I never owned a Nintendo console growing up. I grew up with the Playstaion and then PS2 and I only encountered Nintendo systems like the GBA through Emulation in mid 2000's, and even then I didn't play Nintendo first party games. Nintendo stuff aren't that well-known in my country after all...
So when I began my internet life, I got surprised by how popular Super Mario and Legend of Zelda games. I always wrote the former off as 'the guy who moves from left to right and collects coins' and I didn't know anything about the latter. I thought that Zelda was the name of the hero. Haha. The only Nintendo game I loved playing until my late teens was Pokemon and I'm not sure if it counts as a first party title.
In the recent years, I watched some videos about first party Nintendo franchises and how they are consistent in quality. I decided I have to give Super Mario, Kirby & Zelda a try. I did procrastinate on doing so for years though, (mainly because they're so expensive.) Now that I have a Switch Lite with Online Subscription, I had no reason to procrastinate any further.
The original Legend of Zelda for NES is one of the first Action RPGs ever made. (Even though it's not labeled as a Adventure game.) It follows Link and his journey to find the eight fragments of the Triforce of Wisdom, save the princess Zelda who hid them before getting kidnapped, and defeat Ganon, the prince of darkness who kidnapped her.
Both the story and gameplay of the game are pretty basic, if a bit harder than I thought will be. I played the game with the intention of beating it, but decided to play it casually and not spend a lot of time losing in order to become better at playing.
I liked exploring Hyrule and every screen felt fresh. The enemies felt intimidating despite most of them being color-swaps of each other. The creator of the game, Shigeru Miyamoto was inspired to create the game by his childhood explorations of the mountains and forests surrounding his home town. He wanted to convey that feeling and he succeeded perfectly, considering the limitations.
While playing the game on my Switch Lite, I wished that games on NES classics came with their user manuals. Most of the back story of The Legend of Zelda was written inside the game's manual and not in the game itself. (Which is admittedly not possible with NES limitations.) The game still prompts you to read the manual, despite that it isn't provided with the game in Switch Nintendo Online's service.
What do you think?
For me, The Legend of Zelda is more important from a historical perspective, than for its story of gameplay. I'm glad I tried the game but I don't know if I'll finish it. Many people recommend starting the series with A Link to the Past, so I'll go for that after finishing my NES series in #NintendoClassics articles.
The game's box art is taken from the Wikipedia page. All screenshots are taken by me with a Switch Lite.
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