Email: About that “cave drawing”..

I  despise all the Aonuma gimmicks like “Wolf Link” and “Choo-choo trains” more than anyone I know, but I think you and many of your readers are really, REALLY jjumping the gun with regards to the so-called “cave drawing” ability Link has in the new game. This isn’t some new, annoying way to play the game that doesn’t feel like Zelda. All I see here is a move, a magic move as evidenced by the energy bar, that allows Link to access new places and probably even find secrets.

You see a window with bars, and you know that, even in a Zelda game, you can’t get go through that window as much as you might wonder whats on the other side. With this move, Link can now explore beyond a barred window. That’s pretty cool! There might a barely noticeable gap between the corner walls of a room that Link could squeeze through, leading him to a treasure chest, or a trap. Who knows? The possibilities are intriguing, and all it just seems to be another cool move to add to Link’s arsenal that will allow me to explore new areas. In that regard its no different from the fairy spell or the jump spell in Adventure of Link. And yet you “despise it”? Why are you so offended by it?

How am I jumping the gun? You should see my emails. If anything, I’m the moderating voice. I’m telling people to wait for the game to come out before declaring anything about the new Zelda game.

But I already know I despise the cave drawing. First of all, it looks stupid. This is not how I like seeing Link depicted as some proto-civilization cro-magnon drawing. It looks tacky.

But you know why the cave drawing fails as a game device? And I don’t have to play the game to know this. The reason why is because the cave drawing doesn’t translate to the contextual theme of Link as a warrior. I know the Japanese are pacifists, but I’m tired of their crappy ideology infecting their entertainment. In the past, the idea was to tap into ancient mythology. For example, Link has a sword. He goes around and kills things with his sword. Lately, Nintendo has been removing his sword and neutering Link. Skyward Sword originally was going to have Link without a sword altogether. Wind Waker removed the sword for the entire first dungeon.

Here is where Nintendo gets the ‘puzzles’ of Zelda completely wrong. “When in doubt, use fire…” means Link throwing fireballs at the enemy TO KILL THEM. Link got additional moves such as upward thrust, downward thrust so he can better kill enemies. The sword upgrades and even the sword shooting beams all revolved around killing enemies.

Items were never used for puzzles. Let me repeat that again for the Unfortunate-Person-From-Nintendo-Reading-This-Site. Items revolved around combat use, not around puzzle use in older Zelda games.

Consider the boomerang. Why were you happy that you got the boomerang? It is because it made it easier for you to kill monsters. I’m not denying that in Link to the Past, the boomerang was given puzzle solving elements in certain dungeons. But the boomerang also brought back rupees. The boomerang was a life enhancement device for Link. The boomerang stunned enemies making it easier for Link to kill them.

Consider the bomb. Bombs were used to kill enemies such as that giant rhino thing in the original Zelda (whatever the boss’s name was called). You could say it was a ‘puzzle’ to figure out that the monster eating the bomb was how to kill it, but the true context of the item is that it was combat. Bombs can be used to blow up holes in dungeon walls to access other parts of the dungeons. But dungeons are not friendly places. Bombs were still used in the same way how a military man might use them.

Consider the bow and arrow. How can anyone not say the bow and arrow’s purpose was NOT in a combat context?

The Hookshot, the fire and ice wands, the spellcasting, and even the magic Cane of Making Orange Blocks had combat contexts. Getting new items were VERY EXCITING in Zelda because they changed up how combat works. Combat never got boring in Zelda because the items kept spicing it up.

There were dud items. What were they?

The raft- completely uninteresting.
The ‘gloves’ to pick up rocks – so boring.
The whistle or instrument – lame, lame, lame.

The dud items all have the same thing in common: they are used there entirely for puzzle elements and have ZERO combat context. The raft will not help you defeat monsters therefore it is lame. The raft is just an artificial key the game forces you to get in order for you to proceed further.

I do not see how the cave drawing has any combat context. It might have, but I do not see how it is possible based on the gameplay design of it.

The cave drawing will be despised not just by me but by everyone who doesn’t post on a Gaming Message Forum. Why? It is because it only has puzzle elements and no combat context. It is just another goddamn raft.