I picked up The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass a few days ago and I'm really glad I did. This is a great game. And it does a phenomenal job of utilizing the touch screen of the DS. Many of the tried and true Zelda conventions are given new life with the advent of the touch screen and the stylus. You don't just throw the boomerang in the direction of your choosing, you can actually plot out its course by drawing a line on the screen.
Even the sea travel system is reborn in Phantom Hourglass. While that aspect was, in the opinion of many, a detriment to Wind Waker, in Phantom Hourglass, it's actually fun. Again, you can plot your course using the stylus. And, instead of directly steering the ship as in Wind Waker, once your course is set, the ship essentially steers itself while Link is free to man the cannon.
All of these new ideas work together to create a unique Zelda experience. Even though this is primarily a top-down adventure with gameplay similar to A Link to the Past or any of the other Zelda titles for the handheld systems, everything seems new. The level designers were able to use the new functionality of the boomerang and other tools to create fresh puzzles.
This one seems to be more of an adult game than previous Zelda titles. I don't mean to say Link is dropping F-bombs or giving his patronage to hookers ("yo honey, I'll show you a real good time for twenty rupees!"), but some of the puzzles require a depth of thinking that is, frankly, unusual for a Zelda game. And many of the puzzle hints are vague at best.
Playing Phantom Hourglass has reawakened my taste for the older, classic console games. Luckily for me, many of the old games that I cut my gamer teeth on are now available for the GBA. And, it just so happens, the GBA games are compatible with the DS. So now my handheld game library is stocked with games like A Link to the Past, Final Fantasy IV, and Final Fantasy VI. Once I finish Phantom Hourglass I'm going to start those journeys again. Rockin' it old-school. Hells yeah.
1 comment:
You literally cut your teeth on those games??? No wonder you've bought the same games three or four times over now. . . . . sheesh. Maybe eating a steak would work better than the games.
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