Of course, human characters aren’t the only ones populating Hyrule. Twilight Princess has the series’ classic Gorons and Zora, and one new race: the Twili.

I’ll tackle the Gorons first. Visually, the design of these Gorons was incredible. They took the original Goron design, beefed up the race as a whole so that they were more warlike and imposing, and then gave them swirled tattoos that looked absolutely sweet. Gone are the spindly-limbed rolling rocks of prior games; the Gorons of Twilight Princess are modeled after Darunia and Darmani. The visual side of any character, their design, is extremely important in setting our view of them and their personality. The Gorons were a resounding success in that area, and their aesthetics went hand-in-hand with the general character traits that the development team gave the Goron race. They were portrayed in this game as a proud people, aware of their own strength and perhaps even a bit arrogant about it. They start the game angry and withdrawn from the Hylians of Kakariko Village, trying to sort out their own problems. You find that this is a recent development, and that the Gorons are usually a pretty open and friendly race. Once you rescue them, they return to that, and I must say, I thought it was pretty cool. In Twilight Princess, the Gorons are more than just golem creatures holed up in their own little city; they’re friends to Kakariko village, traveling entrepreneurs, and allies in your own quest. I greatly enjoyed seeing the way that the Gorons were a part of the world beyond their mountain. They show involvement in the world and the story as a whole, rather than act as an isolated piece of the game. There are many examples of this, but my favorite is the way that some of the Gorons wanted to help the people of Castle Town by helping Malo open his bargain-priced shop.

The Zora are very similar to the Gorons in many ways. They feature a sweet aesthetic look that takes the original OoT Zora design and runs with it, giving us those cool bits of Zora clothing and armor. For the Zora, getting their movements to look fishlike and slightly alien was just as important as the design itself, and I think the Zelda team nailed that, too. Sadly, I thought that the Zora race wasn’t as well done as the Gorons. With the Gorons, there is a distinct and immediately apparent racial personality, which is reinforced by the actions they take and things they say. I bet you that everyone who played through TP to the end could tell you that the Gorons are proud, strong and know it too, and that they like hot spring water. And that they have cute kids. But the Zora… there is nothing that people can really latch on to as definitive traits of a Zora. They are ultimately a flatter race than the Gorons; just kind of… there. And even that they did worse than the Gorons. I mentioned that the Gorons involve themselves with the world outside their immediate domain; they actually act as if they are part of Hyrule and have a stake in it. You can go to Castle Town and find that there are some Gorons there; selling things, talking to people, etc. But the Zora are nowhere to be seen. Even when the Zora prince is missing and the Zora should be sending out soldiers to locate him, search parties, envoys to Castle Town… there is nothing. You can talk to some of the Zora and they’ll talk about how worried they are for the prince, but you never actually see any action taken. It is possible for a group to be isolated and still feel like a cohesive part of the world, if they have reasons for it, or a history of being that way. But that is not the case here. Nobody ever mentions or talks about how Zora are reclusive and stay in their own little corner of Hyrule; there is no justification for that anywhere in the game. It’s not a terrible thing; most races in all previous Zelda games work the same way. But it is disappointing to see the development team improve one race so much, while letting the other one stew in Ocarina of Time-era isolation.

One problem that both groups suffer from and always have is that there is no individuality from person to person. Every Goron, with the exception of the named ones, looks the same. Every Zora, with the exception of even fewer important ones, looks pretty much the same. This problem is especially apparent for the Zora: only two Zora, the dead Queen and the little prince, stand out at all. None of the rest have names. None of the rest do anything. The Gorons, although not perfect, are much better in that regard. There are several Gorons that stand out from the rest, not because they look different or have names, but because they have specific roles or do specific things. There is the hot spring water merchant in Castle Town, the one that crushes through that rock barrier for you south of the Castle Town, some shopkeepers, etc. There are one or two Goron children, and they stand out by virtue of being kids. And pretty cute ones, considering they’re made of stone.

Outside of the unnamed members of both races, there are some more important members of each. The Zora, once again, failed to keep up with the times. The prince and his dead mother, although better than all the other Zora, didn’t do much for me. They were depthless. I don’t even remember their names. The Prince shows some growth at one point, but it’s pretty forced and unconvincing. Which is too bad, because I think that was a good opportunity for a great character. Ruto and her father were both more memorable than the Zora royalty of Twilight Princess... which means the Zora characters took a step backward.

The Gorons fare better. We get the four Goron elders: Gor Coron, Gor Amoto, Gor Ezibo, and Gor Liggs. None of them are hugely important or involved characters, but they have cool designs and, especially in Ezibo’s case, entertaining dialogue (“Brudda,” heh). And they’re memorable; unlike the two Zora characters, I actually remember their names. I especially liked Gor Coron, because it seemed like he exemplified everything that the Goron race was supposed to be in this game. On the other hand, the Goron chief, Dargus, was a let down. Previous experience with Goron leaders, such as Gor Coron and Darunia, lead me to expect a pretty cool guy. Dargus ended up being a dim-witted thug. It was also such a contrast to the other, intelligent Gorons that it was noticeably out of character for them to have a leader like him. On the Goron front, he was the biggest disappointment.

The Twili were utterly pathetic. I disliked their design; very ugly creatures. And if the Twili were descended from Hylians who were banished to the Twilight Realm by the Goddesses, than why look so bizarre? They certainly don’t resemble Hylians in any way. I wasn’t expecting the Twili to be as important as the Gorons or Zora, but I at least expected to be able to talk to them. No such luck. All I got to do was turn them from really hideous monsters into ugly monsters that still couldn’t talk to me. If it weren’t for the fact that Midna and Zant were Twili, then the whole race would have ended up a more colossal failure than the Zuna, from Four Swords Adventures.