There aren't many games that can hold a candle (Blue OR Red..) to the Legend of Zelda series, and we've certainly seen a lot of variety over the years.  Whether it was that first golden cartridge for the NES over 20 years ago, that not-so-golden side-scrolling, magic-laden follow up (not "golden" in most of our minds, anyways..), an epic adventure on the SNES, the N64 era (with possibly the greatest game of all time), the most recent incarnation on the Wii, and several handheld efforts, a young boy in green named Link has certainly done and seen it all.  It wasn't a constant for the Hero of Time, however.  There have been changes to the story, changes to the character, changes to the arsenal of weapons, and whole bunch of other things.  At the simplest form, we've seen heart containers in the form of 1/1, 1/4, and most recently, 1/5.  Today we take a look at some changes we would like to see in the new incarnation of Link.

The Legend of Zelda, and the story of a boy named Link...

10 - Motifs

One thing that Twilight Princess was missing was a clear motif in the game.  I mean, I understand that animals were a prominent theme, but it wasn’t something that was really capitalized on when compared to other entries in the series.  Beyond the wolf transformation, a few instances where you help out animals by talking to them, there was nothing.  The dark and light theme, in my opinion, is a bit over used in many games.  When I look in past entries likeOcarina of Time, and Majora’s Mask, the two motifs in the game where clearly evident and used throughout the game.  In Ocarina, it was the use of song, and music; and in Majora’s Mask, it was the motif of healing.  However, I didn’t feel the animal motif in Twilight Princess was explored enough, and I hope that the motif they use in the next game will be used thoroughly.

9 - Not a happy ending

Remember the introduction to Wind Waker? I do, and I loved it.  It says that sometimes between Ocarina of Time and Wind Waker, something horrible happened.  People waited for the Hero of Time to show up to save the day ... but he never came. Then, the Gods flooded Hyrule to settle this problem (pretty radical, I know) and that's why there's this huge ocean in Wind Waker.  Now that we know a bit of the story, why not play it?  The next game could tie Ocarina and Wind Waker together.  Games don't have to always end with a cute and happy ending.  Movies end dramatically all the time!  Since we know how Hyrule ends up after the events, it wouldn't be all that sad anyway.  Some of you might've seen the « Project Deluge » which was a fake interview depicting the next Zelda.  That's pretty much the inspiration for this point right here.  Having something more story driven and ending in a big climax where Hyrule is being flooded by the Gods sounds awesome in my book.  Ocarina- « New Zelda »-Wind Waker : That's a nice trilogy right there and you can then add Majora's Mask as a side story.  I want.

8 - Unnecessary Fetch Quests

This is a change that I hope will occur as well.  I think we all remember these quests in both Wind Waker, and Twilight Princess.  In case you guys forgot, let me remind you; in Wind Waker (towards the end of the game), you had collect 8 pieces of the Triforce of Courage.  To do so, you had to collect 8 maps to find the location of the pieces, which took many wind changes to complete the task.  In Twilight Princess, you had to collect Sky Characters in order to get to the City in the Sky, and complete the Twilight mirror.  These fetch quests (which were mandatory to complete the game) served to extend the game length, and really bogged down the player.  These fetch quests slowed the pace of the game, and in my opinion, were completely unnecessary.  I personally don’t mid fetch quests as long as they are interesting enough, and are engaging to do.  I hope for the next game they either make the fetch quests more integral to the plot, or take them out all together.

7 - Epic boss

We got a glimpse of bigger boss in Twilight Princess and I liked it.  Did you play Shadow of the Colossus?  This boss battle-centric game had the biggest boss I've seen and the way you had to fight them was so enjoyable.  After spending an hour inside a dungeon, I like to be overwhelmed by something impressive, massive, and dangerous.  I love to think to myself how scared I am to fight this thing that looks so much more powerful than anything I've fought in the dungeon.  Also, these epic boss battles require some clever way to fight them.  I'm sure I am not the only one growing tired of entering a boss room, spending around 2 minutes watching it to find how should I use the weapon I just found to bring him down, hit him a couple times with my sword, rinse and repeat.  We could use more weapons, add a bit of magic (that we get back because I said so) and some environment usage too.  I just want to work harder to slay these bosses.