The perfect Zelda video games: each mainline Legend of Zelda, ranked

All through 2023, in honor of the magnificent Tears of the Kingdom, Polygon has been celebrating Nintendo’s Legend of Zelda sequence. It’s been fascinating. Maybe no different online game sequence is so rewarding to revisit, or presents such wildly totally different, refracted visions of its core concept — which however stays constant all through.

Created by the good Shigeru Miyamoto within the Nineteen Eighties as an expression of his childhood love of exploring with out a map, Zelda has at all times held a revered place in gaming tradition, though it by no means fairly loved fashionable success to match — not, that’s, till its unlikely rebirth in 2017, because of the runaway success of the Nintendo Change and the revolutionary design of Breath of the Wild.

The sequence’ robust traditions are balanced by an ingrained behavior of hitting the reset button. Throughout 16 mainline entries, solely a small handful (Majora’s Masks, Phantom Hourglass, Tears of the Kingdom) are true sequels, and even these enjoyment of reinvention. The Zelda timeline is extra a tangle of rumor and fantasy than a longtime canon, and its lore is continually rewritten.

Rating these sensible, shapeshifting video games is, in some methods, an absurd activity. They’re all nice (effectively, maybe all however one); the highest seven or so are masterpieces that could possibly be organized in nearly any order. But it surely’s an attention-grabbing train in exploring a sequence of video games that exist in a singular, echoing dialog with one another. In placing this rating collectively, we paid at the least as a lot consideration to how enjoyable the video games are to play now as to their historic import.

A number of factors of order: Although they’re technically a part of the primary Zelda canon, we have now excluded the multiplayer video games 4 Swords, 4 Swords Adventures, and Tri Drive Heroes. They’re tough to play as their makers supposed now, and truthfully really feel extra like spinoffs (although 4 Swords Adventures, particularly, completely guidelines). Oracle of Seasons and Oracle of Ages, which had been launched as a pair, Pokémon-style, are counted as a single entry. And precise spinoffs like Hyperlink’s Crossbow Coaching or Freshly-Picked Tingle’s Rosy Rupeeland are additionally excluded. The Zelda sequence is gloriously bizarre — however possibly not that bizarre.

16. Zelda 2: The Journey of Hyperlink

Picture: Nintendo

Authentic launch: 1987, on NES
The place to play now: Nintendo Change On-line

If the unique The Legend of Zelda is the sequence at its most youthful, exuberant, and promising, Zelda 2: The Journey of Hyperlink represents the video games’ awkward teen years. Fittingly, the Hyperlink we play in Zelda 2 is 16 years outdated, fumbling his manner by means of new gameplay territory, as Nintendo explores the lite role-playing mechanics from a side-scrolling perspective. Unfold throughout overworld segments of harmful exploration and equally harrowing side-scrolling dungeon crawling, Zelda 2 is a tougher, extra obtuse type of journey.

Lengthy thought of the black sheep of the Legend of Zelda video games, The Journey of Hyperlink was a tougher, clumsier experiment for Nintendo. It was envisioned as an motion recreation infused with role-playing recreation stats, and the tip consequence seems like Nintendo’s designers copying others’ work (e.g., Dragon Quest, Kung-Fu Grasp) as an alternative of flexing the corporate’s trademark originality. Zelda 2 is just not a failed experiment, nonetheless. Nintendo clearly discovered the correct classes from it, in addition to influencing different video games, together with Castlevania 2: Simon’s Quest, Faxanadu, and Shovel Knight. Even the worst Zelda video games have their significance. —Michael McWhertor

15. Phantom Hourglass

Picture: Nintendo

Authentic launch: 2007, on Nintendo DS
The place to play now: Unavailable — monitor down a used copy

The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass represents a considerably awkward period of Zelda. As a direct sequel to The Wind Waker, it had large footwear to fill, and wore them a bit of clumsily. Phantom Hourglass was the primary mainline Zelda recreation to be launched on the Nintendo DS household of handhelds and the primary Zelda recreation to make the most of the console’s contact controls. General, the controls slot in properly with the Zelda components and permit gamers to scribble on dungeon maps and faucet to struggle. Nevertheless, the sport suffers from uneven pacing whereas touring in your customizable steamboat ship, or revisiting the Temple of the Ocean King, a dungeon that requires you to return again to it a number of occasions. Nonetheless, I’ll bear in mind it for its willingness to attempt new gameplay and check the Zelda waters. —Ana Diaz

14. Twilight Princess

Picture: Nintendo

Authentic launch: 2006, on GameCube and Wii
The place to play now: Unavailable — monitor down a used copy of Twilight Princess HD for Wii U

Hyperlink spends a fairly large chunk of time in wolf type in Twilight Princess, which you’d assume could be a promoting level (as a result of he appears to be like so darn cute), but it surely’s truly fairly bizarre. In any case, Hyperlink can’t do the entire greatest components of being Hyperlink when he’s a wolf: throwing a boomerang, say, or twirling his sword round in a circle whereas shouting “Hiyah!” Twilight Princess additionally introduces Midna, a helper character within the vein of Navi, however much more condescending. I discover Midna’s snarky feedback to be deeply satisfying, and the conclusion of her arc on the recreation’s finish feels extra fulfilling than most of Princess Zelda’s arcs. The Legend of Zelda sequence doesn’t at all times permit its feminine aspect characters to have a lot to do, however by the tip of Twilight Princess, it’s truly extra Midna’s story than anybody else’s. —Maddy Myers

13. Oracle of Ages / Oracle of Seasons

Picture: Nintendo

Authentic launch: 2001, on Recreation Boy Colour
The place to play now: Nintendo Change On-line

In 2001, Nintendo lent the proverbial Zelda keys to Capcom. Because it seems, Capcom didn’t want them: It kicked down the door to one among gaming’s most hallowed sequence and made itself proper at house. Billed as a double function centered on time- and season-based puzzles, respectively, Oracle of Ages and Oracle of Seasons are tight and complicated sufficient to have emerged from the workplaces of Nintendo itself. (Sequence creator Shigeru Miyamoto had big-picture manufacturing enter, to be truthful.)

Ages’ time-traveling puzzles are among the many best within the 2D Zelda pantheon, and Seasons’ extra action-oriented strategy makes it a recent entry within the in any other case “left-brained” franchise. Director Hidemaro Fujibayashi would go on to direct a handful of later Zelda video games (The Minish Cap, Skyward Sword, and — checks notes — Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom amongst them), however so far as “basic” Zelda goes, few entries seize the sequence on a grand scale like Capcom’s darkish horse two-parter. —Mike Mahardy

12. Spirit Tracks

Picture: Nintendo

Authentic launch: 2009, on Nintendo DS
The place to play now: Unavailable — monitor down a used copy

As follow-ups on this endlessly changeable sequence go, Spirit Tracks has probably the most simple, cut-and-paste premises: it’s Phantom Hourglass however with a practice as an alternative of a ship. Like its rapid predecessor, it leans onerous on stylus management, course-plotting map traversal, and a mode of journey that’s breezily approachable till it instantly isn’t, within the grim, stealthy, piecemeal ascent of its central tower dungeon.

If Spirit Tracks finally surpasses Phantom Hourglass, it’s due to its sheer, ebullient allure. The enchantment of its steam-train playset is irresistable, and that is additionally the one recreation within the sequence wherein Hyperlink and Zelda — the latter admittedly in ghost type — get to hang around for the entire thing. Zelda even will get to be semi-playable, by possessing clanking fits of armor, whereas the pair have an lovable, harmless chemistry. Choo choo! —Oli Welsh

11. The Legend of Zelda

Picture: Nintendo

Authentic launch: 1986, on NES
The place to play now: Nintendo Change On-line

It’s the uncommon recreation that impresses me extra with every passing yr. However as developments come and go, genres flourish and stagnate, and open worlds proceed to distance themselves from their late-2010s rising pains, The Legend of Zelda frequently grows in my estimation. It’s opaque by at this time’s requirements, replete as it’s with hidden doorways and labyrinthine shifts from one display to a different. And given the selection, it’s pretty far down the record of “enjoyable” Zelda video games. But it surely stands as a progenitor of most of at this time’s greatest video games, open-world or in any other case, and it took Nintendo 31 years to circle again to its elegant conceit of a sprawling, mysterious world value exploring in Breath of the Wild. —M. Mahardy

10. Skyward Sword

Picture: Nintendo

Authentic launch: 2011, on Nintendo Wii
The place to play now: Skyward Sword HD on Nintendo Change

It’s time to reclaim maybe probably the most constantly underrated recreation within the Legend of Zelda sequence. There are causes Skyward Sword’s fame has suffered. First, its unique movement controls, whereas effectively carried out, are simply not how anybody desires to play an epic journey like this. Second, it has a ridiculously overwrought climax worthy of a Hideo Kojima recreation. Third, it arrived at simply the purpose when the Zelda video games’ Ocarina of Time-inspired design was beginning to present its age.

Skyward Sword ended up being a swan tune for that period of Zelda — however what a swan tune. It’s a dense and satisfying recreation, expertly designed, with intricate, cleverly conceived dungeons that rank alongside the easiest within the sequence’ historical past. And it additionally has a hovering, romantic spirit. Skyward Sword is probably the purest expression of Zelda’s high-fantasy aesthetic — and the one time the sequence absolutely owned as much as being a love story. —OW

9. A Hyperlink Between Worlds

Picture: Nintendo

Authentic launch: 2013, on Nintendo 3DS
The place to play now: Boxed 3DS version continues to be in print

I at all times discovered A Hyperlink Between Worlds to be a particular recreation due to the way in which it iterates on the basic Zelda theme of traversing parallel worlds. As an alternative of utilizing a mirror to flip between worlds, this recreation permits Hyperlink to remodel right into a 2D portray, wherein type he can stroll alongside partitions and into the glittering crevices of Hyrule and its counterpart, Lorule.

For me, Lorule is without doubt one of the extra attention-grabbing variations of Zelda’s basic Darkish World. It isn’t only a barren wasteland full of monsters; it’s additionally the house of variety and heroic individuals who need a greater lifestyle. The sport performs effectively, with maybe the best-integrated contact controls in a Zelda recreation. On high of all that, it options an unconventional weapon rental system that permits you to discover wherever you need early on. The sport’s title nods to the revered A Hyperlink to the Previous, and it actually doesn’t fail to dwell as much as its namesake. —AD

8. The Minish Cap

Picture: Nintendo

Authentic launch: 2004, on Recreation Boy Advance
The place to play now: Nintendo Change On-line + Enlargement Pack

The Minish Cap is a hidden gem of the Zelda sequence. Developed by Capcom, this Zelda recreation follows Hyperlink after he meets a speaking hat named Ezlo that grants him the facility to shrink to the dimensions of a pea. Exploring as a tiny hero actually adjustments our perspective on Hyrule and permits the builders to conjure up a sensorial and vivid world the place you’ll struggle Vaati and dodge the deathly plop of raindrops.

Equally to The Wind Waker, The Minish Cap leans right into a cartoony allure; you’ll meet zany sword instructors and speak to cows chewing cud. This recreation additionally incorporates one of many Legend of Zelda’s goofiest objects, a magical cane that turns objects the wrong way up. Mix these charms with some nice dungeon design, and you’ve got the makings of a implausible Zelda recreation. It may not normally be counted among the many Zelda greats, however The Minish Cap finds its brilliance within the tiny particulars. —AD

7. Hyperlink’s Awakening

Picture: Grezzo/Nintendo

Authentic launch: 1993, on Recreation Boy
The place to play now: Select between its 1998 DX type for Recreation Boy Colour on Nintendo Change On-line or the modernized 2019 Nintendo Change remake

This was the first-ever Zelda recreation I performed, so the entire references to different video games flew over my head, in addition to the very apparent signposting about how the story would finish. I felt confused, as so many gamers do, about why the identify “Zelda” was within the title (I did assume possibly the owl was named Zelda). And but — though I skilled the basic Zelda tropes and mechanics within the dreamlike setting of Koholint Island, moderately than within the bigger and extra outlined kingdom of Hyrule — their magic captivated me utterly. Like many others on this record, Hyperlink’s Awakening is a bizarre Zelda recreation, and it’s proof that being bizarre and foolish is simply as a lot part of the patchwork of “being a Zelda recreation” as environmental puzzles or a magic sword wielded by an eternally reincarnating hero. —M. Myers

6. The Wind Waker

Picture: Nintendo

Authentic launch: 2002, on GameCube
The place to play now: Unavailable — monitor down a used copy of The Wind Waker HD for Wii U

The Wind Waker oozes a allure and sense of character that distinguishes it from different Zelda video games and makes it a sequence nice. It dared to take the Legend of Zelda in a daring new visible path with its splendidly expressive, cartoony graphics, and launched one among my favourite Zelda casts. Tetra is an impressed tackle the position of Zelda: an adventurous and succesful pirate captain who helps Hyperlink alongside his journey. This Hyperlink, too, is one among my favourite Hyperlinks, together with his comedian ebook expressions and bumbling antics.

The sport moved me emotionally in ways in which no different Zelda recreation has, and I nonetheless take into consideration Hyperlink’s large send-off, as he waves his tiny arms goodbye to his granny. All this, and it’s completely fulfilling to play. Prospers just like the adaptive soundtrack that performs stringed devices as Hyperlink hits his enemies solely add to its zippy fight. This recreation — from its snot-nosed children to its timeless artwork type — is endlessly endearing. To me, its components make for the proper elixir of a Zelda recreation. —AD

5. Ocarina of Time

Picture: Nintendo

Authentic launch: 1998, on Nintendo 64
The place to play now: Select between the unique model on Nintendo Change On-line + Enlargement Pack, or the Ocarina of Time 3D remaster on 3DS (boxed version nonetheless in print)

Simply as Twilight Princess is secretly Midna’s recreation, Ocarina of Time is secretly Zelda’s recreation — or maybe it belongs to Sheik. It is probably not one of the best Zelda recreation by trendy requirements, however Ocarina of Time set a benchmark by which all subsequent entries have been measured, notably relating to storytelling and world-building. It gives up the phantasm of an open-world Hyrule, planting the seeds for a backyard that will bloom in Breath of the Wild. And it’s the sport with a time-travel story that splintered all the sequence into disparate arcs — maybe an important linchpin within the larger Ganondorf saga. And it nonetheless holds up in spite of everything these years. Too unhealthy its greatest model is relegated to the Nintendo 3DS — at the least, for now. —M. Myers

4. Breath of the Wild

Picture: Nintendo

Authentic launch: 2017, on Nintendo Change and Wii U
The place to play now: Nintendo Change

Breath of the Wild represents probably the most consequential overhaul the Zelda sequence has had because it moved into 3D with Ocarina of Time; the truth is, it could be probably the most consequential ever, bravely scrapping many of the design hallmarks of a revered recreation sequence. Nintendo was looking for to modernize Zelda, but in addition to chop by means of 30 years of collected custom, all the way in which again to the untamed journey of the very first recreation.

It hardly must be stated what successful it was: Breath of the Wild catapulted the Zelda sequence to a brand new stage of recognition and challenged the assumptions of plenty of open-world and role-playing recreation design in a manner that the remainder of the business continues to be digesting. It’s a dynamic, natural, thrillingly pure journey, and the one motive it doesn’t high this record is due to what adopted. —OW

3. A Hyperlink to the Previous

Picture: Nintendo

Authentic launch: 1991, on SNES
The place to play now: Nintendo Change On-line

Writing entries for this ranked record has me excited about simply what it’s that makes a Zelda recreation nice, and I believe it’s the second of realization. A Hyperlink to the Previous serves up scrumptious moments of realization over and time and again. You determine {that a} cracked wall could be blown open to disclose a hidden passageway — oooh! You get a brand-new device and also you notice precisely how it’s good to use it — aha! You instantly determine the trick to a boss struggle — take that! And then you definitely notice that you haven’t even come shut — not even shut — to seeing the entire discoveries on provide right here. A Hyperlink to the Previous delivers on the pure dopamine rush of discovery, forcing a smile onto your face at each new revelation. It simply feels good. —M. Myers

2. Majora’s Masks

Picture: Nintendo through Polygon

Authentic launch: 2000, on Nintendo 64
The place to play now: Select between the unique model on Nintendo Change On-line + Enlargement Pack, or the Majora’s Masks 3D remaster on 3DS (boxed version nonetheless in print)

As we’re speaking about a sequence so centered on music, permit me a metaphor: Whereas Ocarina of Time’s time journey was classical in its strategy (elegant, balletic, and nimble), Majora’s Masks’s time loop was extra paying homage to jazz: fractured, messy, and difficult, however revelatory all the identical. Arriving 20 years earlier than the time-loop craze comprising Outer Wilds, Deathloop, and 12 Minutes, Majora’s Masks places Hyperlink in a three-day cycle that unwinds and respools in an odd dream world replete with characters considering the approaching apocalypse. In comparison with most video games within the sequence, Majora largely revolves round aspect quests, that are largely predicated on the gathering of masks. Stated quests reset themselves each time Hyperlink travels again to the daybreak of the primary day, (hopefully) armed with the required data to bolster his assortment and save a life or two within the course of.

Majora was the feverish reply to a confounding query: “How can we comply with the resounding success of Ocarina of Time and likewise bridge the hole between the Nintendo 64 and the GameCube?” Nobody may have predicted the reply: a melancholy, tick-tock ballet of thwarted desires and determined lives within the face of the apocalypse, probably the most intimate and private Zelda has ever been. It stays the strangest and darkest entry within the sequence, and I doubt we’ll ever see something prefer it once more. —M. Mahardy

1. Tears of the Kingdom

Picture: Nintendo

Authentic launch: 2023, on Nintendo Change
The place to play now: Nintendo Change

Each Zelda recreation has constructed upon the foundations of the video games earlier than it, with even the characters in its world acknowledging the myths of yore. Nobody believes extra within the idea of predicting the longer term based mostly on the previous than the builders of Zelda — in addition to Princess Zelda herself, who opens Tears of the Kingdom by guiding Hyperlink by means of a sequence of historic underground murals.

And but even Princess Zelda in her knowledge couldn’t probably have predicted how unbelievable and miraculous her story would turn into. Tears of the Kingdom is a mirrored image of this continued promise: You might think about you perceive — based mostly on the historical past of Zelda video games — how bold and artistic and world-warping a Zelda recreation could possibly be. And but that very world will nonetheless shock you. Tears of the Kingdom nonetheless surprises me. It’s a present that I can’t imagine all of us acquired. —M. Myers