Thursday, June 10, 2004
Zelda 4 Swords: Review
Alright, today we played Zelda 4 Swords, Duy and I. First we played 1 stage for half an hour, and then later in the afternoon, we played a few more stages, so we saved 1 maiden (of 6 or 7) (so we beat a main boss) and we played 1 more stage, and also played a minigame. So this blog entry is all about Zelda 4 Swords. + one more thing - I'll also e-mail Jason, Duy, and David about it. Oh, and I'm listening and recording MXC right now.
So... Zelda 4 Swords... in 1 player, you control 4 links, and you can put them in 4 different formations + free formation. In 2 players, each player controls 2 Links, and there are 3 formations; free formation, vertical, and horizontal. So let's get to the core of the review: gameplay and all that.
First of all, it's a fun game. Single player would probably be a lot more fun - might be even more fun for 1 player than the multiplayer version, but multiplayer is multiplayer, and it definately is fun. Nah, I take that back, multiplayer is probably more fun than single player. Now that I've praised the game, let's say why it's not for everyone, or why I don't give it 100/100.
Well, there's a lot of "A link to the past" in the game. It's not a rehash, it's not the same game again... but there's something about having the same old stuff, so that there's not much new to figure out. Well, there are new things, but some of them are just... so easy to figure out. So it feels a bit like "a link to the past" again.
Have a fire rod, locked door, 4 unlit lanterns - light lanterns to unlock door. There's a gap, throw a Link to the other side. See a big boulder, use co-op to lift it up. If stuck, chop all the bushes to find a hidden hole. See a switch that's 2x2, get all the links to stand on it. See 4 switches dispersed around the room, get each link to stand on each. See 2 switches in one room and 2 switches in another room, get 2 links to stay and 2 links to travel to the other room. See an enemy with 4 weakpoints, each having a different colour which corresponds to a different link... well, you get the point.
Thus, it feels kinda routine. There are still a few... possibly tricky puzzles.. but not too many, at least not yet. Well, I guess the enemy example isn't bad... still gotta find a way to efficiently attack the enemy. Thus, we get to combat.
Combat is actually a lot of fun. What's more fun than swinging a sword at a bad guy? Swinging 4 swords at a badguy! From 2 different sides! Using different items! Combat is fun, and it looks pretty too. Let's get to gameplay mechanics.
up down left right, B is attack, A is action, or secondary item. L lets you control formations, and R is roll, pickup, and throw. Select does other formation stuff, and Start is pause, or pause menu thing. In no particular order:
you can use R to pick up your teammates, and you can also get them onto your team - so you can control 3 and the other 1. Each player can hold one secondary item at a time - whether it'd be arrows, boomerangs, firerods, bombs, whatever. That player gets infinite of that item - infite bombs, arrows, magic for firerods, etc.
You can use B to slash - if you slash a lot, you do some combos, like slash slash stab spin strike. You can charge B to do a spin strike, or do a quick spin strike by using the control pad. If you do a 'smash' attack, you can do a smash stab in that direction.
Once you get 2000 'force gems', which are like ruppees, between the two players, you get force power. If you do a spin strike, your sword will fire a beam. If you have full life, you can fire a beam every few regular slashes. Also, you can super-charge and hold down B to make a moving spin strike, similar to Windwaker's spinstrike.
** we interrupt this for a special bulletin - I just saw a commercial that advertised that blockbuster - unlimited game rentals - deal again, so hopefully it's back **
Why GBA's instead of Cube controllers? Well, you're on the same screen on the cube, or you can enter a cave or a house, and then you can play on your gba. If you're on the cube screen, you both have to leave the screen at the same time. Let's move on to difficulty.
The game... well, level 2 was pretty difficult actually. You start with 4 hearts, but each time you die, you come back to life, you just lose a few force gems. And it makes you feel bad. But you do have infinite lives - well, we haven't tried both of us dying at the same time, but we do seem to have infinite lives.
Is the game linear? Well, the game is broken up into stages. When you start a stage, you go back to 0 force gems, no secondary items, and 4 hearts. So any heart containers and things like that that you got in a previous level do not carry on to the next level. So... I suppose it's kinda linear? You can still explore each stage, like in a zelda game. We haven't been to any real dungeons - just caves, but I'd like to visit a dungeon...
Now that I think of it... can the last boss really be that hard? If we start each level the same, how is the last boss different from the first boss? Well, the first boss was relatively easy, but when we get to the last boss, we will have the same amount of items, etc... unless we learn some new techniques or something...
It's a really nice game. The synchronous sounds of 2 links slashing at the same time is nice. It's probably not as nice as 4 links at the same time, like in the video I saw, but I guess you give up some things in multiplayer.
Graphically, the game looks great. Link to the past, with beautiful Wind waker explosions and effects, plus a few new effects. It looks really nice.
----------
Now, for the other part, which I have to e-mail in a few minutes, and then head to bed for a trainer appt tomorrow.
We decided that there should be a bit more roleplaying for the 'performing' at the game.
"I play the violin"
"roll a perform check"
"I got 33"
"Okay. Lederer isn't paranoid."
That seems pretty boring. So, what I want you - David, Duy, and Jason - to do, is to pick a song that you can "hum". It doesn't have to be a classical song, which is what Howard likes. So just pick a nice song. Video game song, real song, it doesn't matter... well, preferably, have an mp3 of it, so I can hear what it is - or since you can make up a song, then... whatever.
You can pick a song now, in my comment box, via e-mail, via msn, via phone, etc, or I guess you can do it when you come here. Your task, is during the game, to 'hum' the song together! Not necessarily hum, you can dudududu, or whatever you'd like. You don't have to play the violin or anything, that's too hard... just hum and stuff.
I will judge your performance :) As well, you will roll your perform check when I ask for it. And yes, your real life performance will affect your perform check :)
Anyway, I guess I'll e-mail this message to you 3 now.
Comments:
Post a Comment
So... Zelda 4 Swords... in 1 player, you control 4 links, and you can put them in 4 different formations + free formation. In 2 players, each player controls 2 Links, and there are 3 formations; free formation, vertical, and horizontal. So let's get to the core of the review: gameplay and all that.
First of all, it's a fun game. Single player would probably be a lot more fun - might be even more fun for 1 player than the multiplayer version, but multiplayer is multiplayer, and it definately is fun. Nah, I take that back, multiplayer is probably more fun than single player. Now that I've praised the game, let's say why it's not for everyone, or why I don't give it 100/100.
Well, there's a lot of "A link to the past" in the game. It's not a rehash, it's not the same game again... but there's something about having the same old stuff, so that there's not much new to figure out. Well, there are new things, but some of them are just... so easy to figure out. So it feels a bit like "a link to the past" again.
Have a fire rod, locked door, 4 unlit lanterns - light lanterns to unlock door. There's a gap, throw a Link to the other side. See a big boulder, use co-op to lift it up. If stuck, chop all the bushes to find a hidden hole. See a switch that's 2x2, get all the links to stand on it. See 4 switches dispersed around the room, get each link to stand on each. See 2 switches in one room and 2 switches in another room, get 2 links to stay and 2 links to travel to the other room. See an enemy with 4 weakpoints, each having a different colour which corresponds to a different link... well, you get the point.
Thus, it feels kinda routine. There are still a few... possibly tricky puzzles.. but not too many, at least not yet. Well, I guess the enemy example isn't bad... still gotta find a way to efficiently attack the enemy. Thus, we get to combat.
Combat is actually a lot of fun. What's more fun than swinging a sword at a bad guy? Swinging 4 swords at a badguy! From 2 different sides! Using different items! Combat is fun, and it looks pretty too. Let's get to gameplay mechanics.
up down left right, B is attack, A is action, or secondary item. L lets you control formations, and R is roll, pickup, and throw. Select does other formation stuff, and Start is pause, or pause menu thing. In no particular order:
you can use R to pick up your teammates, and you can also get them onto your team - so you can control 3 and the other 1. Each player can hold one secondary item at a time - whether it'd be arrows, boomerangs, firerods, bombs, whatever. That player gets infinite of that item - infite bombs, arrows, magic for firerods, etc.
You can use B to slash - if you slash a lot, you do some combos, like slash slash stab spin strike. You can charge B to do a spin strike, or do a quick spin strike by using the control pad. If you do a 'smash' attack, you can do a smash stab in that direction.
Once you get 2000 'force gems', which are like ruppees, between the two players, you get force power. If you do a spin strike, your sword will fire a beam. If you have full life, you can fire a beam every few regular slashes. Also, you can super-charge and hold down B to make a moving spin strike, similar to Windwaker's spinstrike.
** we interrupt this for a special bulletin - I just saw a commercial that advertised that blockbuster - unlimited game rentals - deal again, so hopefully it's back **
Why GBA's instead of Cube controllers? Well, you're on the same screen on the cube, or you can enter a cave or a house, and then you can play on your gba. If you're on the cube screen, you both have to leave the screen at the same time. Let's move on to difficulty.
The game... well, level 2 was pretty difficult actually. You start with 4 hearts, but each time you die, you come back to life, you just lose a few force gems. And it makes you feel bad. But you do have infinite lives - well, we haven't tried both of us dying at the same time, but we do seem to have infinite lives.
Is the game linear? Well, the game is broken up into stages. When you start a stage, you go back to 0 force gems, no secondary items, and 4 hearts. So any heart containers and things like that that you got in a previous level do not carry on to the next level. So... I suppose it's kinda linear? You can still explore each stage, like in a zelda game. We haven't been to any real dungeons - just caves, but I'd like to visit a dungeon...
Now that I think of it... can the last boss really be that hard? If we start each level the same, how is the last boss different from the first boss? Well, the first boss was relatively easy, but when we get to the last boss, we will have the same amount of items, etc... unless we learn some new techniques or something...
It's a really nice game. The synchronous sounds of 2 links slashing at the same time is nice. It's probably not as nice as 4 links at the same time, like in the video I saw, but I guess you give up some things in multiplayer.
Graphically, the game looks great. Link to the past, with beautiful Wind waker explosions and effects, plus a few new effects. It looks really nice.
----------
Now, for the other part, which I have to e-mail in a few minutes, and then head to bed for a trainer appt tomorrow.
We decided that there should be a bit more roleplaying for the 'performing' at the game.
"I play the violin"
"roll a perform check"
"I got 33"
"Okay. Lederer isn't paranoid."
That seems pretty boring. So, what I want you - David, Duy, and Jason - to do, is to pick a song that you can "hum". It doesn't have to be a classical song, which is what Howard likes. So just pick a nice song. Video game song, real song, it doesn't matter... well, preferably, have an mp3 of it, so I can hear what it is - or since you can make up a song, then... whatever.
You can pick a song now, in my comment box, via e-mail, via msn, via phone, etc, or I guess you can do it when you come here. Your task, is during the game, to 'hum' the song together! Not necessarily hum, you can dudududu, or whatever you'd like. You don't have to play the violin or anything, that's too hard... just hum and stuff.
I will judge your performance :) As well, you will roll your perform check when I ask for it. And yes, your real life performance will affect your perform check :)
Anyway, I guess I'll e-mail this message to you 3 now.