Zelda II: The Adventure of Link

The Good
The Legend of Zelda is one of Nintendo’s popular franchises, with the first game selling over 6.5 million copies. It came as no surprise that a sequel was released a year later subtitled The Adventure of Link, containing similar gameplay mechanics as its predecessor, while introducing new elements that made their way into future Zelda games. As well as the mechanics, the game shares similar box art, similar objective, and similar game mechanics. To top it off, it was even released on a gold cartridge.

The game comes with a 52-page booklet which starts off with a well-written story complete with detailed illustrations. This is followed by everything you need to know about the game, including how to get around Hyrule, the controls and the basic gameplay. There are even a few maps thrown in in case you get lost. This booklet is excellent, I regret not reading it first.

Link is now a teenager who needs to wake Princess Zelda from her slumber, and to do this he must recover the Third Triforce sealed inside the Great Palace, located somewhere in the kingdom of Hyrule. To break the seal, Link must venture inside six other palaces and place crystals inside well-guarded statues. Zelda is also not the same one from the first game, which is probably why this is the only title in the franchise to have numerals.

You begin your adventure inside North Palace. The music here starts off similar to the first game, but branches off in another direction, and that’s the only time you hear that similarity. As soon as you leave North Palace, you are presented with a map of the “overworld” where much of your time is spent following a yellow road to towns, more palaces, or hidden areas. Step off the road and you eventually do battle with monsters in a third-person perspective in a variety of environments such as forests, deserts, plains, swamps, and even graveyards. The purpose of these battles is to gain experience points, and trust me: you’ll need all the experience you can get before you reach the final destination. The music in these battle scenes is great, and the way you can hear Link wad through the swamp water is a nice touch.

A new addition to the Zelda franchise is the addition of non-playable characters. They are usually found in towns, walking around and going about their business. Some of the inhabitants will give you advice that will help you later, while others shrug you off. But in almost every town, one of the inhabitants asks you to find something valuable to them in return for a magic spell that will help you in your adventure, You need all the spells to finish the game. I like that one of them transforms Link into a fairy, allowing you to fly along the top of the screen when you don’t want to deal with an enemy.

As I mentioned, Link must venture inside palaces scattered around Hyrule to reach the statues. Each of the palaces contains textures unique to them, and there are plenty of hallways for you to go through, some of them containing keys that are used to unlock doors. You always know when you are about to approach a boss if there are curtains on the ceiling. As well as taking down the boss, you also need to search for an item that will be used to bypass an obstacle on the overworld, such as the black river monster who is not a fan of music.

The enemies in both the palaces and in “Battle Mode” are similar to those found in The Legend of Zelda, but they take on a different appearance. A few of the enemies are new, such as the Bots, blue blobs that approach Link. Huge versions of the same enemy can be found in the last palace, and are invisible until Link walks under them.

The graphics are on par with the first game. The map of the overworld is a bit zoomed out, allowing you to see much more of it. There are some good animations as well, particularly for Link. It’s funny that he looks as if he is stabbing himself when he takes damage. Also, the game over screen with a silhouette of Ganon appearing below some text looks amazing.

The Bad
Zelda II is extremely difficult. The group of knights that you encounter in the game have the ability to block your shots, no matter where you aim; and Dark Link, the final boss, behaves much the same way. Also, near the middle of the game, you are expected to work through a maze, with each section containing at least three doorways. Take the wrong one, and you’ll be going round in circles.

The Bottom Line
This is the sequel to The Legend of Zelda, and it is impressive. The game mechanics that made the first game great make a return, but there are a few changes, with one being the introduction of non-playable characters that will help you and point you in the right direction; the other being the game changing to a third-person perspective whenever you go into battle or venture inside palaces. The only problem is the difficulty of the game that may turn off players new to the Zelda franchise. Nintendo banned the real version of Super Mario Bros. 2 in North America on the basis that the game was too difficult, so what made Zelda II any different?

The Good
Very, very challenging game. The side-scrolling parts make things much more difficult, especially later in the game; although, by dungeon #2, things have gotten pretty hard. This made for a very enjoyable game, especially when overcoming obstacles and accomplishing various objectives (getting items, raising levels, finishing underworld dungeons).

The Bad
Some parts of the game were just TOO difficult (i.e., Death Mountain -- getting the hammer...took me at least a week). The final dungeon (end of the game) is also very hard. By the time you get to the Thunderbird, you'll be lucky to have any life and magic left. Good luck beating him. I was never able to finish this game on the NES. It took me about 15 years from the time I bought it until the time I used cheat codes on a NES emulator to finish it. Using the original NES controller was almost impossible for this game. The NES Max helped a lot. The music is this game was also a little sub-par. Zelda 1's music was better, I thought.

The Bottom Line
A great sequel for Zelda 1. Play that game first (play it to death, since that is one of the greatest video games of all time), then get a hold of this. A step-up in challenge and graphics. Classic game.

The Good
I think I applaud the development team for trying something different. The game has even more RPG elements and some of those things made their way into subsequent releases (some of the named locations, fighting a dark version of yourself, etc..) but largely the concepts and ideas in this game were forgotten.

As much as I despised the combat, I did start to get a kind of Souls-like feeling with it. I would figure out the enemy's patterns and after I had died a few dozen times, I became adept at taking them on. Then another enemy was introduced that I couldn't figure out, so rinse and repeat.

The Bad
Well, the graphics are terrible. Even if you're a retro gaming fan, there's a lot not to like about the visuals. Link's sword, for example, is the same color as his skin. So, it looks like Link has a really messed up appendage. All of the towns look exactly the same except for maybe a color palette swap or a slight shift in position. The overworld map is bland and uninteresting.

NPC dialogue is confusing and provides almost no context or information. All of the NPCs look the same.

None of this would be as bad if the gameplay was any good. After all, the Castlevania series attempted a similar shift in format with Simon's Quest and it wasn't terrible. Unfortunately, Zelda 2 doesn't fare so well. The game is unfair, way more unfair than the original. Link's sword swipe is not very long so therefore you have to be super close to the enemy to hit it. Link's movement is as if he's on ice so when you stop you kind of slide just a tiny bit, which makes platforming a bit more challenging than it needs to be.

The bosses, while visually interesting, are random and seem to have no real connection to one another.

The Bottom Line
The Adventure of Link swings for the fences, I will say that much. They tried to do something different, unfortunately it just didn't work. I don't think the game is without merit, the leveling system is interesting, and a lot of the enemies and bosses looked pretty good. Everything else though was pretty bad. The game honestly felt like it wasn't finished and needed just a little more polish and balancing.

The Good
The world is a lot smaller compared to the first Zelda game and I appreciated that. The world is a lot smaller, but also has more detail. The original had an impressive size, but everything just looked the same with only a few changes per screen. Here the screens have been removed and you just walk around Hyrule's areas, There are; swamps, forests, mountain and of course water. I'd say that sacrificing size for detail is a good thing, especially if the world is still quite huge afterwards.

The gameplay is a lot faster compared to the original Zelda, not only do you walk faster, but the fights are also a lot faster and harder. You have to duck, jump and stab in order to kill your opponent. Later on you also discover magic spells and new moves that make the fights even bigger and of course you run into new enemies with different tactics. Nearing the end of the game, each screen I left without taking damage felt just like beating the final boss.

The game has a nice balance between puzzles and fighting, for me at least, which means barely any puzzles and a lot of fighting. The only "puzzles" you do encounter are the temples which are very hard to navigate through and some areas like Death Mountain. This is the NES, so you can't really demand anything else. There are still a lot of secrets to find though and some are mandatory if you want to progress through the story.

The fact that Hyrule is at war is emphasized more in this game, in the original Zelda there weren't any villages or soldiers or anything else to give you the impression you were really saving something. The people in Zelda II beg for help when you talk to them and the soldiers try to help you by teaching you new moves. It's sad that Nintendo didn't keep using this because it's really nice to have the feeling you are doing something worth doing, Zelda games are still pretty awesome, but why say no to even more atmosphere?

The overall story is a little bit more original than in the first Zelda. In the first Zelda game all you had to do was save the princess from her captor, which wasn't really the best story ever written. Here you are trying to find the Triforce in order to wake up a Princess from a very long time ago. It's still not the most amazing story, but certainly an upgrade. Also nice is that you no longer play as a kid, but as an older Link, this way the evil that threatens to take over the kingdom seems just a little bit more threatening.

The Bad
The difficulty curve is all over the place, you start of pretty easy, aside from having to go through a tunnel which requires you to have the item you'll find in the temple on the other side, but after that there is a giant peak in the middle. After that peak (Death Mountain) it becomes easier again. The final boss is very hard, but it doesn't beat Death Mountain. A lot of people may not even make it to Death Mountain, so if you are planning to play through this, I wish you good luck.

It's you against an army of enemies and if you die three times, you are sent back to the start of the game. This is very annoying because it doesn't make the game harder at all, you just go back to what you were doing with fresh health. In the original Zelda you would just respawn at the start of the dungeon if you died, that was a good way to punish me for dying, this however is way too cruel. It's also a problem that the extra lives you find do not return after you picked them up, so if you die, that live is lost forever.

The Bottom Line
Zelda 2 is (one of) my favorite Zelda game(s) out there and for good reasons; the action is fast, the story is better and the puzzles are do-able. Aside from an unreasonably difficulty curve and some weird choices regarding lives, this is a very good game.

However the difficulty is still too much to ignore, so I have to warn people that unless they truly want to play this and know it is very hard, they might want to stay away from it. It's never fun to buy a game and feel like it wants to punish you for playing it, so if you don't want to put up with that, you might want to stick to the (not as hard) Legend of Zelda.

The Good
I like side-scrolling games such as Mega Man and Super Mario Brothers 3, so naturally, I'm going to enjoy a well-designed action game with well-balanced elements, and intense combat(for the most part). The graphics are quite good for a late 80's NES game, but they aren't the best on the system(crisis force comes to mind). The sound is not as great as it was in the original Zelda, but it's still solid nonetheless.

The Bad
Zelda 2's main problem is it's rather difficult game play, especially when it comes to combat. Remember when I said the combat is intense? This is the reason why. Enemies have difficulty patterns to follow, especially the Iron knuckles, Link's sword is WAY too damn short, and most of the magic is only used in certain situations. Again I say, the music isn't as good as the original Zelda.

The Bottom Line
Zelda II is a underrated gem of a game that gets too much bashing just for being a lot different from the original one. It's a solid game that is recommended and very playable, but it's not without flaws, especially where the difficulty is involved. I own Zelda II on Zelda:Collectors Edition on Nintendo GameCube(I play it on my Wii, actually)and I think it's pretty good. One of the better games in the NES library.

                            ***GOOD STUFF***

                             Really fun combat
                      Excellent mix of RPG elements
                               Decent music

                             ***BAD STUFF***   
                           Really freaking hard!!!!
                         Inferior music to the original

Overall, I give Zelda II:The Adventure Of LINK about..... 8.5 out of 10

The Good
Zelda II is a pretty big departure from the first Zelda in the series. So, kudos to Nintendo for trying to do something different. Unfortunately, “different” isn't synonymous with “good” or even “adequate”.

I'll give the game that had an interesting combat system. Fighting the shielded foes by attacking high and low was a neat idea. Unfortunately it isn't really possible to tell where they will block, so you’ll often find yourself flailing at them.

The leveling system was also not a bad idea. You still had to find heart containers, but you also gained experience and leveled up to gain new spells. The spell system was also decently implemented, but really it just replaced the (superior) item system. There is decent exploration. Some characters in the towns will give you hints on the locations of special items. There are some side-quests, but they’re usually little more than fetching.

My favourite moment in this game is when you had to find someone’s child. When Link picks the kid up, he does it in classic above-the-head-Zelda-style. “You got someone’s child!”

The Bad
I’d never have finished Zelda II if it hadn't been for my goal to play though every Zelda game, in their original format, in order of their release. This game is also the reason I’m never going to try that again.

First off, this game has an extremely inconsistent difficulty. Most of the time, the game is far too difficult. It isn't challenging, it’s cheap. Inversely, the boss battles are extremely easy. It appears to me that the difficulty was used to artificially lengthen the adventure. Without the extremely frustrating cheapness, the game would be over and done with rather quickly.

As mentioned earlier, the item collection from the first game has been replaced by learning new spells. This is not only unoriginal; it is also far inferior to the old system. The new random battles are also extremely annoying, as usually they include pester enemies, such as birds.

The Bottom Line
I know there are people who believe this game doesn’t deserve its bad reputation, but it does. Praising it for deviating from the Zelda formula is a little cheap, as there had only been one in the series before it. Guess which style of gameplay they decided to stick with. As it stands, Zelda II is not only a poor Zelda game, but it’s also a BAD game.

The Good
The Sequel to Zelda, Zelda II: The Adventure Of Link, is better than it’s predecessor in all the ways that matter.

In Zelda II, the Princess of the title has been put to sleep by magic. It is up to Link, or whatever you name him, to break the spell and save her. The plot thickens when the dead Gannon’s minions are out for Link’s blood, literally, as it is the key to reviving the evil lord!

Zelda II, is wonderfully darker and more morose, than the first game. The plot is clearer and better written. And this time Hyrule feels like a real place. There are towns and villages this time! So people no longer live in caves. The world is more fleshed out. And not just endless screens that all look the same. The dungeons are more unique as well instead of just a palette swap.

The combat is more visceral and realistic. But it is also much more challenging. More on that later. Link learns to use magic in this adventure a first for the series and it plays a significant role in the game. Gone are the heart containers, now Link levels up, like a real RPG. Many items and weapons return this time. As well as new one like the lantern, to see in dark dungeons.

The Graphics are not good per say. But at least you can tell what things are supposed to be which is not always so with NES games. This is a late NES game so they are decent overall.

The Music is good, but no where near as good as in more recent Zelda games. The sounds are sub par.

The controls are almost identical to those of the original game. So needless to say they get the job done.

The Bad
This game is hard! Easily the hardest in the series. But at least the difficulty is consistent. The sound effect are kind of lame. And the graphics could have been a lot better. Why do most fans hate this one? It is actually an RPG unlike the other Zelda games. Nintendo tried to make the series better but every one hated it…why?

The Bottom Line
Overall, there is fun to be had here. If you can get over lame sounds bad graphics, and the unforgiving difficulty.

The Good
This Zelda broke with the last in that it is a side-scrolling platformer, and despite the howls of some, it is an excellent game on par with the original. In this game, strategy and skill are needed in equal measure to overcome the varied and clever foes that you meet in the lush gameworld. What makes it an unforgettable game is the tightness and reliability of the gameplay, the genius design, and the joy of beating the most fiendishly difficult Zelda game to date.

From towns, forests, plains and caves to palaces, graveyards, mountains and lava fields, Hyrule is a great place for an adventure. Each major location in the game has a group of new foes to test Link's mettle on, while old standards make constant reappearances in the palaces. Each town has a tone and personality all its own, and welcome diversions from the main quest can be found in every one of them. The design and artwork on your opponents is impressive, particularly on the large and well-drawn bosses, and multiple strategies are available for dispatching each one.

The main map of the game is viewed from overhead, and it encompasses many screens. Link can walk on the path with impunity, but enemies appear when he leaves it, and if he runs into one of these, a platforming scene filled with enemies appears, and Link must battle his way out. These enemies are often avoidable (unless one is in a swamp), but the palaces, towns and other special areas are all side-scrolling affairs.

One of the greatest additions is experience. Link actually improves beyond simply gaining life containers in this Zelda game--he can improve his vitality, his battle ability, and his magical skill. Each attribute can gain up to eight levels of experience. Link can also learn diverse magic spells from each town's wise man, and is even taught a few very useful swordplay tricks from knights he meets along the way. The downward and upward jumping attacks he learns open up a whole new world of strategy for defeating enemies, and some foes cannot be destroyed without them. Link in the beginning and Link at the end aren't differentiated only by heart containers and items in this game--the later Link gains inherent skills that do not rely on finite items. No bow exists in this game; no bombs either.

Magic makes up for these lost items. Having worries about being able to navigate an area without getting hit? Cast Shield on yourself, and the damage you take will be halved. Concerned that you need extra maneuverability to avoid dangerous foes in an area? Cast Jump, which doubles your jumping height, and leap circles around your opponents--or simply cast Fairy, which turns you into a tiny flying pixie, and soar above the trouble avoiding it altogether. The unblockable boomeranging maces of the Doomknockers getting you down? Cast Reflect and watch your shield stop a mace in its tracks, or cast Spell and turn the troublesome enemy into a weak and quivering pile of slime. There is always a place for magic in a combat situation, although the precious supply is often used on Life, the spell that recharges one's health.

That's because your confrontations with enemies will take up the majority of the game. And there are some memorable and devious foes to be had here. As far as ordinary enemies, in Parapa Palace you will face your first Ironknuckle. This armor-clad knight stalks inexorably towards you, and once in range proceeds to swing his sword high and low in random patterns, moving his shield intelligently up and down to block your sword. Early on, you will see one marching toward you and mentally count off a few of your precious health squares as you imagine the bloody battle ahead of you. It isn't attacking this denizen of the palaces that is difficult; it's doing so while simultaneously defending from his onslaught that causes the problems.

Later in the game, however, you will have developed your own tactics that turn this enemy, even his later blue incarnation that hurls knives as he stabs, into a pushover. And this can be done a number of ways. One might notice that stabbing high and immediately lowering one's guard in mid-stab will cause the Ironknuckle to drop his guard in unison and absorb the blow. One might discover that the Ironknuckle only unleashes his fearsome fusillade of blows after being struck, and then cools down. One might even develop a strategy of jumping and attacking to defeat these enemies. These tactics will be missed in the first several frenzied combats of both fighters stabbing and blocking, but they will eventually render a once feared enemy harmless. And that's part of the magic of this game design that is present throughout the game. Enemies are not dull patterns to be learned and disposed of in a single dull way so much as they are lifelike and random, and always potentially dangerous to any strategy.

As you progress, harder foes such as the fearsome, axe-wielding Dairas appear. These anthropomorphic, mohawked alligators only swing high and have no shield, but that matters little since their axes cannot be blocked by even a magic-enhanced shield--Link cannot stand off with them for long or he will be seriously hurt. One must stab and charge, stab and flee, or jump and stab to defeat these and suffer minimal damage. The red Daira throws axes, and it is nearly impossible to flawlessly defeat one. In fact, Link is unlikely to walk away from a dead red Daira without having lost a significant amount of health. Certain enemies carry and throw maces that can only be blocked after Link casts Reflect, certain enemies can only be destroyed by fire. Yet these each can be avoided or defeated without the use of magic. Only in a few situations is Link directly forced to encounter an ordinary enemy, and therefore if one strikes you as particularly difficult, it can be simply avoided.

If it is an Eagle Knight you've been cornered by, expect to be seriously injured. These enemies are like the Ironknuckle in that they use a sword and shield intelligently, but they also are acrobatic jumpers and throw knives furiously at all times, causing considerable damage. These, only found in the last palace, can confound any careful strategy because their patterns of attack are easily readable but extremely difficult to react to properly. Your brain 'knows' the proper reaction for defense or offense at any one time, but tying the two together against such an agile opponent can be very difficult.

Bosses are all fun, different, and well-designed. Starting with a giant horseheaded knight toting a large mace, there is a soldier with three heads, an Ironknuckle who thought to bring his horse along, a giant teleporting wizard, a clumsy ogre with a flail and impenetrable helmet, and a lava-dwelling dragon. That's just the ordinary palaces. In the final palace, you must face off against the mythic Thunderbird and of course, Dark Link. Dark Link was an ingenious bit of game design, as it has all the standard moves that you do, and yet it is somewhat more clever about using them than you are. Yet surprisingly simple strategies can be found to defeat this boss. I don't mean cowering in the corner and tapping a button, but rather an approach that would be unexpected based on all your previous encounters--it's great design to require a fresh look at the final boss, asking the player to throw out what he or she has learned and try something new.

The exploration, town scenes, and pure adventure in this game are all great, but the combat system is what really adds to the fun factor, and is so elegantly designed that it deserved the bulk of my remarks. It should go without saying that Link controls like a dream, despite a knockback when hit that Castlevania, Actraiser 2 or Ghosts 'n' Goblins fans will sorrowfully recognize. Those latter games also have something in common with this one--Zelda II is fiendishly difficult. Link has three lives, and after that must start all the way back at the beginning of the game map, which encompasses many screens. Extra lives are there to be had along the way, but that doesn't dilute the challenge of this game, and defeating Dark Link at the end after battling through dozens of Lizalfos and Eagle Knights, Ironknuckles and Darknuts, Bits and Bots and Moblins and Goriyas, you'll feel a palpable sense of accomplishment.

And then, as in Chrono Trigger, the player is allowed to start again with the same stats, but with a greater challenge. This is a game I just recently replayed after defeating it at the age of seven, and it was as enormously satisfying now as it was then.

The Bad
The translation is poor, and speaking with the townspeople is rarely enlightening. Some secrets such as Bagu's Cabin or New Kasuto can be difficult to find or figure out. A few enemies virtually force you to take damage, because at times there is no proper way to dodge/block all the projectiles or foes that are coming at you. But these are just quibbles--this is a superlative game

The Bottom Line
Another great adventure in Hyrule. Side-scrolling and combat-heavy, this second Zelda game isn't a retread of the first and it doesn't suffer for it. Dust off your platforming skills and prepare your mind as well as your trigger finger, for there are puzzles and strategy to be found here in addition to the chaotic and first-rate combat.

The Good
This, I think, is the best Zelda game. It is the toughest of all Zelda games because you actually end up beating your shadow. I have 4 more Zelda games, and they took me weeks of once in a while play to finish them, but this one took me like 10 years, no kidding! (well, maybe because I got it when I was 5 ys. old, but EVERYONE in my family played it and no one could win it.) It requires thinking a lot, and understanding clues. NO tips and tricks from anywhere! It is an interesting story, and has the most original enemies and dungeons from all Zelda Games. I think is the perfect trama because you have to wake up Zelda, the original idea of the game; you don't go around for other objects that have nothing to do with Hyrule like the other Zelda Sequels. You definitely have to think a lot because there are things that have no clues actually, and without them you cannot move on, that is why it took me such a long time, cause i got stuck many times.

The Bad
It is the best game, no complaints, but the fact that you thumbs WILL HURT a lot, especially if you already fought with your shadow!

The Bottom Line
If you like adventure, Zelda games, and most of all best sellers with Nintendo;s Golden Seal, you WILL love this game!

The Good
Ever play Cadash? That's a great game. This is a passable Cadash that predates it by about a year, on an 8-bit system!

The gameplay, as previously mentioned, is sidescrolling, with an overland map interlude for getting from place to place. There isn't much else good to be said about this game, though. It is primitive at best, and is stuck somewhere between Phantasy Star and Cadash, without the horsepower in the NES to pull it off properly.

This kind of side scrolling RPG would become very common in the future. What Zelda 2 has going for it is that it is innovative, it's too bad Nintendo didn't release it with its original characters instead of adding a "touch of Zelda" when the real Zelda 2, which I'm convinced was scrapped, didn't work out.

The Bad
Remember Mario 2? Remember the story of how they took a game that was not Mario and overlaid a bunch of Mario sprites to make a funky game that didn't feel right?

I suspect that isn't the only time Nintendo made that mistake. They did it with Zelda, too.

What you have is a game that was clearly not designed as a Zelda title with Zelda sprites and the first 5 seconds of the overland theme grafted on to make it appear "Zeldaish."

The Zelda overland theme, the really cool one that sticks in your head, plays for about 5 seconds and then immediately and rather crudely dissolves into cheesy uninspired 8-bit kazoo box music. That progression in the music describes the rest of the game. 5 seconds of Zelda and 15 hours of some other game that the box lied about. As you go, it just becomes wildly less and less like Zelda until you start wondering how Link got so tall.

Give me a map, or a compass, or rupees or ANYTHING else from the original game and this criticism becomes invalid, but it isn't there. There's no "nightmare key," no master sword, no heart meter. You can't make a "departure" sequel and ditch nearly everything that made the flavour of the original.

This was the 80's, back when they were plastering Erno Rubik's name on every dumb puzzle they could find, yet none of them were "the cube." This kind of "Brand leveraging" proved to be very damaging to the companies that did it, and so you don't see nearly as much of it any more. Nintendo learned and now jealously guards its brands.

The Bottom Line
Zelda sprites added to a perfectly good RPG to increase sales.

You can play the original Zelda and it's all there, in crude form. Everything that would become the rest of the series.

This game doesn't represent a "departure" as so many apologists will tell you. It's a completely different game. It's very difficult, and by today's standard's not terribly innovative, but okay to play if you like a sidescrolling RPG like Cadash. It's amazing they pulled this off on the 8-bit NES.

So when you hear this game get badmouthed, it's mostly because of people who expected a Zelda title and didn't get one. It's Super Mario Bros. 2 all over again. The good news is that there is a title.

Remember, it predates Cadash by a year, is playing on 8-bit hardware, and is a perfectly good RPG.

(Just watch out for the guy who tells you to get the candle at the palace by going "West." The palace is to the NNE.)

Production standards have improved since these days...

(Reviewer played this off the Zelda Collector's Edition GC disc. There may have been a map showing exactly where the candle palace is in the original.)

The Good
I was trying so hard to find anything good to say about this game...I re-played it many times trying to find something good but I'm sorry there isn't anything I liked about this game. Other than the cool looking gold box the game came in, this game stinks compared to the first Zelda.

The Bad
First off the music and sound effects drove me nuts. It was like someone took the Mike Tyson's Punch Out sounds effects and put them (like that 'boingy' sword sound) all over the game. Second, the character control for Link was like a throwing around a big sack of potatoes. I just didn't feel like you were in control of Link when he would just float around in the air when you jumped sideways. Then third, there was too much reading! "Go to this house and blabhlablablahblahblah", I go there and get more "blahblahblah" from Old Hag #6. I wish I could of just stabbed these blabber mouths like I used to do to the Old Man in the first Zelda game! Ugh. Playing Zelda II again so recently gave me flashbacks of the anger and disappointment I felt when I first got this game when it came out. I remember seeing this game on the Nintendo poster they gave out when you bought a system and was wondering where the game was while standing in line to buy first classic Zelda game. I really doubt the microchips in the game were that hard to make to delay this game a year! I think Nintendo made that rumor up due to the first Zelda game being so good and wanting to milk the sales. They didn't want people to get confused into buying Zelda II so soon and then loose their sales on both games.

The Bottom Line
The first one was so awesome but this one.. It's just feels like someone took that overhead RPG layout of Final Fantasy and added it to the winning side scrolling action of Super Mario Bros. into one big adventure game. With Zelda II you could just say it is plagued just like movie sequels. First one was great but second one. .ehh.. pass if you can...