Game EXP: The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword HD (NS)

The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword HD

System: Nintendo Switch

Release Date: July 16, 2021

Publisher: Nintendo

Developer: Tantalus Media & Nintendo EAD

I had a couple of iterations of my Game EXP article for The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword HD on the Nintendo Switch, and none of them I was happy with.  Each article inevitably turned into a list of things I did not like in the game that felt like a poorly written walkthrough article with an apparent axe to grind.  Let us see if we can condense all of those previous articles, along with what I said in my First Impressions article waaaay back in March.

First and foremost, I did enjoy the game for the most part.  I liked how the story that seemingly started the entire Legend of Zelda mythology unfolded.  I liked Fi, but apparently, that is because her character and her mechanics were modified from being overly annoying in her interjections in the original Wii version compared to the Switch version.  I initially started out really annoyed by Link's romantic rival Groose, and I think he was manufactured for me to feel that way about him, but his arc over the course of the game was well played out.  I also thought that Link's arc was thoroughly refreshing in that while part of his character was deemed that of the Hero, there was still a lot of proving he had to go through before that title was fully realized.  Even Impa called out Link as a wannabe Hero and not up to the task of rescuing Zelda in a way that was not tough love, but instead very real criticism.  The main villain, Ghirahim I was a little more mixed on but I cannot put my finger on it, although I think it was primarily because of his fight mechanics which I will cover below when I get into my criticisms of the fight and puzzle mechanics.  I did like the almost cliche reaction to Link as being insignificant and toys with him in each of the early fights instead of outright killing him, but again, Impa thought Link as insignificant as well, so it was nice to have some consistency between two characters with polar opposite goals.

Mechanics.  I already covered a lot of the issues I had with the mechanics in this game in my First Impressions article.  Briefly, though, I found that I struggled somewhat with several of the puzzles, which include some of the fight mechanics because they were heavily designed around the Wii mote as the primary way to control Link.  When the game was ported to the Switch and motion controls became optional, this took away the need of the player to constantly think about motion controls as the primary way to interact with the world.  With so much of the game created with the idea that players would be in the headspace of motion controls, this did not always translate when motion controls were made optional and since I played 95% of the game in handheld mode (and for people playing on the Switch Lite), I was not always thinking about how the novelty of motion-controls was the basis for so many puzzle solutions in the game.  Thinking about how you can move the joystick on a controller is vastly different from thinking about how you can move your arm and hand while holding a controller.

Another issue I had was the direction that Nintendo had taken the Zelda franchise from Wind Waker in 2002 through Skyward Sword in 2011 (omitting Twilight Princess in 2006 which was closer to Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask in terms of overworld traversal), also including Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks, and that is traversing the world map in a vehicle with a lot of nothing between locations.  Getting anywhere in the Skyworld while flying on Link's respective Loftwing always felt like it took too much time and I wished that there was a fast travel option (and if you know me and fast travel, that is not a good thing).  I feel like I partially understand the reason behind this decision (maybe?) that it was done to help convey the size of the world, that this portion of the world is massive, but the way that this was executed is where I felt let down.  Sure there were semi-interesting characters to talk and run into on various floating islands scattered about, but since a lot of them were based around mini-games to earn more rupees (and presumably more Heart Containers?), I felt more that I did not have the interest ins traversing large swaths of clouded sky to get to their places.

Let us talk about something positive before we close out: the music.  The music was absolutely gorgeous, and kind of what I had been looking from a Legend of Zelda game since Ocarina of Time.  I loved the full orchestration and this was the primary highlight of flying anywhere was that theme.  Not only was it a gorgeous theme with elements from the original Legend of Zelda overworld theme, but it conveyed the wonder of flying and the hero that Link would eventually become.  And as mentioned previously, the Lanayru Desert theme was another theme that I did not mind listening to as I tried to find my way around the sandy barren lands.  Just all around, Shiho Fuji did an amazing job with the music in this game.

You know, I think I will end it there on that high note.  I enjoyed the story, the character arcs, and the imagining of these characters that I have been playing and interacting with for the past 33 years, and even with all of the mechanics that did not translate well from the Wii to the Switch, I am still very happy that I was finally able to play this game in a franchise that I had begun to lose interest in (prior to Breath of the Wild, although Spirit Tracks did not help with that at all).  Now I will be jumping into The Minish Cap, probably sometime soon or after I finish "Fire Emblem" on the Wii U Virtual Console; or maybe at the same time, because why not?

~JWfW/JDub/The Faceplantman/Jaconian
Don't Grow Up Too Fast