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Digital Trends
04-08-2025
- Entertainment
- Digital Trends
The best Legend of Zelda items, ranked
With a few exceptions, every Legend of Zelda game features a new incarnation of Link to take up the mantle of hero and vanquish evil from the land. He's always armed with a sword, shield, and a host of other items he collects from various dungeons and characters that he somehow manages to hold without even having pockets. These items are part of what makes each game unique since they provide a new utility for Link to use in combat, puzzle solving, or both. There are a few that have become almost as common as the Master Sword across the Zelda timeline, but others have only shown up once. Having played every mainline Zelda game, both 2D and 3D, I have experimented with every tool in Link's arsenal and picked out the best of the best. These items are the most unique, useful, and all-around fun items across the entire franchise. Note: I am not including core weapons like Link's sword and shield that are typically part of his default equipment. I'm also not including powers, like the ones in Tears of the Kingdom, even if they are technically coming from the Purah Pad. #6. Bunny Hood Masks were a primary focus of Majora's Mask, but we got a taste of how interesting these could be first in Ocarina of Time. I feel it is almost cheating to include a transformation mask for Majora because they essentially function as an entirely new character, but the Bunny Hood has to be the best mask in both of these games after excluding those. This is more of a headband than a hood, but let's not argue semantics. The effects aren't so great in Ocarina, only preventing those annoying skeletons from spawning at night in Hyrule Field, but it unleashes its true form in Majora's Mask. Here, it greatly increases Link's running speed and even lets him jump a bit further. In a game where time is literally your greatest enemy, being able to dash across Termina is the greatest power you can get. #5. Boomerang Link's arsenal consists of a ton of ranged weapons. You can almost always count on getting a bow, slingshots are cool, and you can even throw Deku Nuts by hand. Even when you factor in different arrow types, nothing has as much utility as the boomerang. Link can toss this as a weapon with a tricky arc to get around shields, use it to collect far-away items, and even cut certain parts of the environment. Some games give it even more power, like Wind Waker where you can mark points to have the boomerang bounce between your targets in a certain order. This is an item I hate to remove from my quick menu. #4. Bombchus Every time there's a new Zelda game I ask, 'Why aren't there Bombchus?' Regular bombs get all the love, but Bombchus are so much more interesting. They're both explosives, but regular bombs can only be thrown or dropped most of the time. Bombchus have so much more potential for interesting design. These mobile explosive devices scurry in a somewhat straight line after Link places it down, crossing the floor and even able to climb walls. It explodes based on time or when it hits an obstacle or enemy. Outside of the Bombchu bowling game in Ocarina, the potential for such an item is largely untapped. There are so many ways Bombchus could be used and expanded upon for both puzzle and combat opportunities. #3. Hookshot Who doesn't love the Hookshot? This item basically turns Link into Batman as you can zip across gaps, to rooftops, and even grab items in some games. It is one of the few items that is just as satisfying to use in 2D as it is 3D. There are tons of Hookshot variations now, and all of them are stellar. Before Breath of the Wild, getting the Hookshot in any Zelda game felt like it transformed the game into a fully explorable open world. They weren't, of course, but being able to run on the rooftops in Kakariko Village in Ocarina of Time still felt like I was going somewhere I wasn't supposed to. #2. Paraglider Now that I've experienced the thrill and awe of the paraglider, I don't know if I can give it up. Going to a true open world format for the last two mainline Zelda games necessitated a lot of changes, and I can't say I clicked with all of them. The lack of proper dungeons and traditional items was a big downgrade for me, but I have no notes about the paraglider. I know it was slower than just running or riding to my next destination, but I always went out of my way to climb the highest point I could and paraglided through the air as my main method of travel. It just felt so freeing and showed off the beautiful world from the best angles. #1. A bottle That's right, a simple glass bottle is, without a doubt, the best item Link has ever held. If you've played a Zelda game, you know that this mundane jar is one of the most exciting things you can get. They're appropriately limited and difficult to get, further adding to the satisfaction. But why are they above everything else? Link's bottles can do just about anything! Need to restore your HP or magic? Keep a potion or bottle of milk in your pocket. Need to deliver a fish or bug somewhere? Use a bottle. There are even some instances where you can use a bottle to deflect attacks! Imagine how embarrassed Ganandorf is when you hit back his magic balls with a bottle. But bottles are completely overpowered when you use one to hold a fairy. This gives you a second life on the spot if you run out of hearts instead of loading back to your last save or checkpoint. No other item can bring you back from the dead, so how could it not be number 1?
Digital Trends
28-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Digital Trends
Games weren't better when you were younger, you've just experienced more
Despite what you might believe, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time isn't the greatest game of all time. People often say games were better when we were younger, but that isn't the case. Ocarina of Time might be your favorite game of all time, and that's fine; it's mine, too. But it isn't inherently better because it's older or more original compared to the games of today. You've just seen a lot more. Recommended Videos When you're young, you have less experience — not just in gaming, but in everything. You aren't as familiar with storyline structure. You haven't seen a wide range of mechanics. The jump from 2D games to 3D games was huge, but graphics have improved in smaller and smaller increments since then. Your 100th ray-traced scene is a lot less impressive than exploring the castle in Super Mario 64 in three dimensions for the first time. In short, those games from back in the day that you view as perfect experiences? You're looking at them through rose-colored glasses. Bear with me, though. Just because your memory of a game is tinted with nostalgia doesn't make it any less valid or important. I have a clear, distinct memory of when I was roughly eleven years old. I'm walking down the street with a close friend on a crisp autumn morning. The sun is shining, and we're brimming with excitement over The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask's Goron Racetrack sequence and how much fun it was. It was a single-player game, experienced together. Watching videos of the course, it doesn't look anywhere near as good as I remember. The mechanics are clunky, and the N64 controller was better suited to being a home defense tool than a game controller. But to an eleven-year-old who had stayed up all night playing the game with his best friend? That experience is unforgettable and unbeatable. Ask yourself, is it the games that stand out so much to you, or the memories forged around those games? Final Fantasy VII is another example. It was the first JRPG I played that had an overworld map I could explore. Unlocking the Highwind and flying around the world absolutely blew my mind, and finding the secrets hidden around the map felt as rewarding as finding real-world treasure. Every day at recess, my friends and I would talk about what we found (and then we started trading notes on Chocobo breeding). I'd be remiss if I didn't mention my first playthrough of Pokémon Blue. No other gaming experience has quite enthralled me like the ten-hour binge I undertook with my first Charmander, pausing only long enough to replace the batteries in my Game Boy. It was a formative experience in my formative years — but there's no way I can argue that Pokémon Blue is a better game than later Pokémon titles. I wouldn't have the patience for its slow battle system today. And therein lies another key reason why older games seem better: Nostalgia tends to filter out the negative. Things annoyed you about your favorite games as a kid; you just don't remember them as clearly as you remember the positive memories. Social media also loves to talk about nostalgia without acknowledging the downsides. Again, to use Ocarina of Time as an example, I can name two parts of the game you likely despised: the Water Temple and anytime Kaepora Gaebora showed up to chat. Let's not even talk about how freakin' buggy some games could be back then (although, let's be honest: most Bethesda titles can still give them a run for their money today.) I don't write all of this to disparage Ocarina of Time. Like I said before, it's my favorite game, and the most influential thing I've ever played. It made me want to tell stories that left an impact on someone like Link's adventure did on me. Without that experience, I probably wouldn't be here writing this article. A young gamer today might get the same experience from Breath of the Wild that I did from Ocarina of Time, or from Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 that I did from Final Fantasy VII. My feelings on those games are the result of timing and circumstance, not some inherent magical quality that video games have since lost. Yes, there's a discussion to be had about a perceived lack of risk in games today versus yesteryear and the factors that surround the industry today, but there have been plenty of games launched in recent years that show the magic is alive and well. Clair Obscur is the most recent example that comes to mind (Sorry, Gio, I can't be normal about it). I began playing it to find out what all the hype was about, and I'll be honest: I expected a run-of-the-mill RPG. Not much surprises or impresses me these days, especially working in games journalism. So when its story, characters, and gameplay essentially reached through my TV screen and grabbed me by the throat, I was caught off guard. Clair Obscur has that special element in spades. A sort of je ne sais quoi, you might say. Every theory I had about the story? Wrong. At no point did I know what was coming next. The graphics and cinematic elements made me think of Final Fantasy VII in the best ways (the fixed-camera shots especially), and the music? Chef's kiss. Now that I've finished the game, optional sections and all, I still want more — and that doesn't happen often. But what also made it special was the interest my wife took in the game. She sat beside me and became just as invested in the story as I was, and we would discuss what we thought was going to happen long after I'd turned off the console. The experience is a precious memory. A single-player game, experienced together. It made me realize that every key memory I have about my favorite games involved other people, whether that was playing Majora's Mask with a childhood friend, battling for the top spot in Halo 2 clan tournaments, or spending too many tokens trying to beat each other's Dance Dance Revolution score at the arcade. Games haven't lost their magic, nor have they gotten worse over time. It's still there. You just have to look for it.
