The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword
Nintendo Wii
The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword came out in late 2011. I remember being extremely excited to play this game, especially after I’d read all the glowing reviews it was getting. I was a huge Zelda fan to begin with, but when you threw in motion sword controls that reacted based on how you swung the Wii remote, it was AWN. I asked my girlfriend (who would later go on to become my wife) for this game as a Christmas gift. Like the good girlfriend that she was, she came through in the clutch and got this game for me. Not only was it super cool that I had gotten the game, but it also came with a bonus CD that had full orchestra versions of classic Zelda tracks on it. I remember the two of us driving out to my parents’ house on Christmas Day with the Zelda soundtrack booming in the car. It was like we were going on an adventure. I loved it!
The game, however, was a different story. The motion controls were cool, but that was the only cool thing about it. The whole game just seemed a bit tedious to me. The environments were bland. You revisited the same three stages over and over again throughout the course of the game. To me, there were no memorable or iconic moments to be seen here like there were in almost all of the previous Zelda games. In fact, the whole game itself was kind of a slog for me to play through. It wasn’t particularly fun and it began to feel like a chore after a while. I could not for the life of me figure out why the game had gotten such good reviews.
I ended up beating the game just for the sake of beating it. The disc went back in the case. The case went back on the shelf. I told myself that I would someday return to the game to see if my opinion had changed on it. About six or seven years passed before I finally picked it up again.
When I first started playing the game again, I found that my feelings had not changed. I quickly got bored with the game and after a couple of days of boredom I decided that I needed a break from the game to play something more fun. I put my playthrough on a temporary hold and switched over to the PS4 to play The Last of Us instead.
When I came back to Skyward Sword, I noticed that something had changed. Maybe it was just me forcing myself to power through the game, but I started playing it for hours on end and found myself actually enjoying the experience. No, it still wasn’t the best Zelda game, but I tried to put that out of my head. I tried to ignore what the other Zelda games had done and judge Skyward Sword on its own merits. That is when I started to realize that the game wasn’t really as bad as I had thought.
The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword is canonically the first game in the Zelda series. Link and his people live in a floating city named Skyloft. The world below is shielded by a layer of clouds so thick that no one has seen the surface in ages. In fact, many people believe there is nothing below the clouds at all. That is, until prominent Skyloft citizen Zelda falls and disappears into the clouds below. A shimmering light shines into the sky, and a passage to the surface opens through the clouds. Being the brave adventurer that he is, Link hops aboard his big flying bird and goes down to investigate.
Down below, Link finds out he is the chosen hero, because of course he is. The villain of the game, Girahim, is attempting to free an ancient powerful demon from his long slumber. Once freed, the demon will destroy everything in its path. Zelda, an incarnation of the ancient Goddess of lore, is going around from temple to temple on the surface, doing her part to help keep the evil at bay. Girahim is attempting to stop her, but Link is there to fight Girahim while following Zelda’s trail in the hopes of catching up with her and aiding her on her quest.
You follow Zelda from temple to temple, navigating through each temple, solving puzzles, collecting keys, and fighting bosses. After you have completed the first three temples, things should become very familiar to fans of Zelda games in the past. You are sent out on multiple quests to track down the artifacts you need to win the game. First you have to go find secret mystical stones. Then you have to go learn songs from the game’s three dragons. Then you have to go collect something else. Then something else. Rinse and repeat - something we have seen in a countless number of Zelda games in the past. Don’t get me wrong, the formula works. This isn’t a bad thing. Not necessarily very original, but still fun. The thing I didn’t like is that the game recycles the same three environments (the forest, the volcano, and the desert) over and over and over and over and over again. You revisit them multiple times over the course of the game. Sure, you unlock new areas and new locations within each environment each time you visit, but things still feel super repetitive after a while. A little extra variety would have been nice.
When not exploring the three surface locations of the game, you will find yourself flying around on your red bird above the clouds. Skyloft and its surrounding floating islands act as the central hub village of the game. Here you can talk to people, take on tasks for them, and do things that advance the game’s storyline. You can also fly from island to island, exploring and seeing what kind of surprises each little area has in store for you. In The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker, I absolutely loved sailing the sea and exploring all of the game’s islands for their secrets. For whatever reason, I never did here. I checked out maybe two or three islands, but that was it. Exploring just didn’t hold the same magic or appeal that exploring in Wind Waker did for me. Probably because each island I visited seemed to contain some random Skyloftian who wanted me to do something for them. Whereas in Wind Waker, you never knew what you were going to find. As a result the majority of my time above the clouds was spent simply going from point A to point B to advance the plot. I could have explored more, I just didn't find the exploration very interesting here.
A lot of reviews of this game praise its puzzles and its dungeons. They were serviceable, but I didn’t find any of them particularly fun or memorable. I didn’t dislike them, but again: nothing groundbreaking or iconic to be seen here like in previous Zelda games. OK, I told myself I was going to stop comparing this to past Zelda games, but here I continue to do it. I guess it is something that just simply can’t be helped! One thing the reviews were critical of was the motion controls, which I liked. Weird, huh? Everything about the game that they liked, I didn’t. The one thing they didn’t, I did. But I just thought the motion controls added some extra depth to combat situations. Plus it just felt cool swinging the Wii remote like a sword, and watching Link react appropriately onscreen. It made things awkward with my cat, though, because she kept trying to lay on my lap when I was playing this game.
Another thing I will acknowledge that I liked about the game is its story. It is average on the surface, but once you dig deeper, the events of this game explain a lot of Zelda lore. It explains the origin of the Master Sword. It explains the significance of the bird logo to be seen in future games. It also details the origins of Ganondorf as the main villain of the series. In fact, the game does a good job explaining why it is that Link, Zelda, and Ganon always seem to be at the center of attention each time there is a crisis in Hyrule. It explains why and how the destiny of these three characters is tied together. That is pretty cool in my books.
I just realized I have nearly made it to the end of the review without mentioning two of the game’s more memorable side characters. One, Groose, is memorable in a good way. He starts out as a bully, but has a nice redemption arc going on where he becomes one of the game’s heroes when all is said and done. The other one, Fi, is memorable in a bad way. She is like this game’s version of Navi. She pops up from time to time to give you advice and explain plot points to you. The only problem is she pops up TOO MUCH and it gets tiring after a while. She talks for a long time. She talks oh so slowly too. You can’t skip over the things she says either. I just wanted to kick her in the head after a while. Worst video game companion ever! Speaking of annoying things, I hate how when you pick up a dropped enemy collectible in the game, such as a jelly blob or a skull necklace, it always has to freeze the action, explain what the item is, pause the game, open your inventory, and deposit the item into your inventory before unpausing the game and letting you return to action. It makes me groan and not want to pick up items when I see them laying around. The game even does this if you pick something up in the middle of battle, too. It is so tedious and intrusive, it drives me absolutely nuts. Come on, guys! Who thought this was a good idea?
Despite my complaints, I did end up liking the game by the time I finished it. This is one of those games where I would keep telling myself "okay, just a little bit longer" but then continue to play for several more hours. This is a pretty decent game on its own merits, but I just can't help but feel that when compared to past 3D Zelda games everything about Skyward Sword screams average to me. Average puzzles, average dungeons, average music, average graphics (seriously, why is everything so bland here? I thought this was supposed to be a step above the GameCube and N64?), average everything. Well, except for the plot. True, an average Zelda game is still better than 50% of games out there, but I couldn’t help but feel that this game was a disappointment as a Zelda game. If I had to rank my favorite 3D Zeldas, this would definitely rank behind Ocarina of Time, Majora’s Mask, Wind Waker, and Twilight Princess. I have not played Breath of the Wild yet, but I can't imagine liking this game more than that one.
So I have a little bit of a dilemma here. Average Zelda game, but slightly above average NOT Zelda game. C is too low. C+ or B-? Hmmmm….
Gah! I just don’t have it in me to give this game a score in the C range. Despite its numerous flaws which I outlined in great detail above, I still had an overall enjoyable time with the game. It could have (and should have!) been much better. But if you take away the expectations that the name “The Legend of Zelda” immediately bring to mind when you start this up, it really is a solid title. Solid, but at the same time never extraordinary.
Overall:
B-
If you liked my Skyward Sword review, please check out a few other of my game reviews:
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