Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask. N64

Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask

Zelda Rating: 9.0
Difference from Other Zelda's: First Zelda to take a really dark twist, Unique mask collection
Using the Console: No differnce from Ocarina

It's times like these i'm glad i'm not popular, yet, for if i we're i'd be hounded down because i didn't post anything for a week, and I claimed i would do "Zelda Week" and my excuse? I was playing video games and sleeping. Geeze. Oh and eating every now and then. But Lets continue on with ZELDA WEEK!

This game is a doozy, and i mean that in the best way. This game in particular has become quite a Cult hit inside of the Legend of Zelda fanbase, but outside of it, many don't care too much about it, I think. But as you can tell, my 9/10 says that i love this game and too would love a remake, but only time will tell. Now onto the review.

The biggest change from this game from the others is it focuses on Link only, no Zelda what-so-ever (And if you say that Zelda links awakening was his own adventure, that's true, but it was also (SPOLIERS) all just a dream. Also i haven't played that game <- main reason.

So link goes on a quest for his friend, Navi the fairy, and so he goes looking for the little guy in the forest, which forest? We can only assume it's the Lost forest, where if people wander in and get lost, they become monsters. Great place to start right?! So Link is soon attacked by a kid wearing the Majora Mask which holds diabolical immense power...

Those piercing eyes... Soulless piercing eyes...

The kid robs link, steals his horse and flees. So what does Link do? Chase after him of course, and soon he enters a room with no floor and just falls down and down and down... (the rabbit hole). 

Now this game has many theories, that Link is dead, that he died before the theft of his stuff or even afterwards, and i'm not here to discuss that, because i wanna wait and see when they bring it back, because a cameo of majora's mask in the newest Zelda game means they're doing something, hopefully.

So Link gets turned into a shrub person, and has to find his way back to normal. Thus the game really begins. 

He looks so sad, i mean he did get turned into a plant... 

When i played this game as a child, it was the single most horrifying experience i have ever had, my reason being that was because i was going into it with the thought that i was playing a Zelda game, it'll be like a fantasy, but then it throws horrifying things at you. When people say this is easily the darkest Zelda game created, it really is. The moon will kill everyone in the world in 3 days, people don't care because they have a festival to run, and at the ranch run by two sisters, the older one drugs the younger the night the moons supposed to crash to make it easier for her. The younger sister knows nothing about it.

The moon has a face, and is going to kill us all. Alrighty then.

Now everyone's whose played a zelda game knows that there's sidequests, and this game has them, has them everywhere, and i mean everywhere, some quests can't be completed till a certain time, and some quests are completable only at the same time as other quests. How is this possible you ask? For those who have never played the game before let me shed some light on the most unique and evil mechanic this game has. 

Time.

The power to control time, in the hands of a small 12 year old boy. Why not.

So the moons going to crush the world in three days huh, not enough time, so what do you do? Reverse that shit. After the first 3 days you gain access to reverse time whenever you see fit, and why i say this is evil and unique, the only way to save your game is through reversing time. And let me tell you, reversing time does exactly that, reverses it. Did you make a great boding relationship with an npc and almost finish their sidequest but ran outta time. TOO BAD. Did you have to go out with family in the middle of a dungeon and had to save, TOO BAD all that work is gone. 

Though, once you "Complete and finish" a portion of something, you can log it into your logbook and it's completed forever, even if the people's lives are reversed because of your time control power and it looks like their life has gone back to shit, you still got the reward from whatever you had to do before reversing time, so why waste your time with the inevitable, I mean you already got the reward.

Evil father time is evil. 

It is by far the most unique mechanic implemented into the game, and i wouldn't be pleased if it changed if they made a remake. That sense of fear that time was not on your side, even if you had control over it, you never really had "time" having your back. 

There are couple ways to make things bearable, you can slow time down to get more things down, and a banker who saves your money even if you reverse time, you get to keep all those precious Rupees, (their currency).

Now the mechanics in the game are amazing yes, but the one thing that makes this game different from the overbearing ocarina of time, was it had four dungeons, and you may compare them from time to time and think, well this game had four and the other had ten. Ten is bigger than four, but when any of the four is harder than any of the other ten, I must say kudos to the team who made this game. 

The first dungeon is so baffling hard at times, and there's so much to do in the dungeon besides the "get to the end". And for that fact as well, when you get to the end, the bosses are so painstakingly hard in comparison, the first boss has no visible weaknesses. Just attack him and pray you damage him more that he hits you, also, he's a ticki totem man who shoots flaming locusts at you. There' that too.

So to quickly summarize, this game has 4 dungeons only, and yet it feels like the game goes on forever because of the amount of content packed into the game. The difficulty is much harder than ocarina of time, and is truly unique to the Zelda franchise.

Pros:
-Hard difficulty
-immense amount of content
-Detailed Npc's each with their own problem to solve
-Unique bosses
-Depressing and well written story

Cons:
-Saving only when reversing time can be a pain if the game freezes. (happened to me)
-A lot of masks (can be good or bad depending on how you look at it)
-I want that damn'd remake, or even a sequel.
-Hard difficulty

"You've met with a terrible fate haven't you?"

Legend of Zelda: Link to the Past. SNES

Legend of Zelda: Link to the Past. SNES

Zelda Rating: 8.9/10
Difference from Prior Zelda Games: Side-quests, Important Npc's, detailed storyline
Using The Console: Multiple (two) item slots to use in comparison to 1.

My first Zelda game I called mine, Not my siblings.

This game was the first Zelda game i owned and could call mine. I slapped that puppy in the Super Nintendo and man, can i say that that intro music is just nostalgic goodness to my ears. And after playing a Link between worlds, i have to say, the classic game is still as beautiful as ever.

I honestly don't know where to start with this game, it was and is simply beautiful. It has tight controls, graphics, at the time, were pretty good and the storyline was great for this game, not too much where you wanted to skip everything, but not too little that you had no idea what the hell to do. I'm looking at you Zelda 1 an 2.

So the big difference, when the game came out, was that this game didn't seem to be connected to the first two in any way. The idea in the first game is that Ganon has destroyed and ravaged hyrule, that is why there are no towns. Afterwards people start rebuilding, thus in Zelda 2 there are villages, multiple ones. Many speculated where it would go on the chronologically, but it soon just became too much as later installments came out, some thought the games were never connected... UNTIL THE HYRULE HISTORIA.

What? Can't read Japanese? Well thats ok the important parts are in English.

As seen in the Huge picture above, Link to the past is technically a prequel, but years and years before the first two games. 

The game starts out quite differently than the first two, whereas you simply just start and wander around with no direction but the manual telling you the story, this game starts off with you being asleep and Zelda's voice calls out to you to rescue her from the castle Fungeon Dungeon. 

So you set off on a mission to save a person you've never met, you a random kid who lives with his uncle. Through hardships you eventually Pull out the legendary blue sword of death Light. Which, trivial information, this is the first game that included this mighty blade, and called it "the Master Sword".

You continue on to the castle where an evil wizard has captured Zelda, and you go to the chamber where he resides to do battle. An Epic final battle, Wizard Vs guy who has a lot of time on his hands. And how do you defeat him? Well there's really two ways, one the boring canon way, and two the lolsy more extreme non sensible way. 

This man earned the trust of the King. Does no one have any Evil Radar senses? Look at him, diabolical hand gesture. Check. Red coat dyed with the blood of the innocents. Check. Grey skin? Check!

For everyone to understand i will explain both ways to fight the evil final boss wizard of evilness. Now the Master sword can reflect light type magic, and whattya know, the wizard shoots lightning magic, and you swing your sword and reflect it back at him. 

Now that you understand how that works, you could also use, a Bug Net. Just swing that baby like you're catching bees. 

The Bug net, Same properties as a magical sword that can reflect light magic.

After this point, SURPRISE the game goes on. The evil diabolical wizard sends you to a dark world, Ooooo. and from there on you must save some crystal ladies and go fight the REAL final boss. Ganon.

The story line is firm and well made, and there are many tiny things in the multiple dungeons that just make this game amazing.

The game's Dungeons and Temples are very unique and you really do get immersed in your own way. Compared to the last two games where the Temples and dungeons were just recolours, these ones are wholly themed experiences. 

This game, I find, introduced Side-quests. Finding bottles under the bridge, getting a bug net to catch bee's (ok not a side quest), and little things here and there to improve your arsenal. But while not only side quests that made this game so unique, but the gambling and minigames. Race here, Race there, and "OPEN A CHEST, MAYBE YOU'LL GET MORE MONEY THAN WHAT YOU PAID" hated that game... 

Grammar, who needs that stuff. 

The world itself is amazing, especially when you have to venture to the Dark World, where Ganon resides. Link loses his form and turns into a bunny. It's so odd but quite appealing, and until you get a magical orb, you'll never get to be yourself in the Dark World, and as a bunny, you can't use your sword.

There are many things i can write about this game, about how good it is, about how well it pulled things off, how well it introduced others. But the one thing i will leave this post at, Is the 3rd Temple boss.

This is by far the hardest boss in the game.

It may not look like a hard boss, for those who've never played this game, but by god i'd rather fight any other boss twice over than this guy once.

He moves randomly, and if he hits you, there's a high chance you're going to fall off  the edge to the room below, and if that happens, the music stops, he regenerates all his health back and you have to hope you can kill him this time before he knocks you back down and you have to do it all over again...

...I get knocked down, i get up again... 

Pros:

-Brought back Top-Down Zelda

-Introduced side quests and fun NPCs

-Tough and challenging bosses, Unique

-Memorable 

-Replay-ability

Cons:

-Third Boss is ridiculous

-I can't think of another Con for this game, because seriously it was a well done game, and if you died, it wasn't the games fault. Except for the Third boss

And now i leave you off with Links Canon Hairstyle colour.

Link and his Pink hair. He can save the world, one strand at a time.

The Legend of Zelda, NES.

GUESS WHAT WEEK I JUST MADE UP!

ZELDA WEEK!

This week i'll review every Zelda game i've played. Sadly while i call myself a fan i still haven't played a couple games in the Zelda series, those titles being, Oracle of ages/seasons, Links awakening and Spirit tracks. 

So you can expect me gushing reviewing and loving all the Zelda games and pointing out why they're so great.

...Except Twilight Princess... If you want to read that already done and posted review, it's been up for a while. Spoiler alert, i didn't like it.

Now i'll be rating these games on a Scale of 1 to 10, now a 4 isn't equivalent to a 4/10 from other sites, this is a 4/10 in comparison to these zelda games. If you want my rating of the zelda games right now, to me are all 10/10. 

I will also be using a "Difference from prior Zelda games" and "using the console"

And with that, lets begin.

The Legend of Zelda. NES

Zelda Rating: 7/10
Difference from prior Zelda games: N/A
Using the console: Implemented a saving feature.

The Title screen that started it all

The Legend starts here, from even before you get your sword to when Ganon disappears into pixel bits. 

The first game in the series to ever come out, and does it hold water to today, Yes. Considering the fact i got this game on my 3DS (i had it on my NES at one point as well) and played it, and loved it again. 

The style for their first game was top down, to see the whole world, and the only time that changed was when you had to go into the basement of some dungeons. 

Link and his sword made out of wood. YA! 

The game was and still is confusing as ever, because you had to figure things out for yourself at the time and this game wasn't a story driven, simply because all the story you needed was either in the manual or in the giant text block before the game. 

Does that mean it's impossible? Heck no. Just means you gotta bomb every cliff you find, oooor go find a guide somewhere, hell there's tons of them now. 

The Naming of the character Link to be named Link, warning trivial information coming, was because the developers wanted the character to be the link, like to link something together, from the player to the video-game world. That idea has still been passed on through the games, but has become much more elaborate and thought out. 

Link, it wasn't his name at the time, but his own class of character. The more you know.

The game did something not many other games had done at the time and that was a save feature. This battery powered save feature made it much more accessible to stop the game and play another time. It also paved the way for the developers to make a longer game with tiny secrets everywhere without the fear it would go unnoticed. After the save feature was known the Password system in games slowly started dying out and made way for save features.

Pros: 
One of the first games to use a save feature,
lengthy game (compared to that of the time),
Tough bosses,
amazing world with actual different well made areas, multiple, different and unique items for exploration and fighting.
Easter eggs, naming your character "Zelda" made you start "Second quest" the harder version of the game

Cons: 
No actual direction given (but really if you can't figure it out i feel bad for you son)
A little confusing at times because of translation errors

Twighlight Princess. Wii Version

*face palm* let's just get this over with...


Now before i begin, i want you, the reader, to know i am a huge Zelda fan. It's my favorite series; i own hylian shield, made by your's truly. The hyrule historia (limited edition) and a self made cell phone case (poorly done) and know meaningless trivia for most of the games. Ah fan-dom... 

Ah glorious sweet Zelda merchandise. 

Now like most Zelda fans, my favorite in the series is Ocarina of Time. It simply is amazing. A good story, great controls and bosses that are intriguing as well as nicely put together. Hell even the handhelds are amazing, and i'm not just talking about the new ones. My personal favorite handheld is minish cap, It was brilliant. I remember i was 12 and i spent the whole weekend non-stop playing this game, ah youth, i don't remember the whole story but i remember feeling such joy playing it. 

By far my favorite sidekick a Link has had

I can go on and on about all the zelda titles i find different and appealing, like majoras mask... that game needs a remake, but I'm talking today about Twilight Princess...

Now before i start the tearing, i want you to know, i think Twilight princess has gotten too much praise for what we got. It simply isn't as good as many of the other games in the series. I don't care if you disagree, nor do i care if you think my reasoning is wrong; compared to the other games in the series, Twilight princess should not be in the top 3. 

This got released on both consoles, I actually wish i had played this for Gamecube.

This game was the first Zelda title on the wii, but it was originally meant to be played on the Gamecube, so when you played it on the Wii many things were off. The wii motion controls were weird, swinging the sword while holding buttons to swing in a specific motion, you could tell the game wasn't meant for the wii. Not only that, the game is supposed to take place after the events of Ocarina of Time. But on the wii version, the whole world is flipped. Things that would be on the right are on the left and so forth (also personal prejudice, link was right handed in the wii one).

yes skyward sword did it too, but i didn't hate skyward sword as much as Twilight princess

That is only the first of the problems i have with this game. Second it copies so much from Ocarina of Time. Chronologically, twilight princess was released 2 games after Ocarina of time, after Majora's mask and Wind Waker, and those two games didn't follow Ocarina this much. 

And winner by default! IS!

CDI Zelda! OH BOY! 

(if you really require the answer to the VS. i got bad news for you)

Now besides the fact it felt like a rehashed Ocarina of time, the feel of the game was so dismal... Yes i get it was twilight, but still, i hated being in the twilight area because it was so lack lustre. Zelda games have always been bright and colourful and always have an opposing feel. With Ocarina of Time there was the destroyed world and Link to the past had the underworld (kinda), but twilight was gritty and ugh. When the first time you step out to hyrule field and all you see is a dark area, you don't know what the "Light worlds" area looks like. If they had let you see the colours of the field prior to darkening it with twilight, hell i might have felt obliged to really look forward to fixing the world.

Entering into this place without seeing what it looked like before is... eugh, also there's no daytime

When i first got to hyrule field and saw the vast openness, in the twilight, i lost all interest in replaying the game. All i remember from hyrule field was the fact it was huge, unbearably huge. In Ocarina of Time the field was big, colourful and had peculiar sights to see, but in Twilight princess it felt huge with nothing in it to see, and nothing to sight see. Many areas are blocked off from the start so to make sure you follow the set path. Now yes i know all zelda games have done this, Blocking off certain areas till you get bombs or hookshots whatever. But from what i remember in Twilight Princess, you could only really go in one area at the start. In Ocarina of Time you could essentially go anywhere, while very, very specific areas were blocked off. 

This is the entirety of Hyrule field, all in one map. Pretty big but it's populated and there are things to see.

In this map the "Hyrule field" is seperated into 3 parts. Yep, 3 huge maps with nothing in them, actually i'll be fair, They lack things of proper size to fit the hugeness of the map. 

Now zelda games have usually had the "Recover the land" type of thing to return things to normal and such. Twilight princess does this as well, personally i love that mechanic. BUT, in other games they show you before hand what the place looks like for you to look forward to fixing the whole area. When i walked into hyrule field i saw dark and black. If i was a first time player of this game, i'd be like "I don't like this place". You have to show the area before bad things happen, so you get a sense of what you lost.

The dungeons felt a little too adult like for my taste. I get that they were trying to mature and give the game a dark feel, but i feel out of all the zelda titles, it sticks out the most. Each game has had characters you fall in love with, and im not talking about main characters. For me, Majora's mask would be the "malon clones", Ocarina of time, music man an so forth. But in twilight Princess the characters shown pretty much have a bland persona. Zelda is seen as the princess who lost everything and is so depressing, links childhood friends get kidnapped and if i remember correctly his love interest loses her memory. I wouldn't mind as much if they were a bit more "alive". From what i remember my favorite character was the woman from Kakariko village who drives the cart. I don't even remember her name.

(lady from kakariko village) Now the real reason i remember her is because she hugs link so hard he gets sucked into her breasts and he gives a look of desperation for freedom. Exaggerating a little bit.

Now i do not, I repeat, Do not hate this game. Its like Justin beiber, you don't really hate him, you hate his fans (wait, no i really do hate him) [god this statements gonna bite me in the ass someday i know it]. But seriously, i hate most of the people who worship this game. Twilight princess was good yes, but not that good. When i meet people who are zelda fans and they instantly tell me about Twilight princess, i instantly know what type of fan they are. Band-wagoners. Twilight princess came at the perfect time for new people to get into the series, and for that i'm glad people love it, but please do not worship the game. Midna was cool, not amazing (neither was navi but still).

"WHAT DO YOU DISLIKE A GAME FROM THE SERIES! DIE FOO'!"

Recently i got a Zelda belt-buckle. It looks pretty cool i admit. Generic zelda design on the front, gold and green. Though, once you flip the buckle over the logo on the back is "Legend of zelda: Twilight princess". Why does a generic zelda buckle have a specific game title on the back? I'll be honest if the buckle had Ocarina of time, i'd still be confused. Its generic, it should just say "Legend of zelda". I digress.

Why does something like this need to have a "Twilight Princess" logo on it?

Overall, Legend of zelda twilight princess was a good game. It brought new things to the table, and kept other aspects as well (some really easily comparable to ocarina of time), it is not close to my favorite game in the series nor will it ever be. Does it mean others shouldn't worship it? Yes. Stop worshiping this game. Of course not. Though if your favorite title is Twilight princess, take a look at the other titles in the series, and if after playing those games you still adore twilight princess to the same extent, 
Band-wagoners Then so be it. 

Words cannot express my feelings accurately