That sure was... a video game I guess?

Ocarina of Time has long been lauded as one of the greatest games of all time, and in some aspects it's not hard to see how much influence it would have in the years going forward. It planted the seeds for multiple new genres of the medium, from the Character Action Game to Open World. It's still visually impressive even today, and it has an incredible atmosphere.

But by golly, the flaws of this game are just so many that it almost overshadows the rest of the experience, and what was once impressive in 1998 is not so in 2023.

Hyrule Field. It's big, it's open, and it is almost absolutely barren aside from the few flying pineapples and Stalfos at night time. Sure, it's visually impressive but for the first half of this game it is utterly miserable to go through.

Playing as Young Link is quite the struggle just because moving through that field with him to go anywhere takes forever. You spend most of your time sidehopping which is nowhere near as cool as say, Alucard's Backdashing in Symphony, and just results in the first half of this game having a very sluggish pace.

Compared to other Zelda titles, even Zelda 1, it's just way too fucking slow. Now getting Epona and the Fast Travel Songs does mitigate the issue somewhat but you can only get those in the second half of the game, which means until that point you are stuck with the utterly snail-like Young Link.

Dungeons... god. I can count with maybe 2 fingers the amount of dungeons in this game that I sort of liked, those being Dodongo's Cavern and the Spirit Temple. Everything else ranged from either being kind of dull and uninteresting (Forest Temple, Water Temple), to actively annoying and unpleasant (Fire Temple, Jabu Jabu, Ice Cavern).

As an aside, how the hell is the Water Temple considered the worst dungeon in a game where both Jabu Jabu and the Ice Cavern exist? Jabu Jabu is a aesthetic nightmare with many places that just look the same and enemies you can't hit without the boomerang, as well as being an escort mission, and Ice Cavern... fucking christ, Ice physics with a Link who has some of the most awkward movement in the series... no thanks. Water Dungeon was at most just boring to go through, the switching of the boots was not nearly as bad as I was told. (Even then I liked the Iron Boots because they make funny noises, I guess I'm just easy to please)

Onto the unpleasant dungeons, Fire Dungeon was ass less because of the actual Fire and more because of how terrible Link controls. Link will sometimes just jump if you're even remotely near an edge, and in Fire Dungeon's case that can result in you falling several floors down and having to redo a fuck ton of things to get back to where you were. I genuinely hate having to platform with Link in this game simply because of this. There will be points where Link is landing directly on top of a box and yet he'll still careen to his death. It's fucking irritating.

Spirit Temple was cool at least, since it was one of the few times where the game actually asks the player to use everything in their toolset, and not just as Adult Link but also as Child Link. I wish we had more dungeons that actually incorporated the time travel aspect this game has, but alas we don't get that.

Combat, is mediocre. This isn't really too much of a sticking point since arguably combat isn't that important for Zelda but it was still a little disappointing, especially with the bosses.

There is not a single boss in this game that was genuinely compelling. Just like with the dungeons we have two camps, bosses that were a snoozefest and bosses that were irritating, as well as the additional third group that has both.

Twinrova, god I hate Twinrova. In concept it's a super cool fight, you reflect the magic from the one sister to the sister weak to their magic. The problem is that sometimes you just flat out can't hit the other sister because they are on the other side of the screen. Then the second phase happens and is worse because it just becomes a fucking waiting game of hoping she'll launch three of the same spell so you can absorb it with your shield and hit her with it.

On the opposite camp we have Volvagia... what a nothing fight. There was a point during it where I just stood still for 30 seconds and took no damage, and then I was able to completely body the damn thing.

Even Dark Link was a joke, with me just doing thrust attacks utterly annihilating the poor guy.

Really the only boss I even sort of liked besides King Dodongo was Bongo Bongo, simply because it asked me to use more than one tool which was cool.

The Ganon fight was cool from a visual and thematic standpoint but was also way too easy for a final boss. Maybe that was the point but it just didn't feel satisfying to me.

Minigames. I will now completely break the rational character I've been writing as up to this point to rant about this. I HATE every minigame in this game, and I HATE that Heart Pieces and Ammo Upgrades are locked behind them. Now I'm sure you'll probably say "oh but those are optional" and sure you're not wrong, but I just like having more health you dig? I like to be more capable, and having more health and ammo is a way to doing that. I would complain less if a single minigame in this game wasn't some of the worst shit imaginable.

The bow/slingshot games are easily the worst of the bunch, you have no reticle. In regular combat this isn't so bad since A. Lock-on is available, and B. You are way less limited in your ammo capacity, so you have many opportunities to adjust your aim. Not so with these. Limited ammo, no lock on, and you have to get it PERFECT, which is just the Gonorrhea Icing on this AIDS Cake.

The others aren't much better, Bombchu Bowling can be utter hell until you find a consistent strategy, the Treasure Chest minigame is just pure guess work (unless you've done a dungeon you can only unlock in the second half of the game). The Dampe Racing is a pain in the ass, and isn't optional the first time since you need the Hookshot to progress. The Horseback racing to get Epona just feels tacked on and makes the process of getting her feel slow and repetitive.

Really the only ones that I didn't outright hate were the jam sessions with the Skull Kids and the Frogs.

The least offensive was surprisingly the fishing minigame, was really easy to figure out. (And very obvious that Sonic Adventure stole from it wholesale).

In general I am just a person who hates minigames locking upgrades, as someone who grew up with Sonic and having things locked behind Special Stages I have just always hated the concept. Maybe these won't bug you, but for me they were easily the lowest point of the game, not helped at all by their genuine lack of quality.

So that brings me to my final issue, which is more an issue that encapsulates problems this franchise has more so than anything: Zelda herself.

I think it is kind of ridiculous how whenever Zelda does anything in this game, it backfires horribly. She sends Link to get the Pendants so he can get the Master Sword and stop Ganondorf from getting to the Sacred Realm... only for doing so to result in him getting there anyway, making her entire plan fall apart.

Then there's her as Shiek, who in my opinion is just... such wasted potential. Shiek only exposits to Link and teaches him the Fast Travel Songs. Outside of that, the only thing of note is that Shiek gets her ass beaten by a fucking ghost and then proceeds to do nothing about it. Would it not have been cool to at least have a dungeon where you and Shiek work together? I mean, Jabu Jabu had a similar premise with Ruto and while I think it didn't work there, the potential for a good dungeon using teamwork between you and Shiek would be cool. Unfortunately we didn't get that.

And of course, the moment she removes the Shiek disguise, she is almost immediately captured by Ganondorf. It's just really upsetting.

I won't lie, this criticism is also amplified by things that happen in Tears of the Kingdom, but I can't help but feel like that stuff really started being set in stone with Ocarina.

Zelda is never allowed to have genuine agency, and whenever she is she or the world is always summarily punished for it. Her entire thing ends in three timelines where the world gets fucked over by Ganondorf in some capacity. I can't help but feel like this series reeks of misogyny when the main female lead isn't allowed to be anything but a damsel and can't genuinely do anything without being punished for doing so. It's just a little fucking uncomfortable to me.

This applies to the entire series too, and while talking in Tokyo Millennium I basically came to the conclusion that Zelda is only allowed true agency when:
A. She's in Super Smash Bros.
B. She's not even in the game
C. The Fucking CDI Games
D. Spirit Tracks, where she spends most of the game dead

I just can't help but see these underlying signals Nintendo is trying to send to me which in big bold letters spell out the word "MISOGYNY".

To conclude, I don't hate Ocarina of Time but it sure just is ok. It's so ok, it's average, and arguably that's far worse than just being bad.

I left this game feeling filled but disappointed at the same time. Maybe it's my fault for playing this as a break game from Tears of the Kingdom, which has been an utterly phenomenal time that I genuinely could not put down, and I'm measuring OoT against it but at the same time I feel like I would always be disappointed.

Ocarina of Time has long been lauded as one of the greatest games of all time, but to me it's just another game to checkmark off the list. A game that doesn't impress, but doesn't fill me with pure animosity.

It's just ok.

Reviewed on Jun 05, 2023


1 Comment


9 months ago

Damn, scathing af lol. Respect though, playing Breath of the Wild and I’m not the biggest fan so I get ya