“Where the Legend Began: Our Earliest Zelda Memories”
10 min read
Nearly everyone remembers the first time they experienced a Zelda game. So we asked our writers a simple question: “What are some of your earliest Zelda memories?”
Unfortunately my first Zelda memory isn’t a happy one. When I got my SNES, I didn’t really play any games I had never heard of. Lots of terrible licensed games mixed among a few Marios. My best friend, excited to share some of her favorites, brought her family’s copy of Link to the Past and popped it in. I’d only ever played platformers, so I had no idea what I was looking at and, unfortunately, I was not allowed to start a new game. All the save files were taken and her family would be upset if any of them were cleared. So I roamed around for a few minutes, thoroughly lost and confused, and decided “No, these ‘Zelda’ games aren’t for me.”
Luckily I never stated that out loud, so when my parents surprised me with an N64, they’d also got Ocarina of Time and, wisely, a strategy guide. At first, I was resistant. I hadn’t liked the one I’d tried at all. So my dad said, “Okay, I’ll play it,” and I sat with him while he died thirteen times to the first three Deku Scrubs (after we’d had to go to the guide to find the Kokiri Sword.) I don’t remember what it was that changed my mind in those first few minutes. Surely the difficulty he had should have made me go “Nope, I was right, not for me.” But, well, it was Ocarina of Time. I was pulled in. In due time, Ganondorf was sealed away, again and again, and a new love was born in spite of a rough beginning.
My earliest Legend of Zelda memory is a little fuzzy, but I think it was around 1988 when I played the original Legend of Zelda for the first time. I remember it being in an electronics store in the mall, maybe a Babbages (the predecessor to GameStop), and there it was! There was an NES hooked up to a display promoting the game, and there was a line to play it…a long line!
I later got the game for Christmas and really enjoyed it, but I was never able to pass the 4th dungeon. It was around that time that my dad subscribed to Nintendo Power magazine and got an issue that ran me through the whole game! I’m not sure that I would ever complete a single NES game if it wasn’t for that magazine.
If we’re talking about The Legend of Zelda as a whole, then my very first memory was when I was five years old, returning home after a half-day spent at kindergarten on Friday afternoons. I’d get my snack, sit in front of the ol’ 24” Toshiba CRT and wait for The Super Mario Bros. Super Show to start so that I could watch The Legend of Zelda cartoon featuring the most annoying of Links haha.
With respect to the games, the first Legend of Zelda entry I played was the black sheep of the family: Zelda II – The Adventure of Link. I was introduced to this game from one of the first friends I made in my new neighbourhood back when I was six and a half. Despite being the odd one out of the whole series, its Action-RPG and side-scrolling elements, as opposed to the traditional top-down views and multiple items to solve puzzles, made me fall in love with the game.
I remember struggling a lot with this game, but I learned a ton about perseverance and tenacity through constant hours of playing this title. I also credit this title for being the sole reason I ended up loving the high fantasy genre of writing. Zelda II and the series overall is what made me the writer I am today.
My first memory of a Zelda game was hearing the opening theme of Ocarina of Time when I was over at my best friend’s house, and he started up a new game. It may seem cliche, but that music and those sounds from the home menu informed me that this was something special.
The first Zelda game I actually played all the way through was Link’s Awakening DX on the Game Boy, and that was a very wise choice in retrospect. It served as a great introduction to the series and all of its hallmarks: exploration, gradually expanding your capabilities with new equipment, puzzles and dungeons, and boss fights. Finding Pieces of Heart and all those blasted seashells became an obsession! The story was a bit out there (who knew that hallucinogenic-dream-inducing whales resided in spotted eggs atop mountain peaks?) but I was so engrossed that I didn’t question it. I loved it and I’ve gone on to love many more titles in this iconic franchise.
Sunlight pouring through the windows and glaring off the desk at my friend’s house as we played Zelda on the NES. (How could we see what we were doing on the screen? Kids’ eyesight must be something else! Oh to see with the eyes of a little kid again…) There we went, into the cave again; the dungeon; the next screen over. Bombing every wall, pushing every statue, burning every bush. The sword upgrades are what I remember most clearly, and the way the dungeon maps gradually took shape as we explored. I think we must have died a lot–I certainly do when I replay it now–but strangely enough, as much of a sore loser as I was, I don’t really remember that now.
When I made another friend at school who played Zelda, we started writing stories together. We’d come up the premise at lunch, elaborate it at recess, and write it in the afternoons. The teacher would let us go on a computer set up in the hall. We’d take turns on the keyboard, just as if we were passing the controller back and forth, writing our derivative fan fictions–but after all we were only in second grade! And more and more kids would come and gather around, suggesting plotlines and adjectives, giving advice on spelling, or just looking for an excuse to get out of class. I wonder if I could find any of those old stories. I think they must still be somewhere on a floppy disk.
When I was a kid, my mom always took me to some electronics place where I could take any game and exchange it for another used one for just $5. It was a great way for me to play a whole bunch of different games and not have to worry about rental periods. One day I brought one of my Game Boy carts (probably a TMNT title) and decided to try this mysterious game called The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening. At the time I didn’t have any gaming magazines whatsoever so I always went in blind. Oh, how this game changed my life.
Link’s Awakening was the first game I played that had such an open explorable world, a deep story, and chararacters that I cared about. I spent so many hours on it and when I finally finished the adventure it had me feeling emotions I had not felt before with a game. The bitter sweet ending of having to say goodbye to all the characters is something that has stayed with me all my life. It not only became my favorite Zelda, but my favorite video game ever!
One of the earliest memories I can think of is watching my dad play The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. I wasn’t very good at games at a very young age so I found a lot of joy in watching gameplay. I’d typically just boot the game just to see the opening, but I’d never get further than Kokiri Village.
The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker was the first Zelda game that I had affinity towards. I’d play through the first quarter of the game over and over because I didn’t know how to progress, but I never got tired of it. Sometimes I’d just use my imagination and run through dungeons again even though I’ve already completed them. I’d go to school and write short stories on those experiences as a kid. When I did this, the teacher would ask me if I like to play video games, and I’d say of course!
My first game I played in the Legend of Zelda series was the pack-in promotional disk that came with the GameCube. The Legend of Zelda: Collectors Edition, named due to it collecting games from the NES era through the Nintendo 64 including the original game, The Adventure of Link, Ocarina of Time, and Majora’s Mask with a playable demo of Wind Waker.
I honestly didn’t play much of the games but enjoyed my time with Wind Waker enough to pick it up when I saved enough allowance money. I remember getting lost pretty quickly in Majora’s Mask and not understanding what to do in the NES titles. I recall eventually selling it for 18 dollars at a local GameStop, put the cuffs on me, officer…it said it was not for resale on back. I was 12, give me a break.
The first time I recall seeing a Zelda game is only a vague memory, seeing a friend playing Ocarina of Time while at his house. I don’t recall much of it except for him showing off the effects of some of the ocarina songs – I thought it was neat, but not having an N64 myself, it probably seemed to my sixth-grader brain that it was too big a thing to really enjoy in shorter, spread-out sessions, the way I could with Mario games.
It is, however, remarkably similar to the starker Zelda memory in my mind. Flash forward to high school and my cousin showing off Wind Waker, once again pointing to its magical music as a selling point. Considering I was a band geek (well, more accurately an orchestra dork, it was strings all the way for me!), it was an exceptionally effective tactic to at least draw my interest, but this time I had a GameCube of my own to really dig into it. I was intrigued enough by what I saw to give it a shot myself.
Suffice it to say that while I did find the music magical for more than just its effects in-game, it drew me in for so many more reasons. Sailing the Great Sea, the puzzles, the swordplay – I was captivated, hook, line, and sinker. Opinions on following entries have ebbed and flowed – I loved Twilight Princess, was meh on Skyward Sword, and somewhere in the middle with Breath of the Wild – but a new one on the horizon never fails to invoke that sense of breathless adventure.
-Linguistic Dragon
Two immediate memories come to mind. The first revolves around the original NES classic. My parents had gone to a video store to grab the family a film for the night, which is a very old-fashioned sentence that makes me feel about a hundred years old. They returned with a handful of NES games the video store was in the process of selling for cheap, as they were making room for hip new SNES games. The golden gleam of one cart stood out from the rest. My 7-yr old brain had no idea of the ensuing hours adventure that lay before me. From the moment the Intro’s Items List kept scrolling and scrolling, giving you an idea of just how much STUFF there was to discover, I realized I’d walked into something epic.I have no recollection of what VHS tape was rented that night, but I’ll never forget the Legend of Zelda.
Flash forward to my early teens, and a friend lent me a copy of their Link’s Awakening to take on vacation. I had zero idea how quirky the characters, story, and general vibe of the game was. The mystery of Kokolint Isle drew me in, and despite having sunny weather and theme parks to explore, I kept finding myself excited to get back to the hotel so I could uncover further secrets. The combo of intriguing story, killer soundtrack, and adorable graphics (plus some Mario characters thrown in, to boot!) made for a treasured playthrough. To this day, Link’s Awakening remains a personal Top 10 favorite game of all time.
The bubble gum incident. I was a pretty wily child and knew how to get out of responsibilities and scholastic obligations. I once put bubble gum in my hair in order to stay home so I could play The Legend of Zelda. That was my plan, at least. All I got out of it was a botched haircut, but the memory underscores the impact that the original had on me.
As I recall, it wasn’t the first game I enjoyed… but it was the game that caused me to fall in love with games. The vast open world (it felt vast at the time) represented an endlessly enticing map of adventure. It’s a trite story, and it’s hard to say anything about the first game that hasn’t already been said, but nonetheless it is my story. I don’t know what relationship I would have with video games today had it not been for Legend of Zelda.
Red formerly ran The Well-Red Mage and now serves The Pixels as founder, writer, editor, streamer, and podcaster. He has undertaken a seemingly endless crusade to talk about the games themselves in the midst of a culture obsessed with the latest controversy, scandal, and news cycle about harassment, toxicity, and negativity. Pick out his feathered cap on Mage Cast podcast, on Twitter @thewellredmage, or on Twitch at /thewellredmage.
Some fun memories here, and why am I not surprised that Red pulled a bubblegum stunt?
My reputation precedes me, I see haha