As for my Zeldality, I enjoyed Wind Waker.  I think XLord summarized my feelings well when he said the game was charming, unique, and fun.  I do agree that it wasn't perfect, was a bit too easy, too much ocean traveling, but overall a memorable experience.  Also, let me say that the final battles (since there are always more than one, and by the way I thought it was fairly challenging) is probably the best Zelda final-battles ever (except for OOT)!

As for other 3D Zeldas, Majora's Mask is still by far my favorite!  In fact, MM ranks as one of THE very best Zelda games in my book.  I thought the storyline, music, action, challenge...just about everything in that game was superb!  As for Okami, it certainly looks great and has received lots of praise.  However, calling it a Zelda Killer is kinda silly in my opinion.  On the other hand, calling Twilight Princess a PS3 killer might be right, since you can get TP and a Wii for 1/2 the cost of a PS3!

cheers,

-avatar!

@ XLord007 and Qui-Gon Joe

What made Wind Waker's dungeon designs worth noting to you two?  Being devoid of challenging adversaries and clever puzzles notwithstanding, I thought the actual dungeon designs weren't nearly as thought out and well crafted as the ones in Ocarina of Time or Majora's Mask.  For instance, none of WW's dungeons reached the sheer brilliance of, say, OoT's Forest Temple (the twisty hallways) or MM's Rockvale (Stone Tower Temple in the U.S. release [though "Rockvale" is a much cooler name] - which is, in my opinion, the most impressive dungeon design I've seen yet in any adventure or role-playing game).

Play Flag Tag (or whatever it's called) mode with proxies in the basement for the most chaotic multiplayer ever.  You'll probably end up destroying the flag in the first minute or so, but that's part of the charm. ;-)

Majora's Mask, yes.  Probably the hardest Zelda game since the NES days, especially if you wanted all the masks.  Anyway, I'm so torn on that one because everything you said above is completely true, but then there's the time limit.  I really, really hated the time limit.  I can understand its purpose and the nifty things it does for the gameplay in the world, but it completely ruins the fun of Zelda in the dungeons.  If Nintendo just suspended the time limit when you were in the dungeons, it would probably be my second favorite Zelda after Ocarina.

I don't recall saying that.  I said I would be watching Okami's dungeons to see if they had the puzzle solving and level design quality of the Zelda series, but I don't think I said anything about Wind Waker's dungeons other than that there are too few of them and that the game as a whole is too easy (if I didn't say that part before, I'm saying it now).  I completely agree that Wind Waker's dungeon designs are much simpler and less interesting than those in Ocarina and Majora.

I said that in my post. I think that the dungeons were the most fun part of the game. I'm not saying they reached OOT standards, or even scraped the brilliance of LTTP, but compared to the amount of filler in WW the dungeons kicked ass. Huge ass. Lots and lots of ass.

That pretty much sums up my thoughts on it too.  I will say, though, that the fire dungeon, forest dungeon, and Tower of the Gods were better than the last two dungeons.  There was something really organic and sensical about the way stuff worked in the early ones.

Hmm, maybe Im the only here, but I did think the characters in the whole game were really funny. That broke grampa really cracked me up. Same goes for that little boy with the snotty nose. Their actions whenever you came near to them was just hilarious. Other than that I really digged that village second village with that rich guy who stole from the grampa.

Funny how one element can really bother one in a game. I suppose the sea travellin in WW was the primary thing that ruined the experience for me. But I never had any problem at all with the time limit in Majora. With that scarecrow's song I thought there was still quite a lot of time on hand, and if Im correct enough to complete the dungeons in one go. But then again, this game was more about the whole overworld to me. The dungeons didn't play such an important role as in Ocarina.

Majora' Mask, I think it's the greatest Zelda game. I certainly had the most fun with it. It was the notebook that really absorbed me, pure brilliance. The comparison of OoT and MM is sort of similar to Golden Eye VS Perfect Dark. OoT and GE were landmark console titles. But the sequels were more intricate and deeper.

PS: Proximity mines in Complex is where it's at. And the farsight in Car Park.

You CAN complete the whole of MM, outside the initial three days, in one period...though I've not positive if you have to glitch out of the city to collect some money or not, which is what the person who did the speed run of it did.
It's also probable based on his actions that you have to do a LOT of extranious mask and other item switching to keep the internal clock down....

-Joshua

I agree.  I thought the time limit only hindered the game in one area --- the dungeons.  Otherwise, I had no problem with it.  I think there was a little too much hand-holding in them.  For example, in Rockvale Temple, there is a sunshine face that you have to shine light on while the dungeon is right-side up in order for a chest to appear in the very first area.  IIRC, there's only a blue rupee in the chest.  However, when the dungeon is upside-down, that chest has to be there in order for you to get to the boss because you need it to hookshot to the upper level.  If it wasn't for Tatl, it would've probably taken me days to figure that out.  Another example would be smashing the ice pillars in Snowhead Temple.  They knew they had to help you through the dungeons because, if the player ran out of time, they'd have to start the dungeons all over from scratch, and many people would've been annoyed and complained.  So I understand the hand-holding, but I think, as XLord007 said, the time limit should've been suspended altogether in the dungeons.  There were quite a few potential stumpers that were halfway spelled out for you -- a definite 'no-no' for the Zelda masochist such as myself.  Anyways, Majora's Mask has solidified it's place as my second favorite Zelda (edged out by OoT). 

@ XLord007 - Sorry, got you mixed up with Zane before.

Also, I have to co-sign with Yuvraj... Proximity Mines + Complex = Riot

Personally, I like prox mines in the cavern level.  The shading makes it hard to see the mines even if they're directly in front of you.

Just got this game.  It was sold out locally when it first came out.

I just played Okami for three hours, and sweet Jesus this is f'n incredible. I'm not too far in, obviously, but I'm far enough to have gotten hooked. The first hour or so was slow, but once you get past the village things really heat up. Great stuff!!!

Just hit the thirteen hour mark myself, and got past the second major boss, the Crimson Helm.  These boss battles are freaken spectacular, by the way.  ^_^

The sense of progression is absolutely wonderful; gathering Praise, raising stats, gaining new brush techniques to expand your passages to the world, learning new techniques in battle, and gaining access to miscellaneous items that further adds to the gameplay. (For instance, I just snagged the Golden Lucky Cat for 50 demon horns, which automatically collects items and money won in battles and fields for you.  Useful!)

And the story is becoming more and more compelling, where even the NPCs play roles far more integral to the overarching plot than one might think.

18 hours in.  Passed the first half of the game.

This is Capcom/Clover's magnum opus for 2006.  This should be up there as a game of the year.

18 hours and you're just halfway through? I didn't think this game would seriously live up to the advertised length. After all, not many do...

One minor grievance about Okami: the slow, non-skippable text. Some of the main events have really slow text that isn't fast-forwardable like the banal town chit chat. It kinda sucks when you're rearing and ready to go and, oh, what's this? That little bug dude has something to say for ten minutes that you can't skip through? Oh, great.

Minor complaint, though. I'm just throwing rocks at a tank.

Yeah, I'm going without an FAQ and doing some exploring, but it's about 18 hours to get through completing the initial story of the game.

Eh?  But if you're not using a FAQ, how can you possibly gauge eighteen hours as being the halfway mark? ;) 

Just where exactly are you in the game right now?  Because I can tell you exactly how far you're into it; I picked up the Bradygames guide today.  Mostly for the art work and character designs, in which there's plenty of both, but it's actually a very efficient and well-written book.  Definitely a higher standard than other Bradygames guides.

A stack of Post-It notes is of higher standard than other Bradygames guides.

Halfway is a bit subjective.  I considered the halfway mark to be that I'm going into the "ultimate battle" with only about 1/3 of the map accessible.  That still took about 18 hours. I tried to dig up every hidden nook and feed all the animals along the way (skipping the feeding scenes), and it still took about 18 hours. I wasted 1 hour doing fishing.  The fish sell pretty well.

Sei-An City (not liberated from evil).  Recovered the special item needed to advance further into the city.

I'm gonna have to disagree here.  The book is pretty, but not a great reference.  I'm sure it's fine for people who want to use it as a walkthrough, but I like to find things on my own while using the book to answer the sorts of questions that instruction manuals used to cover (remember the old Square games that came with charts explaining what all the weapons and magic did?).  For example, I wanted to know what the hell the Traveler's Charm did.  I got the charm in the beginning of the game and in the in-game description is super vague.  So, I turn to the front section of the guide where it talks about the weapons and items, and lo and behold it's the exact same useless definition as in the game.  Thanks.  The game does eventually explain what the damn things do, but not until about 10 hours in.

I'm around 17 hours in and not even at the second boss yet, but then I like to explore very thoroughly and I'm known to take much longer than others (IGN said RE4 was 20 hours, but I went for 45 hours the first time through).

Geez, man...  What the hell were you doing all that time?

Mastering every room.  I kept replaying each room to see all the different permutations of enemy patterns until I could basically perfect each room before moving to the next room.  It made me feel like I was playing a true successor to GoldenEye, but without having to start from the beginning each time.  After beating it, I sold all the extra health pick-ups and ammo I saved and was able to get the typewriter, so I put in another 10 hours doing a speed run with the typewriter.  Plus another 3 hours with Ada and a little while with the Mercenaries mode (which I never really got into).

Is it any wonder I consider RE4 to be far and away the best game of the generation?  Twilight Princess will have to be really special to top it.

Oh really? I thought Mercenaries was an absolute kick. It pretty much shows why this game is just a blast to play other than the amazing settings and atmosphere. You should play it with some friends, I had a couple of really fun nights with it. Pure gaming. I mean, you can easily go wrong with good art direction, think Shadow of the Colossus (how anyone could control a character that is as stiff as a poker is beyond me, I stopped at the first boss)

Hardly. I might agree actually, but my personal favorite is/was Metroid Prime. And TwiPri is more of a next-gen title to me now.

I second that... Metroid Prime.

I dug RE4 a ton... but I'll third the MP love.

You know, that is acutally one of the (many) things I loved about this game: the fact that the hero IS a kind of clumsy young guy, as ANY REAL PERSON would be when faced by a monster that is about a 1000 times his own size.
He gets knocked over by tremors, and he stumbles, and he even gets scratched up as the game progresses.
I loved just about everything about that game.

Agreed on liking the hero in Shadow of the Colossus.  I really really appreciated that he controlled like a real person rather than like a video game character.

Because everything else in the game was soooo realistic?

I really wanted to like SotC, but the controls ruined it for me.  It just wasn't fun.

I don't know why it was brought up, but Shadow of the Colossus was great, although I think ICO was a better game.  I look forward to whatever else that team will be released... I just hope it isn't on PSP ever or PS3 until the price drops.

As for Okami, I got it from Gamefly, played it for two hours, and then bought it---it's definitely a no-brainer for $40, so getting it for $25 was pretty much a steal.  I agree with Zane's really minor gripe, that slow-as-hell text is annoying, especially since that flea thing loves to talk way too much.  And another gripe is that gibberish noise, like Chibi-Robo, that can go away completely.

I finished the game.  I clocked over 67 hours.  I didn't try to max out the fish and animal tomes, but I'm pretty sure I got all the sidequests and I did get all the stray beads (some of which were difficult to get).

The final boss was weird.

The game was definitely a tour-de-force for adventure games.

Great job!  At this point, I've got a long, long way to go; due to an unfortunate incident with my memory card, my main Okami save file (of which I had about twenty hours locked in) had been erased -- along with the rest of my five years worth of PS2 save files.   I was crushed.  -_-;

Oh no! That really sucks!

On the bright side, Okami is so much fun that retracing your steps shouldn't be too painful...