i never owned zelda2 when i was younger. my first experience of playing it was at a cousin’s house and the game was already in progress. so i’ve never really played the game from the beginning until now.

i can’t say that i’m too much of a fan of this zelda. here’s my problems with it…
the gameplay itself is not very fun. part of the problem is the difficulty of the battles. some of the opponents are needlessly difficult to defeat. i’m okay with a challenge, but the difficulty is a bit too unbalanced in this game. if defeated opponents dropped a heart of health from time to time it’d do wonders to balance out the game (like in zelda1). the only saving grace the game has to balance out the difficulty is unlimited continues.

the random encounters suck and aren’t even that useful for gaining experience. on the same topic, i preferred how zelda1 progressed the player without the need of gaining levels. basically, by continuing to increase health and getting stronger items, link became more powerful. that model seemed to fit zelda better. i’m not against the action rpg model…i just don’t think it worked well with zelda2. secret of mana is a good example of it working.

the npc towns are fairly pointless. also the graphics disappoint me quite a bit. everything just looks kind of cheesy. i realize that this is an NES game, but there’s games like metroid & castlevania that have more detailed and vibrant graphics than this game does.

i’m not disliking the game just because it’s a departure from zelda1. i think zelda2 could have been successful as a side-scroller, but i do not believe this game achieved that.

maybe if i had owned the game when i was younger and played it extensively back then i’d have fond memories of it now.