Ocarina of Time was shorter overall. Majora's Mask's sidequests were sometimes ridiculously long.
1) Assuming you did the sidequests.
2) The longest (Anju and Kafei) was roughly 20 minutes long unless you chose to just goof off with it.
One, dungeons don't determine a game's length. Two, you seem to have ignored how most Zelda games have around 7 dungeons.
1) ...Yes they do. If you want to argue basic math, use some reasoning behind it. Especially for the case of a game with short dungeons and little in between them.
2) Irrelevant. Yes, Majora's Mask was rushed. Yes, Wind Waker was huge disappointment in its shortness and cut content. Both suffered in terms of sales because of this. Now why should SS do the same? They had five years. There's no excuse for this.
Three, Skyward Sword had loads of sidequests, easily the most since Majora's Mask.
If you want your arguments to have any credibility, you're going to need to go beyond "Nah uh, it had loads!" The goddess cubes had as much sidequest content (per cube) as each individual poe, bug, and skulltula from OoT and TP. The hearts, as I explained, were shortened, and did I mention how much time dowsing cut?
If you really want me to sit here and show you the math on why SS had few sidequests, then fine, but I'd think this would be common knowledge.
Four, Twilight Princess adding a fifth piece to a Heart Container was one of its many ways of artificially lengthening the game.
And it worked. We got more sidequests, more content, and a larger game.
And five, the Lanayru Mining Facility, Fire Sanctuary, and Sky Keep are three of the longest dungeons in Zelda history.
...Sky Keep? Alright, let me emphasis on how short Sky Keep really is...
A full run on Sky Keep takes 44 minutes.
A full run on the Forest Temple for Twilight Princess takes 44 minutes.
At first your argument seems flawed when you consider the fact that the so-called longest dungeon in Zelda history is as long as the tutorial temple for Twilight Princess. However, when you look at the true reality of it all and the fact that a full run of Sky Keep is 44 minutes, this brings us back to the fact that one of the rooms can easily be skipped. Skipping 1 room may not seem like a big deal, but this dungeon had 8 rooms, one had just a chest in it and one was just a short mini boss. This room is roughly 1/6 of the dungeon So that shaves 7 minutes off your basic run. This leaves Sky Keep with 37 minutes. So what you claim is one of the longest dungeons in history....
is actually shorter than the tutorial temple for its predecessor.
If you don't buy my math, you can follow it by watching it here:
Forest Temple:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E1e_6v9MlV4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kx-oyOc4gOA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=olGN5ArFvX8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HD_Ni5Nc1tA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zgnLj-ORYBg
Sky Keep:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SOit4iBRxWI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15aCqZS3KNE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OCp4UnhhA3c (Temple ends at 6:30)
Skyward Sword had a lot between each dungeon. Did you forget that the surface portions were similar to dungeons themselves?
Dungeon-like, but not long.
As I previously said, SS had the most sidequests in any Zelda game since Majora's Mask. (It didn't have as many as MM, but that game was virtually built around sidequests.) Those Gratitude Crystal quests are very numerous and can be pretty time-consuming due to how unclear it is many times as to what you're supposed to do.
How much clearer could it get? Follow the signal until you get a crystal. Fledge wants a stamina potion, go get a stamina potion, Fledge wants another stamina potion, go get another one. Fortune Teller needs his crystal ball, follow the signal and you get it. Cawlin wants you to deliver a letter...go do it. Do you like Peatrice? Oh OK...oh and her's some crystals...for answering a straight forward question.
You really have to pay attention to detail if you're gonna complete the sidequests without using the dowsing mechanic.
Unless, of course, you read basic instructions and play the game as intended (WITH dowsing) rather than needlessly self "challenging" yourself. I use quotations on challenge because randomly bumping into a crystal because you were too stubborn to use dowsing isn't a challenge...it's just dumb luck.
The two hardest quests in all of this was Finding Kukiel and Beedle's Beetle. The rest required no thought whatsoever.
What was horrible about it? I'm not going to say it was an amazing feature, as it was relatively simple, but horrible? Rarely is grinding for treasure or rupees a necessity, as the game gives you the opportunity to get what you need at the right time. It doesn't hand things out to you on a silver platter like the GameCube games did, but you'll always find what you need if you just give the area a quick look.
To completely 100%, then yes, I can almost guarantee you will need to grind. I spent hours grinding away for the treasures needed to upgrade all potential items of use. Not to mention spent roughly 7000 rupees on it all.
Discussed that in another thread. It's for resource management and to prevent you from being overpowered.
So defending yourself is overpowered, but the ability to disarm any enemy (save Demise) and become momentarily invincible is not.
I think that's all there really is to say. But let's put it this way, go ask fellow ZD users if any of them had trouble stabbing, thought the game wasn't slashing properly, had to recenter too much, felt something was unresponsive or, if you want to be general about it, ask if anyone had any trouble with SS combat. Come back and show me your results.
You didn't complete the game in its entirety, did you?
I don't count grinding for hours as content.
False. The game constantly introduces new challenges and violent twists on previously-established challenges, creating a great sense of pacing. You can't tell me that the challenges we saw in the Faron Woods are what we saw in the final moments of the game, specifically the Horde Battle.
Hmmmm...
Faron Bokoblins...slash and hack wildly until they die...
Horde Battle....slash and hack wildly until they die...while running.
Ghirahim 1...guide his hand away and slash wildly...then sword fight.
Ghirahim 2...guide his hand away and slash widly...but this time he has two swords.
The story and characters were some of Zelda's finest. The presentation, character development (yes, the characters were really good, especially Groose and Ghirahim), and dialogue were all significantly stepped up. Fi was annoying, yes, but her goodbye scene was was very emotional, despite it being rather sudden in execution.
The story was almost non-existant until the Fire Sanctuary was finished.
Zelda gets kidnapped, Link goes to rescue her. Ghirahim wants to kidnap her again to revive his master. All of this is apparent by the 2nd dungeon. It doesn't go anywhere until the 2nd-to-last dungeon is complete. Nope, not even side character development to keep us entertained. Groose doesn't show development until--you guessed it--after the Fire Sanctuary. Not only that, but the whole goal seems until then. I mean, sure, at first Link wanted to keep Zelda safe, but by the 2nd dungeon, he finds her in capable hands, who are, apparently, better than his at the time being. She's safe. What is there to worry about? If anything, looking for her is putting her in danger. Why not be productive and hunt Ghirahim down? I would be more concerned with him seeing how he's threatening Zelda's safety and is talking about this cultist revival. And yet, Link doesn't seem to care.
Groose was good, yes, but Ghirahim was weak. A nice boss battle, but not a good character. I honestly preferred Zant.
Zant, he looks cool, but he's actually a psychopathic manchild wannabe who is driven by his lust for power. His betrayal of his people and his insanity was brought on by the fact that they passed him over. He helps Ganondorf because he's loyal it benefits him too.
Ghirahim is bloodthirsty and...flamboyant. I have no idea why. Probably because he was told to be that way. That's the only thing that seems to drive him, his directive. He was literally just given the directive to revive Demise and his entire life and existence has been dedicated to this. Even though he gains nothing from it and the fact that he admits his entire life/existance was made for this purpose implies he never really met Demise, let alone knew him for long enough to gain any loyalty.