Game: Oceanhorn: Monster of Uncharted Seas

Let's get this out of the way: Oceanhorn: Monster of Uncharted Seas is the Zelda-like to end all Zelda-likes.  Its similarities to and inspirations from The Legend of Zelda—especially Wind Waker and Phantom Hourglass—are numerous, pervasive, and obvious.  From its silent, sword-wielding, pot-smashing protagonist to its Zora-like Gillmen to its secondary B-equipment—bombs, bow, and boots—Oceanhorn wears its muse on its sleeve.  Despite its substantial list of intentional similarities, though, Oceanhorn manages to come across as a self-assured action-adventure as well as a respectful homage to one of Nintendo's finest.The story begins shortly after our unnamed hero's father sets out to find and destroy the great monster, Oceanhorn.  The hero—a young boy who's already lost his mother—goes to stay with a hermitic friend of his father's on a small island.  This friend soon recognizes that the boy shares the same fate as his father, and must also seek out Oceanhorn before it tears their world apart.  What follows is a lengthy adventure across the sprawling, aquatic map of Oceanhorn as the hero seeks out items of power that will help him defeat the beast.  While Oceanhorn's story is not its strongest point, it provides reason enough to make this journey and fills in more interesting gaps via logbook entries your father left around the world."The real star is that world, and the islands, dungeons, and challenges that populate it.  Uncharted Seas is exactly that: a world built on ocean, pockmarked by separate islands that are only accessible by boat.  Even without the added traveling between islands—which is much faster than in Wind Waker—the world still feels vast and open, with each island featuring its own characteristics and secrets.  The Withered Lands is a desolate, sparse desert with striking rock formations; Graveyard Island is foggy and silent, with notably flat terrain; and Gillfolk's Drop—the fishlike Gillmen's home island—is a sandy paradise surrounding their shimmering hideaway.  Despite these distinctions, every island shares certain structural elements that tie it to the others to create a cohesive universe: items and enemies, puzzles and logic, and a verticality that gives each area a 3D depth.