5/5 ★ – RawMetal's review of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess.

System: Nintendo GameCube Started: 2006 Ended: 2008 Flashback Review The Legend of Zelda games were one of my favorite gaming series, but it is humiliating to say that I never beat a single Zelda game back then even after playing dozens of them. My first Zelda game was A Link to the Past for the Gameboy Advance port, played through almost 80% of it but I didn’t beat it. Ocarina of Time for the Nintendo 64: I remember my brother and I shared the controller to play through the game and my brother actually beat the game on his save file, but I didn’t finish it on mine; The same goes for Majora’s Mask. I still haven’t finished Wind Waker, Minish Cap and Four Swords Adventures. Finally, when Twilight Princess came out, I know for a fact that I have to beat at least one Zelda game and Twilight Princess was finally the one. It took me 2 years to complete this game for the 100% goal. Most Zelda fans have claimed that Twilight Princess is the most “Underrated” Zelda game. I disagree, Twilight Princess is just as Overrated as Ocarina of Time and Breath of the Wild. I even got my friend hooked on this game and that actually made him go buy a GameCube and get his own copy of Twilight Princess since he’s an Xbox guy. I knew all of my friends who are Zelda fans placed Twilight Princess in their Top 5. I even remember at Lunch Period in High School, some student actually played Midna’s Lament on Piano at the Music Room and I instantly remembered what that was from. Underrated Zelda Game? I don’t think so. If you want an Underrated Zelda game, I can see either Majora’s Mask or A Link Between Worlds. But don’t get me wrong though, Twilight Princess is Awesome. 2006 was a time period where we got Edgelord games like Shadow the Hedgehog and the Devil May Cry games. Nintendo actually jumped into the Edge pool with the release of Twilight Princess. The Zelda game that took a dark and serious direction. Even Mother 3 came out the same year as Twilight Princess and that game can be pretty dark at times. How dark is this game? Almost as dark as Majora’s Mask. This game actually has a Teen rating which is something that no other Zelda Games has done before. The Tone of this game has grit, really creepy looking creatures especially humans. The creepy Twilight realm area with all those creatures and bosses and that really intense soundtrack it plays when you encounter them can feel intimidating. Link turning into a wolf when you can run faster and brutally maul enemies. It's a game where it blends both Adventure and Horror perfectly and I actually welcome this type of Zelda Game. Your partner Midna actually blows Navi from Ocarina of Time out of the water with her charismatic attitude, yet she has ulterior motives which makes her mysteriously interesting. Definitely one of the best. If not, the best companion in the series. As far as I can think of this game, it has really unique Dungeon level designs, awesome boss fights, especially the final battle which I think it's still the best in the series I played so far. I even like the Art Design for Twilight Princess so much that I even have the Poster/Hyrule Map from the strategy guide it came in. My only minor gripe in this game is the overuse of collect missions. Throughout the game, you have to collect those tears in the twilight realm to purify the region and gain access to the dungeons. It can be a chore and a bit of a drag but once that’s over, the fun part truly starts. You even have to collect Male and Female bugs to assist a bug lady in order to get more rewards and you really need a guide for that because it's almost impossible to find them all without a guide. But at least there are plenty of interesting side missions like the Horseback Jousting Battle, The Snowboarding Mini-game and many others so it has variety. Should you play Twilight Princess? Obviously Yes, even if you want to get into the Zelda games. I own the GameCube version and I was shocked at how expensive it is now compared to its starting price back then. Obvious reason was due to the GameCube Controls making the game better instead of playing it with Motion sensor controls and I played the Wii Demo Version at GameStop at the time. Getting it on the Wii could be the cheapest but I recommend the Remastered version for the Wii U since the graphics are better if you still have the Wii U in your console collection.