Zelda II: The Adventure of Link

Zelda II: The Adventure of Link is the direct sequel to, both originally released on the Famicom Disk System in Japan and then the Nintendo Entertainment System in North America and Europe. While retaining many of the features of its predecessor, The Adventure of Link altered certain elements of gameplay, most notably affecting movement and combat. Traveling across a large world map would lead to enemy encounters which took place on a side-scrolling field of play rather than the top down perspective for which the series became known.

Story
A few years after the defeat of Ganon and the rescue of Princess Zelda, Link, now at the age of sixteen, is disturbed by the appearance of a mark on the back of his hand. Upon seeing this mark, Impa, the nurse of Princess Zelda, tells him the story of how, ages ago, the King of Hyrule had hidden a third part of the Triforce, the Triforce of Courage, in the Great Palace to safeguard it from evil.

Upon the death of the king, his son had searched for the missing Triforce, but its location had been imparted only to the king's daughter, Princess Zelda. Angered upon learning this, the Prince tried to use the power of a Magician to force the truth from his sister. After she refused, the wizard casted a spell upon her to put her into a deep sleep, which caused the wizard to die soon after. Only by uniting the Triforce of Courage with its counterparts, Link would be able to awake the sleeping Princess Zelda. Upon hearing this tale, Link receives from Impa six crystals that serve as keys to open the seal on the Great Palace.

As Link learns all of this, the minions of Ganon begin to attack once again. Believing that they could revive their master by pouring the blood of Link over his ashes, they begin to spread across the land, seeking for him. Eventually, Link is able to gain the Triforce of Courage. Uniting the three Triforces, Link returns to the Northern Palace to wake the slumbering Zelda.

Gameplay
The Adventure of Link was the sequel to the highly acclaimed, and the second Zelda game released. Like its predecessor, The Adventure of Link features dungeons that must be located in the overworld. Inside them, Link can find a boss and an item that will prove useful. However, the game features many and very significant gameplay changes from the previous installment.

Combat is restricted to the Sword and Shield. The main projectile weapon is the Sword Beam, which can only be used when Link has full health. The game also lacks recovery Hearts, meaning that Link can only recover his health by leveling up, using the Life Magic, finding Fairies or Heart Containers, or by talking to some women in towns.

Screen Interface
The game features a more prominent use of a side-scrolling perspective, which is used when Link is exploring a town, cavern, secret open field, bridge, or dungeon. The top-view perspective is only used when moving though the overworld. In addition, when an enemy group (represented in the overworld map as black-colored creatures) manages to make contact with Link, the perspective changes to a side-scrolling one, where Link must either defeat the enemies or flee.

Magic Usage
When Link is on a side-scrolling perspective, he is able to use Magic. Each Magic can be used either for attack, defense, or solving puzzles. Each ability consumes a certain amount of Magic Points on Link's Magic Meter, and while their effects are of unlimited time, they automatically cancel after Link reaches a new area. Certain enemies drop Magic Jars that contain Magic Power which replenishes the Magic stock. There are eight Magic Spells in total:


 * Shield: Enemies inflict half of the damage.
 * Jump: Makes Link jump twice as high.
 * Life: Makes Link recover three life points.
 * Fairy: Turns Link into a Fairy, used to reach high places and pass through locked doors.
 * Fire: Makes Link able to shoot fireballs from his Sword (two at a time).
 * Reflect: Allows Link's Shield to counter stronger projectiles.
 * Spell: Turns enemies into Bots.
 * Thunder: Eliminates every enemy in the screen.

Experience
As Link defeats enemies, he gains Experience points. When a certain number of points is reached, Link can increase the level of his health, attack, or Magic up to level 8. The maximum Experience amount that can be reach is 8,000. After leveling all three attributes to their maximun, every time Link accumulates 9,000 points, he receives an extra life. Link can also increse his Experience points by collecting Treasure Bags.

Lives
Link starts with three lives, and when he is defeated, he loses one, afterwards resuming his quest from the same place where he was defeated. Link can increase his life stock by collecting Link Dolls, generally hidden in secret areas or dungeons. When Link loses all his lives, the game is over and the next time he resumes his quest, he will restart from the Northern Palace. However, Link retains everything he has collected.

Item Usage
Link can also collect different items, however, not all of them can be used directly by pressing a button. The Hammer and the Flute are used in the overworld by pressing certain buttons, to which said items are assigned permanently. They can be used to open new ways to new areas, whereas the Boots and the Raft are used for crossing otherwise unreachable areas without the need of a button press. Other items have permanent effects for the side-scrolling perspective. The Candle illuminates darkened caves, the Handy Glove allows Link to break blocks inside dungeons, the Magical Key can open any locked door, and the Cross allows Link to see invisible enemies.

Second Quest
The game also offers a Second Quest after completing it. However, the game is the same, only that the Experience stats, Sword techniques, and Magics learned are retained from the previous playthrough.

Graphics and Audio
The overworld map has a similar visual style to that of the first Zelda game, but more polished and incorporating new elements that reflect the variety of the ecosystems; there is also a clear distinction between the enemy-free paths and the rest of the ground territory (grass, trees, sand, etc.). The side-scrolling visuals are more reminiscent of the platform games for the NES, especially Super Mario Bros.. Also, each dungeon has a different texture and architecture, not like in the original game.

Unlike most other games in the series, none of the music in this game was composed by famed composer Koji Kondo with the exception of the overworld theme, which was partly based off of his original overworld theme. Perhaps for this reason, almost none of the music in this game was brought back in other games. The Temple music, however, has been remixed several times, and can be heard in, and notably returned to the Zelda series as the "Streetpass Battle Theme" of. An alternate slower version of the temple music also serves as the Victory theme. The only other Zelda game to include music from The Adventure of Link is. Since both games contain scenes of Zelda awakening, the music was reused from Adventure of Link. The miniboss music in is also a remix of a song from The Adventure of Link: the Famicom version of the battle theme. The composer of this game is Akito Nakatsuka, who also composed the music for Ice Climbers.

As for sound effects, there are also many differences in the Japanese version. A few examples include different music for the title screen and for when Link encounters an enemy. In the Famicom version, the bosses also roar, and the sound effects are more harsh sounding than in the NES version.

Setting
The Adventure of Link features the largest incarnation of Hyrule in the entire franchise; the only game that can compare to the NES game in this aspect is. Covering two continents and two islands, it features eight towns, which names were later used to name the Sages from ; the first four towns are located in Western Hyrule, the other four in Eastern Hyrule.

Like the first game's incarnation of the land, and unlike that of most of the others, this one is not landlocked, meaning that Link will have to travel overseas to move from one side of Hyrule to the other. Death Mountain, which used to be north, is now in the southwestern zone, and it is been now explored further, as it is now a complex rocky labyrinth.

Timeline Placement
Both this game and the first are linked in continuity, since the first game revolves around retrieving two of the major fragments of the Triforce, and Ganon is fought in order to rescue Princess Zelda; the second game revolves around finding the third major fragment in order to revive an incarnation of Zelda that was sleeping for a very long time, and to impede the revival of Ganon.

In the timeline revealed in Hyrule Historia, The Adventure of Link takes place in the "Downfall" branch after. It is the latest entry in the timeline that has its roots in Ocarina of Time, and starts with. After Ganon is defeated again in A Link to the Past, the, and , Hyrule then entered The Golden Era, in which the wise Hyrule monarchs used the Triforce to govern the land. After the last king's death and the attempt of the Prince of Hyrule to assemble the complete Triforce, Hyrule was lead into the Era of Decline. The Prince of Darkness Ganon was revived, leading to the events of The Legend of Zelda, but ultimately defeated by Link. The events of The Adventure of Link take place a few years later, but refer back to the Princess Zelda that was put under a sleeping spell at the beginning of the Era of Decline.

Sales
The Adventure of Link was commercially successful, selling 4.38 million copies worldwide and being the fifth best-selling Nintendo Entertainment System game of all time; however, it sold less than its predecessor, which sold 6.51 million copies.

Reviews
In terms of critical reception, IGN reviewer Lucas M. Thomas gave the Virtual Console version a score of 8.5/10, encouraging players to give it a try and forget about the common belief that it is a "bad game"; he praised the sound, the gameplay, the length and the presentation, but admitted that the graphics "did not age very well". Kristian Reed from Eurogamer, when reviewing the Game Boy Advance version, justified the game being underrated, saying that the game was "an ill-fated experiment", and that it aged "badly". When reviewing, Game Observer editor Jacob Crites cited The Adventure of Link as one of the black sheep in the series, along with , and Spirit Tracks itself.

The original version earned a score of 36/40 from Famitsu, and was placed 110th on Nintendo Power's Top 200 best Nintendo games of all time (however, in the December 2009 Issue, they changed their mind and placed it last in their list of best The Legend of Zelda games).

Fan Reception
Years after its release, The Adventure of Link has received positive feedback among fans of the franchise. It currently holds an average reader score of 9.4 at IGN, as well as a current average user score of 8.0 in GameSpot.

Ports and Remakes
In 2003, Nintendo released a bundle for the GameCube which included, a disc which featured, amongst other games, The Adventure of Link. A port for the Game Boy Advance for the "Classic NES Series" was also released.

The Adventure of Link has also been released for download on the Wii's. The game became available on August 31, 2011 as one of the games eligible for free download over the Virtual Console as part of the Nintendo 3DS Ambassador Program, a service available to players who bought a 3DS before its price dropped on August 11, 2011. It was officially released in the US on November 22, 2013.

Legacy
Despite featuring many radical changes from the previous Zelda title, the game also offered canonical elements to be part of the series' standards. It contributed largely to the overall storyline and gameplay of the series. For instance:
 * The ability of Ganon to be revived/return after defeat/death.
 * The introduction of the Triforce of Courage.
 * The first appearance of Dark Link.
 * A magic system, even though it was never used so excessively after this game.
 * The introduction of several new enemies and one boss (aside from Dark Link) that return in later games, such as the Iron Knuckle and Volvagia (called Barba in the original English release).
 * The ability to learn new moves (though still limited to only two). More generally, the existence of distinct sword techniques at all, as opposed to the single forward strike of.
 * The world of Hyrule became significantly larger. The overworld of no other Zelda title can be considered this large, with this many towns and this many different environments.
 * The Sages in Ocarina of Time are named after the towns in this game (in-game chronology, however, indicates the opposite: The towns were named after the Sages).
 * The need to do tasks outside the main mission Quest like having to save a trophy or finding medicine for a sick child.
 * This is the first game where Link shapeshifts (into a Fairy) as well the first game where the process is voluntary and beneficial.
 * Contrary to popular belief, this is not the only Zelda game to feature side-scrolling gameplay. It is used briefly in the first game when taking secret passages. It is also used in the Game Boy games, the Oracle series, and in when taking underground paths, as well as certain boss fights.
 * Bosses have their own battle theme. They lacked it entirely in the first game.
 * This is the first game where villages and towns appear.
 * This is the first appearance of an adult Link in the series. Link is officially sixteen in this game.
 * All of the dungeons in this game are known by the word for temple in Japanese, and this naming convention is reused in English as well as Japanese and most other languages in some other entries in the series, like Ocarina of Time. The English localization of this game changed it to palace due to Nintendo of America's then-current policy concerning religious references in games.
 * Certain recurring types of item, such as the hammer and boots.
 * The suggestion of romantic interest between Link and Zelda, as implied by the ending.

Trivia

 * Although the Japanese title for The Adventure of Link uses the English name of The Legend of Zelda, and the game's backstory explicitly defines The Legend of Zelda as a plot concept, the English language game is the only one in the main series not to include The Legend of Zelda in its title.
 * The Adventure of Link marks one of the few times where Link speaks in a canon game, by saying "I found a mirror under the table" while in Saria Town.
 * The Adventure of Link is the only The Legend of Zelda game where bosses do not drop Heart Containers upon being defeated. It is also the only game where Link does not receive key quest items for completing dungeons, as he instead goes through the dungeons in order to place his key quest items within them.
 * The Famicom Disk System version of the game uses the infamous "Gannon" spelling in the intro, as well as other typos such as "Tryforce." This intro was largely re-written in the North American release.
 * Ganon's laugh when appearing at the game over screen is used in the NES game Punch Out!!, being Soda Popinski's laugh.