With the 25th anniversary of the Nintendo 64 and the 35th anniversary of The Legend of Zelda franchise, 2021 is surely a special year. This is also the perfect moment to revisit Ocarina of Time, a game so perfectly designed that it defined an entire franchise for two decades. Although many of the elements that make Ocarina of Time so ageless were already introduced in the Super Nintendo’s franchise entry A Link to the Past, the first 3D Zelda game refined the formula in a definitive way. There’s a reason Ocarina of Time was used as a standard point of comparison against every other Zelda game, at least until Breath of the Wild presented a new and exciting direction for the franchise.

But what makes Ocarina of Time so special? And why has the game aged so well? There’s more than nostalgia to justify Ocarina of Time’s success. That’s what we’ll be discussing in celebration of both The Legend of Zelda and the N64. So pull a chair, pour a glass, and join us for an Hyrulean adventure. We have a lot to discuss.

3D: Adding a New Dimension

A screenshot from The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
Image via Nintendo

Let’s start with the basics: Ocarina of Time is the first 3D Zelda game ever. We’ve had a lot of 2D Zelda games since Ocarina of Time and even more 3D Zelda games that used a fixed top-down camera to limit the field of vision of the player. Even so, every main title of the franchise — the ones Nintendo focused on for a console release — features a 3D camera that can be moved around freely by the player. Since Ocarina of the Time was the first Zelda 3D game, it laid the foundation for follow-up titles that used the same feature. That means every Zelda game developed after Ocarina of Time had to look back to understand how the 3D was implemented, how its use could be improved, and what already worked in this first experience. Lucky for Nintendo, Ocarina of Time got a lot of things right on the first try, including a 3D combat system so well implemented it would inspire every other action game ever.

Think about an action game. Any action game. It probably has a special button that allows you to target an enemy, making aiming a lot easier and less frustrating. This simple feature, essential to any 3D action game, was developed for Ocarina of Time. It’s really amazing to think that one of Nintendo’s first 3D experiences would birth a mechanic so useful that it still stands as a basic element for action games today. And this is only one example of how Ocarina of Time’s game design was so visionary, standing the test of time.

More than a novelty, the 3D is fully embraced by Ocarina of Time, with puzzles and challenges demanding the player to fully use the free camera to look for clues in a given scenario. Weapons that need to be aimed also use the free flow of the camera, allowing the player to practice their shots to perfection, adding a new layer to combat by taking distance and angle into consideration. If being able to hit enemies close to you or shoot them far away seems simple today, that’s thanks to Ocarina of Time, which experimented with 3D long before it became the standard technology in the video game industry.

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The use of 3D also gave Ocarina of Time a sense of freedom unique at the time, allowing the player to move freely wherever the horizon would call them. It’s a pleasure in and of itself to just ride Epona over the grassy fields of Hyrule, but to make the experience more meaningful, there are secrets hidden in every corner, rewarding the curious player with upgrades and lore bits. Exploration is at the root of the franchise ever since The Legend of Zelda hit the NES, but Ocarina of Time amps up the number of collectibles you can find without ever feeling excessive.

For orientation, it helps that the player can see the sky and follow the sun’s movement while the day becomes night. By using every direction to its full capacity, Ocarina of Time can create a world full of life and moving parts, without ever disorientating the player, as everything is carefully built to serve as a clear indicator. Everywhere you look, there’s something to see; rare were the games capable of giving the player this feeling of wonder at launch. It’s worth noticing how Breath of the Wild’s geography, built to guide players without any additional sign, is born from the way Ocarina of Time designed Hyrule and its surroundings, with a lot of technical limitations at the time. That Nintendo did this in 1998, without any previous examples to guide them, shows how much thought and care was put into the N64, explaining the console’s many, many classics.

Gameplay That Tells a Story

legend-of-zelda-ocarina-of-time-n64
Image via Nintendo

Ocarina of Time doesn’t just focus on pushing new technology to its limit. The game also defined the franchise’s ever-growing lore. With its tale of time travel, Ocarina of Time serves as the fundamental adventure for Link, Ganon, and Princess Zelda, reintroducing characters present in previous titles under a new light. The story of Ocarina of Time is so well written that it’s used to position every other entry of the franchise in an official timeline. There are games that happen before Ocarina of Time, and games that happen in continuity with each of its time streams. Playing Ocarina of Time, then, helps you better understand every main game that comes after it. Just as an example, the flood that covers the world in The Wind Waker happens because Ganon escapes in a timeline without a hero, as you go back to the child timeline at the end of Ocarina of Time. As for the events of Twilight Princess, they happen in a timeline where Ganondorf never got his hands on the Triforce, following the closing of the Door of Time in the ending of Ocarina of Time.

The way Ocarina of Time dealt with narrative is also a turning point for The Legend of Zelda, as story and gameplay were never before so intertwined. The time-traveling is not just a plot gimmick but a gameplay tool that needs to be used by the player to uncover secrets and progress through the story, by manipulating the time-flow and alternating between a child and an adult. Every Zelda game that came after used the same principle by introducing a story element that doubles down as its main gameplay mechanics: The Wind Waker’s baton, The Minish Cap’s hat, Oracle of Seasons’ rod, Oracle of Ages’ harp… Each The Legend of Zelda game becomes unique by including a new gameplay element that’s also central to the narrative, a tradition Ocarina of Time proudly started with its ocarina and time-traveling.

Ocarina of Time is also responsible for giving new meaning to the iconic temples, the dungeons filled with danger where evil bosses lurk. The temples have been a signature element since the first The Legend of Zelda game, but before Ocarina of Time, they were seen only as obstacles created by an evil force. That simple and bland excuse for the temples’ existence was given in every previous game, something that changes drastically in Ocarina of Time. More than places of challenge, each temple is connected to the world and its inhabitants. One temple is a cave near where the Gorons make their home, another is the entrails of a giant fish-god, a third, a fiery prison used by the ruthless leader of a crumbling world. Each temple is not just a challenge in the hero’s path but a piece of worldbuilding and storytelling. This helps to make each temple distinctive not only by its gameplay but by the way it helps to make Hyrule a real place, an innovation introduced in Ocarina of Time but fully embraced by the franchise ever since.

And speaking of great plot concepts, Ocarina of Time also introduces some of Hyrule’s most famous inhabitants. The Gorons, the Zoras, and the Gerudos were created for Ocarina of Time as unique people with their own culture and history. Even the Dekus, which would only develop into a fully fleshed species later, were first introduced in Ocarina of Time. These are the folk Zelda games keep using to populate their versions of Hyrule, including Breath of the Wild. To play Ocarina of Time is to breathe The Legend of Zelda’s history, and that, without a doubt, helps the game to stand by itself so many years later.

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‘Ocarina of Time’ Is Music

the-legend-of-zelda-ocarina-of-time
Image via Nintendo

We cannot talk about Ocarina of Time without highlighting how its gameplay and music are integrated. The game has one of the best original soundtracks of all time, with unique themes reflecting the places you visit during your exploration of Hyrule. Yet what makes Ocarina of Time’s music so memorable is the way the soundtrack is an essential gameplay element. It’s not random that “ocarina” is part of the game’s title, as you’ll use the musical instrument to perform a different number of tasks, from teleporting, to changing the daytime, and even causing storms to appear.

Because they are tools used by the player, Ocarina of Time’s songs become more memorable. This is not just a simple effect by repetition but a clever immersion strategy. The songs you can collect in Ocarina of Time are not items you choose from a menu to then watch an animation; they are actually sets of notes you need to memorize and play in the correct order. The game is forgiving and doesn’t care much about timing, but it’s almost instinctive for players to try to play each note properly, building the melodies themselves. As a fully interactive tool, the ocarina can even be used to play any song the player desires. That’s because, beyond the basic buttons needed to play the magic songs, Ocarina of Time’s developers included extra commands to change the tone of each note.

The Legend of Zelda franchise always had a special place for music. The first game featured a flute with magical properties, which would be back for Link’s Adventure. A Link to the Past traded the flute for an ocarina. The fourth Zelda game, Link’s Awakening, would take a step further and send the hero to collect several musical instruments in order to allow Link to escape a dreamland filled with nightmares. Nevertheless, only in Ocarina of Time does the player have full control of the music, a mechanic reused in Majora’s Mask and Spirit Tracks. Even in games that don’t feature a magic instrument, though, The Legend of Zelda franchise tried to learn from Ocarina of Time, giving the player control of the tools they use instead of just making them watch an animation. This can show up in subtle ways, like when you chose the direction you point the Rod of Seasons in Oracle of The Seasons to change the weather. It can also be more complex, as when you need to learn the movement sequence of the Wind Waker’s spells.

It’s easy to understand why many The Legend of Zelda fans still consider Ocarina of Time the best game in the series, as it defined so many tropes that would become commonplace in the franchise. Even the most divergent game in the franchise in two decades, Breath of the Wild, learned a lot from the first 3D Zelda experience. The franchise took a whole new direction, dropping the Metroidvania progression for an open-world adventure, but the echoes of Ocarina of Time will keep resonating in The Legend of Zelda franchise for a long time yet. Good game design is ageless and can always be appreciated.

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