Here's mine:
Here's the deal: The Adventure of Link is the most hated (or least loved) Zelda game out there. Among the people who dislike TAoL there are roughly two categories:
1.) There are those who think TAoL is a horrible, immensely frustrating and failed Zelda game. I'll have a hard time convincing those.
2.) There are those who just think TAoL is immensely frustrating, but want to like it. For those people there is hope. I shall provide that hope.
But first, I will sum up some of the arguments people from the first group usually bring up when you ask them why they hate TAoL.
- The game is ridiculously hard. Even with 3 lives will you “Game Over” a LOT.
- The music is annoying & repetitive
- The graphics & textures are ugly
- Side-scrolling battles & dungeons for Zelda suck
- Saving is an issue, and you always end back up in the North Palace
That’s the basics. The only two things I really agree with is the first and the last. Since the game is so hard, you WILL die a lot, and losing experience points and always having to start back at the North Palace can get quite frustrating.
My theory, however, is that most people find fault with most things in the game simply because of its ridiculous difficulty level. Granted, if those Palaces are killing you, you will probably not fancy the Palace Theme. Granted, if you have to keep running around in the same area to try and level up, you will get quite annoyed with the graphics & textures. And if you’re a traditionalist, or just annoyed with the game altogether, you’ll complain about the side-scrolling.
All of this is not necessary. TAoL, imho, is a great game. A game worthy of being called “Zelda II”. For no other game comes close to the entrancing difficulty level of the first LoZ. It is a true yet original sequel. The side-scrolling battle/dungeon gameplay works a charm, and is truly refreshing. The way you encounter enemies on the overworld as well. People are always complaining too many things stay the same throughout the Zelda series, yet they disregard TAoL. I’d vote for a sequel for TAoL. Not necessarily story-wise, or in the same part of Hyrule, but at least gameplay-wise. TAoL is the most RPG-ish Zelda around, and deserves to be recognized as the original title that it is.
I promised you reasons to start appreciating this game more. Since my theory is that most people take the hardcore difficulty level to be TAoL’s primary fault, I’m here to give you a few tips which will make life in Northern Hyrule much, much easier for all you adventurers. I, too, started out a frustrated soul who died every 2 minutes. I, too, had to learn things the hard way. But I pulled through. By now I’ve beaten TAoL some 10 times, half of which without any Game Overs. You wanted to learn the ropes? Here you go.
1.) Level up to at least level 3 for all 3 stats before you even enter the first Palace. Be at level 6 to enter the third Palace. This will take some backtracking. Levelling up at Death Mountain is your best bet.
2.) How to level up, you say? I usually prefer the wood areas with the “big” enemies. That’s 2 times 10 experience points. Every 20 enemies of a kind you beat or so, you have a chance that they drop a P-bag worth 50 experience points. Also, those galloping soldiers who steal 10 experience points when you touch them, will occasionally drop a 50 P-bag. Be sure to have your hearts at maximum, so you can easily shoot sword beams at them. Since they will keep coming, this is a good way to wait and be lucky to get a 50 P-bag. If you find this too boring or risky you could always just keep killing blobs in the grassy areas. They only give 2 experience points, but there are 5 per screen, and they, like any other enemies, occasionally drop 50 P-bags as well.
3.) Attack > Life > Magic. You really want to be able to finish off all those nasty Darknuts and such with LESS than 3 hits. Make sure your Attack level is highest, especially before entering a dungeon.
4.) Time your levelling. Being under one thousand experience points short of levelling up is a good idea when you enter a new Palace. If you do it right, you should level up over halfway through the dungeon, giving you a free Heart or Magic refill.
5.) Get all Magic Jars, Heart Containers, Extra Live dolls and P-bags as soon as you can. Your live depends on it.
6.) Golden Palace Rule: never place any crystal at the end of palace. Why? This instantly levels you up, which is total rip-off in the beginning of the game. My hallowed trick: wait until you are completely (or partly) at level 8, and then go back to all the Palaces – they should be a breeze by now – and place those crystals to instantly get levelled up to those final 8000 experience points, and, what this trick is all about, get AN EXTRA LIFE. Yes, after you get at level 8 for Attack, Magic & Life, getting to the new goal of 9000 experience points will get you an extra life. That’s why you want to wait until you’ve done all (or nearly all) of the levelling yourself, so you can claim at least 4 extra lives.
7.) Red Magic Potions part 1. In the game there are quite a lot of Red (Magic) Potions available for you. Either an enemy drops them, or you can slash them out of a mock-Darknut statue, or you can slash them out of a mock-horsehead on the wall. Try it everywhere. I’ve noted most of these locations myself, and I can tell you they are lifesavers. A given are the potions in the mock-Darknut statues at the beginning of each Palace (except the first). Use them immediately. If you are not fully healed, exit the Palace, enter, and it will be back. This is VERY useful, also when beating enemies on the overworld close to the Palace.
8.) Red Magic Potions part 2. Whenever you get a Red Magic Potion, immediately heal yourself up, cast the Shield spell, and any other spells that you might be able to use in the screen you are in. THEN pick up the Potion.
9.) Darknut-tip: you can ALWAYS hit them when you jump towards them and strike just before you hit the ground. The downside is you’ll be screwed in the very low corridors. Try to move away from them when facing enemies such as the Darknuts.
10.) Magic orb tip: you know these annoying flying orbs which bounce around in each Palace? You can kill them, but it requires a LOT of hits, even when you’re at level 8 it’s still more than 5. But it does give you 50 experience points… This is a good thing to do especially when you’ve got the upwards stab. Take advantage of the fact that the orbs, when hit, will be frozen for a while, so you can easily deal a barrage. Time is seldom something to worry about, so take them out! Only don’t do it in a room which is infested with galloping foot soldiers… You’ll pay. Dearly. [/experience]
11.) Bosses. A pain in the ***, the lot of them. Except that axe-wielding giant. That one’s easy to time. In general: be patient. Await your turn. And oh, DO make sure you’re fully powered up before fighting a boss… Overconfidence is the last thing you need in TAoL. [/experience]
12.) In dungeons, you often meet up with blue blobs. Sometimes they even get dropped out of a "dispenser". Every 6 or 7 times you kill a blob, you'll get a small Blue Magic Potion. The trick: exit the screen (you don't even need to go all the way over to the next screen most of the times), and kill the blue blobs again and again until your magic, and consequently life, is maxed out again. This can take some minutes, but your life often depends on it. Even the Great Palace has loads of blue blobs you can use for this trick. And that's a place you DON'T want to walk around in with heavily reduced life or magic.
13.) There are places on the overworld where you will automatically get into a side-scrolling battle. There is a way to avoid 95% of them. How? You must walk around in an enemy region and wait until those 3 enemy figures start moving around on the map. The trick is to walk into an enemy just when he's situated on the screen that normally held one of those "automatic side-scrolling battles" I mentioned. You will get into a normal battle now. If you exit the battle screen, you should be on the spot that normally forced you into an automatic battle. You can now proceed without having done it.
This is particularly interesting for the two forced battles leading up to Darunia in the NW of Eastern Hyrule, and for the battles just after the black "River Devil" in the South. You can only skip two of the three trials there, but unlike near Darunia, you won't even have to face any enemies at all, because the road there is plain orange, which means road, and no enemies.
14.) The latter is a trick in itself, because you will NEVER have to fight enemies on the road, even when you DO happen to bump into an enemy on the road of the overworld. Road = guaranteed safety...
That’s about all I can think of right now. If there are any more things you want to ask, or contribute yourself, please do. And everyone is feel to discuss his/her liking or not-liking of TAoL here, I don’t mind if you hate it. This thread is here to try and persuade people to see it as the unique Zelda game that it is, with many good traits. Many of which I think are worthy to return in a future instalment even.
