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The Degree of Difference

JuicieJ

SHOW ME YA MOVES!
Joined
Jan 10, 2011
Location
On the midnight Spirit Train going anywhere
I'm not really here to argue, but these are two points I'd like to address. For the first, having the hidden skills required for a MODERATE amount of enemies would instantly be seen as annoying, tedious, whatever. I mean, I can compare this to Flowmotion of "Kingdom Hearts Dream Drop Distance" -- if that thing was REQUIRED to defeat enemies, people would shoot it down even more than they already do on its own. The hidden skills--like flowmotion--are just additions to the combat, not groundbreaking attempts to change the game.

I guess that's a good point. I would argue that Flowmotion was executed better than the Hidden Skills, though. But that may just be me.

What I bolded, I would apply far more to Skyward Sword than to TP. TP, despite having a lot of similarties (or at least, a similar feel) to Ocarina of Time, at least stood apart somewhat. Point is, TP did distinguish itself in the Zelda series, and it isn't so much "that one game that piles in a bunch of references just because".

Absolutely not true. Skyward Sword added dashing, stamina, the Adventure Pouch, upgrading, and, most importantly, the game-changing Wii MotionPlus. Twilight Princess? Not so much.
 

Random Person

Just Some Random Person
Joined
Feb 6, 2010
Location
Wig-Or-Log
Absolutely not true. Skyward Sword added dashing, stamina, the Adventure Pouch, upgrading, and, most importantly, the game-changing Wii MotionPlus. Twilight Princess? Not so much.

SS - TP
Dashing - Wolf Running
Stamina - Spin Attack Limit
Adventure Pouch - Different Bomb Bags
Upgrading Items - Upgrading Attacks
Wii Motion Plus - Motion Controls in General

...Actually, looking at this, according to the definition given you could say SS was a clone of TP. (Yeah right)
 
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JuicieJ

SHOW ME YA MOVES!
Joined
Jan 10, 2011
Location
On the midnight Spirit Train going anywhere
Dashing - Wolf Running

This is not something that is always available from the very beginning, and it is not something that has a limit due to stamina. It also doesn't have minor pakrour.

Stamina - Spin Attack Limit

Only in the Wii version, something I consider to be a nuicance, and not the same thing. Stamina involved more than the Spin Attack. It involved half of Link's actions, forcing us to think about how we were going to approach certain areas of terrain. These aren't comparable factors.

Adventure Pouch - Different Bomb Bags

Did these involve limited spaces? Were we forced to think about which bomb bag we were going to take? No. Again, not comparable factors.

Upgrading Items - Upgrading Attacks

If by upgrading attacks you mean the Hidden Skills, yet again, not comparable factors. The power of Link's attacks were not upgraded by collecting spoils and paying someone money.

Wii Motion Plus - Motion Controls in General

The waggle movements of Twilight Princess Wii and the Wii MotionPlus are completely different. The Wii MotionPlus requires actual skill and practice to master. Waggling in TP? Just flail your way to victory every time.

...Actually, looking at this, according to the definition given you could say SS was a clone of TP. (Yeah right)

Yeah, not really.
 
Joined
Nov 26, 2008
So, with the backdrop in place- the question is:

How much of a varying degree must a Zelda game have for you as a Zelda fan to not consider it a copy, clone or opportunistic game that feeds off previous titles?
I don't think it is, or will ever be, a matter of the degree but a matter of the execution. That might end up being a fairly subjective way of determining it, but if so then so be it.

Mostly I just feel that Twilight Princess is rather awkwardly designed at a lot of points. It's difficult to describe. The Oracle games were solid constructions without as many perceptible flaws (well, Ages was; I dislike Seasons more than any other Zelda game), and all the copying they did off Link's Awakening was very intentional, and very well-executed. Phantom Hourglass is one of my favorite Zelda games and had very original gameplay, and I saw Spirit Tracks as an attempt to reverse what Nintendo perceived to be PH's flaws. If Ocarina of Time had been a highly flawed game, I doubt most people would have any gripe about it being replicated (for example I would be totally in favor of a remake of it, if that were the case, and I normally detest remakes). When a concept has flawed execution, you don't mind improvements on the idea. Usually derivatives are considered bad when they can't stand up on their own in terms of production value. Ironically I think Spirit Tracks made things worse with its attempted improvements, but that's irrelevant here.

I actually do think Ocarina of Time had some flaws, and I feel that Majora's Mask refined them. Whereas, Twilight Princess has weird pacing and awkward art design (as I see it), and it makes mistakes in its following of Ocarina of Time. If it had matched Ocarina of Time's level of quality or surpassed it, I wouldn't have much or any qualms about it being derivative in terms of how it was made.

I think another thing here, though, is fanservice. Aside from the gameplay and game design, you also have matters of characters, setting, and storyline. I feel like Twilight Princess pooled ideas from Ocarina of Time's world in a shallow way, rather than a natural way. Again this is ripe for disagreement, but that's how I see the game in the end, and that, combined with its production values, are why I fault it for being similar to Ocarina of Time while I wouldn't fault another game for it.

(If it seems like I sorted my thoughts out and got more confident in what I was saying somewhere around the middle of this post... that's because that's exactly what happened. :P )
 
Joined
Aug 8, 2012
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yggdrasil
Ok. So I know I am jumping into this 'disscusion' late, but i will throw my reasoning that I think that TP is more of a clone to OOT. Though I have fallen in Love with TP atm and adore it i cannot help but feel it. Ok so Here is goes.
1 Like the fire temple you need to find Monkeys instead of Gorons but if you do not get them all you cannot proceed.
2 After 3 Temples you get the master sword (which was also in ALTTP so it could be cloned from there)
3 It follows the same Forest fire water dungeon format for the first 3 dungeons.
4 You have Epona's song so call her (though i am not sure if they SHOULD have done it a different way)
5 The 4 Poes in the Arbiter's Grounds.
6 Using the same songs to unlock the skills ( i wish they would have used different ones)
7 The Iron boot toggle is a nessceity in a water changing Dungeon. ( so it felt reused to me BUT was still good)
8 (NOT OOT) I thought the temple of Time was a Copy of the tower of the gods (WW) even with the same Item(power)
9 I thought that the plot was very similar (minus some characters)
10 (NOT OOT) I think what hurt TP the most was they rushed it to be a WII launch game rather than leaving it as the last GCN game

Ok so those are the ones that I could think of off the top of my head. Looking back at it now when I first played TP, I fell into the 'OOT clone' thing. I am playing it now and have fallen in love with it more now. Anyway, I thought if i would mention why i thought it was like that we could disscuss that lol.

To deviate from the other titles styles and gameplay is probably up to the player. If the player isnt willing to change then the game will do nothing for them. I do not think it is Nintendo's fault, I think it is the fans for other analyzing things.
 
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Joined
Jul 24, 2011
Ok. So I know I am jumping into this 'disscusion' late, but i will throw my reasoning that I think that TP is more of a clone to OOT. Though I have fallen in Love with TP atm and adore it i cannot help but feel it. Ok so Here is goes.
1 Like the fire temple you need to find Monkeys instead of Gorons but if you do not get them all you cannot proceed.
2 After 3 Temples you get the master sword (which was also in ALTTP so it could be cloned from there)
3 It follows the same Forest fire water dungeon format for the first 3 dungeons.
4 You have Epona's song so call her (though i am not sure if they SHOULD have done it a different way)
5 The 4 Poes in the Arbiter's Grounds.
6 Using the same songs to unlock the skills ( i wish they would have used different ones)
7 The Iron boot toggle is a nessceity in a water changing Dungeon. ( so it felt reused to me BUT was still good)
8 (NOT OOT) I thought the temple of Time was a Copy of the tower of the gods (WW) even with the same Item(power)
9 I thought that the plot was very similar (minus some characters)
10 (NOT OOT) I think what hurt TP the most was they rushed it to be a WII launch game rather than leaving it as the last GCN game

Ok so those are the ones that I could think of off the top of my head. Looking back at it now when I first played TP, I fell into the 'OOT clone' thing. I am playing it now and have fallen in love with it more now. Anyway, I thought if i would mention why i thought it was like that we could disscuss that lol.

To deviate from the other titles styles and gameplay is probably up to the player. If the player isnt willing to change then the game will do nothing for them. I do not think it is Nintendo's fault, I think it is the fans for other analyzing things.

1. They were very different and the monkeys actually did something.
2. So basically OOT copied that from ALttP. Getting something important after 3 dungeons. happens in a lot of Zelda games.
3. That's true.
4. That's also true. But why should they use another song?
5. I think this is the only one that was really taken from OOT (and it is also the 4th dungeon), but in TP it was very different than OOT.
6. For unlocking the hidden skills, you use songs from many different games, not only OOT. And those are only references.
7. Same concept, used in different ways.
8. Not a copy, but it is very similar.
9. I disagree, the plots are completely different to me.
10.

I played TP before OOT, and the only thing that I found similar between them is the Poes in the Forest Temple/ Arbiter's Grounds.
 

Sir Quaffler

May we meet again
Ok so those are the ones that I could think of off the top of my head. Looking back at it now when I first played TP, I fell into the 'OOT clone' thing. I am playing it now and have fallen in love with it more now. Anyway, I thought if i would mention why i thought it was like that we could disscuss that lol

That's weird, it's the opposite for me. I loved it when I first played it, but that was years ago and now I am finding tons of flaws with it. It doesn't really detract too much from the game overall, but it does hurt replay value now. I think Ganondorf should never have entered the story (even though I still find the the final confrontation totally epic!) and rather have focused entirely on Zant (he's a much more interesting villain IMO with his true nature as a frothing lunatic hiding behind a calm, collected, and intimidating mask. The wolf sections were fine back then but now I prefer the Silent Realm's manner of handling progression and Okami's wolf controls in general. The Spinner and Dominion Rod, among other items, were vastly underused. And while I still like the part of the plot dealing with the Twilight Realm (I still like the general mood it had on the story and, again, I'm fascinated with Zant) much of the rest of the plot seems like a carbon copy of OoT.

It's still among my top 5 Zelda games, mind you, but I can't deny my opinion of it has paled in light of other games, SS and Okami in particular.
 

Kylo Ken

I will finish what Spyro started
Joined
Aug 10, 2011
Location
Ohio
Sounds like you got a chip on your shoulder. The only time I felt like TP was like OoT was in Kakariko village and Death Mountain. I have no idea why. But TP is second only to OoT, so that's why people say it's a clone. (I'm completely subjective, by the way)
 

JuicieJ

SHOW ME YA MOVES!
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It just has the general feel of OoT to it, is all. JuicieJ has worded this opinion far more eloquently than I can explain, but it's this... intangible feeling that everything I'm doing (aside from the Twilight Realms stuff) I've done before, in the same manner no less.

I don't think the plot is an OoT clone at all. The plot was noticeably different in both style and tone. It's the gameplay that's the clone.
 
Joined
Nov 26, 2008
How is the plot a copy of OoT?
It's not a complete copy, but it does copy off of Ocarina of Time in many, many respects. The overall progression of the story is in some ways different (although the core struggle is exactly the same: save the world from corruption, which is still true in different ways during the first and second part of TP), but quite a number of the individual details within both the story and the game design are copied.

  • The title screen animation is almost the same as OoT's in concept.
  • Large number of songs remixes from OoT.
  • Link lives in a tree house.
  • Link lives in the woods.
  • The most important supporting characters early in the game are children living in those woods.
  • Link has a female childhood friend and potential love interest.
  • First dungeon is a hollowed out tree.
  • Link must earn the Gorons' trust during a crisis which has made them more grumpy or distrusting.
  • The entire game world is totally derivative of OoT. I don't say this because the locations are the same, because that's often true, but it's pretty much all the exact same locations with very similar placement, and the only new one (Snowpeak) is based on the idea and more importantly the placement of the Ice Cavern. The game world makes no attempt whatsoever to be fresh with the shape of Hyrule or its locations, and it's one of the only games in the series to do so.
  • Most dungeon concepts are highly derivative of OoT's as well. Deku Tree; Forest Temple. Water Temple; Lakebed Temple. Arbiter's Grounds pools Spirit Temple, Shadow Temple and Forest Temple ideas together. Temple of Time is a location in OoT.
  • Most major sidequests are similar to OoT's, with collecting the Golden Bugs and the Poe Souls both being basically the Gold Skulltula quest split into two... even with similar rewards.
  • Zora's Domain is frozen.
  • Morpheel is thematically copied from Morpha even though the battles are different.
  • Zelda's character is split into Zelda and Midna; Zelda is your iconic end goal while Midna is the princess who makes all of the plans.
  • The midway point's change of tune is defined by something really, really bad happening (Midna getting hurt, Link getting cursed as a wolf permanently, and Zelda sacrificing herself) just like Ocarina of Time's. This isn't really true of most of the other console games except maybe A Link to the Past (and it should be noted that the whole thing about TP copying OoT is true of other games, too, it's just that it does it to OoT the most).

I could keep going, but I think I'm illustrating the point fairly well. Twilight Princess' story is distinct, but it keeps making nods, and that gives both a game and a story trouble if they're trying to feel distinct. Again, it's the fanservice problem. I believe that Twilight Princess was a response to the fans regarding The Wind Waker just as much as Spirit Tracks was for Phantom Hourglass; people didn't like TWW's departure from Zelda norm with its cutesy style and more importantly, minimal land-travel or traditional Zelda gameplay, so Twilight Princess completely went back to OoT, winding up going a bit too far in that direction. The gameplay, through and through is... familiar. Nothing fresh with the fewest of exceptions.

I think another point here is that Twilight Princess doesn't really have any overarching distinctions. Every Zelda game has its similarities to others. It's definitely a series that sees no need to reinvent the wheel every game, and that's a good thing. But most Zelda games, with the exceptions of some handheld titles, have defining distinctions from the rest of the games that make their similarities moot. I don't think Twilight Princess has any of those, or at least any that are well-executed.

Surely there are people who like this about Twilight Princess, but I personally think it hampers quality design.
 

Zorth

#Scoundrel
Joined
Apr 22, 2011
It's not a complete copy, but it does copy off of Ocarina of Time in many, many respects. The overall progression of the story is in some ways different (although the core struggle is exactly the same: save the world from corruption, which is still true in different ways during the first and second part of TP), but quite a number of the individual details within both the story and the game design are copied.

Correct me if I'm wrong but isn't that the core of any Zelda game?
Save the world from corruption in other words some bad guy who wants to rule the world and spread darkness across it or steal the triforce?
 

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