Twilight Princess finds the Zelda series at its low point of the 3-D era. It is a dark and mostly joyless affair with zero of the charm or whimsy of its predecessors. While the game is visually striking at times and leans into a weirdness formerly unknown to the franchise (aside from the polarizing Majora's Mask), none of that translates to the game's characters, locations, or temple design.
The tacked on Wolf Link gimmick, seemingly even more dull and tiresome than the first time around with this game when it launched with the Wii, is a major anchor on the game's early goings. A string of hide and seek fetch quests for "Goddess Tears" (does that sound right?) sinks the game's momentum right off the bat. Though the HD remaster in an act of kindness reduces the number of items you need to progress, it's still a terrific chore.
On top of everything, Hyrule just feels so empty. We have Castle Town, a difficult to navigate hub with your franchise standard set of mini games and shops, along with your home town followed by Kakariko Village and Lake Hylia, all with little to nothing to do in them. This is extra frustrating when you take into account how vast the world map is. So much time is spent traveling between towns on Epona (a task made more difficult than it should be considering your noble steed is typically a whistle away in most Zelda games). There is so little to distract you from the task at hand, which is a major problem in a Zelda game.
It's not entirely bad, sure. The boss fights are some of the series best, with each of them having that Heavyweight Title Shot feel. The temple design, while occasionally mediocre, achieves some great heights. The transition to HD has certainly done favors for the original game's muddy textures. And while the amiibo integration on this game is rather poor, I'm still interested as to how it will fit in to the upcoming Breath of the Wild. Why I still hold out hope for clever, meaningful amiibo integration is beyond me, but that's my shit to deal with.
With most of the series fairly fresh in my mind, Twilight Princess ranks among the least essential in the franchise. It is a flat game that never comes together in any meaningful way. On most days, a bad Zelda game is still a pretty good game by most standards. This one is just a flat out bad game.