Game Review: The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past

The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past is a game developed and published by Nintendo for its Super Nintendo Entertainment System. It was the third in the The Legend of Zelda series, was released in 1991 in Japan, 1992 in North America and Europe, and received a total sales record of over 4 million copies.

The game presents itself as an action-adventure role-playing game, with a plot combining elements from both a classic chivalric romance and a world-saving epic. At the beginning, the player-controlled protagonist, Link, wakes up on a rainy night as he receives a telepathic message from the Princess of his land, Zelda, calling him to save her from her castle's dungeons. By responding to the call, Link will then go on to defeat first a wizard that seems to be the source of evil, and then, quite unsurprisingly, the dark lord that manipulates him from behind. The game's graphics, music, and mechanics all attempt to revolve around this plot.

The graphics of The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past is a standard conception of a world of an adventure game. The roads and village buildings are yellow, the grasses, bushes, and trees green, with a sharp contrast to the more dangerous areas, the gray dungeons and the red volcanos. A sharp contrast is built between safety and danger. There are no abnormalities.

More controversially, the music of A Link to the Past, combined with some of its mechanics, communicate the game's vision of what an adventure game should be like. When Link is out on the road exploring, the background melody is a bright march, contrasting one's expectations of a more peaceful piece. An obvious reason for this is that the game puts enemies not only in dungeons, but also along the paths to them; in this setting, Link must be prepared to fight anytime and anywhere. The continuous presence of danger does not allow for tranquil music.

Building on that, we may suggest that the game makes Link's adventure in the game a perpetual one: from the moment he steps out of his house on that rainy night, he is pushed to march unstoppably from destination to destination, not allowed to rest until he has defeated the dark lord – the feature of voluntary rest is, indeed, not built into the game. This might all sound very heroic, but not requiring rest is apparently impossible for Link as a human being. And there comes the problem if we take Link to be the ideal hero: does the making of a hero unavoidably involves the losing parts of humanness?

We can easily find more evidence for our doubt from the narration of the game's plot. From the very start, when Link receives the telepathic calling from Zelda, he does not question at all, and immediately rushes to the princess's rescue through her directions, without so much as a sword and a shield – those would only later be given to him by his uncle, mortally wounded on the same mission. Setting the convenience of the plot aside, would a human being risk everything for a stranger's cause just because he is asked to do so? Some might reference Link as the descendent of the protectors of his land, and hence he is obliged to do so – but he knows none of that and never asks. He simply disregards his life and future without questioning.

Starting from the calling Link initially receives, commands and facts are thrown at him as he proceeds with his quest. He seldom ends a quest without being told with imperative sentences what his next quest is and where it is located. Sometimes he is given explanations of his actions, but they are no more than pieces of facts that are practically meaningless. But it's more than that – the interactivity of the game directly shoots those same commands and facts through the screen, at us players. And we, unlike Link, have the freedom to ask ourselves, "Why am I doing this?", "Why should I trust him/her?", "What is in the job for me?" And we will realize how Link is a complete tool from the beginning.

After Link gets out of bed at the beginning of the game, he is not again allowed to rest by his own will. He obeys all orders, whether it is from Zelda, the sanctuary priest, or the son of a village elder. And needless to say, he wins every battle – or he has to, in order to progress the story. Looking at all this, a few questions arise: Is it possible for us to envision ourselves as a hero of a classic adventure game? Can our protagonists become heroes in other ways? How has our definition of "hero" changed, and how does that show in the games we are making?

Some would look at my above analysis and say that it is overreaching, that my observations are but minor details that do not deserve such a fuss. This can be so, but for one thing, it is exactly these seemingly inconsequential characteristics that tells us what a game, and we, take for granted. For another thing, they are no longer unimportant. Over the years, we have begun to expand on who we would call a "hero", and that change is starting to materialize in the video games we produce. Consequently, particulars that I have observed are being taken seriously and given their own significance.

Take a look at The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, where resting is a crucial part of every character's experience in the world, where it serves as a source of health regeneration, as a way to quickly past time when that blacksmith around the corner closes for the day, and as necessary triggers to certain plots and quests. Moreover, high levels of freedom and frequent verbal exchanges gives players and characters the opportunity of doubting what they are told, asking for a motive, staying silent, musing things over, and acting on decision. That priest you must obey in A Link to the Past? You can kill him on the spot. A mention to the side to Octopath Traveler, where there are no instructions nor hints for all side quests, many of which having more than one possible outcome. We will have to proceed solely on our own judgment – something we have done countless times in real life. Our definition of our adventure-game heroes are indeed changing, in the direction of how we function in our society.

We can say that it is decades of technological development that brought us all these brand new ways of being a "hero", which would have been impossible back in the times of A Link to the Past. But I do not think that can overshadow the broadening of our perception in what we can call "heroes". We have decided to give them what ourselves need: freedom of thought and decision, sufficient, logical explanation and reasoning, and of course, time to sleep. That is a breakthrough in our vision, not in game engines.

I want to end with a perhaps far-fetched, but often taken-for-granted point: the series is called The Legend of Zelda, and although I definitely see good reasons as to why that is, Zelda has not done a thing. Why not The Legend of Link? Perhaps it is because the name Link, and the young man bearing the name, can be functionally replaced by anyone with his abilities. He, as a man, does not matter.

Works Cited

Miyamoto, Shigeru and Takashi Tezuka. The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past. Nintendo. 1991.

Lafferty, Craig; Cherig, Ashley and Todd Howard. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. Bethesda Game Studios. 2011.

Asano, Tomoya; Takahashi, Masashi and Keisuke Miyauchi. Octopath Traveler. Square Enix Business, Division 11, and Acquire. 2018.