I played lots of The Legend of Zelda when I was a kid, mostly the old GameBoy ones (which are, of course, the best). When their focus moved to fancy 3D console games, keeping up became more effort than it was worth, so it dropped off my radar for a while. This summer, I suddenly realized that let’s plays exist, so I decided to catch up on how the franchise has evolved since. I noticed some interesting things, which I believe can tell us something about how we view power fantasies, and how video games factor into that.
I watched the games roughly in release order, with some gaps: Majora’s Mask, The Wind Waker, Twilight Princess, Skyward Sword, then A Link Between Worlds. I refreshed my memory on A Link to the Past while comparing it to A Link Between Worlds, and only after all this did I go back and look at Ocarina of Time, which I played a lifetime ago but got stuck on after the childhood arc. (I have been ignoring the Wind Waker sequels because I want to play them myself, so maybe they’re doing something right, but given that they tried to continue the story whose central theme was “it’s over everybody go home and this time we mean it”, I don’t have high hopes.) I believe this order was important, and, in particular, I think it was through this stark return to an early entry that I noticed a certain dissonance.
The popular opinion of the fandom seems to be that Ocarina codified everything and became the face of the series, to the point that everything after is at worst a transparent imitation and at best only building off the existing framework. Maybe this is true for gameplay, I don’t know, but it certainly isn’t true for writing. There is, in fact, a sharp divide almost perfectly in the middle of the series that reflects a radical shift in tone. Everything before The Wind Waker is very dark and serious, as in “everyone you know and love is dead and we’re going to grind your hero into the dirt” dark. The Wind Waker itself suddenly veers to a different direction: lighthearted, comedic, and slightly absurd, but still containing serious themes that reexamine the standard Zelda plot. Everything after that proceeds to light itself on fire and jump off a cliff. (The reason for this is, unsurprisingly, because the old writers got moved to other departments.) There are probably quite a few metrics we could use to examine why and how, but I think it is most pertinent here, in this franchise that dresses itself up in the imagery of legend and mythology, to look at the Hero’s Journey.
Act talked about the Hero’s Journey when she concluded Unlimited Blade Works. While I have not read The Hero With a Thousand Faces, I have taken high school English, so I am familiar with the journey paradigm itself. Here it is:
In her analysis, Act argued that death and rebirth is the most important part of the journey, and was disappointed by the hero of UBW because he failed to follow through with that step. I am inclined to agree, and over the course of the let’s plays, I came to realize that my disappointment with Zelda boils down to the exact same problem. Post The Wind Waker, Link is invincible. He never faces any true consequences for his actions, and any setbacks he experiences are short-lived fakeout scares rather than real, lasting obstacles. Sure, the stories pay lip service to the Death, but they lack the true sting that forces the hero to reinvent themselves: In Twilight Princess he and his partner are afflicted by a curse that can only be broken by getting a weapon upgrade fifteen minutes later, oh woe is him! In Skyward Sword he has to have an epic final boss fight instead of beating the villain in a cutscene, oh the horror! In A Link Between Worlds he…actually I don’t think they even bother in that one. (If anything it’s the villain who goes through Death and Rebirth.) Even in The Wind Waker his “low point” is pretty meh, and it’s Zelda who bears the brunt of it. That’s another common theme here: bad stuff still happens, but it happens to peripheral characters so that you can feel good about swooping in to save them; the hero himself can shrug anything off. While you can map the first half of the Hero’s Journey to Link pretty easily, it slams to a halt at the Death. In short, he is perfect: a Mary Sue. At first I didn’t think much of this – after all, the games are obvious power fantasies and don’t claim to be anything else. Boring Mary Sues are a dime a dozen in video games, since so many video games are power fantasies and Mary Sues are an obvious fit for the genre. I was prepared to simply roll my eyes and move on with my life…
But then I half-remembered-half-discovered that things used to be quite different.
I think the most apt example here, in fact one that practically begs for a scene-by-scene comparison, is A Link Between Worlds. It’s a self-indulgent nostalgia trip ah, “callback” to A Link to the Past – the world map is almost identical, and the plot, in broad strokes, is the same. But what the writers forget is that the devil’s in the details.
Let’s begin before the beginning. If you linger on the title screen of A Link to the Past, you get treated to a quite elaborate cutscene covering the backstory and setup.
Before the story even begins, it makes sure to establish a clear tone and atmosphere: one of fear and desperation. This is not some vague, looming threat that the hero will nip in the bud. Evil has, for all intents and purposes, already won.
A Link Between Worlds does something similar, but the tone is very different. Where the original was dark and fearful, this one is triumphant and empowering. Rather than a bloody war, the focus is on a singular hero defeating the enemy, and it ends with bland fantasy cliche salad rather than clearly establishing the current state of the world.
On to the opening, where we can see that right from the start there’s a significant difference:
Continuing the tension established in the preview, we open with a cry for help. Zelda is in immediate danger and must be rescued, and something horrible has already happened to the other MacGuffin girls. Despite the fantastic element of the telepathy, I feel this is a very grounded and human opening. You are being asked for help directly, you know exactly what you have to do, and you have to do it fast. Tension and motivation are both established quite efficiently.
Once again, Worlds abandons this in favor of safe cliche. We open with vague prophetic dreams, but they’re an empty threat – unlike in Ocarina they never specifically come to pass, so I presume they exist only to establish that Link is ~special~. We then go through the standard wake up routine, and Link is established to have a pretty cushy life and a nice adoptive family. While the orphan route is admittedly pretty worn-out, this doesn’t really improve things. The only way to feel tension here is by creating it yourself and waiting for the other shoe to drop. It never really does, though, so you’ll only be left with confusion and disappointment.
The moment you step outside, you’ll see the pathetic fallacy in play. Past opens with a dark stormy night. Worlds opens with a bright sunny day.
In both games, you start powerless, without the iconic sword. In Worlds, this is just to prevent you from going off the rails, but in Past it contributes to the sense of fear, as you have to go through a bit of a stealth sequence to avoid the castle guards. When you do get your equipment, you have to loot it off your surrogate father’s corpse.
Here, the sword is just kind of…there. Actually getting it is almost comedic, even. The captain only suffers a PG death and ultimately turns out fine despite your failure to deliver it or stop the villain. The uncle’s death in Past hangs a cloud of mortality over the game, but here everything feels very safe.
This is actually one point where Worlds is bleaker, in that you fail to save the day in the prologue mission. But I still don’t feel any stakes – I know I’ll be rescuing the MacGuffin girl eventually, and, to be frank, it’s hard to get attached to so bland a character, especially because we only see her for less than a minute. The fact that the villain doesn’t bother to finish you off also really undercuts any tension this tries to build. It sends the message that while Link may be fallible, he’s also immortal.
(Also wow, the maidens in Past may have been nothing more than living MacGuffins, but at least they weren’t literally objectified. What the heck, game.)
In Past you meet Zelda in a dungeon and must fight for your life both to rescue her and get her to safety. Though you do succeed, it is a tense peace: this is the one bastion of hope in a world gone mad. Zelda also explains that all those soldiers you killed to get to her were just being mind-controlled by the villain, so congrats on murdering innocents, hero.
In Worlds, her castle is bright and cheery. You walk right up to her and get free stuff because she just knows you’re ~special~.
The castle does go bad soon after, which might have worked to create tension if the writers didn’t fumble it by showing that the villain only gets around to attacking Zelda by the time I break the seal.
Then – oh hey, we’re fighting the villain early, that’s pretty cool! After the battle he finally uses his one-hit-kill attack on Link. Oh no, however will he get out of this one???
Oh. A deus ex machina that gives him even more power. Of course.
After that, in both games you collect the MacGuffins and grab the magic hero sword of specialness. You’re strong and awesome and ready to beat the bad guy! You probably feel pretty good about that, huh? Well, we can’t have that.
First your charge is captured, and you can only listen helplessly because you’re on the other side of the country.
Then your sanctuary is breached, and your ally dies.
Then you fail to protect your charge, again.
All you have left is vengeance, and then you don’t even have that.
Then you’re trapped in a scary otherworld, where you’re a defenseless bunny until you find a magic charm (carrying the implication that all the monsters are people too, you murderer). That’ll teach you to feel hope.
And that is how the first act of A Link to the Past ends: you may have a shiny new sword, but you’re a pathetic failure alone in a frightening new world. You can’t even really appreciate the sword, since enemies are way tougher in the dark world. It’s a true Death and Rebirth, pushing the hero to his lowest point and forcing him to claw his way back up. (On a literary level the transformation works very well with this, though sadly I had to perform some sleight-of-screenshots; the standard gameplay sequence pushes you to get the protective charm before the Agahnim battle. I think that’s a lost opportunity.)
So! That’s a pretty shocking and striking sequence, I thought. Surely, with all this talk of callbacks and nostalgia, the sequel will try to top it, I thought.
Hahaha no, they don’t even try. Everything’s fine, presumably because tension and consequence would get in the way of us feeling awesome about our sword upgrade. The villain is all bark and no bite. I also believe that following Yuga voluntarily sends a different tone than Agahnim teleporting your forcefully; in one you have the power to make a conscious decision, while in the other you have your agency forcibly taken from you. It’s minor, but, as I said, the devil’s in the details.
From there you rescue the MacGuffin kids. In Worlds you get another ally to give you hints and tell you where to go, in Past you just get an initial infodump and then you’re on your own. Worlds does do one thing right in that it gives the sages actual personality and allows you to meet them before they’re captured, but undercuts itself by making their characters too bland and generic to really care about. It all feels very token.
In Past they tell you a bit about the backstory and open the way to the final dungeon, while in Worlds they just give you the Triforce of Courage for no apparent reason. I think that’s an important difference: In Past their aid is more cerebral and their ultimate contribution is to give you a fighting chance, nothing more or less; in Worlds they exist to appease your inner magpie by giving you yet another shiny thing you don’t really need. And, maybe this is just me, but I felt that the theme of rescuing people and gathering allies worked a lot better thematically in Past‘s atmosphere of fear and aloneness.
There is the matter of Past Link having super-special bloodline powers. I do find it grating as I find all bloodline stuff, but I think it works alright in context. This is very subjective, but I don’t actually mind powerful protagonists in and of themselves. Though we complain about Mary Sues and boring invincible protagonists, it is their power level relative to the challenges they face that is important, not their absolute strength. A level 20 paladin fighting level 2 goblins is a dull and foregone conclusion; a level 20 paladin fighting level 20+ demigods is an exciting and high-stakes adventure. Past‘s story establishes that this is a difficult and bittersweet story where the hero can’t always succeed, and for that reason I’m willing to let it slide. Link clearly needs all the help he can get, and if bloodline magic is the only reason he’s survived this long then so be it. His being the last of the line also raises the stakes, since if he fails no one can replace him to oppose the bad guys. Yes, “it’s all up to you” is ego-stroking cliche too, but I think the context makes it a bit more tolerable.
Both games end with Link using the Triforce to magically fix everything. (This is not evidence he’s the specialest most wonderfulest in Past, I would like to point out! The manual of Past clearly states that the Triforce doesn’t judge people; the imbalanced virtue defense mechanism was a later retcon.) It’s cheap and atomizes that sense of tension and consequence I loved so much, but in Past he earned it, goshdarnit. (It’s also the first time in the series the Triforce is actually used, so at the time it could conceivably have been a surprise.) In Worlds it just feels like the writers trying to write themselves out of a corner, and it also gets mixed with some bizarre stuff that might have been interesting if they hadn’t decided to cram the entire plot into the last scene. (It also includes a very special lesson about how the universe hates you and trying to be proactive and solve societal problems will blow up in your face, BEEP BOOP ALL HAIL THE STATUS QUO. Screw you, game.)
Despite the attempt to hearken back to the good old days, the two games are as different as night and day, and I for one am disappointed by the change. On a purely literary level, a Journey without a Death stage is simply boring, but that alone is a petty criticism – art doesn’t have to be deep and meaningful all the time. But by the same token, art shouldn’t always be mindless, pandering, ego-stroking fluff either, and I’m a bit concerned about what happens when it is. We talk a lot here about the psychological impact that art has on people, and I can’t help but wonder if this trend towards extreme power fantasy is distorting our views of morality and heroism. Did you know, for instance, that TV Tropes unironically shoehorns Link into the same saint-like character archetype as Vash and Steven Universe? The justification appears to be that he’s so very helpful to all the NPCs who advance the plot and give him shinies, therefore he is a shining beacon of goodness who loves everyone unconditionally. Except… well, am I the only one who notices the central gameplay mechanic of an action game? Zelda doesn’t even do that thing where the game takes pains to absolve you of guilt by saying the enemies aren’t sapient; the zoras, moblins, dark knights, and main villains very definitely are. But apparently people are willing to overlook that in the face of a few token lines insisting you are totally the good guy; a violent, unrepentant murderer can now be, in the eyes of public opinion, an “all-loving hero”.
I’ve heard some theorists equate power fantasies to a drug. Individualist societies tell you that you are special and perfect and entitled to everything, especially if you’re a white cis male. But of course that’s not how reality works. The world isn’t going to hand everything to you on a silver platter; you are only a speck in a sea of seven billion people all struggling with the same sense of specialness and self-worth. Power fantasies are a way to escape by experiencing something that upholds the comforting narrative – look, the game says, we’ll give you the favor of the dark gods too; we’ll make all the women throw themselves at your feet; here’s the opportunity to beat the demon king, even God couldn’t do that! See, you are special! And that’s perfectly fine… provided you recognize it for what it is. But if the narrative takes root and you see it as reality, even if only on a subconscious level, you’ll hate reality for straying from the narrative. You’ll demand that the world change itself to serve your desires, rather than realizing that sometimes you have to change to accommodate the rest of the world (oh hi Gamergate). Like any drug, you’ll build up a tolerance, so the narratives have to become more absurd, more over-the-top, more here’s-the-world-on-a-silver-platter. It’s a vicious cycle that results in this Flanderization and soulless streamlining of the narrative, and everyone walks away disappointed. The hero cannot fail, cannot be questioned, cannot have moments of weakness; because that would force us to reflect upon ourselves, and obviously no one looks at art for that, right? Tell, don’t show.
This leads to a bizarre conflation of the ancient and modern definitions of heroism. We want power, obviously, and that’s enough for some (as evidenced by the popularity of mindless shooters and fighters), but we also want validation and love. We want to be told we’re a good person. Such a wonderful, idealistic goal in theory… but we also don’t want to work for it. So, like power and shinies, we are handed virtue without effort or consequence, and therefore without meaning. But moreover, you never get that virtue alone, because these story-based videogames are built on a pre-existing framework. The virtuous hero must therefore coexist with our desire for competition, adrenaline, and self-interest, regardless of how paradoxical that is: he must be a saint and one-man army both.
I think the weirdest part is that, on some level, players seem to understand this. The general rejection of modernity and idolization of retro can often be attributed to rose-tinted glasses, but I don’t think that’s always the case. As I said, I just watched all these Zelda games back-to-back as an adult, and I can say with certainty that the early ones are far superior to their successors. Some of that was definitely the gameplay – even from my vantage point, I could clearly tell how things devolved from actual puzzles to “use Item on Obvious Item Receptacle” – but I think the writing is what really sold it. Perhaps the love for Ocarina of Time and A Link to the Past is just nostalgia or fun factor… but there’s clearly a reason why grown adults can replay Majora’s Mask and still think it’s the best thing ever, and it’s certainly not for the sloppy, tedious, repetitive gameplay. I think it’s for the writing: the very human, down-to-earth story that bucks the Hero’s Journey model entirely and presents Link as an ordinary guy who has to work for his victories.
But other, more talented people than me have already written entire articles about Majora’s Mask, so instead I’m going to end by talking about Link’s Awakening, the first Zelda game I played. Like in Majora’s Mask, Link is an outsider: no one special. Like in A Link to the Past, you start powerless and must navigate a treacherous area before getting the iconic sword (and like in both, you have to actively work for your ultimate sword upgrade and won’t get it handed to you by the plot). But unlike either, it provides a truly interesting moral quandary in its story that forces you to question your actions: Link is told that he inhabits a dream world made real, and the only way to escape is to wake up the sleeper – which will, of course, make the island and its inhabitants disappear forever. You can’t take your heroism for granted here; you must grapple with the fact that you’re willing to potentially murder an entire populace for the sake of your own personal goals. Though it is easy to rationalize the quandary away by concluding the island’s inhabitants aren’t really alive, you have to make that step yourself. Frustratingly, this is idle philosophizing that trails off without a satisfying conclusion, but the writer was clearly trying for something different, and I’d like to believe it sparked thought and conversation in the kids who played it. That’s the kind of story I want to see more of. I do want to be a hero, and a good person, but I want that to have meaning. I want to improve, not be told I don’t have flaws to begin with. I want my power fantasies to be conversations I can take with me into reality, not phantasms I can use to feed my delusions. I want to earn it.
And I think the other gamers do too. The early Zelda games show it can be done. So do it, games industry. Be responsible artists, and rake in the cash. Everybody wins.
Brief nitpick (as in a correction to an error that doesn’t detract from the point of the article): in Link to the Past you don’t run into enemies that can hurt you until after getting the sword from Link’s Uncle – all the guards you see along the way just block you from straying off course. You may have the event mixed up with the Forsaken Fortress sequence in Wind Waker.
Lots of good points all around. I replayed Twilight Princess last month, and the only time Link gets more than just inconvenienced is an hour in, when his friends are captured, himself dragged into the Twilight and turned into a wolf and imprisoned. But that’s the start of the adventure, which makes it as much of a Death as starting an Elder Scrolls game as a prisoner on death’s row (very probably not much). Any serious setbacks throughout the rest of the game happen to other people.
Also, Twilight Princess had everyone from the village crowing about how awesome Link is, which is a little too on the nose… much like the rest of the game, in many ways (let’s change the music when the boss is weakened to signal it’s time to hack at it with a sword!).
in Link to the Past you don’t run into enemies that can hurt you until after getting the sword from Link’s Uncle – all the guards you see along the way just block you from straying off course.
Huh, really? Didn’t realize that. I guess Agahnim was willing to reign in his guard dogs. Still, I think the fact that I misremember that speaks to the power of powerlessness. Link still feels very helpless during that sequence, even if there isn’t actual teeth behind it.
I replayed Twilight Princess last month, and the only time Link gets more than just inconvenienced is an hour in, when his friends are captured, himself dragged into the Twilight and turned into a wolf and imprisoned.
I wouldn’t even count this, since he gets bailed out almost immediately. If anything it actually helps him in the long run, since it gets him allies in the form of Zelda and Midna! Like I said, the focus is solidly on how it affects other people; Link can’t be held down by anything.
Also, Twilight Princess had everyone from the village crowing about how awesome Link is, which is a little too on the nose…
Personally, the thing that made me lose it in TP was the part where Link got the favor of the Twilight Realm gods too while Midna coos about he’s a true Chosen One. Just, dear gods, do they even look at what they write? They were really pulling out all the stops in Mary Sue Bingo!
Any serious setbacks throughout the rest of the game happen to other people.
Yep, and unlike in LttP or OOT, they are merely setbacks, nothing that causes permanent damage that could cause you to feel bad about yourself. Something I didn’t include in the post itself but probably should have is this Awkward Zombie comic. Look what the caption says: “Ridley is kind of the only Nintendo villain who’s ever done anything really awful — Bowser’s a jerk and Ganondorf tends to make everyone anxious for a while, but both are still probably easily forgiven.” From what I’ve seen of the Zelda fandom, that opinion seems pretty widespread, but like… am I the only one who remembers the part where he murdered the king and burned Hyrule to the ground in OOT? And that’s not even a full list — he also killed the closest thing Link had to a parent, which is the exact crime the cartoonist thinks Ridley is so horrible for! Ganondorf used to be a legitimately threatening villain, but because villains can no longer succeed at anything, he’s become a toothless little woobie like everyone else. It’s kind of amazing how quickly his image was overwritten in the public consciousness.
“am I the only one who remembers the part where he murdered the king and burned Hyrule to the ground in OOT?”
The king is a non-character in nearly every Zelda game, and burning Hyrule Castle Town loses its impact once you realize everyone you could talk to moved to Kakariko. And there’s a difference between having an enemy killed (what Ganon/Agahnim did to Link’s Uncle) and massacring innocents (what Ridley’s done in the backstory of Metroid).
The thing with Ganondorf, I guess, is that after Wind Waker portrayed him with a bit of sympathy and the following games showed him as someone more stuck in his role by the fates (barely appears in Twilight Princess, revealed to be empowered by a curse from Demise against Hylia’s people in Skyward Sword, summoned by and merged to Yuga in Worlds)… well. He’s not on Bowser’s level, because the Zelda team knows he wouldn’t mix well with humor, but his image is more on the level of Dr. Doom in the comics.
after Wind Waker portrayed him with a bit of sympathy and the following games showed him as someone more stuck in his role by the fates
I really wish they’d make up their mind on this. If he’s a plaything of fate, then he’s not the real enemy, fate is. I actually felt really bad for him in Wind Waker, to the point that I actually wanted him to succeed. If we’ve established that he’s not going to kill everyone, well… the Hylian dynasty is clearly incompetent, so would things really be worse with him in charge? It’s getting increasingly awkward how the games stubbornly insist that he is both an irredeemable villain deserving to be killed and a sympathetic victim of fate with no real agency or power. You can’t have it both ways!
Him being turned into a living MacGuffin in Worlds was great, though! Subverting expectations by placing legacy characters in unusual roles is always excellent. I’d love to see a full roleswap (hero Zelda, villain Link, damsel Ganon), but there’s no way the writers have the guts to try something like that.
Well, we did have hero Zelda in the CD-i games, but apparently they were awful, so… :-P
Wasn’t Link the damsel in those, though, and Ganon was still the villain? So it’s not a full roleswap. Honestly, I mainly just want villain Link, to knock him down a peg. But that would require acknowledging the image they’ve cultivated might be kind of unhealthy, and we can’t have that now can we.
You know, I can’t even remember if Link was actually turned into the damsel? But yeah, that was a completely tongue-in-cheek suggestion. :-P
Perhaps you’d be more satisfied with a game that juxtaposed the current sanitization of violence and general naiveté with the inherent difficulties in such a struggle? Perhaps by having Link act as wide-eyed kid, all innocence and “I’m gonna be a hero!”, even while the game subtly (at least at first) underlines how his actions aren’t that heroic?
Eh, just an idea. I can’t really talk about the plot in “Zelda” games, I only played the first two and, well, their plots were basically fairy-tale stuff, only even simpler. :-)
Perhaps you’d be more satisfied with a game that juxtaposed the current sanitization of violence and general naiveté with the inherent difficulties in such a struggle? Perhaps by having Link act as wide-eyed kid, all innocence and “I’m gonna be a hero!”, even while the game subtly (at least at first) underlines how his actions aren’t that heroic?
Eh, it’s been done. Personally, I prefer games that allow you to genuinely be a hero instead of just telling you you suck. I’d prefer something like Majora’s Mask, where you actually have to work for your heroism — though criticizing the hero narrative would also be a plus.
Yeah, I played that one. :-)
I don’t think there’s anything inherently wrong with the hero narrative. It’s the execution that’s often simplistic (as opposed to merely simple; simple can still be good), poorly thought-out or, worse, actively repugnant.
As a person who has grown up with Zelda games (Link’s Awakening my first) and I agree the writing has all gone downhill since Wind Waker, especially with the villains. Twilight Princess has the unique honor of taking a villain who’s more scary and proactive than Agahnim and turning him into a complete joke by his next appearance.
This side by side analysis of Past and its remake Worlds does a good job of showing how the Zelda narrative has changed over the years. Though I must say there is one thing about World’s narrative that I really liked. The fast travel in Worlds is handled by calling a Maple from Oracle games expy who picks you up while saying a tsundere line. I didn’t think much of her at first but after she gets kidnapped and you use the fast travel service, just the broom shows up and you get “…”. It made me sad and I realized I missed her. I went into each dungeon hoping to rescue her and not see “…” every time I fast travel. I was really happy when I rescued her. Then of course I was slightly disappointed when after I rescued her she stays in the Orcarina of Time sage chamber and her line is delivered telepathically.
I’m not sure why the writing of the Zelda series has gotten to this point when Nintendo clearly has good writers working for them (Fire Emblem, Xenoblade, Kid Icarus Uprising, etc.). Though I do think Hyrule Warriors has a pretty good story by Zelda standards.
I agree the writing has all gone downhill since Wind Waker, especially with the villains.
Gods, Wind Waker was so promising. As much as I love the atmosphere of the early games, the plots themselves were still just unimaginative fantasy cliche (complete with the uncomfortable elements like aristocracy worship). WW really took a critical look at the formula and came up with a lot of interesting, novel ideas, and I wouldn’t have minded at all if it set the tone for the rest of the series. But after that they just went straight back to cliche, sans the atmosphere that made it all tolerable. (Coincidentally, Wind Waker is the last game Yoshiaki Koizumi had anything to do with. Given that he wrote the story for Awakening and a lot of the NPC dialogue in Majora’s Mask, I suspect that might be an important factor. It looks like he got shuffled into Donkey Kong and Mario, so maybe take a look at those.)
Though I must say there is one thing about World’s narrative that I really liked.
Yes, I took notice of that as well. Like I said about giving the sages personality in general, it’s good in theory but requires you actually have the characterization to back it up. I was briefly surprised when I saw she went missing and definitely felt a loss, but because she’s so flat it wasn’t really enough. And yeah, having them stay in the chamber really undercut the whole rescuing thing, especially with Gulley. “What’s that, you found our beloved son but he still can’t come home and you can’t show him to us? Whatever, I’m sure whatever he’s doing must be very important and you definitely aren’t lying to us, ALL OUR PROBLEMS ARE SOLVED FOREVER.” In Irene’s case, I think it might have had more oomph if you couldn’t fast travel at all without her, but that might have just been frustrating or cheap.
(Meanwhile, Zelda and Link’s reunion in OOT actually made me cry. This shouldn’t be surprising, since it’s really easy to get emotional torque out of a situation like that. They just didn’t try.)
Though I do think Hyrule Warriors has a pretty good story by Zelda standards.
…Really? Even if it does, I’m not touching it; I took one look at the premise and now I’m desperately trying to pretend it doesn’t exist.
“Coincidentally, Wind Waker is the last game Yoshiaki Koizumi had anything to do with”
Is that so? That would explain a lot regarding the writing of the series. Although if you’re looking for story in Donkey Kong or Mario the closest thing you’re going to get outside the RPGs is the Rosalina’s storybook in Galaxy. Of course if you are looking at the RPGs, I think the Paper Mario series has the strongest among them. I’d be curious to see how those hold up to your analysis
“Even if it does, I’m not touching it; I took one look at the premise and now I’m desperately trying to pretend it doesn’t exist.”
Oh that’s kind of a shame. Though you’re not missing much anyway. Like I said its good by Zelda standards so the story is better than TP and SS but not better than WW, OoT, or MM. It contains a lot of fanservice (not just Cia’s outfit). So I hope that means that the next Zelda will either have a more simple story or a different story because of what Hyrule Warriors’ story is.
Rosalina’s storybook in Galaxy
According to Wikipedia, that’s exactly what his contribution was. But yeah, it’s a real shame that his writing talent is being wasted on such plotless franchises.
Of course if you are looking at the RPGs, I think the Paper Mario series has the strongest among them. I’d be curious to see how those hold up to your analysis.
I actually would like to try them, but, you know, money. When I was young one of my friends had Super Paper Mario and let me play a little, and that looked really fun.
“That’s exactly what his contribution was.”
Well that explains that then. It is indeed a great loss his writing talents aren’t at least being used for the RPGs. If Sticker Star is any indication, some good writing talent is needed really badly.
“Super Paper Mario… looked really fun.”
It is fun and its the most story focused of the Paper Mario games. Its a story about love, and this is coming from a person who doesn’t read or like many love stories, I think it is a good one.
If you just want to enjoy the stories of the Paper Mario games, there is no shortage of good let’s plays out there. I personally suggest Chuggaconroy’s let’s play if you want a thorough 100% let’s play or if you want to see someone go blind with a fun (and incredibly perverted) sense of humor, I recommend Luchajin. She’s a blast.
Speaking as someone who has sunk hours into Hyrule Warriors, its plot is not very good. At its best it’s fanfic-caliber (Play as Ganondorf! Try to make sense of Zant! Give Link a character failing that falls apart when you realize how the average Warriors mission looks from the playable character’s point of view!), and everything involving Lana and especially Cia is awful.
everything involving Lana and especially Cia is awful.
I read spoilers for that and wow. Woooow. Why do writers have so many issues with women? I always thought the Zelda franchise was relatively decent on that front and then they pull this crap. Ugh.
And I’m pretty sure Hyrule Warriors actually is fanfic? It was co-produced with another studio, wasn’t it?
“And I’m pretty sure Hyrule Warriors actually is fanfic? It was co-produced with another studio, wasn’t it?”
It was co-produced with Koei-Tecmo (whichever team is in that company that makes the Dynasty Warriors games) and has Team Ninja’s involvement on some level, yeah. Judging by the Direct that focused on the game, Aonuma’s involvement was mostly “add this cool thing from the games, and this one, and this one”.
Isn’t Team Ninja the one behind the “Dead or Alive” volleyball series? The ones who thought a scene of Samus being shot in the back and apparently dying should be “acted” as if she was having an orgasm?
Right on both counts.
Just to be sure, I checked on Wikipedia, and they state:
“Along with Omega Force, the main developers for the Dynasty Warriors series, Hayashi and Koinuma brought in help from Team Ninja, who had developed the Dead or Alive series, to help more with one-on-one combat and inject new ideas into the development process.”
So one could safely blame Team Ninja for Cia… not that Omega Force hasn’t indulged in fanservicey outfits for the female Warriors in their games.
Oh, I wouldn’t blame it on them, at least not entirely. On the contrary: I think people invited them to work on the game knowing they’d bring their special brand of “fanservice”.
“its plot is not very good.”
Like I said, good by Zelda standards, and by Zelda standards I mean “Baby’s first fairy tale”. The plot isn’t extraordinary but it isn’t a mess like TP and SS. Its fanfiction but it knows it and tries its best to deliver on all the moments expected of a Zelda story. In that regard it does its job.
“everything invovling Lana and especially Cia is awful.”
Yeeaaahh. Not sure what was going on in the writer’s minds with that bit. I wonder who was in charge of writing that story: Nintendo or Koei-Tecmo?
AAAAAARGH, WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU IDIOTS?! WHY CAN’T WE JUST PLAY VIDEOGAMES AND HAVE FUN WITHOUT YOU LOSERS GETTING ALL HOLIER-THAN-THOU ON US?!
You’ll probably be able to work that one out when you figure out why we can’t just talk and have fun without you going all holier-than-thou on us.
Damn you’re whiny. Literally no one is forcing you to read this blog and/or comment on it. Except for yourself.
EDIT: Sorry this was to axel, Farla
Very nice article! I’d argue some of the specifics, but I agree with the overall point. I’ve been meaning to play A Link to the Past for a long time, and this only makes me more interested in it.
TV Tropes
TV Tropes is the same site that considers Kate in the second KickAss movie, someone who cheats on her boyfriend because she feels neglected and then throws it in his face, to be “nearly as much of a JerkAss as her comic book counterpart”.
The reason why comics!Kate is considered a JerkAss? She verbally lashes at the protagonist for stalking her (and he does stalk her) and doesn’t reciprocate his feelings when she finds out he was just pretending to be gay to be closer to her (unlike her counterpart in the first movie).
Well, I never said TV Tropes was a good moral baseline to begin with. :p Still, the community is quite large and many tropers have presence in other communities, so I think it’s worthwhile to take note of these things. And since TV Tropes is an amalgam of multiple nerd communities, I find it useful for observing larger trends that might be difficult to see from more limited perspectives.
The reasoning is solid, I’m just not sure TV Tropes is that good a representation of the various nerd communities as a whole. Still, it’s not something that detracts from the argument.
Well, there’s just one problem. Zelda isn’t a power fantasy, it’s a courage fantasy.
GET IT?!
It’s all LOVE in the end. =)
What do you mean?
Undertale reference. Go play it if you didn’t, just don’t read anything about it beforehand as it’s best experienced blind.
Actually, that does bring up an interesting point. Giving Link too much power does undermine the supposed message of the mythos, which is that it’s wrong to obsess over power alone and you have to take everything in moderation.
Honestly, I would prefer it if the games were actually courage fantasies. Certainly you could make a claim for that in the early games — the obstacles in Ocarina of Time could get downright terrifying, especially considering it was marketed at little kids. But it doesn’t take any courage to stand up to a villain when the deck is stacked so absurdly in your favor.
Ocarina of Time was one of those games I had to go back and beat when I was a teenager, because fuck if I was gonna beat it when I was, what, six? Eight?
Nope, failed the courage fantasy.
I’ve never beaten it, haha. Played it when I was like 10. The horror barely got to me but that falling ceiling puzzle in the Forest Temple completely stumped me for some reason. I think I was just too used to the simpler 2D games and couldn’t mentally transition.
I mean, if you only got to the Forest Temple, then you haven’t seen that game’s horror.
dead hands
…
fitting for a nero-post