This review contains spoilers
In playing this game I seemed to have made a full realisation of what I look for in a Zelda game. This series to me is fun when the puzzles really make me rack my brain and when the solution eventually comes there's immense satisfaction when I figure out the solution. The dungeons and exploration are merely a backdrop for these physics based puzzles. Unfortunately, I rarely got these "Aha" moments that seem to be so common now in the recent entries in the series. But more on that later.
When playing the game for the first time it's obvious that the game has shown its age. Both the janky controls and somewhat ugly artstyle (though it elicits some charm as I grew into the game) are not the best first impression. The Kokiri Forest is a decent tutorial area, not amazing nor bad - it serves its purpose but it serves as much more of an important area thematically speaking than it does for teaching the player. It perfectly ties in with the game's main idea of Link being forced to lose his childhood innocence (represented by the Kokiri Forest).
The Great Deku Tree was a great first dungeon, mostly for its eerie atmosphere but it had simple but effective puzzles to lure the player in. The same could not be said for the next 2 dungeons, Dodongo's Cavern and especially Jabu Jabu's belly which felt like padded their difficulty with nuisance enemies. To add on to that their atmosphere was drab and boring, nothing like I would expect from this game which handles its atmosphere generally very well. I would say this was the worst part of the game for me, it gets alot better from here on out.
From here the adult portion of the game is unlocked allowing the player to switch between his adult and child versions from The Temple of Time. I really like this concept, it forces the player to plan ahead and seeing areas change over time really cements the central theme of the game. For example, magic beans can be planted as a child and when you come back as an adult they are fully grown allowing Link to get to new areas, often resulting in a Heart Piece or Golden Skultula. Though this idea it is let down a bit by the fact that magic beans are so lazily obtained just by throwing rupees at an npc.
The first dungeon Link must go to as an adult is the Forest Temple. This is a fan favourite and I can definitely see why, the music is unsettling and the whole place gives such a mysterious vibe. That being said I have some gripes with it and I certainly don't hold it in as high regard as many. For one, the puzzles are really nothing to write home about. They're cool to look at - namely the changing corridor but you aren't solving a problem, rather you're just flipping a switch or shooting an eye most of the time which is not very engaging to me. My other main problem is that it ends up feeling way too corridory at times with no shortcuts opening up as you progress through the dungeon. I remember I accidentally made a mistake to get a hidden chest late in the dungeon and as such had to walk through the whole dungeon again because of how linearly it seems to be designed (despite having the illusion of having a central hub with several paths, in practice the main route of the dungeon ends up forming just 1 long path).
Next up was the Fire Temple which was fine. The atmosphere and puzzles were seemingly as bland as Dodongo's Cavern but the layout and gimmick of this dungeon definitely has me preferring this overall. It's a bit of a shame Nintendo decided to change the music for this because the replacement is really drab and doesn't contribute much to the atmosphere.
Next up is the infamous water temple. You might be expecting me to trash on this, but this ended up being my favourite dungeon in the game unironically. It feels like the only area of the game which really tests the players puzzle solving and memory. Additionally the whole layout and atmosphere of the dungeon was how a water temple should feel like and it even had an iconic fight with Dark Link halfway through. It had some issues with nuisance enemies and of course swapping out the Iron Boots but the pace of the dungeon really meant that the issue didn't bother me much. If I had to constantly swap in and out for fast paced combat encounters like you have to do with some items in other areas it would have really killed the pace of the dungeon but since this area required alot more of a slow approach I don't think it mattered all that much.
With that being said, next up was the Bottom of the Well and the Shadow Temple which were both pretty dissapointing for me if I'm honest. The Lens of Truth and the hover boots are both pretty boring items to play around with and the game constantly halts your progress sometimes even making you go back to the start of the dungeon or room if you mess up which ends up happening alot with how janky the physics are at times, altogether contributing to a frustrating nightmare of a dungeon. I do agree that the aesthetics of the dungeon are really on point but the puzzles were non existent and I can't even say there were even any entertaining combat encounters outside of the bosses.
Finally the last area being the unexplored Gerudo Valley and subsequent Spirit Temple were very entertaining for me. Adding the Gerudo tribe was a great addition I think and really added to the presence of Ganondorf in this game. The stealth section was a bit lame here but having Link switch between his child and adult counterparts for the Spirit Temple was great fun and I wish this game had more areas like this. This dungeon had everything a dungeon should have in this series - atmosphere, a fun dungeon item, interesting puzzles, tough combat encounters and a good boss. This was a fitting last dungeon to crawl through indeed.
I should talk about the side content before I begin talking about the endgame. For starters there is the pieces of heart which are mostly enjoyable to find but it is not worth it to max out due to some perplexing choices for some of the minigames required to obtain all of them. Well in fairness it comes down to mostly 1, the Bombchu minigame which is probably the most atrocious minigame in the game. This is because for some reason the prizes rotate 5 times and there is no way to skip prizes, some of them being as shit as just bombs or bombchus. The other rewards being a bomb bag, 50 rupees and a piece of heart. It costs 30 to play so if you're trying to get the piece of heart you effectively spend 150 (100 if you win the 50 rupees which still requires you to beat the game) for a CHANCE of getting the piece of heart. This I could overlook if the minigame wasn't so god damn difficult due to bombchus being nearly impossible to aim where you want. You can't really microadjust any projectiles in this game because of the finnicky controls and no gyro controls. Anyway what I'm saying is I gave up with this garbage and just beat the game with 19 hearts instead of 20.
Golden Skultulas were the other main collectible, with 100 of these guys hiding around the map. 50 is required for 2 heart pieces but for some reason the reward for scouring the map for all 100 is only 200 rupees which just really makes me wonder what the point of getting them all really is. They seem to be kind of fun to find in dungeons but looking for them round the map seems to involve alot of luck, like finding a needle in a haystack. Some of them are in cool locations but some of them are just hanging around in places you won't find unless by accident.
There are some other items and whatnot round the map but nothing really compelled me to go out looking for them except for the bottles which are very useful in this game, moreso than any other game in the series. It is very rewarding to collect these and they come in handy several times along the main quest. Some useful optional items like Din's Fire are also hidden tactically round the map which gives me a great feeling when I find them and then can use them to make my life easier in the main quest.
As for the sidequests I really don't like fetch quests so it's no surprise that the Biggoron questline was not one I enjoyed a whole lot. On the other hand, getting Epona was a fun one for me and made traversing Hyrule Fields less boring.
Speaking of Hyrule Field being boring, I should say that the overworld in this game is really lacking anything to do and explore. Hyrule Field feels so empty and seems just like a hub world just connecting the 5 areas of the map which are still pretty lackluster themselves. I pretty much only talked about the dungeons in relation to the main quest because that's all it really feels like when I peel the game back. Some dungeons and an empty world that quickly hurries the player through them hoping that the player won't notice the lack of anything to do that aren't fetch quests, badly designed minigames or collectibles.
Finally, I can talk about the end of the game. Ganon's Tower is fine, for endgame Zelda Dungeons it's one of the weaker ones for me - besides the final boss I can't say it was all too memorable. Ganondorf and Ganon were pretty lacking mechanically but god damn were they cinematic. It truly felt like the true final boss battle to decide the future of this world. To be truthful that's all they really needed to be, the game merely needs the player to believe the fight was challenging and it serves its purpose in my book. I think it succeeds in that.
Overall, I think this game is good but is easily overshadowed by the future 3d zelda games which just do the Ocarina Of Time formula bigger and better. The writing of the series was at it's peak from here on out and this is clearly this game's strong suit. The gameplay is where I can really see the cracks in this game's legacy and there's not much reason for me to revisit this in my eyes. It just feels way too slow at times, the combat is emblematic of this fact but it shows in other areas too. You can't skip dialogue quickly, some enemies pull you into long animations where you can't do anything to break out, traversing the overworld is slow, Navi stops to tell you useless information which you can't skip, you have to constantly go to the menu to switch items, etc etc etc. There's just too much going on that bogs down the pace of the game forcing you to wait. Going back to my first statement I said that puzzles were my favourite part of Zelda and I realised that with this game because of how unimpressed I was with the puzzle solving in this game. Shooting an eye is not a puzzle, lighting a torch is not a puzzle and neither is standing on a button to walk through a door. This game is just full of these 1 step solution "puzzles" which don't challenge the players ingenuity whatsoever. On the other hand the game goes the other direction and makes puzzles with such a random solution that there is only anger in solving them. This is not the feeling that should be evoked from making a discovery, there should be some level of accomplishment felt when putting several elements together but in this game I rarely get this feeling. This game may have been considered a masterpiece in 1998 but gaming has come so far now and it's hard for me to give it praise when it feels so outdated now. If you enjoy this game I'm happy for you but for what I look for in a Zelda game it doesn't hold up like that
When playing the game for the first time it's obvious that the game has shown its age. Both the janky controls and somewhat ugly artstyle (though it elicits some charm as I grew into the game) are not the best first impression. The Kokiri Forest is a decent tutorial area, not amazing nor bad - it serves its purpose but it serves as much more of an important area thematically speaking than it does for teaching the player. It perfectly ties in with the game's main idea of Link being forced to lose his childhood innocence (represented by the Kokiri Forest).
The Great Deku Tree was a great first dungeon, mostly for its eerie atmosphere but it had simple but effective puzzles to lure the player in. The same could not be said for the next 2 dungeons, Dodongo's Cavern and especially Jabu Jabu's belly which felt like padded their difficulty with nuisance enemies. To add on to that their atmosphere was drab and boring, nothing like I would expect from this game which handles its atmosphere generally very well. I would say this was the worst part of the game for me, it gets alot better from here on out.
From here the adult portion of the game is unlocked allowing the player to switch between his adult and child versions from The Temple of Time. I really like this concept, it forces the player to plan ahead and seeing areas change over time really cements the central theme of the game. For example, magic beans can be planted as a child and when you come back as an adult they are fully grown allowing Link to get to new areas, often resulting in a Heart Piece or Golden Skultula. Though this idea it is let down a bit by the fact that magic beans are so lazily obtained just by throwing rupees at an npc.
The first dungeon Link must go to as an adult is the Forest Temple. This is a fan favourite and I can definitely see why, the music is unsettling and the whole place gives such a mysterious vibe. That being said I have some gripes with it and I certainly don't hold it in as high regard as many. For one, the puzzles are really nothing to write home about. They're cool to look at - namely the changing corridor but you aren't solving a problem, rather you're just flipping a switch or shooting an eye most of the time which is not very engaging to me. My other main problem is that it ends up feeling way too corridory at times with no shortcuts opening up as you progress through the dungeon. I remember I accidentally made a mistake to get a hidden chest late in the dungeon and as such had to walk through the whole dungeon again because of how linearly it seems to be designed (despite having the illusion of having a central hub with several paths, in practice the main route of the dungeon ends up forming just 1 long path).
Next up was the Fire Temple which was fine. The atmosphere and puzzles were seemingly as bland as Dodongo's Cavern but the layout and gimmick of this dungeon definitely has me preferring this overall. It's a bit of a shame Nintendo decided to change the music for this because the replacement is really drab and doesn't contribute much to the atmosphere.
Next up is the infamous water temple. You might be expecting me to trash on this, but this ended up being my favourite dungeon in the game unironically. It feels like the only area of the game which really tests the players puzzle solving and memory. Additionally the whole layout and atmosphere of the dungeon was how a water temple should feel like and it even had an iconic fight with Dark Link halfway through. It had some issues with nuisance enemies and of course swapping out the Iron Boots but the pace of the dungeon really meant that the issue didn't bother me much. If I had to constantly swap in and out for fast paced combat encounters like you have to do with some items in other areas it would have really killed the pace of the dungeon but since this area required alot more of a slow approach I don't think it mattered all that much.
With that being said, next up was the Bottom of the Well and the Shadow Temple which were both pretty dissapointing for me if I'm honest. The Lens of Truth and the hover boots are both pretty boring items to play around with and the game constantly halts your progress sometimes even making you go back to the start of the dungeon or room if you mess up which ends up happening alot with how janky the physics are at times, altogether contributing to a frustrating nightmare of a dungeon. I do agree that the aesthetics of the dungeon are really on point but the puzzles were non existent and I can't even say there were even any entertaining combat encounters outside of the bosses.
Finally the last area being the unexplored Gerudo Valley and subsequent Spirit Temple were very entertaining for me. Adding the Gerudo tribe was a great addition I think and really added to the presence of Ganondorf in this game. The stealth section was a bit lame here but having Link switch between his child and adult counterparts for the Spirit Temple was great fun and I wish this game had more areas like this. This dungeon had everything a dungeon should have in this series - atmosphere, a fun dungeon item, interesting puzzles, tough combat encounters and a good boss. This was a fitting last dungeon to crawl through indeed.
I should talk about the side content before I begin talking about the endgame. For starters there is the pieces of heart which are mostly enjoyable to find but it is not worth it to max out due to some perplexing choices for some of the minigames required to obtain all of them. Well in fairness it comes down to mostly 1, the Bombchu minigame which is probably the most atrocious minigame in the game. This is because for some reason the prizes rotate 5 times and there is no way to skip prizes, some of them being as shit as just bombs or bombchus. The other rewards being a bomb bag, 50 rupees and a piece of heart. It costs 30 to play so if you're trying to get the piece of heart you effectively spend 150 (100 if you win the 50 rupees which still requires you to beat the game) for a CHANCE of getting the piece of heart. This I could overlook if the minigame wasn't so god damn difficult due to bombchus being nearly impossible to aim where you want. You can't really microadjust any projectiles in this game because of the finnicky controls and no gyro controls. Anyway what I'm saying is I gave up with this garbage and just beat the game with 19 hearts instead of 20.
Golden Skultulas were the other main collectible, with 100 of these guys hiding around the map. 50 is required for 2 heart pieces but for some reason the reward for scouring the map for all 100 is only 200 rupees which just really makes me wonder what the point of getting them all really is. They seem to be kind of fun to find in dungeons but looking for them round the map seems to involve alot of luck, like finding a needle in a haystack. Some of them are in cool locations but some of them are just hanging around in places you won't find unless by accident.
There are some other items and whatnot round the map but nothing really compelled me to go out looking for them except for the bottles which are very useful in this game, moreso than any other game in the series. It is very rewarding to collect these and they come in handy several times along the main quest. Some useful optional items like Din's Fire are also hidden tactically round the map which gives me a great feeling when I find them and then can use them to make my life easier in the main quest.
As for the sidequests I really don't like fetch quests so it's no surprise that the Biggoron questline was not one I enjoyed a whole lot. On the other hand, getting Epona was a fun one for me and made traversing Hyrule Fields less boring.
Speaking of Hyrule Field being boring, I should say that the overworld in this game is really lacking anything to do and explore. Hyrule Field feels so empty and seems just like a hub world just connecting the 5 areas of the map which are still pretty lackluster themselves. I pretty much only talked about the dungeons in relation to the main quest because that's all it really feels like when I peel the game back. Some dungeons and an empty world that quickly hurries the player through them hoping that the player won't notice the lack of anything to do that aren't fetch quests, badly designed minigames or collectibles.
Finally, I can talk about the end of the game. Ganon's Tower is fine, for endgame Zelda Dungeons it's one of the weaker ones for me - besides the final boss I can't say it was all too memorable. Ganondorf and Ganon were pretty lacking mechanically but god damn were they cinematic. It truly felt like the true final boss battle to decide the future of this world. To be truthful that's all they really needed to be, the game merely needs the player to believe the fight was challenging and it serves its purpose in my book. I think it succeeds in that.
Overall, I think this game is good but is easily overshadowed by the future 3d zelda games which just do the Ocarina Of Time formula bigger and better. The writing of the series was at it's peak from here on out and this is clearly this game's strong suit. The gameplay is where I can really see the cracks in this game's legacy and there's not much reason for me to revisit this in my eyes. It just feels way too slow at times, the combat is emblematic of this fact but it shows in other areas too. You can't skip dialogue quickly, some enemies pull you into long animations where you can't do anything to break out, traversing the overworld is slow, Navi stops to tell you useless information which you can't skip, you have to constantly go to the menu to switch items, etc etc etc. There's just too much going on that bogs down the pace of the game forcing you to wait. Going back to my first statement I said that puzzles were my favourite part of Zelda and I realised that with this game because of how unimpressed I was with the puzzle solving in this game. Shooting an eye is not a puzzle, lighting a torch is not a puzzle and neither is standing on a button to walk through a door. This game is just full of these 1 step solution "puzzles" which don't challenge the players ingenuity whatsoever. On the other hand the game goes the other direction and makes puzzles with such a random solution that there is only anger in solving them. This is not the feeling that should be evoked from making a discovery, there should be some level of accomplishment felt when putting several elements together but in this game I rarely get this feeling. This game may have been considered a masterpiece in 1998 but gaming has come so far now and it's hard for me to give it praise when it feels so outdated now. If you enjoy this game I'm happy for you but for what I look for in a Zelda game it doesn't hold up like that