As I continued my journey through The Wind Waker, I got to meet lots of new characters. There was a group of mischievous boys, a teacher with whom I sympathized greatly, a Rito girl named Medli, a giant talking tree, and, of course, the iconic Koroks. The story and the personalities of the characters have really resonated with me thus far, and I’m very thankful for that, because my gameplay is still being hampered by the controls in this classic GameCube game. Or maybe, just maybe, I’m not as good at playing video games as I think I am.
Picking up where I left off from last time, I found myself waking up on Windfall Island, where a talking boat known as the King of Red Lions told me that I was about to begin an epic quest — that is, once I fetched a sail for him to take me across the ocean. So I started searching around this bustling little island for a sail and quickly found myself roped into a very frustrating mini-game that tested my patience with the controls.
See, very shortly after I arrived on Windfall, I met the four mischievous little boys known as the Killer Bees. They reminded me of some of the elementary students that I have had the pleasure of teaching over the course of my career. These boys were so confident in their hiding skills that they challenged me, the self-proclaimed champion of hide-and-seek, to a little game. I don’t usually focus on sidequests first, but I wanted to teach these kids a lesson because they were making life difficult for their teacher, Mrs. Marie. Since she wasn’t mobile enough to chase these hooligans, I made sure to track them down throughout the village. Of course, nothing in this game is ever that easy, so as soon as you locate them, they flee and force you to give chase.
It’s at this point that I learned a valuable lesson The Wind Waker likes to reiterate on a regular basis: having adept precision is an absolute must. This game requires you to accurately time your jumps and aim your rolls, and there were numerous times when I was sure that I had lined myself up perfectly to roll into one of these little troublemakers, only to narrowly miss and watch them run far away. It’s rather unforgiving, punishing you for your mistakes and lack of precision. These kids were fast and covered quite a bit of ground while trying to evade me, so every missed roll had me falling farther and farther behind. Eventually I would manage to land a perfect roll into one of them (hopefully they have to spend some time in detention for this), but the amount of time it took to land that perfect roll was longer than I’d like to admit.
After that bit of embarrassment, I was eager to just locate the sail and set off on the Great Sea. At first, I didn’t know what to expect when sailing on the King of Red Lions. It was a bit of a bumpy ride, reminding me of Mario Kart whenever I leapt off waves to collect floating coins. But at the very least, there weren’t any Red or Blue Koopa Shells being hurled at me. That being said, when I got to Dragon Roost Island and discovered the next task that awaited me, I began wishing that I could just throw a Koopa Shell instead.
After meeting Medli and finding out about the Great Valoo’s plight, I was tasked with throwing the Rito girl into the air so she could fly on the breeze and land on a cliffside that would take her into the Dragon Roost Cavern. I knew what the trick was: I had to step up onto an elevated platform and wait for the shifting wind current to point in the right direction before liftoff. I went into this expecting the wind to smoothly carry her over, but of course it didn’t, as my lack of precision continued to haunt me. During the first five attempts, I didn’t stand in the right spot on the platform, so Medli couldn’t fly high enough to land on the cliffside. Again, the controls demand exact timing and precision in order to carry out otherwise straight-forward tasks and missions. All of this did allow me to enter Dragon Roost Cavern myself, and later on, Medli gave me the Grappling Hook as a reward for my efforts up until that point. So at least that was worth the trouble.
After defeating Gohma and stopping it from tormenting the Great Valoo, I got to move on to the Forest Haven and watch an amazingly cute scene. Having played Breath of the Wild before this game, I already knew who the Koroks were, so it made me happy to see an earlier iteration of them in this game. Meeting them was definitely a highlight of this phase of the journey; after hearing their music and watching them dance, I knew that I was going to stop at nothing to rescue Makar and bring him back to the Great Deku Tree. Of course, by saving the Koroks, I also ensure the existence of a future Hyrule where I can track down 900 of their little Korok seeds.
But what’s the word of the day again? That’s right: precision! The touchy controls dogged my steps even as I tried to maneuver around the Forbidden Woods. To navigate a good chunk of the dungeon, you have to hop between Boko Bulbs. I always believed that I was lined up perfectly so that I would jump into the next bulb without any problems, but inevitably, the camera would just be a little bit off when I made the jump. This caused me to not only miss multiple Boko Bulbs, but in some cases, I would also fall down so far that I had to repeat a lot of steps to get back to where I was before!
But the Boko Bulbs weren’t the only problem here, as simple jumps proved just as troublesome. One part of the dungeon involves leaping across multiple platforms in a row, and if my camera angle wasn’t exactly right while attempting a jump, I fell into the water and had to swim all the way back to the start of the room just to try again.
By now, you’re either laughing at me for being so terrible at the “easy” parts of the game, or you’re nodding your head in agreement. If you’re in the first group, allow me to offer some perspective: I have beaten the first level of the original Super Mario Bros. with my eyes closed, and I once managed to conquer Super Mario Bros. 3 with only one hand (my left wrist was in a cast and thus couldn’t be used). So believe me, I know how to time and land jumps like nobody’s business. And it’s not like I’m struggling with other gameplay elements in The Wind Waker; so far, I’ve been able to defeat the bosses easily enough, landing the final, devastating blows on my first or second tries. But for whatever reason, I just can’t seem to get the hang of these camera angles and precise button hits. I thought that my previous platforming experience would help me out, but it looks like I’ll have to figure out a different solution to the problem.
After all the frustration and hardship, perhaps I should take a little time to unwind and do some casual exploring across the open seas. Maybe some self-reflection while sailing around with the King of Red Lions will help reawaken my inner sense of precision.
Catch up on the previous chapters in this series with the links below!
The Wind Waker is 20 years old on December 13, 2022! We’re celebrating with dedicated articles throughout the first two weeks of December!
