The Controversial History of Zelda Wind Waker | Gaming History
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- čas přidán 18. 05. 2024
- The Wind Waker is one of the most beloved Zelda games for its unique artstyle and gameplay. However it once suffered a major controversy that shook the series to its core. Today we look at this piece of Gaming History
*Note that this is a remaster of the original video. Audio was subpar for that, so it was rerecorded, as well as had a better mix with the audio overall and some video fixes too.
#Zelda #Nintendo #WindWaker
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Sources:
www.ign.com/articles/2000/08/...
www.videogameschronicle.com/n....
www.ign.com/articles/2013/10/...
iwataasks.nintendo.com/interv...
games.supertrainstationh.com/S...
www.ignboards.com/threads/off...
kotaku.com/the-internets-2001...
web.archive.org/web/200901060...
www.ign.com/articles/2011/05/...
www.gamespot.com/articles/gdc...
torchinsky.me/cel-shading/
web.archive.org/web/200804272...
www.gamespot.com/reviews/the-...
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Credit:
Cel-Shading Example
Cherylynn Lima
• Toon Shading in Cycles...
Cel-Shading Example using Wind Waker
Jasper
• How The Wind Waker Red...
Wind Waker Demo at E3 2002
• E3 2002 - Nintendo - W...
Cel-shaded Games
Gameranx
• Top 10 Cel Shaded Game... - Hry
During my playthrough of Tears of the Kingdom, I was pleasantly surprised by how many ideas from The Wind Waker had been carried over. Whether it was having companions that helped you solve puzzles in dungeons, or finding treasure maps that led to hidden chests in The Depths, the game takes a lot of inspiration from The Wind Waker.
I think it also references the Dragon Roost Island theme in Rito Village
i was very happy to know i can make a boat (or just get the little dingy ship) and sail around in the southern ocean and finding that pirate island.
just wish they expanded the ocean more and put more islands out there to explore and it would have been a 10/10 for me (its a 9/10 just because of the lost opportunity for me).
granted my fav zelda game is Totk then windwaker still.
One positive about this art style is the amount of expressive freedom it allowed Link and other characters compared to the N64 models. Wind Waker's a great game, but Twilight Princess is still my favourite Zelda, so I'm thankful Nintendo responded to the criticism to the way they did.
I remember this controversy when I was little. Admittedly, I was one of the people that were disappointed. But my dad bought the game and I instantly fell in love with it. He liked the look since the reveal because he thought it was so cool that games could now look like that. Now, it's one of my favourite Zelda games, and the art style is groundbreaking for the time.
It still holds up really well today!
I also hated it initially. People forget that back in 2000s, n64 was the closest to real life graphics we had. Hence everyone wanted the next gen to really look like real life.
I first played the game as a kid so I was oblivious to the controversy and as an adult I don’t care. My friend’s the same and this is his FAVE Zelda game
I didnt know about the controversy either and I did love windwaker. I still dont like the look of cell shading though, even today. It wontt stop me from playing a game because gameplay > literally everything else, but idk, I just dont think it looks good.
I loved wind waker but wish they had used the artstyle that was used for zelda 1 and zelda 2's manuals.
To be clear, also as someone present for the Spaceworld demo and the Wind Waker teaser trailer later, the issue wasn’t cel-shading, but the character design/artstyle.
Wind Waker didn’t endear modern audiences to cel-shading. The cel-shading was never the issue. And notice how the other cel-shaded games you cited have far more realistic character design.
The issue was that Link (and every character in the teaser trailer) were drawn with the proportions of seemingly orangutang-like dwarfs. It looked _silly._
Of course, nowadays, the game is rightfully deeply beloved, and its character design and artstyle has held up remarkably well, specifically because it _didn’t_ adhere to trying to be as realistic as possible. Any “realistic” artstyle would look very quickly dated and obsolete with the graphical limitations of the console of the time, compared to future console generations and improvements in graphics.
Love your videos. Especially on Zelda.
I remember the exact same thing. The other issue was that we already HAD an established style for a more cartoony link, from the Oracle games just 1 year prior. To switch art style like this was jarring. Now, in hindsight, we have 6 other Zelda games in this style (2 DS games, 3 multiplayer games, and Minish Cap), plus Smash Bros appearances, so it feels like just an alternate art style for Zelda. It has grown on me, though I still don't love it. But on the Gamecube, when we FINALLY had the technical prowess to see hyrule as it had always looked in our heads, the bug-eyed Link felt like a slap in the face.
Yeah, Skyward Sword and BOTW/TOTK use cel-shading (even TP for some parts) and people like the way those games look. While I think Wind Waker looks great, the controversy was definitely more rooted in the character proportions, and Nintendo has kinda slowed down on “Toon Link” games, so I think they know this.
Thanks. That was the comment I needed. 😀
Is funny that Wind Waker and Sonic Unleash caused a massive backlash years ago and now those games are considered to be one of the best games of their franchise
I get what you’re saying, but attempting to liken Sonic to Zelda just feels so insulting to the latter.
The first part is accurate when considering the initial shock and fan reactions. But thinking about where Unleashed sits in the Sonic franchise and where Windwaker sits in Zelda’s franchise, it’s laughable at best imo.
@@CaptainClark23 I’m not comparing the games I’m talking about controversy had back in the day
wait sonic unleash had a redemption arc?
@@real-horse it looks like is getting a remaster since it got removed from the Japanese PlayStation store
@@CaptainClark23somebody's pride is fragile and tied to video game series.
It's now been a longer amount of time since Wind Waker HD then it was from the original release to Wind Waker HD.
Don’t say that
First time playing the Wind Waker HD right now - has to be one of the best Zelda games I've ever played. The graphics held up big time.
I think I’m the only one that preferred the original WW shading style. WWHD looks like all the characters are smooth, plastic models, instead of paper.
You have to also remember that Skyward Sword used cel shaded graphics and fans did not like it saying it should of used realistic graphics like Twilight Princess had. Nintendo took notes of what fans wanted and the Wii U tech demo showed what a realistic Zelda could look like in HD and even Eiji Aonuma thought to make the next Zelda game Breath of the Wild have realistic graphics to please fans, but ended up making it cel shaded as he said that having realistic graphics made the environments blend with each other and everything looked muddy and having cel shaded graphics made the environment pop out more. After Breath of the Wild released the fans loved the cel shaded graphics and even say the next Zelda game (not counting Tears of the Kingdom) should use cel shaded graphics.
why are these people so obssesed with realistic graphic's i mean most of the zelda games don't even have realistic graphic's
@@jskywalker58 Many of them did until Aonuma took over as director following Ocarina of Time. See Katsuya Terada's official early Zelda art. Miyamoto always wanted realism.
Honestly it always seemed like the issue was not Wind Waker’s art style versus Ocarina/Earlier Titles, but rather if Wind Waker’s artstyle was gonna be the future of the series. GameCube’s titles featured many redesigns for Nintendo characters, and some have stuck around longer than the original designs of characters and became their permanent design (Mario / Metroid / Star Fox) - honestly take a character like Beedle who was first introduced in WW, he stands out in BoTW and ToTK which is good because he’s a shopkeep but bad when you actually compare him to anybody else in the world, he looks like a Muppet.
If Wind Waker was the future of the series, I think the series would’ve faltered even with good games. Toon Link is hella charming but as the face of the series, it’s a good thing Nintendo changes Link’s design every time a Joycon breaks in their offices.
The sad part is though that wind waker did become the default zelda style, since it's the most used art style of any zelda game with 7 games using it, meanwhile other styles like twilight princess and skyward sword only have 1 single game that use it, and most other styles only have 2 games at most before being abandoned forever. Wind wakers art style should just be shelved until other art styles have a chance to actually have their own spotlight.
i love your videos and i love that you've been posting more often recently 😊 keep it up TOG!
Windwaker's biggest flaw way that it's so short, imo.
And too easy.
Love your zelda videos !
Wind Waker is my favorite Zelda game but even I can kind of agree that that initial trailer is pretty bad. It does make the tone look childish and slapstick.
It was a terrible reveal. Luckily it wasn't as childish in the end.
You can't tell me that it's NOT slapstick. It absolutely is and that just adds to its timeless charm.
@@TheKabuto90 There is slapstick-esque visual humor which I do absolutely love but the initial trailer makes it look like that's ALL there is, purely a kids' game, and Wind Waker has just as good and emotionally mature a story as any Zelda game.
I remember playing wind waker as a kid and I had no problem with the art style, but I remember how the game was really fun for the first two dungeons, but after that it feels like it just caves in on itself. The third dungeon didn't appear, it has you do all these fetch quests before you can go on the third and then once you do you get the master sword and that's cool, but then you also have to do some more fetch quest type stuff just to power up the master sword, and that is usually where the wind waker fatigue starts to come around for people. The game wants you to explore around a lot, but at the same time it's heavily restricted since a lot of islands will disappoint you either because they're reused or because they require an item you don't have yet, there are also some islands that are needlessly tied to story progression as well which didn't actually need to be. Then by the triforce hunt portion even the most diehard wind waker fan is usually like "oh right THIS part of the game" and that's when it becomes a pure chore.
I think wind waker would've been better if they had more unique islands, have them be actual islands with characters and stories instead of copy/pasted shrine type areas, remove any fetch quests needed to get to the next dungeons and make those part of actual quests instead, remove the triforce shard hunt completely and allow players to tackle the master sword powering up dungeons in either order they choose, making the next one easier by incorporating optional shortcuts the player can use if they use an item they acquired from the other dungeon first to easily spice up replay value.
I don't mind zelda games being more comical and less gritty, as long as it knew when to take itself seriously. Like majoras mask had a scene in ikana castle where two ghost skeleton heads were arguing in this silly way, but the commander of the two was like "silence, this bickering is what led to our destruction, we're dead and we still let it destroy us" and he brought it back into this serious moment very nicely, it not only had a moment to break the tension, but also gave a nice example of the state of those people.
My only issue with wind waker is the triforce quest and needing a few more temples but i absolutely loved it
Indeed. The difficulty for me too (which the HD version fixed imo) but of course the short development time would do it here.
Am i the only one who geuinely like the triforce hunt its actually my favorite part of the game though that might be because exploring the overworld is my favorite thing to do in the game
@jskywalker58 I liked the triforce hunt, I didn't like raising money for the maps lol. It makes sense in a sailing game. But tingle was taxing
Not even a Zelda fan, but best channel is best channel and deserves support.
Almost forgot this Goated channel
I played the demo at Circuit City and put in my pre-order .. What a fantastic game
Many fans still want to see a Zelda game with a realistic art style. Not sure if Nintendo will ever make one though, but it would be cool to see
Actually Eiji Aonuma thought to make the Zelda: Breath of the Wild have realistic graphics to please fans, but ended up making it cel shaded as he said that having realistic graphics made the environments blend with each other and everything looked muddy and having cel shaded graphics made the environment pop out more.
Twilight Princess. It is Gamecube-realism, so beyond underdeveloped, but it is the most we are going to get. It is just a stylistic one trick-pony for the series, the direction cannot hold multiple games, so it never did. Even the amazing Zelda U techdemo that sadly never became the style of a full game was not really more realistic than Hyrule Warriors ended up being.
@@MERCHIODOS Do you have a source? I would like to see it, it sounds like an interesting read
It's not really that Eiji wanted a realistic Breath of the Wild, but rather they tested it with various artstyles to see what was the best fit. I do explain and showcase this actually in my Breath of the Wild Pt 1 video is interested to learn more
i much rather then try to go for a more experimental artstyle with the next game
if Twilight Princess had come out first and then Wind Waker later, the GameCube might've performed a little better, also the Wind Waker art style would've fitted better on the Wii's ecosystem.
Stupidest comment ever.
Funny how back then, Hey Arnold was considered ugly and badly animated, whereas nowadays it's looked back on fondly.
I definitely had a much more open mind when I was a kid and played WW. I remember seeing stills of the Spaceworld Zelda demo in a Mexican magazine called Club Nintendo. Now, I don’t know if they (the magazine) actually specified that it was JUST a demo, but the thought of “THIS is what the next Zelda is going to look like” didn’t really form in my mind. When WW came out, to me it was just more Zelda… which I gladly welcomed. Yeah, the art style did throw me off at first, like I imagine it must have for damn near everyone, but I didn’t dislike it.
Game came to be my favorite Zelda game. I remember hearing about how people had complaints in reviews, saying that the sailing was too annoying but to be honest, it was one of my favorite parts. I feel like the game’s world was really well and truly realized. Whenever I set sail from one island to another, it truly felt like there was a good sense of distance. Oh, it certainly was a bit monotonous at times but by and large, I truly did enjoy it… Here’s hoping it makes it to the Switch or its successor.
Here are Top 5 reasons why Zelda - Wind Waker would make more sense as a Wii launch title:
• Nintendo fans (as well as Miyamoto) were actually not yet ready nor motivated for a Toon Link to appear on the GameCube.
• Zelda as seen in a Spaceworld 2000 demo needed to be the next sequel for GameCube.
• By the time the Wii comes out, Zelda - Wind Waker would actually have all the given time to be 100% complete with the scrapped dungeons and all being in the game.
• The Wii is powerful enough to graphically implement transparent bodies of water for Link to swim and dive in.
• The Wii is more fitting because the Wii remote would be for players to motion Link's wind baton, and to steer the sailboat.
It's almost a crime that this isn't available on Switch.
GameCube and PS2 was meant to be the generational leap that made games look like the artwork and actual people. In the end we got a chibi link which was wasted potential. It's easy now to say "it's the art style" as we are spoiled by the graphics of today, but all the hype that could have made fond memories was never to be.
I usually never clicked on a new video so fast. I didn't think, I just clicked on the video as soon as I saw it.
I was disappointed by the art style when I was a kid. I was used to watching my brother play OoT and Majora's Mask, so I was really just there for what felt like a dark and mysterious fantasy story rather than a fun game. My brother loved Wind Waker and Twilight Princess, and my little sister played Skyward Sword, but I didn't play anything besides the 64 games until Breath of the Wild came out. Now I'm working my way through the backlog and the more I play the more I love it.
I remember renting it to try it out and loving the game and getting it although I do remember being extremely hyped for TP being realistic and then all the delays...
I like that teenagers of that era were gatekeeping the game from Kids. I was a teen during this but I didn't participate because I didn't own a GameCube
I love the graphics in Wind Waker SD, honestly I think SD looks far better than Wind Waker HD.
Yeah that's a fair take. I know both sides have fans of how it should look.
This was pretty much my journey with the game. When it was announced, I hated the art style because I was obsessed with Majora's Mask and OoT at the time. I preordered it because I was desperate for more Zelda gameplay, and HAD to have the pre-order disc bonus. My dad drove me an hour away, twice, to preorder and pick up the game from the nearest GameStop, and I'll never forget the excitement of the day I got it. When I first played the game, I was still skeptical about the game. Then I laughed out loud when Link was shot out of a canon to enter the Forbidden Fortress, and I fell in love with it. Now it's one of my favorite games of all time. It's probably the most complete 180 turn my opinion on anything has ever changed.
It would be cool to see what the original version for the game woulve been if they kept the realism, maybe someome should make a mod…..
I knew Link, Zelda and Ganondorf from Smash Bros Melee. Thought the were supercool.
Then i saw Wind Waker and i thought this does not look cool at all. I did not want it.
My mother in law did not know, that i did not want the game at all. So she bought it for me as a christmas gift.
I thanked her and accepted the gift.
Played it. And about half way through, when i sank down to hyrule for the first time, i already knew, that this is my favourite game of all time.
It is simply a masterpiece and i can't think of another game as awesome as Wind Waker.
Only BOTW got me near the feeling i had with Wind Waker as a child, althought i was an adult when i played BOTW.
Wind Waker was the first Zelda game I owned. I played A Link to the Past and Ocarina of Time in emulators before, but I purchased Wind Waker on an old Blockbuster around 2010 because Toon Link hit on me very hard in SSBB. I immediately fell in love with the game. Even if it wasn't as hard as ALttP or as iconic as OoT, it was so emotive, with fun battle mechanics, a nice, more personal story, and great designs I still love to this day. The humor was at its peak, and the 2nd half of the game hit me even more. Alongside BotW and ALttP, it has become my favorite Zelda Experience. I even bought Twilight Princess and fell in love with the fun it was to swipe my Wiimote to attack or turn into a wolf to do some sick combos and run around Hyrule, but I still have so much impact from WInd Waker and the DS games to this date.
I recently purchased BotW and TotK, and they felt like the perfect mix of that cool artstyle and mechanics alongside the classic designs and a new open world that remids to the very first game, so it's very cool to see Wind Waker being an important part of Zelda history even today. Hopefully they will do more similar things in the future and be more experimental. I'd love to see that Link with a guitar from the first drafts of BotW or something similar for the Switch 2 titles.
7:44 That wasn't just any narrator. That was THE movie trailer guy, Don Lafontaine (sp?).
I definitely remember this and at the time it made sense to all of us. "Celda" was negative term and people *really* wanted basically Twilight Princess. It's interesting how time changes what we prioritize with graphics in video games
What’s the name of that show at 2:17
I preordered Wind Waker, waited like crazy, and when it finally came out the game gave me migraines. It took me months to beat, because I could only play it for 20-30 minutes before I had to close my eyes and take a nap.
When I finally finished the game, the migraines stopped and went away. I went over a decade without any problems, and when I finally got Borderlands the same thing happened (10 minutes in the headache starts, and in less than a half hour I can’t keep my eyes open because it hurts so badly).
When BOTW launched I was so disappointed that it had cel shaded graphics, and I was prepared to have the migraines again, but they just never came 🤷♂️
so after the 1st year after tears of the kindom looking at the old demo clip for has an alter with 6 medalions and semi temple of time themed so i guess they reused this room design and alter later in both twilight princess and tears of the kindom since arbiters grounds has the 6 medalions alter and tears has the sacred temple for the 6 tears alter and ganons final battle room looks like that as well as shrine of resurrection shape
I knew this was going to be a classic and it is.
Fun fact: Cell shading is the easiest way to make a game not age, so thats why Wind Waker still looks good even now
Being realistic is technology dependent. Being cartoony is not.
It's also very low effort and usually done as a way to avoid hiding bad graphics. BOTW uses it a lot purely because the hardware couldn't handle anything else.
The controversy will never not make me roll my eyes, it's so stupid. Of course gamers loved the tech demo, because it looked like OoT, and gamers ALWAYS want more of what they already have. Of course they hate the cartoony look, because gamers hate being seen as children.
And did these people never play any Zelda games other than OoT? They always had a cartoony artstyle prior to this one. Heck, the sprites from A Link to the Past look insanely similar to Toon Link, with the big eyes. Never seen anyone complain about that.
I genuinely think that listening to the fans is often the worst thing you can do. They THINK they know what's best for a game, but usually never do.
Nah, only some fans think they know better. Majoras mask 3d is widely known to be an inferior version of majoras mask, and it's purely because eji thought he knew better than the fans and directly went against what the fans wanted, and to no ones surprise the fans prefer playing the original over the remaster.
I guess the controversy flew over my radar, because I played it expecting another Zelda. What I got was just "OK". The overworld felt like time wasting filler for a game that barely had any content. The graphics were good, though, no complaints there. And personally, I think Twilight Princess's graphic style still holds up.
Yeah if you were looking at reactions or even too many gaming sites, it was easy to miss the controversy then
I remember seeing those 14 seconds and was blown away next minute WTF
Always loved Wind Waker. Even as a kid when it first came out I thought it looked one of a kind. Still does in my opinion. It's a timeless art style. 👌
I don't understand the motive to hide of what's being made to the literal game director, I mean I get that he wanted to do something his way but that's not his say.
Because eji is a bit of a dingus, he's the sole reason why MM3D is as bad as it is and why TOTK feels so samey compared to BOTW even though they both had the same amount of dev time. Not even joking, every single choice made that made MM3D worse was eji's idea. People like to give miyamoto crap for his bad ideas but eji is the true goat of bad zelda choices.
It's ironic, they originally made WW art style because they wanted something fresh and nothing like other zelda games, but now it's one of the most overused styles, around 1/3rd of all zelda games use it now with 7 whole games using it out of 21 using it (11 out of 24 if you count the japanese only tingle games, in which case nearly half of all zelda games use the wind waker style), causing people to wish they'd reuse other art styles instead if they go that route.
I hope someday they reuse the MM or TP art style, even if it's just going to be used as a smaller title like spirit tracks, or at least give other art styles a chance to shine again, at least until they can catch up to wind wakers numbers..
5:23 So despite his appearance, they list this Link and Zelda as 12-14 in a bunch of design sheets and bios.
I truly wish we got that proper Wind Waker 2... I hope they return to that, whatever ideas they had were probably different than Phantom Hourglass, at least to some degree.
Phantom Hourglass is Wind Waker 2, even the intro recapped Wind Waker. If Eiji Aonuma were to make a game similar to Wind Waker then it'll likey take place after Phantom Hourglass and before Spirit Tracks
My biggest complaint with the game at release (being a child) was how they changed the controls from OoT/MM.
I remember getting so mad about this as a kid but you have understand I thought it would be a permanent change.
I must be old because i remeber when people were upset but the game is a 💎
I haven't finished this game yet but I know it has two sequels for NDS. What's people opinion on those games? I would love to know.
PS. Is Minish Cap a sequel of Wind Waker too?
Honestly, that tech demo would have been cool as a sequel to Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask.
I was around 9 years old when Wind Waker was announced and I thought it looked cool, though to be honest, back then I didn't have access to the Internet and since the GameCube wasn't very popular here in Argentina, none of my friends were aware about the game, I got all the information from some TV shows about games and magazines and all them were very positive about Wind Waker
In retrospective I think Aonuma's decision regarding Wind Waker's artstyle was very bold, he could easily just made it look like Ocarina of Time but with better graphics
I also think the backlash against WW was due to the average gamer perception at the time that all games should have a realistic artstyle and that, somehow, Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask were realistic-looking titles
I love Wind Waker, it's a beautiful game but man, Twilight Princess just goes so hard and Midna literally cannot be topped
See what i never understood about this controversy, is surely people should have known it was only a tech demo and not at all meant to be taken as an indicator for what the next Zelda game would actually look like.
I never had a Gamecube growing up and the first time i ever got to sit down and properly play a Zelda game for myself was 2015...granted it was Windwaker, so there's probably a bias in there too but the reason i chose Windwaker was cause my mate used to let me watch him play it and i thought it was a cute game...so my opinion here obviously carries less weight than someone who was there at the time, but surely the footage being labelled a tech demo, should have been enough of an indicator that this wasn't actually the next game currently in the works. From my understanding a tech demo and an actual demo to represent the games are two very different things.
I don't know maybe i'm chatting out my ass, but i just don't get why so many people hated it at the time. But at the same time i kind of do get it, and i suppose this controversy did eventually get us Twilight Princess which is my favourite game in the series. So i kind of hate there was a controversy but i also kind of love it because we got Twilight Princess 😅😅😅
Lol like a little Akko in a Zelda video
This is a good story! Windwaker is so widely loved these days a lot of people forget how negative the reaction was at first. As an edgy teenager at the time I was absolutely one of the haters. We all know better now though and it's far better than Twilight Princess tbh.
While i still love it i personally think twilight princess is the weakest 3d zelda game mainly because of the wolf gameplay which i find kinda boring sometimes.
I really liked the new Cell-Shading technology, but I kinda disliked Links new look overall, but I eventually bought the game on release, I had so much fun with the game I did multiple playthroughs I can't even count it. It was so well made, for me it was the best title Game Cube overall.
Not going to lie reception to very early demos getting people mad is crazy 😂
😲 - Woah...
Zelda Twilight Princess FTW!
I don’t blame for people hating wind waker when it was revealed just because the tech demo set false expectations but nowadays WW is amazing
Zelda will be a cartoon.
Metroid will be a first person game
Nintendo sent shockwaves during that time.
Because of Twilight Princess i ended up playing this game, my brother beat it but i never touched it because i was a hater lol 😂. Ended up loving this game so much
As a kid turning into a teenager ( I think I was 13 when this came out).
I hated these graphics.
As an adult I really enjoy them.
Everyone else at my school was playing halo and calling this a baby game.
No one I knew owned a GameCube as they thought it was a device for babies.
This game did not help that impression.
I appreciate the game now, but I do think at the time it hurt Nintendo pretty bad in the north American market.
And that's why Miyamoto made the Zelda Movie live action like it or not his vision for Zelda was always realism.
He and Takashi Tezuka drew from Lord of the Rings books when they made the series after all
Exactly...
is it tough? cause when you think about it twlight princess is pretty much the only zelda game to have a truley realistic artstyle, botw and totk were close to that but they had bits of cel shading in their artstyle
@@jskywalker58 Ocarina is supposed to be realistic but because of the hardware back in the day it doesn't look as realistic as they wanted it to.
@@jskywalker58 Miyamoto stopped directing Zelda after Ocarina of Time, ever since Aonuma took over. That's why the early games were more realistic looking, like Katsuya Terada's official art
This game was amazing and the art style is beautiful but I do wish we could have ever seen a zelda in the art style of the spaceworld 2000 demo. Twilight princess was the closest thing but it's dark green/brown earth tone filtered world is an extremely dated product of it's era that looks like shit today. The Wii U demo fixed it up a lot but that never came to fruition either.
The GameCube actually has a 32 bit processor
32 Bit processor, 128 Bit GPU which is what Nintendo used as a selling point
Wind Waker "cat eye" Link looks more like western animation of looney tune than anime.
I think Wind Waker's look is very similar to Toei Animation's early movies like "The Little Prince and the Eight-headed Dragon" (which also inspired Samurai Jack's look), in fact, one of Nintendo's character designers, Koichi Kotabe, worked on that film and Miyamoto actually cited other Toei movies from the late 50s and early 60s as inspiration for the original Legend of Zelda, especially on the creation of Ganon
I still vividly remember this era during high school... People online were fuming under the assumption that infamous Spaceworld Tech Demo was what we should expect for the next upcoming Zelda game and acted like we had the rug pulled from under us, even down to nicknaming it derogatorily as "Celda" for the cell-shaded style as many went under the assumption it was made for little babies.
The obsession for "realism" and "high-end graphics" blinded many of us... Funny how much things changed as the years went on.
Me personally, I remember not being TOO bothered by it, since I really liked the anime art style in Link to the Past's instruction book and Nintendo Power comic.
It's really funny that the gaming community really hasn't changed much at all. So many of these posts I can see being passed around if Wind Waker were first announced today. The Hey Arnold and Tiny Toons comments are especially hilarious because I know people would be comparing this game to Teen Titans Go today 💀
I definitely remember the frustrations with Nintendo around this era, though. Nintendo was getting really experimental with all their franchises, and the only games fans really responded positively to from the start were Melee and Metroid Prime. Everybody wanted Mario 64 2 but got Luigi's Mansion and Mario Sunshine. People wanted OoT 2 and got Wind Waker. And people wanted Star Fox 64 2 and got Star Fox Adventures (side note: Someone mentioned looking toward Dinosaur Planet if they wanted a game like OoT. Funny that game didn't get to escape this torrent either.)
There was so much "why did they have to ruin Mario Sunshine by giving Mario a watergun? Just let it play like Mario 64!" And I even remember Galaxy coming out and everyone claiming it's "just like Marip 64!" despite the fact that Sunshine was *way* closer.
Surface level stuff really is important for convincing people to play your game. I think that's why so many Indie games focus so heavily on presentation.
maybe its because i'm a zelda fan but i loved starfox adventure and honestly vastly prefer it over starfox 64.
plus i much rather them be more experimental then make the same game over and over again
@@jskywalker58 There's definitely a cycle to it, which I think is ultimately the positive note to reflect on this sort of thing. People have intense kneejerk reactions to things that are too different from what they're familiar with. But overtime, as that thing they originally hated becomes a thing of the past, people become more intrigued by it and even begin to enjoy it a lot more than they did when it was new.
It's hilariously Nintendo saw the writing on the wall decades ago after Twilight Princess: great realistic graphics are nice but they age like milk and are very expensive
Whiny, edgy teen boys ruin everything lmao
Nowadays, it seems like some Nintendo fans really hate anything “anime/realistic” because of “perceived blandness/genericness” instead of “perceived childishness”
Yeah it sucks too because the cartoony styles are overused, and other art styles like the OOT one hasn't had a chance to shine in years while WW art style has been used in 7 out of the 12 games released since wind wakers release :( that's less than half of all zelda games since then using ANY art style outside of wind waker.
Nice Video ! Sub & Big Like ! And Love Retro Zelda Games !
I, back then, or even now, never understood why the west loves "hardass" looks. I was always estatic over chibi cute things. Seeing it's trailer on that master quest disc made me go nuts.
But after watching that "space world" video, I understood how people felt betrayed lol.
I always loved OOT style link, the best we got of him is in Soul Calibur 2.
WW zombified the franchise.
In the past I wrote entire essays on Zelda fan forums to explain why.
Now that I'm not a raging fanboy anymore, I don't try that hard to convince anyone anymore. I'm older, see it differently now, and have some sympathy for the Big N.
I now understand they missed one of the *biggest* opportunities in fantasy writing history by not developing a direct, "Hero of Time" sequel to MM.
Few people who read this will understand why. Such an MM sequel would be very difficult to create, but would've broken ground across both the high-fantasy and general story telling metas.
It's an opportunity they will never get back.
It's only a matter of time until a bold, talented story writer who understands where the Big N went wrong post-64 creates a new franchise that will surpass Zelda in story, gameplay, and experience.
First indie development team to pull that off and treat their franchise and fans properly will attract a large, involved following fast.
I still think they should've made a game detailing how MM link became the heroes shade, it's such a missed opportunity that they didn't do that.
It’s pretty hilarious in hindsight that Wind Waker still looks beautiful to this day whereas Twilight Princess looks very ugly, whether the originals or the HD versions.
Windwaker tainted Zelda for me forever. I was so mad when it released that i stopped caring about the series forever.
Nintendo were bullied into making Twilight Princess but it's so good. No bully.
They weren't bullied into making it, it's the game they always wanted to make ever since a link to the past.
As much as I love TWW, fuck Aonuma.
Die Legende von Zelda😩 Die Legende von Zeldaa! 😩 Die LEGENDE von ZELDAAA!!!!!😩😩😩😩🤯
ART STYLE > GRAPHICS BABYYYYYYY
Nintendo stayed the course. Glad they did
Once again, a CZcamsr that forgets Europe exists.
Pretty sure I mentioned the European release date lol
@@TheObsessiveGamer Japan yes, America yes. No mention of Europe though.
@@zxon oh whoops seems that was missed. Sorry about that! Mixed that up with my next video that is coming up that has that mentioned haha
It's interesting.
Wind Waker was hated at the time for being too cartoony.
But when fans got a serious entry in Twilight Princess, it got a lukewarm reception.
It wasn't till years later that both became cult favourites.
BotW and TotK felt like a nice middle ground between anime aesthetics and more heavy storytelling in the franchise.
I've never really liked twilight princess. It was still GOOD but I just can't with it. I was never in love with the visuals, though I don't think it's nearly as ugly as some would say, and I can't say i really care a whole lot for most of the characters and story.
Windwaker was easily up there with oot and majoras mask
I recall all the "professional" gaming magazines and websites at the time clapping for Wind Waker like trained circus seals. So did many blindly-loyal "fans". I always saw it as childish though. And I don't think anyone had a problem with cel-shading. It was the design of the characters that was bad. I watch a video not long ago that said those who worked on WW didn't even like Zelda and were disappointed that they couldn't make their own unique game with the style they wanted. Miyamoto should have just let them make their own new series and leave Zelda out of it. I don't think Wind Waker is any better today. It's still a bad installment to the series, and that's not even addressing the bad storyline additions that helped ruin the Zelda timeline.
blindly-loyal "fans"
so basically if i like wind waker i'm not a real zelda fan, yeah that makes sense
@@jskywalker58 Correct.
@@BelieveIt1051 whatever man, to each their own
I don't mind the cell shading.
I like kid link and the story.
I still hate the art style.
I find it quite hilarious and pathetic how the fans felt ''betrayed'' by the game looking different from the previous 2 Zelda Games. There was no promise that the tech demo was going to be the next game so i honestly think people of the time assumed something and were ''betrayed'' by something that wasnt concrete in the first place. Different times although it shows little has changed lol.
I actually really like how the game looked and i remember when it released i thought it looked nice and to be fair it has aged very well and in a way its timeless. I like how games look different cause id rather have variety in a series rather than everything looking similar or the same
Yeah I remember seeing a commercial on tv in the months before release and thinking that it looked so good. Wind Waker from there ended up being the first game I ever preordered because I just had to have it on release day.
The fans had the right to feel betrayed lmao. Nintendo definitely knew what they were doing when they made that bait and switch like that. If anything, Nintendo is the pathetic ones for taking advantage of their fans desire of an realistic Zelda game and turning into a cartoon. Doesn't help the fact that the GameCube was new at the time, so obviously the fans wanted the lastest Zelda game to take advantage of the new powerful console. Of course, the game ending up being good and we eventually got a realistic Zelda game afterwards, but their reaction was warranted. I'm just glad the devs found a nice balance between cartoony with realism in Botw/Totk and were even getting a live action movie...
@@Key-Knight87 There WAS no betrayal because nothing was PROMISED. That tech demo was literally just ocarina link and ganon with the graphics turned up and ganondorf given a sword, which just going with the ocarina style but upgraded would have been incredibly lame. For that matter Wind Waker did take advantage of the Gamecube's hardware, it absolutely would not have been possible on the N64. People in the early 2000s were just into edgy realism because it was the newest fad and that's really all there is to it.
@@TheKabuto90 No one has to "promise" anything for someone to feel betrayed. That tech demo was made to show what the GameCube was capable of sure. Yes nothing was confirmed or promised, but it was definitely a bait and switch because Nintendo knew that we wanted realism. Yet Nintendo went backwards with a cartoony game knowing damm tell that their fanbase wanted a realistic Zelda game. Nintendo intentions was the betrayal. And no, it wasn't early 2000's edge either. The realistic side of the series still influenced the art styles of later games. People expected Nintendo to come up with a new artstyle that was based on that footage so it wouldn't just a oot clone too. The demand for a realistic Zelda game still grows strong today. It was reasonable for the fans to be upset after what Nintendo did lol. It's also reason why we're getting a live action movie.
It still breaks my heart how so many people who used to speculate like crazy on what the N64/N64DD version of Ura Zelda actually was have all now given up hope on the N64 version being anything more than what we got since leaks from recent years. Deliberately ignoring the fact that those leaks actually proved that speculation right to a degree as literally early versions of two of the mini dungeons from MM were found in the data mines for Ura Zelda. Despite this fact, the whole community just decided to just ignore it like it never happened and that they were always meant for MM and/or acted like it never even had anything to do with Ura Zelda to begin with. Even though it was all there in the files! People chose to ignorantly put end to the speculation. As though people only sought proof, just so they can bury it like it never happened.
I'm still in the belief that we got wasn't actually the Ura Zelda that was in-development for the N64DD. There were even invisible versions of enemies that even didn't make it in the final version of Ura on Gamecube, let alone even the recent restoration mod, that's literally just the Gamecube one, now playable on a N64. There was definitely more Ura and modding community knows it and is literally doing the same exact thing as Nintendo with that knowledge. They may have the majority of their fellow fans fooled, but not me. Especially since the proof is literally right there in the leaks as I've just stated. They can come with lies all they want.
The Ura Zelda we all speculated as a separate thing than what we got was real at one point. And Majora's Mask is literally proof of that! How you say? Because Aonuma! While it is unfortunately true that Miyamoto always intended Ura Zelda to be what we got, Aonuma didn't like this idea. And considering that what we got was literally just OoT with harder versions of the same dungeons, we can definitely see and understand why. The Master Quest / Ura Quest that we got was just a straight up dumb idea and a waste of our time and money since it brought literally nothing new to the table. This is why Aonuma designed two new dungeons, initially for Ura, against Miyamoto intention. Aonuma was quite the rebel back then. He knew we wouldn't like Miyamoto's version of Ura Zelda and tried to fight for the one we all had faith in. But ultimately failed in the end. However, not completely empty handed. The two dungeons he made eventually saw the light of day as mini dungeons for the OoT sequel, Majora's Mask. A game that literally happened as a deal between Aonuma and Miyamoto. A compromise that if Aonuma could make a whole new game with the ideas he had for Ura, they wouldn't have to make his take on Ura, as they would be giving us something bigger than Ura. A whole new game!
So in a way, MM is the Ura we wanted, not Master Quest. That said, is why I still refuse to Miyamoto's version of Ura as the Ura we could've had on the N64. And why this is all the more reason why OoT deserves more than just a true full on remake, but rather that, a reboot in the engine of BotW and TotK. We were denied so much that OoT could've had because of Miyamoto. It's time that Nintendo finally give us the Ocarina of Time that we need and have longed for for so long now. It is about time Nintendo finally takes us back to Ocarina of Time era world for a whole new experience! And with all that has been established in all the other games outside of OoT thus far in mind. Imagine finding a version of the Hero's Sword from WW in an expanded version of the world of OoT! Or fighting enemies we normally wouldn't fight in OoT in the era of OoT, in a canon 3D Zelda game. And being able to see these "high mountains" mentioned in WW's backstory as they were in OoT's era. That'd be insane!
i still hate the artstyle to this game. Besides that, the game was really good, especially the music in it. Look at Twilight Princess and the "Maro Markt" Oh boy, how much i hated that part. Its like a commercial for a 3 year old. I also dislike the artstyle of BOTW. OOT and MM was the sweetspot for me.
Wind Waker taught me a pretty value lesson about the Zelda fan base. They've never ever have know what they want and always want to complain about completely arbitrary reasons that made no sense in hindsight... Heck we had the exact same scenario played out when Breath of the Wild was first teased even like almost point to point. From the complains about not being the realistic art style they wanted because of the previous tech demo to people warming up to it because of the Ghibli comparison.
Too bad the HD version of the Windwaker looks worse than og because of the unfitting bloom lighting and plastic looking characters.
Honestly, Ocarina and Majora's Mask were pretty cartoony despite having a more rustic color palette. Our imaginations made them have more realistic graphics. Wind Waker was, no pun intended, a breath of fresh air.
I still want my hardcore ZELDA with a shiny, Mature, evolved artstyle. Zelda fans are like 40 yrs old now for Gods sake
I just want zelda games to have good writing again, I don't care what style its in but I want writing that has depth and meaning to it. The best parts about MM and TP to me were how deep the characters were, you had link in TP who had to battle with himself about resisting temptation so he could be the hero they need, and in MM they had to deal with the crushing realization that all of their lives were in danger. Meanwhile you have wind waker link who is expressive but nothing he goes through actually has an effect on him or the people around him, they can't go a moment without allowing characters to be deep, it has to be some loony toons style of danger where there's nothing actually bad going on.
@@JimMilton-ej6zi The whole kiddy direction just ruined the franchise for me straight up. I didn’t even play TP because it still looked kinda mid. I wanted a T-rated Zelda that Advanced the main OoT Story with epic swordplay, but TP was full of childishness and weird gimmicks.