Life Without Toast - Sibling Rivalry

In "Twilight Princess", it all starts a bit different to previous Zelda games, namely you're not even wearing the famous green garb at the start. You're a lowly goatherd with a horse called Epona. After a slow start in which you meet the citizens of Ordon Village, round up a few goats, catch a fish or two, get a wooden sword and shield, and figure out who's who, all of a sudden a big hole opens up in the sky, you're knocked unconscious, turned into a wolf, and dragged off into another dimension where you find yourself in a prison cell with no visible means of escape. Then you meet Midna, and it gets really fucking weird. This first part of the story takes about 5-8 hours, or about a tenth of the game.

I don't want to go too far into the story, as it might completely ruin the huge surprises in store for anyone who might read this review and then play the game, but suffice to say huge black monsters appearing from another dimension and turning you into a wolf is amongst the least surprising things that happens to you.

I won't spoil it for anyone by saying your adventure takes you deep into a misty forest, to an ancient temple at the bottom of a lake (that one has one mind-bending motherfucker of a puzzle involving a huge rotating staircase), inside a huge volcano, across a desert, across a snowy-strewn landscape and into a Yeti's house (via a snowboard race with said Yeti) , back in time, to a city in the sky, to another dimension, and finally to Hyrule Castle, where the eponymous Princess Zelda is being held prisoner. All of these locations are or contain "temples" or "dungeons", huge labyrinthine places where there are puzzles to be solved, bad guys to kill, locked doors to open and bosses to vanquish. When you initially visit the locations (or on the way to them), they are in the grip of darkness, and the darkness must be pushed back before you can proceed.

Some of the puzzles in this iteration of the Zelda franchise are truly mind-bending, one in particular had me totally stuck for an hour, and that was the one and only time I really had to resort to a FAQ to get me through (I daresay I might have solved it with a bit more time, but an hour is long enough to waste on one puzzle I think). On the whole, the puzzles are of "medium" difficulty, requiring only a few minutes logical or lateral thinking before the solution prevents itself. A lot of the time it just requires you to go back a step or two, have a poke around, and find that vital thingy you need to move on.

There's almost nothing to criticize in any part of the game. The collection of "Tears Of Light" to rid the areas of darkness on your first visit to them can seem repetitive at first, but it's actually an excellent way of showing you the area before you have to explore it in depth.

The biggest difference between this and other Zelda games, namely your ability to transform into a wolf (and back) at will, at any point, borders on genius. Almost every area contains puzzle elements which require either your wolf form or your human form to solve, or both. This might seem like a lazy way of fleshing out the playing time to non-believers, but trust me, if you play the game, you will understand the genius behind it.

The boss battles (which take place in the final room of all the dungeons) are universally brilliant, requiring use of the main gizmo/toy earned in the respective dungeons to defeat the boss. My particular favourite is the boss at the end of the Arbiters Grounds dungeon, where you *SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER* The final battle with the ubiquitous Gannondorf is as epic a battle as you are likely to see in any game, taking place in four (five?) stages, from the top of a castle to a fight on horseback to final, one-on-one swordfight, to the death (the ending blow is not as good as the one in the Wind Waker though, where you leapt into the air and plunged your sword right into his forehead, a shocking end to such a cartoony game).

All in all, this is an incredibly brilliant game. The Wii-Remote controls are perfectly implemented, from swinging your sword to raising your shield, to aiming your bow and casting your fishing-line (yes, there's fishing, and it's totally brilliant). The standard of art presentation is flawless from start to finish, with each area having it's own individual character and theme music. There are too many tiny little flashes of brilliance to mention, and they come at you thick and fast.

There's a "but" though. I would give this game a mark of 99%. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina Of Time for the Nintendo 64, which came out nearly ten years ago, I would give a resounding 100%. This game, brilliant, astounding, amazing and incredible as it is, is an evolution of the Ocarina Of Time, not a revolution.

But that doesn't mean you shouldn't go out and buy it. RIGHT NOW. And take a week off work. Maybe two weeks.

www.zelda.com/universe