Which zelda is the best

Her blue dress helps her stand out, but she's a rather simple Zelda, from a characterization perspective. She makes an appearance in Oracle of Ages and Seasons when the two games are linked, but she's mostly just used as a sacrifice by Twinrova to resurrect Ganon again.

In this grouping, there are technically three Zeldas, since each of these games takes place in a different period of time, but each version is very similar. They all use a variation of the Wind Waker design, so they look great, but there's little depth to their characters. They each get kidnapped by Vaati, but they accomplish little else. In Minish Cap , Link and Zelda are good friends, despite her royalty, but she spends almost the entire game turned to stone, so the relationship hardly gets explored.

It would have been cute to see Zelda shrink down in size and meeting the Minish, but her role is sadly still a mere damsel in distress. Twilight Princess is a gritty take on Ocarina , and, as such, it's often criticized for being one of the safest entries in the franchise. This title's incarnation of Zelda is the embodiment of that complaint. This would be fine, but just like the previous Zeldas on this list, she's absent for much of the story.

However, she does have some awesome moments, like saving Midna from the brink of death and being possessed by Ganondorf for a memorable boss battle at the game's ending. Overall, she's far better than the worst Zelda incarnations, but there's still a handful of games with a more interesting princess. This is the first incarnation of Zelda that took the initiative to fend off Ganondorf herself.

She teams up with Link to acquire the Triforce and attempt to stop Ganondorf as a child, which ultimately blows up in her face. Ganondorf gets his hands on the Triforce, and her green-clad hero is out of commission for the next seven years. After Link awakens, Zelda disguises herself as Sheik in order to hide from Ganondorf while still assisting Link in finding the remaining sages. She's not the most interesting Zelda, but her design is iconic, and her growth from a naive child into a wise and capable adult is compelling.

Super Smash Bros. Personality-wise, she's the typical sweet and soft-spoken type, but she is clearly very caring and compassionate, too. After acquiring the Triforce at the end of the game, she generously uses her wish to restore Lorule's Triforce, which has no direct benefit for her. Her design is also one of the most charming yet, but the rest of the Zeldas simply have more character development and personality than this one. The one that started it all on the original Nintendo Entertainment System is still pretty stellar.

By today's standards, The Legend Of Zelda and its Hyrule seem basic, but many of the open-world games that gamers know today likely owe it all to the very first game.

Even after all these years, The Legend Of Zelda is an NES game that stands the test of time by featuring a world that's easy to feel immersed in. Gamers can explore at their own pace, discover secrets, and learn to swim or sink on their own. Even the 8-Bit graphics can't hinder what will always be an iconic Hyrule. Still, the Switch remake gives a colorful and serene island for gamers to explore.

Since it is a nearly identical remake of a map for the Nintendo GameBoy, it's also not an expansive map. However, fans agree that the advanced graphics of the Switch make it a visually appealing map for Link's Awakening HD. The NPCs, dungeons, and locations are simplistic but get the job done in the best ways possible.

It was A Link To The Past that revolutionized Hyrule forever with an even bigger world filled with secrets, iconic dungeons, and stunning visuals that made Hyrule feel akin to a world seen in high fantasy films. It did exactly what a sequel should do: take what was done so well in previous games and simply make it bigger as well as better.

Ocarina Of Time would set the new standard that future sequels on consoles would follow. Of course, the dungeons were also more immersive and challenging than ever, leaking with atmosphere. However, many fans will agree that the main Hyrule Field hub world has not aged well. It's essentially an empty section of land that connects to all the interesting places with no NPCs and very few enemies.

Still, Ocarina Of Time 's Hyrule is one that fans will never forget. There are many things to discover and do, such as the plethora of challenges that reward Kinstones. The Minish Cap also utilizes its new gameplay mechanic: shrinking and growing. The products discussed here were independently chosen by our editors. GameSpot may get a share of the revenue if you buy anything featured on our site. The Legend of Zelda is one of Nintendo's most beloved series, and for good reason.

The adventures starring a young hero battling against evil have grown up alongside the gaming industry itself, constantly reinventing itself and having an influence on the direction of video games as a whole in the process. For that reason the Zelda series is easily among the most revered in Nintendo's library, though some are more memorable than others.

We rounded up all of the major Legend of Zelda releases, putting aside spin-offs like Hyrule Warriors. Then the GameSpot staff came together and agreed on a consensus ranking. Here, from least to most legendary , are the best Zelda games.

If you're also a fan of Nintendo's iconic plumber, check out our list of the best Mario games. For Switch game suggestions, we have roundups of the best Nintendo Switch games and best Switch games for kids. Before there even was a Zelda mold, Nintendo thoroughly broke it.

Zelda 2 gets some credit for completely rethinking what a Zelda game could be, swapping its top-down perspective for a more action-oriented side-scrolling combat system, and placing much more emphasis on RPG elements like exploring and talking to townsfolk.

It bore a passing resemblance to its contemporaries like Castlevania 2: Simon's Quest. But for all of its daring experimentation, it was also often frustrating and obtuse. There's a reason Nintendo chose to make subsequent Zelda games more based on the original than this oddball sequel. Nowadays it's mostly known for its final battle, which had Link fighting against his own shadow.

The Nintendo DS got two of its own Zelda games, but to make use of the dual-screen system you controlled Link entirely using the touch screen. The result was a little awkward and halting, but it worked well enough once you got the hang of it.

While Spirit Tracks sported some clever dungeon design, the touchscreen functionality wasn't as novel the second time around, and the limitations of navigating the world via train just didn't feel as adventurous as riding the wind on a boat.

Phantom Hourglass is the predecessor to Spirit Tracks, and it did just about everything better. It got a lot of mileage out of the Wind Waker art style, and sailing around the world was exhilarating.

At the end of the day, though, touchscreen Zelda was an experiment. They pulled it off well enough but even subsequent Zelda games on the 3DS didn't follow in those footsteps, and for good reason. Skyward Sword certainly isn't a bad Zelda game, but it is the point at which the path charted by several previous 3D Zeldas started to show its age.

The pattern of exploring a dungeon to find a new powerup felt a little more rote this time around, and worse yet, the pace was criticized as achingly slow. It took hours just to get out of the opening tutorial island, the game constantly dropped reminders about basic information, and your in-game companion was endlessly chatty. Some of this was addressed in the recent HD remaster for Nintendo Switch, which helps sand off some of the rough edges.

The controls were originally designed for the Wii remote, and the remaster makes mostly successful revisions to those. And to its credit, it is canonically the very first Zelda game, making it a must-play for lore lovers. The Oracle duology is technically two separate games and originally three games! But they're clearly part of a matched set, having followed the Pokemon formula and released simultaneously, with players intended to use cross-game functionality.

You can play either game individually and get a full Zelda game, but providing a linked password to either one treats the other like a sequel and provides the "true" ending.

But effectively doubling the playtime and cost with two similarly-playing games was an awkward fit compared to simply trading pocket monsters, even if the gameplay was a solid throwback to the Game Boy classic Link's Awakening.