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It bothers me that Nintendo keeps ignoring Link's Awakening.

ReyVGM

ReyVGM

Member
LinksAwakening-1.jpg


In my opinion, Zelda: Link's Awakening is the most fun and emotional Zelda game ever made (don't get me started on that sad ending... ), followed closely by Majora's Mask. However, I know a lot of 'casuals' have mostly played the most popular Zelda games (LttP & OoT) and think those ones are the best. So, let's use that line of thinking to say then that Link's Awakening has to be 3rd best Zelda game, and still Nintendo acts like it doesn't exist when it comes to referencing it in other games.

I mean, look at this beauty:

linksawakening-3.png

Source: Jeremy Parish

Missed opportunities:

1- In Majora's Mask, I was so excited when I heard that the Indigo-Go's (the Zora band) were going to play the "Ballad of the Wind Fish". Turns out they just played some other soulless crap and stole that name from Link's Awakening.

2- In the Smash Bros. series, there's barely a mention of a Link's Awakening character, level or music. Even the black sheep of the series (Zelda 2) has a level and music from the game. No Tal Tal Heights or Ballad of the Wind Fish arrangement, no Wind Wish trophy or assist. Only a sad Marin trophy is available, maybe as a consolation prize. I know there was a Tal Tal Heights arrangement that went unused in Brawl, but I don't know if it was actually found by ripping from the disc or what.
Hopefully the 3DS and WiiU Smash has something from Link's Awakening, either by unlocking it or by DLC.

3- In Hyrule Warriors, they're acting like the Chain Chomp weapon is original. Listen here Nintendo, that's no chump chain. That's Bow motherfuckin' Bow from Link's Awakening. Learn your history and name it properly.

linksawakening-2.png


*edit*
JazzmanZ mention that the Hryule Warriors direct mentioned the Chain Chomp was indeed taken from Link's Awakening. Although I don't know why they didn't use the Bow Bow name.
 
M

maxcriden

Member
It's an amazing, immersive and creative game, one of Nintendo's best (and their first superb handheld game IIRC). I agree that it's too bad we don't see the game get much love from Nintendo these days explicitly, but pretty much same thing with the Oracle games and MC. The 3D entries just have a cache and familiarity amongst players that the handheld entries don't have in the same way.
 
J

JazzmanZ

Member
ReyVGM said:
3- In Hyrule Warriors, they're acting like the Chain Chomp weapon is original. Listen here Nintendo, that's no chump chain. That's Bow motherfuckin' Bow from Link's Awakening. Learn your history and name it properly.

linksawakening-2.png
Click to expand...

um...in the Nintendo direct that had hyrule warriors they specifically mentioned the Ball and chain was taken from Bow wow in Links awakening.

in fact: http://www.nintendo.com/nintendo-direct/08-04-2014/#/video-ndirect right there at 16:20
 
DryvBy

DryvBy

Member
It truly is my favorite Zelda game, closely followed by Majora's Mask. Link's Awakening is just magic.
 
G

Grizzo

Member
I always thought that Bow was a chain-chomp, what with all the other references to the Mario series in Link's Awakening (the goombas, the pirahna plant, that Yoshi doll, Tarin...).

Maybe that's why they called it a chain-chomp in Hyrule Warriors? Is it called that way?

But otherwise I agree with you, Link's Awakening is a masterpiece and one hell of a game that is still pleasant to go through once in a while to this day (like every other Zelda game in the series actually). It deserves some more recognition from Nintendo.
 
ReyVGM

ReyVGM

Member
JazzmanZ said:
um...in the Nintendo direct that had hyrule warriors they specifically mentioned the Ball and chain was taken from Bow wow in Links awakening.

in fact: http://www.nintendo.com/nintendo-direct/08-04-2014/#/video-ndirect right there at 16:20
Click to expand...

You're right. Does Hyrule Warrior acknowledge that too?

McDougles said:
Why are you trying your damned best to make me disagree with you?
Click to expand...

Haha. Admit it. Leave the dark side and come to the good side that knows Link's Awakening is superior.
 
O

OrbitalBeard

Member
Nintendo has handled Link's Awakening just fine. It was re-released in color on the GBC and was the premiere launch title for the VC on 3DS. It's a great game and one of my favorites of all time. Not really sure what else Nintendo needs to do with it.
 
IrishNinja

IrishNinja

Member
Shockhog said:
It's available on 3DS VC, which is more than you can say for a lot of Nintendo's hidden gems.
Click to expand...

yeah, i love the crap out of Link's Awakening, but this was my first thought as well - its release early on the 3DS VC was a blessing at the time, too
 
ReyVGM

ReyVGM

Member
OrbitalBeard said:
Nintendo has handled Link's Awakening just fine. It was re-released in color on the GBC and was the premiere launch title for the VC on 3DS. It's a great game and one of my favorites of all time. Not really sure what else Nintendo needs to do with it.
Click to expand...

My post is about Nintendo not referencing the game (enough) in other games or spinoffs.

Gravijah said:
Tal Tal Heights is used in Brawl. Comes from a CD or maybe a challenge, I can't remember.
Click to expand...

It wasn't used ingame as far as I know? *edit* yes it was.

Maneauleau said:
OP I agree I love this game. If you don't know it you should listen to this classical guitar arrangement of Tal Tal Heights
Click to expand...

Pretty cool yeah!
 
S

ShockingAlberto

Member
They made a big deal about it being the first major 3DS VC release. There was even a part of their E3 conference dedicated to it with "and it will be available right after this show" when it released.
 
O

OrbitalBeard

Member
ReyVGM said:
My post is about Nintendo not referencing the game in other games or spinoffs.
Click to expand...

Not sure why the need to. It's a masterpiece. Let it stand on its own. Nintendo tends to stick with referencing the console games anyway, since they're the most well known.

It's also hard to reference things in a world that no longer exists
 
A

Abdiel

Member
This game is tied with Majora's Mask fire my favorite in the series. I actually whistle the ballad of the wind fish all the time. It's so haunting and beautiful. Game is incredible.
 
G

GiantEnemyGoomba

Member
I need to replay this since I seem to be the only one that doesn't think it's one of the best Zelda games. I dunno, I think Turtle Rock might've soured me on the game, it tried too hard to be some gigantic dungeon and was just no fun at all. I'd put Link's Awakening below all the 3D Zeldas, ALBW, OoA, and MC and rank it about the same as OoS.

It's still an amazing game, just kinda middling as far as Zelda goes.
 
F

fredrancour

Member
OrbitalBeard said:
Not sure why the need to. It's a masterpiece. Let it stand on its own.

It's also hard to reference things in a world that no longer exists
Click to expand...

This is why I assume it's never going to get any direct followups or callbacks. Maybe some easter eggs if there's ever a game where
dreams
are a major subject matter.

I can't really think of any items but bow wow that would even be good for wielding in hw. Canonizing the bomb-arrow glitch would be pretty rad i suppose. And the vengeful shopkeeper would be a hilarious villain or npc.

if they did a HW 2 then they could probably get a good stage out of it, though. The beach or the swamp or something. Areas not present in as many games, or not with that flavor.
 
M

Mak

Member
ReyVGM said:
1- In Majora's Mask, I was so excited when I heard that the Indigo-Go's (the Zora band) were going to play the "Ballad of the Wind Fish". Turns out they just played some other soulless crap and stole that name from Link's Awakening.


linksawakening-2.png
Click to expand...

Link's Awakening got rereleased in 1998 as "The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening DX" for Game Boy and Game Boy Color. This version was released on 3DS Virtual Console in 2011. Oracle of Ages and Seasons by Capcom are prequels to Link's Awakening and based on the game's engine.

Most people miss this because it sounds different, but the "Ballad of the Wind Fish" from Majora's Mask actually is the same song from Link's Awakening but as a slower jazz arrangement. If you listen closely you can hear that it follows the same "path" or sequence. Majora's Mask closes with this song too. It's easier to hear in the Big Band Live arrangment. http://youtu.be/SWjjj-n3J20

Malon, Talon from Ocarina of Time are based on the father and daughter characters from Ocarina of Time, Marin and Tarin. Luigi's counterpart was Ingo in OoT, and also had a version in Link's Awakening as the Rooster/Hen House guy on top of Tal Tal Heights.

http://www.glitterberri.com/ocarina-of-time/1101-interviews/parts-they-want-you-to-see/
Toru Osawa: A father and daughter named Marin and Tarin that were introduced in Link’s Awakening for GameBoy also appeared in this Zelda game. We’re hoping that people who’ve played the Zelda series from the very beginning will recognize them. If you wonder “is this a reference to then?” we’ll be happy.​

Aryll, Link's sister in The Wind Waker, is a reference to Marin and is the reason seagull flock to her, and she has a flower on her dress. Her original name was "Maril"

http://www.glitterberri.com/the-wind-waker/zelda-box/character-commentary/the-secondary-characters/
Aonuma: The reason behind Aryll’s name is that there’s a girl named Marin in Link’s Awakening, and a girl named Malon in Ocarina of Time. It was just an expansion on the idea of having a similarly named character. At first we were calling her Maril, but we eventually toned it down to what it is today.​
 
N

Nickle

Cool Facts: Game of War has been a hit since July 2013
LA is a good game by today's standards, but it's no masterpiece (the same could be said for both the Oracle games). I played LA in 2013 and didn't think it lived up to the hype. I'm curious to see if other people without nostalgia feel the same way.
 
J

JinjoUnchained

Member
LTTP is my favorite game of all time. LA always seemed to me like a more campy, "portable gaming" spin on LTTP. And that's a good thing, I love LA as kind of an alternate take on LTTP. But it's not in the same league as the source material, IMO.

FWIW, I also consider Ocarina to be a spin on LTTP. It's 3D LTTP while LA is portable LTTP.

Mak said:
Aryll, Link's sister in The Wind Waker, is a reference to Marin and is the reason seagull flock to her, and she has a flower on her dress. Her original name was "Maryll"
Click to expand...

Fascinating, I never made that connection. Thanks for sharing.
 
T

Tempesta di Fuoco

Banned
I actually find it to be okay at best. Dungeons were not very spectacular and the world was incredibly annoying to navigate, even when I was a kid. Just not very fun to play.

In my opinion, there wasn't a really good handheld Zelda until A Link Between Worlds. Prior to that, all of the games had annoyingly segmented worlds and stupid obstacles preventing you from really exploring.
 
S

Storm Kyleis

Member
Tal Tal Heights is used in Brawl as one of the tracks in the Pirate Ship stage, it's also returning in Smash Wii U. Ballad of the Wind Fish was originally planned to be included as well.

I don't think there's a problem with Link's Awakening specifically, 2D Zeldas nowadays get less spotlight in general. Look at Oracles of Seasons/Ages and Minish Cap.
 
J

John Bender

Banned
ReyVGM said:
LinksAwakening-1.jpg


In my opinion, Zelda: Link's Awakening is the most fun and emotional Zelda game ever made (don't get me started on that sad ending... ), followed closely by Majora's Mask. However, I know a lot of 'casuals' have mostly played the most popular Zelda games (LttP & OoT) and think those ones are the best. So, let's use that line of thinking to say then that Link's Awakening has to be 3rd best Zelda game, and still Nintendo acts like it doesn't exist when it comes to referencing it in other games.

I mean, look at this beauty:

linksawakening-3.png

Source: Jeremy Parish

Missed opportunities:

1- In Majora's Mask, I was so excited when I heard that the Indigo-Go's (the Zora band) were going to play the "Ballad of the Wind Fish". Turns out they just played some other soulless crap and stole that name from Link's Awakening.

2- In the Smash Bros. series, there's barely a mention of a Link's Awakening character, level or music. Even the black sheep of the series (Zelda 2) has a level and music from the game. No Tal Tal Heights or Ballad of the Wind Fish arrangement, no Wind Wish trophy or assist. Only a sad Marin trophy is available, maybe as a consolation prize. I know there was a Tal Tal Heights arrangement that went unused in Brawl, but I don't know if it was actually found by ripping from the disc or what.
Hopefully the 3DS and WiiU Smash has something from Link's Awakening, either by unlocking it or by DLC.

3- In Hyrule Warriors, they're acting like the Chain Chomp weapon is original. Listen here Nintendo, that's no chump chain. That's Bow motherfuckin' Bow from Link's Awakening. Learn your history and name it properly.

linksawakening-2.png


*edit*
JazzmanZ mention that the Hryule Warriors direct mentioned the Chain Chomp was indeed taken from Link's Awakening. Although I don't know why they didn't use the Bow Bow name.
Click to expand...
YES!

It is the best Zelda ever!
 
ReyVGM

ReyVGM

Member
Mak said:
Most people miss this because it sounds different, but the "Ballad of the Wind Fish" from Majora's Mask actually is the same song from Link's Awakening but in a slowerly jazz arrangement. If you listen closely you can hear that it follows the same "path" or sequence. Majora's Mask closes with this song too. It's easier to hear in the Big Band Live arrangment. http://youtu.be/SWjjj-n3J20
Click to expand...

I honestly do not hear any of it. I've heard the Big Band Live arrangment lots of times and I haven't found where it connects with the one from Link's Awakening.

Malon, Talon (and even Ingo) from Ocarina of Time are based on the father and daughter characters from Ocarina of Time, Marin and Tarin. Luigi counterpart was Ingo in OoT, and also had a version in Link's Awakening as the Rooster/Hen House guy on top of Tal Tal Heights.

http://www.glitterberri.com/ocarina-of-time/1101-interviews/parts-they-want-you-to-see/
Toru Osawa: A father and daughter named Marin and Tarin that were introduced in Link’s Awakening for GameBoy also appeared in this Zelda game. We’re hoping that people who’ve played the Zelda series from the very beginning will recognize them. If you wonder “is this a reference to then?” we’ll be happy.​
Click to expand...

Yep, that one I noticed back then. Although I didn't know if it was intentional.

Aryll, Link's sister in The Wind Waker, is a reference to Marin and is the reason seagull flock to her, and she has a flower on her dress. Her original name was "Maryll"

http://www.glitterberri.com/the-wind-waker/zelda-box/character-commentary/the-secondary-characters/
Aonuma: The reason behind Aryll’s name is that there’s a girl named Marin in Link’s Awakening, and a girl named Malon in Ocarina of Time. It was just an expansion on the idea of having a similarly named character. At first we were calling her Maril, but we eventually toned it down to what it is today.​
Click to expand...

They should have left in that connection. Anything that connects to Link's Awakening is aces.

Storm Kyleis said:
Tal Tal Heights is used in Brawl as one of the tracks in the Pirate Ship stage, it's also returning in Smash Wii U.
Click to expand...

Wait, really? But is it going to be a new one or are they reusing the one from Brawl?
 
K

Krejlooc

Banned
entrement said:
Source
Click to expand...

Zelda: Link's awakening uses a 2 megabit cartridge but the game itself is not 2 megabits big. Common practice for such types of old games is to pad your binary to fill the entire cart size with whatever garbage is left in memory, so that the binary for Link's Awakening is 2 megabit even when the game itself isn't 2 megabit.

Well, when they did this for Link's Awakening DX, it was done on an MS-DOS/Win9x system whose compiler used malloc to produce the garbage to pad the binary. In doing so, it dumped whatever was in memory of the system at the time it compiled as the garbage to pad the binary. The person who did the compiling had the source for the game open on his desktop when malloc was called, thus the garbage data to fill the binary is actually the open source. Meaning if you go through Link's Awakening DX, you can actually see the exposed, uncompiled source code at the end of the binary.

The source presence in Link's Awakening DX is a machine disassembly, you can tell by the labeling of the calls. No human in the world programs like that. Nintendo worked using a disassembly of Link's Awakening to produce Link's Awakening DX. The only reason they would ever do this is if the original source was no longer available. Hence, Nintendo lost the source to the game. Link's Awakening DX was produced like a rom hack.

Example of properly labeled gameboy source code:

Code: 
JoyPort_1:
                 AND $02 ;LEFT
                 JR  NZ, JoyPort_2
                 CALL LEFTScroll
                 RET
JoyPort_2:
                 AND $04 ;UP
                 JR  NZ, JoyPort_3
                 CALL UPScroll
                 RET
JoyPort_3:
                 AND $08 ;DOWN
                 JR  NZ, JoyPort_4
                 CALL DOWNScroll

example of the machine disassembly source code seen in LA DX:

Code: 
L_B000_28F7:
                LD A,$7F
                LD BC,$0800
                LD D,A
                LD HL,$9800
L_B000_2900:
                LD A,D
                LD (HLI),A
                DEC BC
                LD  A,B
                OR  A,C
                JR  NZ,L_B000_2900
                RET
L_B000_2914:
                LD  A,(HLI)
                LD  (DE),A
                INC DE
                DEC BC
                LD  A,B
                OR  A,C
                JR  NZ,L_B000_2914
                RET
 
C

CBTech

Member
Link's Awakening and the Oracle games are the best 2D Zeldas. I will take any of them over A Link To the Past any day. The style, the dungeons, the items, everything about these games is fantastic. I saw a survey a few weeks ago that said less then half of Zelda fans have played these games, so if you haven't played them and love Zelda, please give them a shot.
 
K

Kaldea

Member
100% agreed.

Still my favorite Zelda game. I'm probably one of very few, but I still consider it just as dark and full of life as Majora's Mask. I wish they would do more with it. :(
 
M

Mak

Member
ReyVGM said:
I honestly do not hear any of it. I've heard the Big Band Live arrangment lots of times and I haven't found where it connects with the one from Link's Awakening.
Click to expand...

Big Band Live 0:00 - 0:22
http://youtu.be/SWjjj-n3J20
This is the part where Link is playing the Ocarina to start the song.
LA- http://youtu.be/tffSdWU0n0Y?t=17s

MM - http://youtu.be/SWjjj-n3J20?t=22s 0:23 - 2:02
The instruments appear and the Ballad of the Wind Fish plays.
LA - http://youtu.be/tffSdWU0n0Y?t=26s

The melody ends after 2:02 in the Big Band arrangement from Majora's Mask and plays around with the theme for the rest of the song.
 
S

SigmasonicX

Member
I played through this game a few months ago and while I was impressed by the dialogue, general weirdness, and much of the gameplay, there were agitating aspects like the dialogue that pops up whenever you touch a rock without the gauntlets equipped and that one temple where you have to destroy all the pillars. Still, I like it a lot, and I do feel like not enough people have played it. However, it's available on Virtual Console, I see references to it often enough, and it generally seems like fans are aware that it exists, so I'm not too bothered.
 
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