Beginnings, and New vs. Old: Zelda!

Ah, the first post. The post where intentions are stated and all that good stuff. The only problem with that is that I have absolutely no idea what my intentions are for this, except to provide my own commentary on games as they come and go, the people who make said games, and the people who don't like the games. I might throw in some non-game related things in depending on the day and what's happening in the world. It all depends.

So anyway, the first thing on my mind is Zelda. Obviously, since this is called The Girl In The Zelda Hat. I don't know if it's been done, but I was thinking about Twilight Princess and Ocarina of Time, trying to figure out which one is better. In other words...comparison time!

Story: Twilight Princess has definitely upped the ante in terms of the storyline and the general 'really getting into what's happening feeling'. In Ocarina, it was all basic - young kid discovers his destiny and goes on to save the world. Not to say that the story didn't have parts that I loved (mostly the parts involving Sheik, and the last scene with Link and Zelda) but it was really all just little things to get you from place to place and eventually defeat Ganondorf. Twilight Princess, on the other hand... While the scenes aren't as cinematic as those in, say, a Square Enix game, the epic, 'Omigod, I've really gotta save Hyrule' feeling definitely comes through. And the good thing is that there's story apart from the saving Hyrule. Sure, some involves getting Ilia's memory back, or saving Colin, but it's a start! So yeah, TP's story wins out.

Atmosphere: It's kinda hard to compare an N64 game to a GameCube (and Wii...) game in terms of graphics. But the general atmosphere can be more important than graphics (I play handheld games more than consoles, so trust me on this), which is why this one's a tie. Both of them had this feeling that you're really wandering through Hyrule as an intrepid green-clad adventurer with an annoying sidekick. And although Zelda is nowhere near as horrific as some other games I could mention, three areas, namely Ocarina's Shadow Temple and the Palace of Twilight and Hyrule Castle in Twilight Princess had me freaked out. Meh, enough rambling on this, though. They're tied.

Music: My favorite category. Koji Kondo has done the music in most of the Zelda games I've played, along with someone else for Wind Waker. I'm pretty sure he came back for TP, though I can't be sure, because the soundtrack just screams 'good old Zelda!' at me. A lot of people are complaining because it's not fully orchestrated, which doesn't really matter too much to me. Okay, I take that back, it does a little, especially after playing Final Fantasy X, but still... Definite improvements in the fact that there's a little music at night, and the sheer freakiness of Hyrule Castle, so of course this goes to Twilight Princess.

If I think of more categories later, I'll add them in later posts. Gotta run for now, but more rambling shall come soon!