The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past
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 "The Hero's triumph on Cataclysm's Eve wins three Symbols of Virtue. The Master Sword he will then retrieve, keeping the knights' line true."
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The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past is the third game in the Legend of Zelda franchise and was released to the Super Nintendo Entertainment System in 1991 worldwide. It was developed and published by Nintendo. It was rereleased for the Game Boy Advance as A Link to the Past and Four Swords.
Plot
After hearing Princess Zelda contact him in a dream, Link goes to Hyrule Castle to find his uncle mortally wounded. Taking his uncle's sword Link must save Hyrule from the evil magician Agahnim from opening a portal to the Dark World, ruled by Ganon who is pulling Agahnim's strings.
Why It's A Link to the Past
- Incredible graphics that are thoroughly detailed in the environments, enemies, and characters. The art style is also very appealing and easily recognizable.
- Introduced the Master Sword to the franchise and would become one of the most iconic weapons in video game history.
- Two main worlds, the Light World and the Dark World. The Light World is normal, has a busy village, and is mostly peaceful. This is where the main quest is to find three pendants to awaken the Master Sword to fight Agahnim. The second is the Dark World that looks just like the Light World except with new structures, is a lot more dangerous with enemies crawling everywhere trying to kill Link, and the village is mostly abandoned and decrypted. This is where Link has to fight to rescue the seven Maidens including Zelda.
- Instead of using the side-scrolling perspective introduced by Zelda II: The Adventure of Link, this game reverts to an overhead perspective similar to that of the original The Legend of Zelda. While this game still uses mechanics and concepts from the original game, it also introduces new elements and innovations.
- For instance, arrows are now separate items, as bombs are in the original, instead of using a Rupee to fire an arrow. Link's sword attack was improved to swing sideways instead of merely stabbing forward; this gives his sword a broader range and makes combat easier. Link swings his sword as the default attack in future Zelda games, although stabbing is also possible in the later 3D incarnations.
- For the first time, there is a map meaning you won't get lost like you could in previous games.
- The controls are also improved as Link is more flexible than in previous games, as he can walk diagonally and can run with the aid of the Pegasus Shoes.
- The theme of two worlds would become a staple in future Legend of Zelda games such as Link time traveling between seven years in Ocarina of Time.
- A good story for what there is about a younger Link having to stop Ganon from trying to merge the Dark and Light World.
- Introduces Pieces of Hearts which are items that when four of them are collected, gives you more hearts. This became a major staple in the franchise requiring puzzle solving and exploration to obtain.
- Each dungeon has a lot of puzzle solving and an important item to aid in the quest.
- If the player completes the side quest of finding a flute, the player can use the flute to call a bird, which works as fast travel.
- Amazing soundtrack, especially the intro.
- The difficulty has been toned down from Zelda II: The Adventures of Link.
- Unlike the previous game, if you get a game over, you restart back at the beginning of the dungeon.
- Numerous secondary items and some aren't even found in dungeons. Some can be bought, found in hidden locations, or be obtained via side quest.
- The world itself is also filled with lots of secrets that can assist Link on his journey. For example, Link can find a magical fountain that can upgrade certain items like the boomerang.
- Each boss have unique designs with each requiring a different strategy to defeat them.
- Completing Four Swords Adventure on the GBA rerelease unlocks the Four Sword dungeon for the main game.
- This game marks the debut of the Cuccos, a race of chicken that became an staple of the series. If Link attacks a Cucco too many times, an infinite flock of those invincible chickens attack Link to death until the player leaves the area. This teaches people an important good moral of not abusing domestic animals.
Qualities That Could Get Killed By Cuccos
- Sometimes the puzzles' objectives are just "kill enemies" which is kind of lazy.
- Until halfway through the game, you don't get to fast travel.
- Some of the bosses are frustrating.
- The Helmasaur King: Mostly because you face him at a point in the game where you have relatively few upgrades, and between seven to ten heart containers. The latter becomes an even bigger problem when you take into account the fact that he has an attack which drains two full heart containers, and can be difficult to dodge, especially if he uses it and his other attack at the same time (he often does).
- Mothula: Not only is its movement pattern random and diagonal, but the floor keeps moving to send you into spikes. While the boss spits fireballs at you. Worse, the way Mothula's immunity to the spikes' damage is coded makes it immune to all damage while it's over a spike, meaning it can spend long stretches of the fight functionally invincible and there's nothing the player can do about it.
- Kholdstare: If you haven't gotten half magic upgrade, melting the ice alone will drain you of all your magic, and that's just the beginning. Once you've done that, it separates into three eyes that deal a colossal amount of damage (three hearts with the blue mail) and that each take several hits to defeat. Throughout the fight, ice falls from the ceiling at constant intervals, each dealing a heart's worth of damage. Given that this comes at the end of one of the most difficult levels in the game, after which you're likely to have used up some of your potions, it's a challenging fight.
- Some of the dungeons are also frustrating.
- Skull Woods: It houses Gibdos that take forever to kill with normal attacks until you get the Fire Rod from the dungeon or went and got Bombos, and they will always chase you around any room they're in. The dungeon also has Wallmasters, a new enemy you haven't seen before, so when their shadow appears over you you'll have no idea what's happening... then they grab you and drag you back to where you entered the dungeon, resetting everything inside too. Finally, because of the way the dungeon is structured (several entrances that you must go outside to traverse), if you die while outside, you die in the overworld and respawn at the Dark Pyramid, forcing you to walk all the way back.
- Ice Palace: Full of some of the game's strongest enemies, has a ton of rooms filled with slippery floors, drains your magic meter quicker than any other dungeon bar Turtle Rock, and requires you to double back on yourself twice in order to defeat the infamous "Block-Switch" puzzle. Many players skip over to the following Misery Mire dungeon in order to obtain the Cane of Somaria, which nullifies the aforementioned puzzle — and the fact that so many players are willing to delay getting hold of the Ice Palace's armor upgrade to skip the puzzle should tell you everything. Nintendo themselves seem to have tacitly admitted that the puzzle was overly difficult, as the GBA version redesigns it to only require backtracking once.
- Misery Mire lives up to its name very well, especially if you show up early to pick up the Cane of Somaria to skip the Block-Switch puzzle in the Ice Palace; without the Blue Mail the Beamos and Wizzrobes inside deal a ton of damage (Wizzrobes deal four hearts), and the boss Vitreous also deals a lot of damage. Even with a healthy supply of Heart Containers, an unarmored Link can be killed very easily in here.
Trivia
- A Link to the Past is a popular game for speedrunning, having the fifth-most players of all games listed on Speedrun.com. It is commonly run at the Games Done Quick charity marathon, where it is often considered one of the highlights of the event.
- Concept art included in Hyrule Historia shows Zelda dressed in skimpy armor, which might have been the inspiration behind Sheik in Ocarina of Time.
- An animated adaption of the game was in the works by Aeipathy Industries, but it was cancelled when they could not get the rights from Nintendo. This animation would have also led to voices for a few of the characters, including some for the first time in English. The cast included Todd Haberkorn as Link, Kira Buckland as Zelda, Kent Williams as Link's Uncle, Vic Mignogna as Agahnim, and had Matthew Mercer in an unspecified role (generally assumed to be Ganon). However, some of the animations used for this project ended up in a ROM Hack which takes advantage of the MSU-1 chip used in certain flashcarts and recreated in certain emulators.
- The game was originally meant to be sci-fi related, hence the aforementioned Zelda concept art. Link was supposed to switch between the current Hyrule and a futuristic version, instead of between Hyrule and the Dark World. Ocarina of Time would revisit the time-travel concept wholesale, but with a somewhat different spin. This was actually a concept that was considered for the original game, but dropped because of hardware limitations.
- The idea of the world ending when a giant egg breaks on top of the mountain was originally planned for this game. It later was used instead in The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening.
- Unused material in the game files includes a trio of very large trees with faces, which would have been found in a clearing within the Lost Woods. These would not be used in the game itself, but show similarities to the Great Deku Tree that would debut in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.
- An early layout for Hyrule Castle presents what can be assumed to be Zelda's bedroom, suggesting the idea that Link originally had to find Zelda in the upper floors of the castle rather than in the dungeon. This idea was reused twice. The first time is in Ran Maru's manga adaptation, where Zelda attacks Link under the impression that he is one of Agahnim's minions. The second is in Twilight Princess, where Link and Midna meet her in the upper floors of the Castle in a room very similar to a bedchamber.
- One piece of early concept art depicts Link in a church, kneeling before a crucifix and a statue of the Virgin Mary, indicating that the game was originally going to carry over the Christian pastiches of its predecessors before ultimately shifting towards the classically-inspired polytheistic mythology that is now standard for the series.
Reception
A Link to the Past is considered one of the best games ever made and is one of the most important Legend of Zelda titles due to many features in the game being used in future titles. Both versions have a rating of over 4 on GameFAQs and are both ranked the #1 highest rating action adventure game on their respective consoles. According to AVGN, it's one of his favorite games of all time.
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