Collection essentials #410: The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (N64)

Time for a big one.

The original Zelda, as you more than likely know, was a huge deal in the late ‘80s. And Link to the Past was one of the most popular SNES games. And now that we were in the first console generation with full 3D, people were highly anticipating the first Zelda title for the platform. It would come two years into the Nintendo 64’s lifespan, just in time for the holiday season of 1998. Expectations were high, and thankfully Nintendo was up to the task.

Ocarina of Time wouldn’t represent as drastic of a change as Mario 64 did for that series. On a basic level, the structure of OoT does resemble that of Link to the Past very much. This is an action-adventure game where the player traverses the world and a variety of dungeons trying to save the day, accumulating a variety of weapons and items along the way. But with everything in 3D, the mechanics of how everything worked had to be redone from scratch. Probably the most notable mechanic introduced is “Z-targeting”. When holding down the Z button, Link will focus on an eligible enemy or object, and will always face that object when he moves and automatically target it when using any kind of projectile (and the player can swap between eligible targets in range). Link has more moves now too, such as the ability to roll, sidestep, and to do a jumping attack. You can also switch to a first-person view (though Link cannot walk when doing this) to get a better look at surroundings, and aside from Z-targeting you’ll have to use this view when aiming projectile weapons. 

Ocarina of Time is also more “cinematic” than previous Zelda games. Early in the game you get to watch fancy (for the time) cutscenes establishing the game’s plot and backstory. There’s a lot more dialogue in Ocarina of Time and significant characters who Link interacts with. Games that are more plot-driven tend to be more linear since they rely on events unfolding in a specific way, though Ocarina does still manage to give players some freedom in terms of what order they want to finish some of the dungeons in the later part of the game.

In terms of the “Zelda timeline”, Ocarina of Time is a prequel to Link to the Past, which itself was a prequel to the NES titles. The character Link who stars in all these games are actually a series of different characters who have the same name and appearance, something that the games never really explain. The Zelda timeline is really not all that important anyway, and you’re not meant to think about the overall timeline very hard and enjoy each game as a standalone experience. The Link in this game lives in a village of childlike people called “Kokiri” and has a prophetic nightmare about an evil man pursuing a young girl and guardian on horseback. Upon visiting the wise “Great Deku Tree” of the forest, he is advised to set out to meet the princess and stop the evil plans of a mysterious evil man of the desert, and the adventure truly begins.

Dungeons are now much bigger and grander than they ever were before. Link to the Past already had dungeons with a certain “theme” like ice or water, and Ocarina of Time takes that a step further. Now every dungeon has its own distinct music which helps each one set a particular vibe. They take significantly longer to complete, and they are more puzzle-based than ever before. Dungeons in previous games sometimes were pretty quick, especially if you had gone through them before, but in this game each dungeon feels like quite an event.

The “Dark World” from Link to the Past, with alternate versions of locations in the regular world, does not return in this game. But instead, as the title might imply, time travel takes its place. Link starts the game young, but eventually is able to travel seven years into the future and gains the freedom to switch between present and future. The game uses this mechanic in some clever ways, and I’m going to let you play the game yourself to see what they are.

Speaking of things the title implies, the ocarina (which is a real-life musical instrument, a type of flute) is an important tool in this game. Link learns to play various songs on it on his travels, and they all have some sort of special power. This includes the ability to summon Link’s horse, to change from day to night and vice-versa, warping to specific places, and more. There was a magical flute in Link to the Past that Link could play to fast-travel around the world, but this game takes the concept further with many different songs to play, as well as letting the player straight-up play notes on the instrument themselves rather than just press a single button once.

Ocarina of Time retained various themes and elements from the previous Zelda games, but also introduced and established an awful lot of what are now series staples. It introduces prominent new races such as the rock-like people called the Gorons and the desert-dwelling Gerudo, while reimagining the enemy “Zora” creatures as a less-antagonist and more-humanoid water-dwelling bunch. Many of its gameplay elements became the new core of 3D Zelda. 

The series’ main antagonist is Ganon, a large, intelligent, pig-like fiend with magical powers. This game is huge for Ganon, because it introduces his more-humanoid Gerudo form, the warlock “Ganondorf”. The pig-like Ganon is only seen in the final encounter of any given Zelda game, so Ganondorf was introduced to give the antagonist a more active role in the story, and in any given Zelda game he is typically the form that we see most of the time until the epic final encounter. 

Ocarina of Time released to near-perfect review scores from gaming critics at the time. If you were paying attention to console gaming discussion at the turn of the millennium and a few years beyond, you know that this game and Final Fantasy VII were the two biggest names that most frequently brought up when discussing what fans ought to consider the “great game of all-time.” It had an incredibly lofty reputation and was frequently cited as practically perfect. For example, I believe it was the first game ever to get a perfect 10 of out 10 from the prominent gaming website GameSpot, with the reviewer writing, “In a word, perfect. To call it anything else would be a bald-faced lie.” 

Is Ocarina of Time actually perfect? Well, no. Probably the biggest and most obvious flaw is that the overworld that you have to go through to get places is huge and mostly just empty, requiring the player to simply waste time walking without anything interesting going on. While the game is longer than previous Zeldas, it’s also not as briskly-paced as those games, and the pacing feels inferior as a result. One of the most common complaints with this game is a particular dungeon called the Water Temple, which often feels confusing and unintuitive to new players, and it requires the player to constantly go in and out of the pause menu to equip and unequip this certain pair of boots. There are other flaws that people may cite depending on their particular taste, but those to me are the most obvious things.

So while many people hold up Ocarina of Time as the best Zelda, others still prefer Link to the Past on the SNES. And to be honest, if I have to pick, I’d be on Team Link to the Past. But I will say, in Ocarina’s favor, it has a more memorable world with characters that actually stand out, while in Link to the Past it often feels like the world and characters are a means to an end for the gameplay’s sake, in my opinion.

As for my personal history, I was first introduced to Ocarina of Time shortly after my family got the Nintendo 64, probably early in the year 2000. Someone at my dad’s workplace heard that we had gotten a Nintendo 64 and lent the game to us so I could try it out. I remember getting to the Goron village, but I got stuck not knowing what to do for the Goron chief and had to return the game at that point. But a couple years later or so I got the game for myself, and upon subscribing to Nintendo Power magazine I opted for the Ocarina of Time strategy guide as a free gift, so that prevented me from getting stuck. You’ll notice there are two Ocarina of Time cartridges in the photo. The one WITHOUT the “Player’s Choice” label on it is my very same copy that I got circa 2002, while the other one goes with the box and manual which I own, which I acquired later on as a young adult.

This game also was hugely significant for my youngest sister Rebecca. In 2012, I believe this was the second game that she ever seriously sat down to play by herself (after Pokémon Blue), and it helped her fall in love with video games in general, and from there we went on to forge a strong nerdy sibling friendship. For a long time she cited it as the best/her favorite video game (although another game wound up dethroning it).

Of course, I greatly enjoyed Ocarina of Time back then. But I also recognized it wasn’t quite a perfect game and it was a bit annoying to me how people put it on such a pedestal. And so, I tended to not praise the game as much as some people did and considered it to be a little overrated. In my adulthood, though, my affection for the game has grown and I appreciate it more. 

Ocarina of Time is absolutely a game you have to play if you have any interest in Zelda games and their ilk, or, heck, if you want to call yourself a gamer in general because it’s such a hugely significant and widely-played game. Sure, the graphics aren’t as impressive as they once were, and the game’s high praise may mean your lofty expectations may not quite be met, but the good stuff still shines through, and you’ll want to be able to talk about this game with people. There is an improved remake available on a later system that you’ll probably want to play rather than the original version, and I’ll be covering that someday. Still, the original release is one of the crown jewels of the Nintendo 64 and is an absolutely quintessential essential. 

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