The best Zelda games are the handheld Zeldas, yeah I said it

I’m about to admit something that only my therapist should really hear. I’m not a massive fan of The Legend of Zelda series. At least on home consoles.

That doesn't mean I hate it or actively dislike it, but out of all the games release in the series I’ve finished around half of them, and a couple I’ve not even finished the first dungeon. But hear me out before you judge too harshly, I do adore the handheld iterations of the franchise.

There’s something about controlling Link through the world of Hyrule (and others) via a smaller screen that pulls me in and transports me away from this life into a world of fantasy. It could have a lot to do with the fact that The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening was my first proper experience with the franchise when it was first released on the Game Boy back in 1993.

Because it was the 1990s and I was poor I didn’t own many games, I think I completed Link’s Awakening eight or nine times back then, always hunting for new things to find and trading tips and secrets with friends. Since then, this has always been my go-to answer for my favourite Legend of Zelda title, despite knowing that Tears of the Kingdom is pretty much a perfect game. But we’ll come to this one.

This fascination continued as I moved up through Nintendo handhelds; the Game Boy Colour had Capcom bring us the stellar Oracle of Ages and Oracle of Seasons; then the same company knocked it out of the park with The Minish Cap over on Game Boy Advance; when we stepping into the 3D era the sublime Spirit Tracks, Phantom Hourglass, and A Link Between Worlds came and dominated.

Nintendo

All of these have something in common and that’s the limitations of a handheld platform which Nintendo, and Capcom, used to their advantage. They became more contained, they’re less sprawling than the home console releases. There’s also a lot to be said for the 2D sprite work of the Game Boy and Game Boy Advance era which gave way to some gorgeous moments.

To contradict myself greatly, I did have a brilliant time with Tears of the Kingdom, which is of course, incredibly sprawling. However, I played that exclusively in handheld mode on the Switch, which brings me to another idea of why I prefer these games.

Over the years, I’ve equated the Zelda franchise with fairy tales, as Nintendo intended - storybook adventures with the traditional good versus evil and a princess in dire need of saving. Because of this, these handheld adventures feel more like snuggling down with a riveting book and the visual designs brought to us by Nintendo and Capcom really work hard to encompass that feeling.

In The Minish Cap, for instance, we have Link shrinking down to a tiny size to see the world from a new perspective, something that has been tried throughout media to hark back to the days on childlike wonder. In Spirit Tracks, we spend time placing down rails for a toy-like train to travel to villages that seem pulled from the pages of The Brothers Grimm, it’s incredibly childlike.

Nintendo

And when I take myself back to Link waking up on the beach, his ship crashed off-shore, and his memory wiped, Link’s Awakening evokes that traditional Japanese fairy tale trope of an amnesiac waking to find themselves a hero in a strange new world.

While some of the home console releases have tried their hand at this sense of setting, for me, they’ve never quite captured that feeling. Perhaps it’s because the handheld variants felt more experimental in tone, whereas the home console titles focused more on the gimmicks of the console, like motion control, or the traditional aspects of the franchise. In some sense the handheld titles feel more like spin-offs than mainline entries and because of that, there’s a bit more freedom to be playful and buck the trends seen elsewhere.

I don’t want to close out these thoughts without reaffirming that I’m aware that games like Ocarina of Time, A Link to the Past and Breath of the Wild are masterpieces in this artform, and perhaps one day I’ll reach a point where they rise up the ranks of my appreciation. However, each of these games can be played in a handheld capacity in their own right and my opinion doesn’t change, which has me pining for something new from Nintendo.

I haven’t yet played Echoes of Wisdom, which I knew our Ewan really enjoyed. Maybe that can tap into what I love about handheld Zelda games. But I’d love them to throw out the rule book once again and bring us something a bit more surreal or even approach Capcom and see what the company could do with the franchise in the Switch era. Lean into that fairy tale concept and give me something filled with wonder, whimsy and awe.