Starts off amazing with a Link-Zelda dynamic that I was immediately on board with… and then for most of the adventure you’re kind of just going around the world with not much interesting stuff happening. Sure, Zelda is great, but you get to see her for maybe like 10% of the adventure so that strong point kind of fades for most of the game. Besides her, Groose is well done, but his development kind of happens in a flash. He goes from bully to decent guy kind of off screen almost, but some of his lines were good enough that I ended up not minding. The rest of the cast doesn’t really stick out, but I really enjoyed Girahim as an antagonist, he shines in what few scenes he gets.

Now, gameplay-wise, I don’t mind the motion controls that much, but they make this game much more tiring to play than a traditional control scheme. Constantly having to recalibrate isn’t exactly fun, but when they work, they make for some of the most satisfying sword slashes in Zelda. When they didn’t work, they made for some of the most frustrating slashes in Zelda, but I realised that if I take my time with my swings, it worked a lot better. Other flaws are less easy to overlook and make it even more tiring to play. The story not really going anywhere, the companion character is literally the worst since Fi never adds anything interesting to the narrative nor the gameplay, constantly returning to the same locations which are rather bland to begin with (even if the desert with the timeshifting was a mechanic I was always glad to see return), the sky being quite barren and uninteresting… this adventure just takes up so much time where it feels like nothing is really pulling me along or exciting me, but the moment-to-moment gameplay is solid throughout. I especially loved the sandship, but it’s a bummer that the game essentially peaks at that point and you still have quite a bit to go.

Special mention to the music, which is absolute amazing and made some scenes so much more powerful just by the quality of it alone, and the final boss, was fittingly epic! I really like that as your sword upgrades, it feels fittingly OP by the end, worthy of the moniker of Master Sword!

I think it’s definitely a good game, but one with many flaws. It’s an odd case of the good parts never outclassed the flaws, it’s more so that the good and the bad balance each other out constantly so that I managed to get to the end while feeling fulfilled, as well as glad it was finally over in a way. It’s an odd one, but for the music alone, totally worth giving a spin (attack)!