the series' black sheep
throws intense difficulty
at every turn
Additional Comments:
Ah, the infamous Zelda II, spurned by so many Zelda fans for its rampant deviations from a typical Zelda game. I first played this game sometime in the late 90s on the NES and then again a few years back on the Game Cube's Legend of Zelda Collector's Edition. On my first playthrough, I made it as far as the River Devil; completely stumped on how to get past. Thinking back, I believe I may have never uncovered the over water passage to the Palace on the Sea, thus never acquiring the flute to scare away the bugger. On my second playthrough, I made it all the way up to the second mountain pass before the Great Palace. But no matter how hard I tried, I could not muster enough energy to survive the gauntlet from either Nabooru or New Kasuto, depending on what town I used as a home base to regenerate health and magic. And so, I gave up - yet another Zelda game that would sadly go down as unbeaten. Sigh, I have far too many of those.
Anyways, for Beat All Games, it was time to tackle it once again, and finally take it down. Even three or four years since my last contact, I had already forgotten how tough this game is. Right from the get go, this game is relentless, and it only gets harder as you progress. However, what I find so odd is to what ends that this difficulty exists. Unlike most Zelda games, where difficulty is emphasized through the use of complex puzzles, Zelda II creates difficulty with typical NES projectile sprites in which the projectiles are nearly impossible to dodge. To me, this game embraces the legendary "NES difficulty" that is often attributed to a number of early shooter/platformers. That combined with the lack of puzzles (which I'm sure people would be quick to argue - but honestly, the "puzzles" in this game aren't really puzzles, but more of an off-the-beaten-path walkabout to acquire an item) is what really sets this game apart from a typical Zelda game. I know a lot of people will usually point fingers at the lack of overworld play and the questionable side-scrolling sections as the culprits of a bad Zelda game, but for me, they're not to blame. Lack of puzzles and "NES difficulty" is to blame.
But don't think I'm slamming this game just like any other avid Zelda fan. As a Zelda game, yea, it's my least favorite of the ones I've played (hmm, maybe Faces of Evil is worse, but really, I haven't given my all yet with that game, so I'll have to get back on that one). But as I played this game through for the third time, and finally finding victory, I came to realize if you view the game as a generic RPG sidescroller, it's not that bad of a game. It's still tough as balls, but it's a pretty decent NES game that just so happens to share some name/character similarities to Legend of Zelda. That's all. Seriously, once I stepped outside of the "Zelda" box, I came to appreciate the game tenfold. I began to see it as something akin to Faxanadu, but with an early Ultima style overworld attached. Unfortunately, the game still doesn't hold a finger to Faxanadu itself, but I can definitely say the game is nowhere near as horrible as I once made it out to be.
Well, now that all of the controversial stuff is out of the way, I'd like to point out a few grievances specific to the game. I've already touched on the "NES difficulty" and the needless sidetracking, so I'm not going to echo either of those points again. But one very important point I feel must be made: why are there scenarios where you need an item to correctly pass an area, yet said item is after said area? Fortunately, the two glaringly obvious situations where this occurs are both easy, but still, why is this game mechanic even present? The two situations I'm talking about is the tunnel to Parapa Desert, in which you need the Candle, and the plains between the dock and Nabooru Village, in which the Fire spell is certainly a help. However, the Candle is hidden in Parapa Palace and the Fire spell is in Nabooru Village. What the hell, man!?
I'd also like to talk about advance sprite AI - where some of the enemies seem to know your next move before you even know what your next move is. Well, technically, that's not true, nor possible with such primitive coding techniques, but it certainly feels that way. The biggest offenders are obviously the various colored Iron Knuckles and Lizalfoses, but with patience, they can easily be defeated, either by Down Thrusting the Lizalfoses or faking out the Iron Knuckles, but come on, Dark Link is just ridiculous. Other than through the usage of a proximity bug with the left side of the screen, I have no idea how you're supposed to even score a hit. I don't know how many times I attempted Dark Link before I realized you can prove victorious with a no-hit defeat using the aforementioned bug. And with that in mind, the total number of hits achieved before I found said bug: a big fat zero!! Talk about some serious bullshit....
Whatever, the game is done and in the end, despite what I've always thought about it, I rather enjoyed playing through it this time around. It's still a pretty bogus Zelda game that reeks of B-team quality, suffering the same consequences that many popular NES titles suffered when it came to producing a sequel, but it's an incredibly engaging RPG sidescroller nonetheless. And with that, I'm satisfied, because let's face it, there's not that many games to be found in this awkward, little sub-genre, so I'll take what I can get.
And finally, although the music isn't necessarily up to snuff compared to other Zelda games, the music is still quite enjoyable. Both the Overworld and Palace themes are fantastic, and each one is definitely befitting of the environments in which they play.
Nano-Rant:
Fuck those undodgeable, unblockable bullshit projectiles!!!!
Rating: 3 Spell spells out of 5
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