Zelda vs. Okami

[Niered]

What with "Spirit Tracks" being announced and all, I thought I would bring up a point thats been bugging me for quite some time. Now bear with me here, this isn't really a "Versus" thread, because for my argument I'm just going to assume that anyone participating in this discussion has played both Twilight Princess (or even Windwaker) as well as Okami, and will at least agree that although Okami borrows the "Adventure" game concepts from Zelda, it also feels alot...fresher.

Thats all very convoluted so heres what Im saying in a nutshell: Nintendo has to really pull its act together for me to even consider purchasing another Zelda game after I was "spoiled" by Okami.

Why? Well up until this summer I had only heard people laud over Okami. I had played virtually every Zelda game (minus Phantom Hourglass) up to that point, and had always loved the series since my introduction to it with Link to the Past.

Then Okami came out for Wii, and I, starved for games, bought it, played it, beat it, beat it again to unlock the secret costumes, played until I found every last bead, beat it again, and now continue to play it when I feel the need too.

The point being that the only Zelda games Ive ever spent that much time on were the 2 Oracles game (which in my mind at least are the best of the series) which doesnt really count since those were 2 seperate games.

I realized as I played Okami all the little things that bugged me about Zelda, only here in Okami they didnt exist. The biggest of these was that there were no items or brushstrokes in the game that felt situational. No "Bonehammers ill only use to stomp pegs", no "Pointless rod that lets me control robots for one dungeon", no "Stupid ass spinner that has to be the dumbest item ive seen in this series". None of it. Virtually every brushstroke has such power that you find yourself using them all the time.

And the Celestial Brush wasnt a gimmick either! In Windwaker we had the baton, but its only good for when your out at sea, in Twilight princess we had the wolf, but thats completely seperate from the Link style of play, and in Majoras Mask...well, you get the idea. But the Celestial brush was part of every single aspect of play. And the brushstrokes were just as much about finishing puzzles as they were about killing baddies.

And then theirs the story as well. Now Im not saying that Okami's story was mind blowing, but it was good! It added longevity, made me actually care, and had genuinely interesting characters. Miyamato wont even touch a deeper story than, "Save the princess, kill ganon, oh and well hint at small subtle things."


Nintendo has long been criticized of being guilty of the whole "If it aint broke, dont fix it" mantra. Zelda is the worst offender of this, but its still not a bad series, it doesnt even need a redesign, just a good, solid tweeking.

And no stupid trains. wtf.

[Split]

I think what you mean is:


And no stupid trains. Unless they happen to be awesome trains.

[Zarode]

I don't remember a train in Zelda, ever. :E

I enjoyed OoT for the reason that everyone hates it for, the story. Sadly, no other Zelda had such an interesting, but simple story then that one. Zelda hardly tries too hard to top itself, thus that is why it falls on its ass so much, as of late.

Okami, while I didn't get far, was awesome. It was totally fresh. Kinda wish Zelda would go through a nice Tweak session. It needs it, badly.

[jShazBot]

Am I the only one who felt that Zelda Twilight Princess was begging for voice overs the entire game? I know it would seem really weird, especially in a Zelda game but Nintendo needs to seriously step it up. I really loved the whole darker tone that TP had but we need more.

[Shadowpawn]

I don't remember a train in Zelda, ever.

He's talking about the New Zelda game for the DS called "Spirit Tracks". In this one Toon (Wind Waker) Link rides around in train. I find it ironic that the TC wants the Zelda franchise to be "tweaked" in order to feel fresh yet the new game has a tweak in it he's opposed to! :/

[AlexCraig]

As the uber-Zelda-geek I am, I am in partial agreement. I would rather like to see some minor tweaks here and there as opposed to a whole new game. My brother and I often like to think of what ALTTP, TLOZ, and TAOL would look like if they had TP's graphics and style. That would be incredible. Many people (myself included) still love ALTTP, and would likely buy a remastered version if it came out. Nothing can replace the original, but it would be interesting to see it in a new light.

[Leviathan]

I for one welcome this new Zelda game. :wacko:
What's wrong with trains? :E

[Niered]

He's talking about the New Zelda game for the DS called "Spirit Tracks". In this one Toon (Wind Waker) Link rides around in train. I find it ironic that the TC wants the Zelda franchise to be "tweaked" in order to feel fresh yet the new game has a tweak in it he's opposed to! :/

No, the reason I find the train stupid is that the "machinery" in the zelda series is generally pre-steam/coal.

[Leviathan]

No, the reason I find the train stupid is that the "machinery" in the zelda series is generally pre-steam/coal.

So the game was believeable [monsters, magic, and faeries] up until a steam powered train?

[Shadowpawn]

No, the reason I find the train stupid is that the "machinery" in the zelda series is generally pre-steam/coal.

So you want it to remain medieval-ish yet that bores you? I'm very confused here.

[Kent]

In all honesty, I was kinda hoping they'd do a Zelda game like that one group of people made an April Fool's joke out of - you know, the one where everything's futuristic, there are guns, and Epona is a freaking motorcycle. :wacko:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lcvdT2C31oc

[Niered]

So you want it to remain medieval-ish yet that bores you? I'm very confused here.

Both you and the previous poster are completely missing the point. I have no qualms with the settings, the medieval european-esque world of Zelda is fine, my problems lie with the stagnating gameplay.

The train is simply out of place. Thats all im saying about the damn thing.

[Shadowpawn]

It's a completely different world though, you can't say it's out of place if it isn't following the standard templete. If he were in OoT's Hyrule I would understand your point but based off of what I seen Link might not BE in Hyrule. Who's to say Hyrule is the only place that exist in the relam of the Zelda series. Wind waker wasn't in a medieval setting and it was a great game. Don't hate on a game that's not even out because of one silly addition.

As for the gameplay, we if they DID change it too much I'm sure fans would get riled up about it. Also I honestly don't see much of a point to give all or most of the 30 plus items you get in a Zelda game a use outside of a dungeon or battle.

[Outrider]

Just to get it out of the way - assuming Spirit Tracks takes place in the same world as Wind Waker and Phantom Hourglass, there's plenty of technology on par with trains, so it's really not out of place for that game setting.

But anyway, having not played Okami (partly because I can't make up my mind if I should play the original PS2 version or the slightly better/slightly worse Wii version), I can't really comment on that title. I will say that Twilight Princess, while in general a very good game, was certainly missing a bit of the spark from the previous titles.

Honestly, I think us Zelda fans are to blame for the most part. TP tries so hard to be what the loudest Zelda fans called for - more like OoT, darker, bigger, etc. - but it doesn't really hit any of those marks. It's more like OoT, but to the point where instead of referencing it, parts of the game feel either uninspired or like they're from a remake. It's darker, but to the point where it just feels forced and almost silly at times. It's certainly bigger, but at the same time it feels very disjointed, with areas being arbitrarily extended or split up (Hyrule Field being a good example of this.) Don't get me wrong, I do like the game, and I just finished playing through it for a second time (I wanted to try both the Wii and GCN versions), but I think it's an example of the developers trying too hard to please the fans when they should have felt more open to trying new things.

With the (extremely) limited information we have on Spirit Tracks, I don't really feel like I can say anything about it. It looks like it'll run on the Phantom Hourglass engine, which was a great game, but I hope it's not just a "more levels" kind of thing. I'm also not thrilled with the idea that the train gameplay will (literally and figuratively) be on rails, as one of the things I loved about Wind Waker and Phantom Hourglass was the open-world element. Still, I thought Majora's Mask was going to be just like Ocarina of Time and I was pleasantly surprised, so I'm not too concerned.

I do think that the Zelda series needs some updates to keep things fresh (like we felt when we went from A Link to the Past to Ocarina of Time). I have faith that this is coming, as we've seen time and time again that Twilight Princess is supposed to be the last Zelda of its type.

A while back I was trying to come up with ideas of how to refresh the franchise (in terms of production and gameplay), and I had a good time coming up with different control schemes, settings, etc. I think we'll definitely see a different kind of Zelda in the near future, and while I think it'll remove a lot of the more cumbersome aspects we've seen in recent years which might make people call it too casual-friendly, I'm actually pretty excited to see what they come up with.

So, is Spirit Tracks going to be a revolutionary game? No, probably not. I'd wager it'll still be good, though. I would like to point out, though, that you can't really say Twilight Princess shows the Zelda series hasn't changed when you're ignoring the fact that Phantom Hourglass came out after it. (It would be like saying the Final Fantasy series hasn't changed because 9 and 10 were too similar and you haven't played 12.) Sure, PH follows a lot of the Zelda tropes, but it does mix things up in some interesting ways.