Sequelitis - ZELDA: A Link to the Past vs. Ocarina of Time

So this was posted a little over a week ago, and I'd like to see what ASSEMbler has to say about this video.

I've actually got my thoughts on it typed up elsewhere already, but I wanna wait a little bit and see what some people have to say on it before I post anything; I don't want to influence anybody's opinion right off the bat before going in.

 

I think he is reading into it way too much. I do kind get a couple of things he mentioned. However the general theme seemed to be about being told the direction you need to go. I think he has been blinkered by knowing the game too well. Try taking yourself back to your 1st play through. I remember getting suck at least 5 times or so. However ultimately I don't want to wander far too much without having any idea what I am doing. There are too many great game to play now without being stuck in he same game for ages..
Also about the story being too much; I have seem much worse (metal gear for example) Which is also totally awesome.

Having said that with the new Zelda coming next year or when ever (not the new one he was talking about at the end of video.. rather what they showed at E3) They are going to shake things up so he might actually like that. I for one think as long as you have a rough idea what you need to do am looking forward to exploring as long as it doesn't take far too long without knowing what to do, as that is the thing that gets monotonous to me. As the hay stack said in conkers bad fur day --- "Now time to wander around aimlessly" ha-ha

 

A new one?
Is this a miracle?

 

LOL Egoraptor

 

How about a Sequelitis Ys 1 & 2? lol

 

Too hardcore for Arin

 

LMAO! Yeah i know right? and plus he's more of a Nintendo head than anything else

 

He is, though they're playing Decap Attack on Gamegrumps now.

 

Does/is he enjoy it? cuz most guys like him on YouTube doesn't like any games that's made on the Sega Genesis other than the Classic Sonic trilogy.

 

I haven't watched it yet. Been too busy with the Free preview of the WWE Network

 

oh, guess i'll check it out sometime soon maybe

 

Wish he'd do this instead of his usual low effort stuff. This is years overdue iirc. Did not expect for him to praise OoT as much as he did in the beginning as he previously explained he felt it was a good amount inferior to ALttP. And he acknowledges the first games strengths, which many gamers from the 90s and on feel its crummy because it is one of the least accessible. I think he went a little overboard with the nitpicking, but made many valid points. Why doesn't he look around the room when he enters in OoT? That's how you avoid those spiked enemies they're really predictable. He was too harsh on SS.

 

While i do find a lot of his criticism of OoT to be a little on the harsh side, i did find the video funny. A lot of the stuff he complained about in OoT is also present in aLttP.

 

Shameless edited copypasta from my Tumblr! (also, very long rant warning.)

Jesus, Egoraptor, we get it: anything after the mid-90s is crap to you. This is gonna be a kind of "play by play" commentary/criticism, more or less following the order of stuff Ego talks about in the video.


-I'll start with what Egoraptor starts with: he talks about how the first Legend of Zelda doesn’t give you any story beyond being you an adventurer. Um, fucking excuse me?

That looks like a plot to me. Nice try. He touches on the exploration aspect in a positive light, neglecting to mention how much cryptic bullshit there is in the first Zelda; the game does a generally very poor job of directing the player. Well, I was of a mind that he didn’t like cryptic garbage like this, but fuck if I know where I'd get an idea like that.


-Ego then talks about A Link to the Past, and how it added onto the then-fledgling Zelda formula, most of all a more detailed story which gave the player a purpose with more specific and ordered objectives. Which he complains about, because he doesn’t like being made to do things in a specific fashion. Well, maybe having a more narrow path of exploration helps to prevent overly-cryptic nonsense like what was found in the first two Zelda games. He takes a chance here to stroke Zelda 1’s cock some more by praising the lack of “hand-holding†and plot in that game; the former of which, as mentioned before, made the game damn-near impossible without a guide (e.g. how to kill Pols Voices), and the latter is again untrue (but Z1’s story isn’t implemented to interrupt gameplay, which would be much more accurate and legitimate to complain about).


-After this comes the transition into talking about Ocarina of Time, where Ego discusses the issue of enemies like Keese now being able to move in three dimensions and thus not being quite as simple to attack, and introduces OoT’s Z-Targeting system allowing the player to “lock†their focus on an enemy. He at first praises the more in-depth combat made possible by Z-Targeting, but then laments the fact that the perspective of Z-Target fighting is so jarringly different from the perspective offered in exploration time, and that it’s necessary to focus on “each enemy to precisely hit themâ€, never minding the fact that it’s usually only smaller/faster enemies that pretty much require Z-Targeting to hit (e.g. Keese). And then starts the bitching about there being “so much waiting†with Ocarina of Time’s enemies (e.g. Stalfos), having to wait for an opportunity to land damage on certain foes, claiming that these fights are “ordeals†when you have to devote time to them. I’d say that these enemies are more like high class desserts that you take your time with to enjoy how complex and satisfying it is, whereas the enemies in LoZ and LttP are more like snack foods that you mindlessly chomp away at.


-Egoraptor proceeds then to whine about things in OoT like eye-switches, saying that they’re not really “puzzlesâ€. Well, the eye-switches in particular aren’t meant to be “puzzles†so much; they’re more “checks†that ensure consistent use of a weapon/item and your cumulative skills throughout the adventure (which can be a problem if not done enough in games like Twilight Princess, which was notorious for often killing the utility of items and skills soon after obtaining them). And despite Ego trying to insist that having to stop your “forward motion†to have to figure things out to progress is some objectively terrible thing, that’s actually a feature of 3D Zelda games that many fans love (and this design philosophy even crept into later 2D Zeldas like the Oracles and Minish Cap, games that are also highly regarded); in LttP, having to constantly mow down enemies got so goddamn tedious later on in the game, making all the later dungeons feel same-y. (Ganon's Tower. Just. Ganon's Tower.)


-Ego talks about how the “puzzles†in OoT produce annoyed “really?!†moments rather than triumphant “aha!†moments due to sometimes not having all the “pieces†for said “puzzleâ€, showing the Golden Gauntlet pillar in OoT Ganon’s Castle but forgetting to get the Golden Gauntlets beforehand as an example. That’d be a big issue if OoT had “puzzlesâ€, but again, they’re usually not “puzzlesâ€. Again, they’re tests and checks. He uses beating tough enemies like Darknuts in LoZ to unlock a door as an “a-ha!†example, but let’s not forget that LoZ is so chock-full of annoying “really!?†“puzzles†that are far more frustrating and ridiculous to newcomers than any of OoT’s tests ever could be, since that game withheld a far more vital “piece†from the player: direction/knowledge. But whatever, nice cherry-picking brah.


-He mentions how obstacles like the sliding spike pucks in OoT can be “cheap shots†since they player doesn’t have a full view of the room at any given time due to 3D perspectives (unlike being able to see most/all of a room in the 2D Zeldas), and OK… this is actually one I can give to Ego to a degree; the sliding pucks in OoT can be dick moves when you can’t see or hear them coming. But then again, you can usually get a chance to scope out the general lay of a room in OoT before you'd get hit with a puck.


-The “obstacle†of having to make simple leaps to progress in OoT is criticized, with the reason that they’re not challenging, but c'mon: if you were just given a straight shot to a door, that’s boring as shit. Occasional leaps make the dungeons interesting (though I'll concede that it gets annoying when needed to be done often in a small period of time). He suggests having something like spike-pucks sliding across the ledge the player jumps from to make it more difficult, but having to wait on simple timing puzzles for forward progress sounds more monotonous and pointless than simple forward leaps.


-Sudden shift to Skyward Sword time! It’s actually something Ego keeps prodding up to this point in the video, constantly giving it shit for being a game nobody likes (which I call bullshit on) but compliments the clear throw arcs for bombs in that game unlike the more trial-and-error bomb throwing in OoT, citing that they’re harder to use in fights (ignoring the fact that it’s rarely ideal to use bombs with OoT’s enemies).


-Y’know the treasure chest build-up that happens for bigger/significant chests in 3D Zelda titles? That’s another issue Ego hates, and to be fair I agree with him; it’s annoying to have to wait 10 seconds to open a chest. But then he talks about how the treasure chests in LttP create “suspense†by being able to see them yet decries OoT’s chests for often just appearing after defeating enemies, but wouldn’t the total cluelessness of when and where a major item will arrive create more suspense than simply seeing the big treasures from the get-go?


-This segues into more bitching about waiting in OoT, this time with more general stuff like having to wait to open a major chest (kinda annoying), waiting to see certain doors close behind you (3D perspective issue), wait for a character to stop talking (because this never happens in every other Zelda title made), wait for a chest to tell you how to use Bombs for the umpteenth time (kinda annoying too), wait for a switch to activate and see what it activates (again, 3D perspective forces this due to not being able to see the whole room at once), wait for Link to get up after being struck by a strong enemy (god forbid there be any consequence for not being able to adequately dispose of an enemy in certain situations), wait for bombs to blow up (which has also never been present in other Zelda games), and wait to play a teleport* song and see it play again and have to select “yes†to teleport and watch a cutscene to do so (this could’ve been shortened significantly a la Wind Waker HD).
*seriously, Chrome? "Teleport" isn't in your dictionary?



-Ego claims that waiting is the bane of exploration, saying that you should “never, ever hit that point where you’re like ‘eh, I’ll check that room later’ in a game about checking rooms!â€, which is an entirely subjective complaint. Besides, even if a 3D Zelda starts to dull a player’s senses, it’s doubtful they’ll put off checking out a room for later unless they’re stopping playing for the moment, or find out they don’t have the necessary tools to fully explore that room at that time.


-After this, Ego does again make a legitimate complaint about how bosses in OoT (and most 3D Zelda bosses in general) fall into easily identifiable patterns of needing to be made vulnerable with the dungeon item and then attacked with the sword. Yeah, this blows a lot; I felt Majora's Mask was the only one that came close to breaking away from this issue (being that most bosses didn't require the dungeon item).


-OoT in general streamlines the adventure process, and one big aspect of that which Ego examines is how there are obstacles outside of dungeons such as having to find the letter in the bottle to give King Zora, having to give the guard to Death Mountain the letter from Zelda (not fucking Impa as Ego said a few times - Christ, he really doesn't pay good attention to games** at times).


-The bosses in OoT are seen by Ego as formulaic and boring for needing their dungeon items to vanquish them (which I again kinda hated), and he praises LttP for not always needing the dungeon item for each boss or sometimes only ever needing the sword... but then, you can have a boss like Trinexx in this scenario who requires a weapon, the Ice Rod, that isn’t put directly on your path.


-Up next is where Egoraptor kind of shits the bed in his video in my opinion. He bitches about how OoT gives you a motivation that isn’t just an “innate sense of adventureâ€, but rather to save the world. He particularly picks out the quest for the Goron’s Ruby in OoT where Link needs to open up Dodongo’s Cavern to give Gorons rocks to eat (but the bigger reason Darunia made Link do that is to prove that he’s a good soul worthy of the Ruby, unlike Ganondorf who also tried to take the Ruby - again, stellar attention*), and says that having a task destroys an innate sense of wonder and exploration, and claims that that should make the player a hero, not the world of the game. It almost seems like he doesn’t like having the story provide some obstacles for the player.


-He talks about the Master Sword in LttP and its “brillianceâ€, how it’s talked about how it makes you more powerful and able to slay evil better, saying that there’s no other reason why the player wants the sword. Despite the fact that LttP tells you that you need the Master Sword to slay Aganhim (and eventually Ganon) in order to save Hyrule.


-Ego brings up the idea of having more engaging and less “roadblock-y†NPCs in OoT to improve the game, such as having a Goron partner in Dodongo’s Cavern that beats up enemies with you and requires eating rocks to live, only for rocks to become rarer as you progress through the dungeon. Having to consistently feed and keep a Goron alive for a dungeon absolutely doesn’t sound like it’d be tedious or halting in the forward-progress of the dungeon in the least.


-What comes up is perhaps one of the most glaring hypocrisies of the video. He claims that it’s annoying to have to “keep finding the right people to press ‘A’ at for story reasons to move the game alongâ€, but doesn’t having to keep bombing walls and burning trees in the first Zelda for no reason accomplish that same monotony albeit to a worse degree?


Goddammit, that’s all I can handle. I’m done here (mostly because most of the rest of the video deals with more Skyward Sword bitchery and praising A Link Between Worlds).


I want to conclude that I didn’t hate this video because Egoraptor doesn’t like Ocarina of Time. I agree with some of his criticisms and would rather play Majora’s Mask or A Link Between Worlds myself if given the choice for some of those reasons.


What I hate is that he went in with such an obvious bias against post-LttP Zelda**, that it not only resulted in disgustingly shallow analysis of LoZ/LttP’s ups and downs yet overly nitpicky examination of OoT, but the fact that he contradicts statements he makes about game design in early videos and about Zelda design in this very video. It’s obvious that he also doesn’t pay good attention** when playing games, which causes further flaws in his arguments, and I really thought that for having taken two years to make he should’ve put far greater care and research into making this video. Also, it was super obvious he was trying to be super in-your-face with his distaste of 3D Zelda games. Thank goodness he didn't cut himself on all that edge.


This sort of crap is why I don’t like it when he's portrayed as a guru of game design. He needs to acknowledge that things have changed and needed to change in the world of game design since the 80s/early 90s.


**(these facts are also made clear in various Game Grumps videos)

 

Well ...
Zelda ALttP is the perfect 2D Zelda, no doubt about that.
Zelda OoT is the first 3D Zelda, so ofc it's not perfect but it's pretty damn amazing.
If he wants to rant then he should focus on why the Zelda's after OoT didn't perfect the 3D Zelda experience spearheaded by OoT.

To me his video seems more like a publicity stunt to get as many views as possible by talking shit about something everyone likes.
Lets see: Youtube pays $2 per 1000 ad views, the video already has 1,2M views. Lets say the ad's only show half of the time and half of the viewers uses adblock.
So that's $600 earned in one week. Not bad. Seems like he is doing it right.

 

LttP is the best Zelda, Skyward Sword is dogshit because it's packed to the brim with filler and the motion controls suck.

 

Zelda: A link to the past sucks ass imo! Ocarina of time was more memorable. Btw, this is kinda like a Final Fanasty VI vs Final Fanasty VII sorta talk like how everyone prairies 6 much more over 7 lol

 

What does prairie mean in your usage, as a verb?

The difference between if you like FF6 or 7 better depends on which one you played first. Maybe there's a similar dynamic with Zelda?

I dunno, I played LttP first, but I also really like OoT. They are different styles of games and both were incredible at the time they were released and still have some replayability now. A lot of this guy's nit picks are weird... He keeps stressing that this is an "adventure game", but is pissed that the game makes you slow down and explore and soak in the surroundings. This isn't as fast paced a game as LttP.

I think he's unreasonably upset that OoT is "a series of hurdles". It goes hand in hand that a slower paced game in a bigger world will introduce hurdles. Why would a guard let a kid through a gate to a place called Death Mountain? Castlevania SotN is "a series of hurdles" too, but that doesn't define the game. It is a feature of it. He also glosses over the backtracking you have to do in LttP.

Overall, there's too much comparison between LttP and OoT. They are different games in different genres. It's not a 1:1 comparison.

This is very insightful.

 

Try not to let him anger you so much. Arin is kinda pathetic he makes shitty animations and records himself playing games (without putting effort into playing) for a living. He's not as good at voices as people believe, and most of his work relies on the "so bad its good" gimmick.

 

And yet he has 1.6M subscribers on his channel and the Game Grumps channel (1.6M each).