Following the massive success of the original Legend of Zelda, and yes, even the success of Zelda II, it was clear that Nintendo needed to pull a hat trick with a third installment to signify the series as one of their staple franchises. With the release of the Super Nintendo, and the incredible success of Super Mario World, it was all too clear where the series needed to go from here. So, after three years of development, Nintendo would then release The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past.
If you are familiar with the Zelda series, you would know that this game is one of the most beloved in the entire series, and is considered by many to be one of the greatest video games of all time. Personally for me, I also love it a great deal, but I wouldn't consider it to be THAT great. With that being said, it is an absolutely fantastic entry in the franchise, and without of doubt the best Zelda game in the series so far.
The story is standard for Zelda games, but then again, it works for this game and how it executes it, the graphics still hold up extremely well to this day, and are very appealing, the music is incredibly catchy, memorable, and iconic, the control is very solid, with no real problems with it whatsoever, and the gameplay is some of the best that 2D Zelda has ever offered up to this point.
Thankfully, this game returns to the top-down style of the original Legend of Zelda, and the gameplay mostly follows the same formula as that original game. It's an adventure game where you explore a vast world, fight monsters and traverse dangerous landscapes, take on numerous dungeons, fight bosses, and gather a wide assortment of items and upgrades to help you along the way.
All of this would become the staple formula for Zelda for a reason, as this formula was executed almost masterfully with this entry, and I absolutely loved replaying through it all. Exploring this vast, yet simple world, with so much more detail compared to the original game, finding all of the secrets throughout the land, seeing all the different landmarks and people throughout, and conquering all of these simple, yet demanding challenges with the dungeons and bosses. It is all so much fun to accomplish, all accompanied with a sense of freedom to explore the world around you, yet still having a bit of a helping hand with where you need to go next via the story text from NPCs, so you won't feel too completely lost the original Zelda.
As mentioned previously, this game would introduce the formula that most Zelda games after this would take after, where you have to hunt down three treasures of some kind, and then you are sent to a parallel version of the main world, where you then need to then collect more of a central artifact in order to finally take on the big evil, in this case of course being Ganon. Yes, it may be formulaic, especially compared to other games and later entries in the series, but again, it is executed almost perfectly in this entry, and there is a reason that it is still replayed all the way to this day, even with different alterations and playstyles used with the game, like randomizers and plenty of speedruns. Not to mention, many music pieces that would become staples in the Zelda series also stemmed from this game as well.
Now, I know I have been sucking this game's dick throughout the whole review at this point, but believe me, as I have eluded to, I don't think it is perfect, and I do have some issues with it, albeit small ones. First and foremost, while getting all of the optional items, Heart Pieces, and all that is usually pretty enjoyable, some of the little side minigames or whatever that you do in order to get these items can be pretty tedious and annoying. For example, there is this one side minigame in the Dark World where you are given 30 seconds to dig up this field, with there being a heart piece randomly placed in one of the dirt patches every time, so if you aren't lucky, you will have to keep digging... and digging... and digging... and DIGGING over and over and over again. It can get pretty annoying, and again, there are several instances of this in the game.
In addition, I'm not sure if it is just me, but sometimes, the game can become quite a pain when it comes to the amount of damage you can take all at once, with all the shit the game can throw at you either out in the overworld or a room in a dungeon. Again, that might just be a me thing, but that can become quite annoying at times. Other than that, the only other complaint I would have is that it can be a guide game at times, but that doesn't bother me in this instance.
Overall, it is an incredible third entry in this franchise, and a fantastic game in general. Sure, it can be annoying with some elements present in the game, but aside from that, there is a reason it is so fondly remembered as one of the best games in the entire series.
Game #112
If you are familiar with the Zelda series, you would know that this game is one of the most beloved in the entire series, and is considered by many to be one of the greatest video games of all time. Personally for me, I also love it a great deal, but I wouldn't consider it to be THAT great. With that being said, it is an absolutely fantastic entry in the franchise, and without of doubt the best Zelda game in the series so far.
The story is standard for Zelda games, but then again, it works for this game and how it executes it, the graphics still hold up extremely well to this day, and are very appealing, the music is incredibly catchy, memorable, and iconic, the control is very solid, with no real problems with it whatsoever, and the gameplay is some of the best that 2D Zelda has ever offered up to this point.
Thankfully, this game returns to the top-down style of the original Legend of Zelda, and the gameplay mostly follows the same formula as that original game. It's an adventure game where you explore a vast world, fight monsters and traverse dangerous landscapes, take on numerous dungeons, fight bosses, and gather a wide assortment of items and upgrades to help you along the way.
All of this would become the staple formula for Zelda for a reason, as this formula was executed almost masterfully with this entry, and I absolutely loved replaying through it all. Exploring this vast, yet simple world, with so much more detail compared to the original game, finding all of the secrets throughout the land, seeing all the different landmarks and people throughout, and conquering all of these simple, yet demanding challenges with the dungeons and bosses. It is all so much fun to accomplish, all accompanied with a sense of freedom to explore the world around you, yet still having a bit of a helping hand with where you need to go next via the story text from NPCs, so you won't feel too completely lost the original Zelda.
As mentioned previously, this game would introduce the formula that most Zelda games after this would take after, where you have to hunt down three treasures of some kind, and then you are sent to a parallel version of the main world, where you then need to then collect more of a central artifact in order to finally take on the big evil, in this case of course being Ganon. Yes, it may be formulaic, especially compared to other games and later entries in the series, but again, it is executed almost perfectly in this entry, and there is a reason that it is still replayed all the way to this day, even with different alterations and playstyles used with the game, like randomizers and plenty of speedruns. Not to mention, many music pieces that would become staples in the Zelda series also stemmed from this game as well.
Now, I know I have been sucking this game's dick throughout the whole review at this point, but believe me, as I have eluded to, I don't think it is perfect, and I do have some issues with it, albeit small ones. First and foremost, while getting all of the optional items, Heart Pieces, and all that is usually pretty enjoyable, some of the little side minigames or whatever that you do in order to get these items can be pretty tedious and annoying. For example, there is this one side minigame in the Dark World where you are given 30 seconds to dig up this field, with there being a heart piece randomly placed in one of the dirt patches every time, so if you aren't lucky, you will have to keep digging... and digging... and digging... and DIGGING over and over and over again. It can get pretty annoying, and again, there are several instances of this in the game.
In addition, I'm not sure if it is just me, but sometimes, the game can become quite a pain when it comes to the amount of damage you can take all at once, with all the shit the game can throw at you either out in the overworld or a room in a dungeon. Again, that might just be a me thing, but that can become quite annoying at times. Other than that, the only other complaint I would have is that it can be a guide game at times, but that doesn't bother me in this instance.
Overall, it is an incredible third entry in this franchise, and a fantastic game in general. Sure, it can be annoying with some elements present in the game, but aside from that, there is a reason it is so fondly remembered as one of the best games in the entire series.
Game #112
ZELDA MARATHON- 3/20
The jump from the NES Zelda games to A Link to the Past is like a 5-year-old gaining consciousness for the first time and realising it's alive.
Everything in ALttP is a massive step up. The game looks leagues better due to the SNES' hardware upgrade, the music is much smoother (and there are more than a handful of tracks), the story is told beyond the manual and a poorly translated intro screen, and the gameplay is just better in every regard.
The Light World/Dark World switching is a fun gimmick, the bosses are mostly much better (The worm from the Tower of Hera can eat shit though) and the game actually tells you where dungeons are on a map that's more than a grey grid with a white dot on it.
In fact, telling the player anything at all is probably the biggest improvement from NES Zelda that I could ask for. It's not like the game tells you everything, though- Hyrule is absolutely crammed full of secrets just waiting for the player to dig up- Pieces of Heart, multiple secret items, item upgrade stations (one of which you need to find to kill Ganon) and more. Despite laying out the foundations of where you need to go sooner or later, in terms of collectables ALttP plays its cards pretty close to the chest and is all the better for it.
Pretty much every issue I had with the first Zelda is rectified in ALttP. Unfortunately I think it suffers a little bit from having 11 whole dungeons (12 if you count the opening castle crawl), which means the game feels like it's spinning its wheels a little in the last two or three dungeons, but it's not really an issue- the Ice Palace and Misery Mire are the only dungeons I really dislike.
A real standout of the already-fantastic SNES library and sets an excellent template for the rest of the series to follow.
Next- The Legend of Zelda- Link's Awakening DX
Previous- Zelda II: The Adventure of Link
The jump from the NES Zelda games to A Link to the Past is like a 5-year-old gaining consciousness for the first time and realising it's alive.
Everything in ALttP is a massive step up. The game looks leagues better due to the SNES' hardware upgrade, the music is much smoother (and there are more than a handful of tracks), the story is told beyond the manual and a poorly translated intro screen, and the gameplay is just better in every regard.
The Light World/Dark World switching is a fun gimmick, the bosses are mostly much better (The worm from the Tower of Hera can eat shit though) and the game actually tells you where dungeons are on a map that's more than a grey grid with a white dot on it.
In fact, telling the player anything at all is probably the biggest improvement from NES Zelda that I could ask for. It's not like the game tells you everything, though- Hyrule is absolutely crammed full of secrets just waiting for the player to dig up- Pieces of Heart, multiple secret items, item upgrade stations (one of which you need to find to kill Ganon) and more. Despite laying out the foundations of where you need to go sooner or later, in terms of collectables ALttP plays its cards pretty close to the chest and is all the better for it.
Pretty much every issue I had with the first Zelda is rectified in ALttP. Unfortunately I think it suffers a little bit from having 11 whole dungeons (12 if you count the opening castle crawl), which means the game feels like it's spinning its wheels a little in the last two or three dungeons, but it's not really an issue- the Ice Palace and Misery Mire are the only dungeons I really dislike.
A real standout of the already-fantastic SNES library and sets an excellent template for the rest of the series to follow.
Next- The Legend of Zelda- Link's Awakening DX
Previous- Zelda II: The Adventure of Link
This game is honestly kinda odd, because it has at the same time some amazing aspect, that managed to stood the test of time, coupled with elements that clearly show their ages, making this one kind of a slog to get throught a Time
Like, something that will never be praised enough with this game is the world and exploration that come with it: the world IS just...so amazingly well design, especially for its time : It's not a gigantic world, sure, but it didnt have to be : in fact, the smaller scale world invite you to go back at the same area multiple with better equipment to discover new secret that were previously unreachable. Plus, I love exploring hyrule here: the really good soundtrack, the pleasing visual, the little quest you can take part of, the wonderful world design...all of that coupled with the great moveset and a very detailled map, who make perfect use of the mod 7, make this game a joy to travers
Not only that, but this game features two entire world to explore ! And the introduction of that second world is perfect: just when you think you are about to beat the last dungeon, you gain access to a mirror, who grant you access to a alternate reality, a more demonic version of the main world, where evil seemingly took over the entire world. The first time you get there, you only have access at a small portion of the alternate mountain, making you wonder and excited about the rest of this second world...once you go back to the normal World, you beat the third dungeon, the 7 princess ask you to free them from the 7 dungeon in the alternate, and you will have full access on the alternate world afterward (even thought you also need to break free from the rabbit form you have in the alternate world at first)
And thats after that point that the game truly show some weakness : and the big one is that...this game never give you any clue ! Indeed, sometimes, you will have to gain some item, or have to do a special action to continue on the game, but the problem is, for 3/4 of the time, the game doesnt help you at all about what to do, and will let you struggle like a idiot, and honestly, it's not fun, because , half the time, when you finally understand how to go throught a certain section, you just think to yourself : "what the actual hell?" So yeah, more often than not, the game just refuse to give you indication, and not in a good way like elden ring (unfair comparaison i know), making it less fun that it could have been
Also, i hate how the game seemed to give you a choice on which order you can take the 7 dungeon, but for the most part, you need to follow the order to gain item who are located in previous dungeon. And honestly ? If you combine this with the not so great dungeon design in this part of the game, and the very mixed bag boss quality, it make the second part of the game as a whole not as fun as it could have been
Anyway, the first part of this game is amazing, and make you excited for the rest of it, the second part is a slight let down for me
Thought, if we need to remember something, is how important this game is for gaming as a whole, introducing various element for the open world genre of game, that are still used to this day, for how amazing and revolutionary they were
Like, something that will never be praised enough with this game is the world and exploration that come with it: the world IS just...so amazingly well design, especially for its time : It's not a gigantic world, sure, but it didnt have to be : in fact, the smaller scale world invite you to go back at the same area multiple with better equipment to discover new secret that were previously unreachable. Plus, I love exploring hyrule here: the really good soundtrack, the pleasing visual, the little quest you can take part of, the wonderful world design...all of that coupled with the great moveset and a very detailled map, who make perfect use of the mod 7, make this game a joy to travers
Not only that, but this game features two entire world to explore ! And the introduction of that second world is perfect: just when you think you are about to beat the last dungeon, you gain access to a mirror, who grant you access to a alternate reality, a more demonic version of the main world, where evil seemingly took over the entire world. The first time you get there, you only have access at a small portion of the alternate mountain, making you wonder and excited about the rest of this second world...once you go back to the normal World, you beat the third dungeon, the 7 princess ask you to free them from the 7 dungeon in the alternate, and you will have full access on the alternate world afterward (even thought you also need to break free from the rabbit form you have in the alternate world at first)
And thats after that point that the game truly show some weakness : and the big one is that...this game never give you any clue ! Indeed, sometimes, you will have to gain some item, or have to do a special action to continue on the game, but the problem is, for 3/4 of the time, the game doesnt help you at all about what to do, and will let you struggle like a idiot, and honestly, it's not fun, because , half the time, when you finally understand how to go throught a certain section, you just think to yourself : "what the actual hell?" So yeah, more often than not, the game just refuse to give you indication, and not in a good way like elden ring (unfair comparaison i know), making it less fun that it could have been
Also, i hate how the game seemed to give you a choice on which order you can take the 7 dungeon, but for the most part, you need to follow the order to gain item who are located in previous dungeon. And honestly ? If you combine this with the not so great dungeon design in this part of the game, and the very mixed bag boss quality, it make the second part of the game as a whole not as fun as it could have been
Anyway, the first part of this game is amazing, and make you excited for the rest of it, the second part is a slight let down for me
Thought, if we need to remember something, is how important this game is for gaming as a whole, introducing various element for the open world genre of game, that are still used to this day, for how amazing and revolutionary they were
For the most part, A Link to the Past holds up. It's got snappy combat, two interesting worlds to explore, and plenty of great classic Zelda gameplay.
Unfortunately, it's also got uneven difficulty that spikes in several places, and its overworld design is pretty bland by modern standards.
If Nintendo could remake A Link to the Past using A Link Between Worlds' visuals and expanded, more unique dungeon design, then they'd have a true classic on their hands. As it is, this one's well worth revisiting, but it's not better than Ocarina of Time, whatever retro diehards say.
Unfortunately, it's also got uneven difficulty that spikes in several places, and its overworld design is pretty bland by modern standards.
If Nintendo could remake A Link to the Past using A Link Between Worlds' visuals and expanded, more unique dungeon design, then they'd have a true classic on their hands. As it is, this one's well worth revisiting, but it's not better than Ocarina of Time, whatever retro diehards say.
Well 2 hours in I'm still not sure what I'm doing and everything in the world seems like it's straight up non-interactable, and the world itself is kind of boring. Whatever, man
not sure if i played it incorrectly but the bosses seemed stupidly hard and the dungeons were sorta confusing.
the overworld portion of the game was really fun though - running around and collecting stuff and finding new secret ways around never got old.
seems like if the game was modernised slightly, it’d be a little less harder to play
the overworld portion of the game was really fun though - running around and collecting stuff and finding new secret ways around never got old.
seems like if the game was modernised slightly, it’d be a little less harder to play
As a life-long Zelda fan I feel ashamed it took me so long to play this but wow! Glad I did! While the games following it are better for sure, this is still an incredible Zelda game, especially when you keep in mind the only two Zelda games before it were Zelda 1 & 2 on the NES. So many things people know and love about Zelda (and adventure games in general) were invented here. Even beyond its influence, it's still pretty great in a vacuum. The overworld is one of my favorites in the series, and just about every screen has some manner of secret for you to discover. Not a corner of the map feels like there's nothing for you there. Each area really feels unique too, all having their own distinct enemy types (unlike some other Zelda game I know) and style.
The dungeons are pretty easy, even moreso than I'm used to with Zelda. It may be partly cause I'm older now, but they feel much more simple than the ones in later games. Not to say they aren't fun, though! They're all enjoyable romps that have some sort of gimmick to keep things fresh. Although, there are a lot of repeating puzzles like "lift up this thing and find a switch" that get pretty repetitive. ALTTP is pretty unique in the series as I find I enjoy exploring the overworld more than I did the dungeons. Turtle Rock and Ganon's Tower are fantastic though. Especially that final boss fight!
I also dig the Dark World. In addition to having the best theme for any area in the Zelda series, it's super fun to explore. Despite being nearly identical in layout to the Light World, it never feels like you're just retreading the same things you did in the Light World version of that area. Being able to hop back and forth between them makes for some cool moments too, such as climbing to the peak of Death Mountain, and gaining access to the Ice Palace.
All in all, had a blast with it :) It definitely lived up to the hype it's been given over the years
The dungeons are pretty easy, even moreso than I'm used to with Zelda. It may be partly cause I'm older now, but they feel much more simple than the ones in later games. Not to say they aren't fun, though! They're all enjoyable romps that have some sort of gimmick to keep things fresh. Although, there are a lot of repeating puzzles like "lift up this thing and find a switch" that get pretty repetitive. ALTTP is pretty unique in the series as I find I enjoy exploring the overworld more than I did the dungeons. Turtle Rock and Ganon's Tower are fantastic though. Especially that final boss fight!
I also dig the Dark World. In addition to having the best theme for any area in the Zelda series, it's super fun to explore. Despite being nearly identical in layout to the Light World, it never feels like you're just retreading the same things you did in the Light World version of that area. Being able to hop back and forth between them makes for some cool moments too, such as climbing to the peak of Death Mountain, and gaining access to the Ice Palace.
All in all, had a blast with it :) It definitely lived up to the hype it's been given over the years
A occupé trop de mes années d'enfance
really loved this! i dont know if im just impatient, but i did use a guide for almost all of it (after whatever it was that caused me my first roadblock). i think that's more of a me thing, that it still felt a little too obtuse for me to play it completely on my own, but it keeps me from really really cementing it as an all timer for me. still - really great. looks amazing, sounds amazing, plays amazing, really fun and challenging. a great video game.
I really liked this game, and then I played for 4 hours straight and forgot to save and lost all that progress, so now I'm never playing it again. Good game, but I dont have the emotional willpower for that!
Finished this for the first time in 2023 and wow, this game was so ahead of its time. I was consistently impressed by what I discovered through my play-through, and the variety of things Link would end up doing. It has several quality of life problems that old games tend to do but was a worthwhile experience. I can't imagine what it would have felt like playing this when it came out. The graphics alone would have been mind-blowing.
The world is incredibly fleshed out and interesting to explore. It truly captures the spirit of exploration that Zelda games were designed for from the beginning. You are rewarded for spotting oddities and the in-game map detail is limited so the world is expertly designed to be easily navigated from memory. ALTTP was great at having things to explore for exploring's sake, not because of some quest or NPC direction. Most games today still don't get this right.
Speaking of exploration, it has dungeons that truly feel like dungeons. I think this is because they have more of focus on combat and navigational challenges than puzzle solving, but they are still fun. You can quickly get lost even with the compass and map, and the dungeons with dark room elements enhance that feeling even further. Descending some 6 floors and getting stuck for an hour in the depths of the Ice Palace was an experience that nearly drove me insane, but I can't deny it captured the feeling of exploring a dungeon incredibly well.
Link has an abundance of tools and items in this game, although many of them are only used once or twice and then never again. I found this annoying mostly because they each have to be selected before use, as you only have one button for all your items. And somehow the L/R buttons go completely unused unless you are playing the Redux romhack which lets you cycle items with them. The Zelda team certainly learned to refine the item kit in later games, and the reason why really shows here.
Some other small complaints: combat knock-back is so high that it easily gets annoying, and the dungeon and boss fight songs are incredibly repetitive and become grating fast. I suspect the short musical loops are due to the cartridge memory limitations, but I'd rather have no music than annoying music, and the dungeon theme is by far the song you will listen to the longest in your time playing.
Aside from that, this game has great musical elements, excellent animation and sprite-work, a weirdly-dark story, memorable characters, and a truly epic feel. I hope one day it gets remade to bring in modern quality of life features. Even just a remaster with new UI and mapping more of a modern controller's buttons would be a god-send.
The world is incredibly fleshed out and interesting to explore. It truly captures the spirit of exploration that Zelda games were designed for from the beginning. You are rewarded for spotting oddities and the in-game map detail is limited so the world is expertly designed to be easily navigated from memory. ALTTP was great at having things to explore for exploring's sake, not because of some quest or NPC direction. Most games today still don't get this right.
Speaking of exploration, it has dungeons that truly feel like dungeons. I think this is because they have more of focus on combat and navigational challenges than puzzle solving, but they are still fun. You can quickly get lost even with the compass and map, and the dungeons with dark room elements enhance that feeling even further. Descending some 6 floors and getting stuck for an hour in the depths of the Ice Palace was an experience that nearly drove me insane, but I can't deny it captured the feeling of exploring a dungeon incredibly well.
Link has an abundance of tools and items in this game, although many of them are only used once or twice and then never again. I found this annoying mostly because they each have to be selected before use, as you only have one button for all your items. And somehow the L/R buttons go completely unused unless you are playing the Redux romhack which lets you cycle items with them. The Zelda team certainly learned to refine the item kit in later games, and the reason why really shows here.
Some other small complaints: combat knock-back is so high that it easily gets annoying, and the dungeon and boss fight songs are incredibly repetitive and become grating fast. I suspect the short musical loops are due to the cartridge memory limitations, but I'd rather have no music than annoying music, and the dungeon theme is by far the song you will listen to the longest in your time playing.
Aside from that, this game has great musical elements, excellent animation and sprite-work, a weirdly-dark story, memorable characters, and a truly epic feel. I hope one day it gets remade to bring in modern quality of life features. Even just a remaster with new UI and mapping more of a modern controller's buttons would be a god-send.
Primeiro Zelda que joguei. Apesar de algumas partes não serem bem intuitivas, me diverti bastante.
One of the best Zelda games. An absolute classic. Huge world to explore, great dungeons and great music.
Exactly the step up Zelda deserved. A Link to the Past is a fantastic game, and a pitch perfect evolution of the formula established with the first game on the NES. It has aged like a fine wine too, and is still extremely fun to play today.
Unfortunately I played this as a tiny handed youth and was never able to finish it, but that never stopped me spending an ungodly amount of time in this game's enchanting take on Hyrule.
Unfortunately I played this as a tiny handed youth and was never able to finish it, but that never stopped me spending an ungodly amount of time in this game's enchanting take on Hyrule.
I realize this game is not entirely my cup of tea, I had to look up and follow a guide a lot of the time 'cause I was lost or missing an item, also a lot of the bosses were lowkey kicking my ass into the dirt.
However despite all this I find that there is a lot to love and I can definitely recognize how important LTTP is to video games as a medium. From the score, to the world bursting with secrets, to the smaller things like the jingles of making a discovery, LTTP is nothing short of iconic.
A lot of the magic while I can still definitely appreciate is a little lost on me due to my frustrations but I mean come on it's LTTP of course its worth playing and of course it's a gem.
However despite all this I find that there is a lot to love and I can definitely recognize how important LTTP is to video games as a medium. From the score, to the world bursting with secrets, to the smaller things like the jingles of making a discovery, LTTP is nothing short of iconic.
A lot of the magic while I can still definitely appreciate is a little lost on me due to my frustrations but I mean come on it's LTTP of course its worth playing and of course it's a gem.
This review contains spoilers
This is my first experience completing a Zelda game, and I have to say that it was really awesome. The feeling of exploring this beautiful world in a kind of open world way impressed me, how they managed to design something like that 30 years ago? Really impressive. The best part to me was the feeling of discovering this cool world, and when you think you are done, guess what? You have another entire world to explore. I've seen that kind of mechanic in newer games, but I wonder how amazed kids were back in the days when they experienced that. The boss fights are unique and challenging, and make me categorize this Zelda like dark souls for kids, or better saying, dark souls is a Zelda for adults. The game plot was ok at best, not an excellent story, but, the lore that the characters have within the dialogs is very rich, you start to draw the backstory of that world as the characters comment about the past. I really loved the graphics and the soundtrack. Overall, I loved it, and I'm forward to play more Zelda games.
Good ass game, very fun however progression can be a bit too cryptic at times and it feels like it goes on maybe 2 or 3 dungeons too long. Otherwise though basically nothing bad to say here, there's a reason this became the archetypal Zelda game every other one up until BOTW tried to copy lol
Segundo Zelda que juego en 2D, y supera bastante de nes, siendo que aquí ya está las cosas mucho mejor telegrafiiadas, hay variedad de enemigos y obstáculos, aunque igualmente, aunque esto por lo visto pasa en todos los Zelda tanto 2D o 3D, hay objetos o objetivos un tanto obtusos y reguleros, y siendo que tienes que cambiar entre dos mundos, es algo que puede cansarte, aunque esto pasa en todos los zeldas que jugué, al punto de que en algunos, tuve que si o si usar guía en algún momento, pero me la pasé muy bien con este igualmente, ya que dejando parte concretas, o objetos concretos, es un juego bastante bueno. Siendo mi tercer Zelda favorito empatado con wind waker, pero sigo prefiriendo Breat of The Wild y sobretodo majorask (aunque a este punto buscar un juego como ese, tan único, atmosférico y tal, diría que es imposible en esta franquicia, pero bueno, me conformo que tenga titulos muy buenos en los restantes aunque ninguno le llegue a ese juego).
> Defeats Ganon
> Can wish for anything now
> Wishes for the return of the Monarchy
> Dosen't even fuck Zelda
LINK, YOU FUCKING IDIOT!
> Can wish for anything now
> Wishes for the return of the Monarchy
> Dosen't even fuck Zelda
LINK, YOU FUCKING IDIOT!
32 years later, and Nintendo still has yet to top this classic. It is still the best Zelda game they've made, and I really wish they would make more Zeldas that have this format. There was nothing wrong with it. Yes, they can still make the BOTW-type Zelda since people seem to like it, but I wish they would make more like this, too.
The story is good. The overworlds are fun to explore. The world-switching mechanism is fun. The combat is fun. Your items don't disappear on you after a few uses. The dungeons are not super short and are fun and varied. They reward you for exploring the overworld. There isn't a massive amount of dialogue.
It is still the prime example of a perfect Zelda game and I wish Nintendo would realize that.
The story is good. The overworlds are fun to explore. The world-switching mechanism is fun. The combat is fun. Your items don't disappear on you after a few uses. The dungeons are not super short and are fun and varied. They reward you for exploring the overworld. There isn't a massive amount of dialogue.
It is still the prime example of a perfect Zelda game and I wish Nintendo would realize that.
Hyrule gana más identidad que en los primeros juegos, y sobre diseño también. En realidad Zelda II ya ponía restricciones de navegación antes que este, aquí solo introdujeron los puzzles y quitaron hostilidad. Pero está bien, pienso que solo se le reconoce personalidad a Wind Waker, pero este es mejor para mí: como cuando Link se cae al vacío o se pone colorado al mover un bloque, o la personalidad de los soldados. Encima este sí es divertido de jugar, privilegios del 2d.
This game is a ton of fun! I have a few problems with it, but overall it's a very well put together game with a ton of stuff to do, beautiful sprite work, and a great, though a bit repetitive, soundtrack. There's a few parts of it that feel a bit cryptic, but overall the game actually has a clear objective compared to previous entries. From now on I'm gonna pretend this is the start of the series.
Not my favorite 2D Zelda game since I like the sequels Link's Awakening and A Link Between Worlds more but it is a timeless game that redefined 2D Zelda right after the NES.
And yes I only decided to fully play and beat it since Tears of the Kingdom comes out tomorrow.
And yes I only decided to fully play and beat it since Tears of the Kingdom comes out tomorrow.
My babysitter's nerdy, eldest daughter played this while making funny voices, so this game gave me something like an IRL let's play experience from my childhood.
Playing it for myself months later, then again via emulation, a decade after that, I can say this much:
A-woop, weew, A-woop, weew, A-woop, weew.
Playing it for myself months later, then again via emulation, a decade after that, I can say this much:
A-woop, weew, A-woop, weew, A-woop, weew.
One of the best Top down zelda's a Must Play!
(This is the 57th game in my challenge to go through many known games in chronological order starting in 1990. The spreadsheet is in my bio.)
The Game of the Year, ladies and gentlemen. The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, initially released on November 21, 1991 in Japan for the SNES, developed and published by Nintendo, is a fantastic action-adventure and is the Zelda game that has set the framework for the series in so many ways from here on out, and that it has done such a great job with that concept here already deserves a lot of praise (of which it got a lot I hear).
I can talk on and on about the positives, but I'll go over everything in detail in my review. Though I do want to add that I am surprised that Nintendo, after releasing a Game Boy Zelda game in 1993, didn't release another home console game in the series all the way until 1998. That's seven years from now. Of course, releases were almost an annual thing from then on for about a decade, but I am still surprised about this little fact. At release, this game received a 39/40 Famitsu score, the first game to ever get a score so high according to Wikipedia's article on the game, and was the best-selling game in 1991, so it's not like Nintendo wasn't aware of its popularity. Though the gap between BOTW and TOTK was even larger, so it's not any different today. Anyway, here is the review.
STORYTELLING/CHARACTERS | 7/10
The Legend of Zelda: A Link To The Past takes a massive leap in narrative in comparison to Zelda I and II. Unlike all the other improvements the game presented with the jump to the SNES, the narrative jump did not have to be this grand. In hindsight, it's what this gaves this game that little something that many games lack in atmosphere and in what players would be able to draw back on years after finishing the game.
While Zelda II simply had a scrolling text to explain the set-up and then have you go side to side until you get the "you won" text, ALTTP goes to great detail (for its time) explaining the mythology of its world.
The setting is Hyrule, which, according to Hylian scrolls, many moons ago was created by mythical gods of Power, Wisdom and Courage. It is said that after finishing their work, they left a symbol of their strength hidden somewhere in Hyrule, a golden triangle known as the Triforce. The Triforce myth, an ancient epic, tells that this Triforce, an inanimate object, may grant the wish of the person who finds it. Its hiding place is the Golden Land, and over time, more and more people, fueled by greed, looked to find it, killing each other in the progress.
One day, by accident more than anything, a gang of thieves led by Ganondorf Dragmire, or Ganon, found the gate to the Golden Land. Ganon quickly vanquished his followers to have the Triforce's powers for himself. It is explained that the Triforce can not judge between evil and good and grants every wish, so while Ganon's exact wish is not known, it did not take long for evil power to flow from the Golden Land and for disasters to beset Hyrule.
This led the lord of Hyrule to sent out the Seven Wise Men and the Knights of Hyrule to seal the entrance to the Golden Land. A war raged between them and Ganon's evil army. As the Knights struggled to find off the army, they did give the Seven Wise Men the required time to magically seal Ganon in the Golden Land. In the midst of this, the people of Hyrule, suspecting that Ganon's power stemmed from the Triforce, created a mighty weapon resistant to magic which could repulse powers granted by even the Triforce. This weapon is called the Master Sword. It is so powerful that only one of pure heart can wield it.
A long time later, you, Link, are woken up by a person who calls herself Zelda. She needs your help. The reason for her pleas? Ganon, while still sealed in the 'Dark World' (the current name for the Golden Land), wants to take over the 'Light World' (Hyrule) as well. To break the seal, he needs the life force of the seven wise men. He uses a wizard, Agahnim, as his pawn to do this, who captures the seven wise men one by one. You need to save them and kill Ganon once and for all.
And that's the back-story. Quite a detailed one, huh? This information can mostly be found in the manual for the game, but each of the seven wise men you are supposed to capture, and Zelda herself especially, tell you these stories in-game as you interact with them, leaving you with no blanks even if you didn't touch the manual.
With how limited the storytelling used to be during this time, I didn't find any of the main plot points for this game to be terribly sophisticated. But what this game did really well was to go in-depth regarding these plot points. To create plot points for all these important parts of the story at all. This is an action-adventure game with lots of puzzles of all varieties, and getting stuck and exploring to find a way forward is what you are meant to do all the time. So having an in-depth narrative like this compared to the majority of games from this time is actually pretty damn useful in motivating the player to keep going.
Out of these plot points, there is a lot to like, but I want to point out the description of the Master Sword in particular, as personally I am a big fan of weapons that can only be wielded by good-hearted people, I think that's a great sort-of requirement to set for all those young people who played this back in the day. For that reason I think when you eventually get the Master Sword, there could have been a bigger deal made of it, but maybe that's something for a later game in the series.
All in all, in terms of the big picture, the plot here is nothing special. It's a much more sophisticated telling of more or less the same story most games of the time used, but with slightly more depth to it and 'gamified' so the devs could use it as a framework for the game they were about to built. The seven wise men for example aren't this mysterious ancient group, they act as seven dungeons that you are meant to explore and beat in the game. It could have just easily been three or four, but the game would have not been as long this way. The Light and Dark worlds are simply two overworlds that you can explore, and instead of having to design two very distinct ones in shape, the same overworld style was used and just made darker and with a few changes to the traversal were made. So if you want to be cynical, yes, the game design shaped the narrative, but I don't think that's a bad thing for a game, especially of its time, and I appreciate the devs for putting in the effort to have the story not just be an afterthought to the gameplay but have it be integrated in everything you do like this.
GAMEPLAY | 16/20
This game is an action-adventure and introduces more or less the core design that the majority of the follow-ups would stick to in the Zelda series. It plays from top-down 2D perspective. You control Link and traverse an overworld filled with many secrets, enemies and dungeons. The main gameplay consists of the following loop: You need to enter a specific dungeon. The dungeons take pretty long, have multiple floors and consist of many different puzzles the player needs to solve in order to progress to the boss. During each dungeon, you find a special item, like a Fire-Rod, an Ice-Rod, a boomerang, a staff of invincibility, a hook shot, a magic hammer and more. These not only help you beat the dungeon, but once you do, you return to the overworld and a ton of optional (and mandatory, you just don't know it yet) sections of the overworld now open for you to be explored. The magic hammer for example allows you to pound stakes and obstacles into the ground which had blocked off certain areas before.
During exploration, through which there is a LOT to find, you can open up holes to secret rooms, you can find NPCs who give you side quests, you can find environmental puzzles and hints (a shield says that you should not throw something into a circle of stones, I wonder what happens if you do it anyway), you can stumble upon pieces of a heart (4 of which give you one additional hitpoint) and you find required items to potentially open up other dungeons, like a certain medaillon for example.
There are also many different caves and buildings to go to, as these often offer you optional, but incredibly useful upgrades to your gear. Help a gnome find his way to his partner and you are rewarded with an upgrade to your sword. Find a fountain, throw rupees in and you can increase the amount of bombs/arrows you can carry. You can give certain items you find to certain NPCs, who reward you with different items. "I wonder who would have any use for this mushroom?".
There is quite a lot to do here, and I'd be lying to you if I said I wasn't stuck multiple times. Taking a break of more than a week in this game means you're almost guaranteed to start over or use a guide, because a lot of information that you absolutely are required to have comes from one-time dialogue with NPCs often enough. If you don't pay attention or take a break and forget this information, you're going to be looking around for that one elusive item for a while. The game doesn't hold your hand one bit, and that's something each of you will have your own opinion about. Personally, I appreciated this because for the majority of this game, the game design matched this need for exploration by giving you multiple bread crumbs for almost everything you need to figure out. I personally missed some, for sure, and therefore had to make use of a guide a couple times, but if you enjoy the exploration part of this game a lot (and don't want to save some off those minutes to be able to progress through a challenge quicker), I'm sure you can manage to beat it without a guide.
That said, I had two issues here, which I explain more closely in the Level Design part of this review. First, is that the overworld traversal is not perfect and is too reliant on Save & Exit's to not slow the pace down considerably, and the second is that some solutions are not very intuitive. Here is a room which a bunch of tiles. You have to move one tile in a specific direction to make a chest appear. Here are 20 statues with their tongues showing. None do anything after you hit them, pull them and dash into them. Here another dozen. They don't do anything. Here are another 4. One of these opens the door you need to progress. When these are all in the same dungeon and you're stuck, and pretty much anything can trigger anything at times, it can definitely become a frustrating excercise of trial and error.
But these issues don't overshadow the excellent gameplay experience that is on offer here.
The combat is pretty straightforward. You point in one of four directions and can slash forward with your sword. Holding the attack button also produces a 360° attack. You gain a dashing ability pretty early on, which damages the majority of enemies if you dash into them. Many items you find later on also can be used for attacking purposes, so it's rare that you only rely on your sword for too long. Apart from bombs and arrows which you can constantly re-fill, you get a boomerang, fire- and ice rods, three medaillons that produce special attacks and more, some of which drain your 'magic meter', as they'd otherwise be too overpowered. Different enemies have different susceptibilities. Some can only be killed with fire, some need to take an arrow to their eye and late-game skeletons don't fully die unless you kill them with a bomb.
My main gripe is that since you can only slash forward, hitting the target can sometimes be an issue, though not too often to make it annoying. For example, some enemies have a shield or other forms of frontal protection. The shield may be on the right hand of the enemy, which means you need to place yourself further down to hit their left side, which exposes you to a hit for half a second. Then there are enemies that start producing shock waves at random times, and there is no warning for it, so way too often, you'd swing and in those couple frames between swing and hit, the shockwaves can activate and cause rather significant damage to you. Also, there are many enemies that cause knock-back. Since dungeons often have holes that you can fall into, hitting enemies and falling into them can be annoying, but avoiding the fight usually solves that issue. Finally, this is another one of those games where you need to regularly open up your inventory to change weapons, which is a common issue with games that use multiple items like this. It's not too bad but noticeable when you fight particular bosses, especially Ganon at the end.
In terms of controls, this game plays and controls pretty fluently. You want to do something, and Link does it. The only instance where I felt that the controls were truly unfair were on tight platforms where you could fall off to the sides. For some reason, walking and turning had this slippery feel to it, and instead of making a sharp right or left, Link would need a few steps to gain momentum to that side, which often leads to him falling down. On ice-y platforms I understand, but on regular platforms this was odd.
Overall though, this game offers great gameplay and exploration. It proves why it's so popular, as it is several times more polished than other action-adventures of this time.
MUSIC/SOUND/VOICE | 9/10
No voice acting. And I'm glad, at least for the SNES version, because the constant screaming of Link in the GBA version I definitely couldn't have survived for 15+ hours.
The sound design and soundtrack are both excellent here. There are some sound effects, like the discovery of a secret door, that is so iconic that even I, someone who didn't really play any Zelda games before, instantly was able to notice it. In general, there are sound effects for pretty much every action and they all sound clean, which is not something that was to be expected from games on this level at the time. The soundtrack is great for the epic journey that this is supposed to be, with many epic tracks fitting the scneario. I would have wished for more tracks to use during dungeons to make them more distinct on an auditory level, but I also would understand those who say that listening to fewer tracks increases the 'bond' with them on a nostalgic level. Many games today opt for fewer tracks as well, so I wouldn't call it a negative.
GRAPHICS/ART DESIGN | 10/10
The graphical jump here from Zelda II to ALTTP is obviously absurd, but apart from simple image quality and resolution, the art design here also stands out. Bright colors, beautiful 16-bit graphics, excellent sprite work, diverse environments and very solid special effects. Apart from just the eye-candy perspective, the game incorporates a lot of environmental puzzles to its exploration, and the tells from the environmental design are excellent as well. Here is tiny half-circle that indicates a platform, here is a small crack in the wall that is not noticeable until closer inspection, but very noticeable thereafter, indicating a secret area.
You explore all types of different areas in the game, from distinct dungeons and, to be overworld specific, forests, deserts, mountains, swamps, castles and more, and you have few, if any games that look quite like this on such a scale at the time.
ATMOSPHERE/IMMERSION | 9/10
You truly feel like a hero embarking on an epic journey in this one. The graphics and soundtrack set a great stage for your travels, and there is a lot of attention to detail in the world-building that one can only appreciate. A cute thing for example was when I passed the controller to my six year old brother for a while. He started swinging his sword at a bird in the Dark World that just would not die, and to our amazement, after a few dozen hits, dozens of the same bird started flooding the screen and attacking us. Small details that most players won't experieence are always fun to find. One additional thing I enjoyed is that there is actual in-game meaning to the items you find. You don't find a generic book, you find the Book of Mudora, which can translate inscriptions. You find Staffs of Somaria and Byrna, you find three magic medaillons like the Bombos, which only the hero bearing the master sword can retrieve. It's really basic at this point of course, but it does add to the immersion.
CONTENT | 10/10
Few games are so chock-full of stuff to find while exploring. The great part is that the majority of the overworld does have stuff to find. The overworld is seperated through screens, and I wouldn't be surprised if there is something useful or interesting on each screen.
LEVEL/MISSION DESIGN | 8/10
You have specific dungeons to go to, which are marked on your map. That's all that is marked though. You need to find your way there on your own and sometimes, you need to find specific items that unlock your entry to the dungeons themselves. This is all paced really well.
The overworld is differentiated in two versions, the Light World and the Dark World. These are basically the same overworld, but with different looking environments, different obstacles and more enemies on the Dark World part. For example, in the Light World, there is a Kakariko Village to the west, and in the Dark World, the same area is called Village of Outcasts. You can switch between these worlds in two different ways. You can either use a 'Magic Mirror' to switch from Dark to Light, or, since you can't switch back this way, you need to find a warp portal to switch from Light to Dark.
All in all, the game is really well designed. My only issue here is how annoying traversal can be at times. Unless you want to run across the map for the umpteenth time, you have to rely on 'Save & Quit', which allows you to select a location to spawn in (when in the Light World) once you enter back into the game, or which places you at a specific spot near the middle of the overworld (when in the Dark World). Later, the flute item allows you to fast travel to specific locations in the Light World. But this is a minor issue overall and a subjective thing for sure, though more interconnectivity that opens up shortcuts later on would have been amazing.
One additional point I want to make is that some items are very hard to find or making progress can be tough to figure out at times. And while my complaint is not that part, it's that crucial information is often given once and as an aside, so not paying attention once or simply forgetting about something hours after getting the information means you can be stuck for a while. I don't think a journal that notes the most important stuff would have been the worst thing in the world.
Overall, the game balances it game quite well though. You'll get a great dose of exploring, of making your way through large dungeons, of battling and do so in a very good pace for the majority of it.
CONCEPT/INNOVATION | 10/10
Inner-series, the jump from Zelda II to ALTTP is incredible, but even generally, there was no game quite like this at the time, or at least none that managed to put it together quite as well in an action-adventure setting. There is greated attention given to storytelling and world-building, the soundtrack is great, the graphics are cream of the crop, the dungeons are uniquely designed and offer a fun challenge and exploration is incredibly rewarding.
REPLAYABILITY | 3/5
There are more than a few side quests you can still find on subsequent playthroughs, as well as heart pieces. Even improving your sword or upgrading your bomb and arrow space are completely optional parts that are easy to miss, so there will be plenty to discover. The story is linear however and most special items you can find are mandatory.
PLAYABILITY | 5/5
The game worked well at all times.
OVERALL | 86/100
You want to know what the best game of 1991 is? You've probably just read the review for it. Few games during this time allowed for this much exploration and managed to for the majority of the game to balance the joy of discovery with the potential frustrations of being stuck this well by offering breadcrumbs of info in its NPC dialogue and environments that attentive players take to their advantage to continuously make progress. The dungeons are distinct, large and filled with environmental puzzles and combat challenges to overcome. The soundtrack is very good, the graphics great in comparison to its contemporaries and while the overworld design does get somewhat tedious from time to time, you're going to get a very good and prototypical Zelda experience here. If you like Zelda games and you didn't play this, I don't know what you're doing. If you're unsure, future releases will likely offer plenty of QoL improvements that will make them more newcomer friendly, but even if you start your Zelda journey somewhere else, don't forget about A Link To The Past.
The Game of the Year, ladies and gentlemen. The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, initially released on November 21, 1991 in Japan for the SNES, developed and published by Nintendo, is a fantastic action-adventure and is the Zelda game that has set the framework for the series in so many ways from here on out, and that it has done such a great job with that concept here already deserves a lot of praise (of which it got a lot I hear).
I can talk on and on about the positives, but I'll go over everything in detail in my review. Though I do want to add that I am surprised that Nintendo, after releasing a Game Boy Zelda game in 1993, didn't release another home console game in the series all the way until 1998. That's seven years from now. Of course, releases were almost an annual thing from then on for about a decade, but I am still surprised about this little fact. At release, this game received a 39/40 Famitsu score, the first game to ever get a score so high according to Wikipedia's article on the game, and was the best-selling game in 1991, so it's not like Nintendo wasn't aware of its popularity. Though the gap between BOTW and TOTK was even larger, so it's not any different today. Anyway, here is the review.
STORYTELLING/CHARACTERS | 7/10
The Legend of Zelda: A Link To The Past takes a massive leap in narrative in comparison to Zelda I and II. Unlike all the other improvements the game presented with the jump to the SNES, the narrative jump did not have to be this grand. In hindsight, it's what this gaves this game that little something that many games lack in atmosphere and in what players would be able to draw back on years after finishing the game.
While Zelda II simply had a scrolling text to explain the set-up and then have you go side to side until you get the "you won" text, ALTTP goes to great detail (for its time) explaining the mythology of its world.
The setting is Hyrule, which, according to Hylian scrolls, many moons ago was created by mythical gods of Power, Wisdom and Courage. It is said that after finishing their work, they left a symbol of their strength hidden somewhere in Hyrule, a golden triangle known as the Triforce. The Triforce myth, an ancient epic, tells that this Triforce, an inanimate object, may grant the wish of the person who finds it. Its hiding place is the Golden Land, and over time, more and more people, fueled by greed, looked to find it, killing each other in the progress.
One day, by accident more than anything, a gang of thieves led by Ganondorf Dragmire, or Ganon, found the gate to the Golden Land. Ganon quickly vanquished his followers to have the Triforce's powers for himself. It is explained that the Triforce can not judge between evil and good and grants every wish, so while Ganon's exact wish is not known, it did not take long for evil power to flow from the Golden Land and for disasters to beset Hyrule.
This led the lord of Hyrule to sent out the Seven Wise Men and the Knights of Hyrule to seal the entrance to the Golden Land. A war raged between them and Ganon's evil army. As the Knights struggled to find off the army, they did give the Seven Wise Men the required time to magically seal Ganon in the Golden Land. In the midst of this, the people of Hyrule, suspecting that Ganon's power stemmed from the Triforce, created a mighty weapon resistant to magic which could repulse powers granted by even the Triforce. This weapon is called the Master Sword. It is so powerful that only one of pure heart can wield it.
A long time later, you, Link, are woken up by a person who calls herself Zelda. She needs your help. The reason for her pleas? Ganon, while still sealed in the 'Dark World' (the current name for the Golden Land), wants to take over the 'Light World' (Hyrule) as well. To break the seal, he needs the life force of the seven wise men. He uses a wizard, Agahnim, as his pawn to do this, who captures the seven wise men one by one. You need to save them and kill Ganon once and for all.
And that's the back-story. Quite a detailed one, huh? This information can mostly be found in the manual for the game, but each of the seven wise men you are supposed to capture, and Zelda herself especially, tell you these stories in-game as you interact with them, leaving you with no blanks even if you didn't touch the manual.
With how limited the storytelling used to be during this time, I didn't find any of the main plot points for this game to be terribly sophisticated. But what this game did really well was to go in-depth regarding these plot points. To create plot points for all these important parts of the story at all. This is an action-adventure game with lots of puzzles of all varieties, and getting stuck and exploring to find a way forward is what you are meant to do all the time. So having an in-depth narrative like this compared to the majority of games from this time is actually pretty damn useful in motivating the player to keep going.
Out of these plot points, there is a lot to like, but I want to point out the description of the Master Sword in particular, as personally I am a big fan of weapons that can only be wielded by good-hearted people, I think that's a great sort-of requirement to set for all those young people who played this back in the day. For that reason I think when you eventually get the Master Sword, there could have been a bigger deal made of it, but maybe that's something for a later game in the series.
All in all, in terms of the big picture, the plot here is nothing special. It's a much more sophisticated telling of more or less the same story most games of the time used, but with slightly more depth to it and 'gamified' so the devs could use it as a framework for the game they were about to built. The seven wise men for example aren't this mysterious ancient group, they act as seven dungeons that you are meant to explore and beat in the game. It could have just easily been three or four, but the game would have not been as long this way. The Light and Dark worlds are simply two overworlds that you can explore, and instead of having to design two very distinct ones in shape, the same overworld style was used and just made darker and with a few changes to the traversal were made. So if you want to be cynical, yes, the game design shaped the narrative, but I don't think that's a bad thing for a game, especially of its time, and I appreciate the devs for putting in the effort to have the story not just be an afterthought to the gameplay but have it be integrated in everything you do like this.
GAMEPLAY | 16/20
This game is an action-adventure and introduces more or less the core design that the majority of the follow-ups would stick to in the Zelda series. It plays from top-down 2D perspective. You control Link and traverse an overworld filled with many secrets, enemies and dungeons. The main gameplay consists of the following loop: You need to enter a specific dungeon. The dungeons take pretty long, have multiple floors and consist of many different puzzles the player needs to solve in order to progress to the boss. During each dungeon, you find a special item, like a Fire-Rod, an Ice-Rod, a boomerang, a staff of invincibility, a hook shot, a magic hammer and more. These not only help you beat the dungeon, but once you do, you return to the overworld and a ton of optional (and mandatory, you just don't know it yet) sections of the overworld now open for you to be explored. The magic hammer for example allows you to pound stakes and obstacles into the ground which had blocked off certain areas before.
During exploration, through which there is a LOT to find, you can open up holes to secret rooms, you can find NPCs who give you side quests, you can find environmental puzzles and hints (a shield says that you should not throw something into a circle of stones, I wonder what happens if you do it anyway), you can stumble upon pieces of a heart (4 of which give you one additional hitpoint) and you find required items to potentially open up other dungeons, like a certain medaillon for example.
There are also many different caves and buildings to go to, as these often offer you optional, but incredibly useful upgrades to your gear. Help a gnome find his way to his partner and you are rewarded with an upgrade to your sword. Find a fountain, throw rupees in and you can increase the amount of bombs/arrows you can carry. You can give certain items you find to certain NPCs, who reward you with different items. "I wonder who would have any use for this mushroom?".
There is quite a lot to do here, and I'd be lying to you if I said I wasn't stuck multiple times. Taking a break of more than a week in this game means you're almost guaranteed to start over or use a guide, because a lot of information that you absolutely are required to have comes from one-time dialogue with NPCs often enough. If you don't pay attention or take a break and forget this information, you're going to be looking around for that one elusive item for a while. The game doesn't hold your hand one bit, and that's something each of you will have your own opinion about. Personally, I appreciated this because for the majority of this game, the game design matched this need for exploration by giving you multiple bread crumbs for almost everything you need to figure out. I personally missed some, for sure, and therefore had to make use of a guide a couple times, but if you enjoy the exploration part of this game a lot (and don't want to save some off those minutes to be able to progress through a challenge quicker), I'm sure you can manage to beat it without a guide.
That said, I had two issues here, which I explain more closely in the Level Design part of this review. First, is that the overworld traversal is not perfect and is too reliant on Save & Exit's to not slow the pace down considerably, and the second is that some solutions are not very intuitive. Here is a room which a bunch of tiles. You have to move one tile in a specific direction to make a chest appear. Here are 20 statues with their tongues showing. None do anything after you hit them, pull them and dash into them. Here another dozen. They don't do anything. Here are another 4. One of these opens the door you need to progress. When these are all in the same dungeon and you're stuck, and pretty much anything can trigger anything at times, it can definitely become a frustrating excercise of trial and error.
But these issues don't overshadow the excellent gameplay experience that is on offer here.
The combat is pretty straightforward. You point in one of four directions and can slash forward with your sword. Holding the attack button also produces a 360° attack. You gain a dashing ability pretty early on, which damages the majority of enemies if you dash into them. Many items you find later on also can be used for attacking purposes, so it's rare that you only rely on your sword for too long. Apart from bombs and arrows which you can constantly re-fill, you get a boomerang, fire- and ice rods, three medaillons that produce special attacks and more, some of which drain your 'magic meter', as they'd otherwise be too overpowered. Different enemies have different susceptibilities. Some can only be killed with fire, some need to take an arrow to their eye and late-game skeletons don't fully die unless you kill them with a bomb.
My main gripe is that since you can only slash forward, hitting the target can sometimes be an issue, though not too often to make it annoying. For example, some enemies have a shield or other forms of frontal protection. The shield may be on the right hand of the enemy, which means you need to place yourself further down to hit their left side, which exposes you to a hit for half a second. Then there are enemies that start producing shock waves at random times, and there is no warning for it, so way too often, you'd swing and in those couple frames between swing and hit, the shockwaves can activate and cause rather significant damage to you. Also, there are many enemies that cause knock-back. Since dungeons often have holes that you can fall into, hitting enemies and falling into them can be annoying, but avoiding the fight usually solves that issue. Finally, this is another one of those games where you need to regularly open up your inventory to change weapons, which is a common issue with games that use multiple items like this. It's not too bad but noticeable when you fight particular bosses, especially Ganon at the end.
In terms of controls, this game plays and controls pretty fluently. You want to do something, and Link does it. The only instance where I felt that the controls were truly unfair were on tight platforms where you could fall off to the sides. For some reason, walking and turning had this slippery feel to it, and instead of making a sharp right or left, Link would need a few steps to gain momentum to that side, which often leads to him falling down. On ice-y platforms I understand, but on regular platforms this was odd.
Overall though, this game offers great gameplay and exploration. It proves why it's so popular, as it is several times more polished than other action-adventures of this time.
MUSIC/SOUND/VOICE | 9/10
No voice acting. And I'm glad, at least for the SNES version, because the constant screaming of Link in the GBA version I definitely couldn't have survived for 15+ hours.
The sound design and soundtrack are both excellent here. There are some sound effects, like the discovery of a secret door, that is so iconic that even I, someone who didn't really play any Zelda games before, instantly was able to notice it. In general, there are sound effects for pretty much every action and they all sound clean, which is not something that was to be expected from games on this level at the time. The soundtrack is great for the epic journey that this is supposed to be, with many epic tracks fitting the scneario. I would have wished for more tracks to use during dungeons to make them more distinct on an auditory level, but I also would understand those who say that listening to fewer tracks increases the 'bond' with them on a nostalgic level. Many games today opt for fewer tracks as well, so I wouldn't call it a negative.
GRAPHICS/ART DESIGN | 10/10
The graphical jump here from Zelda II to ALTTP is obviously absurd, but apart from simple image quality and resolution, the art design here also stands out. Bright colors, beautiful 16-bit graphics, excellent sprite work, diverse environments and very solid special effects. Apart from just the eye-candy perspective, the game incorporates a lot of environmental puzzles to its exploration, and the tells from the environmental design are excellent as well. Here is tiny half-circle that indicates a platform, here is a small crack in the wall that is not noticeable until closer inspection, but very noticeable thereafter, indicating a secret area.
You explore all types of different areas in the game, from distinct dungeons and, to be overworld specific, forests, deserts, mountains, swamps, castles and more, and you have few, if any games that look quite like this on such a scale at the time.
ATMOSPHERE/IMMERSION | 9/10
You truly feel like a hero embarking on an epic journey in this one. The graphics and soundtrack set a great stage for your travels, and there is a lot of attention to detail in the world-building that one can only appreciate. A cute thing for example was when I passed the controller to my six year old brother for a while. He started swinging his sword at a bird in the Dark World that just would not die, and to our amazement, after a few dozen hits, dozens of the same bird started flooding the screen and attacking us. Small details that most players won't experieence are always fun to find. One additional thing I enjoyed is that there is actual in-game meaning to the items you find. You don't find a generic book, you find the Book of Mudora, which can translate inscriptions. You find Staffs of Somaria and Byrna, you find three magic medaillons like the Bombos, which only the hero bearing the master sword can retrieve. It's really basic at this point of course, but it does add to the immersion.
CONTENT | 10/10
Few games are so chock-full of stuff to find while exploring. The great part is that the majority of the overworld does have stuff to find. The overworld is seperated through screens, and I wouldn't be surprised if there is something useful or interesting on each screen.
LEVEL/MISSION DESIGN | 8/10
You have specific dungeons to go to, which are marked on your map. That's all that is marked though. You need to find your way there on your own and sometimes, you need to find specific items that unlock your entry to the dungeons themselves. This is all paced really well.
The overworld is differentiated in two versions, the Light World and the Dark World. These are basically the same overworld, but with different looking environments, different obstacles and more enemies on the Dark World part. For example, in the Light World, there is a Kakariko Village to the west, and in the Dark World, the same area is called Village of Outcasts. You can switch between these worlds in two different ways. You can either use a 'Magic Mirror' to switch from Dark to Light, or, since you can't switch back this way, you need to find a warp portal to switch from Light to Dark.
All in all, the game is really well designed. My only issue here is how annoying traversal can be at times. Unless you want to run across the map for the umpteenth time, you have to rely on 'Save & Quit', which allows you to select a location to spawn in (when in the Light World) once you enter back into the game, or which places you at a specific spot near the middle of the overworld (when in the Dark World). Later, the flute item allows you to fast travel to specific locations in the Light World. But this is a minor issue overall and a subjective thing for sure, though more interconnectivity that opens up shortcuts later on would have been amazing.
One additional point I want to make is that some items are very hard to find or making progress can be tough to figure out at times. And while my complaint is not that part, it's that crucial information is often given once and as an aside, so not paying attention once or simply forgetting about something hours after getting the information means you can be stuck for a while. I don't think a journal that notes the most important stuff would have been the worst thing in the world.
Overall, the game balances it game quite well though. You'll get a great dose of exploring, of making your way through large dungeons, of battling and do so in a very good pace for the majority of it.
CONCEPT/INNOVATION | 10/10
Inner-series, the jump from Zelda II to ALTTP is incredible, but even generally, there was no game quite like this at the time, or at least none that managed to put it together quite as well in an action-adventure setting. There is greated attention given to storytelling and world-building, the soundtrack is great, the graphics are cream of the crop, the dungeons are uniquely designed and offer a fun challenge and exploration is incredibly rewarding.
REPLAYABILITY | 3/5
There are more than a few side quests you can still find on subsequent playthroughs, as well as heart pieces. Even improving your sword or upgrading your bomb and arrow space are completely optional parts that are easy to miss, so there will be plenty to discover. The story is linear however and most special items you can find are mandatory.
PLAYABILITY | 5/5
The game worked well at all times.
OVERALL | 86/100
You want to know what the best game of 1991 is? You've probably just read the review for it. Few games during this time allowed for this much exploration and managed to for the majority of the game to balance the joy of discovery with the potential frustrations of being stuck this well by offering breadcrumbs of info in its NPC dialogue and environments that attentive players take to their advantage to continuously make progress. The dungeons are distinct, large and filled with environmental puzzles and combat challenges to overcome. The soundtrack is very good, the graphics great in comparison to its contemporaries and while the overworld design does get somewhat tedious from time to time, you're going to get a very good and prototypical Zelda experience here. If you like Zelda games and you didn't play this, I don't know what you're doing. If you're unsure, future releases will likely offer plenty of QoL improvements that will make them more newcomer friendly, but even if you start your Zelda journey somewhere else, don't forget about A Link To The Past.
The day I chose to commit to playing this whole game through was an absolute blast. Fond memories of its simplicity and lore.
This is an insanely well made title and a staple of the SNES era. The puzzles are creative, the world is vast, and the entire game is a memorable experience that defines many 2D games and still holds up by today's standards. This is a true classic, and a game I can enjoy regardless of time.
I've been meaning to replay this for the longest time, but holy shit what a blast! I did this in like a day and a half and I didn't even notice. The level design in this is brilliant, I love the world they created, and just about everything about it is fantastic. I love exploring the world they created and discovering goodies and secrets, I love entering different dungeons and fucking up some cool ass bosses... It's so much fun.
This playthrough (I think) is the first time I've 100% completed it, full items, all upgrades, and all Heart Pieces. It actually was a lot quicker than I thought it would be, I got most of them on my own before I got stuck and used a guide for like the last four heart pieces. Also, totally forgot how quick this game is- either that or I totally rushed through it.
It's such good fun and the game design is so perfect how it naturally leads you everywhere you're supposed to go, and discover all its secrets.
Very happy to have finally replayed this one, and next on my list is Oracle of Seasons, which I haven't played since maybe 2016.
This playthrough (I think) is the first time I've 100% completed it, full items, all upgrades, and all Heart Pieces. It actually was a lot quicker than I thought it would be, I got most of them on my own before I got stuck and used a guide for like the last four heart pieces. Also, totally forgot how quick this game is- either that or I totally rushed through it.
It's such good fun and the game design is so perfect how it naturally leads you everywhere you're supposed to go, and discover all its secrets.
Very happy to have finally replayed this one, and next on my list is Oracle of Seasons, which I haven't played since maybe 2016.
is it a good game? yes. did I have fun playing it? ...err kind of?
This is the second zelda game I have played. I loved the world, its characters, and its puzzles. But it had far too many enemies to fight for my liking and it grew frustrating that they would respawn immediately after leaving/ re-entering an area. In the end I somewhat gave up on exploring and trying to solve puzzles because I was too busy avoiding the same respawned enemies for the dozenth time. Using a walkthrough guide to check on when I got stuck was probably the only way I was able to be motivated to complete the game.
On a more positive note though, I really enjoyed seeing world building elements that have carried over into breath of the wild - I had no idea so many things were already established in earlier games. I loved link's pink hair and the gorgeous drag queen fairies. And I absolutely loved that I could have a little bee friend with me to fight by my side whenever I wanted.
This is the second zelda game I have played. I loved the world, its characters, and its puzzles. But it had far too many enemies to fight for my liking and it grew frustrating that they would respawn immediately after leaving/ re-entering an area. In the end I somewhat gave up on exploring and trying to solve puzzles because I was too busy avoiding the same respawned enemies for the dozenth time. Using a walkthrough guide to check on when I got stuck was probably the only way I was able to be motivated to complete the game.
On a more positive note though, I really enjoyed seeing world building elements that have carried over into breath of the wild - I had no idea so many things were already established in earlier games. I loved link's pink hair and the gorgeous drag queen fairies. And I absolutely loved that I could have a little bee friend with me to fight by my side whenever I wanted.