The Thread of Zelda

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
asic said:
I love Nintendo gameplay but I also hate their console/game release approach.

I think that pretty well sums up the modern Nintendo home gaming experience in a nutshell. Great developers, kind of bad otherwise, right?

Walter said:
I guess I'm confused what the source of all this frustration is.

Your vote with your wallet says you do though, you're just more relaxed about it. You want to buy it and play it, but Nintendo's not making it worth your while and has a mixed record of success and support for these investments long term (even short term there was relatively little to play on the Wii U). It's natural for people be wary and frustrated by this. So yeah, if one doesn't like being jerked around, don't give Nintendo a ton of cash up front for one game and an IOU with Mario's picture on it. I'd rather it be they were really trying hard to earn our money instead of it being like us paying for the privilege of playing their games. It's up to them how they want to proceed though. I don't want them to half ass games either, but it's not like they've all been worth the wait anyway. There's a reason you and Aaz didn't get Wii Us, or there was a lack of reasons to get one.

Walter said:
But I'm comfortable waiting until more rational minds have weighed in on the Switch over time before I get too excited about investing in it, given the Wii U's track record.

I'm lucky in that the only game I'm interested in for Switch, and which could possibly get me to buy it, is the one game that comes out for Wii U. I'm otherwise immune and able to just look at it with the extreme skepticism that it could be the anither Wii U, and/or Nintendo's Dreamcast, rather than another Wii.

I've said before it wouldn't be a bad thing to get Nintendo's software products on a system that also supports the field, the only caveat being their innovations often drive the rest of the market to evolve and I'm afraid if they just became a software company we'd lose that, but I guess we'll see if their hardware ingenuity is really serving their games well or not going forward.
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
Griffith said:
Your vote with your wallet says you do though, you're just more relaxed about it. You want to buy it and play it, but Nintendo's not making it worth your while and has a mixed record of success and support for these investments long term (even short term there was relatively little to play on the Wii U). It's natural for people be wary and frustrated by this.

I feel like I'm something of a special case though. I don't traditionally buy consoles, so I don't feel the inertial pull of a new console launch. A company really has to BLOW ME AWAY to get me to buy it and hook it up to my goddamned TV and pull of away from my PC. If I was Joe Nintendo Fan, I'd probably already be in line :carcus:
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
Walter said:
I feel like I'm something of a special case though. I don't traditionally buy consoles, so I don't feel the inertial pull of a new console launch. A company really has to BLOW ME AWAY to get me to buy it and hook it up to my goddamned TV and pull of away from my PC. If I was Joe Nintendo Fan, I'd probably already be in line :carcus:

I'm the same way, the last time I purchased a home console was a Wii off eBay to play... Zelda: Sykward Sword! Before that I got a GameCube, plus games and accessories, off my friend for $20 back when Resident Evil 4 was still the latest one and picked up Twilight Princess. So, I paid more for those Zelda titles than the systems and games combined. I just don't see the value in the investment when I get 90% of the games I want to play on my old PC anyway, and usually much cheaper. Nintendo is the exception, but other than the Zeldas I could live without them too; Mario's Mario, Kart or otherwise, I lost interest in Smash Bros over a decade ago, and so I've already played largely equivalent iterations of all these games and don't need to pay a premium to continue. If I had my druthers I wouldn't even pick a Nintendo system anyway, but a PS3 or 4 for Demon's Souls and/or Bloodborne. Not a good sign when I even like Sony's derivative exclusives better! :ganishka:
 

Aazealh

Administrator
Staff member
Griffith said:
There's a reason you and Aaz didn't get Wii Us, or there was a lack of reasons to get one.

That's true... but my Switch is shipping tomorrow. :slan:

It IS a bet though, no denying it. But so is every console launch. The PS4 has emerged as a clear leader this generation because of all the exclusives (and the PSVR!), but that wasn't a foregone conclusion. The PS3 was more of a loser than anything last gen. Anyway, I've personally never cared much about how many games are available on a console. It's more a matter of how many games I'll actually buy and play. We all know that out of the usual 15 launch games on a console there's really just one or two that are decent, and then you've got to wait months for the ones that'll actually be good. Here I'm getting a seemingly great game, and there's a new Mario coming out before the end of the year. Then there's also new Splatoon, No More Heroes and Xenoblade titles coming, plus a bunch of cool indie games that are exclusive to the Switch. Speaking for myself, it's enough to justify the purchase.

P.S.

Famitsu 40/40
Giant Bomb 5/5
Gamespot 10/10
IGN 10/10
Edge 10/10
Polygon 10/10
Destructoid 10/10
Metro 10/10
The Guardian 5/5
Game Informer 10/10
 
S

Sweet Prince

Guest
A new No More Heroes game, eh? Like Griffith, I was gonna settle for a Wii U version of BotW, but you might've just convinced me to buy a Switch, Aazealh.
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
It's currently tied as the all-time, second-highest game reviewed on Metacritic. The first being Ocarina of Time.

http://www.metacritic.com/browse/games/score/metascore/all/all/filtered?sort=desc
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
Aazealh said:
The PS4 has emerged as a clear leader this generation because of all the exclusives (and the PSVR!), but that wasn't a foregone conclusion. The PS3 was more of a loser than anything last gen. Anyway, I've personally never cared much about how many games are available on a console. It's more a matter of how many games I'll actually buy and play.

Of course, it's ultimately how many good games or personal "must-plays" are on it, and that can be achieved through sheer volume (which is nice because there is subjectivity there) but also through carefully crafting a first party library.

Aazealh said:
Famitsu 40/40
Giant Bomb 5/5
Gamespot 10/10
IGN 10/10
Edge 10/10
Polygon 10/10
Destructoid 10/10
Metro 10/10
The Guardian 5/5
Game Informer 10/10

Yeah, I've been skimming reviews this morning (eyes half-covered to not be too spoiled =) and it's looking very promising! I still take the scores with a grain of salt though since even the "mediocre" flagship Zelda titles receive 9s and 10s as a matter of course.

Sweet Prince said:
Like Griffith, I was gonna settle for a Wii U version of BotW, but you might've just convinced me to buy a Switch, Aazealh.

So you can experience the $400 frame rates that still slow down? =) I don't even see it as settling unless the gameplay content is pared down somehow. I'm sure there's a demonstrable difference in graphics, I've seen the comparisons, but having seen them I'm also sure I wouldn't actually notice while playing the game unless the Wii U version is literally broken, and that would be a whole different story. I'm not going to prioritize an incremental graphical improvement when that is not Nintendo's priority anyway.

Walter said:
It's currently tied as the all-time, second-highest game reviewed on Metacritic. The first being Ocarina of Time.

http://www.metacritic.com/browse/games/score/metascore/all/all/filtered?sort=desc

Tied with Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2, GTA IV (twice) and SoulCalibur for Dreamcast, wow! :carcus:

For the record, since we've gotten into Zelda scoring, here are the scores for the last 6 flagship Zelda titles (aggregates at the top):

Skyward Sword
Metacritic 93/100
1UP.com B+
Destructoid 9.5/10
Edge 10/10
EGM 8.5
Eurogamer 10/10
Famitsu 40/40
Game Informer 10/10
GameSpot 7.5/10
GamesRadar 4.5/5 stars
GameTrailers 9.1/10
IGN 10/10
Joystiq 4.5/5 stars
Nintendo Power 9.5/10
ONM 98%
VideoGamer.com 10/10

Twillight Princess
Metacritic 96/100
1UP.com (Wii) A+
AllGame (GCN) 4.5/5 stars
CVG 10/10
Edge 9/10
EGM (Wii) 30/30
Famitsu (Wii) 38/40
Game Informer 10/10
GamePro 5/5 stars
GameSpot 8.9/10
GameSpy 5/5 stars
GamesRadar 10/10
IGN (Wii) 9.5/10
Nintendo Power (Wii) 9.5/10
Nintendo World Report 10/10
X-Play (Wii) 5/5 stars

The Wind Waker
Metacritic 96/100
AllGame 4.5/5 stars
Famitsu 40 of 40
Game Informer 10 of 10
GameSpot 9.3 of 10
IGN 9.6 of 10
Nintendo Power 5/5 stars

Majora's Mask
Metacritic 95/100
Edge 9 / 10
EGM 10 / 10
Famitsu 37 / 40
Game Informer 9.75 / 10
GamesMaster 96%
GameSpot 8.3 / 10
GameZone 9.9 / 10
IGN 9.9 / 10
N64 Magazine 96 / 100
Nintendo Power 9.4 / 10
GMR 10 / 10

Ocarina of Time
GameRankings 98%
Metacritic 99/100
AllGame 5/5 stars
Edge 10/10
EGM 10/10
Famitsu 40/40
GamePro 5/5 stars
Game Revolution A
GameSpot 10/10
GameTrailers N64: 10/10
IGN 10/10
Nintendo Power 9.5/10
RPGamer 5/5

A Link to the Past
GameRankings 92.87% (SNES)
AllGame 5/5 stars (SNES)
EGM 8.75/10 (SNES)
Famitsu 39/40 (SNES)
GamePro 5/5 (SNES)
Nintendo Power 4.675/5 (SNES)


Nintendo Power might be the only reason OoT doesn't have 100% perfect reviews. :ganishka:
 
S

Sweet Prince

Guest
I'd (begrudgingly) fork out for a Switch if that was the only way I was going to get a chance to play the next No More Heroes, BotW or no BotW. Zelda would be a bonus, though. All I know is: BotW for the Wii U runs at 720p as opposed to 900p on the Switch (a negligible difference, IMO) and the game's 'environmental sounds' are of an inferior quality on the Wii U (again, fairly negligible) but both versions retail at exactly the same price where I live. So I'm stuck between:

'Ponying up the dough for a Switch in preparation for a potential NMH sequel and buying BotW with it (which should help to ease the pain of spending nearly double what I earn in a week)'

and...

'Buying BotW for the Wii U, paying exactly the same price as I would if I was to buy it for the Switch, and waiting an unspecified amount of time for official confirmation of the next NMH before deciding to buy a Switch (but, in the process, missing the opportunity to play BotW on my lunch break at work)'

Decisions, decisions! :???:
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
Sweet Prince said:
All I know is: BotW for the Wii U runs at 720p as opposed to 900p on the Switch (a negligible difference, IMO)

Right, even the Switch version isn't 1080p, let alone 4K or something dramatic that's going to alter the visual experience in some breathtaking way. Which is fine, like Wind Waker or Twilight Princess, rely on your the art directors to make that impact rather than the hardware.

Sweet Prince said:
and the game's 'environmental sounds' are of an inferior quality on the Wii U (again, fairly negligible) but both versions retail at exactly the same price where I live. So I'm stuck between:

'Ponying up the dough for a Switch in preparation for a potential NMH sequel and buying BotW with it (which should help to ease the pain of spending nearly double what I earn in a week)'

and...

'Buying BotW for the Wii U, paying exactly the same price as I would if I was to buy it for the Switch

Walter said:
If you already have a WiiU, just go ahead and buy that version now. Sell it later if you want.

Yeah, as you can tell from my rantings here I can be stingy as Hell, but even I'm not fretting over the price as it compares to inferior environmental sound quality (though I did wait to buy until I got $10 off, so... =). Plus, as has been pointed out, it's really not the same price of admission unless you get the Switch for free. It's actually a great deal! I'm sure Nintendo probably isn't thrilled to be virtually giving away (and literally for a while as it turns out :ganishka:) their killer, system-selling app on a dead system that already didn't sell because they kinda, sorta promised.
 
I'm really liking this illustration that was featured in the latest Famitsu Weekly.

OCXGUrq.jpg


Sweet Prince said:
'Ponying up the dough for a Switch in preparation for a potential NMH sequel and buying BotW with it (which should help to ease the pain of spending nearly double what I earn in a week)'

and...

'Buying BotW for the Wii U, paying exactly the same price as I would if I was to buy it for the Switch, and waiting an unspecified amount of time for official confirmation of the next NMH before deciding to buy a Switch (but, in the process, missing the opportunity to play BotW on my lunch break at work)'

Decisions, decisions! :???:
The new No More Heroes hadn't started development yet when it was announced at the Nintendo Switch presentation in January, so you'll be waiting a few years for it.

As for me, I don't own a Wii U and I'm not buying a Switch for one game, so I won't be able to play it for awhile.

Griffith said:
Nintendo Power might be the only reason OoT doesn't have 100% perfect reviews. :ganishka:
:ganishka: Oh, wow. That something I hadn't noticed before. And their score for the game isn't counted on metacritic. :???:
 
I love that illustration Hitoshura, I wonder if they'll have that in one of the artbooks outside of Famitsu at some point.

I've always been a fan of Zelda, and while I haven't played every game in the series, some of my favorites are Link to the Past and Ocarina of Time. I own a Switch (went to pick it up last night at the mall) and I am about three hours into Breath of the Wild. When the Nintendo 64 game came out, it was amazing at the time because of the jump to 3D, and I am having similar feelings with this game. The amount of freedom in BotW is incredible, and more then any other open world game I've played currently. I love that it's not just a barren empty void either; there are many things to do, see and explore. So far I'm having a blast and for anyone who has doubts about it, my first impressions are that it is something to experience for sure.
 
My pre-order from Toys-R-Us shipped this morning so I'll still have to wait a few days to play it. Oh well, I'm pretty busy right now so I think I can survive. Might go pick up a Switch this afternoon.
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
Hitoshura said:
I'm really liking this illustration that was featured in the latest Famitsu Weekly.

http://i.imgur.com/OCXGUrq.jpg
Tama said:
I love that illustration Hitoshura, I wonder if they'll have that in one of the artbooks outside of Famitsu at some point.
That is cool, but nothing will ever be cooler than the transition from kid Link, and really pre-OoT Link, to adult Link:

503601221_947952.gif

An approximation of this image's impact on a kid, or puberty.

ea773ecc7aa116271a485b1e0e2135b1.jpg

SUGOI!! :isidro:

I distinctly remember poring over all the pre-release character and enemy art for OoT on the Internet, with a shitty official NG4 watermark in the corner, because in the moment it felt like the coolest stuff I'd ever seen. =)

Hitoshura said:
I've always been a fan of Zelda, and while I haven't played every game in the series, some of my favorites are Link to the Past and Ocarina of Time. I own a Switch (went to pick it up last night at the mall) and I am about three hours into Breath of the Wild. When the Nintendo 64 game came out, it was amazing at the time because of the jump to 3D, and I am having similar feelings with this game. The amount of freedom in BotW is incredible, and more then any other open world game I've played currently. I love that it's not just a barren empty void either; there are many things to do, see and explore. So far I'm having a blast and for anyone who has doubts about it, my first impressions are that it is something to experience for sure.

I'm really looking forward to see how Nintendo solves the current open world genre, because as you say, even when there's technically anything to do, that can easily feel like nothing. DON'T LET GO OF MY HAND COMPLETELY, NINTENDO!

I'm only half-joking too, I'm very curious to see how they make this world "real" and engaging but without telling you what to do.

Sareth said:
My pre-order from Toys-R-Us shipped this morning so I'll still have to wait a few days to play it. Oh well, I'm pretty busy right now so I think I can survive. Might go pick up a Switch this afternoon.

I was a bit concerned about this myself, but Amazon assures me it will be at my house by 8pm tonight... and it better be, because I'm hoping for a late night. :guts:
 

Johnstantine

Skibbidy Boo Bop
So I'm about 5 hours in to BotW and I already feel like this is out-OoT-ing OoT. The mechanics and story are just fantastic.
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
My local Best Buy at around 11am today (1h after opening):

switch_launch.jpg


The Switch after-market on Amazon starts at $475. After this and the NES Classic debacle (still almost impossible to find one in the wild, after-market price of $175 for a $60 item), I'm not quite sure Nintendo understands how to launch hardware.
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
asic said:
475 dollars for a console and one game (so far).
Walter said:
The Switch after-market on Amazon starts at $475.

:magni:

Walter said:
After this and the NES Classic debacle (still almost impossible to find one in the wild, after-market price of $175 for a $60 item), I'm not quite sure Nintendo understands how to launch hardware.

Nintendo Press Secretary:
170121181022-sean-spicer-donald-trump-inauguration-crowd-bts-00002515-large-169.jpg

"That's completely inaccurate! What you're seeing in those pictures is the result of the biggest sales numbers in video game history...!!"

Nintendo Minister of Information:
07-minister.jpg

"Excuse me, thank you Sean, but let the master take it from here. Yes, everything is going perfectly according to plan and I am happy to report that Sony called to surrender just now and we can definitively say we've won the console war. On that note, there is no reason for us to rush more units to market as it's largely a moot point and we don't need to sell any more at this time. Thank you."
 
Griffith said:
That is cool, but nothing will ever be cooler than the transition from kid Link, and really pre-OoT Link, to adult Link:

Yes! I also love that artwork, classic and one of my favorites. :ubik:

That sucks Walter, it seems like they are sold out everywhere around this area too. I only got mine because I pre ordered a while ago. It's strange; you would think Nintendo, being in the business for over 30 years would know how much supply and demand they need, but who knows.
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
So it gets worse: my guaranteed delivery date/time of 8pm tonight just got pushed to between now and the 7th. =)

Anyway, I'm calling to see if I can score a digital copy at the same price or cancelled no more Prime, though it's probably Nintendo's fault. Still, Amazon could have informed me any time BEFORE the promised delivery time so I'd have had options to replace it and not wasted my day as well.
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
Griffith said:
So it gets worse: my guaranteed delivery date/time of 8pm tonight just got pushed to between now and the 7th. =)

Anyway, I'm calling to see if I can score a digital copy at the same price or cancelled no more Prime, though it's probably Nintendo's fault. Still, Amazon could have informed me any time BEFORE the promised delivery time so I'd have had options to replace it and not wasted my day as well.

That's a bummer... You should just go digital, and cancel your physical order if you can. Amazon boned me over in a similar way, for a 3DS game I'd pre-ordered (Dragon Quest 8). The shipment wouldn't have even been ready until 2-3 weeks after launch. Fuck that. Canceled and bought locally.

So ... instead of Zelda, I spent the night playing fucking Berserk Musou, and god... It only gets worse, folks!
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
Walter said:
That's a bummer... You should just go digital, and cancel your physical order if you can.

That's what I ended up doing after threatening to cancel my order and Prime (we were anyway =) wouldn't get them to "switch", heh, me to a digital copy at the same price because they're technically different, they don't price match, blah blah blah, I knew it was a long shot and they're so big they might not even have a mechanism for such hand's on customer service. Anyway, I cancelled and ordered directly from the Nintendo eshop. The irony is this is likely at least related to Nintendo's supply side issues, but they get the business. Anyway, I'm still more pissed Amazon didn't give me a head's up when I actually could have done something about it instead of wasting my time and money (I won't get that discount/rebate back). Maybe then I would have just ordered the digital code from them or waited anyway.

Amazon boned me over in a similar way, for a 3DS game I'd pre-ordered (Dragon Quest 8). The shipment wouldn't have even been ready until 2-3 weeks after launch. Fuck that. Canceled and bought locally.

Jesus Christ, that's ridiculous! Yeah, I've had to make similar pivots and usually I'm more wary of these complications (I had a bad premonition all day), but I ordered it more on impulse due to the discount than my excitement for the game at the time. Otherwise, I would have made sure it'd be mine and ready to play when I got home.

So ... instead of Zelda, I spent the night playing fucking Berserk Musou, and god... It only gets worse, folks!

And I thought I had a disappointing night. There's always Mega Man 3. =)
 
I went over to the Wal-Mart I work for at around 1PM to get a Switch and, dang it, they were out :sad: But they had 2 Zelda Special Editions and I picked one up so I could use my employee discount. When the one I pre-ordered from Toys-R-Us gets here I'm going to resell it.
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
Griffith said:
That's what I ended up doing after threatening to cancel my order and Prime (we were anyway =) wouldn't get them to "switch", heh, me to a digital copy at the same price

No kidding, I think Amazon must have adopted different customer service guidelines recently. They used to be notorious pushovers for this sort of stuff, especially for errors that were documented to have been their fault. You could call or chat and complain about virtually any minor offense and get money back, a gift card, whatever. But based on my last two experiences, and yours, it seems they're tightening their belts on such issues, with a "get fucked" attitude.
 
Top Bottom