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Wii

Skyward Sword Will Include More Than 100 Minutes of Cutscenes

by James Dawson - September 14, 2011, 5:42 pm EDT
Total comments: 37 Source: (The Legend of Zelda Facebook Page), http://www.facebook.com/LegendofZelda?sk=wall

Skyward Sword will also have similar features to Ocarina of Time 3D.

According to the official Legend of Zelda Facebook page, Skyward Sword will be packed with more than one hundred minutes of cinematic cutscenes.

The game will also implement some elements that were introduced to the Zelda series by Grezzo’s Ocarina of Time 3D, such as the inclusion of a boss-challenge mode and hint movies.

Talkback

TurdFurgySeptember 14, 2011

The hint videos don't count towards the 100 minutes, do they?

Metal Triforce Zelda: The Legend of Silent Protagonist

Quote from: TurdFurgy

The hint videos don't count towards the 100 minutes, do they?

No, the hint videos are separate.

oohhboyHong Hang Ho, Staff AlumnusSeptember 14, 2011

Don't supose they would have a movie mode like they had with Twin Snakes.

Chocobo_RiderSeptember 14, 2011

yes!!

I only say this because plot sucks me in to a game more than anything else.  I don't care about bloating numbers like "100 minutes of ____" as a feature, but Other M is my favorite Metroid game because not only was the gameplay intense, the game actually had the guts to stand up for itself and say: "video games are a story telling medium! not just a violence simulator!"

... I am exaggerating for effect.

also, I know Link isn't going to be talking yet... but the further away we get from games that feel no plot/no character = immersive/relatable, THE BETTER!!

Quote from: oohhboy

Don't supose they would have a movie mode like they had with Twin Snakes.

Starring Buster Keaton

EnnerSeptember 14, 2011

If the game is as long or longer than Twlight Princess, I can see how it can be sprinkled with that many minutes of cinematics.

King of TwitchSeptember 14, 2011

How awkward is it going to be when we realize that 30 minutes of that are devoted to Link stuck in the attic watching home movies of himself playing with a hula hoop and opening presents in an epic way?

ThanerosSeptember 14, 2011

I hope they don't go the TP route by building up a story then dropping it half way in.

Chocobo_RiderSeptember 14, 2011

Quote from: Thaneros

I hope they don't go the TP route by building up a story then dropping it half way in.

what are you talking about? the ending was the best moment I've ever seen in a Zelda game!

leahsdadSeptember 14, 2011

Quote:

what are you talking about? the ending was the best moment I've ever seen in a Zelda game!

Yeah, I have to agree with NinSage.  When 


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You found at Midna was a chick, and a very hot chick at that, and she said goodbye to Link forever, breaking the mirror?  I cried.  Seriously. 

AdrockSeptember 15, 2011

That's excessive especially with no voice acting. I seriously don't want to watch that much of a video game.

martySeptember 15, 2011

Quote from: NinSage

Quote from: Thaneros

I hope they don't go the TP route by building up a story then dropping it half way in.

what are you talking about? the ending was the best moment I've ever seen in a Zelda game!

If you feel that way, that's fine by me... but don't you think that's a bad thing to happen in a GAME?  Shouldn't the best moment be something YOU as the player DO?

In passive entertainment the rule is show don't tell.  The rule for interactive entertainment should be DO don't show--and it used to be that way until dev's decided that showing THEIR story was the focus of the game, not the PLAYER'S story of playing the game.

Chocobo_RiderSeptember 15, 2011

@leahsdad

yea man, I didn't cry but I was certainly getting a little misty.  *bro hug for you*

@marty

That all sounds nice.  But, no, it don't work that way.

The only games were you "do" something to reveal the story are the ones like Heavy Rain or LA Noire or the visual novels where the characters actions involve things like making dialogue and plot choices.

The other 99% of games' characters abilities are limited to things like: "shoot this or don't shoot it," "jump over this or run around it."  Kind of silly to make meaningful plot developments EMERGE from THOSE activities.

I am also of the opinion that games with ONE plot tell the best stories.  If that means relinquishing control of said plot - I'm cool with that.  Let us, the gamers, be immersed and have control of HOW the character advances through the plot, not WHAT that plot is.

... again, just my perspective and you are entitled to yours.  If you can explain how yours can and should apply to (most? all?) games, I'm all ears!

Ian SaneSeptember 15, 2011

With almost any other company it would be fine.  With Nintendo?  I'm anticipating my groans already.  Companies that consider story an afterthought to be thrown in at the last minute should not waste the player's time with 100 minutes of cutscenes.

And the one time they did focus a lot on the story they came up with something I would have been embarassed to write when I was 13 years old.  I'm would like Nintendo to treat story with more importance (the constant "Bowser kidnaps the Princess" routine has gone from quaint to lazy and insulting) but I don't trust them, as is, to deliver on that front.  They have to change in two ways: in treating story with more importance and in having the writing talent to deliver a good story.  Sakamoto is on par with Ed Wood as a storyteller.  The more Miyamoto and Aonuma expand on the Zelda story and timeline the more incoherent and stupid it becomes.  And let's ignore the furry fan fiction that is Star Fox.  If they're going to come up with sucky stories they shouldn't bother and if they're going to put some effort into it they need to bring in better writing talent.  It's all or nothing.

KDR_11kSeptember 15, 2011

Quote from: TurdFurgy

The hint videos don't count towards the 100 minutes, do they?

I hope they do, Nintendo isn't very good at making cutscenes that are worth the time they waste.

Luigi DudeSeptember 15, 2011

100 minutes of cutscenes for a game as large as this isn't that long people.  Twilight Princess is currently the biggest Zelda and that seemed to take the average person 30 hours to complete the main story.  Since Skyward Sword is suppose to be a bigger game, we're probably looking at at least 35-40 hours to complete the main story part of the game.  Combined with the fact the openings, big halfway point plot twist and endings to Zelda games usually contain the majority of the cutscenes anyway, these will basically be a non-issue for about 90% of the game.

CericSeptember 15, 2011

I think lots of little things.  Boss Intros, Dungeon Intros, Beginning Plot Points, Item Demos, Obtain a notable item, Fairies, New Important character, Scene changing Transitions, etc.

Once you diffuse those out within 40-50 hours it be very easy to put in a lot of less then a minute stuff that makes sense but, you wouldn't be sitting there going when will this scene end.  Using the 50 hour number we're talking only 1/30th of the game.

UltimatePartyBearSeptember 15, 2011

I think Ceric's right.  And I sincerely hope these are not pre-rendered.  If I'm wearing a bunny hood, I want to see it in the cutscene, by Din's fire!

broodwarsSeptember 15, 2011

I don't even know what to say to Skyward Sword having 100 hours of this: ".........."  If you're not going to have voice acting or even dialogue, do you really need that many cutscenes in a Zelda game?

CericSeptember 15, 2011

Quote from: broodwars

I don't even know what to say to Skyward Sword having 100 hours of this: ".........."  If you're not going to have voice acting or even dialogue, do you really need that many cutscenes in a Zelda game?

Yeah, 100 hours.  All the gameplay must be QTE with 2 minutes of cinematic for 1 minute of gameplay.  :-P

I be very surprise to see more then two cutscenes 5 minutes and over.

Minutes. 100 minutes. Out of what they call a 50-60 hour game. Less than two minutes out of every hour of gameplay is cutscenes.

GoldenPhoenixSeptember 15, 2011

Quote from: NWR_insanolord

Minutes. 100 minutes. Out of what they call a 50-60 hour game. Less than two minutes out of every hour of gameplay is cutscenes.

A rational and logical opinion! Seriously it is not a big deal, and the fact is that the stories have been decent in the Zelda series, at least on par with most games that are out now. Twilight Princess's story was interesting, maybe not stellar, but it was entertaining, Wind Waker had some of the best dialogue of the series, including humanizing Ganondorf, and let's not forget Majora's Mask which had an off the wall story and characters (Which is one of the things I enjoyed about the game). Zelda stories need to be understood in the context of their world, and the series has never focused on story, it has always been more of a background thing. Zelda, is NOT final fantasy or Heavy Rain.

I recently went back and played Twilight Princess, and was even more impressed with the world, and the decayed world from Ocarina of Time. Not to mention I enjoyed the story as well, what little there was. It did its job, tied the game together.

broodwarsSeptember 15, 2011

Folks, it's called a typo.  I mean to type "minutes", but was thinking about something else and put "hours".  Usually, I catch stuff like that, but I'm in the middle of playing a rather engrossing game at the moment so I didn't go back and re-read my post after I submitted it.  Surely, in the vast wasteland that is the internet, you've seen it before.  Aside from the typo, I stand by everything in that post.

And I stand by my post, where I point out that it's not that much when you look at it in relation to how long the game is. As far as telling stories goes, Nintendo usually does their best work in the Zelda series (though looking good in comparison to everything else they've done isn't that hard).

Mop it upSeptember 15, 2011

It would be interesting if someone were to count up the minutes of cutscenes in Ocarina of Time, Majora's Mask, Wind Waker, and Twilight Princess. Something tells me it'd be a higher number than you'd think, and probably close to 100 minutes.

ThanerosSeptember 15, 2011

Quote from: NinSage

Quote from: Thaneros

I hope they don't go the TP route by building up a story then dropping it half way in.

what are you talking about? the ending was the best moment I've ever seen in a Zelda game!


True the ending was awesome one of my favorites too. But roughly midway in the game the story was dropped almost completely and the game was just get to the next dungeon with not much to tie them together. Yes I know most Zelda games are this way but TP kinda made you think it was going to have epic story cutscenes throughout like begining put it failed. Hell, I remember reading an interview on this site that said they did this on purpose to mimic OoT. TP was fan service

martySeptember 15, 2011

Quote from: NinSage

The only games were you "do" something to reveal the story are the ones like Heavy Rain or LA Noire or the visual novels where the characters actions involve things like making dialogue and plot choices.

The other 99% of games' characters abilities are limited to things like: "shoot this or don't shoot it," "jump over this or run around it."  Kind of silly to make meaningful plot developments EMERGE from THOSE activities.

I am also of the opinion that games with ONE plot tell the best stories.  If that means relinquishing control of said plot - I'm cool with that.  Let us, the gamers, be immersed and have control of HOW the character advances through the plot, not WHAT that plot is.

... again, just my perspective and you are entitled to yours.  If you can explain how yours can and should apply to (most? all?) games, I'm all ears!

You say so yourself that LA Noire and Heavy Rain aren't games (visual novels--might as well be choose your own adventure books) so, without a framework of rules and objectives, I don't think the menial tasks the games make you perform count for anything, all they do reveal more non-interactive scenarios.

You seem to think that the framework of a game should serve the plot.  But this is totally backwards.  Is LA Noire a chore to play?  YES.  Same goes for every PLOT driven game I've played.  Killer 7 is another good example.  The problem with these games is that they don't want to be games and they take this problem out on the player.  A game has to logically respond to player input-these games simply shrug off all wrong input until the predetermined right input is done--it's not interaction of 99.99% of the actions garner no meaningful reaction.  The goal of these games basically "do what you're told."  You can't build a strategy around this because your role in the game isn't big enough to effect the game.

Think about the Blue Shell in Mario Kart and why someone might hate it.  The blue shell punishes good play and rewards bad play.  There isn't a logical strategy to overcome the blue shell.  The skills of player are diminished.

Stories that emerge from game play are generally more personal and effecting.  Minecraft is a good example.  The fear night brings.  The satisfaction of building a cool house or finding cool stuff to mine.  Being annoyed at your dog--being sad when your dog dies.  The framework provides so many little moments that build the emotional arc of the game and thus the story is created.  Sports games (especially full seasons) do a good job of this--same goes for the Sims or SimCity2k and the like.  I've heard Dwarf Fortress really excels at this.

Games are a great medium for telling stories but the games and the stories tend to suffer when the games ape movies.  Adding movies to games hasn't made the framework or game play of any game I've ever played better.  There are plenty of effecting non-plot driven works of art that are deeply moving--statues, architecture, paintings, songs, poems, pop-art.. etc--given the spacial reasoning and non-linearity that most of these art forms possess, I don't know why developers insist on making pseudo movies that cripple their chosen medium--games.

StogiSeptember 15, 2011

A 100 minutes of King Zora scouting over!

The sound of his ass sliding is excruciating!

NemoSeptember 15, 2011

I wonder what the average gameplay:cut-scene ratios of other games are, such as Metroid: Other M and any MGS game...

The more I think of it, the more I want it to be one single 100-minute cutscene right in the middle of the game.

King of TwitchSeptember 16, 2011

Quote from: The

A 100 minutes of King Zora scooting over!

The sound of his ass sliding is excruciating!

;D

Chocobo_RiderSeptember 16, 2011

Quote from: NWR_insanolord

The more I think of it, the more I want it to be one single 100-minute cutscene right in the middle of the game.

Oh man, this made me laugh out loud!!

@marty

I think you have some good points but I am too tired (and possibly sick) to fully comprehend them right now.  I will get back to you in the near future!

AdrockSeptember 16, 2011

I don't mind cutscenes when used effectively. Few games do. Off the top of my head, Uncharted uses cutscenes well. They're short and sometimes the game let's you keep playing while still being fed plot points. Just like in movies, after a major action sequence, it's a good idea to slow things down and let the audience take it all in but don't slow down too much or the audience stands to get restless and bored.

Nintendo is just not good at it and until they get better at it or hire people who are better at it, I'd prefer they keep cutscenes to a minimum. I don't mind reading subtitles just as long as it's kept short. I play games to play, not to read. Games like Zelda force you to read long blocks of text and it's not like they're really well-written. Nintendo doesn't usually let you skip them either. Without having seen what Skyward Sword has to offer, I'm not going to condemn it immediately. However, my expectations are fairly low. Hopefully, I'll be pleasantly surprised.

Ian SaneSeptember 16, 2011

Quote from: NWR_insanolord

The more I think of it, the more I want it to be one single 100-minute cutscene right in the middle of the game.

Sounds like Metal Gear Solid 4, except you left out the 100 minute cutscene at the beginning, the ones in between each chapter and the 3000 minute one at the end.

I remember when cutscenes in games were much more rare due to technological limitations.  They were usually at the beginning to establish the setting and the main plot, they were in the ending naturally, and you might also get a couple interludes in between levels, chapters or sections.  They did not do a little cutscene for every little item you found or constantly went from scene to scene showing all sorts of cool stuff that player would LIKE to do but can't because the developer is a wannabe film maker (and usually shows off exactly WHY they never became a film maker in the first place).

FMV isn't some new technology that blows us away anymore.  I find an overabundance of cutscenes to be annoying.  The real purpose of them is provide information to the player in situations where it is not practical for the player to be in control.  So something like a mission briefing or some interlude showing character away from the action is fine and totally appropriate.  But the walk 10 steps, cutscene, walk 20 steps, cutscene pattern is unbearable.  Same with the need to introduce every character or enemy with some little scene.

Zelda is not bad for this but the overall execution of cutscenes in the industry in general is pretty damn flawed.  I think it is something developers need to think about.  I don't play videogames to watch b-movies.

CericSeptember 16, 2011

I always liked the boss introduction ones because it was a chance to show the bosses character and the boss itself because I'm rarely able to see the whole boss while fighting.

UltimatePartyBearSeptember 16, 2011

The latest Extra Credits is pertinent.

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