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[Jonneh3003]

Skyward Sword isn't my favourite game in the series but I don't hear many complaints about anything it does particularly wrong, often the complaints stem to motion controls and the linear design, but are either of those faults?

I think you need to take Skyward Sword as it is rather than comparing it to previous Zelda games, it never teases you with open environments and, bar the sky, each section of the world is populated with puzzles and obstacles. It's a game where even the outdoor areas feel like dungeons and to me this caused a couple of pacing issues. I think Skyward Sword needed a couple more areas to wind down other than Skyloft.

But apart from this I adore Skyward Sword, I love the relationship between Link, Zelda and even Groose. I love how and it looks and I absolutely love how it controls. I think the motion controls really are the cherry on top of the cake and the game just wouldn't work without them. I'm not a fan of The Bit Block but I love the short rebuttal video Josh made in reply to Gamespot's review: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QEge_2Vuft0

I don't think it quite lived up to the origin story tale Nintendo were teasing but I think Skyward Sword did a brilliant job of building a believable world and contains some of the best dungeons Zelda has ever had.

Oh but there was this asshole

 

[RK9039]

The only problem I had was the lack of a free camera. It was borderline unplayable for me, so I quit.

 

[LewieP]

It felt like the opening tutorial was never going to end. None of the other games have that much front loaded handholding.

That's my biggest complaint.

 

[AwRy108]

It was a 30 hour game followed by 20 hours of filler material; in other words: it was a case of "too much of a good thing".

Also, even after 50 hours of combat, the motion control-based sword play never felt 100% reliable.

 

[skypunch]

It feels like a Zelda game that's just "there".

I was also bored of the Zelda formula and I don't really like the art style.

 

[Jonneh3003]

The only problem I had was the lack of a free camera. It was borderline unplayable for me, so I quit.

That's interesting, Wind Waker was the only game I played with a free camera before Skyward Sword so I guess I overlooked this.

 

[KingBroly]

The last...10 hours or so wasn't really necessary. It felt like a chore to go through each area for the 5th and 6th times.

Not to mention the visuals were severely hampered by being on the Wii.

 

[Jonneh3003]

It felt like the opening tutorial was never going to end. None of the other games have that much front loaded handholding.

That's my biggest complaint.

I actually really liked the opening, not for the forced tutorials but the character development. Skyloft felt fully realised and it kept the opening hour really interesting.

Just thought of something else I didn't like:

 

[Barrow Roll]

I'm glad you edited your post to mention the Imprisoned. Not a particularly hard boss in any of its forms, but how many times do you have to fight it? 3? 4? Yeesh.

I agree, and don't really have much to add. I like Skyward Sword a lot, it's a lot of fun, and looks gorgeous on Dolphin.

 

[purseowner]

The motion controls, the puzzles being obtuse in their solutions to the point of pissing me off where no other Zelda game has, the constant backtracking due to confusion as to where I needed to go next.

It's a shame really, as I've heard the game gets way better further in, but I really struggled to progress.

It's not that I hate the game, it's that it seems to hate me.

Spoiler

Not even Groose could salvage my feelings about what I played.

 

[ffdgh]

The motion controls for me...and making simple things like flying and swimming require them. I really should finish it one day since I just kinda gave out.

 

[FunBoy]

Not enough Groose .

 

[Marow]

Had they:

- Trimmed down the padding
- Not had repeating boss fights, or at the very least not annoying ones
- Not had Fi

I think it would've been an ace game. It particularly shines in the dungeons, where the Sandship is the closest thing we've gotten to a 2D style dungeon in a 3D Zelda.

 

[Jonneh3003]

I'm glad you edited your post to mention the Imprisoned. Not a particularly hard boss in any of its forms, but how many times do you have to fight it? 3? 4? Yeesh.

I agree, and don't really have much to add. I like Skyward Sword a lot, it's a lot of fun, and looks gorgeous on Dolphin.

You even fight the Imprisoned again in Hyrule Warriors D:

 

[Spiritwalker]

I'd play a Switch remaster, but that's not gonna happen I guess.

 

[Alethebeer]

My least favourite Zelda 3d.
The "overworld" felt a bit disconnected in its parts and i hated the bossfights, expecially the bosses' aestethic. Story and dungeon design were fine.
Oh, and i've never been a fan of motion controls in general.

 

[Supermanisdead]

Endless padding. It was a 25 hour game stretched to 40 hours for no goddamn reason. Tadtones, escorts quest, multiple imprisoned battles, dowsing etc. were all so unnecessary.

Fi is by far the worst Zelda companion too. She straight up tells you the answer to one of the sand area puzzles before you even try to solve it.

 

[Stone Ocean]

The pacing is insufferable. It makes Twilight Princess seem like a focused romp for fuck's sake.

 

[Peltz]

I loved it too, OP. It's better than Twilight Princess by a lot in my opinion.

 

[KojiKnight]

The biggest problem with the motion control is simply the wii couldn't cut it. Compare sword play in Skyward Sword to the Zelda attraction in Nintendo Land.

(Edit) to be clear, this isn't a motion plus issue, the extra processing power in the wiiu made motion plus sooooo much faster and more accurate in responsiveness. 60 fps versus 30 also helped there.

The biggest problem with the game was Fi.

Still an absolutely great Zelda game, still prefer it a ton to a certain game that rhymes with highlight twincest.

 

[Xdrive05]

The only problem I had was the lack of a free camera. It was borderline unplayable for me, so I quit.

Yeah, for me a free camera is a pretty big deal in 3d Zelda. Just overall, SS felt very limiting to me in control and openness of gameplay, and the lack of free camera probably contribruted greatly to that. Looks like BotW will have one, thankfully.

 

[NSESN]

Nothing, wish Nintendo kept the motion controls for BOTW

 

[Jonneh3003]

I'd play a Switch remaster, but that's not gonna happen I guess.

I would have said no on Wii U but depending on the capability of the joy-cons it's completely possible.

Being 60fps might actually make the controls feel a little smoother.

 

[Jim_Cacher]

My favorite 3D Zelda. The only downside is fighting the Imprisoned three times.

 

[FunkyDealer]

I overall really liked it, a lot.

But they could have scrapped the second fight with the imprisoned, and I had trouble with the controls.

I wanted to just move my swordhand so I could strike from a different angle, but Link would see it as an attack.

I also think bomb-rolling should have used the same hold-and-let-go controls as Wii Bowling. Because that's how I always wanted to do it, and I ended up making a mess of it.

Loved the beetle item though!

 

[jrush64]

Absoultely nothing was wrong with Skyward Sword. My second fav Zelda game only behind Wind Waker. Zelda cycle at work as usual. Also most of the hate you see is pretty only on GAF.

 

[KojiKnight]

As much as I like all of this praise for Skyward Sword here on gaf (check previouss threads, it's a lot more uncommon), I'm wondering if this is the start of another Zelda cycle...

 

[LeleSocho]

There's a lot of wrong in Skyward Sword but not so much that didn't make me enjoy the game.
From the top of my mind here's few things that i thought weren't optimal:
-Fi.
-Completely empty world, even emptier than Wind Waker.
-Long beginning session (same problem of Twilight Princess).
-You are forced to do a little too much filler quests in order to progress ruining the pace of the game.
-Controls, don't get me wrong they are fine and i hardly had problems with them and it should also be counted that was the first game of its genre to experiment with things like this but there's surely room for improvement both on the hardware used and its implementation.

 

[TheMoon]

often the complaints stem to motion controls and the linear design, but are either of those faults?

Nope. Skyward Sword is a fantastic game with some minor flaws.

I vividly remember someone ranting on a podcast or video show back when it came out about how it forces you to douse all the time. You never ever have to douse in this game if you don't want to (maybe the very first time it comes up?). Stuff like this is what keeps driving me nuts.

Also funny: that control rebuttal from TBB to McShea is still one of the best things on the internet and sadly the only redeeming thing about TBB nowadays

Spoiler

(JT is just a class A douche these days)

.

There's a lot of wrong in Skyward Sword but not so much that didn't make me enjoy the game.
From the top of my mind here's few things that i thought weren't optimal:

-Long beginning session (same problem of Twilight Princess)

Nah. Same as with TP, this is way overblown. Even if one thinks TP's opening is too long and boring, SS is much much quicker and engaging.

 

[Captain Europe]

I loved the dungeons in this game and I didn't mind the motion controls, until the lava part where you had control over the futuristic flying monkey, I got so annoyed controlling him, I turned it off and never went back to it. Then I saw on Youtube that there was even more backtracking later, so I just watched the rest on Youtube and never had the desire to finish it.

 

[True Fire]

Zelda cycle.

Skyward Sword has to be a "bad" game so that BotW is considered a good game in Zelda fans' eyes. They'll be begging for an enhanced port in 5 years, at the point where it's cool to hate BotW because it's too open and there's not enough to do.

 

[RK9039]

Yeah, for me a free camera is a pretty big deal in 3d Zelda. Just overall, SS felt very limiting to me in control and openness of gameplay, and the lack of free camera probably contribruted greatly to that. Looks like BotW will have one, thankfully.

BotW definitely needed it so I'm very happy about that. SS was obviously limited in that way because of the motion controls but I really wished there was an alternative control scheme with a free camera. I recently tried the dolphin version and as soon as I had to find the cat I just gave up again, it feels so dumb wrestling the camera like that.

 

[DrunkShogun]

Haven't play it for a while but skyloft and flying was a chore, the boss with hittable toes being fought more than once wasn't the best and the overworked felt weak. Dungeons were fine but everything around it wasn't the best. Not a particularly bad zelda game, twilight princess is weaker but skyward sword slow start makes me avoid replaying it.

 

[Jonneh3003]

As much as I like all of this praise for Skyward Sword here on gaf (check previouss threads, it's a lot more uncommon), I'm wondering if this is the start of another Zelda cycle...

It surely is, I think we appreciate games more when we don't have expectations of them.

 

[Supermanisdead]

It's not the Zelda cycle. SS is just full of padding and it's not fun. Idk why Nintendo loves to throw fetch quests and backtracking into an already long game.

 

[Hot Coldman]

The overworld was fucking terrrrrrible and that was a damn shame. It should have been Wind Waker But The Sky Instead but it really, really wasn't.

Everything else I really enjoyed, even a lot of stuff people call filler. Don't think I could stand to play it again whilst it's SD-exclusive, though.

 

[Midda]

I got Skyward Sword as soon as it came out, played it all the way through pretty much non-stop, and came away really pleased with the experience. Then, I went on the internet to see what other people were saying and was surprised by the amount of hate it was getting.

Sure, Fi was way too intrusive. And yeah, the motion controls weren't perfect, but they responded the way I expected the vast majority of the time, and I loved having to break through the defenses of enemies by changing the angle of my attack. And I think it has my favourite art style of any Zelda game to date.

 

[PhazonBlazer]

Bomb
Rolling

 

[LeleSocho]

Nah. Same as with TP, this is way overblown. Even if one thinks TP's opening is too long and boring, SS is much much quicker and engaging.

I said same problem but not in the same quantity, the comment was to make people notice that even in the sequel they didn't manage to completely correct the flaw.

 

[DXB-KNIGHT]

For me it's empty overworld and repetitive quests filled like rechewing old gum.

 

[ubiblu]

I genuinely believe Skyward Sword to be superior to Wind Waker and Twilight Princess, but it isn't without it's own flaws. The Imprisoned is super fucking annoying, and having to fight it three times is pretty poor design. I also think the pacing could do with a touch up in a remaster, if only to cut down on some of the collecting (great fun at first, but tiresome after too much of it).

Very much looking forward to a Switch remaster, if one is on the cards.

 

[Xun]

Great game.

I don't understand many of the complaints, especially about pacing.

Artistically it's a little uninspired though.

 

[Poyunch]

It felt like a Zelda game with a Mario 64 progression. The world felt more like "levels" and in between all of that you had fillers on the level of Naruto: uninteresting and repetitive in theme and gameplay.

edit: I freaking hate the "Zelda Cycle" scapegoat. If anything that shows that you shouldn't listen to fans and should rather design a game that can stand on its own. I can guarantee I'll never enjoy Skyward Sword. It's the only game in the series I have yet to replay and I have no urge to ever go back to.

 

[Disxo]

Victim of the zelda cycle.

 

[RedZaraki]

"This is a Blue Rupee! It's worth FIVE Rupees! Awesome!"

 

[LeleSocho]

Great game.

I don't understand many of the complaints, especially about pacing.

Artistically it's a little uninspired though.

Bizarro post

 

[gafneo]

The only thing wrong is that people complain about it. All the nagging is because they can't adjust to change. They play too much dual stick games.

 

[Intel_89]

You fight the impriosoned too many times, it holds your hand way too much and the overworld sucks. I like the story focus, combat and controls as well as the art style and dungeon design.

 

[120v]

there's a great game somewhere in there. or, it's like 25% of a great game, the other 75% the maligned "padding" with reused assets.

now, this isn't new to zelda... even going back to LttP you're returning to environments, tackling puzzles and enemies in a slightly different way. difference there though is those variations were interesting, fun, and complemented the earlier game in some way. with SS you're usually just finding more shit strung along the same map. it doesn't respect your time

it has strokes of genius, particularly the laranyu section. the story is probably the most compelling in the series in spite of its horrible pacing. it was a fun ride for a bit but after awhile... dear god, you just want it to end already

 

[Shiggy]

It was just extremely boring. I don't know, for me it was a chore to play through the game due to the backtracking, boring levels, stupid story, and also the bad controls (I played it during Christmas, so there was Christmas lighting in the living room).