Straight from the Nintendo labs, and into my Wii, come's the newest addition to the Zelda series, Twilight Princess. Being somewhat of a fan of Zelda, I decided to pick this game up and see whats all the gripe about.


The story goes as follows, the land of Hyrule is in great peril, and you, good sir knight, is here to save the day. To make the storyline less of a rehash of days of old, this time around, the land is covered in some sort of darkness, and, well besides that everything is pretty much the same. Sorta. Instead of your dear friend Navi, you get this really obnoxious thing called Midnas, and its more mature around this time. Regardless of that, there's still some moments I found myself lole'd.

On the Wii, the game's graphics pretty much scream's Gamecube. So, don't expect much, hell they even ported it for those who own a GC, and not a Wii. Not too keen on the graphical difference between the two, but I'm sure its the anti Aliasing, higher pixel shader, bloom, so on and so forth.

The game itself follows the old recipe of latter Zelda games, run around dungeons, collecting cool toys, kill enemies. Most of the equipment here is a bit of a variation of Orcarina of Time, with spot of creativity. For instance, the iron boots which you get quite early on not only aids you in commiting suicide in lakes like last time, but allows you to cling onto magnetic surfaces, and its twice as loud for those who love to hear that CLUNK CLUNK CLUNK every step of the way, and the boomerange, well it still grab stuff, and thats about it.

The Wii blends in quite nicely. A simple jerking off of the Wiimote translate to a swinging of the sword. While shaking the nunchuck causes the ol' twirly thingie. Shooting with the bow is alot more cooler with the Wiimote, B is fire, so it feels like your shooting a gun. Aim by pointing at the screen. Though at times I hate it when I'm battling and I pull out my bow, and it goes "HOLY SHIT POINT THE WII REMOTE AT THE SCREEN WHILE I BLOCK YOUR VIEW WITH THIS LARGE TEXT". Other than that, I love it. Fishing acually feels like fishing as well. My only other major gripe is how some of the screens are mapped to like - or +, so I spend a few moments accidently going to the equipment screen when I really wanted to pull out my key binding screen. Though after a while you adjust to it.


The dungeons themselves are a helleva lot more interesting this time, requiring acual thinking, which I love most about the game. High five Nintendo for that one. Though I don't like how as the game goes on, a majority of your equipment starts sitting around collecting dust. Like the sling shot, or as I put it, the weakshot, gets taken over by the bow. Still, I'd enjoy it more if some of my equipment still had a purpose in solving the later puzzles.

The Twilight areas, which seems like a decent idea, and its sorta agreeable the first time around, but by the third time, it becomes more of a chore. Basically you run around in a bland and boring landscape filling up this item called the Vessel of Light with...Tears of Light to restore the land back to normal.

Another meh side of the game is the sound track, alot of it is remixes of previous titles, so be prepared to hear some familiar tunes, some which may move you, most which may bore you. It's really quite a mixed bag, but overall I'd rather turn off the music and listen to some of my own.

Overall, its a pretty good game. If your a fan of the series, then go for it. For a launch title, it's not too shabby, especially if your bored playing Wii Sports, or waiting for Super Smash Brothers Brawl. If your new to the Zelda franchise, it's not bad either.

Pro's:

Creative, challenging dungeons.
Great launch title if you're looking something besides Wii Sports.
Decent storyline.

Con's:

No voice acting.
Boss fights are a walk in the park.
Twilight areas are a dissapointment.
Music is...okay.

Score: 8.5/10

-_- I've played it this time. Yes, it's more challenging (compared to older versions of Zelda). *SpoilerThe Temple of Time was the easiest dungeon in that whole game... it took me only a hour to beat it. After this dungeon I got somewhat bored of this game.. I did like the mini-games :) (tried them yet?). Pretty good review of it.

Foreward :

Weird, in my opinion (haven't beaten game yet, so I can't give a full review on everything) I think it's the best Zelda since Ocarina of Time--for sure. As OoT was my favorite Zelda since the night I played it, it took eight years for me to declare one better. It was worth the wait for a good Zelda since Majora's Mask--almost 8 years later.

(**My review may has SOME measily spoilers, but I'll try to keep them out)

Overall Score :

10/10 (Hands down, no questions asked)

Gameplay :

As I saw on Wikipedia, and my own expierence, it's a highly modified engine of Windwaker, which I really liked. The moves you can do are great, and how you can kill multiple enemies in a few easy combonations, but still make it enjoyable. The agility and quickness of the horse and when you're a wolf is superb. The speed you can travel on your horse it great too, since the world of Hyrule is so huge.

Graphics :

(I've played both Wii + GameCube, but I'm on the GC version) The graphics are, no doubt, the best I've seen for GameCube since Mario: Sunshine. The shaders, and the great resolution and colorations are breathtaking--the detail shows very appealing. The water is my favorite graphic from the game--although you look at it and only see about 2 tones (noticably), the way their graphic engine works with it is breathtaking.

The shinings, and reflectiongs are great too. I love how the "twili" world has a slight gaussian (sp?) blur and also the contrast is messed a bit with.

Plots :

This game passes up (also) for best plot in a Zelda game; again, in my opinion. Even though I haven't even beaten it yet, there are only a few foreshadowing points from which happen in the first hour or two or the game. There seems to be about three or so things that are going on at once; and of course I'm counting your adventure. Heh.

Dungeons/Temples :

Great temples, that challenge the regular, and also long time Zelda players, to a fun amount of confusion here and there. Hah. The longest one for me was about 4 hours, and the shortest about 2 hours. There are instances where I've caught myself thinking, "What the fuck--what do I do?" and then I found myself overthinking everything I was doing. Attention to detail is the key to beating the temples, but also overthinking is what catches you off-guard a lot in the temples, unlike the last couple of 3D realtime Zeldas where many things seemed self explanitory.

Their kinda all like water-temples (the ones I've played), but still you keep playing untill you figure out what to do.

A quick temple/dungeon hint--not too much of a spoiler, just get all the chests, but this is why :

In every temple/dungeon, there are 2 Heart Pieces--get all the chests, and that's another step to getting all your hearts.

Items :

(Can't be a lot to cover, since ya'll don't want to know the awesomeness that you await for) Some of the most creative, and distinctive items. It isn't like past games where you use an item for that specific temple, and maybe like only ONE other time, you must use them in future spots in other places, and even in Hyrule and whatnot.

Again, extremely creative, and fun-to-use items.

The World :

I remember getting Majora's Mask and thinking how big it was compared to Ocarina of Time. Now playing Twilight Princess, Majora's Mask could fit in the new Hyrule at an estimate of 10 times over. The world of Hyrule has so many things you do in it, instead of playing countless mini-games in a town, all the fun is spread-out in one massive piece of Earth. I am so glad they made Hyrule, actually and kingdom, instead of a field.

Music :

This has to be the best showcase of Kondo's work since Majora's Mask and Ocarina of Time. After a bit of a dissapointment of folk songs in Windwaker, Twilight Princess has his more classical Zelda styles from the N64 versions, all the way back to the first Zelda, and third one. Many themes used from past Zeldas which is so fun to hear. This is good because you can tell a good Zelda fan when he says which game, and what exactly, the song or melody is used from. Also, as a critic, the "Hyrule Field Theme" is his best song since he composed the main theme for Zelda back in the Mid to Late 80's. The song's melody is also used throughout here and there in the game.

Other Stuff :

The game also endavors hidden places, for example,

In the Gerudo Desert, on the Gerudo Mesa (where the piece of the Bridge of Eldin was), there is a stairway which leads to almost an infinite amount of levels with enemies that you must pass all of them in one sit-down to unlock a certain prize.

and also side-quests that take quite a bit of effort to do. I love how they took Majora's Mask aspects in a few big side-quests, and made them inquired into Twilight Princess too. As heard of, the game has about 80 Hours of gameplay, which I love in a game--takes a while to beat it.

Conclusion :

In waiting for many years for what was named "The New Revolution of Zelda" I think it was worth it, even without completeing the game yet!

I doubt it, but any comments are cool. And the status I'm at :

36 Hours
12 Hearts
2 Swords
2 Shields
3 Armor-Types
22 Poe Souls
15 Golden Bugs
3/4 Done with Temple of Time

Woot!

@Panda - "No Voice Acting" isnt a con. It's always been like that, and it should always be like that. You read the text and imagine the voices in the head--kinda like a good book will do.

@Panda - "No Voice Acting" isnt a con. It's always been like that, and it should always be like that. You read the text and imagine the voices in the head--kinda like a good book will do.

That depends, from someone else's point of perspective they may dislike the idea of not having voice actors. Not everyone likes books, some people like to be read to. :mellow:

Music :

This has to be the best showcase of Kondo's work since Majora's Mask and Ocarina of Time. After a bit of a dissapointment of folk songs in Windwaker, Twilight Princess has his more classical Zelda styles from the N64 versions, all the way back to the first Zelda, and third one. Many themes used from past Zeldas which is so fun to hear. This is good because you can tell a good Zelda fan when he says which game, and what exactly, the song or melody is used from. Also, as a critic, the "Hyrule Field Theme" is his best song since he composed the main theme for Zelda back in the Mid to Late 80's. The song's melody is also used throughout here and there in the game.
You realize that Toru Minegishi composed a lot of the soundtrack too, don't you? (He did all the field and dungeon music). The fact that he did actually really disappoints me. There are no memorable field themes (with the expection of Hyrule Field) in this game. Places like the desert or Snowpeak have music that's just remixed the Twilight Princess main theme.

Anyway, I don't think this game needs its own thread. If there shouldn't be multiple FF threads, there probably shouldn't be multiple Zelda threads either.

Yeah, Maestro, I know that Toru Minegishi did a lot too, but the main themes and such is what I'm talking about. Ordon Village, Illia's Theme, Saving Midna, Midna's Theme, Hyrule Field Theme, etc. Toru has some good boss battle music (I think he did the boss music in Majora's Mask) but I didn't know he did some other field themes. Damn, I need the OST. :heh:

@Maestrosetti: The thread stays...

Great reviews, both of you. I didn't read Mazeppa's spoilers though cos I still haven't gotten my hands on a Wii + ZTP.

I agree with Noir here; two very in depth, great reviews. I finished the game a few weeks ago though, and I'm inclined to agree with Mazeppa's review here. This is the first game I've beaten in like five years. It takes a lot for me to play a game all the way through. ^_^