Eiji Aonuma's conclusion in the Hyrule Historia is one of the book's better features. It's a very straightforward document, but it contains a fact that is very important. Zelda games are built around mechanics (often those presented by a particular console's strength), not story.
This fact is a quick way to dismiss inconsistencies in the Zelda timeline. But, more importantly, it emphasizes the accomplishment of creating so many games that are rather intimately linked together. It also makes the stories of future games in the series as unpredictable as they'd be without the conceit of a millennia-spanning video game series.
As was pointed out in an episode of Extra Credits, that Zelda games are designed around mechanics rather than story also means that they'll always have great potential to be great games. It's one of the things that sets story-heavy games apart from novels, in a way: Concentrating on the way that story is interacted with, rather than what the story is all about. Maybe that's why video games can become graphic novels fairly readily (sequential art requires visual work similar to that which video games demand to fully enjoy it), while books don't often adapt quite so well to the panelled medium.
Fully understanding and enjoying words alone is a quite different quiver of arrows after all.
As per the Hyrule Historia as a whole? It's a great artifact for Zelda fans, and a decent introduction for those curious about the story of the princess and the hero clad in green.
No comments:
Post a Comment