Culturess’ Ranking of The Legend of Zelda Games

15. The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass

The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass really had a lot to live up to, because it’s the direct sequel to The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, one of the bigger games in the series. Unfortunately, Hourglass moved from the world of the GameCube down to the Nintendo DS.

The rundown is this: after the events of Wind Waker, Tetra and Link are off exploring, and they run into a mysterious patch of fog with a ship adrift. Tetra disappears, and Link’s attempts to save her end up with his waking up on a completely different island. If you’re worried about the sailing from Wind Waker being gone, fear not: Captain Linebeck and the S.S. Linebeck are there to save the day.

If you can get past the touch-screen controls (easier said than done), there’s actually a lot to like about Phantom Hourglass. There’s a central dungeon, the Temple of the Ocean King, aside from the normal dungeons, which represents a different turn than most Zelda games. However, at the same time, it’s not always fun to go through the same dungeon — which resets every time — multiple times in order to progress in the game.

In other words, you could probably skip Phantom Hourglass if you really wanted to.