I'm very underwhelmed by the new Zelda, I had really, really high hopes. Everyone else seems completely blown away by it. Like Happy Console Gamer's reaction
Edit: On Nintendo Treehouse: Live they just said something really interesting and a key point I think they should stress more, which is that the Zelda game they're playing at E3 is an edited version to the game that will be released. They removed NPCs and towns so as not to give away any of the story. I was thinking it would get kind of boring just running around grassy plains.
The majority of builds shown on tradeshow floors are not "final gold builds" and are manicured to be presented to the public while hiding a lot of elements, so yeah I was not expecting it to represent the final game in its entirety (it still has over 6 months of development scheduled, not mentioning if they push it again)
The things that excited me were
1) Lack of gimmicks - the last console zelda looked great and had cool ideas in terms of level design and systems, but the gimick of controlling with a wii mote literally ruined the game for me and I never finished it.
2) Expedited menu system - the last few zeldas were stuck in the same old rut in terms of UI, and I appreciate that it's quicker to change items/equipment, and that you are not constantly bombarded with popup alerts with link gawking at the item he just looted (thought it does still have some popups and hand holding via this system, it's not 100% fixed)
3) Climbing, jumping, and other traversal systems. I hate in zelda how long they relied on the "context sensitive" jumping, but somehow implemented jumping puzzles and activities - f*ck that. In Skyward swoard you could sprint, and there was a stamina meter, but I never understood why they hand't implemented some sort of system for climbing a la Uncharted - seems like an awesome avenue for level design and providing the player with more tools for exploration.
The only Zelda's I didn't enjoy the art style of were the DS, CDI (dur), and Twilight Princess. I think this current iteration's art style is one of my favorite - very similar to Skyward Sword but in a much cleaner resolution.
There's not a lot jumping out at me to be concerned about for this game, which is exciting in itself. I look forward to playing it, I enjoy these kinds of games a lot.
