The Legend of Zelda – Console Game Profile

While traveling through the kingdom of Hyrule, adventurer Link comes upon royal servant Impa, under attack by a band of thugs. Link jumps into action and drives off the roughens. Impa tells Link of the evil army invading Hyrule, led by Ganon - the prince of darkness. Ganon seeks the mystical Triforce - powerful triangles handed down to the rulers of Hyrule. In an attempt to stop Ganon from gaining the full power of the Triforce, the brave Princess Zelda, broke the Triforce of Wisdom into eight fragments and scattered it throughout the land. Now capturedZelda, sent Impa to find a brave warrior to save the kingdom.

Link must now seek out the fragments of the Triforce of Wisdom and reform the power to stop Ganon, but first he must fight through numerous minions, monsters, and dragons until his journey lands him at Death Mountain for the final confrontation.

History:

The early days of video games went along two paths. The graphically charged arcade style games, big on action but light on storyline and depth - and the popular computer text based roll-playing games. Although text games lacked any graphics, they created a rich universe and lengthy storylines that changed depending on how the players interacted.

Although consoles were extremely popular and had many fantasy adventures, until The Legend of Zelda came on the scene they could never fully tap into the RPG gaming. This mainly came from a lack of saving capabilities. Although video game consoles could read information off the cartridges, they couldn't save any information to it, and held no hard drive to retain memory. As computers were designed to record digital files, RPG text-games could last endlessly without the player losing their status.

In 1986, Nintendo released a solution to this problem with the Famicon Disk System. This was basically a disc drive peripheral to the Nintendo Entertainment System (called the Famicom in Japan), that attached to the bottom of the console and connected via a RAM adaptor into the cartridge slot. The FDS allowed games to be read off a special floppy disk, and save game info back to it. The large 128 kilobytes of space on the disk allowed for larger games with more graphics, levels and content.

The Legend of Zelda (called Zelda no Densetsu: The Hyrule Fantasy in Japan) was the launch title for the FDS, and was a monumental hit, driving big sales for the FDS. Although the FDS peripheral was also big success and remained in production until 2003, it was never released outside of Japan. Because of this a new strategy had to be taken with Zelda's international releases, so Nintendo developed a high capacity game cartridge, with a built in battery and a Memory Management Controller chip to for game saves.

The superior game content, with far longer gameplay and the ability to save progress, Zelda became the first game to incorporate the best elements of computer roll-playing games and arcade adventure games with rich graphics and multiple paths. In what eventually became known as RPG-lite, Zelda let players to interact with Non-Playable Characters (NPCs), choose from various responses and choices, purchasing weapon upgrades, puzzles, and move along non-linear paths, which today is known as Sandbox gameplay. The arcade adventure portions of the game include the fast paced combat, pick-ups, and the richest graphics of its time.

In Japan:

• Released As: Zelda no Densetsu: The Hyrule Fantasy
• Release Date: 02/21/86
• Publisher - Nintendo
• System: Famicom Disk System
• Type: Floppy Disk
• Genre: RPG-Lite Fantasy Adventure

In North America:

• Released As: The Legend of Zelda
• Release Date: 08/22/87
• Publisher - Nintendo
• System: Nintendo Entertainment System
• Type: Cartridge with internal battery
• Genre: RPG-Lite Fantasy Adventure

• Arrows: Basic and Silver
• Bombs: Used to damage enemies and knock down walls.
• Boomerang: Basic and Magical - Can be used for battles, stunning enemies and retrieving items.
• Bows: Level 1 and 2
• Magic Wand: Shoots bolts of magic
• Shield: Basic and Magic
• Swords: Wooden, White, Magic Level 1 and 2

• Bracelet: When worn it gives the ability to push boulders.
• Fairies: Refills health.
• Little Heart: Adds one health heart.
• Magic Book: Enchants the magic wand allowing it to shoot fire.
• Potions: Restore your health – Blue (one use), Red (two uses)
• Rings: Reduces damage from enemy hits – Blue (reduces damage to 1/2) Red (reduces damage to 1/4)

• Candles: Light up dark environments and set bushes on fire – Blue (one use per screen) Red (unlimited use)
• Compass: Helps show what direction on the map you are headed.
• Flute: Calls upon the Warp Tornado
• Magic Clock: Freezes enemies for a limited time.
• Magic Key: Opens all locked doors.
• Map: Layout of levels.
• Monster Bait: Draws out monsters in the dungeons.
• Raft: Ported at docks to cross water.
• Rupees (Money): Used to purchase items. Found in denominations of ones and fives.
• Stepladder: Used to cross very small bodies of water.

• The Legend of Zelda – NES – 1987 ('86 in Japan)

• Zelda II: The Adventure of Link – NES – 1988 – North American version of Zelda 2

• Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past – SNES – 1992

• The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening – GB – 1993

• Link: The Faces of Evil – CD-i - 1993

• Zelda: The Wand of Gamelon – CD-i – 1993

• Zelda's Adventure – CD-i – 1995

• The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time – N64 – 1998

• The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening DX – GBC – 1998

• The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask – N64 – 2000

• The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Ages – GBC – 2001

• The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons – GBC – 2001

• Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past – GBA – 2002 (Port of the SNES title)

• Classic NES Series: The Legend of Zelda – GBA – 2004

• Classic NES Series: Zelda II – GBA – 2004