Pros: Plenty of tasks at hand with a great story and barely any mechanical flaws.
Cons: A few weak music tracks, very easy.
The bottom line: This is the reason to buy a Wii. A must for almost any video game fan.
Some game franchises are timeless. There are just some games that have commonly known (well, to nerds like me) icons or are even icons themselves. Mario is a good example; I’d say a large chunk of the general public can identify the little Italian turtle-hating plumber. The Legend of Zelda series is another iconic franchise: from its Nintendo Entertainment System roots the series has produced gaming classic after classic (in fact ign.com held a reader survey in which Ocarina of Time was pronounced the best game ever created, and the editors proclaimed it #2 on the all-time list ). So Twilight Princess has some big shoes to fill and some impressions to make; I have never played any games in the revered series (the Wii’s Virtual Console should fix that), and I’ve wondered what the fuss is all about. I’ve learned: Twilight Princess is easily one of the top five games I’ve ever played.

Story
As I said, this is my first Zelda game, so where this game fits in the lengthy timeline is beyond me. That however does not stop me from realizing the strength of this story despite its lack of voice acting.

The game starts with a teenager named Link who wrangles goats in his small village of Ordon. He is sent by the mayor to deliver a letter to Hyrule Castle. Just before he leaves, strange creatures take him away and abduct his friend Ilia. When he awakens, Link is a wolf, and a floating impish creature named Midna is sarcastically goading him to leave. Link soon realizes that Midna is on a quest to recover the Fused Shadows, items that could restore peace to her world, the Twilight Realm. Zant has usurped the Twilight Realm throne and forced Hyrule’s princess Zelda into turning the world of light over to him. Naturally the first thing he does is blanket all of Hyrule in twilight and turns everyone into a spirit. It’s up to Link and Midna to restore their worlds. While things start slowly, the plot only improves as it goes along. Not far into the game shocking revelations will appear at every turn even to the last five minutes of gameplay. This is definitely a strong story that drives the game along even minus voice acting.

Gameplay
This is the Zelda series’ trademark. This series blazes new paths left and right (or at least so I’ve gathered). This is the biggest reason why this edition in the series is such a strong one in my mind.

The basic premise is simple; get whatever you’re sent to gather by clearing dungeons. Dungeons also follow a simple premise: fight enemies in your way use small keys to open locked doors, use the Big Key to open boss’s lairs and fight the boss. The uniqueness comes in how those goals are all accomplished. Within and between dungeons Link is presented with new tools; grapple hooks, iron boots, boomerangs and a magic scepter are just a few. They all help you accomplish the puzzles that can be utterly mindblowing at times (ign.com’s Guide feature became a favorite of mine with this game). With each level new ideas are presented; use a Dominion Rod to take control of a statue to accomplish new tasks, use a grapple to trigger a switch to get on your way, use a spinning disk to climb a wall in an ancient temple…the possibilities are many.

Much has been made of the Wii’s motion-sensing remote and its occasionally gimmicky use. Twilight Princess is one game that makes the remote a complement to the action and not the sole focus. The remote is used for aiming weapons and gadgets as well as sword fighting. Unfortunately the game doesn’t track your movements exactly; a shake of the remote triggers a slash from Link, but this doesn’t hurt the game as much as you might think; you still get a big adrenaline rush fighting enemies. The nunchuck is used for the famous spin attack and plays a role in some of the unlockable skills. The camera works very well for a game without a second analog stick; the camera usually does a nice job on its own, but it can easily be centered with a quick tap of Z (also the lock-on button; putting the two on the same button does get a tad annoying). The close-up third-person view used in aiming gadgets works nicely as well. So all told the game has its control scheme down pat unless you’re lefthanded—I had played a PS2 for years, and on that system the left analog stick is used for movement, so I was fine. With the Wii however the analog stick was assigned to my right hand, so that did take some getting used to.

That seems pretty basic, but there’s a nice twist in this version of the game. Link now has the ability to turn into a wolf under certain circumstances. The game does a nice job adapting the control scheme; the remote now controls Link’s biting instead of his sword (although the lack of a finishing move is sorely missed in combat). As a wolf Link also has an ability to sense spirits and other hidden objects and track scents. Everything works as it’s supposed to do, and at times these segments can be quite fun, but honestly most of the time it’s much more fun to be the standard sword-wielding hero. I much prefer riding Epona to being a wolf; the levels where you get engaged in horseback combat are thrilling.

So the vast majority of the technical aspects are solid, but how does the game actually play? Trust me; everything is extremely entertaining with the exception of some wolf quests. Each dungeon and the segments between dungeons dare you to think and use your tools and skills in new ways. There’s an incredible amount of things to do outside of the main story as well; there are Heart Pieces to gather, Poe Souls to capture, Golden Bugs to snag, a secret dungeon and plenty of other things to do. All of this is on top of a main story that can take 40-50 hours to complete which means that this game has a ridiculous amount of replay value. And with only a few exceptions it never gets old; this game is an engrossing experience that will keep you coming back. Yes, the dungeons can get frustrating, and the game mostly very easy, but this game still has a ridiculous amount of entertaining things to do.

Graphics
On top of the infamous motion-sensing gameplay the Wii has been noted for lesser-quality graphics. While Twilight Princess won’t amaze like an Xbox 360 game will in terms of detail, at no point will you saying anything against the graphics. Where the game impresses is with style (I dare you to find a game that even vaguely resembles the Twilight Realm and its inhabitants), scale (Nintendo claims that to go from one end to the other would take forty minutes; I’d say around twenty) and in animations (Link’s movements look quite natural). Lake Hylia is one spot where the detail impresses; the huge watery landscape can look remarkable. Character models like those of Gorons and Zoras are also quite good. The twilight-clouded areas can get a bit drab, but even they are unique. So while this game doesn’t quite stack up to next-generation consoles, it’s still certainly very strong.

Sound
The music in this game alternates between orchestrated and synthesized with the former almost always being the stronger. All told the music is a mixed bag; the themes of Hyrule Field and Snowpeak Mountain rank among the best game songs I’ve ever heard, but the City in the Sky song with its nasal weird voices and the bland twilight-clouded area music get annoying quickly. Fortunately there are many more great songs that outweigh the two weaker ones. As for sound effects for the most part nothing is particularly annoying although the tinny sounds from the Wii remote speaker isn’t particularly enthralling (and if you don’t love the sound of an anxious chicken, you have no sense of humor). There’s no voice acting per se aside from some foreign babbling and Link’s grunts neither of which get annoying. Overall the game’s sound is solid.

All things said and done the reason to play a game is the gameplay. Games are supposed to be fun. Twilight Princess has fun in spades even if the fun is easy and not as beautiful as some other games. Even with the flaws I’ve mentioned the game’s sheer amount of depth and entertainment combined with almost no technical issues makes it easily one of the top five games that I’ve played in my lifetime.

Final Scores
Story-94%
Graphics-88%
Sound-87%
Gameplay/Mechanics-99%
5 Stars