Tag: Balance

Some people think of Zelda as a puzzle-centric franchise. But that’s not really what Zelda’s about–at least, not exclusively. Anyone who started with one of the first four Zelda games is likely to have a very different idea. The original Legend of Zelda had rudimentary puzzle solving usually involving big questions, like how to access an entire part of the map, rather than Portalesque room puzzles that involved complex block pushing. Puzzles certainly weren’t foreign to the 2D games —…

Ocarina of Time is the single most highly regarded and famous Zelda game. The majority of gamers in general look to it as the single shining example of a perfect Zelda title, and even outside the Zelda series, it is regarded as the greatest game of all time by most. That said, there are those that believe that Ocarina of Time didn’t actually surpass its precessors, or possibly that it has been surpassed since. The game most commonly said to…

What makes a game difficult or easy? Good question. Game designers walk a delicate balancing act of making a game challenging without causing it to be frustrating. Like any job, there are techniques to accomplish this goal. Major points that contribute to difficulty are the implementation of a navigator, success of game controls and mechanics, and in Zelda games the puzzle quality. However, the most important factor for determining difficulty in any game is the use of patterns. The balance…