DGC Ep 057: Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (part four)

Dev Game Club

Welcome to the fourth and final episode in our series exploring SNES classic The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past. We discuss the end of the game, finding nooks and crannies, various difficulties, and then quickly cover our takeaways. Dev Game Club looks at classic video games and plays through them over several episodes, providing commentary.

Sections played: Through the end of the game!

Podcast breakdown: 0:35 Segment 1: Finishing Zelda 46:48 Break 47:22 Segment 2: Takeaways, Feedback 1:10:28 Aw Jeez

Issues covered: Brett's loop, using a walkthrough to find the pieces of heart, Tim playing less cautiously due to save state style, Brett fills in Tim on bottle locations, lack of systems, sprite and processing limitations, credits sequence, Brett's dungeon strategy, visual language problems, low cost of failure and encouraging exploration, finding multiple solutions, Brett wonders how you build a thing like Zelda, GDC talk on BotW, taking space to iterate on a game and add moments, planning and serendipity, critical path and not, usability costs, "it's a sword game," boss descriptions, finding the super bomb, aesthetic cracks, opt-in hints from the Sage, "It's.... Zelda...", overworld, progression structure and lenses, exploration and discovery, differences with Metroid progression, powering up, Swiss Army knife, learning rule sets, playground banter, taking sea changes seriously, differences with Western action-adventure, skill-based gameplay with adventure vs exploration, timelines vs legends, making it hard and OCD, remembering why you got into it in the first place, finishing a project.

Games, people, and influences mentioned or discussed: Final Fantasy IX, Breath of the Wild, Ocarina of Time, Mario series, The Witcher, Nintendo, Shadow of the Colossus, Super Metroid, Nintendo Power, Metroid Prime, Twilight Princess, Majora's Mask, Wind Waker, Beyond Good and Evil, Darksiders (series), Soul Reaver, Tomb Raider, GTA, Spirit Tracks, Link Between Worlds, Ben Zaugg, That Alex Guy, cam_dax, Kotaku Splitscreen, Republic Commando, Spider-Man 2, segosa, blarg9538, Barbie's First Surgeon, James Taylor, Beamdog, inXile, Torment: Tides of Numenera, Brian Fargo, Fallout.

Next time: Planescape: Torment - through the mortuary!

@brett_douville, @timlongojr, and @devgameclub [e-mail]