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| The follow-up to The Legend of Zelda diverged from the original significantly! |
Originally developed for the Famicom Disk System in Japan (and released about 7 months before the original Legend of Zelda in the US) The Adventure of Link was a whole different beast than the original. Eventually making its way to the US in December 1988, Zelda II would introduce several new gameplay aspects to the series. Some, including the 'Magic Meter' and the Dark Link character would see use in later Zelda games, however others including Experience Points and Multiple Lives. Zelda II is famous for being the 'only' Zelda game with side-scrolling portions, however this is not exactly the case as some of the Gameboy Zelda games would reuse this concept.
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| A screenshot from the Zelda II Overworld |
Zelda II borrowed the 'overworld' idea from Role-Playing games of the era (Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest, etc.) and plays very similar to another great NES game - Faxanadu (a side-quest from Xanadu/Dragon Slayer, an RPG series nearly exclusive to Japan with Faxanadu being one of the only releases outside of Japan).
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| A screenshot from Zelda II's side-scrolling portions - here he finds the sleeping (original) Princess Zelda for the first time. |
Zelda II was the most popular NES game of 1988 and would eventually go on to surpass all other NES games (save the Super Mario Bros. trilogy and the original Legend of Zelda) in sales. The game has since been ported to the GameCube (in the The Legend of Zelda: Collectors Edition) and later to the Game Boy Advance (as part of the NES Classics series) and has been released on the Virtual Consoles of the Wii, 3DS and Wii U.
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