Topic: Which Zelda game has the best (x)?

My feel when existing. But seriously, yeah, I think it's a great intro for people patient enough to play a 50-hour adventure game in the first place.

Have you gone into Rusl's house after turning back into a human? There's a very easily missable scene that passes either after you enter or after you complete the Forest Temple. If not you can just look it up, it's pretty neat. Even replaying the game several times over I never caught it until I saw it mentioned online.

@Kimyonaakuma It probably would've been too much to code a Twilight Realm into BotW, and it seems to be something that'll remain exclusive to TP. But that'd be interesting if they ever do revisit it.

@Haru17 Do you mean the scene with Rusl injured and his wife recognizes Link has Rusl's sword and wishes him good luck? I thought that was a neat scene. I went before the Forest Temple.

@shadow-wolf Would it though? The Twilight Realm was never a permanent part of Hyrule so they would be able to load it as a separate area when the Mirror of Twilight was used. They could just keep the sky permanently at sunset to make things more orange, that's close to the time that twilight is anyway. Throw in some floating black squares and you're basically done!

It will probably remain a TP exclusive unless they do a prequel or sequel though. Without Hyrule being covered in Twilight there is no point. The Twilight Realm itself seems to just be a floating palace. There might be more to it though...

@shadow-wolf Awesome, I'm glad you caught it. I love that incidental way of guilting the player. Twilight Princess actually does a pretty job of giving the player cause to feel like an outsider, like with being able to talk to animals but have humans scared of you while in Wolf Form.

About Breath of the Wild...

About the Twilight Realm, no, the Palace was not all of it. Just like Ocarina of Time or even Breath of the Wild aren't all there is to Hyrule. Redeads didn't just go extinct, it's just a matter of development resources. We have every reason to believe that there is an entire Twilight Realm floating on rocks beyond the capital. After all, Ganon didn't hide on those three islands for a hundred years.

And yes, I guess it would feel kind of lackluster to visit the Twilight Realm in a sequel given that Midna would (probably) be long dead and the whole thing with the Mirror of Twilight shattering. Perhaps it's best not to add onto one of the best game endings. My main point was that Zelda, especially Skyward Sword and Breath of the Wild, could use more inventive biomes.

@Haru17 The Twilight Realm seems to be never ending expanse, which makes sense seeming as it's pretty much limbo. Especially due to the relation between the saying that twilight is when we're closest to the dead and what is said at the beginning of TP. What they don't say is if the buildings there are old prisons or were just built by the Twili. I wouldn't expect the Twilight Realm to have a "surface" like Hyrule due to the large amount of portals and floating platforms that they use, so they I wouldn't expect them to build such an awkward country.

With that said, the developers probably didn't put that much thought into this and we probably will never know. The whole thing with Ganon is probably for the sake of the story and not logic. The mirror transports you to the entrance of the Palace and I don't see Ganon just avoiding that to go and float around for a while.

I think a prequel could work, probably set somewhere early in the timeline. It could happen a while after Skyward Sword and focus on the "Demon Tribe" that Ghirahim came from, except that they turn out the be the Dark Interlopers that get banished in TP. It would also be nice to see a more open version of Skyward Sword's Hyrule without any barriers between areas.

That's pretty long dude. Quite a few Zeldas have the first dungeon with 30 minutes. Those that don't tend to have something a bit more interesting happening in its place.
If I'd directed it, I'd have just cut the wolf-link stuff out of the game completely. Really don't think it adds much overall and controls worse than regular Link.
Brace for incoming Harustorm.

After that horrendously boring intro (GOAT IN! GOAT IN! GOAT IN!), the terrible wolf link stuff (seriously, who thought this was a fun addition to the game?), and the ridiculous first dungeon (monkeys? really?), I just couldn't find the will to keep playing TP. Turned it off after the first dungeon and never felt a desire to revisit it. That's the only Zelda game I've ever done that with. Even ones I didn't particularly care for, like OoT and LA, I still played to completion.

The only other Nintendo game I've ever had that reaction to was Paper Mario: Sticker Star.

@Ralizah

You should try and persevere with it. Some of the later dungeons are incredibly good. Snowpeak ruins especially is unforgettable.

@Dezzy I'll probably grit my teeth and play through the rest at some point. Sticker Star was gone by the next weekend (gifted it to a younger family member), but I've held on to TPHD since release.

Twilight Princess isn't notably longer than any other game, it's just the intro. The rest is better paced. But yeah, the game doesn't really pick up until you leave Faron, that's after the first dungeon, and even then it still takes a while before you get to explore Kakariko as ''human'' Link. I didn't mind it, but it's definitely one of the slower Zelda games.

@Octane
I don't think that's true. Howlongtobeat.com (yes of course there's a website for this) puts Twilight Princess, Skyward Sword and Breath of the Wild as being at least 10 hours longer than any of the other games.
Some of the 2D ones are about half as long.

Monkies are Zelda, you are impatient.

@Dezzy I'm aware of that site.

From my own experience; however, it usually takes me around 40-50 hours to complete any of the 3D Zelda games. OOT and MM are on the shorter side, followed by TP and WW. Skyward Sword is the longest, but that's probably just me stumbling my way through that game and dying more than any other person ever should in that game. Breath of the Wild is... an exception. It's either really short or really long if you truly want to ''complete'' the entire game.

Breath of the Wild's main quest is like 10 hours tops with travel time. The rest of the game is shrine, material, and Korok seed grinding.

Well you'd have to actively force yourself to do that in Breath of the Wild though. The natural playthrough will almost definitely include all of the shrines you go near/see on your way through the story given that there's such a strong incentive to get more hearts/stamina early on.
I'd consider the standard playthrough of BotW being one where you get the master sword. It is mentioned a hell of a lot during the story so they obviously want you to know it exists.

@Kimyonaakuma I mean you're right in technically adding it in, but designing it and making the game revolve around it enough that it doesn't feel shoe-horned in will take a good chunk of time — time I don't see them spending in future games.

@Haru17 There's twilight in BotW? I beat Ganon but I definitely didn't notice any twilight above the castle. Maybe it might be "twilight" like lighting, not "twilight" like the Realm.

@Ralizah I disliked Twilight Princess the first time I played it too. But now that I'm replaying it, I'm starting to appreciate it more. I haven't gotten past the Forest Temple yet, but it gets more intense later on. Plus I think the characters in Ordon got more development than the starting village characters in Ocarina or Wind Waker. The Wolf Link sections are a bit of a drag at first, but if you view them in a different light — a different way to tackle puzzles — it becomes nicer.

@Dezzy Yeah Wolf Link sections aren't too great. I'm starting to warm up to them now on my replay of the game, but when I first played the game I loathed them. But I still think the intro helped set the tone for the game and the characters. Although you might be right, Ocarina, Majora, and Wind Waker and BotW (can't comment on Skyward Sword, haven't played it) all got running much earlier than TP. But of course WW had those obnoxious triforce fetch quests so both WW and TP had issues with pacing.

@Octane Huh, your experience is interesting. From my experience Ocarina took about 50 hours or so, TP not sure but probably around the same if not slightly more, BotW about 50-60 to complete the main story without blitzing through the Divine Beasts. Wind Waker however, took me only 35 hours, and that's including the time it took me to visit every tile of the ocean and collect data on it from the fish. It was definitely a shorter game compared to BotW, TP, or Ocarina.

@Haru17 @Dezzy I mean BotW has the most fluid structure of any Zelda game since the original. There's no pre-determined track to beat it, it's all up to you. Want to just go and beat Ganon right away? Spend 2 hours or so to "beat" the game. Want to travel to each Divine Beast and then fight Ganon? Probably looking at 35 to 40 hours or so. Want to explore the world, find shrines (though not all of them), do some Korok seeds (but not all), complete some side quests (but not all), find all the memories in addition to all the aforementioned stuff? Probably 110-130 hours (that's what I did). Want to do EVERYTHING (collect all Korok seeds, do all shrines and side quests)? Looking at possibly 300 hours or so. It's all up to the player to decide how much he/she wants to get out of the game, which is one of its strengths (although I would appreciate a more linear approach for the next Zelda game).

@shadow-wolf I'm sure they could have managed it in a side story somewhere. But yeah, I wouldn't want it to just be added for no good reason.

@Ralizah When I was younger and played the game for the first time I didn't really enjoy it much. My favourite part of the opening act was the first wolf link sequence and introduction to Midna. The rest wasn't very fun...
After that though I think I stopped at the Goron Mines, it was all a bit of a chore. The Tears of Light sections annoyed me because the Twilight versions of Hyrule kind of looked like an orangey-brown smudge across my screen which wasn't great for exploring and collecting.

However when I bought TP HD I still found the opening part a chore but due to the lack of Wii U releases I decided to complete it, and I have no regrets. Some parts still drag on for no good reason and the it's not my favourite Zelda game but I think it has some great moments. Dungeons like Arbiter's Grounds, City in the Sky and especially the Snowpeak Ruins are worth the wait.

I really liked some reimagined areas from Ocarina of Time, Castle Town and Zora's Domain in particular. It might not be great for a Zelda game but it's still a great game in general!

@shadow-wolf I was just talking about the critical path for all of the main quest content, not the open world stuff. That campaign is the shortest in the 3D series.

Those were my top 3 as well.

The only bad thing to say about these is how useless their chest items were in the rest of the game.
The spinner, the ball and chain and the double hookshot all have maybe 2 uses outside of their dungeons.

This is a problem that the BotW approach solved (or the ALBW approach I guess)

@Haru17 Fair enough I guess. Though at least it had more to do besides the campaign. IMHO Wind Waker's campaign wasn't much longer and had virtually nothing else to do (like any other 3D Zelda besides BotW) after you beat the game.