oh fuck yes the oracle games are coming to nintendo switch online?? finally the excuse i needed to play the only main series zelda games i never got around to let's fucking go
this shit hits. i wish i'd played these games back in the day bc it's so good. it reminds me of zelda 1 but less confusing because there's actual characters and dialogue to point you in the right direction lol.
like the first dungeon is a clear reference to level-1 in original zelda, the old men who live in holes are back (and sometimes take your money lol), sometimes you have a dungeon room that's just four blocks and a bunch of enemies, you've got the 2D sections returning from link's awakening also calling back to zelda 1... they even bring back some of the original boss monsters!
but also it's just so charming - you can see the throughline from this to minish cap for sure (also they kinda recycled the stump gimmick i never knew that lmao)... nothing else in the series has quite the same vibe as holodrum/subrosia (and that was a surprise! i wasn't expecting a whole alternate underworld in this one!). the random encounters with syrup, the big animal friends, the sidequests... you can see that the capcom-zelda approach is to give as much personality to the world and characters as possible because it comes through big time.
i have gotten lost a couple of times (i never would have thought to pick up the stupid squid miniboss out of the water i mean who touches enemies on purpose still mad about that one), but i think in general the game does a great job of dropping hints so that a player who likes to explore will remember to return when new areas open up or when it's time to check in on certain characters (like for the trading quest, the pirates, the old man with the gem, etc). plus you can always get a hint on where to go from the maku tree and impa. i've only gotten stuck and had to look up what to do two or three times, and i don't really feel bad about that because it's like really specific stuff that would be hard to hint more strongly without just doing it for you. most of the time if i'm lost i can fumble around and find someplace to go/something to do until i realize where i'm supposed to go and it's pretty satisfying to uncover the path forward like that.
i don't have a big point i'm trying to make except i guess Oracle Games Good, Actually :)