I’m old.
OK, I’m not really that old by conventional standards. I’m in my mid-twenties, really, but in gaming years, that makes me old as the hills themselves. I remember the days before gamepads, when our games were controlled with one-button joysticks, or, even worse, paddles, which are nothing but wheels with a button to press. (We used them to play games like Pong and Breakout. Perhaps you’ve heard of them.) Compared to the days of the old Atari, the NES was simply earth-shattering, with sprites that actually looked like roughly humanoid forms and gameplay that could last longer than a single session, what with the introduction of passwords and battery backups. While it took a bout of chicken pox to get one of these magical machines in my youth, in my mind, it was worth every dab of Calamine lotion.
Jumping aboard the retro craze that has emerged over the past year or two, Nintendo has decided to take advantage of the fact that the GBA is more powerful than a Super NES (let alone the original Nintendo Entertainment System), and re-release a series of classic NES games for their handheld, for a mere $20 apiece. Well, granted, $20 is a lot for some of these games today (I think I’d be lucky to squeeze $10 out of Ice Climber, personally), the jewel of the series, and easily one of the best games for the NES as a whole, is the original Legend of Zelda.
Granted, Link’s been on a number of adventures since his debut in 1987, and it’s easy to forget that he began his life on a small, grid like Hyrule, with nothing but his wooden sword and a few tools he picked up along the way to defend him from the likes of Octaroks, Leevers, and even Ganon himself. While The Legend of Zelda is certainly primitive by today’s standards (heck, what NES game isn’t?), it holds up remarkably well against even more expensive GBA titles that are released today.
In case you’re unfamiliar with the story of the original adventure, the wicked, pig-like Ganon, in possession of the Triforce of Power has kidnapped Princess Zelda in order to steal the Triforce of Wisdom from her; if he were to obtain it, he would be unstoppable. However, anticipating the attack, Zelda scattered the Triforce of Wisdom into eight pieces and scattered them throughout the kingdom of Hyrule. Link was then tasked with reassembling the Triforce and defeating the nefarious Ganon with the power of Wisdom. OK, it’s not a great story, and the game makes no mention of it at all during the game itself, but it did set the stage for the game, which was really the only purpose of the story in games of this era.
From start to finish, this incarnation of Zelda is a faithful recreation of the NES classic, and, generally, this is a very good thing. As far as the conversion goes, everything is exactly as one would remember it from the NES version. There are no changes or enhancements, a la the Super Mario Advance games. Everything, from where the items are located, to which enemies spawn on which screens, to the fact that saving only saves your equipment but not your location, is exactly the same as the NES original.
For the most part, of course, the game converted as-is holds up extremely well. Even veterans of the game will find plenty to do, with nine dungeons and a detailed overworld to explore. Even if you know where everything is, the game is still good for a few hours, not counting the second quest after you’ve defeated the first one. If you don’t have the game committed to memory, it’ll last at least as long as any other full-price GBA game available, and chances are that, either way, you’ll love every minute of it.
The only difference between this version and the original (other than the platform itself) is the addition of a Sleep Mode, common to a number of Nintendo’s first-party GBA games. By pressing both shoulder buttons together, the game will power down but not shut off, allowing the player to take a break and pick up where he left off at the expense of a small amount of battery power. Still, though, given the number of remakes that have included the ability for a one-time save (like the aforementioned remake of Super Mario Bros. 3), this hardly seems adequate today.
The sound is as true to the original game as the gameplay is. The classic themes come through just as clearly through the GBA speakers as they did through the television once upon a time. (An added bonus is that the small speakers make the incessant beeping when your life is low that much less noticeable.) After an hour or so, you’ll be humming the overworld theme even after you turn the game off (that is, if you don’t do that already).
The graphics are equally classic, although they are occasionally plagued by extremely noticeable slowdown. The slowdown was undoubtedly present in the original version of the game, and, to be fair, it really only shows up when there are eight or more enemies on the screen at once. Even so, one would expect on more powerful hardware that the slowdown wouldn’t be a problem, or at least not as bad as it is. It certainly doesn’t break the game, and it doesn’t happen often, but it is quite jarring when it does pop up, and it feels like, if nothing else, that could have been corrected in the translation.
If you’re thinking about buying the Classic NES version of The Legend of Zelda (or any of the Classic NES games, for that matter), the important thing to understand is that you’re getting exactly that, being the version that came out for the NES; you get nothing more and nothing less. More than any of the other NES re-releases, though, The Legend of Zelda is easily worth the $20 investment, despite the lack of updates and occasional slowdown. In fact, the only thing that makes the decision to purchase the re-release of The Legend of Zelda is that it was just reissued on the Zelda Collector’s Edition for GameCube several months ago. Overall, though, Zelda is just as much fun today as it was almost twenty years ago, and it holds up extremely well against its modern competition. And, after all, isn’t it worth $20 to not have to blow into the cartridge for five straight minutes every time you want to play Zelda?
