When you think of
the original Nintendo Entertainment System, what games come to
mind? For me it is Mario and Zelda. The master of video games,
Shigeru Miyamoto, created both games. Mr. Miyamoto defined
Nintendo as a power in the video game market, and his talents
still define the best games I have played. He helped revive the
dying market after the crash in 1984, and back in the late 80’s,
people did not say they were playing video games: They were
playing Nintendo.
The Legend of
Zelda remains one of the most popular video game series to ever
grace this planet. The series has six games, and each one is top
notch. Only a few series can claim the success that the Zelda
series can. It was a definitive game for the system and at the
time held the record for being the game that had the most copies
sold (later usurped by another Nintendo game, Super Mario Bros.
3).
The games story
was pretty simplistic. The land of Hyrule was in danger. The magic
artifact, known as the Triforce of Power, was stolen by Ganondorf
Dragmire (Ganon) to help him take over Hyrule. He was searching
for the other Triforce, the Triforce of Wisdom. However, Princess
Zelda split the Triforce into eight pieces and hid them throughout
the land. Ganon’s forces eventually captured Zelda, so her
nursemaid, Impa, went out to try and find a hero to save the land.
She found Link. His mission was to find the eight pieces of the
Triforce of Wisdom, and then face of against Ganon and save the
princess.
The game is
played from an overhead view, which was the standard for most
Zelda games, and most RPG's at the time. The game itself is very
solid. The gameplay is great and the story is very good. There are
nine dungeons to explore, and a very large overworld to explore
and even get lost in from time to time. The puzzles are not that
difficult, but can be at time somewhat frustrating. At the end of
each dungeon you face a boss monster. The bosses do repeat
sometimes, but not that often. This was one of the first games I
bought on the NES back in the day, and I played it over and over
again. I still play it today. I cannot get enough of the sword
slashing action.
The graphics were
pretty good for their time. Although compared to today’s games,
they are terrible, but at the time they were very good. The game
was very impressive. The graphics were some of the best I had seen
in the NES.
The Legend of
Zelda has also some of the most memorable music in any game. You
play the Zelda theme, and I can bet that just about anyone of the
“Nintendo Generation” will recognize the themes from the game.
The overworld theme is probably one off the most recognized video
game themes there is out there. It is probably only second to the
theme from the original Super Mario Bros.
The game was also
one of the first to use a battery back up on the cartridge. This
allowed you to save your progress throughout the game. The battery
lasted for years, and worked very well. As a mater of fact, the
battery in mine still works after almost 15 years. This was a
revolutionary feature at the time, and was very impressive. Was
nice to stop and comeback later to finish the game I had started.
| Graphics: Gameplay: Sound: Value: Overall: |
5 10 10 10 8.5 |
The Legend of Zelda Review by Admiral |
0 comments:
Post a Comment