News: Nintendo News | Zelda: Phantom Hourglass Details Page 1

Nintendo News | Zelda: Phantom Hourglass Details

12.05.2007

The latest edition of Famitsu details new information from the upcoming Legend of Zelda game for DS, Phantom Hourglass - soon approaching a much anticipated release in the land of the rising sun.

The game takes place in a large central dungeon that holds an evil curse, limiting the time our hero can spend. As players venture deeper into the temple, they can use found sea-charts to navigate to islands to aquire "Sand of Time" to buy more time (by beating bosses) to spend in the dungeon.

To accompany him, Link ventures around with a fairy known to the Japanese as "Shiera" and Shii-wan

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Prometheus 12.05.2007#1

:O OH SHI

Shig Guevara 12.05.2007#2

KL sounds good! Although people will say sands of time is a blatant rip off eventhough it contains the same name and nothing more!

I'm probabily the only person who thinks this but I think She and her crew where pretty Kl, appart from Niko, he was a queerbait.

The sailing was the only think I hated with WW, I hope they improve this in PH. It would be good if there where pirates who could board your ship and have a fight between the two crews, or if you could pillage other ships.

Megadanxzero 12.05.2007#3

Hmm... Not sure about the time-limited thing, I thought it was shit in MM... I hate anything that's limited by time, and an exploration-y type game like Zelda doesn't seem like the ideal thing to shove a time-limit on. We'll see how it goes though

Still a proud member of the 'omfg amazing water in games' society

Martin_ 12.05.2007#4

Depends though, in MM there was more than enough time to explore. Furthermore, in tiny games like Zelda, it gives the illusion of size. Half-an-hour running around in TP is enough to know that it's really small.

( Edited on 12.05.2007 23:26 by Oni )

The Croft 13.05.2007#5

Oni-Ninja said:
Depends though, in MM there was more than enough time to explore. Furthermore, in tiny games like Zelda, it gives the illusion of size. Half-an-hour running around in TP is enough to know that its really small.( Edited on 12.05.2007 23:26 by Oni )

You just had to get it Oni didn't you Smilie

To be honest this is game my DS was bought.

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Martin_ 13.05.2007#6

Oh leave it out, I'm allowed to make fair anti-Nintendo comments. Zelda game are small. It's just the truth. The time-limit is what made MM seem bigger. Not saying Zelda isn't allowed to be small, but just that it doesn't lend itself toward un-teathered exploration, because it just doesn't have the scope.

Zapp 13.05.2007#7

Smilie it sounds fucing awsome. i cant wait! Smilie

I see all these people insulting the Nintendo corporation because of the lack of mature content. Yet there is something about Nintendo (at least their games) that strikes a certain unadulterated feeling of joy!!! Pokemon Y - 1048-9263-5562

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James2t3 13.05.2007#8

Well at least it's diffrent however i think i'll have to wait on some reviews for this one.

XBL Gamertag: James2t3

ohm 13.05.2007#9

Oh leave it out, I'm allowed to make fair anti-Nintendo comments. Zelda game are small. It's just the truth. The time-limit is what made MM seem bigger. Not saying Zelda isn't allowed to be small, but just that it doesn't lend itself toward un-teathered exploration, because it just doesn't have the scope.

Only compared to games like stalker and Oblivion. Come on, 95% of games are smaller than zelda. Even the Epic Bioware games are more restricted.

o accompany him, Link ventures around with a fairy known to the Japanese as

~~Buffy the Fanboy Slayer 13.05.2007~~#10

Oni-Ninja said:
Depends though, in MM there was more than enough time to explore. Furthermore, in tiny games like Zelda, it gives the illusion of size. Half-an-hour running around in TP is enough to know that its really small.( Edited on 12.05.2007 23:26 by Oni )

I am having difficulty deciphering "small" according to you. Everyone would have a different interpretation, say like "you think your dick is big, but every girl thinks it is small" kind of thing. Not that I am saying you have a small dick or anything Smilie

Temporarily banned until further notice.

ohm 13.05.2007#11

The game takes place in a large central dungeon that holds an evil curse, limiting the time our hero can spend. As players venture deeper into the temple, they can use found sea-charts to navigate to islands to aquire

Balladeer 13.05.2007#12

I'm another person slightly dissapointed with the 'limited time' gimmick. I slightly hope that one can spend limited time in the dungeon, while crossing the overworld won't eat into the time stock. But it won't happen, and therefore I am worried that the time pressures will stop me from enjoying at my own pace what is likely to be otherwise a great game.

Screwing the rules since 1989.

Martin_ 13.05.2007#13

Z said:
Oh leave it out, Im allowed to make fair anti-Nintendo comments. Zelda game are small. Its just the truth. The time-limit is what made MM seem bigger. Not saying Zelda isnt allowed to be small, but just that it doesnt lend itself toward un-teathered exploration, because it just doesnt have the scope.
Only compared to games like stalker and Oblivion. Come on, 95% of games are smaller than zelda. Even the Epic Bioware games are more restricted.

I disagree. For the genre that it is in, Zelda is small.

oldschool said:
I am having difficulty deciphering small according to you. Everyone would have a different interpretation, say like you think your dick is big, but every girl thinks it is small kind of thing. Not that I am saying you have a small dick or anything

You can get from one side of TP to the other in under five minutes. That is small for the genre. Zelda was overtaken in size by it's peers years ago. It's no bigger than Banjo-Kazooie, a ten year old N64 platform game.

( Edited on 13.05.2007 08:00 by Oni )

Mandown 13.05.2007#14

I think the time limit only concerns the final dungeon and your actually buying time to spend in there and defeat the boss, there is not time limit on the three islands from what i have read elsewhere.

Sounds great cannot wait. LS

Nintendo Lad 13.05.2007#15

It sounds okay, but depends on what happens with the sea charts bit.

I just hope its not as mundane as it was in Wind Waker.

ohm 13.05.2007#16

I have yet to play TP, but Wind Waker was quite huge. Before you attack me, saying its just empty and boring, there was 49 islands and many landmarks in between. Wind Waker really had that sense of adventure in it.

I'm another person slightly dissapointed with the 'limited time' gimmick. I slightly hope that one can spend limited time in the dungeon, while crossing the overworld won't eat into the time stock. But it won't happen, and therefore I am worried that the time pressures will stop me from enjoying at my own pace what is likely to be otherwise a great game.

The time-limit only applies to the dungeon. But even if it applied to the whole world, it was done right in Majoras Mask. I really liked the Ground-Hog day feel to it. But yeah, you can explore at your own leisure now. Having a time limit in the dungeon is good since it provides more challenge, which the latest zelda games have been seriously lacking.

Martin_ 13.05.2007#17

Majora's Mask is the hardest Zelda.

ohm 13.05.2007#18

I thought Majoras Mask was easier than Oot... which was easier than all the zeldas before it.

dartmonkey 13.05.2007#19

You know, this actually might drag me away from Animal Crossing for a bit.

I think the idea of a time-limit puts people off, but MM pulled it off spectacularly well. The most disappointing thing is that Nintendo are plundering themselves for innovation. I'll let them off this time though - the portability and functions of the DS make this a genuinely exciting prospect (which is a real feat after TP sapped my Zelda-beans).

Less posty, more gamey.

ohm 13.05.2007#20

Well not every game needs to innovate, just be different from its prequels. And the time limit is being managed quite differently in this iteration.

Darkflame 13.05.2007#21

" Zelda game are small. It's just the truth."

What games, in your view then, are "big"?

[/waits for a list of tile-based RPG games]

oh, and Banjo Kazooie is not bigger then Zelda.
Great game though it is, its still only 15-20 hours at most, and it doesnt have a streaming landscape at all.

Oh, and the fact that you can get accross the landscape so fast in zelda is a good thing.
Because its boring to travel ages and not get anywhere (read;Wind Waker, or X:Beyond of the Frontier at the start).

Time does not corralated to Size, because you forgot to factor in Speed.

====

Anyway, ontopic;

Not sure about the time limit in this.
Majoras Mask was a wonderfull game and its time limit made absolute sense plotwise.
Like it or not, it was the whole point of the game.
Majoras Mask = "Groundhog3days"

The timelimit wasnt there to make the game longer, it was merely a side effect of having a complete 3 days worth of charecter movements and scripted interactions planned out.
The time limit *didnt even apply* in dungoens.

But this game the reasoning seems less logical, and the timelimit is only in dungeons.
Seems the opersite of Majoras Mask in many ways.

Still looking forward too it very much, however.

( Edited on 13.05.2007 16:04 by Darkflame )

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Martin_ 13.05.2007#22

I'm not talking about the time it takes to complete it (which if you collect everything, is nearly as long as Zelda). I'm talking about the size of the game world. Furthermore, I did not say Banjo-Kazooie is bigger than Zelda, I said

Oni-Ninja said:
Its no bigger than Banjo-Kazooie, a ten year old N64 platform game.

Read my posts properly before you reply to them.

Dr_R 14.05.2007#23

Oni,

Change the record mate. Is there any point in having these conversations again and again?

Having said that, I think you've got a point, but that it's not a particularly important one. Yes the world in Zelda is physically small compared to modern RPG and adventure games. But, with the exception of TP, where I believe you're completely correct, the world in Zelda games is interactively huge compared to many, many other games. Majora's Mask is probably the best example of this: Termina is small and Clock Town is probably slightly smaller than Hyrule Castle Town in TP, but contained within it are an absolute multitude of things to do.

I'd say physical size of a virtual environment is only important to the extent that it gives a feeling of immersion within the world of the game. The very worst thing in an artificial world is reaching that wall beyond which there is nowhere to explore. It's especially annoying if it comes early and feels artifical (like the boat in Wind Waker refusing to go past a certain point because it's 'too dangerous'). Once that barrier of size is past, the most important thing is the level of interactivity in the world. That was where TP fell down for me. It wasn't that it was small, it was that it was empty.

On the topic of Phantom Hourglass, I like the sound of it. I think the single, time-limited dungeon, which I'm sure will be huge, suggests that there's going to be lots of the sidequest, character-based interactivity I've been talking about. Dungeon-crawling can get very boring. I'd like a bit more interactivity in the overworld.

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ohm 14.05.2007#24

In that case WW pawns it.

Balladeer 14.05.2007#25

Eh? Wind Waker had too high a ratio of space to things to do. TP's world, although the amount of sidequests was disappointingly small, was compact enough so that one could get anywhere fairly swiftly - which, for those who think that size is the only matter of importance, is A Good Thing. Wind Waker had you sailing over five minutes or so of ocean, only to get to a disappointingly small island holding a single Piece of Heart, on too many occasions. (The figurine sidequest was brilliant, though.)