With all these excellent Zelda clones. Will the Zelda series finally die..?

As many of you know when the clones of the genre king get better and better the main series usually dies. We have seen this with FPS games (Doom is no longer the predominant FPS game), with realistic racing games (Virtua Racer was the benchmark at one point then it was GT now its Forza) and it kinda happens now with open world games (GTA IV was successful but GTA EoLC sold well below expectations and GTA CW bombed on every platform it appeared -of course relatively speaking-) and also WRPG games (Once Ultima was the predominant one. Now its probably between Bioware RPGs and Bethesda RPGs).

On the contrary no 2D Platformers ever reached Mario, no 3D platformer ever reached Mario and no Kart Racer ever reached Mario Kart (Yes Sonic, Sonic Adventure and Sonic and Sega Superstars racing are great and all. But they dont compare to the sales number and overall quality of the aforementioned games) And we see that the progenitor franchise is still intact while the challengers have dwindled a lot. Similar things can be said about JRPGs as the two origin titles (Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy) have yet to encounter a successful clone (Pokemon is a JRPG too but it is geared towards another crowd then the other two games i believe).

Now Zelda was long considered to be a game that has no clone. Or at least no successful clone. The only game that was considered to be a worthy clone was Okami. Now in 2010 things have changed quite a lot. Darksiders came out and people consider it to be way superior then any 3D zelda game ever created and 3D Dot Heroes is considered to be even better then Alttp. Not only that on the DS Okamiden will comeout and will probably claim the crown of DS Action Adventure Puzzler that Zelda Spirit Track currently holds. Now Zelda is getting attacked by three superb clones or followers that are considered to be both evolutionary as well as potentially even more successful (Especially since Darksiders and 3D Dot Heroes are being published on HD consoles which tend to sell more software). Could this mean the end of the Zelda series and the beginning of a new era of Zelda like games ? Especially since Zelda sales were pretty bad in the last decade (all less then 10 million. which is bad in nintendo terms).

No

Nope

sure they're excellent, but they are FAR from better

No

sleepingzzz

sure they're excellent, but they are FAR from better

CDUB316

Hahahahahahahahaha no hopefully it will cause nintendo to actually change the games up a bit though.

We will see at E3. I doubt Zelda will be stolen of anything.

No

sleepingzzz

[QUOTE="CDUB316"]

sure they're excellent, but they are FAR from better

farnham

besides you....who?

No

sleepingzzz

Pretty much.

[QUOTE="CDUB316"]

sure they're excellent, but they are FAR from better

farnham

Nobody, not one person, not one reviewer, think that any of the Zelda clones are anywhere near the caliber of the Zelda games.

Zelda is something else. Zelda will never die.

[QUOTE="farnham"][QUOTE="CDUB316"]

sure they're excellent, but they are FAR from better

CDUB316

besides you....who?

I'd consider Okami better than TP, or about the same. But that is the highest I'm willing to go.

[QUOTE="farnham"][QUOTE="CDUB316"]

sure they're excellent, but they are FAR from better

sonic_spark

Nobody, not one person, not one reviewer, think that any of the Zelda clones are anywhere near the caliber of the Zelda games.

Zelda is something else. Zelda will never die.

Seriously, no way.

Darksiders came out and people consider it to be way superior then any 3D zelda game ever created

farnham

I don't think yo get exactly just how fanatic the Zelda base really is.

sure they're excellent, but they are FAR from better

People siad Darksiders is better than Zelda? hahah yeah sure. Maybe in yourworld dude.

[QUOTE="sonic_spark"]

[QUOTE="farnham"] a lot of people consider them far better.farnham

Nobody, not one person, not one reviewer, think that any of the Zelda clones are anywhere near the caliber of the Zelda games.

Zelda is something else. Zelda will never die.

Zelda has been doing it for over a dozen games, each of them memorable. From 8-bit to the current gen. You're using examples of games that had very very few installments.

The only reason Doom gets acknowledged because at the time it was revolutionary. But once other games came out, they failed to recapture their audience. Nintendo with Zelda has done it over a dozen times. Through different gens, crossing different platforms, and they amaze us each and everytime. The games in your examples don't have the track record of Zelda.

Few games do.

[QUOTE="farnham"]

Darksiders came out and people consider it to be way superior then any 3D zelda game ever created

PannicAtack

Best signature of all time goes to PannicAtack

[QUOTE="farnham"][QUOTE="CDUB316"]

sure they're excellent, but they are FAR from better

GamerForca

lol thats funny

but seriously i dont even think Okami is better then most zeldas okami is a good game no an excellent game but not better then most zeldas

people just like to see nintendo franchises die which idk why they are the cream of the crop in the gaming industry

I don't think yo get exactly just how fanatic the Zelda base really is.

Serraph105

[QUOTE="PannicAtack"]

[QUOTE="farnham"]

Darksiders came out and people consider it to be way superior then any 3D zelda game ever created

skinny_man_69

Best signature of all time goes to PannicAtack

[QUOTE="Serraph105"]

I don't think yo get exactly just how fanatic the Zelda base really is.

farnham

You mean they can't do what they've been doing for years now?

According to Metacritic:

Twilight Princess - 95

Wind Waker - 96

Majora's Mask - 95

Ocarina of Time - 99

---

According to VGChartz(lulz):

Twilight Princess - 7.08 million

Wind Waker - 4.55 million

Majora's Mask - 3.36 million

Ocarina of Time - 7.60 million

---

My guess is the new Zelda Wii game will have a metacritic rating of 95+ and top 5 million sales. Am I going out on a limb here?

Darksiders came out and people consider it to be way superior then any 3D zelda game ever created and 3D Dot Heroes is considered to be even better then Alttp.

farnham

:|

No they don't and no it isn't.

Stop using strawmen.

Did Mario die?

Did Street Fighter die?

Did Halo die?

[QUOTE="farnham"][QUOTE="sonic_spark"]

Nobody, not one person, not one reviewer, think that any of the Zelda clones are anywhere near the caliber of the Zelda games.

Zelda is something else. Zelda will never die.

sonic_spark

Zelda has been doing it for over a dozen games, each of them memorable. From 8-bit to the current gen. You're using examples of games that had very very few installments.

The only reason Doom gets acknowledged because at the time it was revolutionary. But once other games came out, they failed to recapture their audience. Nintendo with Zelda has done it over a dozen times. Through different gens, crossing different platforms, and they amaze us each and everytime. The games in your examples don't have the track record of Zelda.

Few games do.

[QUOTE="sonic_spark"]

[QUOTE="farnham"] well people claimed similar things about Doom and Ultima. where are those games now.farnham

Zelda has been doing it for over a dozen games, each of them memorable. From 8-bit to the current gen. You're using examples of games that had very very few installments.

The only reason Doom gets acknowledged because at the time it was revolutionary. But once other games came out, they failed to recapture their audience. Nintendo with Zelda has done it over a dozen times. Through different gens, crossing different platforms, and they amaze us each and everytime. The games in your examples don't have the track record of Zelda.

Few games do.

this whole time you have only named 3 games, 2 of which are nowhere near zelda's quality... so where are these 'lot of clones that do a better job'?

[QUOTE="sonic_spark"]

[QUOTE="farnham"] a lot of people consider them far better.farnham

Nobody, not one person, not one reviewer, think that any of the Zelda clones are anywhere near the caliber of the Zelda games.

Zelda is something else. Zelda will never die.

Doom 3 was a success and Doom 4 is currently in development, so Doom is far from dead. As for Ultima, that series died due to EA's poor handling of the franchise.

Probably no I'm not a big Zelda fan and I agree recently the series is going on a downfall but still I dont think Zelda will die anytime soon.

Darksiders lacked everything that makes the Zelda series amazing. It can't even match up to the Zelda clones of last gen (Starfox Adventures, Sphinx and the Cursed Mummy, Beyond Good and Evil).

3D Dot Heroes is a great clone of the original Zelda but little more, and all subsequent Zelda games have improved upon that game.

Okami is excellent though I don't think it matches Zelda in quality, nor do I consider it a clone unless you consider all action-adventure games with an overworld and dungeons to be Zelda clones.

But let's say you're right, and all these games are better; that in no way indicates that the Zelda series will die.

Did Mario die?

Did Street Fighter die?

Did Halo die?

D00nut

Darksiders lacked everything that makes the Zelda series amazing. It can't even match up to the Zelda clones of last gen (Starfox Adventures, Sphinx and the Cursed Mummy, Beyond Good and Evil).

3D Dot Heroes is a great clone of the original Zelda but little more, and all subsequent Zelda games have improved upon that game.

Okami is excellent though I don't think it matches Zelda in quality, nor do I consider it a clone unless you consider all action-adventure games with an overworld and dungeons to be Zelda clones.

But let's say you're right, and all these games are better; that in no way indicates that the Zelda series will die.

_BlueDuck_

According to Metacritic:

Twilight Princess - 95

Wind Waker - 96

Majora's Mask - 95

Ocarina of Time - 99

---

According to VGChartz(lulz):

Twilight Princess - 7.08 million

Wind Waker - 4.55 million

Majora's Mask - 3.36 million

Ocarina of Time - 7.60 million

---

My guess is the new Zelda Wii game will have a metacritic rating of 95+ and top 5 million sales. Am I going out on a limb here?

gamecubepad

[QUOTE="gamecubepad"]

According to Metacritic:

Twilight Princess - 95

Wind Waker - 96

Majora's Mask - 95

Ocarina of Time - 99

---

According to VGChartz(lulz):

Twilight Princess - 7.08 million

Wind Waker - 4.55 million

Majora's Mask - 3.36 million

Ocarina of Time - 7.60 million

---

My guess is the new Zelda Wii game will have a metacritic rating of 95+ and top 5 million sales. Am I going out on a limb here?

farnham

huh? oh, i got it... this is a joke thread

As many of you know when the clones of the genre king get better and better the main series usually dies. We have seen this with FPS games (Doom is no longer the predominant FPS game), with realistic racing games (Virtua Racer was the benchmark at one point then it was GT now its Forza) and it kinda happens now with open world games (GTA IV was successful but GTA EoLC sold well below expectations and GTA CW bombed on every platform it appeared -of course relatively speaking-) and also WRPG games (Once Ultima was the predominant one. Now its probably between Bioware RPGs and Bethesda RPGs).

On the contrary no 2D Platformers ever reached Mario, no 3D platformer ever reached Mario and no Kart Racer ever reached Mario Kart (Yes Sonic, Sonic Adventure and Sonic and Sega Superstars racing are great and all. But they dont compare to the sales number and overall quality of the aforementioned games) And we see that the progenitor franchise is still intact while the challengers have dwindled a lot. Similar things can be said about JRPGs as the two origin titles (Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy) have yet to encounter a successful clone (Pokemon is a JRPG too but it is geared towards another crowd then the other two games i believe).

Now Zelda was long considered to be a game that has no clone. Or at least no successful clone. The only game that was considered to be a worthy clone was Okami. Now in 2010 things have changed quite a lot. Darksiders came out and people consider it to be way superior then any 3D zelda game ever created and 3D Dot Heroes is considered to be even better then Alttp.Not only that on the DS Okamiden will comeout and will probably claim the crown of DS Action Adventure Puzzler that Zelda Spirit Track currently holds. Now Zelda is getting attacked by three superb clones or followers that are considered to be both evolutionary as well as potentially even more successful (Especially since Darksiders and 3D Dot Heroes are being published on HD consoles which tend to sell more software). Could this mean the end of the Zelda series and the beginning of a new era of Zelda like games ? Especially since Zelda sales were pretty bad in the last decade (all less then 10 million. which is bad in nintendo terms).

farnham

me, gamerankings and 99% of the worlds population disagree, everything you have left is yourself and some cows, and maybe a lemming whos willing to agree.

Okami is, and will still in many years to come be, the only Worthy clone

[QUOTE="_BlueDuck_"]

Darksiders lacked everything that makes the Zelda series amazing. It can't even match up to the Zelda clones of last gen (Starfox Adventures, Sphinx and the Cursed Mummy, Beyond Good and Evil).

3D Dot Heroes is a great clone of the original Zelda but little more, and all subsequent Zelda games have improved upon that game.

Okami is excellent though I don't think it matches Zelda in quality, nor do I consider it a clone unless you consider all action-adventure games with an overworld and dungeons to be Zelda clones.

But let's say you're right, and all these games are better; that in no way indicates that the Zelda series will die.

farnham

Why would any company ever make any game that isn't their best selling/most profitable franchise?

And that has nothing to do with competition from similar games.

[QUOTE="gamecubepad"]

According to Metacritic:

Twilight Princess - 95

Wind Waker - 96

Majora's Mask - 95

Ocarina of Time - 99

---

According to VGChartz(lulz):

Twilight Princess - 7.08 million

Wind Waker - 4.55 million

Majora's Mask - 3.36 million

Ocarina of Time - 7.60 million

---

My guess is the new Zelda Wii game will have a metacritic rating of 95+ and top 5 million sales. Am I going out on a limb here?

farnham

Yep, Nintendo expects all it's games to sell the same amount of copies.

:|

[QUOTE="gamecubepad"]

According to Metacritic:

Twilight Princess - 95

Wind Waker - 96

Majora's Mask - 95

Ocarina of Time - 99

---

According to VGChartz(lulz):

Twilight Princess - 7.08 million

Wind Waker - 4.55 million

Majora's Mask - 3.36 million

Ocarina of Time - 7.60 million

---

My guess is the new Zelda Wii game will have a metacritic rating of 95+ and top 5 million sales. Am I going out on a limb here?

farnham

10 mil is not disastrous! SSBB and Galaxy haven't even sold that much, and Both are considered extremely successful. Last time I check, Nintendo still makes Metroid games, which don't ever reach the 2 mil mark.

[QUOTE="farnham"][QUOTE="Serraph105"]

I don't think yo get exactly just how fanatic the Zelda base really is.

789shadow

You mean they can't do what they've been doing for years now?

[QUOTE="sonic_spark"]

[QUOTE="farnham"] well people claimed similar things about Doom and Ultima. where are those games now.farnham

Zelda has been doing it for over a dozen games, each of them memorable. From 8-bit to the current gen. You're using examples of games that had very very few installments.

The only reason Doom gets acknowledged because at the time it was revolutionary. But once other games came out, they failed to recapture their audience. Nintendo with Zelda has done it over a dozen times. Through different gens, crossing different platforms, and they amaze us each and everytime. The games in your examples don't have the track record of Zelda.

Few games do.

1. A Link to the Past is considered one of the greatest SNES titles of all time.

2. The "Wii" games or any "casual game" is fine. It's a money maker sure. So does that mean Nintendo is to forget about the core Nintendo fans who expect their Zelda, Mario, Metroid, etc.? That's like saying Microsoft will axe Gears and Halo because of Project Natal. Or Sony will axe God of War or Gran Turismo because of Move.

3. Zelda definitely isn't a niche title. The reason it lacks competition because no other developer can pull off a Zelda-esque title the same way Nintendo has for 20+ years.

4. Zelda doesn't need to "get right for the fans". Zelda is Zelda. It's something special. It's irreplaceable, and has a lair of polish that few games in this industry have. Zelda only worries about being Zelda. Nintendo could care less about second rate clones like Darksiders or 3d Dot Heroes. Good games, but they're no Zelda.

5. If Nintendo developed only these casual titles, it would alienate their core crowd. Like any console/software developer knows, the core keeps coming back, the casuals can flip flop.

6. Zelda can't sell systems? The Gamecube had 20 million installed systems. Windwaker sold 5 million. That means 1 out of 4 gamecubes were playing Zelda. Zelda TP on the Wii sold 5 million at launch according to VGchartz (lulz).

7. You seriously have no idea what you're talking about.