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| Yes, This game right here. |
First and foremost I'll get this out of the way: Ocarina of Time is a fantastic game both taken along with and without it's place in history. In this article I'm merely trying to explain how both sides of the spectrum look at this game and how they both need to change. This argument could easily be applied to any other "Best game ever" so apply as need be, especially to Final Fantasy VII and Super Mario 64 because they have the exact same problem as OoT.
Now then, I'm going to tell you something that seems rather tangential at first, but really isn't. When gaming started designers were still trying a whole bunch of new things that had never been tested before and games themselves were still constantly evolving and improving. You'll rarely find a platformer fan who will claim the old arcade Donkey Kong is the best platformer ever made, and likewise you won't find people claiming Galaga or Space Invaders is the best shooter, Akalabeth is the best RPG, or Karate Champ is the best fighting game. Those people are out there, but you understand what I'm saying. Anyways, by the time the NES, SNES, Genesis, and computers of the Apple II and beyond came around developers had been working with games for many years and had a lot of development experience under their belts. That's why many games that can pop up on a "best of all time list" and many of the most recognizable and enduring series came about in that decade. Series such as Super Mario Bros., Zelda, Ultima, Prince of Persia, Ninja Gaiden, Megaman, Metroid, Kirby, Castlevania, and so on and so forth all came from that period of time.
But then something happened. Technology evolved in such away that wireframe graphics, Mode-7/ Super Scaler, and first-person turn based dungeon crawlers weren't the only way to make 3-D games. Textured polygons started showing up and being used in 2-D games before eventually making their way to games that were fully able to render things along the Z-axis. This was a huge change for gaming as a whole, and it's hard to imagine not having 3-D games at this point. There's no denying that the ability to make 3-D games has improved gaming tremendously, even if your favorite games are still 2-D or 2.5-D (many of mine are). On the other hand, nearly everything can be a double-edged sword, and 3-D was no exception.
Gone were those years of experience. Sure everything still applied to 3-D gaming, but there are so many more variables and problems at work that it was like starting from scratch. Allowing people to move in three dimensions meant everything had just become exponentially more complex. A few genres got off easy, RPG's still played the same so they merely had to focus on how they wanted to do the visuals, and forced scrolling shooters only had to change the forced scroll, from right or up, to into the screen. However, other genres had to figure everything out the hard way.
This is one of Ocarina of Time's greatest strengths, but also the place of a flaw. Because 3-D gaming was so new OoT was the first game I can think of to give a semi-free floating camera with a button to recenter it behind the character, and if it wasn't the first, is the the one that popularized it. Earlier games had either had the camera locked behind the character (ala, Megaman Legends and third person shooters in general), locked in a specific direction (Crash Bandicoot), or left to it's own free form devices with limited player control (Super Mario 64). Ocarina of Time was also the first game to have a lock-on combat system allowing you two very distinct ways to fight, a mechanism that is still copied with virtually no change to this very day.
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| Yes I took these images from Wikipedia. I can't capture it myself, and open source means no chance of copyright infringeme- Er I mean, Z-Targeting was crazy innovative! |
Ocarina of Time also used the flexibility of three dimensions and polygons too their fullest giving you a large list of sword attacks and dodge moves to spruce up combat a whole lot from the previous 2-D outings and give you a whole new meaning to the word "control".
Yet look at it now, without taking any of those "firsts" into mind. The camera, while still generally good, acts up occasionally, notably while climbing on vines or in very enclosed environments like one of the block puzzles in the forest temple that immediately comes to mind. It's not bad, but it definitely shows that the camera still needed a little tweaking that only could have come with more experience. Likewise, for all those movements and sword attacks there's almost nothing in the way of combos, and the differences between the vertical slash, horizontal slash, and stab really hardly matter since no enemy really takes advantage of them. Sub-weapons and the sword are only ever used in relaxed succession (one to open them up, one to attack), never in combination or requiring precise timing of a switch. The puzzles are also relatively easy and generally only ever frustrating because they're time consuming not difficult (I'm looking at you, Water Temple) Take all that into account and the game tends to be pitifully easy compared to other Zelda games which, with the exception of the first, aren't known to be particularly difficult anyways.
Once again, I still think it's a fantastic game, and I'm not disputing it's place in history. However, what I am saying is both the lovers and the haters need to shut the hell up. Two paragraphs up gives reasons to the haters, and the one after that is for the lovers. Look, there's no denying it's a good game, but there's also no denying it doesn't have flaws. If you still think it's the best game ever, or it's your favorite game of all time that's OK. I was born too late so I didn't get the same nostalgia bomb others did, but I understand the message Ocarina of Time gives. The fact that Link goes into the future and then looks back at the places from his past seeing how much they changed for the worse shows a fear about growing up and a reflection on childhood that most gamers who grew up with the NES got touched by. At the same time, the fact that Link got to grow up and fulfill his duties while still retaining his childhood innocence reached out to many younger gamers who were just starting the hobby. I was in the middle of those two groups, the age of the latter, but I had started gaming at 3 with and NES, and was introduced to the SNES and Genesis one year later with the Saturn, PS1, and N64 a year and half after that. I already had experience with games and Link's story wasn't really all that new to me from the child perspective, but I hadn't grown up and needed to reflect yet either.
What I'm trying to say is that games that really have an emotional connection with people are the games that deserve to be considered great, whether it's an emotional connection through life experience, or just a game that is sheer fun enough to cause everything else to drop away while playing it. The games that can do both, like the following two for me or OoT for many people are why many people call them the "Best game ever". I personally think the greatest game of all time is Shadow of the Colossus, a story of a man choosing his own path in life and tackling the impossible for purely selfish reasons, to someone like me who was always being pushed into advanced classes, pushed into sports, and pushed into just about everything it was a powerful message.
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| Tackling the impossible indeed. |
It got me to go into Competitive Marching Band as opposed to a sport, a decision I will never regret (no matter how much of a geek it makes me), and it also eventually led to me choosing to major in English despite my parents pushing for me to go into a bunch of high money making careers that I simply have no interest in. Likewise NiGHTS Into Dreams hits second place on my list for giving us a view on escapism. The story of NiGHTS is one of shy kids who realize that their escape from the world can only and should only ever be temporary but can help give them confidence to succeed in the real world. To someone like me who was incredibly shy and hesitant as well as an avid daydreamer NiGHTS Into Dreams really gave me a much needed push to live in the moment.
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| I bought this and a Saturn off eBay a few years back to undo a huge mistake in my life: Selling it in the first place. |
So, now comes the other end of the spectrum. To those of you who do think Ocarina of Time (or any game) is the best game ever and has absolutely no flaws, Not the regular fans, just the ones who avidly defend it as the best thing ever, YOU'RE RUINING IT FOR EVERYONE ELSE! That's right, you set the bar so high for people who are going off to play the game, and flame out anyone who thinks it isn't super special awesomely spectacular that you ruin the game for all of them. I honestly hated OoT, SM64, and FF7 for a while, downright despised them, but not the games. I hated everything about the games except for the raw games themselves, if anyone said anything good about the games I had to counter with something bad because the taste was just so bad in my mouth from fanboys being utter assholes about them.
Look, the haters of the games don't actually hate the games. Well they might, but if they do it's not just that particular game it's that entire branch of the genre. They hate the games because you all refuse to. You refuse to see any flaws in the games at all. Look, a flaw doesn't make the game worse. OoT in terms of technical execution, design, and difficulty has been one upped by other games, but when everything is taken into context it's unarguably one of the strongest ever. However, refusing any possible flaw or anyone that doesn't think it's the best game makes you a horrible person. Not everyone had the same experience you did, and therefore the flaws were more apparent to them. Either the message didn't strike the same chord with them or they're too young and they played other, better technically executed games, with the years of experience that OoT paved the way for, first so it didn't have any real impact on them. My personal favorite Zelda game is Majora's Mask, and has been since the day it came out when I got it, but I'll explain the reasons for that another time. Let's just say it's another game that had an emotional impact on me. However, I'll be the first to admit the game does have some flaws, and several love it or hate it elements (which in a way are flaws, but necessary ones). Refusing to acknowledge such flaws in your favorite game simply because it's the more commonly liked choice is why the haters of it are so steadfast and ever growing.
Also haters, sit back and figure out if you really like the game or not as the raw game itself, and if you do: Shut the hell up because you're part of the problem too. Nit picking is only making the lovers defend it harder.
