Onward With Skyward Sword!

It's here!  It's here!

It took over three years, but it's here!  In celebration of The Legend of Zelda's 25th anniversary, here's:

Yes.  The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword is in my possession on the day of its release.  I wanted it that badly.  The Wii has been on its way out for me, as I barely play any games on it other than MLB Power Pros 2008 just because I'm an avid baseball fan.  As a matter of fact, Skyward Sword is the first Wii game I have purchased since Super Smash Bros. Brawl.  It's been that long.  All the games that I've wanted since Brawl were either on Playstation 3 or XBox 360.  Fortunately, I own a PS3, so I wasn't completely lost.  Now that I have Skyward Sword, it's back to the Wii for me.

I'm only about three hours into the game and I've barely scratched the surface.  So far, I've noticed several things, both good and bad.  I guess we'll start with the bad first so the good things will be fresh in our memories by the end of this post.

So, bad thing number one.  Well, It's not that bad, but, man, the graphics.  They're okay, but even Brawl has better graphics.  Skyward Sword has this little mash-up of Wind Waker and Twilight Princess graphics, which is... well, I guess it works, but it doesn't really make the Wii look any better than the GameCube.  Sure, the cinematic sequences and in-game textures are no different from each other, which makes transitioning very smooth.  It gets the job done, however... it's no improvement from any recent Zelda releases.

Bad thing number two is by far the worst problem.  As much as WiiMotion Plus has improved upon the original WiiMote, the controls are still a little funky and shaky in Skyward Sword.  I am willing to say that within the first three hours, 75 percent of the time everything worked smoothly, but the remainder 25 percent involved a lot of controller recalibration.  It happens rarely enough that it doesn't interrupt the gameplay to a point of intense hatred for all things motion sensor, but it happens often enough that it's noticeable and rather annoying.

That's as much negativity as I can say about Skyward Sword... so far.  The rest are all good to excellent.

Good thing number one.  Zelda is not the same old damsel-in-distress as often depicted in the older games.  This time—at least so far from what I'm seeing—she can be seen on the same level as Link.  She even has a personality, which, thank God Almighty, grabbed my attention right away.  At least I'm not just focused on making Link the most awesome protagonist ever.  I can actually root for Zelda to do something, or say something, impressive and/or witty.  Oh, and before I forget, her cute/hot factor got boosted significantly.

See, graphics not that impressive—as I've mentioned earlier—but it gets the job done.  Look at Zelda.  Look at her.  She is stunning!  And plus, I pointed out that she has a genuine, full personality now, as well.  Not only can we try and find Zelda and whatnot, but her relationship with Link in this game is also on a totally different level.  It's not some "hero saves the princess" deal in this game.  It's a quasi-realistic "boy searches for girl he cares about" scenario.  Cliché?  Perhaps.  But it's something to pay attention to, nonetheless.

For good thing number two I am deciding between the story and the music.  All right, let's just say it's good thing number two and good thing number three in no particular order or ranking.  I must say, Skyward Sword has got to be the most theatrical version of any Zelda game.  Ever.  Half the time, I thought I was watching a CGI movie.  This is a big deal, considering that I've only gotten through about three hours of the game (which technically shouldn't be called "three hours of gameplay" because I spent more than enough time wandering around and testing the controls).  It's not a bad thing, I repeat, it's a good thing.  The story is engaging, partly because Zelda and Link have personalities.  They're more believable characters now.

Speaking of Link... yes, he's still mute.  You don't hear anything exit his lips besides obligatory grunts, faint chuckles, yells, battle cries and howls of pain.  However, to my knowledge, his supposed "talking" animation has been used far more in Skyward Sword than any other Zelda game I've played.  He is seen "talking" animatedly despite having no dialogue appear on screen and nothing leaving his mouth.  Characters he "talks" to always respond as if he was saying something.  Bummer.  Too bad we'll never know how Link speaks.  Not that we want to know, I'm sure.  He's a man of few words and he ought to stay that way to maintain his cool factor.  So, this "talking" animation... it adds to his personality as I've been constantly pointing out.  His scenes in the first couple of hours with Zelda are just superb attention-grabbing material.  Kudos, Nintendo.

As for the music, I've got to say, I'm highly biased because I've always been a fan of orchestral scores.  The fact that Koji Kondo remained the music director/composer/mastermind/etc. and the background music for Skyward Sword moved beyond cheap MIDI and cheap digital alternate routes to incorporate full orchestral scores is... well, just awesome.  Music that fit with different scenes like hands and gloves tells us that something is obviously working here.  As long as you can play the game without being bothered by the music, or simply wander around a given environment to listen in on the ambient music, something is right about the combination.  This is the case with Skyward Sword.

I'm very certain there are plenty of more good things to be said about this game by the time I complete the main storyline (which I'm going to bet to be about 30 plus hours).  One of these aspects I'll be watching for is the dungeon or temple layouts.  Are the puzzles challenging?  Are the level designs engaging?  I do hope they are.  On the other hand, what about the bad things?  Well, they're pretty much outweighed by the good as of now.  I'm simply going to keep an open mind as I continue through the game.  People with no attention spans need to stay away from this game.  Details, details, details.  You must pay attention to details in this game—or any other Zelda games, for that matter.  Anyway, so far it's turning out to be a fun ride, gameplay-wise and cinematography-wise.