You know, I have a history of WOW THIS LOOKS PRETTY HEAVY YOU WONT BE ABLE TO LIFT IT WITH JUST YOUR BARE HANDS disliking zelda games since I was a WOW THIS LOOKS PRETTY HEAVY YOU WONT BE ABLE TO LIFT IT WITH JUST YOUR BARE HANDS little kid. Maybe part of it WOW THIS LOOKS PRETTY HEAVY YOU WONT BE ABLE TO LIFT IT WITH JUST YOUR BARE HANDS is because I had all sega stuff growing up, but WOW THIS LOOKS PRETTY HEAVY YOU WONT BE ABLE TO LIFT IT WITH JUST YOUR BARE HANDS going back to link's awakening once I WOW THIS LOOKS PRETTY HEAVY YOU WONT BE ABLE TO LIFT IT WITH JUST YOUR BARE HANDS finally acquired a taste for zelda and saw everyone say this game is WOW THIS LOOKS PRETTY HEAVY YOU WONT BE ABLE TO LIFT IT WITH JUST YOUR BARE HANDS one of the best in the series only to discover WOW THIS LOOKS PRETTY HEAVY YOU WONT BE ABLE TO LIFT IT WITH JUST YOUR BARE HANDS WOW THIS LOOKS PRETTY HEAVY YOU WONT BE ABLE TO LIFT IT WITH JUST YOUR BARE HANDS that it plays it's little fucking "you cant do this yet" message every WOW THIS LOOKS PRETTY HEAVY YOU WONT BE ABLE TO LIFT IT WITH JUST YOUR BARE HANDS fucking WOW THIS LOOKS PRETTY HEAVY YOU WONT BE ABLE TO LIFT IT WITH JUST YOUR BARE HANDS time you even so much as touch the WOW THIS LOOKS PRETTY HEAVY YOU WONT BE ABLE TO LIFT IT WITH JUST YOUR BARE HANDS thing you can't use yet that I just cant help but think my old point of view was just a little bit WOW THIS LOOKS PRETTY HEAVY YOU WONT BE ABLE TO LIFT IT WITH JUST YOUR BARE HANDS justified.

This game had no right to be as good as it was. Back in the Game Boy days, you were lucky to get anything resembling the home console experience on the go. Clunky ports, clumsy sprite retooling and departures from series staples were the norm, with concessions having to be made to cram things into that tiny cartridge and monochromatic screen. The biggest successes of the platform were games like Pokemon, which took full advantage of the quirks of their hardware, or games like Tetris which simply accepted their place in the market and embraced the idea of being addictive timewasters. Link's Awakening said nuts to that and offered the full Zelda experience, and even managed to buck some series trends way before it was the cool thing to do. Taking place on a mysterious island, the narrative is completely divorced from just about any previously established characters or concepts, save for Link himself and a single name-drop of Zelda at the beginning. The twist at the center of the game isn't a particularly revolutionary one, but it is a twist, and one that was surprisingly emotionally affective for its time. There are minor gripes, of course - the dungeons are a bit simpler, only having two buttons for items (including your sword) means constantly having to jump to the pause screen to swap things around, and you will never want to see another acorn again for as long as you live by the time the credits roll, but otherwise, it's the genuine Zelda experience in the palm of your hands. I love this game and I will happily pick it back up to play it any time I have a long car ride ahead of me. Arguments can and have been made about whether or not this is the best 2D Zelda, but as far as I am concerned, it's the best got-dang Game Boy game ever made, and that's a title it gets to keep forever.

i've spent most of my life not really being a big zelda fan, but after playing and loving majora's mask and link's awakening, i think what i like in zelda is when it does something weird and interesting. guess i'm not too big of a fan of most of the series' established mythos or conventions. overall link's awakening is an incredibly solid 2d zelda with consistently good dungeons and a great presentation. turtle rock was kind of annoying to navigate but otherwise the game is amazing. the story isn't the most in depth but it didn't need to be, it conveyed it's themes and narrative in a way that i adored and i hope more people give this classic a try.

Só tinha jogado uma vez, a versão DX. Isso foi Deus sabe quantos anos atrás e não tinha gostado muito. Talvez porque eu tivesse jogado os Oracles à exaustão antes ele não atendeu às minhas expectativas.

Em minha revisita à Link's Awakening, decidi jogar a versão original, de 1993. O que posso dizer é que minha expectativa dessa vez foi muito mais positiva. E não é só oela perspectiva histórica de que é um autêntico The Legend of Zelda rodando num Game Boy tijolão (um grande feito). Mesmo para jogadores contemporâneos que não têm apego nostálgico ao jogo ele tem bastante à oferecer.

Link's Awakening tem dois principais pontos fortes que se reinforçam mutuamente. O primeiro é o ritmo. Sendo projetado para um aparelho portátil, a aventura divide a famosa fórmula de Zelda em objetivos e subobjetivos que nunca duram mais que 30 minutos. Eu fui jogando o game em doses homeopáticas no decorrer de dois meses, e mesmo nas seções mais curtas a sensação de progresso era constante. E o segundo ponto forte, que se liga diretamente ao primeiro, é a variedade. Na transição de uma dungeon para outra à sempre alguma missão interessante que você tem que cumprir antes, como ajudar um príncipe a recuperar seu castelo, salvar Marin de moblins ou encontrar a Vila Animal. Às vezes o que você tem que fazer é meio non-sequitur, mas até isso acho que se encaixa com a temática onírica da história.

E falando em história... Que finalzinho meio melancólico, né? Outra coisa que meu eu do passado não soube apreciar muito, mas o do presente se sentiu um pouco emocionado.

(This is the 85th game in my challenge to go through many known games in chronological order starting in 1990. The spreadsheet is in my bio.)

In this challenge I'm doing, The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past or 'Zelda 3' is still my 2nd favorite game I've played up to this point. Knowing that its sequel, The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening, was released on the Game Boy, I didn't have too high expectations because I've come to realize that most games on the Game Boy have not aged well due to the handheld's capabilities. Looking at Super Mario Land 2, I expected this to be one of the better games on the system though, and after having played it for a good while, I can confirm as much. It's absolutely one of the best games on the system. Unfortunately, I didn't have as much fun with this game as I would have liked, and it mainly has to do with the slow pace of it at all, mainly due to one issue.

Story-wise, Link's Awakening starts off as a follow-up to A Link to the Past in that Link travels by ship to other places and, on his return home to Hyrule months later, has his ship destroyed by a storm and washes ashore on a place that is not actually Hyrule, which makes this game the first Zelda game to not play in Hyrule. The island he is on is called "Koholint Island", and he is taken home by a girl called Marin, who tends to him until he wakes up. When he wakes up, Link can talk to Marin's father, Tarin, who looks suspiciously like Mario (and also likes mushrooms) to recover his shield. He makes his way to the beach to recover his sword, where an owl tells him that he needs to wake the Wind Fish, which is in an egg crowning the large mountain of this island. Only this way can Link escape the island. To do this, Link needs to collect 8 instruments out of 8 dungeons.

It's a pretty neat setup for this game and it's nice to see it be different from the typical save Hyrule from Ganon plot, which is by no means bad, but from there, the game plays exactly like A Link to the Past, but on the Game Boy. This is luckily also not a bad thing, as the concept put forth by A Link to the Past is rightfully praised all over. It is, however, on the Game Boy, so it just plays like a smaller version with fewer features. In addition, I want to say it is designed for children in terms of its difficulty, but one constant issue that "pops up" (pun intended) makes me think this was designed for 6-year olds, though even 6-year olds are unlikely to need this much help on this front.

What I am referring to are "message pop-ups" that constantly, and I mean constantly, interrupt your gameplay, to the point it drove me to near-madness and made me end my playthrough, as it just made the game straight-up unenjoyable. The way these games are set up is in a Metroidvania-style where you lack all abilities at the start and therefore can't enter certain areas until you find suitable items elsewhere. For example, pots and stones can not be carried unless you equip a "Power Bracelet". This presents the two main issues I had with this game. First, there are many items in this game (just like in 'A Link to the Past') but here, instead of having them be passive skills, you need to constantly manually equip the items you need at a given moment, with two items equippable at the same time. You need to switch a lot, which slows the game down too much for me and has led to many annoying deaths over the time I played. Second, which is the worst part, EVERY time you accidentally run into any item that you cannot interact with, a message screen pops up telling you that you cannot do that. I KNOW. And it's not like the message goes away once you have the Power Bracelet. No, every time you don't have it equipped, you get the message again. Why? For whom? You also get the same message about the same items you pick up in each dungeon explaining their functions. It takes so much time to constantly have to wait to skip through them and just felt so odd throughout.

Perhaps my fixation on these pop-ups was exacerbated by the fact that I found the puzzles in this game to be less clever (and more annoying because of the constant item-swapping) and "whimsical character wants an item to trade" as puzzle-solving multiple times didn't really translate to enjoyable content to me at some point. I think overall, it just felt like the worse version of A Link to the Past that it is and it couldn't really excite me enough to see through the story, which hadn't really moved along at all at the time I stopped playing apart from the Owl constantly sending me to different dungeons to collect instruments. It definitely didn't help that all of this was happening on my computer screen instead of on a handheld like initially intended, but I'm also not a kid anymore, haven't played this game back in the day and after thousands of games, both by and not by Nintendo, that copied Zelda's charm, as well as the monochrome graphics, I just couldn't really get excited about most of what I was seeing and playing.

OVERALL | 66/100

To call The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening a competent game would be my way of saying that it is not a bad game at all, and if you love Zelda games, you will really enjoy this one as well (though I'd opt for the remake at this point). But calling it competent is also my way of saying that the game did little 'wrong', however the things it did do wrong (message pop-ups, item switching) hampered my enjoyment of the game a lot. It doesn't help that this game follows the same rigid collect a certain number of things to beat the game like seemingly all first-party Nintendo Game Boy games (which I presume is due to the limitations of the Game Boy), so even though it had the Zelda coding on it, I couldn't help but feel unimpressed from an enjoyment-perspective. From a technical perspective, it is undoubtedly impressive how much the devs were able to get out of the Game Boy with this game.

Many people are familiar with David Lynch's screed against watching films on smart phones. I agree with Lynch that watching films on phones sucks, though people certainly take it further. If you spend enough time talking about movies, you will encounter the "well you didn't really see the movie watching in that format" argument: only this cut, on this size screen, projected in these specifications, colour graded this way, with this quality of sound, sitting in this seat, and knowing this historical context is the only true experience of a film. Undeniably these factors can impact your appreciation of a film but I will maintain that, unless you stopped watching, you did see the movie. When my dad saw Mad Max: Fury Road on a plane and didn't like it, he was seeing it equally as much as I did in a theatre with a packed crowd or when he saw it on a big TV and enjoyed it a lot more.

You'll find this sort of discourse in any artistic medium, and as I've gotten more into video games, I've both seen and advanced similar arguments myself. Beyond the obvious instances where controllers differ substantially in form and function or a CRT provides a more authentic image, you have hundreds of invisible technical quirks that can affect the experience for better or worse. It becomes easy to just recommend/instruct people to play a game you enjoyed in the exact way you did and not risk the potential differences of emulating or going back to original hardware or whatever undermining their enjoyment. There will also always be the argument in gaming for the highest specs and most modern conveniences possible: give me a 30 year old 8-bit game running on my 360Hz 4K OLED monitor with save states, rewind, debug menu available, whole nine yards (and if I like it there better be a randomizer mod I can try out afterward).

This is a long way of saying I don't really care how you play Link's Awakening: on a pea-green Game Boy, on your Switch, on your phone; in its original, DX, or remade version; for a couple hours, to the end, to 100% completion, etc. Go nuts. There's value in all its iterations, and all of it is Link's Awakening. However you played it, you played it, and I wouldn't be concerned about what someone in a discord or on here will shame you for.

But if after all that you'll indulge me one thing: I think you should play it handheld, because I think that's the point.

Worlds in (single player, offline) games materialize when you boot them up and disappear when you turn them off. Multiple games have made artistic hay under that particular sun, tending towards the "the best thing you can do is stop playing" conceit. Link's Awakening is distinct. I've heard Koholint Island being a dream described as a twist, when in reality it is much more a premise. I'd say the twist is that despite being the destined hero who always saves the day in other Zelda games, here there is nothing you can do to alter the transience of this world. Yet the game wants you to keep playing, and see it through to its conclusion.

We make and unmake every dream we have, inherently. Turning an idea into something material or corporeal is both creation and destruction: the result is never exactly what is in your mind, and you can never quite go back to what it was as just an idea. That disconnect can make anyone despondent if they dwell on it; if they let it convince them there is no value to making something no one will see just as you see it, if they see it at all. "Verily, it be the nature of dreams to end."

The Wind Fish is right, but it is also the nature of all things to transform. Experience becomes memory becomes premonition becomes experience and on and on. Dreams deferred will dry/fester/stink/crust/sag/explode. The story in the author's mind becomes the story in the cartridge becomes the story in my mind. You know it's just images moving really fast, it's just words put into a specific order, it's just code rendering. But when I take out my Switch and boot up this game, I feel like I am holding a world in my hand. I know it will textually evaporate when I finish it, I know it will literally evaporate when I turn it off, I know it was never really there to begin with.

But they only ever made and remade this game for handheld devices. And when I hold it I feel it. And maybe by telling that to you, you'll hold this game and feel it too. Or maybe you'll feel something different because you've held these words in your head. I'm fine with whatever.

After the series had seemingly lost its footing with the good, yet incredibly frustrating Zelda II, The Legend of Zelda had gotten right back to its roots with A Link to the Past, and it was all the better for it. It is still a really great Zelda game even to this day, with plenty of different things to do, dungeons to face, enemies to conquer, and treasures to find, while also establishing plenty of tropes that would become a staple for the series even to this day. The game was also pretty successful too, selling over 6 million copies to this day, and with this success in mind, Nintendo wanted to take it a step further. Sometime after the game’s release, development then started on a port of the game to be released on the Game Boy, but that project quickly got scrapped, and instead, transformed into an original game. One that didn’t have as many restraints on it as others, one that was aiming to be weird, and one that would successfully bring the series onto the smaller screen. After one and a half years of development, this new game would be released to the public as The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening.

This was actually the very first Zelda game that I have ever played. I remember buying the DX version of the game on the 3DS eShop, and I remember thinking it was ok at the time. It did seem appealing, but it wasn’t something that personally interested younger me, who didn’t like any video game that wasn’t Mario, Kirby, Pokemon or Sonic. Then, later on in my life, I got to play the original Ocarina of Time, and I loved it, which led me to fall in love with the Zelda series, and to give this game a proper shot. After that, I ended up loving the game, so I figured since it has been long enough, I thought I should go ahead and revisit the game once again to see how it held up. And yes, I did decide to play through the original version of the game rather than the DX version. What does that version have over this one, COLOR? BLEH, GROSS! Nah, I want everything to be all black and white and boring, just like my soul. So anyway, after playing through it again, I would still say it is a pretty great Zelda title as a whole, and a great way of bringing the series to handhelds. Sure, it isn’t better than A Link to the Past, and there are some annoying aspects about it, but it is still a pretty solid entry for this series.

The story is a bit of a departure from your typical Zelda plot, where Link crashes onto the mysterious Koholint Island, and he must gather musical artifacts in order to make a wish to the Wind Fish to escape the island, which is a pretty interesting setup, despite the fact that it also takes place all in a dream (the game isn’t called Link’s Awakening for no reason), the graphics are Game Boy graphics, but they do manage to do a great job at making the game feel like a Zelda game, with all the typical types of enemy designs and series motives that you would expect, the music is pretty good, with there being plenty of great tracks throughout that not only remix previous themes, but also new ones that will stick with you after an initial playthrough, the control is basically what you would expect from a Zelda game, and it works out well for the most part, although there are some instances where it could be better, such as with the fishing minigame, and the gameplay takes everything that A Link to the Past did well and brings it onto a smaller console, and it manages to do so wonderfully, with it remaining fun to experience to this day.

The game is your basic action-adventure game, where you take control of Link, explore the many different locations of Koholint island, talk to many friendly faces that will either give you good advice, give you helpful items to aid you on your quest, or just say useless bullshit, fight many enemies of varying size and shape along your way, gather plenty of items to help you out along the way, and take on plenty of dungeons, where you will solve plenty of puzzles, take on much more powerful foes, slay a set of big bad bosses, and gather the musical artifacts that will lead you towards your ultimate goal. For the most part, it is pretty standard for a Zelda game, but it still remains pretty fun throughout, and for being the first game in the series to be placed on a proper handheld, the gameplay still holds up remarkably well. Not to mention, there are several elements that do make this game standout from other titles in the series.

In terms of new additions to the series, this would be the first game in the series to feature a trading side-quest, where you would need to go around to various places and talk to plenty of people, giving them specific items that allow you to get one BIG item at the end of it all. While I myself personally don’t like these kinds of quests, as I find it pretty tedious to go around and talk to multiple people just to get all of these random things, there is a reason why it has become a staple in the adventure genre, as what usually awaits at the end of that tunnel is worth it. Alongside that, there are also several sections that would diverge into side-scrolling sections similar to Zelda II, but unlike that game, these sections are actually FUN to traverse through. They don’t last too long, but there are plenty of them, and they are usually pretty well thought out. And finally, as I mentioned earlier, we now have…. fishing minigames. I’m not really a fan of fishing, both in video games and IRL, so I don’t really like these, but hey, I can see the appeal for those that do.

Alongside all of this, there is one other aspect of Link’s Awakening that stands out from other Zelda games: how fucking weird it is. For the most part, it is your typical Zelda game through and through, with no real strange gameplay elements or anything of the sort, but there are weird things that you will be seeing throughout your entire journey, such as inhabitants that are just big ol’ animals, some of the items that you can get that can allow you to jump, and even the Wind Fish himself, who is pretty odd for being an all-powerful god. Not only that, but there are also a lot of elements of this game copied over from other Nintendo series. Since there weren’t that many restrictions placed on the development of this game, they were able to place plenty of enemies and characters from Mario in here, such as with Goombas, Piranha Plants, Chain Chomps, and Yoshi. Hell, even Kirby and Gordos makes an appearance in this game at several instances, which is bizarre to see, but they somehow fit right in alongside everything else.

Now, despite how much this game has going for it, the game isn’t perfect. As I have mentioned already, I am not really a fan of the fishing minigame or the trade-sequence sidequest that you can take part in throughout the game, but then again, both of those things are optional, so they don’t really drag the game down entirely for me. But there are one or two other elements that do. First off, there is the bigger issue of the item system in the game. With all of the major items in the game that you obtain, such as dungeon items or even your main equipment, you have to equip them to the A and B buttons, but you can only hold one item in those positions at a time. Needless to say, having to constantly stop what I am doing in order to switch out these items can be pretty tedious and annoying at times, which does kinda suck, especially when two of the items you have, AKA your sword and shield, should just be part of you already, and not something separate. Thankfully, the remake fixes this, so it isn’t that big of a deal. And secondly, while I didn’t mind it too much, I will say that Eagle’s Tower isn’t really that fun of a dungeon. Having to constantly find your way around it while getting these big balls to knock into the towers to bring it crashing down, I will admit, is a creative approach to a Zelda dungeon, but one that I just personally am not a fan of, and I don’t typically look forward to it whenever I come back to this game.

Overall, despite a tedious item equip system and some annoying parts here or there, the original Link’s Awakening is still a great entry in this series, and it is still fun to go back to to this very day. While it wasn’t the game that led me to loving the Zelda franchise, I am glad that it was the first one that I ever played, as it is unique enough to stand out, and it will always hold a special place in my heart. I would definitely recommend it for those who are fans of the Zelda franchise, or for those who have already played through the remake of the game, because while it may not be as visually appealing, it is still a great time all the same. Just, you know, stick to the DX version if you are, because it is the definitive version of the original game. And also, while you’re at it, make sure to not steal anything from the shop, alright? You don't wanna be a dirty scummy THIEF, do ya?

Game #392

This is a game quite beloved among The Legend of Zelda community, either because of the cute and goofy charm of its world, or also because of how incredibly well made it is for a game for a console as primitive as the Game Boy, I wouldn't exaggerate to say that it easily surpasses even most NES games, and almost equals many SNES masterpieces.

Link's Awakening is that kind of game that was made to be more than just a game for a handheld, unlike games like Donkey Kong Land, Mega Man World or Mario Land, which were simple adaptations that today leave much to be desired. This game on the other hand was made to match the quality of a home console game despite the major hardware limitations that the original Game Boy had, such as low resolution, low power, little storage space on the cartridges, lack of buttons, and lack of color, to name a few. This game is not only overflowing with excellence in the highly polished and well-groomed technical section, but it is also excellent in game design.

The gameplay is directly inspired and designed to emulate that of Zelda A Link to the Past (a Super Nintendo game), and you can tell on more than one occasion that the developers of this game just put some things in so they could say "See, like the SNES game, but on a Game Boy!", and the truth is that I won't deny that this is both awesome and cool, A Link to the Past is my favorite and the fact that this game is not only inspired, but is a sequel to it pleases me infinitely. However, due to the limitations of the GB small alterations were made that actually end up improving the inventory system in part, because given the limited amount of buttons on the console, in order to have a more flexible gameplay, we can now choose what items we want to equip on the "A" and "B" buttons, we can even leave Link without a sword, which is something that will be necessary in some cases and can serve to make some combinations between items, such as bomb arrows.

As for the design of the overworld, it was something that disappointed me at first, as this game lacks the freedom that previous Zelda games gave you and also the backtracking can sometimes be a bit exessive, although I think this is more annoying than it should be due in part to the map is divided to only a small area per screen at a time, and partly I feel it was also a decision taken to lengthen the game a little more. However, when you play it with the mindset that you're playing in a world with a small Metroid Fusion style main map (unlock abilities to unlock areas as you progress through the story) it's quite enjoyable, and more so because of the amount of optional Puzzles that are hidden. Also, this game started a tradition in the series which are the exchange sequences, which basically consist of starting with a useless item such as a stone, which you will be exchanging for all kinds of items until you end up with something big like building an entire bridge.

The dungeons that this game features are pretty well designed, they have puzzles that will require you to really think a bit and make you use the item you got in that dungeon in a lot of ways. At the end is the typical boss that will usually be an easy battle.

But hey, since I already talked about what makes Link's Awakening excellent as a video game, I'll talk about what makes it an even more memorable and special adventure: its charming personality. After saving Hyrule from the forces of evil in the previous adventure, Link finds himself on a strange island where everything has a rather relaxed and goofy tone, but in a good way, as it endows the game with a lot of grace and uniqueness, for example, there are kids who break the fourth wall and literally tell you "I have no idea how I know this, but if you press the Start + Select buttons you can save game" or other NPCs that say "I'm going to get lost in the mountains, so go look for me", even the bosses of the dungeons that I mentioned before, the great thing about them sometimes is not the battle itself, but how the boss looks and behaves. All of the above makes the game stand out from the rest of the era, as most games always had a "Save the world from evil" type story and not a simple but effective "Find a way to leave this strange, but lovely island".

Conclusion
To be honest, the first time I played this game I found it just "okay", but this time it was different, as I was actually hating it, as I was looking more for a more open game like Zelda 1 or ALttP. But still, because of expecting something from the game that I wasn't going to find in it, I was missing out on appreciating the things that it did do differently, the things that it did have and did well; its originality. And it was here that I realized something very important, and that is that a sequel doesn't necessarily have to be "the same but better" than the previous game. This game has taught me that a sequel doesn't necessarily have to be that way, because even if the changes mean losing things that I as a player love, they can also mean new things that can be just as great.

And having said that, the message of the game is about that, that things are not forever and sooner or later we will have to leave things behind to move forward, but not for that reason those things will be forgotten, because we must appreciate them and value them fondly for what they were and meant to us... Similar to the past (or a dream), we can not return to it, but the memory that it once happened is what gives it meaning and importance in our day to day.

They put a jump button in this one and it's game-breakingly good.

If not my first video game ever, The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening is my first Zelda game. I vividly remember playing this game on my dad's big clunky Game Boy with my mom over my shoulder watching what i did and giving me suggestions of what to do. If this game was terrible, it would still hold a special place in my heart as the game my mother and i went on an adventure through.

But this game is particularly good, despite being on the Game Boy. I think that's something to temper your expectations with before going into it. It's a Game Boy game, and those always pale in comparison to their console counterparts. But Link's Awakening is one of the best Game Boy games ever. It's a simplified Zelda game, but it holds its own. If you need proof of this, it's been remade twice (once in color on the Game Boy Color, and then a full on 3D HD Remake on the Nintendo Switch).

There's a lot that makes this game so remake-able, and to that extent, enjoyable to play, and the most noteworthy is the intriguing story. But that story would be slightly less interesting if there wasn't a colorful (considering this review is on the black and white Game Boy version of the game, i'm using colorful with a bit of poetry here) cast of characters to interact with and adore. Marin in particular is a very lovable character, and she's lovable enough to play through the game without getting a single game over. Do it for her. She deserves it.

Link's Awakening falters for me in an interesting way, but I have to explain the good part about it first. It chooses to let you use the two face buttons on the Game Boy for any item however you want. For example, you can equip the sword to either the A or B button, or neither of them because you have the bow and shield out because you're low on hearts and don't want to get in close. This trait actually lets you use the first instance of Bomb Arrows in a Zelda game, beating Twilight Princess to it by over a decade. (Just press the bomb button slightly before the arrow button).

The way the game falters is that because it's on the Game Boy, and you only have two buttons to work with, you're constantly pressing the pause button and waiting a split second for it to show up so you can swap items and then wait another split second for it to go away so you can go back to the game. It's a little thing, but considering how many times i pause to swap the Roc's Feather out for something else and then pause again to swap back to the Roc's Feather adds up.

This brings us to the Roc's Feather. I like the Roc's Feather in the same way a crackhead likes Crack. The Roc's Feather lets Link jump, and jumping diagonally increases Link's speed. It feels incredible to play. But at the same time, playing without it for whatever reason makes the game feel less fun. It feels stiffer, it feels stunted. It shouldn't feel that way, it's a fine game on its own. But that feather changes everything. It's Crack. Thankfully, the 2019 Switch remake doubles the face buttons you can use and then adds a few more for good measure, so your Roc's Feather can always be on hand.

Despite this, the original is still worth playing. Any shortcomings you might find are balanced with cuteness and silly charm.

I have played this game so many times I know it by heart. I've played every version of it multiple times. I've glitched the DX version to do a full Damaged Sprite Tunic playthrough just because i liked how it looks. I adore the Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening. My biggest gripe with it is that it's not long enough, i want more.

While not the first Zelda I ever played, it's easily the one I put the most time into as a kid. I was pretty much glued to this thing, and it was the first Zelda to suck me in so much that I felt compelled to learn more about the franchise. This was in the early days of the internet, so there was a lot of scouring for details on fan pages and printing out character bios and getting my dad's computer filled up with viruses. Good times...

I remember being awestruck by the amount of secrets and easter eggs in this thing, like being branded an all-caps THIEF, or turning Marin into a dang ghost. It was years later that I caught on to the more disturbing fan theories about the story, and while those are almost certainly false, I think they're fun to think about too. The game certainly has a mysterious air about it, and for a an early 90s Game Boy game, they managed to pack in a lot of atmosphere.

Naturally the smaller scope of the game means there's a lot less content to explore. This isn't as vast as some other Zelda titles, and even the Ages/Seasons games feel like they're more robust, but there's still a lot to do for an early 90's Game Boy game. The graphics are pretty sharp too and the controls are spot on, it feels like a perfectly condensed version of A Link to the Past, impressive given the power game between console and handheld hardware.

There is a remake for the Switch, and it's fine. It has a horribly tacked on create-a-dungeon feature and the framerate really likes to nosedive for some reason. But it's still pretty authentic to the original, and is a perfectly fine way to enjoy Link's Awakening today. But my fondness will always be for the original, and I think it holds up surprisingly well today.

When the remake was announced in a direct, I immediatly dug out my gameboy and my battered copy of this game. I replayed it for the first time in a long time and felt so emotional while I did, I honestly don't entirely know why, but this game has and still does mean a lot to me.
The map loading in squares made me get lost a lot, the puzzles confused me and would have me stuck for days, but as a kid that all made it feel weirdly magical somehow, so, seeing a remake trailer made me nearly tear up and desperately replay the game that I remembered. It held up I think, but the magic wasn't magic anymore, it was nostalgia, but I don't think that changed the experiance.