If you didn't ride the hype in buying this game, I would recommend staying away from it.
You see, before I start this rewritten review, I want to say that I’m a very Right Sided thinker. No, that doesn’t mean I’m republican, but it does mean that I’m a very ‘artistic’ person. I don’t say that with the mind that my opinion is the be all end all of all opinions on art, but I do think that there are a couple of people who might be better off saving their money. Like Demon’s Souls, I leave my bloodstain for those like-minded individuals to avoid the pitfalls that may be set for them.
Phantom Hourglass is a sequel to the game, Windwaker, which was released to stellar reviews. I personally thought that Windwaker was Myamoto’s ninth--it was a brilliant game full of surprises and innovations that you never thought Nintendo had the balls to implement.
The game is a somewhat linear story of Link’s journey to save the sprites from the whatchamacallits to help the Ocean King. The story is, I hate to say, boring and full of unnecessary plot-holes. Like the Brothers Bloom, except that the plot-holes aren’t intended to be funny. Similarly, the aspects of the story that are intended to be funny, aren’t.
Something was lost among the papers at Nintendo Headquarters whilst designing and modeling all the characters. It might have been a couple of good ideas and maybe a sense of taste. You see, even the eight-bit ‘Link’s Awakening’ had a strong sense of style. They were limited with what they could do back then; therefore, the art direction of the game was that much more commendable. The art of Phantom Hourglass was simply an insentient, humdrum land of dull--of which could only be compared the general rabble of licensed games assigned to the poor DS.
What’s even more frustrating about this game is the repetition of the Ocean King Temple. I’m not one for mindless games, so I often questioned why I had to repeat the same puzzles several times over. Like the clicker in Direct Instruction or the dialouge of Duplicity, I found myself frustrated and bored to a point of giving up on the game entirely.
I give this game a five point five simply because it is what I feel it is--mediocre. Nintendo had the tools to make a very good game, even though the art style was, even at that time, being pounded into the ground. With Spirit Tracks, I wanted something different, but the train seems even more limiting than any of the previous forms of transportation (boat, horse etc. etc.)
From what I've played, Spirit Tracks feels much less like an adventure game, and more like a stretch into the abyss for more interesting ideas. If Nintendo wishes to do something interesting, they have to change everything up entirely. This concept and art style has been worked into a corner--sometimes its best to just scrap everything you have and start over.