(12-31-2017, 05:39 AM)Bighead Wrote: Link's Awakening (10/10) - One of my personal favorites. Interesting story, the first Zelda with a trade sequence, the first Zelda to allow jumping, the first Zelda with the Owl.
I definitely agree with Link's Awakening being a 10/10. You would think the Oracle games would be even better since both of them offer even more content than Link's Awakening while maintaining the same engine, but Link's Awakening is just a masterpiece and I agree that the Oracle games just lacked on what made Link's Awakening so special. I found the minigames in the oracle games always too hard. I took me about 10 years before I finally could complete the minigame in Oracle of Ages in order to proceed to the third dungeon. Save States through emulation are a boon.
The Zelda II is simply not my type of game. I don't hard 2D platformers (I do love them), but for a Zelda game... Nah. Skyward Sword is just there worst there is... Fetch quests, re-used bosses, dungeons and area's and those horrific motion controls. I found both Twilight Princess and Wind Waker pretty great. But Wind Waker lacked the difficulity and additional dungeons and the GameCube version is not as streamlined anymore (enter the Wii U version!). Twilight Princess takes forever to start, basically a glorified tutorial, but once it kicks in it is pretty good. I found the City in the Sky dungeon to be one of the best in the series (only to be bested by the OoT's Forest Temple and BotW's Hyrule Castle). And how can you say Majora's Mask is a 5? It is amazing, it just lacks dungeons.
Most of the Zelda entries since Ocarina always came with the word but. But too easy. But to few dungeons. But to many fetch quests. But poorly controls. But a long introduction. A Link Between Worlds did not have any of those buts. Sure it is not the longest game and not the hardest, but every hour is full spent in immersion. I was glad it broke the formula by allowing doing dungeons in any order. And of course, we all know my opinion about Breath of the Wild by now.
My ranking list for Zelda games:
Nr. 01 - Breath of the Wild
Nr. 02 - Ocarina of Time
Nr. 03 - Link's Awakening (DX)
Nr. 04 - Majora's Mask
Nr. 05 - A Link to the Past
Nr. 06 - A Link Between Worlds
Nr. 07 - Twilight Princess (HD)
Nr. 08 - Wind Waker HD
Nr. 09 - The Minish Cap
Nr. 10 - Oracle of Ages/Seasons
Nr. 11 - The Legend of Zelda
Nr. 12 - Phantom Hourglass
Nr. 13 - Spirit Tracks
Nr. 14 - Skyward Sword
Nr. 15 - The Adventure of Link
Wind Waker SD is not worth my time anymore since the HD remake proved to be much more streamlined. Stopping everything you do and switching the wind direction on sea is just the worst. The original Zelda is fun, but my fondest memories started since the SNES and Gameboy. I would have ranked the original NES Zelda higher if I started playing the NES version earlier. As said, Zelda II isn't my style. I basically hate everything motion related, which is why Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks is ranked quite low, but are still pretty fun on the own. Completed Spirit Tracks at least three times. I never touched Skyward Sword again since it completed it on Normal Mode. At least sailing the sea in Wind Waker was more fun than flying around in Skyward Sword. The thing about Majora's Mask what makes it so great is how it handles the time limit in a perfect manner no other game suceeded to do so far.
The tricky part in grading Breath of the Wild is how many hours you can put in it. Literally hundreds of hours. All previous Zelda games were mostly ranging from 15 tot 60 hours with Twilight Princess being the longest. Most of the previous games just had a primary focus on the main quest with here and there some sidetracking such as obtaining additional heart pieces, bottles, skulltulas and other minor stuff. In Breath of the Wild, 90% of your time is spent being sidetracked with the other 10% being the pure focus on working on your goal towards defeating Ganon. Since the previous Zelda were more focused on the main quest it was easier to remain optimal engaged with puzzles, dungeons, boss battles and what not. All these game eventually end at some point when you beat the final dungeon, but Breath of the Wild does not really end there. Sure you can beat Ganon and call it a day but chances are high there are still a lot of koroks, shrines and sidequests to complete. I even managed to find a new village, the horse fairy, the royal horse, a missing tower and quite a few area's I have never been to before after I beated Ganon. I think it is important to consider when you think you have completed the game. Doing all shrines is worth it. But I did not collect every korok seed, only half of them. Collecting any more would be pointless since there is no reward for it anymore (the inventory is maxed out anyway). Even doing every sidequest might not be worth of your time. It would be better to call it completed and start redoing it again (in Master Mode of course). it is a shame that once you completed the second DLC and obtained the bike that chances are high you already "completed" the game. You could have some fun racing around, but there is not any goal left anymore by that point to benefit from the bike... Unless a third DLC will be coming, but Nintendo already said they wrapped up the development for the game and that they started working on the next entry in the series.
In short: Completing Breath of the Wild a full 100% might not be that fun anymore while all other Zelda games remain fun for the whole 100%. Not that it is bad for Breath of the Wild, it just has so many to offer and takes a great amount of time to work your way through. If you did not fully complete an older Zelda for 100% you might get the feeling you did not get all there was from the game.