik and then has to sneak in, maybe beat a dungeon, and grab it.

The mechanic of stealing things from the castle (or other enemy strongholds) could work on some combination of the mechanic for learning echoes in Echoes of Wisdom and the popular fanon in the LU fandom of Wild storing things in his Slate (plus something like the way cartoon!Link pulls things in and out of his belt pouch in a little sparkly pixel cloud). Link has a magic pouch with an inventory size and maybe some sort of mechanism for controlling the size of things he can take in and out and when the player goes up to something they want to put in the pouch they go up to it, hit a button, and Link magically dissolves the object into the pouch. Then he gets it out again the same way. The inventory and the input/output bandwidth are both upgradeable, so to begin with Link can only pick up small things and can only carry a limited volume of stuff, but by the endgame he can steal entire carts and that kind of thing.

As well as defeating bosses, part of the goal is to put a team together and there are recruitable NPCs with different skills. Some of these people can be rescued from monsters, some have to be won over with specific sidequests. Their skills can vary such that only particular ones are good at combat; maybe some are good at crafting (or dismantling) and mending equipment and maybe that's how upgrades could happen and would be a way of handling weapon durability: Link can steal weapons from monsters, but if he gets something particularly good (maybe stolen from the castle or a dungeon boss or something) it can be maintained. However, the "Merry men" who are good at combat could have a mechanic like in Hyrule Warriors attached to them, where the player can set up strategies and send them to different parts of a battlefield or dungeon to help him, taking advantage of different skills as well as having multiple not-quite-playable characters to use.

One option for stealing things (and getting loot from monsters, finding resources, etc.) could be that different things are more or less easy to repurpose or sell to travelling merchants (Beedle). A team member who can break down something large could therefore be useful so if Link does something wild like steal Ganondorf's bed right out of his bedroom, it can be converted into wood, fabric, precious metals, nails, etc. that can be used. Link can then use those resources for himself or give them to ordinary people in need in the traditional Robin Hood way.

And there could also be a mechanic that incentivises helping ordinary people on top of it being thematically appropriate and giving the player warm fuzzies. I really like the idea of this being how this game has an equivalent to spirit orbs. Kind of reaching to the Robin Hood roots, people Link helps can't pay him with anything - that's kind of the point - so there aren't rupee rewards for doing side quests or saving people from monsters or anything, especially in the early game where people are under the heel of monsters. However, what they can do is pray for him. As more people are praying for Hylia to bless him because he helped them, Link is able to pray himself and gain hearts that way (and maybe something like stamina vessels, maybe special upgrades or abilities, that kind of thing).

So the gameplay loop is first trying to protect people from monsters, then moving on to stealing from the rich ((monstrous) minibosses) and giving to the poor, and these things allow Link to gain more powerful equipment and strength in the form of things like hearts, stamina, and so forth. Sheik becomes aware of him and vice versa and that's the first dungeon - trying to get through something to talk to Sheik and then fighting 'him' to prove himself. After he's defeated Sheik, Shiek offers to help him with information and things like warnings of monster movements. On an open-world any-order basis, he can then work his way through other dungeons, including sneaking in and out of the castle, building up his team of merry men and taking down Ganondorf's minions, all the while protecting and helping the common people of Hyrule and gaining more strength and ability himself. Midway through, Shiek gives him information that leads him into the castle and to getting the Master Sword from its vault, a little after that - maybe something to do with the sword or the triforce or something - he finds out who Sheik actually is and that Zelda, who he's seen from a distance while sneaking around and maybe she's covered for him or hasn't reacted to seeing him or something, is also the person who's been feeding him information and maybe training or something. Then, gameplay-wise, once all the sub-bosses have been dealt with something happens and Ganondorf finds out about Zelda/Sheik, turns on and probably kills the king, kidnaps Zelda (I mean, it's a LoZ game, it's a little bit mandatory) and then Link gathers his resources, leads his merry men in an attack on the castle, takes down Ganondorf, Zelda becomes queen, we all live happily ever after.

And the whole time he's getting tips and suggestions from his fairy companion Little John :P

[crazylittlejester]

back again with miscellaneous fun facts. 2day/nite (idk when ill finish editing) episode: GameCube ✨️

ok so funny little thing, part of the GameCube's failure can be partly blamed on 9/11. 'Bea what r u on about' ok so there's this game called Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem, and this game was intended to be a launch title for the GameCube. Eternal Darkness was actually originally planned for the N64, which is actually pretty important because this game was more known about. A demo of the N64 version was shown at i believe the 1999 E3.

'ok great this was a game that switched consoles during development, why is this important to the GameCube?' youll never guess, my favorite little effect i lovingly call the Resident Evil effect. this was the era were so many games were trying to be darker and edgier to compete *cough* which is why Wind Waker was so controversial *cough* (theres more to Wind Waker but ill get to that in a bit).

back to Eternal Darkness, this game was for one: a third party title, being produced by a Canadian development studio called Silicon Knights. as i mentioned before, this was during the time were third party developer and publishers weren't working with Nintendo nearly as much and choosing to work on titles for Sony's PlayStation. and two: this would be Nintendo's first Nintendo published M rated game. yes other M rated games have been on Nintendo consoles, but none of those have been published by Nintendo.

now enough backstory on Eternal Darkness, how did 9/11 have any effect on this? so there was a character named Joseph De Molay who was a Templar knight. Templar knights were known for taking part in the Crusades (spreading Christianity to the Middle East). Joseph was removed from the game to avoid any controversies or appearing offensive and was replaced. officially it was said Joseph was removed as he was "just a demo character" but he was playable at E3 2001 and was known about all the way back during the N64 development, which is a lot of work for a character who was supposedly a demo character. especially so close from release, and at the same 2001 E3, two other characters were in that demo who were actually in the game proper. (keep in mind the GameCube released November 2001 in the US and September 2001 in Japan)

there was also all Arab writing in texture images removed. this is a lot of last minute reworking for game that was almost completely, which ended up with Eternal Darkness missing the GameCube's launch and came out roughly half a year later.

because of Eternal Darkness not being a launch titles, especially as such an anticipated title, the GameCube was left with pretty much just Luigi's Mansion. unfortunately, Luigi is yk Luigi. People liked Mario and weren't super interested in a Luigi focused title.

i teased it easier, so Wind Waker, definitely a bit more of a known case. at a 2000 Space World exposition, when Nintendo announced the GameCube, there was a clip of Link fighting Ganondorf to show off the GameCube's capabilities (here). and people were excited at the idea of a realistic looking Zelda game only to get Wind Waker a few years later. Wind Waker's toon style, despite being what Eiji Aonuma was so passionate about, was not well liked by the public until years later. this actually directly caused Twilight Princess to turn out the way it did.

originally Twilight Princess was going to be Wind Waker 2, using the same toon style but was changed to try to recapture the Ocarina of Time's success and appeal to the trend of darker more realistic style games (thx Resident Evil effect).

Twilight Princess is commonly criticized now a days for being "just a OoT rip-off" or "dark and edgy" (i can go on a whole rant about that comment but i shall spare yall today) despite the fact that in 2006 that is what was wanted.

the GameCube was unfortunately doomed from the start, and attempts to boost sales/interest in the system ended up in vain.

sorry that was a lot. um. yeahh.

drink water yall :)

adding the failure of the game cube to the list of things caused by 9/11 right up there next to the downfall of Ellen and the Oppenheimer movie

[thisbelongsto-nohbodys]

Finally beat Echoes of Wisdom (wanted to 100% it, also I beat the final boss in Zelda’s PJs, lol) and I really hope we get more playable Zelda games. This was a fun game and I want to see more of it, granted that they'd have to do something different considering the ending but still, y'know.

The only problem I have is that in all of the map, the only place not really used was the Hyrule Fields for any story stuff except for a few of the collectables, otherwise there wasn't a reason to visit (sure to get ur horse but with warping and water blocks, a horse isn't really needed)

Well, now to play the Ace Attorney Investigations game until the new Mario & Luigi game

[light-wolf]

Ok, time for some of my Nintendo Direct thoughts! I'll go in announcement order:

Mario & Luigi: Brothership: Well, this came out of nowhere! After the closure of AlphaDream, I assumed the M&L series was dead, at least for the time being, so this was a really cool surprise. Mario RPG fans are eating good lately. Game looks really fun and charming and I'm looking forward to it!

Fantasian Neo Dimension: I'm not super familiar with this game but I've heard cool things about it so it's nice seeing it on Switch. I have soooooo many JRPGs in my backlog already though...

Donkey Kong Country Returns HD: This one was a bit of a disappointment, to be honest. Not that I don't like seeing a great game get an upgraded version available on a modern console, but man... it's been 10 years since the last original DK game, and all we can get is yet another remake? This is one of Nintendo's biggest and most iconic franchises and it feels like all they do with it these days is using it as Mario spin-off fodder. It's just sad. Oh well. Great game, though, highly recommended.

Dragon Quest III HD-2D Remake: I haven't played much DQ outside of DQV (which is one of my favorite RPGs of all time) but this one is said to be a classic and I like the HD-2D look so it's definitely on my radar. Nice to see the first two games get remade as well. But I can't help but feel that what I really want is a DQV remake in this style. xD

NSO stuff: Great to see Four Swords live again in some form! Also ZERO MISSION FINALLY!! I've been wanting to replay that one lately. I'm not really interested in Turok or Perfect Dark but I guess it's a good thing that the West also has an "adult" version of the N64 app now, as that opens the door to more games.

Super Mario Party Jamboree: I've never been much of a Mario Party fan, but this one looks quite fun! At least it seems more interesting to me than the other Switch ones. I probably won't get it since I'm more of a solo gamer but I'll keep an eye on it.

The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom: HOLY SHIT!!! YES! YES! YES! Oh man, I'm soooo glad that this game exists! I LOVE 2D Zelda and I've been wanting a playable Zelda for so long. Also the gameplay looks so creative and fun! Not a huuuuge fan of it reusing the "toy" art style of the Link's Awakening remake (even though I loved it in that context) but I feel like this game has enough differentiating stuff to have its own identity, so I'm fine with it. Absolutely love this. Probably my favorite thing about the Direct, and it's releasing quite soon too! Can't wait!

Stray: Not a lot to say about this other than it's a game I really wanted to play back when it first released but I didn't have access to it. So it's great to have it on Switch! If the port doesn't suck I'll probably get it at some point.

Ace Attorney Investigations Collection: YESSSS!! These two are the only AA games I haven't played yet, and while I've considered emulating them for years, this is even better! Also great to see the second game get an official localization. So all around a great thing. AA7 when, Capcom? :P

Metroid Prime 4: Beyond: Oh man, what can I say? It's real. Seven years after being announced with just a logo, we finally got a real first look at it. A very short first look that didn't really show much, but a first look nonetheless. It was a bit disappointing seeing it get a 2025 release date, but oh well. I wouldn't be surprised if this ends up being a cross-gen release. We'll see. Can't wait to see more, and find out what's the deal with Sylux.

Overall I'd say it was a pretty good Direct! Nintendo is still giving the Switch a lot of love during its final years and that's great to see. Now, to keep working on that backlog...