#zelda is my favorite franchise of all time. I can talk about it for so long | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

blueskittlesart · 1 year

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hi! im really curious about your thoughts on oot, i'm trying really hard to like it and i wanna see what you enjoy about it

Hi!!! I'm going to do my best to explain exactly why I like oot but there is a TON of ground to cover. i have already written a bit about the story and my thoughts on it in this document, but this is a much more in-depth analysis of the symbolism and implied narrative which i think may be more helpful to you if you're struggling to get into the story and gameplay!

oot is my favorite zelda game of all time and was what made me fall in love with the series, but I will concede that it shows its age, especially with the insane advancements that video games have made over the past 2 decades or so since its release. Try to remember when playing it that it came out in 1998, when a game with any sort of 3d graphics at all was still new and exciting. some of its gameplay is going to be a bit dated, unfortunately, and it's totally reasonable to dislike that aspect of it i think! If you really find yourself struggling with gameplay, i recommend zeldadungeon.net for dungeon walkthroughs. they have very concise and easy-to-follow walkthroughs for the entire game which make the gameplay MUCH smoother for first-time players! there's no shame in needing walkthrough help in these dungeons, ESPECIALLY some of the later ones which get notoriously convoluted and difficult. that being said, even if you use walkthroughs, I'd encourage you to still pay attention to the dungeon's designs and details as a lot of thought was put into these designs and I think they're still some of the strongest in the series! gameplay-wise I'd also say that there are a lot of little collectibles that will seem like they're way more important than they are to new players. you don't need the skulltulas (they get you a bigger wallet), you don't need to complete any trading sequences, you don't even REALLY need to go out of your way to collect any of the extra heart pieces, the game is perfectly beatable with just the hearts you'll get from dungeons. Knowing all these things going in will really streamline your gaming experience and make things easier for you if you're getting put off by the 90s-style game design.

As for what i really love about the series, it's the story. And i understand that if you're not someone who makes a habit of analyzing media to an obsessive degree, at first glance oot doesn't seem to have a lot of story. A simple fact of old game design is that more dialog and cutscenes meant more storage space was needed, and the biggest constraint in game design at the time was the limited amount of storage a disc or cartridge could hold. What this means is that storytelling in older games like oot takes a very different form than the cutscene and dialog-heavy storytelling that games tend to use nowadays. the storage restrictions on the game meant that a lot of oot's story had to be told implicitly, via details and worldbuilding and actions carried out by the player. I know this can make it difficult to grasp at first glance! that's why i love to analyze it and talk about it, because I want people to understand how rich and well-told oot's narrative actually is and i know that most people aren't as willing to put in the work as i am, lol. with that being said, this is where the spoilers are gonna start! i'm gonna recap and analyze most of oot's story here, so if you're not looking for spoilers scroll away now and experience the game for yourself!!

oot is at its roots a story about adults failing children. i will elaborate on this point a bit more later, but for now let's look at our opening segment. We are introduced to our link, the youngest link in the franchise, at nine years old. From the get-go, we as the player are told that link's hylian parents died in a conflict very shortly after he was born, leaving him in kokiri forest to be raised by the deku tree, among the kokiri.

The kokiri are a race of eternal children. what this means, essentially, is that we begin the story with a link wearing rose-tinted glasses. the kokiri live forever without aging or dying, and they never leave the forest. Link has grown up isolated and without any concept of aging or death. he has been told by the deku tree, his father-figure, that he IS a kokiri and therefore will never age or die. Despite this, link does have a crucial difference from the rest of the kokiri that even he is aware of--he has no fairy. If you talk to the kokiri in the initial kokiri forest segment of the game, many of them will talk down to you or make remarks about you finally getting a fairy, reminding the player that link knows SOMETHING is wrong with him, that he's different from the other kids somehow, but he's not yet been able to pinpoint what.

we come to our first dungeon segment, where the deku tree summons link and tells him that he's dying and that link must defeat a monster to save him. when the player completes this objective, the deku tree dies anyway, revealing that he knew all along he couldn't be saved and lied to link about it in order to get him to do the dungeon. with his dying breath, he tells link to leave the forest and find princess zelda. (worth noting that up until this point, link has been told that leaving the forest will KILL HIM.) this is the first major failure of an adult we see, and as the inciting incident of the game it sets the tone very nicely for the rest of the shitshow. The deku tree lies to link his entire life about who he is, and then spends his dying moments lying to link AGAIN, specifically in service of a greater plan to turn link into the savior of hyrule by sending him to help princess zelda. this point is crucial--the deku tree has clear-cut, understandable reasons behind acting the way he does. It would have been much easier on link to allow him to grow up isolated among the kokiri, and it removes a lot of the potential danger he would have faced as an orphan in hyrule in the aftermath of the war which killed his parents. (we will later see that hyrule is in no way a safe place for a child on their own.) Explaining all the magical-destiny lore to a nine year old had the potential to scare him away from the task ahead, as did admitting to him that there was no way to save the deku tree. But lying to him about it all still ultimately deeply hurt him. this is the stage upon which the rest of the game will build.

Link, freshly traumatized by the death of his tree dad, leaves kokiri forest. he goes to castle town and meets princess zelda, a girl no older than him. Princess zelda tells him that she fears for the safety of her kingdom, but that no one will listen to her when she tries to warn them of the danger. this is our second adult failing--the entire conflict around which this game centers could have been prevented if only any adult was willing to listen to zelda's concerns about ganondorf. But because she is a child she is dismissed over and over again until she finally turns to ANOTHER child for help. her plan for link involves him retrieving objects needed to open the gateway to the sacred realm within the temple of time, which i know sounds like a bunch of confusing lore shit but all you really need to understand is that there's a gateway to what is essentially godlike power inside this temple, and zelda wants link to open the gateway and claim the power before ganondorf can. link already has one of the 3 keys he needs--it was the reward for killing the deku tree beating the first dungeon in kokiri forest, and zelda takes this as proof enough that he will be able to find the other two.

in these first three dungeon segments, link is confined to his nine-year-old form. His sword is wooden and deals considerably less damage than it will later in the game, and in each of the dungeon segments there are reminders of the way being a child affects his autonomy in hyrule--the guard at the gates of death mountain won't let him pass, the zora princess berates him for not being enough of a man, several collectibles are clearly visible but impossible to reach with his current size & ability, etc etc. this section of the game is deliberately juxtaposed against the initial segment in kokiri forest, in which everything was built for someone of link's size and strength and no part of the map was unexplorable or all that challenging. What you're supposed to realize here is that being a kid in hyrule is HARD. you have very little autonomy and are constantly condescended to. One of the few hylian npcs your age, Malon, is a good example of this--in her mini-quest she vents to link about how her father can't see that his stablehand resents him and she's constantly having to look after him without being listened to. She is being given adult responsibilities (looking after her father & the animals on their farm) without adult social status. Her situation is a deliberate parallel to both link and zelda's, though during this 3-dungeon segment of the game it's not immediately clear yet just how much adult responsibility link is actually shouldering. in any case, this is our third example of adults failing children, and the theme begins to be echoed in the worldbuilding of hyrule during this stage as well.

now we come to the initial confrontation, the scene which alters the trajectory of the game and divides what i consider the first and second halves of the gameplay (although the second half is probably much longer lol). Link, having found all 3 keys to the sacred realm, returns to hyrule castle, only to find that ganondorf has attacked, forcing princess zelda to flee with her attendant. He catches one final glimpse of her where she throws him the final key needed to unlock the temple of time: the ocarina. although no words are exchanged between them, it's clear that she's asking link to carry out the rest of her plan on his own and claim the power sealed in the temple before ganondorf can. and so link goes to the temple of time and opens the gateway, but link is nine years old and so link doesn't notice that ganondorf, a trained thief, is following him. When he opens the temple, ganon siezes the power zelda was trying so hard to keep him from finding.

we then pan down to link again, but different. he's changed, he's older. notably, he isn't an adult. he is sixteen years old, physically, but mentally, for both link and the player, no time has passed at all. this is important to keep in mind for the rest of the game--no matter how link may look, he is mentally still nine years old. he wakes up to essentially a lecture from the world's biggest dickhead, the sage rauru. Rauru places the blame for ganondorf's rise to power squarely on link and zelda's shoulders, noting that if link hadn't opened the temple of time in the first place, ganondorf would have never been able to sieze power. he tells link that he placed him into a deep sleep for the past seven years because, at nine years old, he wasn't strong enough physically to take on ganondorf and win. But now, he says, link is old enough to be a real asset. it's time for link to defeat ganondorf.

Once again, we have a clear-cut case of adults failing children. Link and zelda took matters into their own hands BECAUSE of the adults in their lives. for link, it was the deku tree (HIS FATHER)'s dying wish that he help zelda. for zelda, her plan was a last resort after begging every adult in her life to see what was coming and being constantly ignored. now that what she predicted has come to pass, she and link take all the blame for it, for being kids in a difficult position doing the best they could with NO ADULT HELP WHATSOEVER. you can't place the fate of an entire kingdom on the shoulders of two nine year olds and expect it not to fall. but that's what hyrule's adult leaders did, and when the kingdom fell they let the nine-year olds take the blame for it. zelda hasn't been seen for years. she's either dead or in hiding out of shame for her mistake. meanwhile, Link has once again become a pawn in someone else's game. The sage rauru decides for him, without ever consulting him, that he can't be trusted to remain conscious for the seven years between gameplay segments. that he will be safer and happier to remain asleep. anyone who stops for a moment to consider what this might do to link's mental state would have not done this, but rauru sees link as a child, which in hyrule is synonymous with an object to be controlled, with no feelings of his own. he needs to be protected and hidden, regardless of what effect it has on him when he wakes up. nothing else matters as long as he can be kept alive and unharmed. this is a deliberate parallel to the way the deku tree treated link while under his care in kokiri forest--he doesn't need to know the truth, because it's easier and more convenient for everyone else if he doesn't. its effect on his mental state doesn't matter. what matters is that he is kept in a position which is convenient for the adults in his life. this is another reminder of the way in which being so young hurts link, and if I can diverge into real-world relevance for a second, it's an obvious metaphor for the way trauma steals one's childhood. Link was never allowed to grow up normally. he went from being a kid one day to an adult the next, with no time in between to figure anything out. his childhood, his coming-of-age, was stolen from him by greedy adults who needed him to be a pawn in their war.

the dungeons in the adult segment of the game can technically be completed in multiple different orders, but the usual order (and what i think is probably the way the narrative is intended to progress) is to get to the forest temple first, which requires you to reenter kokiri forest, all grown up. it's important to note that up until this point in your gameplay, link still has plausible deniability about his race. sure, he didn't die when he left the forest, but maybe that was a lie told to ALL kokiri. maybe he's still a kokiri and he won't grow up. but now he's got solid proof that he was lied to, and that the safe, beautiful sanctuary he's spent the majority of his life in was never actually meant to be his home. When you return to kokiri forest as an adult, you find that it's nothing like the safe-haven you remember. it's been overrun with monsters that are taller than you now, as an adult. This is a metaphor, obviously, for returning to someplace changed. link goes back to his home and it doesn't feel like his home anymore with all that he knows now. And if the monsters weren't enough, if link talks to the kokiri, cowering in their little kid-sized houses, not a single one of them recognizes him. they address him as an adult they've never met before. to them, it's been seven years, and they've never known a kid to grow into an adult before. but to link, it's been a few days at most, and inside he's still the little boy they knew.

the dungeons in this segment of the game are mostly straightforward training exercises to give link the necessary skills and assets he needs to fight ganondorf. I'll skip over most of them, but there are three things i DO want to highlight about this section of the game: malon, sheik, and the water temple.

Malon is introduced in the first half of the game as an example of another child with very little agency and power. Seven years later, if link visits her again, he will find the ranch in an even worse state, with the stablehand having taken over and kicked out malon's father. Malon stays purely out of fear of what will happen to her horses if she leaves them in his hands. She is an adult now, as you are, and yet she has even less power than before. So much of the first half of oot is framed in such a way that the player wishes link was older. It wants you to think, wouldn't this whole thing be easier if I was an adult? Wouldn't I have more power, more agency? but now that you ARE an adult, you're confronted with the fact that nothing has changed. you are still a pawn in a war against ganondorf. Malon is still trapped at the ranch, forced to endure daily abuse or leave her animal friends to die. however, this segment is also the first time you as the player are given the option to fight back. If you, as a child, have taken the necessary steps to befriend malon and epona, one of her horses, you are able to use the bonds you forged in childhood to run the stablehand off the ranch and return power to malon. this mini-arc with malon is a teaser for the overarching arc of the game--having no power in childhood, believing that adulthood will be your savior, but finding the same powerlessness in adulthood, and ultimately returning to pieces of your childhood in order to finally reclaim your power.

next up is sheik, who is deliberately a mystery for the majority of this segment, but. well. we all know he's zelda, so i'm not going to beat around the bush. Sheik is what has become of zelda in the years since ganondorf took power--where zelda was once strong-willed and refused to stand down in the face of danger, sheik now moves among the shadows, darting in to offer link a bit of help or advice but never getting too close. My reading of this is that zelda, after growing up in the aftermath of her failed plan, was afraid of what she'd done to link. She saw her influence as the thing that brought hyrule to ruin--after all, link never would have opened the door in the temple of time if not for her. The way she sees it, her choice to use him back when they were nine destroyed his life and her kingdom. This is why she's largely absent in this segment of the game, only stepping in for brief moments and disappearing the second link tries to reach out for her. Her character at this point is essentially representative of self-isolation as a coping mechanism.

finally the water temple, which I promise i didn't single out just because it sucks, but i will warn any potential players that it sucks. it's the most convoluted ass design in the world and even with a walkthrough it gets confusing and hard to navigate at times. this is not the point of this paragraph, though. the point of this paragraph is that there is a miniboss in this dungeon that is INCREDIBLY important to link's character and to this day is one of the most well-done and impactful battles i've ever had the pleasure of playing. (side note, why the hell did the himekawa manga make this battle happen at the bottom of the fucking well?? ive believed for years that he was a shadow temple boss because of that. whatever. anyways)

about halfway through this dungeon, you come upon a room that looks like an endless sea of water, with bits of ruins and a single rotting tree in the middle. when you walk into the room, you'll be attacked by a mini-boss that takes the form of link's reflection, black and translucent with glowing red eyes. the miniboss dark link will mimic your attacks and block when you swing, requiring players to be crafty and strategic in order to beat him instead of just swinging with the right weapon at the right time. from a purely gameplay-based standpoint, this fight is sick as hell. it rewards you for thinking on your feet and forces you to come up with real time strategy to beat a foe who genuinely seems to think the same way you do, which is REALLY cool, especially for a game released in nineteen fucking ninety eight. narratively, though, there are symbols upon symbols upon symbols to be picked apart in this fight alone. there's the obvious metaphor of fighting onesself--representative of an internal struggle of some kind. pair that with the set dressing for this arena and the information we already know about link, and things start to fall into place. Link was raised in a lush forest, surrounded on all sides by walls of trees that kept him safe and isolated from the world at large. the minute he left that forest, bits and pieces of his worldview started to fall apart--he learned his identity as a kokiri was a lie, experienced the hardships of being a child in hyrule, and now he's grown up and become a pawn in the fight against ganondorf, losing what little agency he had along with the ability to return to his home in kokiri forest. He finds himself in this illusion room, with a shadow version of himself waiting to attack him, clearly indicating that this room is representative of his state of mind. an endless, desolate landscape stretching out into infinity. no walls to keep him safe, no cover at all save for that one single, ROTTING TREE in the middle. This tree is a symbol of link's mental state. (my evidence for this one spans across a couple games but just trust me when i say this interpretation is grounded in reality it would just take too long to explain) and the tree is not looking good. it is dying. and from this dying tree springs a reflection of himself that link must fight to progress. I think there's an obvious message that's being conveyed here: link regrets leaving kokiri forest. he regrets the way he's been used, the hard truths he has had to learn about the world since he left. He is still mentally nine years old, and as a child he still yearns to return to that safety he was promised in kokiri forest despite knowing that it's no longer there for him to return to. Dark link is representative of all link's fear and regret and turmoil surrounding his destiny and what has been done to him over the last seven years. Because this is a video game, he is able to physically fight those feelings, to defeat the reflection of himself that torments him and walk out of that room at peace, having faced his fears and confronted his true feelings. Narratively, this battle is representative of the ongoing internal struggle link is grappling with over the course of this segment of gameplay, and shows the player how link must overcome those feelings of fear and inadequacy in order to gain the power to defeat ganon.

now we finally come to the ending segment of the game. this is where the lore gets a little bit convoluted and trips some people up. if you're not a lore slave you can basically ignore the triforce thing. the only affect it has on the narrative is that it gives ganondorf a reason to need both link and zelda, since they have the other two pieces of the powerful relic he's after. this is why he kidnaps zelda and taunts link to come rescue her instead of just like. hunting them both for sport in the wilds of hyrule.

the final battle with ganon is the culmination of all your efforts throughout the game. in the leadup to it, the final dungeon reminds you of this by having each of its rooms be a mini-version of one of the previous six temples you completed in the second half of the game. once you finish this final dungeon, you're able to get into the castle. I have to mention one of my favorite design choices in this whole game here, which is the fact that the background music in the castle gets louder the closer you get to the final room, and when you finally get there it's revealed that ganondorf was playing it the whole time. the details in this game make me crazy they're all so well-done. anyways. to discuss this battle we first need to discuss a crucial character who i realize i've forgotten to mention this ENTIRE time somehow: navi.

I love navi. i hate the way she became a joke among fans. this is not the point of this post. the point is that narratively, navi is one of the only GOOD adult figures we see in the entire game. (one could argue that she isn't an adult, but she takes on a guiding and mentor-like role for link so i consider her one despite some of her more childish mannerisms.) Navi is the one character who has been at link's side since the very beginning, the only consistent good influence on his life. the only adult mentor who hasn't somehow tried to fuck him over or manipulate him somehow. She is INTEGRAL to his survival through all the crazy bullshit he gets caught up in. the game makes her importance clear to the player in two ways: the first, obviously, is that she's the tutorial character--she tells you where to go, what to do, explains mechanics and puzzles, etc. The second, and the detail that's gonna be super important in our discussion of the final battle, is that she's tied to the game's targeting mechanic. It's subtle enough that I actually didn't notice it my first time around UNTIL this final battle, but every time you target an enemy to attack them (which with the way the camera movement is designed in this game is basically a required element of combat) navi flies to their weak spot and hovers there, which is the in-game explanation for what targeting is--navi is showing link the monsters' weak spots. in the first phase of the final battle with ganondorf, he erects a forcefield which prevents navi from entering the battlefield, removing the player's ability to target completely.

i absolutely LOVE this battle in terms of both gameplay and narrative. removing the targeting mechanic is a genuine handicap that makes the battle genuinely difficult for the player, and narratively it serves to remind you of the importance of navi, a positive adult influence, in link's life. without her, dealing damage is so much more difficult, but as soon as you have her back the battle becomes super intuitive and you're able to strategize much more effectively. Eventually, you deal enough damage to get navi back and flee the castle with the princess, before making one final stand against Ganon, a mutated beast-form of ganondorf. with navi by your side, his massive weakness becomes easily targetable, and you're able to defeat and seal him for good.

the end-credits scene of the game shows link time-traveling back to his nine-year-old self, before any of the events of the game have come to pass, and re-entering hyrule castle to warn nine-year-old zelda about what is to come. this is a time paradox, i know, but i LOVE this ending thematically. As I mentioned extensively earlier, link and zelda's stories are both representative of the way trauma robs you of childhood. they were both stripped of their chance to be children and grow up and come of age due to what happened with ganondorf. Allowing link to go back and prevent those events from ever occurring is a promise of healing. it's a promise that he and zelda will be able to reclaim the childhoods that were stolen from them by war and by adults who wanted to use them as pawns in it. it's a reclamation of the agency that these characters have been consistently denied throughout their stories. it's. a good ending. it's a really good ending. I like it a lot.

So uhhh wow that was a lot! what it comes down to is that i think oot is a story a ton of people can relate to. being a kid with responsibility but no agency and longing to be an adult, but then growing up and wanting nothing more than to return to the childhood you lost... that's something that really resonates with me, at least. and yeah oot has a lot of quirks and convoluted story and stuff but at its core it's a really beautiful coming-of-age that deals REALLY well with trauma and childhood and growing up!! tldr it's just. a genuinely incredible story and it means a LOT to me lol

#THIS IS SO LONG IM SO SORRY IM CRAZY LMAOOOO #zelda analysis #everyone please play ocarina of time. im going insane here

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croakings · 6 months

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breaking my loz silence to be a hater but also, here's how totk can still win

i will preface this with the thesis but also bear with me, ok, so: let it be known that in most circumstances, like most people probably, i hate when stories go "And It Was All A Dream!!!"

however. under some certain conditions. it is So Tasty. and i think totk is like. i'm sorry i think this is the only thing that can redeem the story of that game even somewhat. to me. this is all obviously just going to be my own personal opinion if you liked totk you are valid etc and so on and so forth but this is probably not the post for you

a minor point i want to start off with is that we were promised majora's mask vibes and they did not (imo)(this will be the last qualifier/clarification as far as that goes just stick "imo" everywhere in your brain for me please. thanks) deliver on that so much...... UNLESS MY UPCOMING TINFOIL HAT/COPING "THEORY" APPLIES! (there is absolutely no evidence or support for any of this whatsoever.)

i know people have come up with theories and Themes Analyses as to why the totk ending is good and makes sense and i did like a lot of those, and those people are very smart, however what they do not take into account is that i do not like it. if there's one thing i hate more than It Was Never Real In The First Place, it's And Actually None Of That Mattered That Much At All!..........

unless! It Was Never Real In The First Place!!!!!!!!! (<- IWNRITFP)

SO many of my personal gripes with totk are solved by making "the primary impact of these events is just like. emotional there aren't a lot of other consequences if any" follow the caveat of Because IWNRITFP!!!

"but bug" you might say, "what the fuck are you talking about". that's fair despite all those paragraphs i've said very little. i understand.

i am team "pissed off about the arm". team "ZONAI??????? AAAAAAAGGHHHH". team "AND WHY DOES IT ALL DISAPPEAR IN THE END ANYWAY COME O—". team hater. if you will. zelda doesn't even get to have any dragon features stick around like come. ON. ok anyway

also. we have the Monarchy Good Let's Keep Doing That Actually. despite. gestures at all of botw and the info we get of link and zelda post-botw pre-totk. where they're like. really not so much doing the monarchy. is the thing. and that seems really great for them in fact. and this seems really kind of silly outside of it really being needed to continue The Cycle. of loz games. and in loz games. which is that there is a princess and link punches things. and monarchies are a little necessary for point one. there.

but also some of you know me. you know what my favorite activity is. it's Making Up Lore To Explain Mechanics/Whatever i know this is not mechanics it's like. Video Game more broadly. franchise continuity. and that too. put that after the slash idk how to phrase that. so here's the thing.

they go down to the castle murder basement. right. gloom is there. it's spooky. things Go Wrong. tale as old as time.

this is a reach but cope with me. bear with me. what if. the murder basement. is the last real thing that actually happens. (until the ganon fight)(i think)(disclaimer: i have played only like 35 hrs of totk and the greater portion of that was mapping out the depths. so please understand i hate this game and this essay is based on information i gathered trying not to be doomed to hate this game/attempting to gain motivation to like. actually play it.)(if you notice i barely succeeded. if at all. rip)(one of the first things i did was collect the dragon tear memories and that INSTANTLY made me tap out. iykyk y'know.)

I KNOW. BUT. HEAR ME OUT.

here's the story of totk: link and zelda go down to the catacombs. neither of them come out. like. link does. sort of. i guess. if you ask some people. but like. nothing he does seems to matter or affect people. or. most things. with a few direct Plot Related exceptions. no one recognizes him the famous Savior Of Hyrule (the sword one)(not the princess the other one) who has spent literal multiple years scurrying around speaking to without hyperbole every single person in the country probably multiple times in insane circumstances pretty much every time. everyone is just Have You Heard The Legend Of Press Down B To Slash Fancy AND I SOLVE THIS TOO. with Game Theory.

WHAT IF. what if. ganon's last hurrah. ganon who like. constantly loses. and is repeatedly killed by teenagers at best and children not infrequently. is to see these guys who pretty well won. because they lost. who have a pretty good chance of doing things differently. where he can't. and/or won't. who can set hyrule in a different direction, if they're allowed to continue on. does not let them continue on. "lol they're traumatized young adults," he might say, "i am The Scourge Of Millennia and HERE. is how i can still win." (<- loses)(inevitably)(of course)(BUT HE CAN TAKE THEM DOWN WITH HIM.)

what. if IWNRITFP. maybe we can say the zonai in some capacity WERE real idk. this is irrelevant to my essay but i do like the thought they're just Early Hyrule and we know nothing more about them that's true than we did in botw. i think it would be incredibly good soup if ganon just made EVERYTHING about zonai and the Ancient Times that we see and learn of in totk. just. completely up. this also solved how ganondorf (and also rauru and sonia like character-wise) kind of sucks in this game tbh: because he's The Villain. he's MADE himself THE villain. what are his motivations? you may ask. what the hell is he trying to do? what on earth is even going on with zelda and co in the past? irrelevant. you see if he is as cartoonishly evil as possible and makes zelda and co (The Good Guys)(So Good Guys Wouldn't It Suck If Something Like Killed Them Mercilessly Or Whatever) completely miserable and sets up the perfect, most unassailable dichotomy in her mind of Me Evil, Monarchy (You) Good then zelda and link who are already traumatized can just be pushed more firmly into The Cycle if he just. makes them live out a nightmarish reality he constructs of "nothing that they are or have been matters and they have to cast it all aside to be The Princess and The Hero" and keep that going forever. because without them(The Princess and The Hero) there is only Him (The Villain). they HAVE to be in the cycle to keep him from winning the cycle by default. don't they. right. sure they do don't look at the man behind the curtain what man. who said that.

also the sages!!!! Bloodlines!!! Of Course It's About Bloodlines!!!!!! it's the cycle!!

and see the thing is link and zelda come out of the catacombs with Dragon Ganon Defeated and that can be real. that's the story. link and zelda come out of the catacombs. they have experienced once again a bunch of things that no one else had anything to do with or could be reasonably aware of and there is nothing they can do about it, and they can try to talk about it but everyone else really truly it cannot be emphasized enough was just doing other things.

also!!!! this makes the depths like. less. [picture so-so gesture here.]

i mean. they're still like. more should have been done with the depths. more (or less) should have been done with all of totk but i'm exhibiting favoritism here. the depths make sense if IWNRITFP. the yiga are down in an empty inverted-ish Ghost Monster Hyrule doing loony toons. they are also. cartoonishly. evil(?). do the yiga have a point? in totk? like. really? do they. (other than Mechanics.) well. do they NEED one? link loots stuff and knowledge from them. as in: you have to know things in dreams. somehow. sometimes. what i'm trying to get at here is aren't the depths and the yiga so much more funny if ganon is literally just making them up. like "here is Evil hyrule (look at the ghosts of all those you've failed) with my Evil minions (evil)(like me)(cartoonishly evil and bumbling)(this is a dry joke sarcasm HUMOR. if you will.)(what if ganon is like "oh yeah the yiga my doomsday death cult in botw what was going on with— did link throw that guy down a hole. that's hilarious. i'm going to make a whole thing about that.) and my Evil loot here have relics of past heroes. this doesn't mean anything btw don't worry about it just put them on. yes Put The Tunic On no don't think about it i'm not even here. what. who said that"

like. OH of COURSE no one recognizes you or says much of anything that doesn't somehow give you instructions or tasks to do if IWNRITFP. like. ganon doesn't care. link doesn't care!!! that's something people do. when he is running around trying to save the world. that makes sense..... DREAM SENSE.

do you all see my vision. is this anything. had i played more than 5% of the game or read more stuff i could probably expand on this or be at all coherent but DO YOU GET IT. am i communicating. please take this and run with it THIS is how we can still get majora's mask and. COSMIC DOOM AND HORROR also again justice for ganondorf (and zelda)(and link) on this one WHAT IF. he was evil. what if he was FUNNY. what if totk were good.

ganon with the last vestiges of his Evil Power from his corpse under the castle sealed for There Can Still Be A Good Story There: if two guys were on the moon and one guy killed another guy with a rock would that be fucked up or what. also wouldn't it be cool if i were a dragon. i’d like to be a dragon. i can make that happen and sort of kind of make sense. as a treat. while also doing that to the princess while tormenting her with (More) Visions.

welcome to his twisted mind...... mine.......... minecraft server. hey gamers have you ever THE CYCLE THE CYCLE GET BACK IN THE CYCLE

life could be a dream. IT COULD BE A DREAM

#*#chatter #loz #i thought of posting this to one of the quarantine blogs for brainrot but instead i will torment u all on main #i've never used one of these tags before but #totk salt #no one come pitchfork at me i tried so hard to be pitchfork repellent #also i wrote this while doing 3 other things as usual and i refuse to proofread. um. sorry.#my solution to everything is ''so and so could have a sense of humor. this fixes everything''

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fvedyetor · 17 days

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points. zelda fan. did you play tears of the kingdom?

i've gotten thru like mooooooost of the main quest (as far as i remember) and tbh i think its like. my favorite zelda game. i love fusing stupid stuff together and making silly cars that don't work at all........ also skydiving.

do u have any like. favorite tloz games? :0 like totk is up there for me but im also very fond of windwaker, spirit tracks, and twilight princess <3

yes omg!! ive finished the main quest in totk and all the shrines and caves and lightroots! just missing some quests and a ton of korok seeds lol. totk is the only game that ive actually kinda completed so as of rn its my fave i think. lately ive just been trying to max all my clothes which has mainly been just harassing the dragons for their scales and stuff hehe i do it out of love <3

ive played through all of botw except for the final boss fight. actually recently restarted my game so i could start over bc its been years but ive been too busy to play T^T cant wait for summer omg

zelda is my all time favorite video games!! i hot young parents who i grew up watching play zelda games. i watched my dad play majoras mask and my mom play twilight princess and skyward sword so all of those have a special place in my heart <3 watching them play it is why i love loz sm. no other video game franchise can compare.

i wanna play more games tho!! i need to find a way to stop all the time passing around me so i can just play zelda forever lol

ive also played part of a link to the past (unblocked on school computer) and part of twilight princess (got the master sword and then just got too busy :((

i also have some zelda manga!! i have 1 and 3 for tp and then one that has both minish cap and phantom hourglass. on the hunt for more hehe

i also have zelda shrine. and a growing collection of printed images of totk ganondorfs on my door. and paper dolls of zelda characters. and OMG MY SLIDESHOWS. i have two slideshows about why ganondorf is objectively hot, a slideshow in progress of all the foods from totk/botw, and a bunch of other wips (loz geography, loz timeline, etc) all in order to educate my poor irl friends. OH I ALSO HAVE A LOZ OCARINA and a little book of songs from oot and other games hehe

aaaaaaa im sorry this is so long i had an excuse to talk about zelda and i ran with it hehe

ok but my faves are totk defintely and then also twilight princess and majoras mask are up there for sure. im so indecisive tho aaaaaaaa. for sure tho the cartoon is NOT up there i do not like the cartoon at all (except for maybe zelda... but i didnt finish the cartoon so who knows)

#i think id like windwaker a lot more if my sibling hadnt spent so much time playing it on the tv instead of me :(#i really ought to play it tho #i think ive done the tutorial and then didnt touch it for years bc i was so young and i forgor #if u couldnt tell im OBSESSED with totk i love it sm #this next halloween im gonna be gerudo girlie link hehe :)#i was tp link two years ago #i could talk FOREVER abt zelda omg #if you want to see any of the things ive mentioned (my shrines my slideshows etc) just ask! id be very glad to do so #hehehehe #fvedyasks #seknots-izumimir <3 #loz #ugh my ohones gonna die oh nooo #*phone

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hervygervy · 4 months

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what other thing do you like besides Kid Icarus and Grim Adventures?

Sure, I'll bite. I'll take any excuse I can get to talk about things I like. Obviously I like a lot of other media franchises, but I opted to put those two in particular in my bio just to let other people know what I'm definitely going to be posting about the most. They're my favorites and all that. My warning to others of my chronic media obsessions. Otherwise I like a lot of Nintendo stuff: Pokémon, the Legend of Zelda, Animal Crossing, Earthbound, etc. Whenever people ask me this kind of question I'll always tell them I like Xenoblade Chronicles, but I've only played the latest two games and I only like 3. But hey, I look cool if I say that. In terms of other publishers, I like some Capcom and Namco games like Ōkami and Katamari Damacy. I also enjoyed my time with games like Elden Ring and Hollow Knight. Oh, I really like the Parappa games too. So mostly I'm a gamer, I suppose. My favorite genre is the monster collecting RPG. I love turn based combat, and I like creating whacky teams of equally whacky monsters. On the cartoon side of things, I've been trying to watch more of them. I watched a lot of cartoons on TV as a kid but somehow I missed out on what people consider the golden age. I used to think it was just because I was young but I've talked to people a couple years younger than I am and they somehow caught the golden age shows on TV. I stopped watching cable TV when I was 11 or 12 or so and went through a brief anime phase as a teen. Most of the shows I opted to watch weren't all that good so I kinda just stopped watching anime consistently after a year or two. But I can name a few shows I like, even through all the mediocrity. Beastars and Made in Abyss are excellent, and I remember Asobi Asobase and Aho Girl being funny but I'm not a teen anymore so who knows, maybe if I revisited them I might find them cringe. I had another brief anime phase during my first year of college, if you can call it that: I was really just trying to crunch through a lot of anime based on video games. Did you know Parappa the Rapper got an anime adaptation? It's pretty interesting. As for books... I don't really like reading. I read As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner for one class not too long ago. I liked that one I suppose. It's an awfully difficult read though and I can only really say I liked it because I had the professor explain the whole plot to me in detail. Alright... I think I rambled enough now.

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un-pearable · 1 year

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Hi! Uh, I want to get into Sonic. Any shows/games you would reccomend starting with? An order? Also!! What's your favorite iteration of sonic (if you have one)

i think this might be THE question every sonic fan is dying to be asked. that is to say, hell yeah it would be my pleasure to make some recommendations >:]

best things to try as a very first introduction to the hedgehog and friends (that are still relatively bitesized or accessible):

the official animations for sonic mania, team sonic racing, chao in space, sonic colors, and most recently sonic frontiers. personal favorites are chao in space bc its adorable and frontiers for… obvious (knuckles) reasons (it’s about knuckles). these are short and sweet and absolutely adorable so they’re always some of the first things i recommend :] check ‘em out if you can - you won’t regret it.

on that topic, Sonic Frontiers is a solid place to start with the games! it’s the most recent release so there’s currently a demo available on switch and it’s also on sale on steam right now (until Feb 13th!). few of the games directly lead into each other so picking specific games to start with is more down to personal taste, i’ll go into more detail if you’d like but for an introduction to the series? frontiers has been very well received and many consider it a return to form after the last few games, so it’s a good place to pick up the series! EDIT: I FORGOT ABOUT GENERATIONS. sonic generations is basically a Best-Of compilation of sonic’s most well known stages and it’s also perfect for a first time player. it was MY first game. how on earth did i forget about it. anyway it’s also on steam and it kicks ass!!!

alternately, much of the franchise was codified in the adventure games, so if you prefer starting at the beginning, they’re big recommendations as well! both Sonic Adventure and Sonic Adventure 2 are on steam and MANY playthroughs are online. SA2 was also the first of the sonic fandubs, so if you’ve seen any of those memes that’s where they’re from.

also, if you’re into zelda games you’ll probably love frontiers. but if you prefer 2D/pixel art games, Sonic Origins just came out last summer and contains rereleases of the first four sonic games and Mania is always a fun option! alternately, try here for a taste of sonic 2 :]

comics!! comics!!!!! the IDW Sonic The Hedgehog comics are killing it lately and double as canon and ridiculously fun. the first arc is issues 1-12 and if that won’t sell you on this funky little guy, well, there’s a lot more options too! you can find the IDW run here - but support your local comic shop if you can!

for a little more bite-sized try the recent miniseries scrapnik island! it’s standalone from the main storyline and considering you’re a ninjago fan i think you’ll enjoy a fun story about morally complex robots :D

the Archie series is amazing at times and so bad it’s funny at others - but what isn’t? while i am a HUGE fan it does require quite a bit of time and investment. other recommendations from the 300 issue+ legacy of sonic comics are available on request (i do not know how to shut up <3)

tv shows!! Sonic Prime just released on Netflix and it slaps. not the most traditional sonic but it’s fun as hell and ongoing - we’re only ⅓ into the first season and there’s at least two guaranteed. the animation is astounding and it’s coincidentally produced by wildbrain just like current ninjago. i edited one of it’s kickass fight scenes here

this is almost certainly far more than you need but i love talking about this series so thanks for humoring me :] i hope you enjoy them!! hmmm… they’ve all got their own appeal to me but lately i’ve been watching a lot of playthroughs while drawing (and i eagerly await the frontiers dlc so i have an excuse to replay it) and i think atm game sonic’s my favorite! the comics are delightful and the shows always have their own twists but i love good ‘ol game sonic… the others are more than just facets of his character and have their own great stories, but there’s something special about the original. this message brought to you by how absolutely astounding his characterization is in Sonic Unleashed. we missed you big guy. hope you have fun!!

#this is like the best time EVER to be getting into sonic so youre in for a treat. so much awesome stuff has released just the last year #i hope this helps!!! sorry its so long i love this series too much <3 #text✨#sonic #sonic the hedgehog #tried to include as broad a range as possible bc this series is SPRAWLING and includes every possible media format under the sun #I DIDNT EVEN MENTION THE MOVIES SFDKJDS #anyway. keep me posted i love helping new people get into it :]#tried to include as many..... helpful.... links as possible but if you need anything else im your guy <3 have fun!!!!

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arcanacards · 11 months

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hrhhgrjgrrrrjhgrhgrhghrjg i’m so happy i have totk i’m so happy!! it’s real!! i’m so happy i’m able to play it and i’m so happy i can talk about it with people!! the legend of zelda is still continuously one of my favorite franchises of all time to this day and i’d even argue it’s remained a special interest despite all my many fixations over the years it’s just all hitting me at once, i looked back at my first blog to reblog a couple things and saw so many of my friends old and new associating me with zelda in ask games and it just made me really happy. i hope people still do! both the series and character. it’s been a significant part of my life for almost all of it, and it actually was the first fandom i was actively a part of. honestly i really miss the energy i had several years ago when botw first came out, the vibes, the atmosphere of my life back then because everything felt so full of wonder and passion, i wish i could find that whimsy again soon because the love never left. idk where i was going with this i just have a lot of feelings right now. the kin memories stemming from totk aren’t . helping

#it's also 1 in the morning if that's anything #⟡

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starlightshoals · 1 year

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Link's Awakening DX (Review)

-Part 1: My History with the Series-

So, let's start with a bit of background. Before this year, I had never finished a Zelda game, or even played one for longer than an hour or two. I remember watching my dad play through the entirety of Ocarina of Time when I was a little kid, and I have hazy memories of trying out Wind Waker, Minish Cap and Majora's Mask. But for some reason, Zelda as a franchise never quite caught on with me. I had a mild interest and appreciation for the series from a distance, but certain aspects of the gameplay turned me off growing up. As a kid who loved platformers and Metroidvanias where fluidity of movement is vitally important, playing as Link in those games just felt awkward - he couldn't jump, he was sluggishly slow, it seemed as if you had to constantly go into your inventory to switch out items, and a lot of the puzzly elements felt obtuse, unintuitive, and dragged the pace even further to a crawl. For me it left the impression that Zelda simply wasn't a series I could enjoy playing.

As I got older, though, I can see how that may have changed. I got into more games where puzzles play a central role, like Portal and the Silent Hill series. In fact, Silent Hill's methodical lock-and-key based exploration isn't entirely dissimilar to Zelda's dungeon crawling! And a couple of my favorite games I've played in the past few years owe a massive debt to Zelda, wearing the influence proudly on their sleeves. The first, Nier Replicant, is structurally, narratively, and to some extent mechanically a twisted homage to Ocarina of Time. And my game of the year for 2022 (which I also reviewed!) is a little indie title named Tunic, which could not be more open in its reverence for Zelda if it tried.

My love for these two games, combined with my love for all the friends I have who've been pushing me to play some Zelda for ages now, is what finally got me excited enough to try Link's Awakening DX for the Game Boy Color.

-Part 2: In the Shadow of a Masterpiece-

Awakening is an odd little game and I'm coming at it from an odd place, too. You see, I started playing it a couple months ago, cleared six out of eight dungeons, got forcibly sidetracked by a heap of real life stuff, then two or three weeks ago I started on a different Zelda game that came before it, A Link to the Past, which I've now played, replayed, and even dipped into randomizer runs before finally coming back and finishing my Link's Awakening playthrough.

And I'm glad I did, because it threw into perspective just how much Awakening lives in the shadow of ALttP. It's a smaller entry on more limited hardware that serves as the follow up to a certified classic that laid the groundwork for decades of subsequent Zeldas and Zelda-likes to come. ALttP has not one but two sprawling overworlds that work in tandem with each other, and it marries exquisite combat scenarios with a strong puzzle solving element and an item based progression system reminiscent of Metroid. The items themselves are tremendously fun and addictive to use (the Pegasus Boots, the Hookshot, the Fire Rod, etc), with almost every piece of your eventual loadout remaining useful and serving an essential purpose in combat scenarios as well as exploration. A Link to the Past is jaw droppingly expansive yet compact, a tour de force of world and dungeon design where every piece fits perfectly in its place.

So why am I reviewing Link's Awakening instead, when it's a significantly weaker experience that never stood a chance against its wildly successful older brother? Well, for one thing, it's because there isn't much more I could say about ALttP that hasn't already been said better by other people, and I'd just keep gushing about how great is it for sixty paragraphs. And that's boring!! I'd rather talk to ya'll about a flawed, dinky little weirdo game that not as many people have played and celebrated.

And yes, I know there's a 2019 Switch remake of this game that rebuilds it from the ground up with new graphics and music, a better button layout, and even more secrets to find. (I've already dubbed it Link's Remakening when chatting with my friends.) But it was important to me to experience this game in an older form first to better appreciate its place in history and how that remake chooses to "modernize" it when I inevitably get around to playing that too. And hey, I think the way the best Game Boy titles made the most of their hardware is pretty neat! I find the "dated" graphics charming and it features a trio of composers that made excellent use of the sound chip, among them a brilliant lady named Minako Hamano, of Super Metroid and Metroid Fusion fame...or at least I wish she'd receive more fame and credit.

Because damn, when you first boot this game up you're hit with a stormy screen and a hauntingly foreboding piece of music, depicting Link on a raggedy little boat struggling to stay afloat in a violent sea that looks poised to swallow him whole. Then a strike of lightning comes down, the screen flashes, and we transition to a tranquil beachside while a far more mellow track plays. We see a lone girl walk down the shore to find an unconscious Link washed up on the sand. Then the camera pans up while the iconic Zelda theme kicks in and we see a distant mountain with a giant egg and a ring of clouds at its peak, as the title of the game appears at the top of the screen just like in the image I opened this review with.

-Part 3: An Island of Dreams-

This moody little intro immediately sets the tone and feel for Link's Awakening as a whole. It's a surreal, melancholy, dreamlike little game that appeals to the player's emotions through sound, subtle character moments, and imagery that will stay with you. While Awakening draws inspiration from ALttP in many respects, it also pulls away from it by telling a more intimate and personal story than the monomythic quest to save Hyrule.

That girl in the intro who rescues Link is named Marin, and the game proper begins with Link awakening (hehe) in her house. Her dad, Tarin, gives you back your shield and the two of them let you know that you're on Koholint Island and your sword should still be sitting around the beach somewhere.

Because Link is effectively you, the player, the game is trying to make you feel a couple things here. It wants you to like and care about Marin and her dad, so it has them be as nice and helpful to you as possible. And by extension, knowing there are monsters threatening them and their village gives you a reason to wanna protect this place in addition to solving whatever mysteries you may find here.

Awakening, you see, puts a lot of love and effort into its setting and NPCs. By injecting more flavor, sensitivity and humanity, with a cast of quirky oddballs, it left its mark on the Zelda series in a way that's still felt today. It even has an item trading sidequest that has you going around the entire island talking to people! And while most of the sidequest isn't mandatory, completing it is necessary to get an item that for most players will be needed to finish the game. In other words, Awakening really pushes you to get to know Koholint and its inhabitants, and hopefully grow to care for them and feel the weight of your main quest's consequences.

That main quest, as it turns out, is to wake the Wind Fish that slumbers in the enormous egg atop Mount Tamaranch at the north end of the world map. This requires collecting instruments from each of the eight dungeons scattered across the island...so let's talk about those dungeons.

-Part 4: Into the Labyrinth-

To reach most of them, you'll first need to explore the overworld and complete some random, often pretty strange tasks to find a key that will open the way to the dungeon. For instance, getting to Eagle's Tower requires you to bring a stone rooster to life and fly it across gaping chasms you couldn't cross with just the Hookshot. It's pretty weird.

The dungeons themselves deviate and elaborate on the structure used in ALttP in a few ways. Instead of finding a "big key" that gives you access to a "big chest" and unlocks the rest of the dungeon, more emphasis is placed on the central upgrade you find halfway through. The first leg of a dungeon typically has you wandering around, hitting lots of dead ends until you finally get your hands on the new item and suddenly the rest of the dungeon will open up for you, because now you can complete the environmental puzzles necessary to push further in. Likewise, where bosses in ALttP presented challenges mainly for you to resolve with your sword, bow or fire rod, the bosses in Awakening almost all demand that you use your shiny new upgrade as the means to defeat them, like the genie in Bottle Grotto whose bottle you need to toss at the wall with your new Power Bracelet. In some ways this creates for more gimmicky boss design, and most of them are pathetically easy compared to the genuine adversity ALttP throws at you, but it's an approach that allows each dungeon to more clearly identify with its central item. And I'm told that becomes the norm in future Zeldas!

This upgrade-driven progression also speaks to an overall shift more into the Metroidvania lane for Awakening. The fact that the game takes place in a smaller, tightly knit map full of roadblocks you'll need to use your full item kit to bypass contributes to this as well, with new shortcuts opening up as you go. And it's a good thing the overworld is pretty small compared to ALttP, because the screen size is also painfully tiny and thus so is your view of the immediate surroundings. With all the pauses for screen scrolling it has to do, it's good that the game doesn't bite off more than it can chew and for the most part avoids being too difficult to navigate (though I still got lost and turned around more times than I'd like).

And I gotta be honest here, progression in this game can get pretty wonky. Sometimes the devs lean too far into the realm of dreamlike chaos and present you with puzzles and gating that just doesn't seem to have any intuitive logic behind it. One minor example is when the game expects you to open a locked door by...throwing a pot at it. This is not set up at all and you have no reason to think this particular door is so different from every other door up to that point which is unlocked by a key or by clearing out the room's enemies. Similarly, that thing I mentioned earlier about bringing a rooster to life takes a series of steps so bizarre and illogical that I was dumbfounded when I looked it up.

That's not to say Awakening is lacking in puzzles that were a pure joy to solve, because there were some amazing "ah ha!" moments that gave me the same sense of excitement and satisfaction that Tunic so often did. That lightbulb going off is the high I was chasing when I started my quest to play every major Zelda game, and Awakening sometimes delivered. Not to spoil too much, but there's a moment in the third dungeon, Key Cavern, where you realize you can combine the effects of two upgrades to do something super cool that you'll go on doing in various places for the rest of the game. And if you have a hunger like I do for "puzzle box" dungeons that require you to interact with the environment in ways that dramatically alter it and gain the spatial awareness to navigate it intelligently, then Eagle's Tower will be the highlight of your playthrough. It's been a few days and I'm still thinking about how brilliant that dungeon was. While ALttP is by far the better game overall, its steady consistency stands in stark contrast to the highs and lows of playing Link's Awakening.

There are other evolutions to the dungeon formula, too. A big one is the change in functionality of the compass - in ALttP, all the compasses would do when you found them is mark the boss room on your dungeon map. This was pretty useless since the geography of dungeons in that game will naturally lead you in the boss' direction regardless. On the other hand, Awakening's dungeons tend to be far more labyrinthine and confounding, so this basic quality to the compass is inherently more valuable. But wait, there's more!! In Awakening, the compass now also plays a jingle when you enter a room with a hidden key, and it marks every unopened treasure chest left to find on your map! This makes the compass so much more vital to finding your way and uncovering secrets.

And the last thing about dungeons I need to point out is the addition of sidescrolling segments, with some light platforming and even cameo appearances from Mario enemies, like goombas and piranha plants. Because yeah, this game has platforming. The first dungeon upgrade is the Roc's Feather, which lets you jump in a Zelda game that isn't Zelda II, almost 25 years before Breath of the Wild! You can only imagine how giddy I was to have this item and how much fun I got out of it across my playthrough.

-Part 5: Why This Game Sucks Actually-

However, speaking of the item inventory...this is where we have to address one of Awakening's most painful flaws. Inventory management in this game is excruciating. Because it's on the Game Boy, you can only assign items to the A or B button, and every item you obtain is bound by this system. Where ALttP had picking up pots and rocks as a context sensitive A press, Awakening has you go into the menu to bind the Power Bracelet to A or B every time you wanna lift anything up. Likewise, where the Pegasus Boots were just a press and hold A to charge up in ALttP, in Awakening you have to button assign it if you wanna use it. Every single time.

What makes this worse is that every time you brush up against a liftable object without the Bracelet equipped, you get a long, slow, unskippable text box telling you that you can't lift it. This is pretty bad at the start of the game when you don't have the item, but it becomes unbearably bad later on when you already know that, god game shut up!!

What makes it somehow even worse than that is the fact that the game's overworld seems tailor made to exhaust you with constant, and I mean constant dips into the menu to switch out items. There are so, so very many obstacles to get around. Rocks you need to switch in the Bracelet for. Pits you need to switch in the Feather for. Enemies you need to switch in your sword for. Blocks that can only be broken with the Pegasus Boots. Gaps you can only cross with the Hookshot. It adds up, and while you get used to it, it makes traveling from one end of the map to the other a tedious ordeal.

Fixing this issue, above anything else, is something I feel like Link's Remakening (2019) has to offer over the original. From what I hear, all your most necessary upgrades are generally already bound to buttons on the controller and stay that way, dramatically minimizing the amount of menuing you have to do. I look forward to re-experiencing the game in this way at some point, because good gravy is it a problem in the og version.

-Epilogue: I Love it Anyway-

Despite some frustrating flaws that hold it back, though - some of which are a consequence of the hardware, some of which are just questionable choices on the part of the dev team - I would still say Link's Awakening DX is a lovely little game that showed a whole new side of Zelda and maintains its own special place in my heart. Koholint Island is a setting I can't help having fond affection for, with its wacky characters, poignant story, whimsical locales and the fascinating risks and experiments the devs took in making it. The director apparently said he felt as if they were making a "parody" of Zelda, and I can see it. Parts of this game feel like a weird romhack more than a fully polished official product. But that's part of its enduring charm, and I'm thankful for the strange, dreamy journey I got to take with Link, Marin, and all the rest. They'll stay somewhere in my memory, like a sad and silly dream that lingers after you wake.

#tloz #link's awakening #review #zelda #alttp #tunic

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ghostybreads · 9 months

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Hi....If you don't mind, can I ask, what are your top 10 (or top 7) favorite media (can be books/ manga/ anime/movies/tv series)? Why do you love them? Sorry if you've answered this question before......Thanks....

hello!! i absolutely don't mind! this is such a cute question, i love talking about my interests 🥰 the top few are my absolute all time favourites, but otherwise no particular order! Put under a cut because I rambled a bit!

How to Train Your Dragon

I'm so so obsessed with this franchise, I'm not even sure where to start on why I love it. I actually have a toothless tattoo! and like, six toothless plushies that my friends and I call the council. The show race to the edge for it is one of my favourite parts, but nothing will top the first movie for me. There's just something so magical about it. It's truly beautiful, every time I watch it I genuinely feel like my heart is soaring <3 A lot of people don't know that the shows exist but I think they're so good and silly, they're such a comfort for me.

Servamp

This is a manga I always end up going back to again and again. I'm sure people have put it better than i could, but it reflects a very real and flawed human experience (despite the vampires lol). It feels like each and every side character gets so much depth, and everyone has their own journey, and its a very sympathetic and nuanced with its antagonists. The main pair grow SO much as people over the course of the story, and they build up plot twists so fucking well, ive watched it unfold and still felt like it was all planned from the very beginning. Also has british vampire catboy who goes 'meow' in the most serious deep voice ever, my beloved.

The Legend of Zelda

I'm counting this as one because I feel this way about most of the games, they're all so special to me in different ways. Breath of the Wild/Tears of the Kingdom I've loved playing, I felt so immersed in the world in such little ways, and all the small interactions with the people in that world felt so real and made me care about it. Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask are also so incredible and such wonderful stories, and I have such a soft spot for Skyward Sword, idk I couldn't choose a favourite if I tried. I've loved them since I was a kid so its hard to pinpoint what exactly it is that draws me to them.

Jing Wei Qing Shang/Clear and Muddy Loss of Love

TOXIC LESBIANS. I fear that since i've read JWQS no sapphic media will ever be good enough for me again, its insane how perfectly to my taste it was. The main chara can telepathically communicate with horses in an otherwise normal non-fantasy world and there's no explanation or even plot necessity for it, its so perfect for me. Qiyan, the MC, has so much gender. She's a malewife, she's a pathetic boyfriend, she's a lesbian, she's a boygirl, she's everything. The premise is that Qiyan, in her quest for revenge, ends up accidentally in an arranged marriage to the daughter of her enemy. And despite falling in love with her, she continues with her revenge anyway, prepared for the love of her life to kill her with her own hands when its over. There's so much emotion on both sides, its overflowing love and hatred and anger and bitterness and affection all at once. It truly is a whole journey to get through and I've been a changed man since.

Scum Villain's Self-Saving System

Another one I'm so batshit over that I don't know if any series will ever replicate. They're so insane. Shen Qingqiu's unreliable narration is so funny but also so fascinating to unpack, there's so much to read in what he doesn't say. It's so funny, but then when you think about what's really happening, it's kind of horrifying, there's this constant whiplash. The whole premise of one persons impact changing the story, the very narrative itself, is sooo important to me on so many levels. Bingqius dynamic is so incredible to me too, they're just so insane and so much fun to read. They've always stuck with me.

MILGRAM PROJECT

I LOVE MILGRAM it's a song story project told through music videos and audio dramas! The producer is one of my favourite artists, DECO*27, and every song is consistently a banger. Every character has such an interesting, nuanced story, and as the audience you're challenged to figure it out yourself based on the clues, and your interaction decides where the story goes. It's so much fun seeing a new MV come out and everyone come together to theorise and discuss. It's still ongoing, and very easy to get into, so I always recommend it! My favourite prisoner is Fuuta :)

Voltron

Okay look. The question said favourite media, not explicitly media I thought was good. It is a show that is very very dear to my heart, and I think it fucking sucks after a certain point. The PREMISE is so so good, it had so much going for it on concept, and the characters carried it. I got so attached to them, I love their silly dynamics and they're so funny. I really do love the first few seasons, and I love the potential for what it could've been :') I very frequently text my best friend to rewrite parts of the lore.

That's 7 in detail, and the bonus additions are: Natsume's book of friends, good omens, and word of honour!

Thank you for asking!!! 💖💖💖 I don't think my thoughts were very comprehensive but I had fun, I hope they make some sense??

#ghost answers #WAH this was so nice i love talking abt my little neurodivergent interests #thank u!

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ratralsis · 1 year

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Sudden Vulnerability

Today I want to talk about one of my favorite features in stories: surprise vulnerability.

Vulnerability, in this case, means a character revealing a weakness or insecurity in themselves that another character can, if they so choose, use to utterly destroy the first one.

For example, person A ("Alice") and person B ("Bob") are talking, and suddenly, out of nowhere, Alice reveals that she's long had deep romantic feelings for Bob. It's weird, right? Maybe it's something that we, as bystanders, already knew. Maybe Alice was the main character of this story the whole time.

But the point is, Bob now has a choice: he can hurt Alice or not. And we don't want him to hurt her, so we cheer for the idea of him not hurting her.

I'm going to give two examples. Neither is long, or complex, and both are from fairly popular franchises that had installments in 2017 and got sequels this year.

Example 1.

In Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, there's a famous line where Yondu shouts "I'm Mary Poppins, y'all!" It's been memed to death. It's very funny. It's a great line.

What led up to that line? And no, I don't mean the story about how it wasn't originally in the script (https://screenrant.com/guardians-galaxy-2-yondu-mary-poppins-line-origin/). I mean the actual dialogue from the movie:

"You look like Mary Poppins." "Is he cool?" "Hell yeah, he's cool."

When Yondu asks, "Is he cool?" What he's asking isn't "Is Mary Poppins a cool person?" What he's asking is, "Am I a cool person?"

What he's saying is, "Son, I want you to think I'm cool. I want you to tell me that I'm cool."

What Peter realizes in that moment is "My dad cares what I think about him. I have an opportunity here to hurt his feelings. To absolutely devastate him. Or I can make him happy. I can make him feel cool."

What's happened here is that Yondu has suddenly shown vulnerability. He's made it clear to Peter that he has an ego, and it's fragile, and he worries about what his son thinks of him. He wants to be cool in the eyes of the man he raised. That matters to him.

So when he says "I'm Mary Poppins, y'all!" What he's saying is "My son thinks I'm cool!"

It's a great moment, and it works because it's a funny joke, and because everyone was on board with Yondu being vulnerable in that moment.

It's easy, when you're a kid, to view your parents as "adults," which are totally separate from you and your kid peers. But they aren't. They're just kids who grew up. Adults care about how they're seen. Not in the same ways, that's for sure. But they care. Yondu cares. He loves his son, even if he was never great at showing it. And, as he floats down with his Mary-Poppins-like wand in hand, he wants to know that his son loves him, too. He gets that confirmation, and it makes him so proud that he shouts it to everyone. "My son loves me, y'all."

Example 2.

In The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, when you defeat the final story boss, the giant monster made out of pure dark energy using a magical Deus Ex Machina Bow that Zelda herself beams down into your hands (it's bad; it's a bad boss fight, and I hate it), she appears before you for the first time in the game.

If you've been a good player, you've seen her in flashbacks. You've heard her speak to you telepathically. You've slowly regained your memories of how you met her. How you saved her life, back before you were the you are now. How you kept her safe while everyone around her died due to her weakness, and how that devastated her. How you, before you were the you controlled by you, and her, a hundred years before she was the her she is now, became close.

You've remembered who you were, and who she was, and now, a century later, which passed by for you like it was nothing and for her like it was a hundred years, she stands before you. She's everything you hoped she would be. She's a hundred and seventeen years old. The Seventh Sage, the leader of them all, with the Triforce of Wisdom. She held back the Calamity Ganon for 85% of her life, and now she can walk around again.

And she congratulates you on what you've done. She tells you what you, the player, want to hear, as her theme, Zelda's Lullaby, plays in the background. It's boilerplate. It's standard. It's powerful and official and regal.

"I've been keeping watch over you all this time. I've witnessed your struggles to return to us, as well as your trials in battle. I always thought, no, I always believed, that you would find a way to defeat Ganon. I never lost faith in you over these many years. Thank you, Link, the Hero of Hyrule."

Then the music cuts out. It's done. She's done. She's been the Sage who held back the Calamity for so long, but all of a sudden she's just a seventeen-year-old girl again, looking at a boy she likes, and she's afraid, and hopeful, and she needs to know something.

"May I ask… Do you really remember me?"

She's the strongest woman in the world, and she's vulnerable, right then. All of a sudden, none of what happened in the last hundred years matters except that Link lost his memory, and Zelda didn't, and she wants to know that he's regained it and that he knows who she is and who he was and who they were together, back before Link was you. She wants to know that, now that she can walk around and be a girl again, a literal child, that there's someone left in the world who cares about her as much as she cares about them.

Because, if not, what was it all for?

Saving the kingdom? Of course. That's her duty as the Sage. That's what she needed to do. But what she wanted to do, what kept her going, was thinking about seeing her sworn knight and protector once more. Now, here he is, and she isn't sure if he's the same guy or not.

I've written about moments like these before. I wrote about a couple in my Death Stranding essay from a few years back. I won't repeat it here, but I didn't emphasize it in the same way. Maybe it hadn't really clicked for me yet.

Characters need to be vulnerable for me to care about them. I don't want to give examples of characters who are never vulnerable, though I can think of a few.

A lot of movies try to make characters who are vulnerable for a few seconds at a time so we'll care about them. I don't care about that kind of thing, at least, not for the purposes of what I'm writing here.

I wanted to come up with two examples of a character very suddenly revealing vulnerability in a way that is deliberately shocking.

You don't have to share more with me. I think I've made the point I wanted to make, which is that it's pretty goddamn cool when stories do this kind of thing. It's a good thing to do in a story.

#ratralsis writing #text post #long post

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videogamevvizard · 2 years

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Kicking off this blog with a game that im currently replaying, Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. This games particularly close to me because it was one of the first Zelda games I've played. It was specifically the one on the 3DS, aka the one I'm replaying and the one I'll talk about.

SPOILERS FOR OCARINA OF TIME!!!!

I'm extremely biased to this game. Besides that i think its one of the best! The modeling for it is very good, the music is classic for the franchise, and its overall just amazing! I quite like the ocarina mechanic in the game it was a clever way to impliment stuff like fast traveling and solitions to simple puzzles. Another thing i liked gameplay wise was the combat mechanics, its very good. Simple enough to where someone who cant fight very (me) well can beat enemies up easy peasy while still being a fun challenge.

i mentioned the modling beforehand but it really is good especially for its time. I feel like the blockyness of it is a bonus and the textures used srent utterly eye burning like in the original GameCube one. The music as well is amazing and its nice to see how it became a staple to the franchise, as some of these songs are used today (i.e. Great fairy fountian, zoras domain, Lon Lon ranch, ect.) Its honestly beautiful, the work that went into composing and art for this game is amazing and i feel like its overlooked sometimes how amazing it really is. Some of the songs aren't so great though, like the Fire temples.

The plot itself is also very good and the way its paced is splended. I kind of wish we spent some more time in the child timeline but thats just a small issue. I quite liked the characters and the dungeons were amazing, my favorites dodongos canvern because funny cave and its the first one I beat by myself as a kid (I'm still very good at it). JABBU JABBU ON THE OTHER HAND. Difficult. I hate it so much its so confusing? Walls everywhere and mazes and everything looks the same I get very lost.

Anyway, the plot is that Link, a hylian living in the kokiri forest with the Kokiri kids, gets sent on an adventure to save hyrule from Ganon by the dying Great Deku tree. Hes sent by Zelda to go get some cool rocks and access the Temple of Light and aquire the master sword and get teleported to the future to defeat Ganon then by finding all the Sages and going on more funny adventures. Then hes sent to the kid timeline forever, in which the royal family just kicks Ganon out and Navi (the beloved and not at all annoying fairy companion) flies off giving way to the sequel (and my favorite game ever) Majoras Mask. Theres more details to the plot but these are the basics to it.

Something I don't like are some of the items and how they're blocked off depending on what timeline you're in. Let me use sticks as an adult please let me hit things with sticks. I get kid Link not handling a hammer and how its meant to block things off to help puzzles be harder but. The STICKS MAN. The sticks I wish to hold them.

So basically, I like this game a lot. 8/10 points taken because i hate that stupid whale jabbu jabbu fuck you jabbu jabbu. Anyhow, back to playing this game in class whichever chance I'm able to actually beat Ganons pig form.

#I ramble about a funny video game #loz #ocarina of time #video game

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trashlord-007 · 2 years

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I'm glad you have a sense of humor or at least realized that the killed a man question was supposed to be funny.

Lemme preface this by saying some of your questions about me I'm happy to answer, but others I'd like to leave until after the reveal if you'd still like them then. Gotta try and make it hard to identify me if you let curiosity get the better you.

Jongdae is a sweet man and deserves the world, I'm so happy for him getting the family he's wanted. Hopefully, we'll get a new album from him eventually. Did you have a favourite of his songs? Or a favourite bit of his from an exo song?

I do game a bit, although I've never played mass effect or far cry, I stick with the final fantasy and legend of Zelda franchises. Though assassin creed did catch my eye during the ff15 crossover event and I briefly contemplated playing it. I get the finding some semblance of peace actually...final fantasy 15 has a fishing option too though I'm more likely to pop that in and follow the storyline as I wander the world rather than fish. Same goes for Zelda really, I'm more of a start the game over and revisit the world and actions through the story line sort of person.

Problems are a valid creation lol. But gif making? That's a labour of love as far as I'm concerned, I've seen what goes into making gifs and gif makers have all of my respect for the work they do. Same goes for fic writers, fanartists, etc theres so much that goes into producing fan content and its amazing what people do for the things they enjoy.

What sort of things do you write? I'm afraid I haven't familiarized myself with your work. Do you have a favourite genre to write for? What about reading while we're talking about it?

Speaking of reading I squealed so loudly when I read the words gunslinger!!! That is one of my most favorite series ever in the history of ever. Please tell me you've read all of them. Lie if you must lol. Really though, "The man in black fled west across the desert and the gunslinger followed" is an epic opening line and it gives me chills even just typing it out. And don't get me started on when Jake told Roland "Go then, there are other worlds than these." And then purposefully fell. One act that sent Roland on his path to further redemption. The whole series is a masterpiece truly.

You said horror and scifi....I'm not much for horror, but some sci-fi I can do. I generally stick with fantasy and comedy and dramas tbh when I consume media. But there are a few notable exceptions namely the three star franchises...Stargate, Star Trek, and Star Wars. Also Doctor Who...not that my brain equates the doctor with sci-fi lol. Though some are more familiar to me than others. What sort of sci-fi are you into?

Uh most watched YouTube? Well my go to channels are nate the hoof guy and north of the border. I tend to stick them on as background noise since they're easy to follow along with without having to actually pay attention. I do listen to music sometimes when I create though when i do its whatever helps me concentrate best at that moment. Sometimes it's something wordless so I can just immerse myself in whatever I'm working on, or it's a certain song on repeat that I can fade into if that makes sense.

Best part of fandom is its people tbh. As for what I like to create....edits, moodboards, fic, eventually I'd like to try my hand at videos and sound mixing there's a few mash-ups on YouTube that are so cool. I also like to create food, and I love to fingerpaint. I absolutely suck at it but it's fun and messy and a great way to relax, I highly recommend it!

Speaking of creating, I'm not sure what I'll have the time for gift creation wise so how about you give me a few suggestions for themes for the edits or the moodboards, ( I can also do icons/headers/lockscreens) and maybe what you'd be looking for in a fic? Au?, type(angst,fluff,slice of life etc)? member?, that sort of thing.

Now for a a few new questions.... do you have any blog recommendations on here? People you enjoy interacting with or content creators whose work you enjoy. How about exo fanarts or artists? Do you enjoy those? Do you have any favorites?

I like to think I have a sense of humour!

hehe, I can respect that. I promise I won't search for you prematurely but feel free to ignore any/all questions you don't wish to answer!

Jongdae does indeed deserve the world! he's so lucky, too, to be blessed with not just one child but two! My favourite song of his is definitely Good Night! So, so beautiful T_T and definitely one of my favourite songs of all time.

oh heck yeah!! FF and LOZ! I have a FF on my shelf to play but haven't gotten around to it (I have many brand new games on my shelf that still need to be unwrapped, I'm so behind >.<). I don't have a Switch so I haven't played BotW but it sure does look fantastic. I think my last LOZ game was... A Link to the Past on GBA... no, nevermind, I just checked and I had Phantom Hourglass too. But my favourite was Wind Waker on GameCube!!

I'm hoping they remaster the first AC! To me, in my personal opinion, not confirmed (I'm just hoping!!) they kinda hinted that maybe they would?? at Ubisoft Connect this year! so I'm really hoping!! because I never actually finished it T_T I got pretty much to the end, too. Le sigh. I'm so close! But I lost my original save files on one of my earlier consoles >.<

I'm hesitant to replay older games because everyone is doing remasters or remakes these days! I bought the DLC for the Mass Effect games a few months before the remaster was announced with all the DLC included lmfao

I started playing FC6 again the other night (never finished it, oops) and my first achievement of the night was for catching fish so I think it's safe to say I'm obsessed with that mechanic haaaa.

I get that! I like to replay games for the story, too. Sometimes I even lower the difficulty if I'm in a mood to experience the story rather than the gameplay. That way I can finish it quicker! And I won't do 100% completion runs (like checking every planet in ME).

Playing through your favourite games is self-care! -- me, who is spending all my time gaming lately instead of being on here and responding to you in a timely manner (sorry!!).

It really is! I always knew it was hard to do but my God, I didn't realise the true extent of it. GIF creators are amazing. And you're so write!! Anyone making fan content is perfect, talented, and lovely. So wonderful, truly.

That's fine and also please DO NOT feel like you have to! You needn't read any of my fics!

I mainly write... well, I was going to say smut and yandere but my fluff masterlist is the longest so I definitely sneak those in quite often. My favourite genres to write for are the same as the ones I read! I know some people don't like to mix business with pleasure, but I love writing horror and sci-fi! Though I will admit I haven't written space-based sci-fi yet. And if a book or fic is sci-fi or horror, I will try it out. If it's a sci-fi horror or just based in space?? I WILL read it there and then!

OH HELL YES!! Another Dark Tower fan!! Dude, it's freaking PERFECT! You even quoted my favourite line T_T While it does have one of the best opening lines in the history of ever, Jake's "Go then, there are other worlds than these" really just punches me in the gut every time I think about it!! King really outdid himself with that series, my God. The Gunslinger will probably always be my favourite but I'm enjoying every book so far!

But, ahem, I'm still on the fourth book! I miss Blaine the Train T_T he was so much fun! I'm currently finishing Paolini's To Sleep In A Sea of Stars and then I will be go back to listening to Wizard and Glass!

Yes, I love me so good horror! I used to be, hmm, opposed to horror films because every year my birthday was overshadowed with Halloween (lol, don't judge me, I'm opening up here), but now I love them (and Halloween) so much!! And sci-fi... to vaguely quote Markiplier, "I'd sign up on a mission to space even if I knew 100% I would die".

I also don't really think of Doctor Who as sci-fi even though it is! haha, funny. I love the original 6 Star Wars films! I named my kitty cat after Anakin! I haven't watched the new ones yet tho. And, haha, I watched the original Star Trek series after watching the new films. So great, so classic!! I named a kitty cat after Cumberbatch's Khan, too. I never watched much Stargate aside from the original film.

I enjoy any sci-fi that is based in space! Interstellar is my favourite film right now~ and it used to be Avatar which is getting its second film soon!! I told myself I don't even like Avatar that much anymore and then watched the trailer and BOOM obsessed once more haha!

I don't know Nate the Hoof Guy or North of the Border. What type of content do they make? If I had to pick individual channels I like then I would go with Slogo and Markiplier (gaming) and Nick Crowley and Watcher (horror/paranormal investigations/stories etc).

What kind of music do you listen to when you create? Do you have any specific songs/playlists rn? and yes, that makes perfect sense! I like to repeat / loop music when I write, too.

Wow! You're a jack of all trades! that's so cool T_T edits and moodboards require such skill and talent and an eye for design. I also want to try out audio mixing. I make youtube videos occasionally so it would be fun to learn! You cook?? omg, you really are so !!! you know??? I can't cook, like, at all. Finger painting...? I think I'd be too OCD to do it T_T I freak out a little when my hands get dirty haha. I've been better about it lately but I had an episode the other day--- why am I talking about this? lol, I always ramble T_T

No worries at all~ don't stress yourself out over the gift. It's not a big deal! For edits and moodboards, my go-to request is always Jongdae and thunderstorms! For fics... I don't read for Jongdae but if it's platonic then I would! or a Baekhyun fic~ Anything genre wise except angst and MCD.

Honestly, anything you come up with will be perfect! <3

Blog recommendations... I'm assuming EXO-Ls?

@merinaart does the most amazing artwork ever! my favourite artist on the site tbh! @mel-loves-all is one of the sweetest people ever and she used to host this event! @myeoning-call makes some really amazing content, too! and she was my first giftee <3 and @your-sophie18 is my new friend, oml, love her + she tags me in cool things about EXO <3 such a real one. Then I can't forget my lovely @achenlove who made me the cutest little Chen drawing last year T_T I still cherish it!

oh,.. I kinda included the CCs I like to interact with ^ up there. I don't really interact with people that aren't moots very often, and when I do it's just to reblog and leave feedback on fics. I'm not very outgoing like that! hmm... how about you tell me some CCs you like and I'll check them out? or blog recs in general!

Hope you're well and sorry again for the delay! sometimes I just... eh, it doesn't matter. Always have some kind of excuse.

Sending you love and wishing you the best! <3

#long post #exo secret santa #such a sweetheart #much love to you!

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