Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask. N64

Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask

Zelda Rating: 9.0
Difference from Other Zelda's: First Zelda to take a really dark twist, Unique mask collection
Using the Console: No differnce from Ocarina

It's times like these i'm glad i'm not popular, yet, for if i we're i'd be hounded down because i didn't post anything for a week, and I claimed i would do "Zelda Week" and my excuse? I was playing video games and sleeping. Geeze. Oh and eating every now and then. But Lets continue on with ZELDA WEEK!

This game is a doozy, and i mean that in the best way. This game in particular has become quite a Cult hit inside of the Legend of Zelda fanbase, but outside of it, many don't care too much about it, I think. But as you can tell, my 9/10 says that i love this game and too would love a remake, but only time will tell. Now onto the review.

The biggest change from this game from the others is it focuses on Link only, no Zelda what-so-ever (And if you say that Zelda links awakening was his own adventure, that's true, but it was also (SPOLIERS) all just a dream. Also i haven't played that game <- main reason.

So link goes on a quest for his friend, Navi the fairy, and so he goes looking for the little guy in the forest, which forest? We can only assume it's the Lost forest, where if people wander in and get lost, they become monsters. Great place to start right?! So Link is soon attacked by a kid wearing the Majora Mask which holds diabolical immense power...

Those piercing eyes... Soulless piercing eyes...

The kid robs link, steals his horse and flees. So what does Link do? Chase after him of course, and soon he enters a room with no floor and just falls down and down and down... (the rabbit hole). 

Now this game has many theories, that Link is dead, that he died before the theft of his stuff or even afterwards, and i'm not here to discuss that, because i wanna wait and see when they bring it back, because a cameo of majora's mask in the newest Zelda game means they're doing something, hopefully.

So Link gets turned into a shrub person, and has to find his way back to normal. Thus the game really begins. 

He looks so sad, i mean he did get turned into a plant... 

When i played this game as a child, it was the single most horrifying experience i have ever had, my reason being that was because i was going into it with the thought that i was playing a Zelda game, it'll be like a fantasy, but then it throws horrifying things at you. When people say this is easily the darkest Zelda game created, it really is. The moon will kill everyone in the world in 3 days, people don't care because they have a festival to run, and at the ranch run by two sisters, the older one drugs the younger the night the moons supposed to crash to make it easier for her. The younger sister knows nothing about it.

The moon has a face, and is going to kill us all. Alrighty then.

Now everyone's whose played a zelda game knows that there's sidequests, and this game has them, has them everywhere, and i mean everywhere, some quests can't be completed till a certain time, and some quests are completable only at the same time as other quests. How is this possible you ask? For those who have never played the game before let me shed some light on the most unique and evil mechanic this game has. 

Time.

The power to control time, in the hands of a small 12 year old boy. Why not.

So the moons going to crush the world in three days huh, not enough time, so what do you do? Reverse that shit. After the first 3 days you gain access to reverse time whenever you see fit, and why i say this is evil and unique, the only way to save your game is through reversing time. And let me tell you, reversing time does exactly that, reverses it. Did you make a great boding relationship with an npc and almost finish their sidequest but ran outta time. TOO BAD. Did you have to go out with family in the middle of a dungeon and had to save, TOO BAD all that work is gone. 

Though, once you "Complete and finish" a portion of something, you can log it into your logbook and it's completed forever, even if the people's lives are reversed because of your time control power and it looks like their life has gone back to shit, you still got the reward from whatever you had to do before reversing time, so why waste your time with the inevitable, I mean you already got the reward.

Evil father time is evil. 

It is by far the most unique mechanic implemented into the game, and i wouldn't be pleased if it changed if they made a remake. That sense of fear that time was not on your side, even if you had control over it, you never really had "time" having your back. 

There are couple ways to make things bearable, you can slow time down to get more things down, and a banker who saves your money even if you reverse time, you get to keep all those precious Rupees, (their currency).

Now the mechanics in the game are amazing yes, but the one thing that makes this game different from the overbearing ocarina of time, was it had four dungeons, and you may compare them from time to time and think, well this game had four and the other had ten. Ten is bigger than four, but when any of the four is harder than any of the other ten, I must say kudos to the team who made this game. 

The first dungeon is so baffling hard at times, and there's so much to do in the dungeon besides the "get to the end". And for that fact as well, when you get to the end, the bosses are so painstakingly hard in comparison, the first boss has no visible weaknesses. Just attack him and pray you damage him more that he hits you, also, he's a ticki totem man who shoots flaming locusts at you. There' that too.

So to quickly summarize, this game has 4 dungeons only, and yet it feels like the game goes on forever because of the amount of content packed into the game. The difficulty is much harder than ocarina of time, and is truly unique to the Zelda franchise.

Pros:
-Hard difficulty
-immense amount of content
-Detailed Npc's each with their own problem to solve
-Unique bosses
-Depressing and well written story

Cons:
-Saving only when reversing time can be a pain if the game freezes. (happened to me)
-A lot of masks (can be good or bad depending on how you look at it)
-I want that damn'd remake, or even a sequel.
-Hard difficulty

"You've met with a terrible fate haven't you?"

Paper Mario Sticker Star: 3DS

Making a paper Mario game with a new mechanic; Stickers. Now i'm not against change, 2D jumps to 3D and sometimes even new whole takes on the game. But my god this is how to butcher a game series, take everything which made it what it was and ruin it. Now lets go back to the beginning, the real beginning, the start of the paper Mario series, and if you can already guess, i'm talking about Super Mario RPG. 

Super Mario RPG, an old game for the Super Nintendo, was a brilliant game and it had a whole new cast of characters, old characters had a new but not contrasting personalities, and the game itself was brilliant. I remember in my youth playing this game, but i had never beaten it, always though hoping for a sequel. Super Mario RPG had a turn based combat system, meaning in fights each team took turns to battle each other. It was a mix of final fantasy (The old ones) and Mario.

Now many people wanted to play another Mario rpg, and luckily it became the parent of two Mario RPG themed game series. The first being Mario and Luigi's super star saga series, where the two Mario brothers go out on an adventure of sorts to quell evil yadda yadda. The second, which came before Mario and Luigi, was the comical fun adventure of paper Mario.

One of the most innovative games for the SNES

Paper Mario was the most entertaining thing to see, it was if the developers at Nintendo decided to parody themselves. Take the world of Mario that you know and simply put them into a world of paper and see what happens. Because they were made of paper, they could do things that you normally wouldn't think of but makes sense because, paper.

Now as i said briefly, this game was highly comical. While Mario never talks (like how link talks in his game with gestures) the genius comes from all the other characters. Luigi goes on his on adventure in one of the games and he constantly tells mario how he's going to save a kingdom, but he's scared. Mario meets with these 4 masked koopas, and my god are these my favorite villians. The game is constantly having fun. 

The Koopa bros. What type of cameo are they? Some say Ninja turtles, some aren't sure...

Now since Super Paper Mario for the Wii, the formula for the game has been changing. Now i personally liked Super Paper Mario, it was not turn based but rather real time jumping and stomping, but the one reason i can overlook it is because MR.L. I firmly believe he is the best character of this game, and it shouldn't be a spoiler but it's Luigi. 

I DON'T KNOW WHO THIS MASKED FIGURE IS!

Now you might be wondering why i spent the last couple paragraphs reminiscing on the past. If you've played paper Mario sticker star, you'd understand. In this game Bowser returns as the villain. Now over the years Bowsers become a weak Villain, capture princess ect. Now i have not beaten this game, so if theres a big twist i can be wrong, but from what i played i did not enjoy, so i will not rate the story portion too much.

This game centers around stickers, you use them in combat, you use them to unlock areas, you even use them to help toads (the mushroom people). Now i would be fine with this concept, expect if in combat you run out of stickers, you run out of things to do and are forced to run. Granted nintendo does a great job, no sarcasm, putting stickers everywhere, literally. The boss fights require each a special sticker that can be used on them and does mountains of damage, trying to beat it without it, simply means you'll lose (when you run out of stickers).

The biggest problem i had with the game was the way the levels were separated. In traditional Mario games the levels are separated by and overworld map with World 1, world 2 ect and in each world smaller sub stages. eg. World 1-3 would be stage 3 of the first world. In the paper Mario series it was a giant world, no overworld, and to get to other areas you had to walk, which sounds tedious, but it felt like a real adventure.

Welcome to the world map, go have fun on the very linear stages.

In Sticker Star, the stages are ordered in the traditional Mario game setting, eg World 1 stage 3. It also has an overworld. While that doesn't sound so bad hearing about it now, it really takes away from the game. It doesn't do the series justice. The first two games in the series had you finding new companions to help out in your adventure. The version for the Wii had you switching between princess peach and bowser, though this one, for what i played, has you playing with only mario with a single sidekick.

Now over the years mario has become more of a blank slate persona, but thats where the paper mario series thrived, it made mario look as weak as paper. Pun intended. I remember when the first one came out and you had to fight bowser and jumping on him, the only thing that happened was a ting sound of nothing affecting him. In this one it looks as if a battle will start between bowser and him, but then it just cuts to the next scene, no fight, no nothing.

Paper Bowser, you were quite the villian. And comic relief. 

Overall Paper mario sticker star feels like a sad attempt at trying something new. They throw in a new mechanic to keep the game fresh, now i am ok with most of the sticker element, but other parts do not meld well. I like the museum where you collect the stickers you use in battle and spend them to put them on the wall, though it is seriously costly, and i can tell nintendo did that on purpose. Do i recommend sticker star? If your a huge fan of the series,  tread lightly, if you saw this in Gamestop or walmart and decided to buy it with no knowledge, you'll be fine. It's more of an ungraceful addition than it is a bad game. So Overall, a bad game to the franchise, but if you had no idea what paper mario is prior to this... you'll be fine.

The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. N64

The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time

Zelda Rating: 9.5/10
Difference from Prior Zelda Titles: Entered the 3rd dimension, Target System, Fishing, Ganondorf
Using the Console: Another Item slot due to controller increase, Z-Targeting

Boy do i remember purchasing this game. Well, by purchasing i mean getting the game from my sibling from a blockbuster bin. Yes, this game, this holy grail of game, one that you find in a retro game store, cartridge only $50+, was in a bargain bin for $15 at Blockbusters. This is why i feel sad when i hear blockbusters is gone. 

Enough of sentimentalism for a video store off to the game! By now, if you've followed and read the other entries i've done, you can kind of understand the rating system, and see that this one scored a 9.5, why? Because it's my favorite Zelda title, ever.

It gives the Demon a face, Ganon, great pig monster, is seen as a man, a man who thrived for power. But a man non-the-less. Ganondorf. Now you may not think much of it because so many games these days have seen it happen, Ganondorfs a human/pig monster ect. But this one show's the current evil happenings of Ganondorf. During the game he kills, steals and freezes the people Link saves, except for the one he killed... sorry deku tree.

Probably one of the few real sad moments of the game, your surrogate father just died even though you saved him...

In the first three games, even the show that isn't canon, show Ganon as a pig monster, no human feature, wielding a trident like spear, on occasion. Whereas this game changed all that. They gave the monster a face, a background a History. 

Ganondorf, scary looking yes, but now i'm going to tell you how tall he is. 7"6.

Ganondorf is born into a tribe of thieves called The Gerudo. Now, this tribe is all women, and once every 100 years a boy is born among this tribe. BUT WAIT WHAT?! How can a tribe of only women give birth or even have children? Geeze c'mon this isn't earth where we discriminate because of race. The gerudo's occasionally went away from their tribe to find boyfriends. Because of this i'm sure you can put two and two together. 

So eventually, Ganondorf is born, and when a male is born among the Gerudo tribe, the male becomes King of the tribe. Having this taste of power from ruling the gerudo tribe, Ganondorf seeks out more power, Hyrule. Ganondorf begins to cozy up to the king, and learns of the secrets of the Temple of time, and goes throughout Hyrule, his first stop, the Great Deku Tree. 

Ganondorf curses this tree because it refuses to relieve itself of one of the keys to the door of the Temple of time, for behind the door lie two things, one, the Master sword, and two, the sacred Realm, and within that realm, the Triforce.

The Spiritual stones, three magical keys that open the Door of Time.

And this Ladies and Gentlemen is where Links story begins. He destroys the curse on the Deku tree, clears out a cave of monsters for some rock eating Mountain creatures, called Gorons, and rescues the fish people's, called Zora's, Princess.

So because of Links adventures and saving people, he was given the magical keys to the Temple of time, Link opens the door and see's only the master sword, he goes in pulls it and is forwarded 7 years...

Now when you play the game, you just find out you've been sleeping for 7 years and the game continues, and you eventually, bit by bit find out what happened. I will tell you, because it's all really trivial.

After link opens the Door, it stays open, like no security or anything, and Ganondorf goes in, and finds the "sacred realm" which quite honestly i don't believe exists because in that room there was only a sword... so i don't know how Ganondorf found the triforce... 

Anyway, he found it, and it split apart because of the many rules of the triforce.

1. The one who lays his or her hand on the triforce will have their wish granted, whether it be good or evil
2. If one who touches the Triforce does not have their will's   in order, Power, courage and wisdom, The Triforce will split and the person will only inherit the piece they believe in the most.

So Ganondorf touches it, it splits up, and Link gets the Triforce of courage and Zelda gets wisdom. 

You may be thinking now, this is a review of OOT, where's the review. And all i've got to say to that is, There are tons, TONS of generic reviews, Link does this, and link does that and gameplay.

No Love for Link...

From what i've reviewed, you can in the least understand that this game is heavily story driven. I've barely talked about Link and the multiple Dungeons and Temples he goes in. And trust me, i can talk about a single dungeon and the mechanics behind and niche with them for a good while. And i chose to review this game by talking about Ganondorf, why? Because when i get to Wind Waker (Gamecube/Wii U) i'll bring it full circle.

And now a brief paragraph on Gameplay. The game brings back many items from previous titles. Hookshot, bow and arrow and bombs. But because it's in the Third dimension, things have to be changed. So Link enters first person when using the Bow and Hookshot, which is quite nice, or if you wanted you actually can be in third person when using them, though strictly to combat.

The controls are well done, and i find are well suited to this kind of game. Z targeting works because the Z button you use so often, is right in the place your finger lands on by simply holding the controller. 

Three spots to hold the controller. GENIUS. if we had 3 hands.

The only area, which personally i never had a problem with, is the water temple. Theres a way to actually never be able to finish that temple, by using the key in the wrong door. This was fixed in the 3DS release of the game. Which was a perfect remaster for anyone considering it.

And the reason that, for me, the water temple is my favoite, is battling Dark Link. It's just a shame that he's only a mini-boss...

The final boss of Zelda II, becomes the mini-boss of not even the final temple.

Pros:
-Ganondorf is created, background given
-Easy target lock system made for the 3rd enviorment
-Detailed storyline
-Diverse npc's
-A lot of Sidequests (Not covered in the review)

Cons:
-Water Temple
-Some, camera problems
-Dark Link reduced to Mini-boss

And now i leave you with the average players final fight with Ganondorf.

Legend of Zelda: Link to the Past. SNES

Legend of Zelda: Link to the Past. SNES

Zelda Rating: 8.9/10
Difference from Prior Zelda Games: Side-quests, Important Npc's, detailed storyline
Using The Console: Multiple (two) item slots to use in comparison to 1.

My first Zelda game I called mine, Not my siblings.

This game was the first Zelda game i owned and could call mine. I slapped that puppy in the Super Nintendo and man, can i say that that intro music is just nostalgic goodness to my ears. And after playing a Link between worlds, i have to say, the classic game is still as beautiful as ever.

I honestly don't know where to start with this game, it was and is simply beautiful. It has tight controls, graphics, at the time, were pretty good and the storyline was great for this game, not too much where you wanted to skip everything, but not too little that you had no idea what the hell to do. I'm looking at you Zelda 1 an 2.

So the big difference, when the game came out, was that this game didn't seem to be connected to the first two in any way. The idea in the first game is that Ganon has destroyed and ravaged hyrule, that is why there are no towns. Afterwards people start rebuilding, thus in Zelda 2 there are villages, multiple ones. Many speculated where it would go on the chronologically, but it soon just became too much as later installments came out, some thought the games were never connected... UNTIL THE HYRULE HISTORIA.

What? Can't read Japanese? Well thats ok the important parts are in English.

As seen in the Huge picture above, Link to the past is technically a prequel, but years and years before the first two games. 

The game starts out quite differently than the first two, whereas you simply just start and wander around with no direction but the manual telling you the story, this game starts off with you being asleep and Zelda's voice calls out to you to rescue her from the castle Fungeon Dungeon. 

So you set off on a mission to save a person you've never met, you a random kid who lives with his uncle. Through hardships you eventually Pull out the legendary blue sword of death Light. Which, trivial information, this is the first game that included this mighty blade, and called it "the Master Sword".

You continue on to the castle where an evil wizard has captured Zelda, and you go to the chamber where he resides to do battle. An Epic final battle, Wizard Vs guy who has a lot of time on his hands. And how do you defeat him? Well there's really two ways, one the boring canon way, and two the lolsy more extreme non sensible way. 

This man earned the trust of the King. Does no one have any Evil Radar senses? Look at him, diabolical hand gesture. Check. Red coat dyed with the blood of the innocents. Check. Grey skin? Check!

For everyone to understand i will explain both ways to fight the evil final boss wizard of evilness. Now the Master sword can reflect light type magic, and whattya know, the wizard shoots lightning magic, and you swing your sword and reflect it back at him. 

Now that you understand how that works, you could also use, a Bug Net. Just swing that baby like you're catching bees. 

The Bug net, Same properties as a magical sword that can reflect light magic.

After this point, SURPRISE the game goes on. The evil diabolical wizard sends you to a dark world, Ooooo. and from there on you must save some crystal ladies and go fight the REAL final boss. Ganon.

The story line is firm and well made, and there are many tiny things in the multiple dungeons that just make this game amazing.

The game's Dungeons and Temples are very unique and you really do get immersed in your own way. Compared to the last two games where the Temples and dungeons were just recolours, these ones are wholly themed experiences. 

This game, I find, introduced Side-quests. Finding bottles under the bridge, getting a bug net to catch bee's (ok not a side quest), and little things here and there to improve your arsenal. But while not only side quests that made this game so unique, but the gambling and minigames. Race here, Race there, and "OPEN A CHEST, MAYBE YOU'LL GET MORE MONEY THAN WHAT YOU PAID" hated that game... 

Grammar, who needs that stuff. 

The world itself is amazing, especially when you have to venture to the Dark World, where Ganon resides. Link loses his form and turns into a bunny. It's so odd but quite appealing, and until you get a magical orb, you'll never get to be yourself in the Dark World, and as a bunny, you can't use your sword.

There are many things i can write about this game, about how good it is, about how well it pulled things off, how well it introduced others. But the one thing i will leave this post at, Is the 3rd Temple boss.

This is by far the hardest boss in the game.

It may not look like a hard boss, for those who've never played this game, but by god i'd rather fight any other boss twice over than this guy once.

He moves randomly, and if he hits you, there's a high chance you're going to fall off  the edge to the room below, and if that happens, the music stops, he regenerates all his health back and you have to hope you can kill him this time before he knocks you back down and you have to do it all over again...

...I get knocked down, i get up again... 

Pros:

-Brought back Top-Down Zelda

-Introduced side quests and fun NPCs

-Tough and challenging bosses, Unique

-Memorable 

-Replay-ability

Cons:

-Third Boss is ridiculous

-I can't think of another Con for this game, because seriously it was a well done game, and if you died, it wasn't the games fault. Except for the Third boss

And now i leave you off with Links Canon Hairstyle colour.

Link and his Pink hair. He can save the world, one strand at a time.

Zelda II: Links Adventure. NES

Zelda II : The Adventure of Link. NES

Zelda Rating: 5/10
Difference from prior Zelda games: Legend of Zelda; Camera angles, Level up system, Towns
Using the console: No difference from Prior game

Oh boy, this game was the first Zelda game i had ever played. I remember watching my older siblings play this game, as i was too young to understand how to push buttons appropriately at the time... 

Gold Box and a Gold Cartridge, Classic

I remember this game being so dark and weird. I had no idea what the game was about but that the person sleeping in the bed was Zelda and you were a person in green, Probably Link. I never beat the game as a child sadly, but i own the game now and can say this game was a perfect sequel. 

Losing in this game meant Ganon comes back and kills everyone. Well Shit.

Many believe that Zelda games follow a formula, Go to dungeon, get item, beat boss with item. While that is true for some games, many don't see the other formula Nintendo uses for Zelda games. Each of them reinvents the game in some weird quirky way, which i will get to over the course of these reviews.

In The Adventure of Link, you find out that Zelda from the first game wasn't really Zelda and you have to save a new Zelda by claiming the ancient power of the Triforce, But what? You already reformed the triforce of wisdom, and Ganon had the Triforce of Power. There's only 2?! Ok enough i know no one fell for that, I mean the word TRI kinda also means 3... Well Spoilers ahead, link has to battle to the end to receive the Triforce of Courage.

The first game in the series to really say that Link isn't just an ordinary guy, but chosen by fate.

So the game follows a interesting path for the most part, you start in a room where Zelda sleeps and must travel throughout Hyrule, visit towns and Temples (Not dungeons) in order to place jewels to unlock the final Temple where you can receive the Triforce of Courage. 

One of the more interesting things that has not been used since this game, was not only the Level system, but the fact that items are strictly exploration. All the items Link acquires are all used to help him get further on the overworld map but not in battle.

Get hammer, Break rocks, Do not use hammer on enemies, Do not pass go, Do not collect $200

 But what does he use in battle you ask? Well his sword, shield, and multiple spells he's learnt from wizards living in basements. ...Yea i never understood that either.

Gee, thanks Mr. Old wizard in a basement! Pew pew, fire sword!

So Links arsenal in this game are, exploration items, A multitude of spells (Many help with exploration as well, but not strictly to overworld map) and a leveling up system to increase your Health, magic meter and sword strength.

This game i have to say out of the whole entirety of the Zelda series has never been remade, or redone like this. Where link grows as he fights everything, as compared to when he grows when he picks up heart pieces from bosses or pieces by exploring, or upgrading the sword through side quests. 

Which to level, which to level, save up for attack power? Or just level life right away, oh the choices.

Now for the one thing that i adore about this game, the thing that just makes this game the PERFECT sequel, is the Final boss. 

Dark Link, or Shadow Link, whichever you prefer.

Purple background, Black outline of you, This is just perfect.

So Links goal was to acquire the Triforce of Courage, what other way to test yourself against yourself?

I found this the most remarkable way to end the game, No ganon fight, no beast from the beyond. Just you, and you. The shadow knows all your moves and deals a lot of damage. And i gotta say, if fighting a shadowed version of yourself doesn't warrant a Shiny Triangle that represents courage. I don't know what does. 

Pros:

-Reinvents the game by turning the whole thing on it's head, Level system, sidescroll fighting and items only for exploration.

-Last boss is not Ganon

-Really feels like each monster helps you grow (cause it does)

-Unique and interesting addition to how you acquire the Triforce, and how it comes to existence
Cons:

-So bloody hard, when you have to level up to do better, and when you die you lose exp (needed to level) it becomes a tedious level grind

-Many people are really confusing, especially in the villiage where some people turn into bats...

-When you die you have to backtrack all the way to the place you were at, and that may sound easy enough, but good god is this world huge.

On that note I end off with I am Error

The Legend of Zelda, NES.

GUESS WHAT WEEK I JUST MADE UP!

ZELDA WEEK!

This week i'll review every Zelda game i've played. Sadly while i call myself a fan i still haven't played a couple games in the Zelda series, those titles being, Oracle of ages/seasons, Links awakening and Spirit tracks. 

So you can expect me gushing reviewing and loving all the Zelda games and pointing out why they're so great.

...Except Twilight Princess... If you want to read that already done and posted review, it's been up for a while. Spoiler alert, i didn't like it.

Now i'll be rating these games on a Scale of 1 to 10, now a 4 isn't equivalent to a 4/10 from other sites, this is a 4/10 in comparison to these zelda games. If you want my rating of the zelda games right now, to me are all 10/10. 

I will also be using a "Difference from prior Zelda games" and "using the console"

And with that, lets begin.

The Legend of Zelda. NES

Zelda Rating: 7/10
Difference from prior Zelda games: N/A
Using the console: Implemented a saving feature.

The Title screen that started it all

The Legend starts here, from even before you get your sword to when Ganon disappears into pixel bits. 

The first game in the series to ever come out, and does it hold water to today, Yes. Considering the fact i got this game on my 3DS (i had it on my NES at one point as well) and played it, and loved it again. 

The style for their first game was top down, to see the whole world, and the only time that changed was when you had to go into the basement of some dungeons. 

Link and his sword made out of wood. YA! 

The game was and still is confusing as ever, because you had to figure things out for yourself at the time and this game wasn't a story driven, simply because all the story you needed was either in the manual or in the giant text block before the game. 

Does that mean it's impossible? Heck no. Just means you gotta bomb every cliff you find, oooor go find a guide somewhere, hell there's tons of them now. 

The Naming of the character Link to be named Link, warning trivial information coming, was because the developers wanted the character to be the link, like to link something together, from the player to the video-game world. That idea has still been passed on through the games, but has become much more elaborate and thought out. 

Link, it wasn't his name at the time, but his own class of character. The more you know.

The game did something not many other games had done at the time and that was a save feature. This battery powered save feature made it much more accessible to stop the game and play another time. It also paved the way for the developers to make a longer game with tiny secrets everywhere without the fear it would go unnoticed. After the save feature was known the Password system in games slowly started dying out and made way for save features.

Pros: 
One of the first games to use a save feature,
lengthy game (compared to that of the time),
Tough bosses,
amazing world with actual different well made areas, multiple, different and unique items for exploration and fighting.
Easter eggs, naming your character "Zelda" made you start "Second quest" the harder version of the game

Cons: 
No actual direction given (but really if you can't figure it out i feel bad for you son)
A little confusing at times because of translation errors