After finishing
Final Fantasy XIII-2, I didn't play any new video games for a while. First of all, my spirit was crushed by the weight of Square Enix's complete and utter failure. Also, the weather was finally nice enough to actually go out-of-doors with regularity. I did pick up
Civilization V, which I enjoyed quite a bit but found the replay value surprisingly lacking. I even went back to an old stalwart,
Heroes of Might and Magic III, which I'm happy to report I still play every so often. But eventually I decided on continuing down the
Zelda timeline and playing through my first handheld game in years,
The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap. It only took me a couple of weeks to explore everything, even with working full-time and five fantasy football drafts to plan for, but no one expects massive amounts of content from an eight-year-old handheld game. What I did expect was vintage
Zelda gameplay in bite-size form, and in that,
The Minish Cap delivers with aplomb.
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| Consistently crisp and refreshing, the Zelda franchise satisfies. No, it's not a beer or a candy bar. |
I loved the look and feel of
The Minish Cap almost immediately. It reeks of an updated
Link's Awakening (which I played and replayed religiously as a kid) and the plot continues the threads from
Skyward Sword. This was my first experience with game developer Flagship, a subsidiary of Capcom who also worked on
Four Swords and the two
Oracle games. Their expertise in handheld gaming is evident, as the nuts and bolts of
The Minish Cap all feel right. The scale and graphics are wonderful, the controls feel natural, and the dungeons and tasks are short enough that the player won't run out of battery life just before a boss fight. Keeping things short and sweet on a handheld platform is essential, and director Hidemaro Fujibayashi and his team accomplish that goal extremely well.
As mentioned above,
The Minish Cap begins with a nod to the world of
Skyward Sword. The introduction tells of darkness descending on the land of Hyrule long ago, when a race of very small creatures called the Picori came from the skies (possibly alluding to Skyloft) to bestow a sword and a golden light on a young hero. The hero banished the darkness, locking the evil beings in a bound chest, and the Picori Blade was enshrined by the people of Hyrule. Every year since, they remember the gifts of the Picori in an annual festival. Seems like a standard backstory, but there are two things I appreciate. First, it hints at an untold story of a former Link, one whose adventures would take place between
Skyward Sword and
The Minish Cap. As the
Zelda franchise has grown and changed over the years, Nintendo has done a nice job of tying together themes and stories, and I wouldn't be surprised to see a future
Zelda title cover the Picori's initial trip to Hyrule and the hero they encountered. Second, it tells the story of a legendary sword other than the Master Sword, which as we eventually learn in other games, is tucked away in the Sealed Grounds. Instead, the Picori Blade is Link's weapon of choice, and
The Minish Cap details how it eventually becomes the Four Sword. It's a fun little story, perfect for both the setting and the handheld console.
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| I always love way-epic stained glass windows. |
More after the jump...
