Gaming Target - Game Boy: The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past

Written by Tim McGrew on September 25, 2002

First Impressions: 10 years ago, we fell in love. Now, we can fall in love all over again!

Years ago, almost a decade to be exact, the Super Nintendo was in the hands of most gamers across the world and a single game encapsulated us into a world of magic, mystery, and mayhem. Although that sounds terribly clichщ, that's exactly what it was, but the world had a name, Hyrule; and the land had a villain, Mandrag Ganon; and the world knew of only one hero, an elven boy that was sent to save us all. His name was Link.

Today, after so many sequels on both handhelds and consoles, Link returns to us in a classic manner that is both welcome and anticipated by all Zelda fans. Tentatively titled The Legend of Zelda, Link returns to us in a renewal of the classic SNES Zelda game, A Link to the Past, for the Gameboy Advance. However, this time around the Zelda series will make a return to not only retell a great story for a new audience, but also to present an entirely new feature never before seen in any Zelda title to date: multiplayer.

A decade is a long time and people tend to forget, but the aspects of the game that made this Zelda adventure so appealing in the first place still remain. The gameplay is classic, even perfect if one were so inclined to say such things. The design of the game comes from a time when they were made simply to play. The stories themselves weren't exactly poetry and Ganon wasn't exactly the most hated villain in gaming history, but the game itself begged to be played for the sake of playing. You didn't advance to the next temple because the FMV told you to do so, you did it because it was just plain fun. The puzzles were challenging, the designs of the levels were colorful and interesting, and the areas you traversed were actually worth being in for the sake of exploration. You wanted to know what everyone in the town thought of you and what you were doing as well as what they could offer you in exchange for helping them out. It was the little things that made it worth revisiting time and time again for every little hidden element and secret you could get your grubby paws on.

For this GBA adventure, the game itself is ported over from the SNES exactly as it was with a few changes here and there to make up for the 2 missing buttons on the GBA, as well as the wider screen on the GBA. Although this should make the title worth purchasing already, the game does come with an array of extras that will please all Zelda fans. The most exciting of these features is a long awaited multiplayer mode.

Present in the Legend of Zelda is an all new adventure titled The Four Swords where up to four people can connect through GBA link cables and move through several dungeons while completing a number of puzzles that require both skill and teamwork to move beyond. However, the goal of the game is changing into one of greed where each player's simple task is to collect as many rupees as they can inside the dungeon.

Although collecting rupees doesn't sound like the most appealing aspect of a Zelda game, completing this objective is half the battle. Each player can virtually kill the other with their swords and moves by knocking them off bridges, bumping them into spikes, or even throwing them into pits, no player who falls is penalized for it other than the fact that you are pushed to the beginning of the room limiting your chances to collect as many rupees as possible.

For the most part, this makes the multiplayer aspects challenging, but where the competition becomes heated, the teamwork also becomes a factor of the overall experience. At times, all four players will have to work together to overcome a variety of puzzles. A large block that can only be moved by all four players is but one example of how teamwork will be a requirement in this game. The teamwork aspect of the game is refreshing and the factors for winning the game create a mix of both cooperation and hatred between yourselves and your friends. I can only imagine the exchange of words across the room as each player with a GBA argues with the other over completing tasks while another player knocks them both into a pit with their sword.