The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D

The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, is truly a special game. It is one of those rare treats in an artistic medium for which the universal praise and superlatives are entirely true no matter what angle you look at it from. Very few would argue against Ocarina of Time's greatness, or its lasting impact on the industry as a whole, and the fact remains that even after all these years since its release, it still reigns supreme as the world record holder for highest rated game in history. To attempt to remake such a classic masterpiece is a very daunting task indeed, but developer Grezzo, under Nintendo's watchful eye, did just that. The question is, is the remake worthy of the original's name? In short, yes, yes it is. This, to me, is the shining example of what remakes should be, but allow me to go into greater detail to explain why I think this.Full Disclosure: The Legend of Zelda series is my favorite franchise in video games (a hobby I consider my favorite pastime). It is no stretch to say that Ocarina could very well be the greatest video game ever made thus far in the relatively young entertainment medium. The incredibly epic story of good versus evil, the compelling characters, the masterful gameplay, the beautiful art design, the iconic music, the sheer variety and amount of excellent content, the majesty and mystery of exploring the massive (at the time of its release, anyway) world of Hyrule, Ocarina had it all, and honestly, it still does. You could play this today in its original format and despite its age, you'd still get a masterpiece (as evident by its popularity on the Wii Virtual Console). I make no apologies for my belief in these statements, and I stand by them. Obviously, when considering how to rate a remake, you first have to consider the backbone of the package by analyzing the original works being remade. Ocarina 3D has one of the best games ever to work with, so no problems here. Second, you have to consider what work went into the game to qualify it as a "remake" AND if it benefits the original work enough to warrant a remake treatment. How does Ocarina of Time 3D fare in that regard?Back in 1998, Ocarina of Time was groundbreaking in many ways as a 3D adventure game, but one of the most striking examples of this were in its visuals. If you play the original today, you'll obviously notice Ocarina has aged pretty horribly, despite the timeless art design, gameplay, music, story, etc. Graphically, Ocarina needed a facelift, and this 3DS remake does just that masterfully. From character models/animations to structures to textures, literally everything was remade from the ground up visually. Grezzo's goal in remaking the visuals was to finally channel the exact art design that was originally conceived, seen through the original official concept/promotional art for the game. That been said, rather than being the detailed, adult graphic novel style of Twilight Princess, OoT3D is more like a vibrant, colorful stylized comic book/anime. Is that bad? By no means! It's more a matter of taste. Personally, I think this game is absolutely gorgeous! The 3DS is essentially a portable Gamecube in terms of graphical capabilities, so imagine that kind of power channeling the original epic concept and promotional art for Ocarina and you have a pretty good idea what you're looking at here. If you don't think the difference between the original and this is much, I dare you to say so after looking at videos and screenshots of them side-by-side. Yes, in terms of visuals, Grezzo nailed it with this remake! To play Ocarina with the visuals it was always intended to have before but couldn't because of hardware limitations is reason enough alone to warrant a purchase, but that's not all Ocarina 3D has going for it visually.Another visual treatment that this remake got was one that only the 3DS could offer: 3-D (duh). In all honesty, this is one of the better examples of stereoscopic 3-D on the 3DS. I actually found myself playing the game with the 3-D slider all the way up most of the time, and viewed it as an essential aspect to the experience, something I did not expect going into it. That 3-D effect really lent this feeling of organic life to the game, and helped Hyrule truly feel like a living, breathing world. As gimmicky as that all may sound, it's very true in this game's case. Nintendo did a great job making this a showpiece for the 3DS' three-dimensional capabilities. The only problem I ever encountered in this area was image ghosting in places where there was very high contrast, but that's more of a criticism of the 3DS' screen system and not this game.Koji Kondo's work as the main composer in Ocarina of Time is unrivaled in terms of iconic, brilliant music in a game. To this day, Ocarina's music is required listening for any fan of Nintendo, Zelda, video games, you name it. That been said, they did not rock the boat when handling the soundtrack for this game. The music was remastered, but plays pretty much unaltered in any way from the original (per Kondo's request). It's fun to take in the sound/music design in this game, as the original was pretty groundbreaking in this way. For example, the Hyrule field theme would change in pace and instrumentation depending on circumstances, which is something we take for granted today, but back then it was amazing. It is still impressive today. Grezzo's treatment of the audio was extremely respectful, upgrading and refining without altering, and as a massive fan of Zelda, that is exactly what I wanted.The controls are as intuitive and satisfying as ever, and in some areas may actually be better than the good ol' N64 "pitchfork" set-up, which always worked so well. The lower touchscreen on the 3DS is utilized to great effect, making looking at the map, changing equipment and gear, changing the view to first-person, talking to Navi, using two of four item slots, and playing the Ocarina, all smoother and more accessible. Otherwise, the action buttons are masterfully mapped on the 3DS' button layout, no complaints there. I DID find my hand cramping after extended play due to the button placement for z-targeting and shield usage, but that's more criticism of the slick, compact 3DS itself. This 3DS hand grip helped *immensely* in that way (and if you have a 3DS XL, then I highly recommend this grip). You also have the option to use the 3DS' gyroscopic capabilities to aim things like your bow that feels really good to use, but that often means losing the 3-D effect, so there is a trade-off there.To summarize, this remake is, in my opinion, the best version of one of the best video games ever made. It makes substantial upgrades to the original in its visuals, 3-D implementation, audio remastering, controls, as well as the inclusion of the Master Quest (a game that plays the same as the original, except that it is mirrored and the temples/dungeons are very different and much harder, as a challenge to Ocarina veterans). The fact that this new portable version of one of the most revered games ever channels the spirit of the original so perfectly while still feeling brand new again is pretty amazing. In my opinion, that is everything a remake should be, and is exponentially better than the hideously lazy cash grab opportunities that comprise most remake/rerelease/port efforts, but in all honesty, this isn't really a "remake." No, it's more of a respectful refinement. You can tell that the developers were constantly cognizant of the massive shoes of the original, and so refined all that had aged and respectfully left untouched all that makes this game so timeless, and timeless it most certainly is. It is just as good now as it was all those years ago, and is a game that would be worth buying the 3DS for alone. Yes, Ocarina of Time is indeed one of the greatest games ever made, but here's what you maybe didn't expect: Ocarina of Time 3D actually refines and revitalizes this timeless masterpiece. Buy it, save the beautiful kingdom of Hyrule once again, and become the destined Hero of Time.

The most incredible game ever forged by the hand of man or the gods that is Ocarina Of Time just became better.When done right Zelda is not simply a videogame but akin to having a religious experience.Well like its predecessor Link To The Past before it all it seems that Ocarina ever does is the right things to move the Zelda series forward.If only Eiji Aonuma had never been born, then Zelda's progress would not of taken 200 steps back from this epic acheivement in gaming and human history that was and is The Legend Of Zelda: Ocarina Of Time.As a hero character Link has so much untapped potential and marketability it is ridiculous and yet as a character he is horrifically and pathetically mismanaged by Aonuma and underutilized by Nintendo.Link and the Zelda series deserves far better than this clown Eiji Aonuma and I hope to either a loving god/s or even an uncaring universe that one day justice is served and Eiji Aonuma FINALLY is removed from the Zelda series development along with the entire Zelda team which he assembled after OOT which he selected who share the same sick ideas he has about what the series is supposed to be.Well moving on to the rest of my review...Ocarina Of Time has become better with this edition to re-iterate a previous point.And NO its betterment is not owed to Nintendo's atrociously horrible 3D idea but rather because of the beautiful graphical reworking the company has done to an already good looking game that really held up in appearance quite respectably since it's original 1998 release on the Nintendo 64 home game console.Also owing to its superiority when compared to it's previous incarnations is how much more functional and fluid the game has become due to the accompaniment of the 3DS's dual screen feature which allows you to access items such as the iron boots much quicker than could be done in the past on the home console versions of the game.In anycase though this greatest game of all time is often criticized by fools and traitors ie Aonuma Zelda fans and related Nintendo damage controllists for having a mostly empty Hyrule field, yet the fact of the matter is the Hyrule field in this game is the greatest ever created since the series conception only rivalled by The Legend Of Zelda: A Link To The Past's version of Hyrule.A testament to the ridiculously pleasing design of the field is that despite all of these long years passing as videogames became increasingly sophisticated, powerful with awe inspiring graphics Zelda OOT's Hyrule field is still preferred over the newer "Aonuma Zelda" Hyrule field in Twilight Princess and thats despite the Aonuma Zelda title's field being filled with far more action and things to do in general.This speaks to the superiority of Shigeru Miyamoto and others as Zelda directors and the utter inferiority of Eiji Aonuma in that same position over Zelda.In anycase to touch on the dual screen functionality again I will say it really is quite incredible, it makes having to remember your Ocarina songs to trigger certain game actions such as warping to a new location or summoning your horse Epona into a thing of the past.Bottom line is this is a 5 star game.Reason being?Amazon's system won't allow me to rate it any higher.Buy this game!Especially so if you've grown up never having experienced it before.You'll soon see how inferior Eiji Aonuma's so called "Zelda" games are in comparison.The man is a hack that MUST be fired from Nintendo, he and his Zelda team for the series to ever produce a game at or beyond Ocarina Of Time's level ever again.