You know what grinds my gears?

Zelda. Nintendo has started to edge to the point where they are trying to appeal to younger and younger audiences. Which means they will stop placing hidden meanings and themes like in MM/OOT/LA/WW.

Damn the children and protective parents who are afraid of violence/sex.


That's what grinds my gears

And its funny because mature things are becoming ever more accessible and acceptable for younger audiences.

And what was the hidden theme in The Wind Waker?

Have you read Hylian Dan's article? The 'Missing Link'?
http://www.zeldauniverse.net/article...tal-childhood/

It ties WW in with LA/OOT/MM together with a prominent theme.

Hmm, I have. I guess i'm a little rusty.

You know what grinds my gears? People who think a game needs sex and violence to be good.

Originally Posted by Triforce of the Gods

You know what grinds my gears? People who think a game needs sex and violence to be good.

this is true, but I think however he meant that he wants deeper storylines and themes, I know what he means since I know what he is talking about, I felt that TP was too watered down for the kiddies as well as PH.

I dunno... when has Zelda ever had any more violence than what it has now?

If it has been more violent-
1. I haven't noticed it.
2. Violence dosn't make a game. Nor does mature themes.

Hylian Dan's Immortal Childhood article was essentially about growing up and leaving the world where there were no worries, if I remember. Not necessarily anything dark. I agree though, Zelda doesn't need to become kiddy.

it should appear kiddie from afar, so when kids play it, then grow up, they fully get what was implied there. hidden themes would be a good middle ground here. zelda has so far failed to get there.

I agree that Zelda shouldn't try to appeal to the kids and casual gamers out there. The Wii already gives them all a crap ton of casual games, (even though most of them are terrible) but Nintendo doesn't need to take our hardcore games like Zelda, Mario, and Metroid and give them to the casuals.

P.S. - I don't think this should be in N64 Zelda...

yeah really. either general or future, this wasn't an issue in the 64 games.

Originally Posted by Linked-

Zelda. Nintendo has started to edge to the point where they are trying to appeal to younger and younger audiences. Which means they will stop placing hidden meanings and themes like in MM/OOT/LA/WW.
Damn the children and protective parents who are afraid of violence/sex.
That's what grinds my gears

I really liked Hylian Dan's article(s) too, but it's important you don't base your whole opinion on his.

While he goes into depth about the theme of childhood throughout the series, Dan leaves out Twilight Princess from his analysis, which could be for a number of reasons. It could be because Twilight Princess strays thematically from the OoT/MM/WW idea of growing up and letting go of the past. It might also be because, in various posts on this forum, Hylian Dan has said he doesn't personally like the game. But I'm not him, so I wouldn't know.

Twilight Princess has a message if you are willing to analyse the story deeper than face value. Just because Hylian Dan hasn't pointed it out doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

Originally Posted by electricut

it should appear kiddie from afar, so when kids play it, then grow up, they fully get what was implied there. hidden themes would be a good middle ground here. zelda has so far failed to get there.

Zelda has been there with MM and then again with WW but TP failed to do that.

TP had a lot of dark elements in it and had some sinister characters. To say Nintendo's been pushing LoZ games to target a younger audience would be false. Most of their LoZ games have been made to attract a spectrum of customers young and old. The hand-held LoZ games do seem to be more chilish, even though I haven't played them, and I could just be biased about that. Regardless of that, those may still be great games. Future LoZ games might follow in suit of their past target market: young and old players.

Originally Posted by Linked-

Zelda. Nintendo has started to edge to the point where they are trying to appeal to younger and younger audiences. Which means they will stop placing hidden meanings and themes like in MM/OOT/LA/WW.

Damn the children and protective parents who are afraid of violence/sex.


That's what grinds my gears

I hate how it's the violence and sex that sells, and not the storyline, characters, and everything else that actually makes a video game.

Granted, violence is a big role in a lot of video games. And Zelda has violence. Just not enough to satisfy some people, apparently.

As for the sex, it's everywhere. There's too much of it and its references in the media today, in my opinion.

My question to you now is: Why do Zelda games need to have more of this stuff to make the games better?

I can see where he's coming from; many games stray away from sex and violence because they want to avoid being offensive. It's a bit insulting, and it degrades the medium in a number of ways; firstly for assuming it is solely for the enjoyment of children, and secondly for assuming that video games themselves are inherently offensive. They should therefore avoid being any more offensive than they already are.

That's not to say every game needs horrible violence or racy intercourse to be relevant, only that it shouldn't shy away from it.

Originally Posted by LinkdOOd110

I hate how it's the violence and sex that sells, and not the storyline, characters, and everything else that actually makes a video game.

Granted, violence is a big role in a lot of video games. And Zelda has violence. Just not enough to satisfy some people, apparently.

As for the sex, it's everywhere. There's too much of it and its references in the media today, in my opinion.

My question to you now is: Why do Zelda games need to have more of this stuff to make the games better?

I don't believe LoZ games need more violence, gore, or sexual innuendos. They are known for not having to resort to such superficial facets to make a great game. The series has made itself phenomenal by being phenomenal without having to do the aforementioned things. Instead, they create them with a compelling story, fun gameplay, and innovative concepts to use and refine in their games. Any other game can have sex, explicit violence, gore, alcohol, or any other things that make it look like a mature title, when it really isn't, it just has that appearance and not much else. For example, Halo, it's a great series and madly addicting and I know this since I have it on Xbox Live. It's story doesn't compare to LoZ games, and this may very well be an utterly arbitrary claim, but LoZ has exceeding concept qualities, not superficial ones like graphics, online multi-player, etc. MM is one of the rare games that deserved to have an 'M' rating to me because it had countless mature parts to it, e.g. you have three days to save the world; how the lives of the inhabitants of that world change dramatically and you have to intervene to get situations straightened out; the forgiveness notion plays a big role here; many innuendos that have certain Biblical allusions (Stone Tower Temple); and lastly, deaths of major characters that you meet play an important role in your quest to save that world.

I know MM has an 'E' rating because it's rated by the ESRB, but they rate it by what's most easily noticable, not by such subtlties as I have just mentioned. I'm just getting my point across about why the LoZ series doesn't need to have gore, sex, explicit violence, etc., to be a great game. The series gets better on its own by evolving from its past mistakes and growing from its self, not by doing what every other game's doing.

Wait. Wasn't WW deeper than TP? And wasn't it specifically aimed for the younger audience (it's artstyle)?

Your argument is invalid, OP.

First of all, I respect everyone's post

Second of all, I never stated that Zelda games needed more violence/gore/sexuality. I said that Nintendo should stop trying to change the original message to suit the game for children(i.e OoT Ganondorf puking out green liquid instead of crimson blood.)

Originally Posted by Majrin Twil

I know MM has an 'E' rating because it's rated by the ESRB, but they rate it by what's most easily noticable, not by such subtlties as I have just mentioned. I'm just getting my point across about why the LoZ series doesn't need to have gore, sex, explicit violence, etc., to be a great game. The series gets better on its own by evolving from its past mistakes and growing from its self, not by doing what every other game's doing.

It doesn't need to be sexual/violent to be a great game, I agree. However, in the mad quest to avoid such content, Nintendo will deviate from their path and go with something more acceptable. This is all theoretical because I don't know what goes on inside Nintendo, but I think we can all agree that the newer games are certainly not up to the normal standards.

Originally Posted by Double A

Wait. Wasn't WW deeper than TP? And wasn't it specifically aimed for the younger audience (it's artstyle)?

Your argument is invalid, OP.

It's not always about the artstyle, it's about the overall theme and underlying meaning