xav's 2023 media thread: The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker (2002) (REPLAY)

two zelda posts back to back, woo. this post is very delayed, i beat WW on the 10th but since then ive been swamped with college work so i havent had time to really sit down and talk about it. that being said, it definitely gave me time to reflect on it, one of my all time favorite zelda games alongside MM, BOTW, and now TOTK.

counting WWHD, this has been my first playthrough of the game in 10 years now (oh my god WWHD is 10 years old jesus christ.), and even longer for the original release. getting my JP copy was also what kinda spurred me on into finding a region modded gamecube, and now ive finally experienced it in full. my japanese still isnt perfect, but i was able to at least read a lot of the dialogue (not translate all of it necessarily, but read it at the very least). ive kinda been able to track my progress based on my playthroughs of these games in japanese, and its been really fun!

this was another 100% run...save for the nintendo gallery. im sorry but i really, really could not be bothered to do it...by the time i realized i hadnt gotten pictures of several permanently missable figures, it was way too late to do anything about it. doing it in the gamecube version SUCKS with the 3 photo limit. its SLIGHTLY better in a second quest file since you start with the DX picto box, and in WWHD its way easier with a 10 photo limit and the DX picto box being the first one you get anyways, but its still not fun to try and do. i did everything else in the game at least

now youd think that without the additions that WWHD has like the swift sail and the improved triforce shard quest, that playing the original WW would be a pain, and at first it kind of was...but i got used to it rather quickly. in fact, the pace of the game became very therapeutic. i came to fall back in love with the game all over again through my time with it. i think my favorite moments that i had during my playthrough were when i was just sailing through the great sea at night, with the sounds of the ocean calmly playing through my speaker as i traveled to my next destination or went to find treasure, under the moon.

sailing during the day was equally beautiful too, as some of my favorite moments were when seagulls would fly by you as you sailed, and the classic great sea theme would play. every inch of the great sea has something unique in it, and i found myself traveling to all corners of the world at least once to accomplish something. i think that was a great way to incentivize traveling a large overworld, an issue that ive always had with OOT's hyrule field. and yeah, the triforce quest was definitely longer- especially in the JP version, where one of the charts is behind an extended treasure chart trail, but i didnt hate it? it was still fun, i love the feeling of going on treasure hunts and cross referencing maps to find chests in the sea.

WWHD has a lot going for it, but i think im always gonna lowkey kinda prefer the original. theres things to adjust to but it doesnt hinder my enjoyment of the game whatsoever. especially visually, as ive always admittedly hated the sheer amount of bloom and color saturation that HD has. the flat cel-shaded look of the world and concept art in WW was a really distinct style thats incredibly charming and timeless and i feel like that was lost in the transition to the HD version. i really wish they didnt go so hard with the bloom and lighting...it just looks ugly. but i digress.

WW is a really beautiful game. it has a special place in my heart as a game i played all the time as a kid, and playing it now so many years later felt like returning home...its another comfort food game for me. and now, im able to appreciate the deeper themes of the game, and the amount of nuance that comes with it. an amazingly written article i read recently that got posted while i was in the middle of my playthrough discusses this

a big part of WW ive come to realize is the concept of generational trauma, the loss of innocence, but hope and overcoming the past as well.  OOT tackles the innocence theme as well, but i think WW handles it gracefully too. one factor of WW that ive always loved is that link in this game isnt a chosen hero by the gods or anything. he's literally just a 12 year old boy who just wanted to enjoy his birthday when things quickly spiraled out of control and he lost his sister.

he goes on this journey of his own accord, he pulls the master sword from his own will and inherits the burdens of past generations that he isnt even technically related to. he doesnt actually get the triforce of courage until the end of game, and thats after painstakingly recreating it from the shards in the ocean floor himself. he makes himself a hero, and ive always loved that. but with making himself a hero, he, and tetra, are thrust into the cycle of protecting hyrule and sealing evil when they never asked to be. theyre victims of the past, of two old men in king daphnes and ganondorf's eons long showdown, and made to play parts they didnt ask for.

this isnt even going into medli and makar, two similarly innocent bystanders who awaken as sages and are made to play their roles in this fight against evil. ganondorf is an incredibly written character, and as the article mentions, he represents a man who cant let go of the past, and is making that problem the responsibility of the children of the future. and then that broken laugh he lets out when the king touches the triforce before he gets a chance to, and his plans that were made thousands of years ago fail....chills, man.

king daphnes' speech at the end is beautiful, too:

in all of this pain, all of this strife caused by hanging onto the past...the king leaves link and tetra with hope for the future, telling them to live their lives for themselves now, and walk their own path divorced from the whims of previous generations. when link and tetra set off from outset island like they did at the start of the game, theyre on their way to make a new life for themselves, letting the winds guide them on their way. it really is a masterful final act and ending, and one i think i kind of took for granted until now.

when i hit the credits....i couldnt help but smile