Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap
Review by DavoJune 2006
The 2006 Game Developer’s Conference and E3 have come and gone and, as usual, there were more games revealed than I could every play in two lifetimes. One of the most exciting announcements at both shows (for me, anyway) was Nintendo’s unveiling of the new Legend of Zelda game for the Nintendo DS, The Phantom Hourglass. The upcoming DS game bears a strong visual resemblance to the excellent Wind Waker title on the Gamecube and appears to make clever use of the dual-screen hardware and stylus controls. There’s just one problem: it’s June 2006 at this writing, and the new game isn’t scheduled to release until the end of the year. What’s a Zelda fanatic to do in the interim? Well, you could start by playing the Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap, an outstanding Gameboy Advance game that deserves every bit of its stellar rating.
Shrinky Link
In part, The Minish Cap reinforces the cliché that everything old is new again. The Minish Cap recycles a number of tried-and-true ideas that have been used in Zelda games before. Gameboy Advance and SNES Zelda veterans will instantly recognize the familiar tunes, interface, controls and overhead camera view. These elements end up feeling fresh, however, because Nintendo has wrapped them around an interesting new addition to the world of Hyrule. Link now has the ability to shrink himself down to the size of a flea and explore cracks, corners and crevices unavailable to normal-sized folk. As it turns out, a hidden world exists beneath the view of the denizens of Hyrule. A tiny race of elf-like creatures known as the Minish live underfoot, collecting coins, thimbles, matchboxes and other “giant-sized” detritus.
Shigeru Miyamoto, creator of the Zelda series, once pointed out in an interview that the inspiration for the Legend of Zelda came from his own exploration of fields, forests and caves as a boy. Miyamoto said he wanted to capture the sense of wonder and adventure he experienced as a child discovering mysterious, unknown environments. The Minish Cap embodies the spirit of Miyamoto’s inspiration perfectly. You can’t help but feel childlike wonder as you explore the normal-sized world from the perspective of an ant. Everything is exactly the same as it was when you were full-sized, except for your perspective. It’s amazing how this single addition to the Zelda universe invigorates this most recent entry.
“Oh, the Places You’ll Go and the Things You’ll Do!” Dr. Seuss
The Minish Cap begins with the familiar “rescue Princess Zelda” story. That wacky Princess Zelda is at it again. She manages to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, as usual, and gets herself turned to stone by Vaati, an evil magician. Vaati, who is a stand-in for Link’s usual nemesis, Ganon, has some connection to the Minish people. It’s up to young hero Link to save the princess and foil Vaati’s evil plans. Link can restore order only by shrinking and seeking help from the teensy Minish, who will speak only to children without evil in their hearts. The story is a light and whimsical affair that fits the colorful game world perfectly. The core “rescue Princess Zelda” story maintains its viability, at least in part, by avoiding heavy, dark, adult themes. The Minish Cap’s story is far more Discworld than Thieves’ World. If you’re looking for a bleak, moody, adult-themed story, look elsewhere.
Story is somewhat beside the point, anyway. Although the story is well-presented and fun to follow, it’s gameplay that makes The Minish Cap so enjoyable. There are so many things to do in the game that are fun, intriguing and addicting. Frequently, you’ll experience all three at the same time.
You begin by exploring Hyrule looking for clues to guide you on your quest. Early in the game, you acquire an annoying talking-bird hat that allows you to shrink down to the size of an insect and interact with the Minish. Spending time among the Minish is one of the best parts of the game. Past Zelda games have utilized light and dark worlds to add depth and variety. In previous games, you would begin in a light world and enter the dark world halfway through the game. The dark world was generally a wrecked mirror image of the light version. It was a great device that made you feel like you were playing a second game. The only downside was that you had to play half the game to experience the alternative world. In The Minish Cap, you experience the alternative world at will. You can shrink down to Minish size anytime you want to as long as you have your bird hat and you find a type of pot that triggers the transformation. As soon as you shrink, you’re in the other world. Now you can wander through mouse holes, floor cracks and sewer grates and interact with the Minish. As it turns out, the Minish are everywhere. When you’re outside, they’re in gardens, sewers and backyards. Inside, they’re in fireplaces, attics and basements.
Since The Minish Cap is a Zelda game, dungeons are a critical part of the package. Soon enough, you’ll find yourself delving into dungeons filled with wicked traps, mysterious puzzles and difficult boss fights. The Zelda games have always maintained an adventure game sensibility while being primarily action games. Character movement and combat are purely action-based. You fight enemies in real time, maneuvering for position, deflecting attacks, looking for weak points and striking when the moment is right. At the same time, you’ll have to pay close attention to your environment for critical clues. Enemies and bosses generally have some crushing weak point that allows you to dispatch them with relative ease. Figuring out that weak point, however, can be a real exercise in mind-bending cleverness. You’ve got to think like an adventure gamer but play like an action gamer.
This adventure game sensibility extends to the game’s many traps and puzzles, which are usually incorporated logically into the environment. When you’re in the wind maze, you’ll come to an area where you have to work your way across a wide chasm by jumping into a series of tornadoes that spit you from one to another. Halfway across the chasm, you’ll encounter a row of air jets that blast you out of the air and send you hurtling to the ground. You have to figure out how to turn off the air jets so you can get across. The answer is usually right in front of you. Good luck seeing it if you’re not paying attention very closelyand sometimes even if you are. Even familiar puzzles are perfectly placed, in a nostalgic kind of way. You may find yourself, for example, trying to work through a graveyard with a repeating-screen maze. If you leave through the wrong exit, it’s back to the beginning of the maze. Repeating-screen mazes are as old as the first Zelda game, but they are not out of place here. They also embody the adventure-game feeling that permeates the game. You don’t need arcade skills to jump tornadoes or navigate mazes. You have to think and pay attention. Trial and error also plays a large role.
As with past Zelda titles, Link’s tools are among the real highlights of the game. You start with a sword but quickly accumulate shields, bombs, boomerangs, wands and other devices. Some of the tools are unusual, like a vacuum jar that can suck in enemies, rocks and other environmental obstacles. The great thing about the tools is that they usually serve multiple purposes. A tool that flips objects may also prove useful for collecting distant items, fighting bosses or crossing barriers. Boots that let you run really fast also allow you to skim across poisonous swamps and explore previously inaccessible areas.
Speaking of inaccessible and hidden areas, the game is filled with them. As with all Zelda games, much of the fun lies in exploring every inch of the landscape looking for secret places or ways to get into areas you can see but not reach. Players who love exploration will get the most mileage out of the tools. A cape that lets you float across gaps and chasms may also allow you to glide into other areas you couldn’t reach earlier. You can have a lot of fun just wandering around the landscape using bombs or the cape or some other tool in random areas. Sometimes you’ll even get lucky and open up an unmarked hidden area. Most of the hidden spaces have environmental clues, like a crack in a wall, pointing them out. A few, however, have no clues. Experimentation is very important.
If you’re a packrat at heart, The Minish Cap has a subgame that you’re just going to love. Throughout the game, you’ll collect mysterious objects that look like blue seashells. A merchant in the main town will trade you the shells for a chance to use his figurine machine. The machine is essentially a coin-operated toy dispenser similar to the red-topped ones you see near supermarket entrances. There is a percentage ratio assigned each time you use the machine. The first time, you have a 100-percent chance of getting a new figure. As you continue using the machine, your odds of getting a new figure decrease. Each shell spent decreases your percentage by one point. By the end of the game, you’ll have something like a 3-percent chance of obtaining a figure you don’t already have, and the shells become scarcer and scarcer. I don’t usually bother with side activities that add nothing to the story. Give me a new dungeon or a new item, and I’m in. But I love miniatures and was completely addicted to this particular subgame. There are more than 100 figurines depicting characters and scenes from the game. You can collect bosses, enemies, friends, locations and other people and events you’ve come into contact with on your quest. I mismanaged my shells early in the game and ended up putting in an extra six hours or so of play time at the end scouring fields, caves and forests for more shells to complete my figurine collection. If you have any propensity for collecting, it becomes a bit of an obsession, really.
But waitthere’s more. The game also channels your inner scavenger hunter by scattering kinstones all over the landscape. Kinstones are Minish coins that have been cut in half in a variety of configurations. When you encounter one of the Minish, you can ask him if he wants to match kinstones with you. If you possess a matching kinstone, you’ll unlock additional hidden areas, heart pieces or quest objectives. Once again, you’ll have to pay close attention to your environment. Later in the game, you’ll be able insert kinstone pieces into wall slots to find even more hidden stuff. The kinstones come in common, uncommon and rare varieties. As you might expect, the rare ones are hidden in the most devious places.
Graphically, the game looks outstanding on the Gameboy Advance and takes advantage of everything the hardware can produce. The world is presented in a vibrant and well-drawn style that fits the game perfectly. The Minish viewpoint is especially suited to the art style. It’s really fun to walk through a garden and see Link disappearing under leaves and blades of grass as you look down from your bird’s-eye view. When Link is in Minish form, you’ll play him in one of two modes. In one mode, he appears normal-sized, but the environment is gargantuan. Blades of grass are as big as trees, and berries are as enormous as hot-air balloons. In the other mode, the environments are unchanged, but Link is a few pixels tall. It would be easy to lose track of Link in this mode had the developers not come up with a clever solution: When Link is tiny, a thought bubble with a picture of his face follows him around wherever he goes. The bubble is tethered to Link’s head, so you always know exactly where he is.
Musically, the game mixes old and new tunes in a very appealing presentation. The quality of the musically compositions is especially worth checking out. Sound is a bit tinny on the Gameboy Advance, but it isn’t really a problem unless you’re fanatical about audio quality. Even with the hardware limitations, many of the tunes manage to come across as grand and sweeping.
Picking Nits
Is there any bad news? Honestly, I feel like it would be extremely picky to say there was anything about this game that I didn’t like. However, if you don’t like Zelda games, then it’s unlikely you’ll find anything here to convert you.
I suppose you could say the game is a tad on the short side when compared to other Zelda games. You could work through the main quest in about 15 hours if you ignore all of the side missions and collectibles. But few Zelda fans are going to skip these optional quests, which generally provide real benefits in the sense of extra life hearts, hidden weapons and useful tools. Hunting down even half of the side-quest stuff should add at least another 10 hours of game time. Collecting the figurines takes another five or ten hours. If you add it all up, there’s a good 30-plus hours of game time here.
Some of the end-level boss fights are hardreally, really, toss-your-Gameboy-down-in-frustration hard. But that’s always been the case with Zelda games and hardly a negative unless you hate difficult boss fights. Boss battles are always hard in Zelda games, and some puzzles are so difficult that you could spend days stuck in one dungeon. The boss battles may be the real deal-breaker for traditional adventure gamers. You need some arcade reflexes to beat many of the bosses. Although nearly every boss battle comes down to some core weakness that you can exploit, you still need midrange arcade skills to pull off some of the more complicated attacks. And, admittedly, some of the puzzles are obscure and difficult enough to vex all but the most experienced players.
Step Away from the Next-Generation Console and PC!
The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap is pretty amazing. I have an Xbox 360 and I just got a shiny new PC. I’m on the cutting edge of technology. But when I think of all the games I’ve played over the past six months, The Minish Capa Gameboy Advance gamerises right to the top of my list. It’s just that good.
The Verdict
The Lowdown
Developer: Nintendo Publisher: Nintendo Release Date: January 10, 2005
Available for:
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Copyright © Electric Eye Productions. All rights reserved. No reproduction in whole or in part without express written permission.
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[…] nobody@flickr.com (graftedno1) wrote a very interesting post today. Here’s a quick excerpt:My greatest fear is to be trapped alone in a confined space with a blind human, in total darkness. They have a heightened sense of smell and hearing, and. […]
Lewis, you made me think of the scariest moments I’ve experienced in gaming, and we’re very similar people.
Bioshock had two moments – the dentist and the flooded room filled with mannequins.
Thief had Return to the Cathedral, which was terrifying to me. Thief 3 had Shalebridge Cradle, which is so scary it ought to be fined.
System Shock 2 kept me on the edge of my seat, but it was more lonely panic than true fear.
Korsakovia was so scary that I uninstalled it.
And STALKER. Oh, god, the haunted labs in STALKER. The latter two games don’t have scares like that. Few games do.
It’s especially rare for a game to have more than mere “moments” – for a game to be scary from beginning to end, that’s a triumph.
Wonderful article. As if Gregg’s review wasn’t enough to convince me that Penumbra is not something I have the courage to play!
I’m with you Lewis … I’m a bit of a puss. I just have a hard time wrapping my head around the idea of dread as entertainment.
Still, I’m drawn to dark stories when they have something interesting to say, whether it’s a game like Thief or a film like, say, Gaspar Noe’s Irreversible. So I’ll push through, sometimes peering through my fingers.
The trouble with games, though, is that if you look through your fingers, you’re probably just going to have to play through the scenario again. :~)
I wanted to play this game. I downloaded the demo but the controls were just too wonky for me to get my head around. I liked the atmospheric vibe a lot. I think I’m a bit desensitized from an overdose of horror movies in my youth so I don’t so much get the dread thing from these games as a nice creepy vibration. If only the controls were better…
@ Mike, what’s wrong with the controls bud? As someone who despises poor control schemes, Penumbra’s is just like any other FPS, except to examine things you right click on them. To use things you left click. I’m not sure that can be considered difficult 🙂
@Steerpike: Yeah my greatest shit-scared moments were with those games too. A few spoilers below people, so beware.
Bioshock – Haha, I remember the dentist. I didn’t really find the game that scary overall but the bit where you go into the wine cellar and notice a mannequin facing the wall and after upgrading your weapon it’s stood directly behind you motionless and quiet just for a moment before attacking you. I shat a brick. I also missed that bit originally until Lew told me about it.
System Shock 2 – same as you really, more unremitting tension all the way through rather than specific terrifying moments. Oh actually, theres a bit where you call a lift and it breaks then you realise a service droid is coming to fix it… I do remember having sleep issues after my first encounter with the cyborg ninjas though.
Thief: The Dark Project – The Sword and Return to the Cathedral and Down in the Bonehoard and well, loads of them. The Sword made me break out into goosebumps though because there was a bit where you could hear this creepy giggling which seemed like it was following me about then it suddenly changed to this horrible throaty noise. What made matters worse was that the EAX (bless you Creative) made my foot steps sound like somebody else was there with me. That level was incredible, a bit too incredible as it seems I missed great chunks of it because I was so eager to leave.
Thief II: The Metal Age – Trail of Blood where you end up in that opening with those damn tree beasts. God the first time I saw one of those hurtling towards me I actually died shortly afterward. Do you remember that Mechanist child walking around on one of the levels? That was a little creepy.
Then there’s Penumbra: Overture – quite a few bits but I’m not mentioning them here.
Oh and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. – The brain scorcher lab just because it was so damn quiet. My imagination seriously got the better of me there. Those stuffed animals and heads I’d seen in various buildings led me to believe that those creatures were lurking somewhere in the Zone, specifically that lab.
@Mike: My control setup was perfect after some tweaking (as well as the simple weapon swing fix). If you ever fancy giving it another go, give me a shout and I’ll let you know my setup.
I’m not sure why guys, but one of my starting paragraphs had gone missing, even though I copied it straight from the original source, and It was fine earlier.
Incase you missed it due to some technical issue you might want to re-read just after “Well no she wouldn’t in truth, but in Penumbra: Overture you don’t want to move anyway.” at the very start for those who’ve already read the article. Apologies 🙂
Lewis, it was the weapon swing. It had this terrible, unresponsive feel to it, like trying to hit through molasses. I couldn’t stand using it. I tried the .ini fix as mentioned in the review but it didn’t seem to help. Of course this was the demo…but that shouldn’t have made any difference. I might try the second game instead as I guess they did away with the weapons thing.
I’m see your first paragraph just fine. It’s the dialogue, right?
I like the argument that weapons can remove fear, but even loaded to the teeth with ammo in AVP’99 the Marine missions were frightful because the enemy was anywhere at any time.
As for Penumbra Overture, if the controls are anything like the original Penumbra they need to hack in some Wii-Remote 3d controls. I did not like using my mouse for 3d movements.
@Mike: I’ve read that many people avoided conflict altogether in Overture which incidentally is something forced upon you in Black Plague. As somebody who has been renovating a house over the last 6 months with no DIY experience I can safely say that swinging a hammer is significantly easier in real life than it is in Overture without the fix. The fix balanced that for me.
I’d highly recommend completing the first Penumbra because it’s one big build up to Black Plague which spoils the ending to Overture in the intro. And it’s a great ending too. Just so you know!
@ Steerpike, those moments you mention are all my worst too!! Do you remember the Robot labs in SS2? Absolutely terrifying, waiting for robots to burst out on you! 🙁 oh and have you ever player Condemned?
@ Mike, The use of weapons in Penumbra is different to say HL2, where the player is physically holding the weapon, as in Penumbra it floats slightly infront of you. However, if you change the control method to normal weapon swing, it’s no different! Speak to Greggi and he’ll tell you what to do 🙂
@ jdeuel, AVP the original and its sequal were scary however what type of fear do you think it is? I don’t think it’s anything more than sheer tension. Having a Smart Gun makes you feel incredibly powerful. I can honestly say in Penumbra the fear is sheer unrivalled terror, where you actually have to force yourself to play on. It genuinly is that scary! 🙂
It’s so true, an arsenal of weapons and ammo rapidly deflates any sense of horror or uneasiness in any game for reasons you already mentioned. Sakey, I thought Bioshock was more “lonely panic,” while I was pretty much always terrified in System Shock 2. I really, really, REALLY did not want to enter The Many’s nursery, and my weapons were so unreliable and ammo so scarce that I never felt safe.
Silent Hill was terrifying for the same reasons. Ammo was rare and I frequently had to rely on my pipe for self-defense. Even when I had ammo, the game mechanics prevented my character from being anything other than marginal with any firearm.
Fear had one moment for me: I was climbing up a ladder, and as I reached the upper platform, my guy briefly looked down as he climbed off. As my perspective looked up again, that Ring-esque little girl was RIGHT THERE, reaching for me. I screamed and she was gone.
What else…the original Aliens vs. Predator sent me into a locker room and I could only hear the facehuggers scurrying about somewhere within. I had to go in there. I advanced about three steps before the damn thing screamed and filled up my screen with its repulsive underside as it implanted me with its spawn. My roommate made fun of me for weeks for screaming like a girl child.
Korsakovia–meh. I was too annoyed and frustrated by the box rearrangement/jumping puzzles to be scared. I uninstalled it after an hour of play, I think. Maybe the scary parts were later, but I doubt it.
As for Penumbra, I did play through about half of it before other games distracted me. I remember unease and creepiness, but no sweaty fear. I think I’m to blame here, or, more precisely, my daughter, who was still an infant at the time and generally allowed me only to play during the day for 45 minutes at a time. I was denied total immersion and the fear effect suffered. Maybe I should give it another go after I finish Call of Pripyat since she sleeps through the night now. With any luck, Penumbra will keep me from doing the same.
I played the demo of F.E.A.R. but that ladder scare is the only bit I remember. Christ, that made me jump. I’m not too good with cat scares.
Also I felt exactly the same about Korsakovia. It was creepy at first but then it began to irritate me far too much and it just soured the experience. I stopped playing as a result. Not to mention, when I realised I could bash those smoke-things with my crowbar they didn’t bother me nearly as much.
Great article. I look forward to reading more in the future.