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So I played Ocarina of Time for the very first time, and this game could do with a modern remake

It's stuff like this that makes me sad because it means that some of the best unique puzzle game design is truly dead, the artform of the Zelda 3d dungeons have never been recreated at such a high level in gaming that I've seen and I know because open world sandbox games are just more popular its truly dead. Why would Nintendo every try that hard again, it's just more difficult to create and makes less money.
Zoomers can’t play old Zelda games because the dungeons are bigger than 1-3 rooms and their attention spans can’t handle it. Prove me wrong
m3vvg5P.jpg
Yeah..these kids are lowkey ruining gaming because all they want is a fucking sandbox with little context to fuck around in.

Like here we are in a thread where a so called gamer doesnt have the context of actually playing OOT or windwaker. Hes a bro talking to me about games. I thought I escaped that with online forums. But its just kids who console game only and barely played the better shit.

Or hes like 15-23, in which case he grew up with shit gaming. so its all bad.

Most gamers tiday are like videogame dunkey and nakey jakey.
Vro gamers with short attention spans that have rhe most fun with games like souls, TOTK, and just cause because these are """"gameplay first"""
 

MagnesD3

Member
Yeah..these kids are lowkey ruining gaming because all they want is a fucking sandbox with little context to fuck around in.

Like here we are in a thread where a so called gamer doesnt have the context of actually playing OOT or windwaker. Hes a bro talking to me about games. I thought I escaped that with online forums. But its just kids who console game only and barely played the better shit.

Or hes like 15-23, in which case he grew up with shit gaming. so its all bad.

Most gamers tiday are like videogame dunkey and nakey jakey.
Vro gamers with short attention spans that have rhe most fun with games like souls, TOTK, and just cause because these are """"gameplay first"""
Kids and people who dont have that much time/don't care that much for gaming love massive amounts of 3 star finger food instead of one 5 star world class chef made meal you'll neva fahget
 
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Kids and people who dont have that much time/don't care that much for gaming love massive amounts of 3 star finger food instead of one 5 star world class chef made meal you'll neva fahget
Probably the best way to put it I've seen lol

Glad im not the only that...notices this. Sometimes I second guess myself posting the shit I say lol becauss I assume Im like probably the only asshole that would say something like that xD but its true. imo for the first time in history, younger gamers are actually concerning...because newer games are actually becoming more formulaic, monetized and less complex or streamlined. And the standard to compare it to...isnt being played the younger they are.

Imo...I just saw cybperunk recieve hate on its game quality for not being a open sandbox that lets you just fuck around.

I see the witcher 3 getting hated on more and totk and Elden ring being regarded as the top of open world ambition.

Which games are more ADHD friendly? ToTK or The Witcher?
 

MagnesD3

Member
Probably the best way to put it I've seen lol

Glad im not the only that...notices this. Sometimes I second guess myself posting the shit I say lol becauss I assume Im like probably the only asshole that would say something like that xD but its true. imo for the first time in history, younger gamers are actually concerning...because newer games are actually becoming more formulaic, monetized and less complex or streamlined. And the standard to compare it to...isnt being played the younger they are.

Imo...I just saw cybperunk recieve hate on its game quality for not being a open sandbox that lets you just fuck around.

I see the witcher 3 getting hated on more and totk and Elden ring being regarded as the top of open world ambition.

Which games are more ADHD friendly? ToTK or The Witcher?
Agreed minus the Elden Ring part, that shit doesn't pander to anybody but people who like godlike combat/exploration/level design.

But overall the whole freedom sandbox shtick fucks up game design since they have to make sure anything can work it narrows down what they can do, dumbs it down.
 
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Most gamers tiday are like videogame dunkey and nakey jakey.
Vro gamers with short attention spans that have rhe most fun with games like souls, TOTK, and just cause because these are """"gameplay first"""
Actually dunkey has made one of the better reviews for OoT that I've seen.
 
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Dampf

Member
(there is a late game dungeon where I had to keep going into the menu to switch equipment every few minutes, and it was a long and cumbersome process each time). there's a lot of stuff in this game that just doesnt hold up.
That was your mistake right there, playing the N64 version. This has been fixed alongside other aspects of the game in the 3DS remake.

OoT is truly timeless as has not aged a day (aside from graphics of course)
 

Skeptical

Member
The OP isn't wrong about Hyrule Field being empty. I thought the same all the way back in 98. Besides the natural limitations of the time, I wonder if part of that was to invoke a sense of wonder rather than fear the first time you saw it. Little Link is starting on an adventure, and it shouldn't feel dangerous at first.

But that said, regardless of Hyrule Field itself, I think OoT did a wonderful job of capturing that same feeling of wonder that the original did back on the NES. Sure, maybe some of it was simply due to a lack of knowledge and experience with 3D games, but there was still that same sense of how deep does the rabbit hole go? And maybe it feels differently today when you have a 900 game backlog and are just burning through games quickly to complete them. But back in the day, when you could play the same game for a month straight, you would notice all the little details and wonder what they are there for. And you would feel like you are the only person who knew about some of these details, because you had to go out of your way to stumble across them. Much like BotW/TotK, you could feel like you knew the game well and still be told something you had no idea about. And if you discovered it yourself, just seeing it was enough of a reward.

So even if a field is barren, there was so much to see and wonder about. I love the fact that there were weird things that served no purpose. Go to Jabu Jabu's grove and find a secret passage filled with invisible enemies that brought you up to a clearing where you can look out over the pond. Why? Well, there's a gold skulltula there I guess, but mostly because why not? Run around a seemingly dead end in the lost woods and find yourself on the Deku stage. What's it for? If you don't think to try wearing masks, including the ones that served no purpose, you would never know. Sink to the bottom of the mad scientist's pool and find a shark there. The Hylian Loach. Stealing the fisherman's hat. Getting bombed by the guard in Zelda's courtyard. All of the entirely different ways the gossip stones respond to your weapons. The mortally wounded soldier. The cucco hanging out on the little room at the top of the windmill. The impossible to defeat running man.

Did you know about any of those when you played, L LakeOf9 ? It may not have an intricate maze-like overworld like LttP (and to be honest, for me it is LttP's overworld that loses points, as it is the only Zelda game where I found all of the pieces of heart), but it has a surprising density of weirdness and random items that serve no purpose other than make the world richer. And because of that, the game felt impossibly large and full of mystery and wonder. It's not surprising that this game resulted in a myriad of rumors regarding finding the Triforce; if they managed to fit all these little things that served no purpose, surely they can hide something big as well.

That sense of wonder is also aided by the fact that the game lets you see so many things early and let your brain wonder when you would learn about them. I went through the entire Lost Woods before entering the Deku Tree (mostly because I was an idiot and couldn't find the sword, but let's pretend I did it on purpose). What was this Goron city? Why was there a bridge I couldn't get to? What were these dirt patches on the ground? And why all the buildup to this sacred grotto with a dais with the Triforce on it? So many questions, and I didn't even have a sword yet! Compared to the linear approach and "don't introduce something until the player is ready for it and can learn what it is about" philosophy, this just made the world feel that much more alive.

Is it dated in some respects? Perhaps. But Ocarina of Time is still such a brilliantly designed world with plenty of secrets to find and wonders to behold. And for that I still love it, even today.
 
no they are not.


Most ps1/n64 games are nearly unplayable tbh, not to mention ugly af.
Combat in both of those games still feels better than BotW. At least, I don't need to pause and search through a list of food items every time I get hit by an enemy. And I don't have to keep changing my weapon, as each only lasts for a few hits.

I hate the combat in the new Zelda games. Exploration is good, but the combat is a chore and is clunky AF.

Windwaker isn't an N64 game, and honestly, the HD version looks cleaner and better than TotK still.
 
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NeoIkaruGAF

Gold Member
I played the PC port with free camera and it's awesome.

Unfortunately there are not enough inputs left to cover the c-buttons and have a couple of extra shortcuts on the D-pad, which the port allows.
Majora’s Mask 3D has free camera. But that’s because it came out after new3DS with its extra ”stick” was a thing.
 

MagnesD3

Member
no they are not.


Most ps1/n64 games are nearly unplayable tbh, not to mention ugly af.
Lol some of the best games of all time are from those consoles to this day, but tastes are getting worse with younger generations who care too much about what a game looks like or if it holds thier hand.

When people say stuff like this I always know there is a knowledge check missing in understanding what makes a good video game.
 
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diunxx

Member
Lol some of the best games of all time are from those consoles to this day, but tastes are getting worse with younger generations who care too much about what a game looks like or if it holds thier hand.

When people say stuff like this I always know there is a knowledge check missing in understanding what makes a good video game.
Dude I'm 35, not arguing that some of the greatest games are from that gen but most of them are unplayable today, not only do they look ugly as sin but the control scheme, mechanics etc are dated as fuck not to mention the awful framerate, you are getting blinded by nostalgia.
 

Pilgrimzero

Member
I first played it when it came out on Gamecube. Yeah it was alright.

I found it very boring at first. Just let me go adventuring!

And it started Zelda's slide into being very anime/japanese/eastern fantasy/etc.

I liked Wind Waker better but that's not saying much.

BotW was nice but lacked dungeons IMO.

Having played almost every Zelda ever created (sorry CD-i games), still have to give the 2 top spots to Zelda 1 and 3.
 

MagnesD3

Member
Dude I'm 35, not arguing that some of the greatest games are from that gen but most of them are unplayable today, not only do they look ugly as sin but the control scheme, mechanics etc are dated as fuck not to mention the awful framerate, you are getting blinded by nostalgia.
Half of them I played 20 years after release for the first time it ain't nostalgia lol, they are just incredibly good being way better than most modern games AND THEY DID THIS YEARS AGO, that says alot about the game industry's direction as a whole and what gets prioritized. Graphics, better frame rates and controls feeling more tight are important but they ain't more important than incredible Game Design baby.

Why have we never seen a better Banjo like adventure 3d platformer, why have we never seen a better Starfox like, why can't anyone else make incredible 3D Zelda Dungeons outside of the older Zelda games. Why isn't there something like a better Metal Gear Solid in the world. Etc.. It goes on and on.
 
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Dude I'm 35, not arguing that some of the greatest games are from that gen but most of them are unplayable today, not only do they look ugly as sin but the control scheme, mechanics etc are dated as fuck not to mention the awful framerate, you are getting blinded by nostalgia.
Many of those games are still great, control just fine, and while they look dated to varying degrees, I don't mind at all. Some stuff is just timeless for me.
 

diffusionx

Gold Member
Many of those games are still great, control just fine, and while they look dated to varying degrees, I don't mind at all. Some stuff is just timeless for me.

Yea. If somebody wants to play an old game, they'll get over the dated graphics in a few minutes. it just becomes the game you are playing. Like why would I care if, say, Vagrant Story doesn't look like FFXVI while I am playing Vagrant Story? It does not matter at all. Just enjoy the game you are playing, it's fine.

It's like watching a great black-and-white movie, if you are mentally hung up on the fact that it's not in color you are watching it wrong. Enjoy it on its own terms.
 

Poordevil

Member
I can still remember the opening scene of Link riding his horse... and that music!
That was back in 1998 on the N64 displayed on a Sony CRT.
For a long time OoT was my favorite video game of all time. But I'm done with it. Replayed it several times.
Back in the day I really overlooked it because it was an RPG. My only experience with the genre was FFVII and I had no clue what was going on with that game! Played it a little on a borrowed Playstation. I remember coming off a train facing a line of enemies with numbers popping out of their heads... So I thought that was what Zelda was going to be.
While browsing my local video game rental store I noticed that OoT was actually there for rent. It was always rented out. Glanced over the box and the artwork. I took a chance on it.
 

nemiroff

Gold Member
The game felt clunky to me even back then. It was almost like it was too big for the hardware it was running on. I enjoyed it though.
 
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This thread quickly went from reasonable disagreements and meeting at a middle ground of understanding, to angry older gamers upset at a first timer not liking their favorite entry as much as they do. Since we’re here, it needs to be said…

I don’t even think it’s that wild of a take to say that the SNES/GEN generation aged 3x better than the entirety of the N64/PS1/Saturn generation and that aside from a few top of class games from that first foray into 3D, the rest of them aged like milk compared to their SNES/GEN counterparts. This includes awkward controls, terrible frame rate, and going from beautiful artistic pixel masterpieces to horribly blocky and blurry textures.

Some of you guys will never admit to it being nostalgia driven but truly look, play, and compare the two generations and it’s not even close. If I had the choice of giving a first time Zelda player a game, it would always be Link to the Past. That game is simply gorgeous compared to the original OoT.
 

MagnesD3

Member
This thread quickly went from reasonable disagreements and meeting at a middle ground of understanding, to angry older gamers upset at a first timer not liking their favorite entry as much as they do. Since we’re here, it needs to be said…

I don’t even think it’s that wild of a take to say that the SNES/GEN generation aged 3x better than the entirety of the N64/PS1/Saturn generation and that aside from a few top of class games from that first foray into 3D, the rest of them aged like milk compared to their SNES/GEN counterparts. This includes awkward controls, terrible frame rate, and going from beautiful artistic pixel masterpieces to horribly blocky and blurry textures.

Some of you guys will never admit to it being nostalgia driven but truly look, play, and compare the two generations and it’s not even close. If I had the choice of giving a first time Zelda player a game, it would always be Link to the Past. That game is simply gorgeous compared to the original OoT.
I'd say the same thing to people who try to peddle Link to the Past or the original Loz lol. Of course I think they are good games it's just 2d zeldas are inferior to the 3d ones.

I actually feel the snes generation is very overrated, 2d mario is very overrated imo. They control great but are often forgettable alot of the time due to thier short slice nature.
 
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I actually feel the snes generation is very overrated, 2d mario is very overrated imo. They control great but are often forgettable alot of the time due to thier short slice nature.
If this were truly the case, the indie scene wouldn’t still be trying to copy or outdo Super Mario, Super Metroid, and LttP for nearly 3 generations at this point.

Also don’t skip over the ‘they control great’ part so quickly lol, because that’s literally a big part of what makes them age so well.
 

Regginator

Member
I can't deduce from the OP which version you've played, but regardless I'd say it already has a modern remake though. Ocarina of Time is my favourite game of all-time, and I'd say the 3DS remake improves upon the original in significant ways when it comes to modern(ish) controls and some QoL-improvements (like the Iron Boots as items instead of gear). Overall speaking it plays better as a result, and it stands the test of time better.

That being said, I can think of only two downsides: the fact that it's portable-only, and that some visual design changes weren't always for the better.
 

MagnesD3

Member
If this were truly the case, the indie scene wouldn’t still be trying to copy or outdo Super Mario, Super Metroid, and LttP for nearly 3 generations at this point.

Also don’t skip over the ‘they control great’ part so quickly lol, because that’s literally a big part of what makes them age so well.
But I would rather player Ocarina an unforgettable game with powerful atmosphere, incredible dungeons with the ost/boss/puzzles and intriguing story. Or Super Mario 64 (even though its camera has issues)/Banjos Adventure 3D platformer with tight choose your own path with tightly controlled platforming challenges or interesting believable worlds that know how to invoke the feeling of the place through its charming characters, atmosphere and music.

Also just because it's popular doesn't mean it's the best, I'd argue 3d Zelda was honestly pretty niche in mainstream gaming sales wise due to its incredible linear puzzle design being not what draws that crowd in, it wasn't until BOTW when it became an open sandbox/resource game with less focus on incredible puzzles that had more grounded puzzles more in line with the real world and became easier in general for it to become a mainstream hit.
 
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NeoIkaruGAF

Gold Member
This thread quickly went from reasonable disagreements and meeting at a middle ground of understanding, to angry older gamers upset at a first timer not liking their favorite entry as much as they do. Since we’re here, it needs to be said…

I don’t even think it’s that wild of a take to say that the SNES/GEN generation aged 3x better than the entirety of the N64/PS1/Saturn generation and that aside from a few top of class games from that first foray into 3D, the rest of them aged like milk compared to their SNES/GEN counterparts. This includes awkward controls, terrible frame rate, and going from beautiful artistic pixel masterpieces to horribly blocky and blurry textures.

Some of you guys will never admit to it being nostalgia driven but truly look, play, and compare the two generations and it’s not even close. If I had the choice of giving a first time Zelda player a game, it would always be Link to the Past. That game is simply gorgeous compared to the original OoT.
The complexity introduced by 3D and bigger data storage makes some earlier 3D games a much more interesting proposition compared to the 16-bit era. 5th gen made games bigger and more ambitious, without allowing for the amount of useless filler we got later and that seems to be indispensable today to “justify“ a game’s price.

In their tirades against early 3D games, many people forget that those games were perfectly playable in their time. It’s not like Spyro or OoT played badly, at all. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have become classics. So why should they play badly today? Good gameplay stays good. Mario 64 is 30fps and has that camera, yet it still plays great and it’s a speedrunners’ favorite.
Awkward controls? I dunno, we just had another “the claw” thread last week. Too many actions on so many buttons, it’s not like modern games are that straightforward to just pick up and play. Took me a few hours, and an in-game hint, to understand just how the fuck you throw items in TOTK.
As for framerate, daily reminder that framerate issues are more related to screen tech than anything else. Furthermore, those games were made with framerate limitations in mind; they weren’t programmed at 60fps and then just forced to run on incapable hardware. The gameplay was tied to the framerate. Problem solved - or rather, never even created to begin with.

Also, SNES/GEN was a long enough gen that tech improved exponentially between launch games and end-of-cycle games. There is no comparing FFVII to SNES FFIV in a sane world. And FFVII was still a better game overall compared to FFVI - plot and characters are down to personal preference, yes, and FFVI’s art was insane for 2D; but I replayed FFVII recently like it was new, while FFVI never managed to pull me in.
Even so, while late 16-bit games could be technically amazing and their artwork blows early 3D out of the water, the actual gameplay was often lacking. SNES got so many Mario copycats. Arcade ports were better played in the arcades anyway. Sports games could only do so much. Non- action JRPGs were a grindfest, while action JRPGs had terrible limitations. A lot of games were bland, unoriginal, plain boring even if their graphics were incredible and refreshed 60 times per second.

I guess the bottom line is, games don’t age like milk just because time has passed. If they were good to play then, chances are they still are, if you give them some time to get past the inevitable limitations.
 
Ocarina of Time should always be remembered for the pioneering title it was. But I think these open world interpretations of the first Zelda was what they were trying to achieve even back then; OoT was just the limit of what the N64 would allow at that time. The franchise then IMO made the quite reasonable but ultimately mistaken decision of going in the overall direction of "let's make a better Ocarina of Time" up until BotW.
Only Twilight Princess fell flat on that trope. And I find it wrong that such decision was the mistake seeing how technology had evolved since OoT. The issue was that the planning fell flat. OoT in it's tiny world had more sidequests than TP. And while they did a huge overworld for it, they didn't have time to populate it enough. Sometimes youy have a bunch of parts that come together in the end, sometimes you don't. Zelda TP is an example of a game that didn't come together in the end, I feel like it would with slightly different guidance and one extra year. That they didn't have in 2006 (the console it was meant to be released on originally being on the verge of being replaced and all).

Majora Mask didn't try to best OoT, Wind Waker didn't either. Skyward Sword was quite contained in scope as well (a midsection between TP and BoTW, with Wii limitations thrown in).
 
3DS version is fantastic, it's difficult to go back to the original after having the quality of life updates (quick touchscreen inventory management, etc).
N64 controls are still better though. (also, IMO, the GC controller is still the best controller of all time for Zelda)

Playing instruments on 3DS feels like playing a 3d platformer on a keyboard. Simply wrong.
 

Muffdraul

Member
OoT is one of the few old classic favorites of mine that I can't play now, haven't been able to in years. I must have played it 100 times from 1998-2003 or so but the last time I tried to play it on Switch it was just too painful. Normally I can play my old favorites no matter how old they are (within reason, no matter how much I loved an Atari 2600 game when I was 12 I can only take about 3 minutes of it now) but I just can't hang with OoT or MM. They just feel so goddamn wonky. I'd love a remake. Hell, just adapt the 3DS version to Switch and I'd be into that.
 
OoT is one of the few old classic favorites of mine that I can't play now, haven't been able to in years. I must have played it 100 times from 1998-2003 or so but the last time I tried to play it on Switch it was just too painful. Normally I can play my old favorites no matter how old they are (within reason, no matter how much I loved an Atari 2600 game when I was 12 I can only take about 3 minutes of it now) but I just can't hang with OoT or MM. They just feel so goddamn wonky. I'd love a remake. Hell, just adapt the 3DS version to Switch and I'd be into that.
From what you're saying (that the 3DS version is fine) it's probably down to the framerate, no?

I still really like the N64 presentation over 3DS, the menus are great and the animating HUD (green and blue context icons) are gorgeous. But the 20fps framerate hurts bad.

I actually hope that now that they decompiled it and seeing stuff Kaze Emanuar did with Mario 64 source code optimizations (upon which engine OoT and MM are based), that a 30 FPS path for both OoT and Majora Mask on real hardware is done by somebody. If Kaze rolled down the updates he did to vanilla Mario 64 I wouldn't be surprised if he could pull 60 fps at this point (he claimed a few months ago that he reached 4 times the performance of the original with his rewrites) so 30 fps are not much of a stretch, notwithstanding that OoT was more demanding and optimized than Mario 64.
 
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Muffdraul

Member
From what you're saying (that the 3DS version is fine) it's probably down to the framerate, no?

I still really like the N64 presentation over 3DS, the menus are great and the animating HUD (green and blue context icons) are gorgeous. But the 20fps framerate hurts bad.

I actually hope that now that they decompiled it and seeing stuff Kaze Emanuar did with Mario 64 source code optimizations (upon which engine OoT and MM are based), that a 30 FPS path for both OoT and Majora Mask on real hardware is done by somebody. If Kaze rolled down the updates he did to vanilla Mario 64 I wouldn't be surprised if he could pull 60 fps at this point (he claimed a few months ago that he reached 4 times the performance of the original with his rewrites) so 30 fps are not much of a stretch, notwithstanding that OoT was more demanding and optimized than Mario 64.
I imagine the framerate is what makes the control feel so wonky and stiff to me now. I don't remember how good/bad the framerate was on the 3DS version. I generally don't enjoy playing handheld. But I like to think if they ported/adapted it to Switch, they could give it a nice frame boost.

For the record, I am absolutely NOT a "give me 60fps or give me death" warrior. 60 is nice to have, 30 is totally acceptable to me.
 
The original game back in the day was a travesty that benefited from shill internet reviewers back when casuals were starting to use computers more and more for social stuff than just playing games made for them or spreadsheets at the office. The amount of hype for the thing was insane especially since Nintendo needed an edge against Sony outside of the US, which didn't work as planned. First rpg with day night cycle when the game wasn't an rpg and already years of games with day night cycles, was one of my favorite media pieces.

Reviewers were letting the game get away with inefficient intuitive controls and the "jumping" that they wouldn't for others, and the fact Z-targeting was designed specifically to reduce conflict and control your viewpoint because they couldn't figure out another way to help the player with that silly controller, was a sight to behold. The Hyrule Field being empty went against the hype.

However if you were coming off of the SNES with Link to the Past (the better game with it's own issues) and were literally seeing 3D gaming for the first time, the game was suitably made for new comers though the controls even for 1998 were still head scratching, I can see why people coming from Sonic or Super Metroid who were excited, would be really impressed, for those older with more experience? not really.

One thing I will give the original N64 version is that it was impressive in 1998 for the N64 hardware specifically for the time. The N64 was a heavily gutted SGI compatible machine to try and undercut the competition in price with Nintendo also wanting to be able to produce a lot of units with some inexpensive components, so this was already going to make 60FPS games and certain graphical achievements hard to impossible on the N64. But if you were to compare only on the N64, a game like Banjo to Ocarina it was an impressive game given the limitations of the N64 hardware, No Expansion pack required.

It's definitely a game that was hindered the most by the hardware, and then the controller.

The various rereleases of the game were all better than the original just for the controllers, and the 3DS version adds more QOL improvements, and now with all these new ways to play it with enhancements, free cameras and such, it's an almost different game now, other than the foundation of the game and the plot which weren't all that deep.

The 3DS version seems to be the most recommended.

In their tirades against early 3D games, many people forget that those games were perfectly playable in their time.

This is heavily dependent on which games are discussed because there are a lot of games that control like ass from back then that were considered acceptable in the past as well. Consoles were doing a lot of weird experimenting with 3D games from movement, to menus, to combat.
 

NeoIkaruGAF

Gold Member
The original game back in the day was a travesty that benefited from shill internet reviewers back when casuals were starting to use computers more and more for social stuff than just playing games made for them or spreadsheets at the office. The amount of hype for the thing was insane especially since Nintendo needed an edge against Sony outside of the US, which didn't work as planned. First rpg with day night cycle when the game wasn't an rpg and already years of games with day night cycles, was one of my favorite media pieces.

Reviewers were letting the game get away with inefficient intuitive controls and the "jumping" that they wouldn't for others, and the fact Z-targeting was designed specifically to reduce conflict and control your viewpoint because they couldn't figure out another way to help the player with that silly controller, was a sight to behold. The Hyrule Field being empty went against the hype.
Huh, heavily disagree here but if that's your opinion, I'll take it.
I doubt it was widely called a RPG in '98, when the term was just entering the video game mainstream. And yeah, it wasn't the first game with a day/night cycle, but in how many other games that cycle was just a palette change and a different schedule for the NPCs and monsters instead of being properly represented with the sun and moon coming up and down and everything that comes with it? For consoles it was a big deal.

About the controls, I maintain that the N64 controller was and still is perfect for Nintendo's own games on the console, and I will die on this hill. It was the most intuitive configuration in an age when other consoles added analogue sticks to their controllers just in case someone figured out what to do with them. After 25 years it's about time the problems with figuring out the N64 controller were recognized to be on the users and not on the thing itself. The problem was learning to move in 3D, not how to handle the controller.
The auto-jump was a brilliant design choice for OOT, and Z-targeting has nothing to do with the controller considering that it's still used today in many 3D games, like Souls just to mention the most obvious. Z-targeting alleviated a problem with 3D that most other games were more than happy to ignore.

Very difficult to believe your "shill internet reviewers" narrative when internet reviews were a much smaller portion of reviews back then, and OOT has been unquestionably influential on game design and controls, not only in the console world.
 

JCK75

Member
I had so much fun in the N64/PSX Era.. but man.. it's the puberty of gaming.. it's such an ugly generation and only a handful of titles hold up today IMO.
So many of those games need to be remade because the foundations were so strong.
 
OoT is the proof that a pure entertainment product, in this case an adventure game, can become something bigger than its own genre or media. If you dont see this I dont know what more to say
 
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Huh, heavily disagree here but if that's your opinion, I'll take it.
I doubt it was widely called a RPG in '98, when the term was just entering the video game mainstream.

RPG were already a mainstream genre, you're proving my point abut relative ignorance by using FF7 as the bar and pretending the term RPG wasn't already a major genre before it, giving it way too much weight. Basically you're doubting something you didn't understand at the time. The gaming industry was more fragmented then so especially on consoles chambers were a pretty big issue.

And yeah, it wasn't the first game with a day/night cycle, but in how many other games that cycle was just a palette change and a different schedule for the NPCs and monsters instead of being properly represented with the sun and moon coming up and down and everything that comes with it? For consoles it was a big deal.

Again proving my point.

About the controls, I maintain that the N64 controller was and still is perfect for Nintendo's own games on the console, and I will die on this hill.

How is this relevant?

The problem was learning to move in 3D, not how to handle the controller.

No, it was the controller. Especially regarding games like oot where this is self-evident even starting from the early GC rereleases. I also mentioned hardware imitations were part of the problem as well but people like t skip over that.

The auto-jump was a brilliant design choice for OOT, and Z-targeting has nothing to do with the controller

No it wasn't, and now you're arguing against Nintendos own interviews about why they added the system.

Z-targeting alleviated a problem with 3D that most other games were more than happy to ignore.

Z-targeting was done as Nintendo said to give control of player view and to have a method to interact with objects and NPC's in the world and to simplify combat. The actual system wasn't even new, it was just ANOTHER 90's console experimental method that already had other implementations, to get around the limitations of the controller, a system that not very many games actually used after and definitely don't use much now despite a few games giving credence to it, which isn't unique, many games are influenced by other games, that's not really an accolade. Many modern games have mechanics used far more than Zelda implementation of targeting. Not saying it didn't work and people didn't take notice, but you seem to be implying because a few devs cited it it was some major monolith that had wider change than it did in the gaming landscape which I find to be a strange hot take.

Very difficult to believe your "shill internet reviewers" narrative when internet reviews were a much smaller portion of reviews back then,

This is 100% wrong and shows you either were too young to understand what was happening or weren't there. As a matter of fact the early days of Game Rankings also throws this take away, because they sourced many of their reviews from online sites. It wasn't an exclusive problem with internet reviewers it happened with Mags too, but you're downplaying the impact of the webs popularity quite heavily:

  • Gamespot
  • Nintendojo
  • IGN
  • Gamepro.com
  • Nintendorks
  • Xengamers
  • Cinescape Online
  • Game Genie
  • Avault.com
  • Antkids.com
  • Gamespot UK
  • Cnet Gamecenter
  • GameCritics
  • Hype.SE
  • GamingMaxx.com
  • Nintendo Hot Games
  • Gaming Age
  • Game Revolution
  • GamesRadar UK
  • Total Games Network

There's likely more but this is already 20 out of 36 reviews back in the day so it already more than proves my point and anything else is a bonus. It was lopsided, they only slowly added other media overtime but it was always lopsided to online, and this became more true later and when Metacritic came on the scene and increased the number of niche blogs and Nintendo fan sites. Oddly this is one of the games were some outlets you can see for other games don't appear on the list for some reason. This type of unbalanced was prevalent on the N64 for several big marketed games, much more rare on other consoles.


The reputation of online reviewers people memed over started back in this time, it's where all of the references came from in the first place. Once the other outlets became less popular or closed shot it transformed from Online reviewers, to "Gaming Journalists" we know now.
 

ResurrectedContrarian

Suffers with mild autism
No it wasn't, and now you're arguing against Nintendos own interviews about why they added the system.

In Iwata Asks, they discuss the origin of Z targeting at length, and the controller limitations are never mentioned.

They wanted a way to make 3D combat mentally intelligible. They went to a special show with different live combat reconstructions and came away 2 great ideas:
  • group combat is still essentially 1-on-1 combat for the most part in any well choreographed battle; the combatants actually rotate 1:1 showdowns within the larger flow, where they might shift between participants but at any given time, there are basically 2 people circling each other while the others stay back a bit and only take maybe an opportunity shot if you get too close; in today's terms, they decided that "Musuo" games have exactly the wrong design philosophy
  • they watched a battle where one combatant was connected to another by a chain, so that the circling happened while their actual movement was really occurring on that single axis. They thought this was excellent and they took the z-target straight from it.


It's a bit crazy to try and argue that z-targeting was about controller limitations. It was a brilliant gameplay concept and is still used in countless games today.
 
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I imagine the framerate is what makes the control feel so wonky and stiff to me now. I don't remember how good/bad the framerate was on the 3DS version. I generally don't enjoy playing handheld. But I like to think if they ported/adapted it to Switch, they could give it a nice frame boost.

For the record, I am absolutely NOT a "give me 60fps or give me death" warrior. 60 is nice to have, 30 is totally acceptable to me.
It's stable 30 fps with no dips whatsoever.

Here's a comparison:



Performance on the N64 was targeting 20 fps target, with dips. It's a effectively a slideshow, and because it's limited/targeting such value (instead of slowdown) it's slow on every platform due to that. It's slow on Wii/WiiU/Switch and PC emulation (even if the emu is saying it's doing 60 fps) unless patched or running codes, there's always some glitches associated. The PC port solves these.

Iwata Asks interview of the time:

Iwata: When a game’s graphics change to 3D, a lot of new discrepancies arise, so you had to address those points as well.

Aonuma: Yes. It was hard enough just dealing with the Nintendo 3DS system’s increased frame rate.

Moriya: Yeah. That was the hardest this time. The trouble that the original staff had experienced was visible in the program source code. For example, there were remains of frantic calculations written in it, like 10 + 1 + 2 – 5. It must have been really tight.

Iwata: It was not easy to change the frame rate of the software created in the past. Especially considering that the original game included different frame rates between the heavier and lighter processing parts.

Moriya: That’s right. When there was a number assuming a processing delay, we held our heads in dismay!

Aonuma: Back then, we might assume a processing delay would occur, but we would work hard to find a way so that players wouldn’t pick up on it. In particular, the battle against Ganon was sluggish.

Iwata: But that slightly heavy feeling made Ganon seem large and heavy.

Aonuma: That’s right! If his movements were swift and sharp, it would be weird.

Shimizu: Recreating that is hard.

Tonooka: With regard to collision detection between Link and monsters, the original was 20 times in 1 second, but this time it’s 30 times and the movement is smoother. But Ikuta-san said, “Isn’t it more difficult than before?” I had tried to program it so the difficulty wouldn’t change, but the more precise collision detection had changed the way it feels. So I was careful about such things to make sure it felt as similar to the original as possible.

Ikuta: Sorry, I didn’t know the reason. I just felt like something was different.

Tonooka: I’m impressed that you noticed! (laughs)

Aonuma: That’s right. You never forget what you learn with your body. Experience is important.

Iwata: Just like learning to ride a bicycle, once your fingers learn a game, they never forget how it feels.
Source: https://iwataasks.nintendo.com/interviews/3ds/zelda-ocarina-of-time/3/1/

Basically it was 20 fps by design, just like 30 fps console games sometimes don't scale well to 60 fps at all because multiple systems were tied to it. Note: Menus ran at 30 fps and there were some crazy optimizations that are what modern programming ethos likes to call "Bad Code" Like how FF7 on PSone has a 7 second delay (might be a different number of seconds than 7) before playing music when entering a battle, because that's how long loading graphics took on vanilla PSone. Give it a faster or slower loading time and you need a patch seeing the cpu was just counting seconds before unleashing the battle soundtrack, this will take exploit or optimization to mitigate in emulation. It's not a bug, it's by (crappy) design.

"bad code" is incidentally what sometimes makes old software, and exclusive software hard to port to other architectures. it's hacky in nature.
 
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The whole point was to use the lock-on/fairy to be able to correct camera view during traversal in the game word by being able to ping to objects and NPC's, which was also used as a way to talk to them in certain cases including iirc the tutorial, because they couldn't figure out another way on the controller to keep all the gameplay mechanics in tact and had camera control. it's all about focusing on an object hence why the combat is generally 1v1 simplified so you can focus on enemies individually for the most part. It was the only way the game could work on the N64 with its controller. It's also literally a fix to the Mario64 sign issue, a problem that was also the result of trying to map a solution to the controller. It for the N64 specifically, was a clever strategy, but just because that implementation is the only one you knew about doesn't mean it was the first one or the only one. Doesn't take away from clever use around a limitation.

But there were also developers who came up with the same concept with out going through that because they had a better input method. So they skipped those several of those work-around mechanics entirely because they were able to give you more flexible combat system with targeting, or had no targeting because you had enough actual control over your character and camera it wasn't needed.

It was a brilliant gameplay concept and is still used in countless games today.

You know the bold is false but you still said it anyway. it's not used in "countless" games "today", and it wasn't even countless back when it was newer at release. For major releases that aren't intentionally being clones or close to, the most you see this mechanic in modern gaming outside Zelda titles is a niche-sub-genre of character action games, then select bigger games like Souls (who's dev is trying to actively separate the two in their design so fans don't dilute their ideas) and a few others sprinkled about, that's not much of an output.

It's always these broad terms that don't mean anything like "countless" "all" "most" "blueprint" when in reality all it is, is erasing other games to prop another up. Also, just because a game may seem to have a similar idea doesn't mean everything goes back to Zelda when there were multiple with the same idea before and at the same time:

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3 different games all the same concept. There's others too and they all had to get their ideas from somewhere but clearly not all from the same place.
 

fersnake

Member
It's stable 30 fps with no dips whatsoever.

Here's a comparison:



Performance on the N64 was targeting 20 fps target, with dips. It's a effectively a slideshow, and because it's limited/targeting such value (instead of slowdown) it's slow on every platform due to that. It's slow on Wii/WiiU/Switch and PC emulation (even if the emu is saying it's doing 60 fps) unless patched or running codes, there's always some glitches associated. The PC port solves these.

Iwata Asks interview of the time:


Source: https://iwataasks.nintendo.com/interviews/3ds/zelda-ocarina-of-time/3/1/

Basically it was 20 fps by design, just like 30 fps console games sometimes don't scale well to 60 fps at all because multiple systems were tied to it. Note: Menus ran at 30 fps and there were some crazy optimizations that are what modern programming ethos likes to call "Bad Code" Like how FF7 on PSone has a 7 second delay (might be a different number of seconds than 7) before playing music when entering a battle, because that's how long loading graphics took on vanilla PSone. Give it a faster or slower loading time and you need a patch seeing the cpu was just counting seconds before unleashing the battle soundtrack, this will take exploit or optimization to mitigate in emulation. It's not a bug, it's by (crappy) design.

"bad code" is incidentally what sometimes makes old software, and exclusive software hard to port to other architectures. it's hacky in nature.

man 60fps feels weird.
 

kiphalfton

Member
for those who have kept up, after playing and loving BOTW and TOTK I decided to try some of the older Zelda games. The four ones that were most recommended to me were link to the past, ocarina of time, wind waker, and link between worlds, and I am going to go through them in release order. I played and loved link to the past already you can see my thread on that here:


now I am playing ocarina of time, and it is... it's fine.

I think this is the first zelda game I've played that doesnt feel timeless. botw and totk both feel like they have this sort of timeless quality of unrestrained adventure to them, and link to the past is basically probably the most perfectly designed game I have ever played. ocarina of time by comparison feels very aged and very old. I dont mean this in a graphics way, I actually dont care as much about graphics as most console players do, I mean this in a general polish and mechanical way.

this makes sense to me, it's one of the early era 3d games, and more than that, it basically invented a lot of 3d game design concepts so it makes total sense that compared to, well, almost everything else that came afterwards, it feels janky and aged. but ya, the controls, camera, combat, the size of the world or the towns, the emptiness of the central hub area, all this feels pretty aged. the ui is very weird too (there is a late game dungeon where I had to keep going into the menu to switch equipment every few minutes, and it was a long and cumbersome process each time). there's a lot of stuff in this game that just doesnt hold up.

But! the core design, story, atmosphere, music, and adventure is all as amazing as in any zelda game, in fact in a lot of ways I would say this is the best zelda has ever been on a lot those fronts. I fucking love the story, and I was a little surprised at how well told and how cool it gets, its actually more story focused than any modern nintendo game I played (I love the twist about link's parentage, the seven year time jump, and the reveal of who shiek really is). the dungeons in this game are insane, far beyond anything in botw and totk, probably put together (forest temple is amazing, it still blows my mind they did this on a n64, and while water temple is really annoying with the constant menu management, the actual core design is so cool). boss fights are great, the music is amazing (and this is all midi! somehow), and the game has amazing pacing, with very little downtime. this makes sense, it's basically a 3d remake of a link to the past, which also similarly had no bloat, but it does lose points for losing the intricate world of link to the past, and just sort of replacing it with a big open empty space with nothing in it except annoyingly spawning swarming random enemies, some spiders to hunt, and ghosts to find.

in general, I think the world part of tis game is the weakest, which is a bit disappointing because in all three of the zelda games ive played so far, the world was my absolute favourite thing about all of them, while in this the world just feels super limited. I know its a bit unfair of me to expect a early 3d game to compare to peak 2d design or the open world mastery of botw and totk, but tis very jarring when I am playing this for the first time and with no nostalgia for it.

I still like this game a lot (it's definitely my least favorite of the four I have played so far though), but I think this one would benefit a lot from a resident evil (or at least a bluepoint style) style remake. keep the core design as is (its honestly amazing), keep the story and adventure as is (all excellent), but fix the controls, camera, combat, and expand the world a bit, and we should be good. its a very good game, and I totally understand why its so praised. I think it's a game worth playing, in the end, even if I like the other ones I played more.

next I will play wind waker.

How the fuck can you say the two switch games are "timeless" when breath of the wild isn't even that old, and tears of the kingdom came out like a month ago?

Jumping through gun much?
 
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