Through Into the Dark World

It’s safe to say that if you were a kid, playing your games on the NES back in the mid-1980s, you didn’t have any clue what a new Legend of ZeldaCreated by Nintendo in 1986, the original Legend of Zelda game presented players with a open world to explore, packed with dungeons and monsters all ready to kill them at a moment's notice. The mix of adventure and action game play created a winning game and launched not only a successful series but an entirely new video game genre. game would look like. There’s the trope that sequels in the NES era were unlike their previous games, with the likes of Super Mario Bros.. and Castlevania having really strange sequels by comparison. Even games series like Adventure Island and Kirby (over on the Game Boy) had creatively different sequels that managed to push themselves outside the comfort zones of their original titles. But in all those games, you could still recognize the bones of what came before. They felt very different, yes, but they were still recognizably connected in the series.

Not so with The Legend of Zelda. The two entries on the NES were as different as they could be, with a top-down action adventure being followed by a side-scrolling, platforming dungeon-crawler. The only shared elements between the two games were a green, sockhatted hero going into dungeons to collect items and defeat bosses. In all other respects The Legend of Zelda and sequel Zelda II: The Adventure of Link were so different they could have practically come from two different franchises. As such, gamers didn’t know what to expect if and when a third game came along. But then, with the release of the Super Nintendo, Big N answered that question: the next Zelda game would be a lot like the first one. A return to its roots. A proper adventure.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I appreciate Zelda II: The Adventure of Link for what it is, but the game is very different and, by all accounts, not what fans were looking for in a sequel to the original game. That, combined with a chip shortage that affected NES games sales in 1988, meant that the sequels sales weren’t as good as the original, and Nintendo obviously wanted to go back to a formula that sold. Thus, for the third title, The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, the game went back to the roots of the franchise for an expanded adventure that felt very much in line with what fans actually wanted from a sequel.

Like the original NES game, the third Zelda title is a top down, action-adventure experience. Link, our hero (a different Link from the first two games and, in fact, one of the first characters to be a Link on the Zelda timeline), awakens to find that his uncle has left on a quest, out into the pouring rain late one night. Link follows, wanting to know what’s going on, and he finds his Uncle dying in a tunnel leading to Hyrule castle. He passes his nephew his sword and shield, making the boy promise to go into the castle to save the Princess within. Link does, but this only sends him on a larger quest to save the land of Hyrule.

The setup for this third Zelda game already felt different from the beginning. The mechanics felt familiar, with Link exploring the top-down world, but there was already a massive emphasis on story that was missing from the first game, with people guiding Link’s hand, telling him where to go and what to do. Go to the castle, save the princess. Talk to a wise old man, get a quest to collect three pendants. Grab the Master Sword, fight an evil sorcerer. It was clear what you were supposed to do, where you had to go, and where the adventure ended. It felt somewhat linear, but still, in a way, free for you enjoy and do as you liked.

Right up until the game threw a massive twist that changed the whole experience. The big change that The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past throws into the experience is that once you’re finished the main quest you learn that the quest actually isn’t done at all. The three pendants are only the first part of the experience, and once you go forth and defeat the evil sorcerer Agahnim, you get thrown into the Dark World, a mirror version of Link’s homeworld, with places and landscapes that parallel the original world. Now Link has to navigate the two worlds, solving puzzles between them and collecting the various items spread across both worlds, all so he can collect seven crystals and take on the true villain of the game, the evil Ganon.

The two world concept was such a huge expansion of the Zelda experience that it made this third game feel staggeringly huge and complex, even in comparison to the original NES title. That first game expanded its experience by having a second quest that jumbled everything up and made the game harder. The SNES adventure, though, didn’t need that as it was already a massive and expansive game. It had everything a fan wanted to do, with plenty of freeform exploration (especially in the Dark World), that it completely redefined the Zelda experience.

The different worlds concept became a staple of the series for a time, from Ocarina of Time’s future and past to Oracle of Ages and travel between past and present, and then the Oracle of Seasons four seasons for the overworld. Heck, the concept even lives on today, with the main world and darkside reflection in the underground making up a big part of the exploration in Tears of the Kingdom. In a Zelda game, you weren’t expecting to just play one overworld anymore, and that’s all because of A Link to the Past.

But beyond that, the game came to define so many other mechanics of the series. Water used to be something Link had to transport across, usually via a raft, but swimming became a main mechanic of the series going forward, with Link gaining the flippers in this game and then never looking back after. Magic, which was introduced in Zelda II: The Adventure of Link, was remade to be a meter that powered many of your magical items in the game. And then there were the specific items that became staples of the series, from the magic hammer to the bottles (and bugs), and, most importantly, the hookshot. These all got their start in this SNES title, and the series has been iterating on them ever since.

Of course, what was most important for this title was just how smooth and refined it felt. The original NES title was great, an adventure game that let you tease out all its secrets on your own, but it was often obtuse and unfair in its design. Dungeons were unforgiving when it came to exploration, with walls that needed to be bombed having no clear indication, while enemies were packed into rooms, coming at you from every direction. A Link to the Past was a more controlled experience, giving clues as to where to go and what to do in dungeons, while enemies were placed in a way that didn’t feel so unforgiving or unfair.

Is it an easier title? Yes, but that’s not a bad thing. In the context of this adventure, with so much to do that Nintendo clearly wanted you to see, the difficulty was pulled back just enough that anyone could, theoretically, get through the game with a little practice and a fair bit of heart collecting. The dungeons were fun to explore, with cool puzzles and interesting ideas around every turn, and the enemies provided just enough challenge without making you want to throw your controller against a wall.

And, on top of that, the game was beautiful. The graphics, while simple in design, still showed far more robust colors than the NES could have ever managed. There’s artistry and detail to the environments, with many locations having their own style and feel, never the same old dungeon tilesets used over and over again like in the first two games. The design of the game makes you feel like you’re exploring a real slice of a world, end to end, and seeing all its varied and interesting sights in the process. This is coupled with a great soundtrack with a number of excellent tunes (the overworld theme, the Dark World theme, the Light World dungeon theme) that keep your energy up as you’re exploring every nook and cranny.

Start to finish, The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past is a masterful game that gave its players everything they wanted. There’s a reason why it’s still rated as not only one of the best games of the SNES, but also one of the best of the whole Zelda franchise. Players continue to go back to it, year after year (both in the vanilla game and the randomizer) to see all its sights and experience its adventure all over again. This was peak Nintendo on the SNES, proving once again why they were the company to beat in the 16-bit era.