Nintendo of America has brought together a number of acclaimed developers such as Shigeru Miyamoto, Takeshi Tezuka, and Koji Kondo, to talk about the original The Legend of Zelda on the Nintendo Entertainment System. The developers fondly reminisce about the ground breaking game’s development and the NES. Here’s what you need to know:
- Miyamoto was inspired by the Indiana Jones films when working on The Legend of Zelda
- He was looking to bring that sense of adventure to a video game
- Miyamoto noted that the popularity of computer RPGs also sparked his desire to create The Legend of Zelda
- The initial goal was to make an adventure game based on treasure-hunting
Legend of Zelda development began before Super Mario Bros., even though that came out first - The two games were worked on at the same time
- All Kondo had to go on for creating the cave music was a note from Tezuka that said “short BGM”
- The note given for the Fairy Fountain sound effects were “fanfare, sparkly”
- Kondo wasn’t sure what to use for the title crawl music
- He was using Ravel’s Bolero for quite some time, but learned it was under copyright
- The copyright had one more month until it expired, but the dev team felt they couldn’t wait that long to release the game
- Kondo ended up pulling an all-nighter to compose the opening song
- Kondo ended up reworking the main theme while playing into a title song, making it sound more epic
- Miyamoto wanted players to check out the instruction booklet for game details and tips, which is why Link holds up a sign that says “Please look up the manual for details.” in the opening crawl
- Miyamoto felt the instruction booklet was important to convey the game’s atmosphere
- Miyamoto found it more fun to not use tips/hints to play the game
- “It’s a secret to everybody” was written by Miyamoto
- Miyamoto says the Molblin that says this could be turning his back on his comrades, which is why he says this line
- He also says the line could appeal to the player, telling them to keep the rupees secret from friends/family
- Miyamoto says the name rupee was more inspired by the cute-sounding name, and meant to mimic ruby gems
- Japanese packaging used “The Hyrule Fantasy” subtitle to convey the game’s world of swords and sorcery
- The devs hoped The Legend of Zelda would continue as a series, so they intended to call that series The Hyrule Fantasy
- That subtitle may have been dropped to avoid looking like copycats with the Final Fantasy series
- Miyamoto says that the NES means “competition” to him, says its important in competition to put forth the best possible performance within certain conditions for the NES Baseball game, Miyamoto was the game designer, handling the athletes’ poses and moves
- Miyamoto is a big fan of baseball
- Kondo says he owes his ability to write all kinds of music today to the NES
- Tezuka thinks of the NES as a magic box; a single device, but by changing cartridges, you can play something different
Zelda <3
To think that iconic music hung on whether they wanted to wait a month to release the game.
In the original days of the NES, I had no interest in The Legend Of Zelda. I used to think it looked stupid when I saw pictures of it in Nintendo Power magazine. So, it wasn’t until YEARS later when I finally played the original (which was on the promotional Gamecube Zelda Collection game). It took some time to get into, but I ended up loving it. But was disappointed at the simplistic ending. To this day, I STILL never played more than a few minutes of Zelda II, Adventure Of Link.
My very first Zelda experience was A Link To The Past on SNES. My mom rented it for me at Blockbuster Video. I grew more and more addicted to it. I kept re-renting it over and over. Until my parents bought me a complete copy of it, and it was MINE. Thus, my forever love for the Zelda series began. I’m just SO glad that I gave A Link To The Past a chance.
I remember the day the original Zelda came out. My Dad bought it for me and my brothers. However he said the game was probably too dificult for me, and to let my two older brothers play the game first. Well, he was right, the game was too difficult. But not for me, for my older brothers. They could not get into it and lost interest. But the game clicked for me and I beat it after a 3 day marathon. Still to this day one of my favorite games.
So much love for Zelda. Been on the adventure since a lil Tot playing on NES.
By the time BotW comes out I’ll be all but caught up. Just missing one game experience. Skyward Sword.
Skyward Sword is fantastic. I hated the idea of motion control in a Zelda game, but gave SS a shot anyways. I’ve played through the game twice since then. The second time through you get to play it on hero mode which honestly makes the game alot more challenging and fun. I like the idea of double damage and no hearts in the wild… You actually grow quite fond of the motion control believe it or not. Its the only game besides Wii Sports where I actually LIKE the motion controls… Go figure.
I rather enjoy all that motion control stuff. I’ll admit, I bought into the Wii rather late into its life cycle. So I didn’t really get to experience the large library of game’s. But, what’s sad is there are many game’s on Wii I STILL want to play. Red steel 2, no more hero’s 2, legend of Zelda: SS, among others.
But yeah, Wii had plenty of gem’s, sadly I missed a handful of em’. 😵
Skyward Sword & Red Steel 2 are definite buys if you want to experience true motion control using swords.
Yeah, I’m a big fan of Suda 51, Killer 7 is one of my top 5 fav. Games. The first game was some what hard to get down, but fun overall. And yeah I’ve looked in to the others. eBay’s got some good deals on both.
I first discovered the loz franchise from playing melee. I just liked using link so much that my friend told me about his origin. He then let me borrow his copy of oracle of seasons and I played it every chance I could until I beat it. I loved the game so much that I asked him if he had anymore loz game. He did, so he gave me links awakening dx. I played the crap out of it and beat it. From then on the franchise had my attention. To this day I own every main game in the series and is my favorite game series of all time. Big thanks to all those involved in the creation of this wonderful franchise.
My first Zelda game was Ocarina of Time. Freaking love that game! Got me into video games in general and is the reason Zelda is now my favorite franchise. Admittedly tho i was too young to play that game when it came out. (I was born in 99) I should have started with Wind Waker but my family was always a bit late on getting new consoles at the time. Funnily enough tho, Wind Waker is my favorite Zelda game. I loved the original and the HD remake is even better! I do think BotW will surpass it finally tho, that game looks SO GOOD!!
||In our world there is nothing called late, we only require that you buy…||
My first Zelda was Majora’s Mask after a friend brought it over one time. It was like nothing I ever played before, and I wanted more (until I got to Ikana Canyon, got face-humped by a Gibdo and got so freaked out I turned the game off and gave it back, never to play again- I was 9 at the time). I never finished the game until 9 years later when it came out on Wii Virtual Console, and it’s one of my absolute favorite games of all time, and no other Zelda has gotten close to topping it.
May we continue to see Zelda retain its greatness for many, many more years.
The first Zelda I played was A Link to the Past but since I was so young I don’t understand how to progress in the game. Then years later when I played Ocarina of Time that is when I started to like the series. Majora Mask played part makin me like more Zelda. And now it is part of my two favorite franchises of Nintendo (Metroid is the other favorite).
So The Hyrule Fantasy was originally intended to be the name of the franchise? That’s intriguing. Never knew that before.
I always thought it was intended for just one use. Kind of interesting if that had gone on to be the name of the franchise as originally intended.
So glad they didn’t wait for that copyright of that song to run out. Otherwise, I honestly don’t think Zelda’s music would be nearly as iconic as it is today since the original theme it used wasn’t even made especially for Zelda and was something made years before.
Anyway, Ocarina of Time was my first Zelda. I’ve had a strong connection to Link, the Hero of Time, ever since. I long for the day we get to see the Hero of Time in action again some day. It’d be awesome if it’s ever revealed he became a time traveler some time many years after Majora’s Mask & that the Hero’s Shade was simply Link using magic to hide the fact he was still alive. But I digress. Let’s hope we see another 30 years of Zelda!
I believe there was a theory that stated that OoT/MM Link is the stalfos/ghost soldier that teaches Link the advanced techniques (like the Mortal Blow) in Twilight Princess. Unless that’s the Hero’s
*Hero’s Shade you were talking about.
Damn phone cutting me off.
It’s not a theory as Hyrule Historia confirmed the Hero’s Shade in Twilight Princess was the Hero of Time when it released years ago. If you don’t own the book, I highly recommend you find & buy it. It’s a good little read & helps the official timeline make a lot more sense. If half of the people bitching about the official timeline had actually gotten Hyrule Historia, maybe there wouldn’t be as many people against it as there are.
Hmmm… perhaps it best behooves me to acquire a copy then. If I hadn’t already made my holiday wish list, I would add that to it.
And this was released how many years ago? Imagine what Hyrule Historia 2.0 will contain when that comes out after Breath of the Wild and several other entries.
It was originally published back in… December of 2011.