The Definitive Ranking of The Wind Waker
Posted on May 14 2020 by David Nystrom
Where does The Wind Waker rank among your favorite Legend of Zelda titles? In our Best Zelda Ever rankings from last November, The Wind Waker sat just outside the top five, at sixth overall. Link’s sea-faring adventure has been met with both criticism and praise over the years, and that seems to be the case with our own rankings. In this month’s episode, Gooey and Mases gave their opinions on The Wind Waker. Just as with previous episodes, we also polled the staff and community, and you can view the results just below. Check out the YouTube video above to get the in-depth analysis behind the numbers.
This is the 5th game in our rankings, and in three of the four lists, The Wind Waker slides into the second spot. It’s worth noting that the art style and music/sound are the most agreed upon strong points in the game, while its pacing and progression sat at the bottom. The world itself seemed to have the biggest separation between the voters, earning a 1 from Mases and nearly a 4 from the community.
In June, Zelda 2: The Adventure of Link will come into focus. The same ten categories will be used in voting, and there will be an open poll for the community to vote. Make sure to cast your vote right here. The poll will be open from now until June 6th, so if you haven’t played the game, you can give it a go. Zelda 2 is available as part of the Nintendo Switch Online NES collection, as well as several ports to older consoles.
Vote in the Zelda 2: The Adventure of Link community poll.
David is an editor at Zelda Dungeon. He’s the author of the ongoing series, The Era Without A Hero, and his favorite Zelda games are Ocarina of Time, The Wind Waker, and Skyward Sword. He’s also generally a fan of JRPGs and other major Nintendo titles, such as Smash Bros. and Mario.
