The Legend of Zelda (video game)

The Legend of Zelda
Developer(s)	Nintendo EAD
Publisher(s)	Nintendo
Release date	Famicom Disk System: February 21, 1986 Nintendo Entertainment System: August 22, 1987 1987 February 19, 1994 (Famicom) Game Boy Advance: February 14, 2004 June 2, 2004 July 9, 2004 Virtual Console (Wii): November 19, 2006 December 2, 2006 December 7, 2006 December 8, 2006 Nintendo 3DS Ambassador Program: August 31, 2011 August 31, 2011 September 1, 2011 September 1, 2011 Virtual Console (Nintendo 3DS): December 22, 2011 April 12, 2012 April 12, 2012 July 5, 2012 Virtual Console (Wii U): August 28, 2013 August 29, 2013 August 29, 2013 August 29, 2013
Genre(s)	Action-adventure
Console(s)	Nintendo Entertainment System Game Boy Advance Virtual Console (Wii, Wii U, 3DS)

The Legend of Zelda is the first video game of The Legend of Zelda series. It was first released in Japan, as a launch title of the Famicom Disk System peripheral in 1986. A year later, in 1987, the game saw an overseas release on the Nintendo Entertainment System, and is played from a gold cartridge. The Legend of Zelda is the first home console title with an internal battery for saving game data.

At its time of release, The Legend of Zelda was noted for its expansive, nonlinear open world gameplay. It would eventually be regarded as one of the greatest and most influential video games of all time, selling over 6.5 million copies since its release. A much different sequel for the same system, Zelda II: The Adventure of Link, was first released in Japan less than a year later. The Legend of Zelda would eventually spawn more successive titles and spin-offs and become one of Nintendo's most popular and beloved franchises.

Plot

The story, as told from the opening intro

The story of The Legend of Zelda is described in the instruction booklet and in the short prologue after the title screen.

During an age of chaos, a small kingdom of Hyrule is invaded by an army led by Ganon, who steal the Triforce of Power. Ganon (initially spelled as "Gannon" in-game, which is fixed in later revisions), nicknamed the "Prince of Darkness", sought the three pieces of the Triforce to rule over the world with fear and darkness. Fearing his rule, Princess Zelda split the Triforce of Wisdom into eight fragments and hid them around the kingdom. She then commanded her trustworthy nursemaid, Impa, to find someone with the courage to fight Ganon and his forces. Ganon finds out about her plan, so he angrily imprisons Zelda and sends his minions to search for Impa.

Impa fled from Ganon's troops, through forests and mountains. Sometime during her escape, Impa loses all of her energy and gets cornered by Ganon's troops. She is saved by a young hero named Link, whom she retells the whole story of Zelda and Ganon to. Link decides to go on a journey to rescue Zelda and recover each fragment of the Triforce of Wisdom, with he can use to defeat Ganon.

During the course of the tale, Link locates and braves the eight underworld labyrinths, each containing a guardian monster, and retrieves a fragment from each one. With the completed Triforce of Wisdom, Link is able to infiltrate Ganon's hideout in Death Mountain, where he confronts Ganon and destroys him with the Silver Arrow. Link recovers the Triforce of Power from Ganon's ashes, and he returns both the Triforce of Power and the Triforce of Wisdom to the rescued Princess Zelda, allowing peace to return into Hyrule.

Gameplay

Link exploring the Overworld (left) and the Level-3 dungeon (right).

The Legend of Zelda is notable for incorporating elements from the action, adventure, and role-playing genres. From a top-down perspective, the player can move Link around the Overworld, a large outdoor map with various environments. Link starts his adventure only equipped with a small shield, but he can enter a nearby cave and obtain a sword from the Old Man. Throughout his adventure, Link is aided by several characters who give or sell equipment and clues to him; these characters are found in caves scattered throughout the land. Some are easily accessible, and others are hidden beneath obstacles such as rocks, trees, and waterfalls. The Overworld is divided into sections, and a few enemies spawn in nearly every part of the map. Link must either battle or avoid them as he searches for entrances to large dungeons.

There are nine dungeons, each consisting of a maze which is individually separated into rooms, which are connected by doors and secret passages. The paths are usually closed off, and can only be opened if Link defeats every enemy in the room, or by moving blocks around. There are some unique items that Link can obtain within the dungeon, such as a boomerang. A boss often appears inside a dungeon, and must be defeated by Link to recover a piece of the Triforce of Wisdom.

The Legend of Zelda is also noted for its flexibility, so the player can decide on the order that they complete the dungeons. However, the dungeons steadily increase in difficulty by number, and a few dungeon entrances from the Overworld can only be entered by using items that are obtained in previous locations.

After completing the game a first time, the player unlocks a harder mode known as the Second Quest. It is essentially a harder version of the first mode, featuring entirely different dungeons, relocated items, and stronger enemies. The Overworld remains largely unchanged except for the relocation of the dungeon entrances.

Characters

Playable character

Sprite	Name	Description
	Link	The main protagonist and playable character of the game. He embarks on a journey to stop Ganon and his forces.

Supporting characters

Sprite	Name	Description
	Fairy	A helpful magical creature that can restore Link's health by contact if dropped from an enemy, or through a heart-giving spell at fountains.
	Hungry Goriya	A guard in some dungeons that can be bribed with food.
	Impa	Although she does not appear in the game herself, Impa is mentioned in the instruction booklet, as Zelda's most trustworthy nursemaid, of whom Zelda sends out to find someone to take on Ganon and his forces, later found to be Link.
	Little old woman	Old women have various roles. One, if given a letter, will sell Link Water of Life. Other ones give advice if given a certain amount of money.
	Merchant	Various sellers of items found in various locations throughout the game, some hidden.
	Old man	Old men also have various roles. One in the beginning gives Link his sword. In dungeons, they look slightly different and give Link advice, and will have their torches shoot fireballs at Link if he attacks them. In the overworld, one gives Link a letter to give to an old woman. Other ones can be found operating gambling games. Certain hidden ones will demand Link pay them for destroying the door to their hiding spot, which is done automatically, except for two in a dungeon in the second quest, which will give Link the option to either pay with Rupees or permanent loss of a Heart Container.
	Princess Zelda	Zelda is the princess of Hyrule, and has been kidnapped by Ganon prior to the game's events. She has also scattered the eight pieces of the Triforce of Wisdom around the map. She is rescued by Link at the end of the game.
	Secret Moblin	Hidden Moblins that give Link Rupees if he discovers their hiding places, telling him to keep it a secret.

Enemies

Sprite	Name	Description
	Armos	Statues that come to life and run around when touched.
	Bubble	Floating, burning skulls that flash various colors. Touching them causes Link to be cursed into not being able to us his sword for a time. In the second quest, there are solid red ones that curse Link indefinitely, until he touches a solid blue one.
	Darknut	Knight enemies with blocking shields that must be attacked from the side. They come in orange and blue.
	Gel	Small slimes that move one tile at a time, and typically share their colors with the dungeon wall, though some are black to blend in in dark rooms.
	Ghini	Ghosts that come out of gravestones infinitely when they are touched.
	Gibdo	Mummies that can visibly carry items such as bombs and keys.
	Goriya	Boomerang-throwing canines that come in red and blue.
	Keese	Bats that fly around the screen erratically. They are typically blue, though they appear black in some darker dungeons to blend in with unlit rooms. When a Vire is defeated, it splits into two red-colored ones which act the same.
	Lanmola	Segmented centipedes that move erratically around the room, and are typically found in pairs. To defeat them, the various segments must be destroyed. They come in orange and blue.
	Leever	Spinning, burrowing plants found in sandy areas. They come in red and blue.
	Like Like	A tube-shaped enemy that will eat Link if touched, irrevocably stealing his Magical Shield if he is carrying one.
	Lynel	Tough lion-like centaurs that can shoot sword beams. They are found in mountainous areas and come in red and blue.
	Moblin	Spear-throwing bulldog enemies found in forests. They come in orange and teal.
	Moldorm	Segmented worms that live in sandy rooms in dungeons, and snake around the rooms. Their segments must be destroyed to defeat them.
	Octorok	Simple octopus enemies that spit rocks, found throughout the overworld. They come in red and blue.
	Patra	A blue flying eye surrounded by circling smaller orange flying eyes it can manipulate in various ways. Defeating the blue one defeats the entire group.
	Peahat	Flying flower enemies that can only be attacked when landing.
	Pols Voice	Durable rabbit ghosts that are week to the Famicom Disk System's microphone, and arrows in Western releases. They share Link's palette.
	Rope	Snakes that will charge at Link if they see him and are on the same x- or y-coordinate. There are also stronger ones flashing various colors in the second quest.
	Stalfos	Skeletons that walk slowly around dungeon rooms. In the second quest, they can shoot powerful sword beams.
	Tektite	Hopping spiders that come in orange and blue.
	Vire	Hopping demons that split into two red Keeses upon defeat.
	Wallmaster	Hands that emerge from walls, sending Link back to the dungeon's entrance room if they grab him.
	Wizzrobe	Powerful wizards that shoot magic. The orange ones slowly warp around the room between magic blasts, and the blue ones move forward constantly and can warp across the room rapidly to surprise or evade Link.
	Zol	Large slimes that split into two Gels upon defeat. Like Gels, their color is typically shared with the dungeon's own walls, but black in some darker ones.
	Zora	Territorial fish-people that spit fireballs before hiding back under the water.

Obstacles

Sprite	Name	Description
	Rock	Simple boulders that fall from mountains to their bases.
	Stone Statue	Gargoyles that typically act as decoration, but in some cases shoot fireballs in Link's direction.
	Trap	Invincible spined mechanisms that slide quickly at Link when he crosses their x- or y-coordinates.

Bosses and mini-bosses

Sprite	Name	Description
	Aquamentus	A dragon-unicorn that can spit three fireballs at a time. The horn is the weak spot.
	Dodongo	A tough-skinned creature resembling a Triceratops or a rhinoceros that can be defeated by either feeding it multiple bombs directly, or stunning it with a bomb and then hitting it with a sword. Later in the game, several appear as generic enemies, often multiple at ones.
	Manhandla	A four-headed Piranha Plant that can move and shoot fireballs from each head. Each must be defeated individually to destroy the whole plant.
	Gleeok	A multiple-headed dragon, ach of which can shoot fireballs. After a head is defeated, it will turn red and start flying around, still able to shoot fire. Once all heads are detached, the creature will be defeated.
	Digdogger	A large sea urchin that shrivels up into a small, defeatable state when Link plays the recorder in it, though sometimes it additionally splits into multiple smaller versions.
	Gohma	A large, cycloptic, fire-shooting arthropod that comes in red and blue. In both cases, its eye is weak to arrows when it opens.
	Ganon	The main antagonist, he warps around the room while invisible and shooting fire. After damaging him enough, he becomes visible to Silver Arrows, which will defeat him by turning him into dust.

Items

This section is a stub. You can help Triforce Wiki by expanding it.

These are items that cannot be used from the Inventory:

Sprite	Name	Description
	Clock	Permanently freezes every enemy that is currently on-screen.
	Heart	These items restore missing portions of Link's health.
	Container Heart
	Rupy	Rupees are the currency used in game. A blue Rupee, named 5 Rupies, is at the value of five Rupees. They are called "rubies" by the manual and "Rupies" by the game's item list.
	Triforce fragment

These are items that can be used from the Inventory:

Sprite	Name	Description
	2nd Potion
	Blue Candle
	Book of Magic
	Food
	Letter
	Life Potion
	Recorder
	Red Candle

These are items and objects that help or allow Link to access different locations. They cannot be assigned from the Inventory:

Sprite	Name	Description
	Compass
	Key
	Magical Key
	Map
	Raft
	Stepladder

Weapons

Weapons can be assigned to the B button from the Inventory.

Sprite	Name	Description
	Arrow
	Bomb
	Boomerang
	Bow
	Magical Boomerang
	Magical Rod
	Silver Arrow

Equipment

Unlike weapons or items, these are automatically assigned to Link; some are later replaced:

Sprite	Name	Description
	Blue Ring
	Magical Shield
	Magical Sword
	Power Bracelet
	Red Ring
	Sword
	White Sword
	Wooden Shield

Locations

Overworld

The Overworld is the hub location of the game. Aside from labyrinths, some other locations appear from the overworld itself:

• Cave
• Fairy Fountain
• Graveyard
• Lost Hills
• Lost Woods
• Main screen
• Spectacle Rock

While technically not a location, Link can play the Money Making Game from a few of the caves.

Levels

Every level takes place in a labyrinth:

• Level-1: Eagle (Second Quest)
• Level-2: Moon (Second Quest)
• Level-3: Manji (Second Quest)
• Level-4: Snake (Second Quest)
• Level-5: Lizard (Second Quest)
• Level-6: Dragon (Second Quest)
• Level-7: Demon (Second Quest)
• Level-8: Lion (Second Quest)
• Level-9: Death Mountain (Second Quest)

Development

The Legend of Zelda was developed and directed by Shigeru Miyamto and Takashi Tezuka. Miyamoto produced the game and Tezuka produced both the story and script. The manual's backstory was written by Keiji Terui, whose writing was inspired by conflicts in medieval Europe.

The Legend of Zelda began development in 1984, at the same time as Super Mario Bros., which had a largely similar development team. The ideas were separated between both games, for instance, how Super Mario Bros. had linear gameplay contrasting with The Legend of Zelda's open world exploration. According to Miyamoto, those in Japan were confused and had trouble finding their way through the multi-path dungeons, and in initial game designs, the player would start with the sword already in their inventory. Rather than merely simplifying matters for players, Miyamoto forced the player to listen to the Old Man who gives his their sword, and he encouraged interaction among people to share ideas on finding various hidden secrets, a new form of gaming communication. Many years later, this concept was used as the root of the Animal Crossing series.

With The Legend of Zelda, Miyamoto wanted to flesh out the idea of a game "world" even further, giving players a "miniature garden that they can put inside their drawer." He drew his inspiration from his experiences as a boy around Kyoto, where he explored nearby fields, woods, and caves, always trying through Zelda titles to impart players some sense of that limitless wonder he felt through unknown exploration.

Early concepts of the game involved technological elements, with microchips for the Triforce made of electronic circuits and a time-travelling protagonist. While the final game follows a traditional heroic fantasy setting, subsequent games in the series have incorporated some technology based concepts.

The five music tracks were composed by Koji Kondo. The orchestral piece Boléro was originally planned as the title theme, but Kondo was forced to change it late in the development cycle after learning that the song's copyright had not yet expired. As a result, Kondo wrote a new arrangement of the overworld theme within one day, which has become an iconic motive echoing throughout continued entries of the series.

Release

In February 1986, Nintendo released The Legend of Zelda as a launch title on the Famicom add-on, the Famicom Disk System peripheral. It made full use of the Disk Card media's advantages over traditional ROM cartridges, with an increased size of 128 kilobytes which would be expensive to produce on cartridge format.

However, due to the disk space's limitations, all of the text was only sourced from the katakana alphabet. Players could save their progress by using rewritable disks rather than using a password system that many other games had. The Famicom Disk System utilized an additional sound channel for certain sound effects, such as Link's sword beam at full health, the roars and growls of dungeon bosses, and those of defeated enemies. The sound effects had to be altered for the eventual cartridge release, which used the Famicom's PCM channel.

When Nintendo published the game in North America, the packaging design featured a small portion of the box cut away to reveal the unique gold-colored cartridge. The cartridge made use of the Memory Management Controller chip (specifically the MMC1 model), which could use bank-switching to allow for larger games than had previously been possible. This release was notable for being the first cartridge-based game to utilize battery-powered RAM that allowed players to save their progress.

From the success of magazines in Japan, Nintendo knew that game tips were a valued asset. Players enjoyed the bimonthly Nintendo Fun Club newsletter's crossword puzzles and jokes, but game secrets were most valued. The Fun Club drew kids in by offering tips for the more complicated games, especially Zelda, with its hidden rooms, secret keys and passageways. The mailing list grew. By early 1988, there were over a million Fun Club members, which led Minoru Arakawa to start the Nintendo Power magazine.

Alternate versions and re-releases

• 1986 - Original release on the Famicom Disk System (Japan)
• 1987 - Original release on the Nintendo Entertainment System (North America/Europe/Australia)
• 1994 - Back-ported on a Famicom cartridge and renamed to The Hyrule Fantasy: The Legend of Zelda 1 (Japan)
• 1995/1996 - A remake, titled BS Zelda no Densetsu, was broadcast for the Satellaview add-on of the Super Nintendo in four episodic, weekly installments.
• 2001 - The original game is unlockable in Animal Crossing for the Nintendo GameCube. It is one of the Forbidden Four, and cannot be accessed in-game without a cheating device.
• 2003 - The original game is one of the four full games on The Legend of Zelda: Collector's Edition
• 2004 - Ported onto the Game Boy Advance as part of the Classic NES Series
• 2006 - Ported as one of the first Virtual Console titles on the Wii
• 2008 - Available as a Masterpiece on Super Smash Bros. Brawl
• 2011/2012 - Ported on select Nintendo 3DS units as an Ambassador Program title, and later became more widely available with a Virtual Console release in 2012 (December 2011 in Japan).
• 2013 - Ported on the Wii U as a downloadable Virtual Console title
• 2014 - Also appears as a Masterpiece on Super Smash Bros. for Wii U
• 2016 - Released as one of the 30 games included on the NES Classic Edition and its Japanese counterpart, Nintendo Classic Mini: Family Computer.
• 2018 - Included as a playable title on the Nintendo Switch Online service. A "special save data" version was later released, where the player starts the game with more items and Rupees.

Names in other languages

Language	Name	Meaning
Japanese	ゼルダの伝説 Za Hairaru Fantajī Zeruda no Densetsu

External links

• The Legend of Zelda on Wikipedia