February 11, 2015

Zelda II: The Adventures of Link

Doesn't it seem like Zelda posts always show up a few at a time? Right after Webber finished off the Wind Waker HD remake, I finished off the most disliked game of the franchise- Zelda II: The Adventures of Link. This one was a direct sequel to the first game but as everyone knows the gameplay was completely overhauled. The biggest changes came in the form of RPG-style experience points and leveling, as well as side-scrolling combat rather than top-down. And while I was completely okay with the latter, I couldn't stand the former. Link shouldn't be grinding for experience! Despite this, I was surprised at how similar this felt to the original Legend of Zelda. There's a higher level of difficulty to both of them that you won't find in later entries to the series; and you still run around in similar looking environments and similar looking palaces to get many of the same items. Adventures of Link wasn't quite as open-ended, as you can't skip over levels or play them out of order, but its over-world did still retain the feel of the first- heading off the beaten path will make things tough, but there's usually a bunch of experience or a fairy out there to make it worth your while. Still though, as little as I enjoyed playing the original Legend of Zelda, I will say that Adventures of Link is worse; combat wasn't fun, so grinding for hours to gain levels felt like a waste of time and the good parts here never outweighed the bad. Perhaps at one time this was a fun game, but too much time has passed and the series has gotten so much better and I wouldn't recommend playing this for anything other than series completion.

No comments:

Post a Comment