The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker
The cartoon Zelda the internet swore it hated — derisively nicknamed "Celda" before it even shipped — that time revealed as one of the greatest games ever made. Link sails a drowned Hyrule with a talking boat and a conductor's baton, and every cel-shaded frame still looks brand new.
At Space World 2000, Nintendo showed a brief demo clip of a realistic adult Link battling Ganondorf, and fans took it as a promise. So when the real GameCube Zelda debuted at Space World 2001 as a cel-shaded cartoon, the backlash was ferocious — critics derisively dubbed the game "Celda," and disappointed fans revolted at the toon-styled Link. Even inside Nintendo the style was contested: producer Shigeru Miyamoto remained dubious and reminded director Eiji Aonuma it wasn't too late to change course, relenting only because of the team's enthusiasm — and because a realistic Zelda might have taken a decade to build.
The Wind Waker, directed by Aonuma and produced by Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka, launched in Japan on December 13, 2002, and in North America in March 2003. Link sails a vast ocean dotted with islands to rescue his sister from Ganon, aided by pirate captain Tetra — an incarnation of Princess Zelda — and a talking sailboat called the King of Red Lions, conducting the wind itself with the baton that gives the game its name. Critics showered it with acclaim, likening it to a playable cartoon in the vein of Disney and Miyazaki films and praising its gameplay, music, and story.
Players stayed divided on the art, though, and it showed at the register: 4.6 million copies sold against Ocarina of Time's 7.6 million, weak enough that Nintendo course-corrected into the grittier, realistic Twilight Princess. Then the vindication arc kicked in. Retrospectives now routinely place The Wind Waker among the greatest video games ever made; its "Toon Link" became a franchise fixture, two DS sequels (Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks) continued the saga, and a 2013 HD remaster on Wii U confirmed what the timeless art had been proving all along — the game everyone mocked in 2001 is the one that never aged.
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