Topic: NWR's Top 10 Zelda Games: A Link Between Games

[Ian Sane]

I'll put up with a "Ocarina of Time 3" for the Wii U as long as I don't have to deal with Skyward Sword's motion controls or the DS games' touchscreen controls.  I'd be quite fine with a alternating safe Zelda/weird Zelda pattern if Nintendo didn't insist that goofy controls is the only way to think outside the box.  OoT was conventional (if you can call it that; it was a extremely innovative at the time) and then they used its graphics engine to make an unconventional sequel.  That approach would be perfect for HD development.  You take the risk on the safe game that's more likely to have huge sales and then reusing assets keep the dev costs lower on the more creative sequel.

Though I think a big reason MM didn't sell as well was that it came out fairly late in the N64's life and required the expansion pack.  Perfect Dark suffered the same fate (though I'm sure someone will say the lack of the Bond licence was the cause of that one).  Ocarina of Time was like the last time the N64 was treated seriously.  By that time everyone knew the Playstation had kicked its butt and they held on to their "failed" Nintendo console to grab that Zelda 64 game they had been hyped up about for years and then, upon beating it, promptly sold their N64 or put it in the closet.  Everyone I know who owned a videogame system from 1997-98 had an N64 but by 2000 I was like the lone weirdo over the age of 12 among my colleagues that still cared about it.  They didn't reject Majora's Mask as much as just didn't know it even existed. Hell, MM came out the same day the PS2 launched.  The gaming world was not paying attention to it.

Twilight Princess sold huge as a launch title on one of the highest selling videogame consoles ever made.  Skyward Sword came out two years after the Wii fad was over so I'm sure it sold way worse but it didn't have the same favourable circumstances of TP's release.  It's like comparing a games Cube sales vs. its sequel's Wii sales.  Obviously the sales potential of a Wii game, particularly during its first three years would be greater due to the size of the userbase and popularity of the console.

[Leo13]

Really, you hated Skyward Sword's controls? I loved them, though I wasn't thrilled with the actual game.
Am I in the majority of minority with my thoughts on the controls. I wonder if New Zelda HD could allow you to pick controls like pikmin does that way you could Skyward Sword it with Wii remote and nunchuk or you could Gamepad/Pro Controller it.

[NWR_Neal]

#6 and #5 are up! http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/feature/35515


I welcome all guesses about the Top 4, though I won't confirm until it gets posted!

[Luigi Dude]

I welcome all guesses about the Top 4, though I won't confirm until it gets posted!

Considering the way the list is going the top 4 will probably be.


1. Ocarina of Time


2. Link to the Past


3. Link's Awakening


4. Wind Waker




Considering how controversial Wind Waker still is to some, I doubt that will be top 3 so 4 looks right.  The other three are all mostly praised plus have huge nostalgia helping them so I'd be shocked if the top three doesn't look like that.

[Leo13]

Wait!?! No Oracle of Ages/Seasons? It's hard for me to argue with your guess for top 4 even though I thought Link's Awakening was boring I know I'm in the minority. But It's also hard for me to fathom that the Oracle games aren't on here.

[Adrock]

I'd switch three and four as guesses. A Link to the Past would be my number one, but for this list, Ocarina of Time is probably at the top.

As for the Oracle games, something had to be cut. They might have made my top ten (counted as a single game) since Skyward Sword wouldn't be on mine. I remember liking The Minish Cap, but it's a while since I played those games.

[Shaymin]

I will say you probably had the order of 6 and 5 correct as they pertain to each other... but they'd be better served as honorable mentions.

[NWR_insanolord]

I will say that I was the only one who voted for The Legend of Zelda: Battle Quest, so it will sadly not be on this list.

[NWR_Neal]

#4 and #3 are up: http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/feature/35520

[Adrock]

A Link to the Past is number three?

[Khushrenada]

Looks like it will be Wind Waker 2 and Ocarina #1. Oddly enough, that's close to how I played my first few Zelda games.

Link to the Past was the first game, Wind Waker the second and Ocarina the third. Maybe that's why it has taken me so long to play some of the others. I'd unknowingly played the best there is in the series. Link's Awakening and Twilight Princess are fine games but they left me disappointed compared to the others and the Original NES Zelda I had gotten about halfway through but got stuck and stopped playing. Still, I was quite happy with the progress I made in it as I'm not a fan of NES games and the little I tried of Zelda 2 did not encourage me to play more. The only Zelda I really need to play and want to play at this point is Majora's Mask. That and Skyword Sword. I own them but have yet to take the time to sink into them.

[Fatty The Hutt]

Only the final two to be revealed, eh?
So, the winner is now super obvious. It's by far the best Zelda game, and one of the best games of all time.


Clearly, our winner will be...


Link's Crossbow Training.


Called it!

[Disco Stu]

Wind Waker should definitely not get #1 over Ocarina.  This is because Ocarina came out when I was 11 years old and everyone must conform to opinions based on my nostalgia for the experience! 

[Ian Sane]

Fucking Wind Waker better than Link's Awakening and A Link to the Past?  That's just ridiculous.

We all know about Wind Waker's graphics controversy.  Every Zelda fan took a side on that.  I frankly feel that Wind Waker has since become overrated as it got attacked for its graphics and thus its fans feel a need to defend it by making it out to be a better Zelda than it is.  If Wind Waker didn't bust out the toon graphics and was just known as that Zelda game with all the damn sailing in it would be ranked this high?  Hell, would it be ranked even in the top ten?

I don't like the graphics but even ignoring that Wind Waker has:
-the triforce hunt
-slow sailing through a big blue ocean of nothing
-a very low difficultly.  I personal have never seen the Game Over screen.
-spots were it was incredibly obvious that a dungeon was cut to meet the release date
-a worldwide flood storyline that completely fuggered up the timeline

Frankly the elements of Wind Waker that I felt were really good were the typical Zelda elements that every game has.  The new ideas it brought to the table annoyed me.  However it isn't as blatantly cliche as Twilight Princess or as padded with obvious filler like Skyward Sword so it's still number three for the 3D games for me.  It is still an awesome game but Zelda games are always awesome unless Phillips is making them.

[Neifirst]

I love all the Zelda games, but Wind Waker above Link to the Past is an insane opinion to hold.

[NWR_insanolord]

I'm infamously not a fan of Link to the Past, and thus it wasn't on my list, which may have thrown off the numbers a bit. If so, I apologize to all the people who are wrong and would rank that game that high on this list.

[Leo13]

I  agree with the ranking in that Wind Waker should be higher than a Link to the Past, and this is coming from a guy who's first Zelda game was a Link to the Past.

[daverhodus]

ALTTP is #1 for me. No question.

[Luigi Dude]

I'm infamously not a fan of Link to the Past, and thus it wasn't on my list, which may have thrown off the numbers a bit. If so, I apologize to all the people who are wrong and would rank that game that high on this list.

After this list is done, you guys should make a Top 10 Zelda game topic for the Forum members of the board like you guys did after you're Top 10 Wii games last year.


http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/forums/index.php?topic=39463.0


It'd be interesting to see how the Forums Top 10 Zelda list compares to the Staffs.

[NWR_insanolord]

 That's a good idea. I'll set that up once this wraps up.

[Mop it up]

I like Twilight Princess and I'm not sure why people call it Ocarina of Time 2. Aside from the locations on the world map being in vaguely the same spots and the usual Zelda conventions in every game, I see little in common with OoT, and TP felt and played quite different to me. I think it's a great game with fun dungeons and items, but is held back by the terribly boring wolf transformation and ugly, unfitting graphics.

[pokepal148]

I don’t think Twilight Princess gets enough credit for the things it does better then OOT, particularly in terms of world building. in OOT the various villages and other settlements of Hyrule felt so isolated from eachother. (heck nobody seems to even know that kokiri village exists) however Twilight Princess has the people of Hyrule very well connected to eachother. they aren't just a bunch of villages connected only by the Hylian flag. they are an interconnected community of people that rely on eachother. you have your farmers and miners along with your traders and everything else. In Twilight Princess the kingdom of Hyrule actually felt like a kingdom. Additionally TP was very experimental with its dungeon settings compared to previous games in the series. only half of the dungeons in the game actually took place in the traditional dungeon/castle setting (i'm not counting the temple of time due to the fact that the temple is in ruins when you see it from the outside because of some weird time travel thing.
The rest took place in abandoned prisons, old mansions, a city in the sky... for everything you can bash TP for the world it presented felt much more real then the world presented in OOT.

Only the final two to be revealed, eh?
So, the winner is now super obvious. It's by far the best Zelda game, and one of the best games of all time.

Clearly, our winner will be...

Link's Crossbow Training.

Called it!

The top two are on the CDi

[Ian Sane]

In regards to Twilight Princess's OoT 2 reputation, I think Zelda games are hurt by staying in Hyrule and doing all this multiple Links stuff.  Link's Awakening and Majora's Mask are two of my favourite Zeldas and they involve established Links having an adventure in a different land.  Imagine if that was the whole series all along - the multiple adventures of Link from the first game in different lands fighting different enemies and meeting different people.  That makes it ridiculously easy to keep things fresh and yet Nintendo keeps giving us a new Link with Hyrule and all the typical trademarks like Death Mountain and Kakariko Village.  It seems so bizarre to pigeonhole oneself like that.  It's much more challenging to make the same place interesting over and over again than to just go to new places where you can just make up whatever the hell you want.

Nintendo could probably just pick one Link they particularly like and continue his adventures outside of Hyrule and it would work really well.  Though they would so pick toon Link, wouldn't they? *sigh*

[Evan_B]

Placing A Link to the Past below Wind Waker or Ocarina of time is shameful.

Ocarina of Time, while revolutionary, doesn't hold up today, and no reskinned 3DS version can change that. It's boring and static, the art is horrendous, the boss battles weak and arguably the start of the offensive "dungeon gimmick" element that has been so prevalent in recent titles.

And the Wind Waker has so many flaws that its timeless art style can't hide: the weakest dungeons, difficulty, and content of any of the titles. Comparing them to A Link to the Past, a quintessential game in the franchise and the peak of the 2D format, the format the game was designed for, is just not right!

[StrawHousePig]

I'm infamously not a fan of Link to the Past, and thus it wasn't on my list, which may have thrown off the numbers a bit. If so, I apologize to all the people who are wrong and would rank that game that high on this list.

Yoouuuu!! Insanity Level: User Name Earned 

I have to agree with (some of) what Evan said here. So many of these games are different enough that putting them in a list like this is silly. That said, Link To The Past is top 3, easy. I'm OK with it being 2 or even 1.