PixlBit

Thoughts reposted from another forum

So I fired up Project 64 and the game to do some "research." I played the game about 14 years ago, when I didn't look at games the same way I do now, because the Decline* hadn't hit its stride yet. I never finished it. When I boot it up, it's set to a higher resolution by default. Edges are clean even without AA. Otherwise I'm playing the game as is, no texture packs.

It's the last and perhaps most visionary game Nintendo has ever made. It carries through on all levels, from structure, to mechanics, theme, plot, visuals. The best Mario games are visionary in terms of mechanics and level design, but not beyond that. Super Metroid is a fuller package than Mario, but not as original or plain bugnuts as MM. And this is just based on the events leading up to removing the Deku mask. Darkness or edginess do not impress me in themselves, but they can provide visual and thematic texture and give the pure-hearted protagonist (and thus the player) a real force of evil to contend with. Afa Nintendo is concerned, it reached its peak in MM, and then almost vanished. Remember, when you fought Bowser in the original SMB, it was amidst a lake of fire and darkness (or as close as the NES could get to depicting those things back then). By SMW, you're fighting him while he flies around in a fucking clown car. They tried to bring back a dark texture to Twilight Princess, but by then it was too late, and the results felt forced to many.

I don't have to explain the time structure to anyone familiar with the game. It's a brilliant shake-up of the series and action-adventure games in general. Only in the pre-Decline era could this happen.

Another thing I noticed is that the story-telling is surprisingly good. It's still fantasy gobbledygook like most video games, but they really knew how to present it in this game. The cutscenes, dialogue, and plot work together very well, which is to say that unlike in most games, they don't utterly embarass the medium and aren't obviously stolen bits from movies, Joss Whedon, and games that sold well the year before. As with Okami, which is being discussed in another thread, this is a game that will pull me through based on an enjoyable plot and characters, one of a handful of games I can say that about. LoZ was never this good in the storytelling category again, or before. Twilight Princess was an undisciplined mess of a plot, and I couldn't tell you anything of import that happened in Wind Waker, despite putting that game through its paces. In MM, Skull Kid is established early on as an opposing force. This is effective, proven institution of a villain. The hero/player is provided a major goal to work towards (along a trail of sub-goals) as well as the force that stands in the way of your success. Skull-Kid and the impending doom that rides along with him are always looming out of scene and in the subconscious, like Darth Vader and the Death Star. At least in the first half of the story; I know Ganondorf makes an appearance, but since I never finished, I don't know how he comes into play? Does he usurp Skull-Kid's role as the main villain. I'm eager to find out. In game preferably, but I know some jackass will spoil it for me.

In a way, console game design has fallen very far. There is just good design in MM, and when I say design, I mean how design is supposed to work: the parts woven together purposely and carefully to form the whole. There are technical flaws, but it is not a kit-bashed game of disparate parts. Everything is deliberate. I look at quests in games and think "none of this adds up to anything in the long run. It's padding for better review scores and to impress simplistic audiences who equate quantity with quality" The mini-games are so often diversions from the main structure. In MM, an immediate goal (getting into the observatory) leads you to doing some light detective work (finding out how you can gain access), which leads to a mini-game (hide and seek) which leads to you getting access to the immediate goal, which leads to the next part of your main goal. And you're learning mechanics during all of this. The standard quest-beacon quest design prevalent in so many games today is mostly lazy. Rockstar's Bully is one of the better games in this regard, as the sidequests do a better job of feeding into the main story, but they still feel disconnected. Btw, I think it's the smaller games like Bully, The Warriors, and Manhunt that really speak to R's design chops.

So yeah, that's the first 15-20 minutes of the game, without exploring much of the town or talking to NPCs.

*"Decline" is a little inside thing at the forum I posted this in.