Review of Legend of Zelda Link Between Worlds

Thanks to a contest on IGN I managed to get my hands on a copy of Legend of Zelda Link Between Worlds. So after beating the game I figured I’d review the game and highlight some things that really stood out and improved the Legend of Zelda series as a whole.

Let’s start with the gameplay.  It has the same style of gameplay you’d expect from your standard Zelda game where you have a couple of buttons to use your sword, and a couple of tools, and you use the direction pad to navigate dungeons; however, the simple idea of being able to turn into a 2D painting and travel on walls made a huge change to how you go about playing the game.

Normally when you come across an open gap in the game that’s a sign that you have to find another way across, but with this new power in many cases you can just simple travel along the wall. This was a bit hard to get used to because it opens up several more options on what you can do in a dungeon. It was a  very nice addition to the game and it was a lot of fun to experiment on what you can do with this new power. Another thing I liked about it is how it improves your ability to move around a dungeon safely. Not only will enemies not see or attack you, but you can’t take damage from normal enemies while in painting mode.

Another addition to the gameplay was the use of items. Normally with bombs and arrows you buy a set amount of ammo to use, but instead every item uses up your magic gauge and so while you have an unlimited supply, you can only use them so much before you have to recharge. This made it easier to be ready for combat and scenarios, but it also meant you couldn’t just keep using the items over and over again and spam enemies with them.

A shocking twist to this game was the story. This game actually has a solid story to it and it keeps the player engaged, without causing a distraction with the gameplay.  Zelda and the seven sages are captured, and it’s your goal to rescue them.  They were taken out of Hyrule and into a new world called Lorule.  There you work with the Princess Hilda to find the sages and of course go and stop the bad guy but you see a plot develop as you progress in the game. A story in both Hyrule and Lorule that engages the gamer in between the dungeons.  While it seems like a simple idea to just develop a more engaging story , it added so much to the game and made it even harder than normal to put it down.

Then there is the open world game where you can rent items and go to any dungeon you want in no particular order.  Honestly it wasn’t as big of a deal as it was made out to be, but it was a nice idea.  It just made it easier to go from one dungeon to another because if you get stuck looking for a dungeon you can always look for another one.

Finally the items. It’s nice to be able to get the items at any time, and the idea of loosing those items if you die in the game adds to the difficulty a little bit. The problem is with so many rupees spread all over the map it’s not hard at all to have plenty of money to spare in case you die to go and re rent your items.  So while this idea was supposed to add stress to the gamer to be more careful, it really just adds an irritating twist to when you die in the game.

Overall the game is amazing and hard to put down. You have more options at any point in the game, and you have a more engaging story that keeps you playing.  I recommend this game to any Legend of Zelda fan, and I suggest it to any 3DS owner as an excellent addition to their collection.

I give this game a 10/10

Jacob Carpenter is the writer for TSCN.TV and also a blogger under the name JSnakeC on IGN