Zelda fans have long drawn a distinction between two different types of Zelda game, which up until BotW roughly corresponded to the 2D and 3D Zelda games and which I’ll be referring to the using the labels Adventure and Quest Zeldas, respectively. Though fans argue over which type of game is better, at the end of the day the two simply aim to provide different experiences and so appeal to different people, without either one being inherently better than the other.

Now, the differences between the two experiences roughly correspond to the differences between a quest and an adventure: An adventure is something you go on for its own sake, because you expect you’ll find it enjoyable. Though it may have some objective or destination in mind, what matters is ultimately the journey, not the destination. Conversely, a quest is something you go on to fulfill some purpose, usually to resolve some sort of conflict, and the journey only matters insofar as it gets you closer to or helps you prepare for your goal.

Similarly, the Quest Zeldas are designed in such a way that they emphasize progression through the story as a motivating factor, thus evoking a feeling like that of being on a quest, while the Adventure Zeldas focus on the gameplay and player discovery, thus evoking a feeling like that of being on an adventure.

Personally, I prefer the Quest Zeldas over their Adventure counterparts because I’ve never felt Zelda’s gameplay to be much more than serviceable. I find the good Quest Zelda games masterfully intertwine their stories with their game progression and worldbuilding in a way that few other games are able to match, so that all these elements come together to create something that’s much more than just the sum of its parts.

I want to describe here some of the ways in which this is achieved. I’ll be using Majora’s Mask and Twilight Princess as representatives of the Quest Zeldas and A Link to the Past as representative of the Adventure Zeldas so that I can provide some concrete examples of what I’m referring to.

Generally speaking, the relevance of story events in Quest Zeldas extends beyond the cutscenes in which they play out. As you progress through the story, you’ll see the world’s inhabitants and the environments react to the events taking place. In Majora’s Mask, when you’re introduced to a new location, you meet the characters living in that place and identify the central conflict that ails them; you see them face their predicaments with sadness, fear, desperation, or outrage. When you fix their problem, they react with gratitude, joy, or relief. In Twilight Princess, some characters will even see that you’re on a quest to save the land and will try to help you on your way. Stuff like this shows that the events of the story aren’t occurring in a world of their own, they have actual significance within the game’s world and to its inhabitants.

Contrast this with LttP, where most of the characters seem completely unaffected by the events of the story; they just stand around contentedly, not caring about whether or not you beat a dungeon or rescue a princess or defeat the villains. The story and the world feel almost disconnected.

In Quest Zeldas, beating a dungeon generally results in progression of the story, or marks the resolution of some storyline. It’s very rarely the case that you just find another McGuffin only to go looking for the next one. In MM, the central conflict of each location is resolved by beating that area’s temple; for instance, by beating the first temple you rescue the missing deku princess, absolve the monkey who has been blamed for her disappearance, and stop the flow of poison into the swamp. By beating the second dungeon, you end the unnatural winter plaguing the goron village and prevent the gorons from freezing to death.

Something else that Quest Zeldas do a bit more often than Adventure Zeldas, and which I think is best exemplified in Twilight Princess, is having the dungeons be locations that are actually integrated into the world, rather than just random temples that no one in the world seems to care about or to even be aware of. TP’s dungeons include locations such as the goron mines, a mansion inhabited by a friendly yeti couple, an abandoned prison where Ganondorf was once held, and Hyrule Castle. These are all places that hold significance to the characters in the game. They’re not places that exist solely for the sake of the gameplay, but actual locations with lore behind them that contribute to the worldbuilding.

All of these things contribute to making the world and story more believable, thus making it easier for the player to become invested in them. They also help evoke the feeling of being a hero on a quest to save the world by showing you that the things you’re doing are heroic instead of simply telling you that you’re a hero, and this is one of the things that sets these games apart for me.