Played Legend of Zelda(NES) for the first time this weekend

[MulishaSoldier929]

The bad: I wanted the "back in the day" experience and wanted to play without walk-thru's. I lasted about 6 hours b4 I caved. The hints the game gave were total chit and some of the secrets were so off the wall hidden, you would have to go around bombing/burning everything in sight to even find hidden areas. The bosses are way too easy(Except Ganon) while most of the dungeons were VERY super difficult. Plus the dungeon eight's boss was a re-hash of a previous boss. Why didn't they just use Patra instead of making him a mid-level boss in Death Mountain? Oh and don't even get me started on the Wizzrobes lol

The good:The first Zelda game with an actual decent monetary system. Rupies didn't fall from tree's unlike the later titles. The music is classic even in 8bit form. Even tho the bosses were easy they were at least pretty cool(for the NES anyways) and fun to fight. Roaming the countryside killing monsters in classic Zelda style is still a blast.

My take:
Long story short I have never (other than a couple minutes as a young lad) played the original Zelda. So I picked it up this weekend and I was surprised at how good the game actually is. Its hard as nails in so many ways but still had me coming back after I would throw the controller down and walk away and that to me is a sign of a great game.

Anyways rant over. What did you guys think of it?

[Zing]

The game actually makes it rather easy to find the secret entrances. Each screen on the overworld contains exactly one entrance, either hidden or revealed. There are a few screens with no entrance (e.g. the lost woods), but otherwise, this is a good rule-of-thumb. This makes it easy to draw a grid-based map and mark off each screen as you find the entrances.

I re-played Zelda and Zelda 2 last year after not having played them for 20 years. I used no outside help other than the instruction manuals. I posted my thoughts on the two games at Nintendo-Age:
http://nintendoage.com/forum/messagevie ... adid=52174

[Zing]

Here is my in-progress map of the first quest. My second quest map is much more complete, as I had to do a lot more exploring to find what I needed.

[MumboJumbo]

Classic game, I love it. I beat it about a year ago and I think I only used a walkthrough once on something really stupid (the grumble, grumble Moblin). I used my mom and brother's help since they played it back in the day and both of them beat it. It was a great feeling finishing it. It's a masterpiece of a game. Although, I've yet to complete it on the actual NES since my copy died on me. I did it on the Wii, and I'm working on the GBA version. I want to do the 2nd quest but on the actual NES so I have to find another copy .

I gotta say though, I never thought the rupees falling out of the trees was weird though. I thought the inhabitants of Hyrule were just trying to hide their money since the bank is just "rob me!" painted all over it.

[Gunstar Green]

I enjoyed the game a lot when I was a kid, but I don't really revisit it all too often now. Like Metroid it's a great prototype for the experiences that came later but it's just not as good as those refined efforts.

It's still fun for a blast of nostalgia, I don't know if I would like it myself if it were my first experience with it but that's impossible to tell.

As a disclaimer I guess I should say I'm not the biggest Zelda fan to begin with but I adore A Link to the Past and Link's Awakening.

[MulishaSoldier929]

The game actually makes it rather easy to find the secret entrances. Each screen on the overworld contains exactly one entrance, either hidden or revealed. There are a few screens with no entrance (e.g. the lost woods), but otherwise, this is a good rule-of-thumb. This makes it easy to draw a grid-based map and mark off each screen as you find the entrances.
http://nintendoage.com/forum/messagevie ... adid=52174

I went to your link. Very impressive! I liked the home made map too. Not sure I would have the patience for that kind of endeavor tho. What I was getting at was that you had to guess where to bomb(no cracks in wall as a hint) so it was basically hit or miss. Mostly miss. Another annoying thing was the hints that were giving were very vague. Like the hint for getting to dungeon 7 was along the lines of "Go where fairies do not dwell" which meant go to that one pond without fairies and play your flute to open up the doorway to dungeon 7 lol. Little things like that frustrated me until I started using the watlkthru.

I gotta say though, I never thought the rupees falling out of the trees was weird though. I thought the inhabitants of Hyrule were just trying to hide their money since the bank is just "rob me!" painted all over it.

What I getting at was that unlike all the other Zelda game's I have played where acquiring rupees were never a problem, this game actually made me go out to kill guys so I could afford stuff. It took me a good while to find 250 rupees for the blue ring which was more in line with how the other Zelda's (imo) should be like.

I enjoyed the game a lot when I was a kid, but I don't really revisit it all too often now. Like Metroid it's a great prototype for the experiences that came later but it's just not as good as those refined efforts.

It's still fun for a blast of nostalgia, I don't know if I would like it myself if it were my first experience with it but that's impossible to tell.

I whole heatedly agree. It doesn't hold a candle to the later installments but for its time I can only imagine how huge of an improvement to gaming it actually was compared to what was out there. As a first timer I can honestly say it was worth my time/money to play such a classic and see the groundwork that the later Zelda games would stand on.

[Godot102]

Its was a fantastic game for its time but it is beginning to show its age especially if you play it after playing the more modern 2d Zeldas such as four swords adventure or minish cap. One minor annoyance is that Link doesn't swing his sword, instead he "Stabs". Also the bosses can be extremely easy. Despite those minor issues, I really enjoyed playing the original zelda on my NES. I need to finish the second quest one of these days.

[BurningDoom]

Fantastic game for it's day. But yeah, I can easily see it showing it's age. The clues were cryptic, but back then that was done on purpose because the games weren't very long and it made it seem like games were longer back then when they did stuff like that. The graphics are also pretty dated, even by NES standards.

But when it came out, there was nothing else like it. There were no other home console games where you could practically go anywhere and do anything and explore this massive world any way you saw fit. So those things that are annoying now, were easily overlooked back then.

[Xeogred]

I grew up playing it when I was a lad and love it to this day, I even love Zelda II to death as well, but by the end of the day when I think of "Zelda", stuff like Link to the Past or Link's Awakening is what comes to mind for me. Real puzzles, real dynamic maps and unique dungeons, items that actually change things up, etc. The original ends up being pretty simplistic in the long run and BurningDoom summed up the "clues" well, they were cryptic. Just really weird trial and error puzzles and randomness. The difficulty of the original to me is just surviving the insane later dungeons that have rooms loaded with enemies that deal tons of damage. In the other games it's more about the exploration/puzzles I'd say.

Still one of my favorites nonetheless and one of the greatest title themes of all time.

[irixith]

Another annoying thing was the hints that were giving were very vague. Like the hint for getting to dungeon 7 was along the lines of "Go where fairies do not dwell" which meant go to that one pond without fairies and play your flute to open up the doorway to dungeon 7 lol.

We know now that much of that was related to technical limitations.

However..

Growing up through that era of gaming, I'd have to say us kids were a heckuva lot smarter. We had to think, to plan, to memorize to get through these games. There were no walkthroughs two clicks away on the "internet". Every so often you could grab some ascii text files through a BBS if you were lucky enough to have the technology or know someone who did. That assumes you were connecting to a good BBS and that someone actually had the temerity to "ascii-ize" what you were looking for in the first place. (..and that you had a floppy disk, and a dot matrix printer, and a lot of other "ifs")

We were well versed in tabletop games and choose your own adventure books. We came before the generation who had their ability to think critically and logically stripped rudely from them. No matter how many people at this point go through those games for their personal first time, the "figure it out for yourself" that our generation had will never be re-captured. That's a big part of the nostalgic pull from these games -- the memories of how it was done before it was done better. The farther in time we move away from those games, the less they will be appreciated by a smaller and smaller proportion of people.

Kudos to you for trying to play true to the original spirit. Unfortunately modern games and their ease spoil even the most hardcore amongst us.