Sunday, December 15, 2013

Skyward Sword vs. Twilight Princess: Combat Gameplay

This is definitely more of a technical review than a story-wise review. When I first picked up the Wii-Mote to play as Link, the controls felt very natural. Move the Wii-Mote, slash the sword. Time your nunchuck thrusts right, Link bashes his shield. It was easy.

And then Skyward Sword happened.

Wii-Motion Plus is required for this game. Rather than hack-n-slash as before, now you had to angle your Wii-Mote to not get blocked by the attack. Worse, the controls wouldn't work the way you wanted them too sometimes. Usually, I'd just end up slashing wildly until one attack worked and I killed the baddy in my way.

Now that's just the everyday mooks you're cutting down in a dungeon. What about Bosses and Mini-Bosses?

For Twilight Princess, it's pretty obvious. Almost every boss has a giant "HIT ME RIGHT HERE" spot and you use the new item you got in the dungeon to take it down. Even the mini-bosses have this. While some of them are a bit more challenging than others, it becomes pretty obvious what you have to do.

Skyward Sword on the other hand...

The first Boss you face is Ghirahim, the main villain of the game. Yeah, and you're still figuring out how the motion controls work. Talk about hard. Even the first Mini-Boss is hard. It's a four-armed skeleton that, while having epic music, cuts you to pieces before you can even get a strike in. Some bosses have this "HIT ME RIGHT HERE" spot, but I feel like the designers were trying to move away from that.

At any rate, while there were some fun moments with the Wii-Motion plus controls, I never felt like I had changed as Swordsman. I was still taking stupid hits because the controls didn't follow my movements. Twilight Princess was easier because I didn't have to think as much. Even if I was freaking out, I could still slash my way through the guy and go off to save the world. Skyward Sword didn't allow me that luxury. Freaking out = getting hurt for no good reason.

Twilight Princess wins this round since I felt it was a little easier to do things. Skyward Sword had good potential, and if we can ever get motion controls super precise, that would be a fun remake to do again.

Twilight Princess: 3
Skyward Sword: 3

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