I conquered Koholint island finally! I really enjoyed my time playing Link’s Awakening. I can’t believe they fit a whole Legend of Zelda game on Gameboy! I really enjoyed it
I ended up getting stuck trying to get the bird key. I could not figure out how to get the flying rooster. I tried bombing the weather cock, lifting the weather cock, pulling, using the hook shot, using the magic rod, digging every tile in mabe village, getting the boomerang, giving back the boomerang, tried every key item I could think of. I ended up beating level 8 before level 7. I even made this map of the entire game in google sheets to try to figure it out.
Tap for spoiler
Turns out you can just push the statue
Oh well, I don’t count it as time waste. If anything else it was a great excuse to keep playing. I’ve never played a 3D Zelda before so I am looking forward to OoT
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One of my favourite games, it was a very impressive title for the Game Boy at the time. It had an interesting development story, it started as a Game Boy port of Link to the Past, developed in off hours as a sort of passion project.
I remember having to download a text file guide, with dungeon layouts drawn in ASCII art, to get through a couple of the tricky bits.
The Switch port is worth checking out too, the graphical style is adorable.
Oh man. I had forgotten about those text guides we used to use for games. Those were invaluable, and IMO, better than YouTube walkthroughs of today.
Congrats - Links Awakening is truly a masterpiece and yes, they really worked hard to get a whole Zelda onto the GB.
I’ve never played a 3D Zelda before so I am looking forward to OoT
In case you go the emulation route and don’t use the version on Nintendo Switch Online (or a virtual console version on older Nintendo consoles), you should also take a look at Ship Of Harkinian. They decompiled OoT and ported it to run natively on several platforms. In contrast to other versions, you can play it in wide-screen, with unlocked framerate (instead of 14-20fps of the original) and you can also enable several QoL features (everything optional). You only need to provide a ROM file, but in case you plan to go the emulation route, you’d need that anyways…
How cool, I think I’ll have to take a look at this. I have never played OoT either (was a PS1 kid, and always jealous of my friends N64). This seems like a fun way to experience it today.
I’ve always wanted to know this from someone who beat the game for their first time as a grown adult:
I beat the game when I was 10-ish and the sad ending hit me so hard that even today hearing that end credit song makes me feel morose. I used to think it was because of what a masterpiece the game always was and how masterfully they’ve made that ending, but was it just because I was too young? How does that ending hit to an adult?
I was actually left feeling like Link was something of the villain of Link’s Awakening. The monsters are only fighting for their own survival because they know everyone will cease their existence if Link wakes the Wind Fish. The bitter sweet ending as Link remembers the villagers before the dream fades away.
The game sets up Marin as such a sweet character with a sweet relationship to Link and ambitions to leave the island. It is saddening knowing she fades away at the end of the game.
I choose to interpret the fact that Marin and Tarin completely go missing after she leaves Animal Village signifies that maybe the dream is falling apart toward the end of the game and that they were never “real” in the first place.
Despite being “illusions”, dreams and the memories of them feelings can still have impact and evoke emotions from us. The ending hits me the same way a dream of seeing a long lost loved one again does or the way a dream of an sweet experience of someone who never even existed does.
You should try for the secret ending then.
This is a great question. Nothing like a good end of Link’s Awakening cry.
Finished the Switch remaster a couple years ago and the ending hit me with a wave of existentialism. I’m kinda glad I played as an adult, I don’t think I would’ve been emotionally developed enough as a kid to appreciate it
I haven’t had much time to dedicate to it, but I’ve been playing this for the first time as well.
The only Zelda game I’ve played before has been Link to the Past. It’s been very enjoyable so far, especially for a Gameboy game! I’m in the palace with the Pegasus boots and I got the boss key, but I’m short one of the regular keys, so I got pissy and stopped for now.
Posting on Superbowl so much means I get the Koholint owl posted back at me regularly, so I decided it was finally time to check it out.
Link’s Awakening (especially the first GB version) is an amazing feat.
They could have made it simple, but they didn’t, they extracted the essence of a Link to the Past (which was really the game that, if not invented, really codified the whole series) and they reproduced the experience as faithfully as they could on an incredibly limited device, just two years after it.
Also, it’s fun, creative as fuck, and has great dungeon design.
My first game I ever found a glitch in! Pre internet, I opened my map right as I was moving to a new area, and it put me on the opposite side I should have been on! I wish I knew the programming behind that glitch.
I’ve been really impressed so far. I’m going to have to try it with a physical controller, I’m not used to mobile gaming, so especially using the screen for the dpad makes it feel kinda clunky.
Design wise and what they were able to accomplish is quite impressive. It looks beautiful and is giving me about the same quality of experience as LttP.
Lucky you, time to move on to Oracle of Ages and Oracle of Seasons, the best 2D Zelda games in my opinion.
I love the QoL improvements of those games, but I do love the small intimate story of LA a bit more. Don’t get me wrong, I adore the Subrosians, adorable nerds, but the little seagull at the end of LA gets me every time. You’re not a traditional hero in LA.
I’d love if you all would leave a hint or a message on the map I created, if you have the time. I think it’d be something really cool to share with new players, and it would make the hours I spent taking screenshots trying to figure out were Marin was feel less wasted (I was convinced she had something to do with the flying rooster)
At least it sounds like the weather cock had a good time.
For real though, great work. I played through the original Link’s Awakening on Gameboy when I was but a wee lad, and have played through various re-releases. It’s a blast every time.
Have you played the Switch remake as well? I’m wondering if it is worth playing the original. I actually like Gameboy graphics, but the music is hard to get used to.
I haven’t played the switch version so I have no idea how it compares. From what I’ve seen it plays pretty close to the original
Such a great game. Eagle tower was really hard as a kid. Always took me forever.
I needed the guide book as a kid - I wasn’t even able to get past the third dungeon without it, I think…
![[Link's Awakening]Another Zelda game down!](https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/3e5a3f7a-2671-46e7-b30f-bd492ea42ce3.png){kind=link}