A Link to the Past is actually the third in the Zelda series (or fourth, if you count the Game & Watch title) but it is the first one to give the series the shape which it would retain to this day. You could almost look at this as a template for later Zelda games.

The game starts with Link’s uncle leaving the house to go and rescue Zelda, who is being held in Hyrule Castle by the mysterious wizard named Agahnim. He insists Link stays behind, but obviously that doesn’t happen and Link follows after just a little later. He finds his uncle wounded, takes his sword and goes on to finish the quest himself. Sadly, things aren’t so easy and he soon discovers that he has to travel across Hyrule in order to collect the three pendants of courage so that he can defeat the evil wizard.

After the opening sequence of events, you are pretty free to explore the large world of Hyrule as you please. You can visit Kakariko Village where there are lots of people to speak to and games to play, or you can go out and explore the forests and the fields, finding secret houses and caves where you’ll get little things that may help you along with the quest. The map shows you were you need to go, but not what you need to do there, so it’s all fairly nice and open. You can be quite rigid and go straight to the marks on the map and figure out how to get into the dungeons or you can take your time and explore every corner of the world.

One downside is the difficulty: I found that the majority of the game to be a little too easy. Pretty much all of the first dungeons in the game could be completed in a single sitting, but then the last two were incredibly difficult. I’d actually go so far as to say that I didn’t especially enjoy any of the dungeons in this game that much and that the main appeal for me, was the bits in-between (the bosses are good too). I also found that, at times, supplies could be annoyingly sparse. If I ran out of magic, it might take ages to replenish it. The same is true of arrows. This provides you with what I think is a case of unfair difficulty which is just irritating more than anything.

Thankfully, this still manages to be a very good game. The sound track is wonderfully atmospheric and gives the whole thing a lovely tone and I find the 16-bit graphics quite charming. Lots of important things like the hook shot and ocarina are introduced in this game too so I’d suggest that anybody who likes The Legend of Zelda series should give this a try.

Rating: 9.2/10

Buy it here.

This is an important game for lots of reasons. Firstly, this is the first appearance of Mario and also the first appearance of Donkey Kong, both of whom would go on to feature in and inspire various games. Furthermore, this was the first really successful game made by Nintendo; had they not had this success they may not have gone on to make Super Mario Bros. which would have made the face of gaming today very different. But while this game is certainly of historical interest, is it still a fun thing to play?

The story is very basic: Donkey Kong has kidnapped Mario’s partner Pauline and Mario must travel through a few levels in order to rescue her. It’s nothing in-depth, but this isn’t the kind of game that requires a ground-breaking story.

Each level fills an entire screen with Donkey Kong standing with Pauline at the top while you, as Mario, must make it to the top, dodging barrels, fire balls and various other hazards along the way. There are four levels and it shouldn’t take more than a quarter of an hour to complete it, but once you’ve done the last level, you go back to the first and you can loop it forever to try and get the highest score, the difficulty increasing each time. It’s actually quite hard to begin with too. An important thing to bear in mind is that the NES version of the game cuts out the second level (which is my favourite) and it’s the NES version that is available on the Virtual Console and the Game Boy Advance. If you want to play the second level, you will need to play this game on Donkey Kong 64 or in an arcade

The game has a multiplayer mode too, but it doesn’t add much to it. Two players take it in turns to do the levels and compete for high scores. It’s nice in a way because it encourages people together, but it’s not really anything that couldn’t be done by playing at different times.

I think the biggest downside of the game is how Mario controls; he walks really slowly and he doesn’t jump very high either. He also dies awfully easily: everything kills with one hit and there’s nothing you can do to change that. Even falling relatively short distances kill him! Having said that, there is a rather useful hammer you can use for a limited time which will destroy most things which come towards you, but which still doesn’t make you entirely invulnerable.

On the whole this is an early video game, and you can tell it’s an early video game, but it’s still fun and certainly worth a try for Nintendo fans and anybody interested in old arcade titles. I doubt that it’ll be your all-time favourite, but you’ll probably consider it worth your time to go through every now and again.

Rating: 6/10

Buy it here for the NES.

Buy it here for the GBA.

Buy Donkey Kong 64 here.

Buy it as part of the compilation Donkey Kong Classics here.