The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time — A Review

7 min readAug 12, 2024

This post was originally published on Substack.

I have recently rolled credits on The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time for the very first time (I know… take my Nerd card right now for not doing this sooner). I thought I would write about my experience playing the game basically for the first time. But first, some history.

My Relationship with Zelda

One of my first video games ever was The Legend of Zelda for the Nintendo Entertainment System. I would play around with the game, but the simplicity and freaking awesome controls of the original Super Mario Bros. always drew me away from Link and his Master Sword. I would finish a few dungeons in The Legend of Zelda and ultimately put it down for another game I rented from the video store(yes kids, I am old) or got for my birthday or Christmas.

Making Link sad…

Years passed and I became a Genesis kid. We didn’t have a Super Nintendo in our home and so I was only exposed to The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past through my cousin. He would let me play the game when I visited. Thankfully, we lived near one another and so I got a lot of second hand exposure to the Super Nintendo’s library of games. Once again, I played a little bit of A Link to the Past but never had enough time with the game to complete it.

More years passed and I became a PlayStation kid. My once very close relationship with Nintendo began to fade. I didn’t have any exposure to the Nintendo 64, unless you count playing Super Mario 64 at a Toys ‘R Us for about 30 minutes. Therefore, it was many years later until I even interacted with Ocarina of Time or Majora’s Mask.

Don’t go!

Fast forward even more to my adult years, I ended up waiting in line to be one of the first people in my area to get a Nintendo Wii. I got Twilight Princess as a launch title. The motion controls were a novel idea and I did end up playing several hours, swinging Link’s sword to and fro. But, the pattern of neglect continued and I dropped Link like a bad habit in favor of another Wii game or probably an XBox 360 game, I can’t remember(old person probs).

Since then, I’ve managed to purchase almost every Zelda game, yet I had never finished a single one. I would make attempts but history was destined to repeat itself and I would bounce off of Zelda fairly quickly.

A few months ago, a friend of mine approached me and asked if I wanted to play through the Zelda games with him. We would choose games “roulette style” and randomly pick a game from the list of Zelda games. We would play through each game at the same time, share stories and progress and keep each other motivated. It sounded like a good idea to me and it might just be a way for me to get into the series. Our first game was… wait for it… Ocarina of Time. Having never rolled credits on a Zelda game, now was my chance to completely redeem myself.

Welcome back!!!

The Graphics

A fairly huge difference

I had already owned a copy of Ocarina of Time on the Nintendo 3DS handheld system, so thankfully I didn’t have to go EBay hunting for a Nintendo 64 cartridge.

Because of this, I thought the graphics were pretty darn good. The remaster is really well done, smoothing out some of those jagged edges of the original. It felt like I was playing maybe a 10 year old game rather than a 22 year old game. And, in regular Nintendo fashion, in Ocarina they manage to do a lot with very little. Even though this was one of the early 3D Nintendo games, Nintendo was able to make the game feel cinematic and full of life and character. It’s truly one of the more impressive things about this game.

The Plot

I can’t really compare this plot to other Zelda storylines but I know it follows that classic Zelda formula of Link being the “chosen one” and Zelda being the princess who needs saving(I won’t spoil the ending). The main storyline is fairly basic. What really makes the plot shine are the time travel aspects and the various NPCs you come across. There are some really fun and interesting characters such as Zora, chief of the water domain and Darunia, the Goron Patriarch. Almost every character has their own quirks and little backstories that help flesh out the game. The time travel feature allows Link to view the entire world in two different modes: as young Link and as adult Link. Almost every character says something different depending on at what stage of life you speak to them. I never found myself bored and I never really felt like I was grinding or backtracking for no apparent reason.

The Gameplay

For a game that was originally released in 1998, the gameplay is excellent. Combat is fairly tight and the targeting mechanic works well for the most part. Traversing the world is slow and I found myself rolling everywhere to get places faster. But, once you get Epona the horse, things move quicker in the overworld. The dungeons are a joy to go through with the exception of the Water Temple which can get quite backtrack-y and annoying. The dungeon bosses are inventive and fun with the exception of Bongo Bongo who I absolutely hated.

There is a night/day cycle in the game. It was neat but I honestly didn’t take full advantage. Certain characters say different things and are in completely different places at night versus the daytime. I only used the night cycle for hunting Skulltulas and for other required plotlines.

Another notable feature of the gameplay is collecting and playing songs on the Ocarina. I thought this was a cute little addition to the game and added some much needed whimsy. I liked that they would let you come up with your own song as well for summoning a scarecrow. Why? Because Zelda.

The camera is by far the worst aspect of the game. I found myself struggling sometimes to look at the things I wanted to look at. I kept wishing the camera was free floating like a modern video game rather than locked to the back of Link.

The Ending

As I mentioned, I will not spoil the ending of the game. I will just say I thought it had a satisfying ending even though the last boss fight was pretty easy as compared to the other dungeon bosses. I ended the game with 16 hearts and 62 gold Skulltulas which are collectibles you can find throughout the game and gain rewards for doing so. I believe there are 100 total Skulltulas but my goal was not to 100% the game, only roll credits. A great thing about Zelda though is I could go back and 100% the game if I wished. The game doesn’t have a lot of missable items or quests.

Final Thoughts

Overall, I am really glad I finally spent ample time with this game. It truly is one of the best games ever made. The fact that I can say this in 2020 when the game was originally released in 1998 is quite impressive. I am really excited to continue my Legend of Zelda journey. I am already 20+ hours into Skyward Sword HD for the Switch and I am having a blast. I will be writing up a review post on that game once I roll credits.