I think Wind Waker has got better over time. At the time it came out, the lack of dungeons and the time spent sailing left me feeling pretty deflated. As the years have gone by, I've learnt to appreciate the pace and the wonderful little details that were put into the game.
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Note: In this post I can only reference the HD remake, as it's the only version I've played.
I love Wind Waker! But yeah, it's overrated. It's a great game, it has a great art direction, great characters, amazing music, fun dungeons, tugs at your heartstrings and is a satisfying play. Sailing over the vast Great Sea feels epic and a really unique way of travelling from place to face and a really effective mechanic to make the game's world feel huge.
But in this huge world the narrative always directs you with linearity to where you need to go next. It's almost impossible to stumble upon sidequests in the way you were forced to find them in Ocarina of Time, where all the locations were close together and you were dumped outside dungeons after completing them with little instruction about what to do next. For the most part in Wind Waker, unless you pick a location on the map you haven't explored and directly sail straight there and hope there's something to do, it's just not easy enough to find activities other than progressing through the main dungeons. It's easy to feel disconnected from such a huge world when its locations are so disparate.
The Triforce Shard quest is repetitive, unimaginative and slightly tedious. In A Link to the Past, A Link Between Worlds and Ocarina of TIme we had to beat seven dungeons to save the sages, but in Wind Waker we just had to open the map, maybe pay Tingle to decipher a chart (pointless padding) and then... sail to it. And pick it up. Yeah, okay, sometimes we had to go through combat or something to get it, but if this was the premise of the whole game and there were seven shards in seven dungeons, it would have made for a much more effectively paced gameplay experience.
Also, besides plunging the Master Sword directly in between his eyes (somewhat out of place in a generally family friendly game) in a cool throwback to beating him in Ocarina, fighting Ganondorf was anti-climactic.
The game doesn't feel linear to me. I think it's balanced between telling you where you need to go and letting you explore. I've heard the Triforce shard quest was more annoying in the GameCube version, because you needed Tingle to decipher a treasure chart for all 8 shards. What's sad is that the Triforce shard quest wasn't suppose to be in the game, that was actually filling a place for two dungeons that were removed, because Nintendo wanted the game to be released by Christmas. And I agree that the final boss with Ganon is really easy. I feel that the mini boss before would have made a better final boss.
It's definitely receiving too much praise currently. It's a fun game at times, but I found the pacing to be all over the place. The few dungeons in the game, at least in my memory, were fantastic, but that dungeon would be followed by sailing. I get Nintendo was trying to show off the Gamecube's capabilities but sailing was a pain. I haven't played WWHD, so I don't know how much the faster sailing option helps, but constantly adjusting the wind and sailing across the same blue ocean to the same music was just tedious. I recall reading complaints about how empty Hyrule Field was in TP, but WW had the same issue, to an even lager degree. For the people who can look past the sailing, it's a great game. I'd say makes some of the best use of three dimensions in the Zelda series.
TL;DR "Too much water 7.8/10"
The Fast Sail in the HD version automatically adjusts the wind to stay behind you, fixing that problem.
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Your opinion is wrong. Wind Waker is actually kinda underrated, it doesn't get all the praise it should get. The game is beautiful and the sea made it feel enormous, traveling was a great experience to me. The only think that I didn't like is that I expected more dungeons, but that doesn't even count, all Zelda games are different and they don't need to have the same amount of dungeons.
There's already a thread about Unpopular Gaming Opinions and plenty of threads on what games you think are overrated. You thought this was enough to make a thread about?
I don't like your opinion. I think it's wrong and should not be allowed to be said online. Follow the crowd man... follow the crowd and keep being silent!
I always felt this game was underrated personally. When is was released I remember people being pretty split on it, whether it was the cell shaded graphics or the travel , dungeons, etc. For me it sits as my #2 favorite right behind Ocarina of Time, followed by Skyward Sword. I actually feel this game is much less linear than previous installments, and loved the sense of exploration and finding the sunken treasures etc. I'm hoping the new Zelda U follows this kind of format and scale. Watching the footage I was actually reminded of WW with the auto horse traveling, when I would set my direction, wind, and go make a sandwich. I'm one of those weirdos that doesn't like when they added faster travel to games like Everquest or WoW, I think it ruins the immersion of a huge journey in a big world. And yes.. I realize waiting 30 min for a boat is not a popular pastime.
Oh, but you can't expect to wield supreme executive power just because some watery tart threw a sword at you.
I'm not sure if you could call this game overrated or underrated. It was panned when it was released by most Zelda fans although it was a good game (which makes it underrated) but ever since Twilight Princess came out, Wind Waker has been re-discovered as one of the best 3D Zelda ever made, which makes it overrated I guess (?). It's a game that has lived at least two lives, so doesn't make much sense to call it over/underrated.
Personally, I've never been a huge WW fan - the sailing is obviously tedious (it was designed this way to give a sense of openness despite the GameCube's limitations, not to show off its power), but the problem is that most of the dungeons feel really underdeveloped - too short and possibly too intuitive. Beside the sailing parts, it probably has one of the best overworlds ever in a 3D Zelda - it's colourful, interesting, it's poetic without being ceremonious, it feels epic without being pompous etc etc - but when you go inside the actual dungeons it falls a bit flat...
Top-10 games I played in 2017: The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild (WiiU) - Rogue Legacy (PS3) - Fallout 3 (PS3) - Red Dead Redemption (PS3) - Guns of Boom (MP) - Sky Force Reloaded (MP) - ...
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It might be overrated but It's still an incredibly fun game to play. Nobody is going to deny that. The details, art style and gameplay make this one of the most unique Zelda games. I don't see the need to discuss whether the praise is deserving or not...
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