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With the “atomic bomb” of “Grand Theft Auto 6” arriving on 19 November, few games are “daring to release” this month, said Paul Tassi on Forbes. “But few games are ‘The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time’.”
The game, a Nintendo Switch 2 remake of the 1998 Nintendo 64 classic, is out today and it’s “no great surprise” that it’s already racked up a Metacritic score that is “the best of the year by far and one of the best of all time”.
Time will tell whether it can reach the dizzying heights of the original, which holds the record for the best-reviewed game in history with the only 99/100 rating on the critic aggregator site.
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The original “Ocarina of Time” was “one of the most groundbreaking games of its time”, said BBC Newsround. Players take control of the “young hero” Link, who must “explore the fantasy kingdom of Hyrule and stop a villain named Ganondorf from taking control”. Link is helped by Navi, a “glowing fairy” who provides clues along the way.
The first Zelda game made with full 3D graphics, it became an “important step towards modern open-world adventures”, helping developers figure out how “movement, combat and conversations could operate in three dimensions”. One of its most “influential” features was Z-targeting, which allowed players to “lock the camera onto an enemy” or specific object.
While it didn’t invent lock-on targeting or “labyrinthine 3D level design”, the original “Ocarina of Time” was “special” as it was “arguably the first game to do those things really well” as part of a “cohesive, unforgettable experience”, said Alex Perry on Mashable.
‘Dream come true’
It’s always nerve-racking to expose your “jaded adult sensibilities” to a “formative piece of art from your childhood”, said Keza MacDonald in The Guardian. But I couldn’t be happier to report that the “ambitious” remake is a “dream come true”.
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Much of the “flow and structure” of the original game remains intact. At its heart, this is still a “clever, challenging game about a lonely boy” trying to save the world. But while the graphics of the original were “fuzzy around the edges” and filled with “evocative but simple colours”, the remake now looks like “very detailed theatre scenery”.
The visuals are “beautiful”, said Perry on Mashable, and there are “snappy and satisfying” new controls, including the “much-talked-about new jump button” that “reduces the likelihood of accidentally launching yourself off a ledge”. However, the new “cartoony” voice acting “took me out of the story at times” and the game felt “a little too easy for adults”.
I found it “almost trivially easy, from beginning to end”, said David Jenkins in Metro, and young Link had a “slightly creepy, mannequin-like appearance at times”. But Nintendo hasn’t changed anything of “substance”; this is a “pitch perfect remake of one of the best video games of all time”.
Irenie Forshaw is the features editor at The Week, covering arts, culture and travel. She began her career in journalism at Leeds University, where she wrote for the student newspaper, The Gryphon, before working at The Guardian and The New Statesman Group. Irenie then became a senior writer at Elite Traveler, where she oversaw The Experts column.
