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The Legend of Zelda's Swords
Because I know Alex probably wants to explain what is wrong with them and I want to read said explanation, but it would be better if the Images thread didn't get clogged with that
Comments
Dammit, I already replied to his post over there >
I was being a bit facetious; Zelda games are heavily stylised, so there's no reason the swords shouldn't follow the same pattern. That said, I was kind of disappointed with how many were just forgettable, especially since the real world is full of excellent, aesthetically pleasing designs.
The issue (if there is one) is that most of the swords have a set of individually practical parts that don't have much synchronicity. The Master Sword is indulgent, but pretty good until you reach the pommel on the versions that have extra hilt space. For a strictly one-handed sword, a strange pommel is fine because you're not meant to grip it. But for something that implies at least some two-handed use, a streamlined pommel is the glaringly obvious choice, because then you can grip that and have a longer lever with which to swing the sword.
Then there's even more subtle stuff, although even I think it's anal. For instance, most of the swords (or even all of them?) have either diamond or hexagonal cross-sections, which are features of later medieval swords used to pierce armour. These are more advanced blades than the earlier, lenticular styles of cross-section, which provided a great cut and great malleability at the expense of anti-armour measures. Heavily armoured individuals are uncommon in the settings, though, so it begs the question of why every sword has these anti-armour design features.
This kind of thing is more easily ignorable the more stylised the game is, but a lot of that stuff is still in place in titles like Ocarina of Time and Twilight Princess. Even those games are pretty stylised, mind, but they're definitely pushing for a less wholesome aesthetic, with more attention paid to bodily dimensions and the like.
But the Master Sword is always used one-handed.
Super Smash Bros.
Anyway, some iterations of the Master Sword (especially lately) are clearly designed as "bastard swords" -- one-handers that had the correct dimensions to also be used two-handed in a pinch.
I have never played Super Smash Bros, so I can't comment.
I don't think the swords are intentionally designed to be bastard swords. Or maybe they are, I dunno, but I think they just went for aesthetics over functionality, just... sticking close to real swords to do it. Like, "Oh hey, that sword looks alright. That can be the base, now let's stylize it to fit with the game."
Would be nice if they could stick with one design for the Master Sword, however...
That's non-canon!
The aesthetics for each game change all the time, but the Master Sword's basics always remain the same.
A curved crossguard, in the shape of a C or an M, a gem embedded in the tang, a blade that is thin near the tang, then widens out suddenly, and tapers off, and a Triforce emblem on the blade.
^^^^ I fully realise that realism isn't their goal. It's just that looking at the image, I was kind of disappointed at the lack of really cool, mundane swords and stuff. Basically, I'm sperging for sperging's sake, and there's nothing wrong with the designs beyond many of them just being sort of boring.
^^ Are we looking at the same swords? The colour of the hilt, the way the blade tapers, the length of the blade, all that changes
Unless the definition of basics is, "It's a sword"
I just like the way the Master Sword looks, especially in Ocarina of Time/Twilight Princess/Skyward Sword.
There are aesthetic differences, which is because the aesthetics between the game changes, but the basics of each sword remain the same. Curved crossguard, tapered blade, embedded gem, triforce symbol.
Okay, Icalasari which Master Sword do you mean? They all look purple-hilted, wing-shaped and about the length of the blade? The games that feature different sizes that are noticeable, at least to me, are the ones with a radically different design from each other. Can't comment on the tapering though.
The tapering does differ- in the Ocarina of Time/Twilight Princess style games, the tapering tapers off immediately, forming a straight blade and leaving a small diamond shape in the blade where the Triforce blade is, while in the Wind Waker-style games, that tapering happens in the cross-section (I think it's the cross section, correct me if I'm wrong, Alex), while the blade remains straight after the initial curve outwards.
Here's a decent image:
Although it's a bit misleading, since these aren't to scale with one-another. But there are some significant changes. As the games move onward, apart from Wind Waker, the Master Sword becomes both longer and more slender, and it picks up additional hilt space along the way.
This shows us how, in Ocarina of Time, the Master Sword was modelled with a diamond cross-section rather than a hexagonal one. Many would probably miss that difference, but I'd say it's pretty significant in terms of design alterations.
And this? This is just awesome. Nothing to do with official designs, but it's quite beautiful.
Also, to prevent confusion:
There are two terms that use the word "cross". "Cross" by itself can mean "crossguard", but this is easily mistaken with "cross-section". The cross-section of a sword is how the blade looks if cut in half and viewed from above, and it gives us powerful indications of what a sword was designed for. You can usually tell a cross-section by the ridges on a blade. If it has no ridges, it's lenticular; a central ridge means it's diamond; a flat surface flanked by a ridge on each side means it's hexagonal. You can also "halve" these to derive the single-edged versions. So a diamond cross-section becomes triangular, and a hexagonal cross-section becomes pentagonal.
The blade in Skyward Sword really doesn't look significantly longer or more slender than the blade in Link to the Past.
Note the different in the thickness of the grip. If two grips are the same length, but one is significantly thinner (like we can see above), then that means the image likely isn't to scale. The indication we get here is that the grips are actually the same or similar thicknesses, but the Skyward Sword version's longer hilt requires its image to be resized to fit with the others. Basically, imagine the kind of hand that would have to grip each sword and you'll see how they stack up in size.
I'm pretty sure that all the links are meant to be the same height, and the Master Swords scale the same.
Except probably the Wind Waker one.
That's why I emphasized meant to be. They are meant to be the same height, but due to Wind Waker's massive stylism, everything looks a lot shorter in it.
^^^ Right, so most of the hand sizes are the same. But not all of those swords will fit the same hand, ergo scaling.
No, I mean that the Master Swords are still the same length compared to the wielder in each game, when to scale.
I'm pretty sure the OoT Master Sword is significantly shorter than the Twilight Princess one, and the Skyward Sword one is longer again.
But there are adults in Wind Waker, and Link is like half their size. I think he's like 12 or 13.
^ Hm.
The way I figure it, WW link is about the same height as Young OOT Link.
Yet the Master Sword is a perfect fit for him.
Maybe it's the sword being magic?
The sword is a creature of chaos. It may take many incarnations.
Prolly the easiest way to look at it, yeah. Fits itself to the wielder.
The thing that really bugs me about Wind Waker's Master Sword is more how Ocarina of Time Link was forced to go into stasis because his body wasn't old enough for the sword, yet Wind Waker Link somehow gets a pass >.>
Incidentally, I just thought of something. So, in OOT, Ganon wins because the sword decides Link is too young to wield it and puts him to sleep for years. Then later, in Wind Waker, a Link of about the same age takes the sword and it doesn't do that.
So, I'm guessing when Link took the sword out of the Temple of Time and the world was all destroyed and stuff, it thought "well, fuck. I'm never doing that again."
Half-Ninja'd by Ica.