Legend of Zelda

  • Publisher: Nintendo
  • Developer: Nintendo
  • Genre: Action-Adventure
  • Release Date: February 21 1986
  • Console: Nintendo entertainment system
Introduction

Legend of Zelda was like no other game made before, for the first time in a game you had a open world to explore treasures to collect, places to go, and people to see! One of the best thing about zelda was up until now you didn't have a choice what to do or where to go, normally you were placed in a level and you had no choice but to complete it. But in the legend of zelda you could choose where you went and what levels or (dungeons as there called in legend of zelda) you wanted to go to first you could go to the last dungeon first if you wanted to. This gave gamers more of a option and got the player more involved in the game. Legend of zelda was a big game and was one of the first games which you could save your progress rather than use passwords.

Story

The Legend of zelda is set in the land of Hyrule and has been engulfed in choas ever since the prince of darkness Ganon invaded the beautiful kingdom and managed to secure the triforce of power (a golden fragment which gives the user incredible power) Hyrule's princess Zelda afraid that ganon would steal the triforce of wisdom, she split the fragment into eight pieces and hid them in eight secret dungeons across the land. Zelda's nurse maid Impa was surrounded by ganon's henchman when a young boy named Link came to her aid, once link defeated ganon's minions impa told link what happened to zelda and the triforce pieces. Once link heard the sad tale he summoned all his courage and went out to find the fragments before ganon got to them, and to save the princess and hyrule!

Gameplay

As I briefly mentioned in the introduction the gameplay in legend of zelda is very different to most games of it's time. Hyrule was an open world to explore and discover, link would have to explore the world to find the eight hidden dungeons spread across the land. A dungeon is where the princess zelda hid the eight pieces of triforce from the evil ganon. Of course it isn't just a matter of finding the dungeons once you found one you would have to explore it and defeat the dungeon boss to obtain one of the eight pieces of the triforce. Once you found seven of the eight pieces you would have to find the last piece of the triforce which was hidden in ganon's lair death mountain and was guarded by ganon himself, once you defeated ganon you could obtain the last piece of the triforce and save princess zelda in the process making link the hero of hyrule!
The controls were very simply too, the A button was to use link's sword and the B button was to use what ever treasure link had equipted.

It all sounds quite simply really find the eight dungeons, collect the triforce pieces slay ganon and rescue the princess job done. But of course it wasn't simple finding the dungeons in the huge world of hyrule was a big task in itself. Link would start off the game with nothing except a small sheild, if link was gonna stand a chance against ganon's minions he needed a sword. Thankfully a sword was close by if link entered the cave next to where he started he would find an old man who gave him a wooden sword, link could finally start his quest! Around hyrule link would find many caves and openings most of the things in the cave were people who would sell things to link to aid him on his journey (the currency in hyrule was rupees which could be found by defeating enemies) things like medicine and other mystical things like power rings! This gave the player more insentive to search hyrule there were many things which could be found if you had the treasure to do it with.

The dungeons themselves were not for the faint hearted, they were full with puzzles, strong enemies, traps etc. But there were good things about each dungeon too, each one contained a piece of the triforce obviously a treasure of some kind to help link on his adventure and once you defeated the dungeons boss you would also obtain a heart container which simply would add one more heart to your life so link could take more hits (you could also find heart pieces hidden across the world if you could find four heart pieces you would also earn a heart container!) You objective once you were in a dungeon was to find the dungeon's boss defeat him and collect the piece of the triforce, there would be one key treasure and a few "dungeon" treasures for example the key treasure in the first dungeon is the boomerang which stuns enemies for a few seconds so link could deal some damage without the enemies fighting back. "Dungeon treasures" would be things like keys (which would unlock keyhole doors) maps (which would give you the map of the dungeon) and compasses (which would mark where the dungeon's boss was) Dungeon treasures could be found in each and every dungeon where as the "key" treasure would be unique to that specific dungeon.

The "key" treasures were vital to link, without collecting the key treasure in every dungeon link would eventually find he wouldn't be able to continue his adventure without the specific treasure. Most key treasures either harm enemies or help link in someway maybe by giving him access to the next dungeon for example the raft would allow link to cross water, bombs which could be found could blast holes in walls so link would be able to find a secret treasure or just make a door for himself so he could continue on his adventure. There were also some key treasures found in hyrule as well if the player was to search hyrule, for example link would be able to upgrade his sword, shield and tunic (by finding magic rings) again if link was gonna succeed he would need to find these treasures which were well hidden.

How it played then

Right im gonna say it one more time but legend of zelda was a different game to the other games that were released in that time (sorry to keep repeating myself) No other game had as much freedom as zelda had, it was a an open world for the gamer to explore. You didn't have to do things in the right order you could do the third dungeon first if you wanted too. It gave the gamer options that wasn't available in other games, secret treasures to find, places to explore, bosses to kill!! Legend of zelda felt like a very big game to gamers so big in fact the designers of the game included a map with the game to help people find there way around. It was a very successful game and because of this game legend of zelda became a very successful franchise, zelda fans are always looking foward to the next major zelda title.


How it plays now

Legend of Zelda still plays well today of course by today's standards the games map looks very basic and not that big, but thats because of technology the game is over twenty years old games have alot bigger maps now. The other thing that time has done to zelda is the control of link can only move up, down, left, and right, which makes the control of link seem very dated and to hard to avoid enemy attacks. But apart from that legend of zelda is still a great game to play most of the modern zelda titles use elements from this game. Which proves how popular the first zelda game is, it may not be the best zelda around now but the first game is what started all of the zelda universe off and is one of the best action/adventure games out there.

Overall score

The Legend of zelda is a fantastic game and always will be try playing loads of games from the nes era then play zelda and you will see what a master piece this title really is!

                              8/10

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