Tag: Twilight Princess

WWW Wednesday – June 14, 2023

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www_wednesdays

WWW Wednesday is a weekly book meme run by Sam over at Taking on a World of Words. Check out her post and others over on her blog!

The Three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?

Currently Reading

Jurassic ParkI’m still making slow but steady progress with Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton. We’ve been slowly introduced to more and more dinosaurs, though things haven’t hit the fan just yet. I’m noticing more this time around how much the book itself is giving itself an out for how its dinosaurs are represented compared to what the science says; Doctor Wu states that they’ve only recreated the past as best they can, not literally revived dinosaurs as they were, especially since they filled in gaps in the genome. It used to bother me when I was younger that the dilophosaurus was venomous with no scientific basis too, but as I’ve come to understand paleo-art more and more, I realize such an artistic liberty isn’t at all inappropriate: you just shouldn’t be using fiction as the entire basis for your understanding of something.

Recently Finished

The Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess 2Last night I read through the second volume of the manga adaptation of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess by Akira Himekawa. This volume properly introduces the impish Midna, with whom Link reluctantly partners in order to return to human form and fight back against Zant and his incursion into Hyrule. This volume moved things forward a lot more. I appreciated how the first volume set things up, but establishing Link and Midna’s dynamic was a lot more fun, especially since it is typically one-sided in the game. It deviated a little more from the game here with how events unfold, as tracking things down and completing a dungeon don’t really adapt well. I can’t help but be a little bothered by it, but I understand why the change was necessary.

Reading Next

The Complete Poetry of Edgar Allan PoeThough I still want to focus on stuff I’ve already been meaning to read for a while now, I cannot help but be tempted to start reading The Complete Poetry of Edgar Allan Poe, which I picked up last month. I try to read poetry on occasion, though I struggle with reading it a lot more, and I really like the poem “The Raven” and this book is pretty short overall, so I’m hoping I’ll enjoying getting into this. I haven’t started reading it yet at all, but I have put a bookmark into it, and I feel like that counts for something.

Until next time, thank you for reading! Feel free to share your own post down below.

WWW Wednesday – June 7, 2023

RyanLeave a comment
www_wednesdays

WWW Wednesday is a weekly book meme run by Sam over at Taking on a World of Words. Check out her post and others over on her blog!

The Three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?

Currently Reading

Jurassic ParkI’ve been able to make some more decent progress in Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton since last week, though nothing too major. The main cast has made their way to island now and the initial tour is underway. Though I don’t think I was blind to it the first time I read this book, John Hammond’s petulance around the island’s safety being assessed is a lot more apparent to me. It is actually making some elements of the film feel a little dissonant to me, as he is treated a lot more kindly there, yet workers have suffered fatalities from dinosaurs right from the start of the movie. I get that he’s a bright-eyed idealist, but that rings a little hollow when you think harder about how much he’s deliberately overlooking the deaths of his workmen. I think I’m appreciating how much more the novel is matter-of-fact than I did the first time.

Recently Finished

The Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess 1Over the weekend I read the first volume of the manga adaptation of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess by Akira Himekawa. It was an interesting adaptation of the early phases of that game, as a certain degree of work had to be put into characterizing Link, which is typically only lightly done in the games. I was surprised with how deep they made it, giving him a bit of a tortured backstory that situates him in a specific place in Hyrule while also explaining why he already has some skill with a sword. There’s also an element of him being an outsider to Ordon Village, which is a nice touch considering even in the game he has pointed ears while nobody else does there. I’m especially looking forward to what his dynamic will be like with Midna, which it seems we’ll start to get a look at starting in the next volume.

Reading Next

Not making anymore concrete plans right now, other than obvious, i.e., the second volume of Twilight Princess. I’ve got plenty to get to that I’ve said I would already, no sense in repeating myself.

Until next time, thank you for reading! Feel free to share your own post down below.

WWW Wednesday – May 24, 2023

RyanLeave a comment
www_wednesdays

WWW Wednesday is a weekly book meme run by Sam over at Taking on a World of Words. Check out her post and others over on her blog!

The Three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?

Currently Reading

I’ve read a little bit of Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton since last week, though I’m still in the beginning phases of the story; I’ve yet to even meet the main cast of characters. So, I don’t really feel I have much to update about this book as yet. Hopefully I’ll have more to comment on next week.

Recently Finished

Adventure Time Season 11I just finished reading the comic book Adventure Time: Season 11 by Sonny Liew et al., having recently finished rewatching the series in its entirety, including the Distant Lands specials. Unfortunately, before I even finished reading this volume, I learned that the creators of the show don’t consider this comic book to be a canon continuation of the show, as they had virtually no involvement in its creation. There are also references to comics-only continuity as well, so that was a bit of a bummer. The volume contained two stories, one a little longer than the other. The first involved time travel to 1000 years in the future, a concept the comics seem oddly obsessed with. It was just okay. The latter two chapters felt a lot more character focused, however, with Finn still reeling from losing his home and having other humans closer by. Despite the first story being a little middling, by the end it was a nice little epilogue to the series as a whole, canon or not.

Reading Next

The Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess 1Though there are a number of books I’ve mentioned in this section that I haven’t started yet, I recently received a book I had on hold at the library: the first volume of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess manga by Akira Himekawa. I’ve been on a bit of a Zelda kick again, since before even the new game came out, and I’ve been wanting to read this manga after recently finishing Twilight Princess HD. I really don’t want to buy more and more volumes of manga, however, and this adaptation is a lot longer than the others, so I was excited to see a lot of this series is in my library’s catalogue (though volume 3 is maddeningly absent). Hopefully the due date will spur me on to actually read this soon.

Until next time, thank you for reading! Feel free to share your own post down below.

A Mature Zelda Game Needs Balance

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DeadHand

Dead Hand by Harangon

With E3 just around the corner and Nintendo dedicating its presence to the next Legend of Zelda game, I thought I’d talk about some thoughts I’ve been having on the series lately.

I’ve started playing The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword for the first time, a game that I’m late getting to, but remember a lot of the buzz around its release. It’s had me thinking about the various visual/tonal styles the Zelda series has had over the last several console iterations. Since the departure from the more realistic style in Ocarina of Time and Majora’s Mask to the cell-shaded cartoony visuals of Wind Waker, people have been clamouring for a “serious” or “mature” looking Zelda game. For some reason or another Twilight Princess came up a little short for people — some even feeling the game was underrated in its time — and the marriage of the cartoony style and this “mature” style in Skyward Sword did not seem beloved either.Read More »