Skyward Sword a Mediocre Game?

[nsanesk8er16]

ok so honestly i really dont see why everyone seems to love skyward sword so much and say it is the new best in the series. honestly i was disappointed in the game and i really thought it lacked a lot of the quality that other games seemed to have. i didnt like the overworld, i didnt like the bird, i thought the motion controls seemed a little broken, and overall i didnt really like how you had to keep chasing zelda down from one location to the next. the whole experience felt like this giant game of cat and mouse to me and the linearity didnt really work in my opinion. not to say i thought that skyward sword was a bad game i just didnt think it was all that good.

 

[theoathtoorder]

I LOVE SKYWARD SWORD. 9.5/10 for me. Majora's mask right behind it- maybe tied.

 

[mαrkαsscoρ]

i agree,i hated the overworld,i disliked the '3 lands' thing especially since there was pretty much nothing to do after you were done w/ your objective there,bootleg sidequests,barley any content
overall a disappointment.....but i still liked it better than ocarina

 

[JuicieJ]

I can understand someone not liking the game that much, I guess, but I can assure you the controls aren't broken in any way. They Wii MotionPlus is flawless and 100% accurate. The only way the sword can perform and incorrect move is if the player does (or if it's calibrated improperly). It's all in how you swing the Wii Remote. If you swing it inaccurately, Link is going to do the same. If you swing it correctly, Link do the same, as well. The fact that it's possible to play the game without any control issues is proof of this. Any mistakes are user error.

That said, I really loved SS. The puzzle-style overworld was incredible and adventurous, and I really hope it stays. To me, it's not about all the "open exploration" and what not. It's about getting from dungeon to dungeon in an immersive and entertaining way. SS provided that for me. I'd much rather have a SS-style overworld than those like in ALttP and WW where it's too large, resulting in the content being too far apart.

The combat was also the finest in the series. For the first time I was actually concerned about defeating the enemies rather than how many hearts I had left. Before it was all about waiting for the moment to strike. This time we had to create that moment -- for the most part, as there was some waiting involved at times -- which is exactly like real combat. Combat doesn't consist of going into a fight and swinging wildly. It's about patience and exploiting your opponent's weaknesses, which is what SS does with pretty much every battle.

The item use was also incredible, as each item (save the Whip for the most part) was used innovatively and intuitively, something many past titles can't say. Sure, there was unique use, but there was always an item or two in past titles that had absolutely no legitimate use in the game when there should have been use for it/them. Din's Fire, the Ice Arrow, and the Bombchus in OoT are great examples of this, as well as the Gale Boomerang and the Spinner in TP.

I also thought chasing Zelda was a good thing. Instead of just being thrown into an adventure and having to save the princess, we chased after our childhood friend with a drive of wanting to save her. I'd never cared too much about what happened to Zelda in past games (save ST and somewhat WW). Yeah, if she'd died, I wouldn't have been happy or anything, but it wouldn't have felt like a huge loss. If Zelda had died in this game, I'd have probably screamed "NO!" The drive behind saving Zelda wasn't just so we could beat the game this time. It was actually wanting to save her. That was a huge improvement.

Pretty much everything in SS was executed incredibly well and to its max potential. It was a very different Zelda, so I can respect you not liking it, but the game is still very well put-together in every aspect with an insane amount of detail. Best game yet imo.

 

[MW7]

ok so honestly i really dont see why everyone seems to love skyward sword so much and say it is the new best in the series. honestly i was disappointed in the game and i really thought it lacked a lot of the quality that other games seemed to have. i didnt like the overworld, i didnt like the bird, i thought the motion controls seemed a little broken, and overall i didnt really like how you had to keep chasing zelda down from one location to the next. the whole experience felt like this giant game of cat and mouse to me and the linearity didnt really work in my opinion. not to say i thought that skyward sword was a bad game i just didnt think it was all that good.

I wouldn't call it mediocre, but I would say it didn't come close to reaching its full potential. It's still a great game, but for me it had tons of "what were they thinking" moments. It's mostly that the developers are turning Zelda into a very different series than it was just 10 years ago and really scaling back exploration in favor of action and telling a linear story. To me that makes no sense because the series was originally built upon nonlinearity, and so I think it would have made more sense to mold the story to the gameplay such as seen in a choose your own adventure book. So the story wouldn't be the same everytime you play the game and you'd be free to pursue the game's content in a much more open manner.

Besides the game's style which I disagreed with, there were plenty of poor design decisions as well. For instance the bug/treasure notifications interrupting gameplay (to tell you that you have 43 amber relics- how isn't there an option to turn this off?), the fact that you can only skip cutscenes in hero mode (why not normal mode?), forcing a single control scheme in several situations when two would have been very appreciated (flying, swimming, etc.), only being able to play hero mode after beating the regular mode and being unable to choose to play it without playing through the regular mode first, making the game design linear in situations in which it doesn't even make sense or benefit the story (why say go get three flames and then force the order in which you go after them?), and an inefficient warping system (having to go to the sky to go from statue to statue even within the same province for instance).

 

[JuicieJ]

I wouldn't call it mediocre, but I would say it didn't come close to reaching its full potential. It's still a great game, but for me it had tons of "what were they thinking" moments. It's mostly that the developers are turning Zelda into a very different series than it was just 10 years ago and really scaling back exploration in favor of action and telling a linear story. To me that makes no sense because the series was originally built upon nonlinearity, and so I think it would have made more sense to mold the story to the gameplay such as seen in a choose your own adventure book. So the story wouldn't be the same everytime you play the game and you'd be free to pursue the game's content in a much more open manner.

I'm all for a little more open exploration, but having a different story every time you play through it? I wouldn't call that a wise idea. The timeline is already jacked up enough. Different stories would only further confuse the issue. I don't really care about the timeline, but I would rather know what's supposed to happen in the story and avoid mass fan confusion than do something like that.

Also, there's nothing wrong with a linear story. A non-linear story can't be properly developed, which causes the game to lose substance in the process. Stories in Zelda need to be linear. The overworld is what should be open for exploration (which I actually felt SS did fine). Beyond that, making Zelda "a different series" isn't exactly a bad thing. A series that doesn't grow and evolve is a series that dies. Zelda shouldn't go back to what it was in the old days. Again, I have nothing against some open exploration, but the old Zelda games don't have enough progression to them. They're just one long, drawn-out journey with the only thing driving us forward being finding that next dungeon or hidden item. The story keeps the game interesting. Add an open world to a linear story and you get the best of both worlds.

 

[TheRationalDove]

ok so honestly i really dont see why everyone seems to love skyward sword so much and say it is the new best in the series. honestly i was disappointed in the game and i really thought it lacked a lot of the quality that other games seemed to have. i didnt like the overworld, i didnt like the bird, i thought the motion controls seemed a little broken, and overall i didnt really like how you had to keep chasing zelda down from one location to the next. the whole experience felt like this giant game of cat and mouse to me and the linearity didnt really work in my opinion. not to say i thought that skyward sword was a bad game i just didnt think it was all that good.

First off, nsanesk8er16, I respect your opinion. The linearity is one of the things I don't like about the game, either. However, the Loftwing and chasing zelda around, I thought, were good additions. I liked the Loftwing as it fit the mood of the game and meant something to the culture of the people of Skyloft. It's pretty much Epona with feathers for me in terms of its usefulness in comparison to other games (*coughcoughOcarinaofTimecoughcough*).

The fact that you chase afte zelda, to me, is quite a break from her being captured. t tells us that she is out there actually doing something as far of her role in the prophecy. That's a pretty welcome change from some past Zelda incarnations that didn't do squat.

The motion controls, I thought, were quite innvative and challenging in comparison to Twilight Princess's waggle addiction. I mean, the menu screen may be a bit off sometimes, but I really think that is one of the best parts of the game. Like Axle the Beast has said in his articles, most of the time, it's the player's fault when it comes to the motion controls.

So,, nsanesk8er, I think you are justified in thinking SS wasn't hat good and I respect your opinion. I merely disagree with some of your grivances/

 

[MW7]

A non-linear story can't be properly developed, which causes the game to lose substance in the process. Stories in Zelda need to be linear.

I don't understand why this is the case at all. That seems very arbitrary to me.

My example is in the spoilers

Spoiler

For instance take the Wind Waker. The game has you collect three pearls before the Tower of the Gods and you get them in a specific order. What if there was a branch in the story after getting the first pearl. The game forces you to go after the one in the forest next but what if you could choose. Whichever pearl you go after next could have a huge impact on the story and game. In the actual game Greatfish Isle is destroyed because you don't get there soon enough, but what if you could have gone there before the Forest Haven. Then the Forest Haven could have been destroyed rather than Greatfish Isle which completely changes the game. Something that dynamic within the game would add tremendous replay value. They could have set it up so that a whole new dungeon would be playable and replace the Forbidden Woods in this alternate story. That would be pretty awesome at least IMO. Plus the end result of the story would essentially be the same.

 

[JuicieJ]

I don't understand why this is the case at all. That seems very arbitrary to me.

My example is in the spoilers

Spoiler

For instance take the Wind Waker. The game has you collect three pearls before the Tower of the Gods and you get them in a specific order. What if there was a branch in the story after getting the first pearl. The game forces you to go after the one in the forest next but what if you could choose. Whichever pearl you go after next could have a huge impact on the story and game. In the actual game Greatfish Isle is destroyed because you don't get there soon enough, but what if you could have gone there before the Forest Haven. Then the Forest Haven could have been destroyed rather than Greatfish Isle which completely changes the game. Something that dynamic within the game would add tremendous replay value. They could have set it up so that a whole new dungeon would be playable and replace the Forbidden Woods in this alternate story. That would be pretty awesome at least IMO. Plus the end result of the story would essentially be the same.

Those alternate paths would still need to be linear in order to progress. Like in Mass Effect.

 

[MW7]

Those alternate paths would still need to be linear in order to progress. Like in Mass Effect.

Ok that's fine (I haven't played Mass Effect though so I'm not 100% sure what you mean). I just want the alternate paths and know lots of people who'd want that too. It's fine with me if the ending is the same or if there's a couple of points in which the stories all align as long as you can choose do things differently in the middle.

 

[JuicieJ]

Ok that's fine (I haven't played Mass Effect though so I'm not 100% sure what you mean). I just want the alternate paths and know lots of people who'd want that too. It's fine with me if the ending is the same or if there's a couple of points in which the stories all align as long as you can choose do things differently in the middle.

That's cool (and exactly like ME). Buuuut, this is off topic, so let's just leave it there.

 

[Gambitgamer]

Well its HAS to be good game if it got such good scores from the reviewers, and so many people love it! Not saying that the reviewers opinions are anything but thiers. Now I thought the over world was great. You didn't have to walk through GIANT fields like in other games and there is still stuff to get from the many different islands. I don't really know why you don't like the bird... I don't understand what you don't like about the motion controls either. Reviewers were saying it is the best use of motion controls EVER! And I think so also. I thought the story was decent. Maybe not the best but pretty good. I really think you should give the game another chance. A lot of people go into a game that everyone is raving about and automacticly think it's terrible. That might not be you.... But then again...

 

[nsanesk8er16]

i actually played through the entire game and in no way hated the game I just thought it really fell short in a lot of ways such as open world exploration and also not mentioned in this thread i found fi to be the most annoying companion throughout any videogame i have ever played. the reason i hated the loftwing so much was that i found it a bit slow and awkward to control at times. as for the motion controls please remind me why they even exist i mean limited motion controls such as the motion controls in twilight princess and prime 3 corruption are ok but when a game is centered around a motion gimmick to such an extent that i literally have to re calibrate the controls every 20 minutes then i equate that to pushing the a button and having either a b button or an x button reaction. when it comes to control schemes nothing has worked better than just a standard controller and i really hope nintendo moves back toward that direction.

 

[r2d93]

First off, I totally agree with all of the criticisms you have with the game. However, I still think it is a stellar game. I'v explained my feelings for SS multiple times so basicly i liked everything besides what you listed, and therefore, id say SS is a fantastic game. However, It didn't really feel like a Zelda game to me. So i'd say its a fantastic video game, and a pretty good Zelda game.

 

[A Link In Time]

Skyward Sword was neither a mediocre game nor a mediocre Zelda game. The combat and puzzles were some of the most clever in series history and the dungeons and boss battles were stupendous-Koloktos, the Ancient Cistern, Sandship, and Demise rank right up with the best in the franchise pantheon. Personally, this was due to Nintendo finally ditching the formula of each dungeon having one specific set theme. Skyward Sword was a bundle of creative ideas. There were few block puzzles in the game and most items served functions throughout the entire game especially the beetle. The whip saw little spotlight as JuicieJ mentioned, however, it was a welcome addition nevertheless and made for some fine sword swinging moments in the final phase of the Koloktos boss battle.

In regards to the overworld, it was not by favorite either. The sky felt rather barren and the land masses should have been connected (although that can be forgiven within the context of the story). The Eldin region was painfully small, however, Faron and Lanayru more than made up for that with their varied landscapes and numerous puzzles. Speaking of puzzles, Nintendo kept its promise of creating an overworld that truly felt like a dungeon unto itself with a plethora of dangers mixed into it.

The Loftwing may not have been my favorite to pilot especially since it seemed like a hell bent attempt on Nintendo's part to complete the air, water, and ground trio established across earlier games, however, it certainly wasn't too painful after you got used to it. Speaking of getting used to something, the controls weren't that bad. In fact, Skyward Sword has the best motion controls of any game on the market. I did have trouble with some actions such as the thrust but considering how far we've come from 2006 and the original Wii Sports, those are all minor trifles.

And don't even get me ranting about the story Ocarina of Time is my franchise favorite but Skyward Sword blows it and all other installments except maybe Majora's Mask and Twilight Princess out of the water. Ghirahim and Groose were some of the most developed characters in franchise history. It was nice to see a connection with the Sheikah once more. Demise improved on the 2006 Twilight Princess battle in every way and was a poet unto himself in his brutality yet eloquence. Fi departure at the end was oe of the strongest appeals to pathos in series history. Skyward Sword may not take the crown for me but thinking it's anything but a mighty fine game is a fallacy.