What have they done to you, Ganondorf?
Zelda games have always revolved around somebody telling you where to go next. The ability to ignore that guy has always been the series' greatest strength, and The Windwaker was thankfully faithful in this regard. I was disappointed, however, to find nearly everything I loved about some of the older games had been abandoned to travel down a completely different path. It was noble to try something new, but it seemed a lot of mistakes were made.
We all know the story. Ganon has decided to try to take over the kingdom and by extention the world. The difference is that he's resurrected the Ganondorf body that he tore apart back in Ocarina of Time, and this time he's much much fatter, for reasons I simply cannot explain, even facetiously. The kid destined to stop him is, unexpectedly, NOT Link, though that whole thing gets rather confusing later on.
I digress. It's the same story with a few wrenches thrown into the crucial gears. As far as Zelda stories go, it's strictly average, and may put off casual fans as well by changing the hero and villain as it does.
The mechanics of Windwaker are rather interesting. Combat itself is the best Zelda has ever been, allowing complex rolling, dodging, and a simple counterattack system. The ability to steal weapons makes for some neat variety as well, and Link's usual arsenal is rather useful.
However, this was the only improvement I noticed. Dungeon crawling is composed of your usual sliding block puzzles, torch lighting puzzles, and hit-the-switch-then-swim-real-fast puzzles, as well as the stadard platform jumping challenges. How's your aim with a pot? You can bet it'll be great by the time you're done with some of these dungeons.
So how about the stuff to do between dungeons? There's a multitude of side quests and puzzles to figure out, some of which are genuinely interesting. It's just too bad that most of them send you packing across to the other end of the kingdom and back, which leads me into the next and by far the worst aspect of Windwaker...
The last gameplay complaint I'll make is travel between the islands. There are enemies to battle along the way, but they are literally limitless, and I received no real sense of accomplishment after defeating them when more of the same thing simply took their place. This could have been made tolerable if you could keep sailing while battling, but this is simply not possible, so stopping to entertain yourself with a battle will only prolong the grueling trip. To make matters worse, near the beginning of the game, the next island to visit on your quest is regularly on the opposite side of the map, and assuming you try to get there without dealing with the incessant baddies along the way, it can take a good ten or fifteen minutes. I would often point the ship in the right direction and go make, consume, and clean up after my lunch only to come back and discover I still had more waiting to do.
Let's see, what's next...the graphics! Oh, the graphics. Loved by some, despised by others, this cell-shaded acid trip of a visual experience took Zelda even further in a whole new direction. It was a peculiar and unexpected artsy decision, and it's hard to say whether it payed off or not. I will say that considering the path they chose, Windwaker came out looking very nice, especially in the explosion department. For the record though, Ganondorf must be restored to his former, thinner, blood-vomiting glory before I accept him back as a powerful villain.
The music in Windwaker was iffy; the actual background pieces and "cinematic" music were decent, and somewhat immersive. Well done to be sure, but nothing exceptionally memorable. The windwaker pieces, however, were crap, plain and simple. It was like they took all the worst ocarina songs from the old games, changed the key signature, and made you play them with a stick instead of a woodwind instrument. Fabulous.
So what's the verdict? Is Windwaker a smash hit or an overrated piece of sea scum? Well, diehard Zelda fans are sure to love it, but a person who has never played a Zelda game (if such a person exists ;-) ) would probably find it tedious and unappealing. And the rest of us casual Zelda fans? I recommend waiting it out for Twilight Princess, if you can't borrow the game from your bud. It's worth a try though, since chances are, they won't be feeling much drive to muck through the game a second time. Tell them their "trophy collection" can wait.