Remaking Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks

While replaying Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks, it became very apparent to me that these two games are going to be the next big Zelda remakes, maybe even made by GREZZO. I know that a lot of Zelda fans are probably sick of remakes / remasters by now, especially Twilight Princess HD seems somewhat unnecessary at the moment, but it's also partly our own fault, since we literally begged for Majora's Mask 3D to happen.

Anyway, I'm not talking about this generation, but about the next with the NX and whatever there may come. Right now you can still play these games on both Nintendo 3DS and Wii U, so there's no direct demand. We all want Zelda U next and if we get bored in a couple of years, let us have these.

Graphics

The current Wii U versions certainly do tell their age. The Nintendo DS wasn't really great for 3D graphics starting with an entire lack of shading and quite pixelated 3D visuals. When I rode the train in Spirit Tracks, I constantly imagined how the beautiful the game world would look like in a 3D or HD remake. Of all Zelda games, these two certainly would require the graphics update the most, since early 3D graphics didn't age well – unlike 2D sprite graphics, which still look fine today.

 

Controls

A lot of Zelda fans also probably would wish for optional button controls and after coming from Tri Force Heroes I also felt the urge to play these games with the GamePad in my hands. However, while an analog stick or slide pad certainly offers the same precision as the touchscreen controls, it would not offer the same speed. This is very obvious with the archery minigames, where there's no way that you would be able to pull off a high score with button controls. You really need that point and click speed.

But for the most part I could see the games working with button controls, at least during top-down view. The boat and train rides on the other hand were really developed around touch, but even there I could imagine that you would steer with the left analog stick, view around with right stick and precisely aim with the gyroscope. That could work just fine. This way you could also play the games on a 3D screen...

Treasure System

This needs to change so badly. There's an annoying level of grinding required in both games, if you want to complete your collections of Ship Parts and Train Cars. And fighting a random number generator is usually not the best use of your gaming time. In Phantom Hourglass the massive size of the collection was an issue, where getting the last few parts could take quite long, while in Spirit Tracks they improved the system, but made some treasures super rare for you, so you would have to trade with others.

But Phantom Hourglass should simply follow the approach of Spirit Tracks. Instead of finding the Ship Parts everywhere, you simply buy them from treasures. The best place would be the Treasure Teller in Mercay:

It makes a lot of sense. He has the money and the goods, while he lives right next to Mercay's shipyard. This certainly makes more sense than finding gigantic Ship Parts in small chests... Just replace all those with treasures, which you then use to buy the Ship Parts. In the game one treasure corresponds to one set of Ship Parts in their values, like this:

• Pink Coral ↔ Bright Parts
• White Pearl Loop ↔ Iron Parts
• Black Pearl Loop ↔ Stone Parts
• Zora Scale ↔ Vintage Parts
• Goron Amber ↔ Demon Parts
• Ruto Crown ↔ Tropical Parts
• Helmaroc Feather ↔ Tourist Parts
• Regal Ring ↔ Golden Parts

And I wouldn't go for crazy prices like in Spirit Tracks, since there are so many Ship Parts. I would simply make it so that one treasure gives you a Ship Part of the corresponding set. So, from a Ruto Crown you can get a new tropical part. And from a Regal Ring you earn a golden part. That way you won't keep getting duplicates, like in the original, where you might find five Golden Chimneys in a row, but not that Golden Wheel that you still need. Here you simply would get another gold part, as soon as you find another Regal Ring. And if you've already completed the gold set, you can still sell the Regal Rings for 1500 Rupees, which was their original use.

In Spirit Tracks they just have to get rid of the random rare treasures per savegame. Treasures of the same price should all have the same chance of appearing. This already would improve and fasten things a lot.

But additionally they should also add more spots, where you can find a specific treasure. The game already has this partly: you can get Stalfos Skulls from killing Stalfos, you can get Bee Larva from destroying bee hives, and you will always get a Regal Ring in the Lost at Sea Station. They could do more than that, e.g. scoring high in the Goron Target Range always gives you Goron Amber. Something that makes sense.

Ship Parts and Train Cars Abilities

Tri Force Heroes showed that appearances alone don't matter: the outfits in the game might look interesting, but they most importantly give you different abilities. And this could even be adapted here in various ways by completing a set of Ship Parts and Train Cars. So, each completed set would offer a certain perk next to the additional hearts. These could be things like:

• Enhanced Speed
• Big Cannonballs
• Triple Cannonballs
• Scaring Enemies
• Higher Jumps (PH)
• Quicker Salvaging (PH)
• Happier Passengers (ST)
• Freight Protection (ST)

For example Demon Ship and the Dragon Train scare enemies away, so you won't get attacked as often by pirates and the like. The Iron Ship and Skull Train could offer stronger cannons, while the Cake Train makes its passengers extra happy, so you don't lose points as easily. Stuff like that.

Other Improvements

Since improving the game flow was a big thing in all Zelda remakes so far, the Nintendo DS Zelda games certainly wouldn't be an exception. I guess, the Temple of the Ocean King is the first thing that would come to mind for many Zelda fans, but I personally enjoy it the way it is. They could add more midway points though. Some people only have an issue with repeating sections, so let them skip them. I never use the midway point, because I want to use shortcuts for an optimal time, but I wouldn't mind the option.

But I personally would look more into Spirit Tracks when it comes to improving things, starting with the slow train rides. Just make it faster, problem solved. Add a 3rd gear and maybe a 2nd reverse gear. And maybe even add some of these insane Tears of Light on the overworld for light speed travel. Those could even be unlocked by Force Gems and new tracks, since some of the additional tracks are quite useless. Naturally, the boat in Phantom Hourglass also could need an additional gear, but thanks to the teleporting the boat rides are not as tedious already...

The whole Phantom mechanics in Spirit Tracks could also be smoother. Maybe add a way to control the Phantom directly, instead of just drawing paths. The Phantom should also be faster and less prone to run into obstacles.

With Phantom Hourglass I would also want the fishing to be improved, so it's less random, especially getting a Stowfish. Spirit Tracks on the other hand needs a bigger Rabbit Net, which you should get after collecting 10 Rabbits or so. The minigame is way too annoying the way it is...

Additonal Features

Hero Mode from the start. Clear thing. Easy Zelda games are too easy.

With Phantom Hourglass they could also add something similar to the "Take 'Em All On!" challenge, where you fight lots of enemies and have a way to rebattle all bosses again. Don't lock it behind amiibo though...

Replaying Spirit Tracks on the Wii U

Done. This was the third time that I have completed this game. I went for the 100%, so I've caught all Rabbits, unlocked all tracks, got all Train Cars, earned a Diamond membership at Beedle's shop, scored 999 hits in the sword training (technically only 900 is necessary) and so on. I'm even a little sad that it's over. And that's some big statement considering that I usually claim this to be one of my least favorite Zelda games and the Zelda game with the lowest replay value.

Especially when I replayed this game in late 2010 (see here), I complained about, how slow this game really can be. But I guess, I went back to the game too early. Now, five years later, I didn't mind the train riding as much. The beautiful music really helps, as well as the entire scenery, though most of the time I simply imagined, how this pixelated mess would look like in a pretty 3D remake.

Pace

It still takes its time, I clocked 44 hours for this replay, ten more than with Phantom Hourglass. This is easily one of the longest Zelda games to complete, but not because it offers so much content, but because it plays quite slowly and a lot of grinding is required to complete your Train Cars collection.

One example of slowness, which really struck me this time around, are these birds around Papuchia, which you need to get from one small island to the next. In Phantom Hourglass you would simply draw a line with your Grappling Hook and you're over there in a split second. In this game you have to call the birds with a song, then attach to them with you whip and hold as they slowly fly towards your destination... Ugh.

But I've already compared both games in the past, where I pointed out, how Phantom Hourglass plays significantly faster in many ways.

Totem Time

I also wasn't very fond of the entire Phantom mechanics this time around, especially the path drawing feels inconvenient. And the Phantom is a lot slower than you, so you have to keep waiting for it, so the whole gameplay just drags on too much in these parts.

But it was interesting to see, how this game inspired the whole totem mechanic of Tri Force Heroes. I almost forget about these things and after playing Tri Force Heroes a lot, going through these parts again was quite the surprise. The Phantom takes you piggyback, where you use the Whirlwind to blow off enemies riding on Armos. There's even a part, where the Phantom blocks flame throwers in order for you to pass, where a very similar puzzle exists in the Fortress area of Tri Force Heroes.

I also have to say that the final part of the Tower of Spirits is ingenious, easily one of the most clever dungeon parts in the series. This had good replay value, since even though I played this for the third time, I still struggled with some of the solutions. And it's rare to find puzzles of that quality in Zelda. Though a part of it had to do with the fact that you have to cross that long lava pit multiple times, because it takes a while to unlock shortcuts, which was rather badly designed and again adds to the slow pace of this game.

Spirit Flute

While the slow pace wasn't as much of turn-off as the last time, on the Wii U Virtual Console I was faced with an entire new problem. Let me present to you the real final boss of the game:

That's right, the Spirit Flute! Or let's better say the Wii U microphone. It really doesn't work well with this game and now I can fully understand the frustration people had in the original with this feature. On my Nintendo DS Lite playing the Spirit Flute never was an issue - blowing into the mic gave a continuous tone, as it should. If I ever had problems, it was with staying in tact. But the Wii U microphone seems to have some sort of noise filter activated. So, whenever you start blowing into the microphone, it shuts off. Or at least that's my theory, how it works, because it simply doesn't register all your hot air the same way the Nintendo DS did. And this can be super frustrating. Imagine that you want to play the right note, but nothing happens. And it's not your fault.

I'm not even exactly sure, how I did it in the end, but mostly I used short bursts to play every note individually. This, however, might take too long. And sometimes even this doesn't help, where you can blow at the thing all you want and nothing happens. Finding a good angle helps, but mostly it's just luck and you have to keep trying many, many times in order to complete all the Lokomo duets.

This even put me off, when I started to replay the game on the Wii U. Originally I wanted to play this right after Phantom Hourglass, but I ended up playing all the GBC Zelda games instead. I even continued with Harvest Moon GB afterwards, just because I felt replaying that would be more joy than the messed up Spirit Flute. But this week I finally got myself around to finish this despite the technical difficulties.

Nintendo needs to fix this somehow, either get the microphone to work properly or offer a button for microphone input. They still haven't released this elsewhere and this might even have to do with these issues...

Treasures

Another big problem in Spirit Tracks are also the fake rare treasures, which is every completionist's nightmare. Random stuff is bad enough, but random stuff with tampered probabilities is a lot worse. In Spirit Tracks some treasure might appear for you very rarely in order to have an incentive to actually use that Contact Mode with other people. In the original this was already an issue, but on the VC you can't even use this feature anymore and Nintendo didn't bother with fixing this problem, so you're stuck with near endless grinding.

This time I even had it a lot worse than on my cartridge savegames, where only two treasures seemed to be rare at a time. Now, the following five treasures played hard to get:

• Demon Fossils
• Star Fragments
• Dark Pearl Loops
• Ruto Crowns
• Mystic Jade

What a mess! In my original playthrough on the Nintendo DS it used to be Wood Hearts and Black Pearl Loops. And when I replayed the game for the first time it was Bee Larva (I believe) and White Pearl Loops / Pearl Necklaces. And now I got this...

This was the first time that a 500 Rupee treasure turned out to be rare for me. And two of both the 50 Rupee and 150 Rupee category. With the 50 Rupee treasures this actually felt natural, since blowing leaves in Whittleton gives you acorns, bee larva and skulls most of the time... things that you actually might find under foliage, as opposed to fossils and crystals. And the Demon Fossils didn't appear to be rare at first, while the Star Fragments did. You only need nine Star Fragments, so this is one of the best treasures to be rare, but it later on appeared more often (though not as often as the others), while the Demon Fossils wouldn't show at all for me. And you need 25 of those...

With the higher prized categories I tried to abuse the Restore Points of the Virtual Console, but it didn't really help much. It felt like the probablities to get that Mystic Jade were around 1%, so I could reload dozens of times without any luck. But similar to Phantom Hourglass the game starts to have these bursts, where you suddenly you keep getting what you need, if you try long enough. Or at least it changes the probabilities temporarily, so a mixture of replaying the same minigame and Restore Points did the trick.

I also noticed, how either the Alchemy Stone / Gold Crystal or the Regal Ring will be rare for you. I went back to my old savegames on the Nintendo DS, where on my 2nd playthrough I didn't have many Alchemy Stones, but lots of Regal Rings. This time it was the other way around, I would find Alchemy Stones in random spots, but Regal Rings only in their set spots. Which actually is better, since you can always get more Regal Rings from the Lost at Sea Station (one of my favorite mini dungeons). The Alchemy Stone doesn't have a similar spot. Though this is only an issue, if you actually sell them.

It's quite weird, how this game is already six years old and in all this time no one has found out, how exactly the whole treasure system works with its probabilities. It would be nice to know...

Restore Points

While they didn't help too much with the treasures, Restore Points were at least very helpful with other things, especially the rabbits. Trying to catch all those can be frustrating, because if you miss, you have to go back to the nearest station. And some of these rabbits are very hard to catch. But luckily this was not an issue on the Virtual Console.

It also enabled me to do the 999 hits in the sword minigame in the "intended" way. Originally I abused a glitch to get there, but I couldn't get it to work this time. So, I decided to do those 999 hits the real way with the assistance of Restore Points, which really makes this bearable. I couldn't do it without it and I have huge respect for anyone, who did.

If A Link Between Worlds will ever be playable with Restore Points, then that's when I will finally complete the game with the 999.99 Cucco Run challenge. Even that would be bearable then.

Fin

Despite all the issues I enjoyed replaying Spirit Tracks more than I thought I would. I probably won't play this game again until there will be some updated remake, which I suspect might already happen in the next generation. Both Nintendo DS Zelda games haven't aged well with those graphics and there are many things to improve here, where I probably make another blog post about this. But it was nice to refresh my memories of this game a little.

Next Zelda games on my replay list are the NES Classics on the 3DS Virtual Console, where I probably just keep praising Restore Points. I will play these in February, which certainly will be a nice fit for the start of the anniversary. And in March I will be busy essentially replaying Twilight Princess with its HD re-release.

After the Nintendo DS Zeldas I also really want to replay Skyward Sword, since it followed these games, but I still don't have a TV yet, so this will have to wait until later this year...

30th Anniversary Banner?

The 30th Anniversary of The Legend of Zelda starts on February 21st, in less than a month. And in March Nintendo is already releasing lots of Zelda stuff like Twilight Princess HD, the New Nintendo 3DS XL Hyrule Edition (in Europe) and Hyrule Warriors Legends in the West. But why is nothing here already put under the 30th Anniversary banner?

(image by Alexander Martinez)

Well, some of these things were already released earlier in other regions, but at least Twilight Princess HD should fully fall under the 30th Anniversary releases. And in 2011 nearly everything Zelda was released under the 25th Anniversary banner, starting with the Ocarina of Time 3D soundtrack CD. So, why not here? What are they waiting for?

Okay, in 2011 the Anniversary banner was already revealed at GDC in March, but they waited for the E3 to reveal their full 25th Anniversary plans, so Ocarina of Time 3D itself didn't receive this label at first. And the same might happen right now with Twilight Princess HD and all the other March releases. It's still quite curious, because it feels like they would start advertising all these products with the anniversary right away, instead of waiting until E3, just for the hype of it.

And what will be left? 2011 had the reveal of 25th Anniversary concerts, the Four Swords Anniversary Edition, Hyrule Historia, Skyward Sword with a golden Wii Remote and more. There were quite some big surprises and I wonder, what surprises the 30th Anniversary will offer.

Naturally the Zelda game for Wii U will get the most attention and considering that the 30th Anniversary of Super Mario Bros. focused almost solely on Super Mario Maker, it's entirely possible that Zelda U will be the entire focus of the 30th Anniversary as well. Aonuma said that there might be 30th Anniversary concerts, but that's nothing new or surprising, especially since they have Zelda concerts all year long.

But what else could they do? We have been recently teased by the new president Kimishima that Nintendo is licensing movies and TV animes, where something for Zelda would certainly be a surprise, which might please many Zelda fans...

I'm also considering the possibility of a smaller release, maybe revolving around the first Zelda game, like a new Zelda game that is made in a similar style, though we certainly had our share of remakes, remasters and requels in the last years. But The Legend of Zelda for the Wii U is going to be the 19th Zelda game, unless they put some small game before that, because then Zelda U would be the 20th Zelda game during the 30th Anniversary, offering a double anniversary. For this the release would have to be something original though or at least something similar to A Link Between Worlds, because remakes, remasters and re-releases don't count.

This brings me back to my idea of Random Zelda, where you might have a game following the style of the first Zelda game, which randomly generates worlds and dungeons each time you play it. This could be interesting, but it would also fall behind Super Mario Maker, while being too similar at the same time.

With the 25th Anniversary they wanted to avoid doing the same things they did for Mario and this will probably apply to the 30th Anniversary of Zelda as well, while at the same time they want to avoid copying the 25th Anniversary of Zelda. Nintendo wants to surprise people for better or worse, where a Zelda anime certainly would feel different enough from anything they've done so far, not counting that 90s TV show (though I personally find that one hilarious). Imagine an anime in the same art style as Zelda U - the game already gives you a certain anime vibe, which could be expanded upon.

Anyway, still I would like to see something like the "Realm of Memories" as a new set of levels for Tri Force Heroes as a 30th Anniversary gift, though this would be quite similar to Four Swords in 2011. And they probably shouldn't wait until E3 to release new content for Tri Force Heroes, this game needs attention now.

Twilight Princess HD: Poe Lantern?

Nintendo Minute posted a video tour of Twilight Princess HD last night and it revealed a couple more improvements. What they show directly is the quick transform, where you just have to tap the GamePad to transform between human and wolf, which sure is handy.

But there is something even more interesting. If you look at the HUD, you can spot a new lantern item on the Y button:

This isn't the classic lantern, which looks like this:

Nintendo of Europe updated their artworks for this game, which is where I got this image from, so the design of the normal Lantern hasn't changed. And the new item rather looks like the lanterns carried by Poes:

Now, this is very interesting! What could it do?

It could be an upgrade for the normal lantern, which doesn't require any oil. But that alone would be rather boring and unnecessary. And one of my suggestions for the HD release was a way to change time in the form of an item. And this could be it, it's even a very good choice. Whenever you take out the lantern, it turns night. Or Poes appear even during the day.

The main reason, why I want to change the daytime, is collecting Poes. So, as long as the Poe Lantern helps with that, I'm happy. It could also do both upgrade the normal lantern and act as a help for collecting Poes. We will see.

As to where you get it, it could simply be a reward for collecting a smaller number of Poe Souls, like 10 or 20. In the original this quests lacked some rewards, especially when compared to the different rewards you got from Skulltula hunting in Ocarina of Time. But in Twilight Princess you got a new bottle at 20 Poe Souls and the infinite Rupees at 60. It could make sense to change this up a little in order to squeeze the Poe Lantern in there somewhere. But it could also be hidden on Kakariko Graveyard, where it thematically would fit in very well.

Twilight Princess HD: Ganondorf & Wolf Link amiibo Features

With the upcoming Famitsu there is more info about the use of (sc)amiibo in Twilight Princess HD and you can find the details here.

Trial of the Beast

So, this "Twilight Cave" turned out to be yet another Cave of Ordeals, this time with 40 floors, where you can only play as a wolf. Boring.

With the remakes Ocarina of Time 3D and Majora's Mask 3D I was both times actually hoping for a trial dungeon like this. Now they finally add one, but it's for a game that already has one? Why, Nintendo? Oh, I know why: to sell amiibo...

However, it doesn't strike me as the biggest selling point, since you can already play through the Cave of Ordeals as a wolf. Nothing special here. It even seems like they put this new dungeon in the desert... how original!

The reward is the "Bottomless Wallet" holding 9999 Rupees (not just 2000 as I previously thought), which is the same maximum as in the Nintendo DS Zelda. Considering the Magic Armor it seems way too much and unbalanced, but I don't really care.

The part about the save data still isn't clear yet, but the way I understood it is that you can save your progress in the dungeon on the amiibo. You can then return to floor 35 or whatever, but you will have the same number of hearts as when you've saved. I guess it's not the worst way to use an external memory chip of 8KB, but I was hoping for something more intriguing. At least there seems to be an incentive to keep using the amiibo throughout the dungeon, instead of just using it to open the front door, which is good.

And even if it worked that way, the question remains, what Zelda U will do with the data. Will it just recognize the data to unlock something or will your progress in the Twilight Cave be actually meaningful? We will have to wait and see.


Ganondorf amiibo = Hero Mode²

Now here's some secondary amiibo use that I find clever! If you scan the Ganondorf amiibo, the Heart Meter turns temporarily blue and you will receive double damage during this duration. It's like a curse and it makes perfect sense with the Ganondorf amiibo that it actually would not help you, but Ganondorf in the game. I suppose, it will even stack with the official Hero Mode for an extra self-imposed challenge for whenever you feel like it.

According to Famitsu there won't be any rewards, you just use it to challenge yourself, which is good. It's similar to the Cursed Ring or the Bear Minimum outfit, before it got upgraded by Hero Points. And I like that.

This has it all right. It doesn't unlock anything, but instead it's used for an interesting temporary effect, which can be related to the character and where you might want to keep using the Ganondorf amiibo. Feel like the game is still too easy? Just scan Ganondorf to let him curse you!

I feel like this is an example, where amiibo was done right. This is something, where I might even want to buy the amiibo just for this game, but not because I feel forced to. You're not missing out, if you don't have the amiibo, since there's already the Hero Mode, but it's a worthwhile effect to have for the fun of it.

The other Zelda amiibo are not on par with this, they offer small cheats, which might came in handy, but nothing you really would want to have. For example scanning the Toon Link amiibo could change the music into tunes from The Wind Waker... But let's not give them too crazy ideas for the sake of our wallets and as long as I won't miss any content, I'm fine.


But overall I'm not too unhappy with the amiibo effects in this game and certainly not angry, like I felt with the Spinner in Hyrule Warriors. After Tri Force Heroes successfully avoided amiibo for its costumes (which is a good thing), I feel like the (sc)amiibo usage in Zelda U won't turn out too terrible after all.

Hyrule Warriors Legends: One Final Character?

The character select screen in Hyrule Warriors Legends has space for 5 x 5 characters, that's 25 in total, while so far there only have been 24 announced. This already let me to believe that there would be one more character left last year.

Now, today Koei Tecmo showed the new character roster on the Wii U (video) and things have gotten even more apparent:

If they didn't plan to add at least one more character, then they would have set the column lower by one for a better fit.

We also know now all the element types of the new characters and weapons from Legends. It's pretty equal with only Water getting two new entries, which it really needed, since it was the only element, which didn't see any DLC weapons in Hyrule Warriors. This is the current count:

• Light: 7
• Darkness: 10
• Fire: 7
• Water: 6
• Lightning: 6

But I would not focus too much on the element count anymore, it hasn't been balanced ever since the original game. My best guesses are either Toon Ganondorf or Groose.

So far Ganondorf is the only major character that didn't get an alternative version. Both Link and Zelda have three different outings by now and even Midna got two. Toon Ganondorf is quite different in his form than the other Ganondorfs, so he as an individual character could work. His attacks would yield the dual Katana and probably involve Puppet Ganon.

Then Skyward Sword didn't get all that much attention in the form of characters and Groose has been a popular request in the U.S., so this wish might come true. He would have some form of Bomb Flower shooting mortar as a new Fire type weapon. I would also love to see Batreaux from the game using dual scythes as his weapon of choice.

Ocarina of Time didn't get too much attention either, where Nabooru would make an awesome new character. There are also good character choices left from Majora's Mask like Mikau or the Deku Princess, but I doubt that we will see those before a potential Hyrule Warriors 2.

It also would make a lot of sense to have Ocarina of Time and Skyward Sword DLC packs for Hyrule Warrios Legends, each offering a new Adventure Map with an 8-Bit-version of their worlds, since by now we got Adventure Maps for The Legend of Zelda, Majora's Mask, The Wind Waker and Twilight Princess. It seems like there is a new total of 60 Heart Containers, where you currently can get to 50. Probably 5 Heart Containers again per new Map. But we will see. (And apparently level 99 is the maximum again, thank Nayru! I really hope that they won't change this and that the overall difficulty is less tedious than on the Wii U.)

Maybe one pack comes with a new character and the other with a new weapon, like a Horse weapon for Ganondorf in the Ocarina of Time pack and Groose in the Skyward Sword pack.

Update: It turned out to be Medli with a Light type weapon (harp). And we're getting another column of DLC characters, at least four of them.

All Zelda Games on Nintendo 3DS and Wii U

The Nintendo GameCube on its time was quite special for Zelda fans, because it allowed you to play all 13 existing Zelda on one system thanks to the Collector's Edition and the GameBoy Player peripheral.

Today things are not as simple and after a related question on Reddit, I thought it was a good idea to compile a list, what Zelda games you can actually play on Nintendo's current gen systems, if you bought them now.

Nintendo 3DS

These are the main releases for the (New) Nintendo 3DS and Nintendo 2DS, both available as boxed retail editions or as downloads on the eShop:

• Ocarina of Time 3D
• Majora's Mask 3D
• A Link Between Worlds
• Tri Force Heroes
• Hyrule Warriors Legends (coming March 2016)

You can also download the following classics on the eShop and play them via Virtual Console:

• The Legend of Zelda (NES)
• Zelda II - The Adventure of Link (NES)
• Link's Awakening DX (GBC)
• Oracle of Ages (GBC)
• Oracle of Seasons (GBC)

In addition the Nintendo 3DS offers backwards compatibility to Nintendo DS games, which allows you to play the following cartridge games:

• Phantom Hourglass
• Spirit Tracks
• Tingle's Rosy Rupeeland

Early on two more games were available as free downloads:

• Four Swords Anniversary Edition (DSiWare)
• The Minish Cap (GBA)

The Minish Cap was given to early adopters and the Four Swords Anniversary Edition was a gift during the 25th Anniversary of Zelda. It's entirely possible that GBA games might come to the New Nintendo 3DS Virtual Console and they might make Four Swords available again during the 30th Anniversary, but right now you can only play them on systems, which still have them installed, but not on brand new ones.

Anyway, you can play up to 13 out of 19 official Zelda games on the Nintendo 3DS. The games, which you simply can't play, are A Link to the Past, Four Swords Adventures, The Wind Waker, Twilight Princess, Skyward Sword and the upcoming game for Wii U.


Wii U

These are the main releases for Nintendo's current home console, which are both available as retail discs and eShop downloads:

• The Wind Waker HD
• Twilight Princess HD (coming March 2016)
• Hyrule Warriors
• The Legend of Zelda U (coming 2016)

The following games can be played on the Wii U Virtual Console:

• The Legend of Zelda (NES)
• Zelda II - The Adventure of Link (NES)
• A Link to the Past (SNES)
• Ocarina of Time (N64)
• Majora's Mask (N64)
• The Minish Cap (GBA)
• Phantom Hourglass (NDS)
• Spirit Tracks (NDS)

Majora's Mask isn't available on the Wii U eShop yet, but you can still get it on the Wii Shop Channel, which is offered by backwards compatibility along with the following Wii releases:

• Twilight Princess
• Link's Crossbow Training
• Skyward Sword

Overall 12 out of 19 official Zelda games can be played on the Wii U. The ones unavailable are Link's Awakening, Oracle of Ages, Oracle of Seasons, Four Swords, Four Swords Adventures, A Link Between Worlds and Tri Force Heroes.


There's only two Zelda games, which you can't play, if you buy a Nintendo 3DS and Wii U now: Four Swords and Four Swords Adventures. This makes me suspect that they will at least re-release the Four Swords Anniversary Edition during the 30th Anniversary, just to make the collections look more complete. And they might do something with Four Swords Adventures in the future, because otherwise this gem will be lost completely. However, right now the focus will certainly be on Tri Force Heroes, so I'm not expecting them to port or remake this multiplayer game anytime soon.