Everybodys Free (To Play Zelda)
By Steve Dixon
Ladies and gentlemen of the Gaming industry: Play Zelda. If I could offer you only on tip for the future, Zelda would be it. The long term benefits of Zelda have been proven by hand-eye coordination experts, whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering experience. I will dispense this advice now.
Enjoy the first few moments of Zelda. Oh, nevermind. You will not understand the magical qualities of those few minutes until they have long faded. But trust me, in 5 months, you'll look back at those moments and recall in a way that you can't grasp now how much more rewarding the game might have been if you had taken it slowly, playing the game a couple hours at a time. You are not as slow as you imagine.
Don't worry about finding the triforce, or worry, but know worrying is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubble gum. The real troubles in the game are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind, the kind that blindside you at 4 in the morning while trying to solve the water temple.
Fight one boss every day that intimidates you.
Don't be reckless with your heart containers and don't tolerate monsters who would be reckless with them.
Don't waste time on jealousy.. Sometimes you're ahead, sometimes you're behind. The race is long and, in the end, you'll never beat the new Zelda first.
Remember the battles you win. Forget the ones you lose. If you succeed in doing this, you probably have a Game Genie.
Don't feel guilty if you can't find the second dungeon in the first Zelda. The most interesting people I know didn't know where to find it, and they have beaten a couple of the other Zelda games. Some of the most interesting people I know have beaten all the other Zelda games and still can't find level 2.
Buy plenty of potions, be careful with your bombs. You'll miss them both when they're gone.
Maybe you'll beat the game, maybe you won't. Maybe you'll save Zelda maybe you won't. Maybe you'll give up in level four, maybe you'll dance the funky chicken when you beat level 9. Whatever you do, don't congratulate yourself too much, or berate yourself either. No matter how good you are, someone else has beaten the game before you.
Enjoy your control pad. Use it every way you can. Don't be afraid of what other people think of it, even if it is a generic pad.
Kill every keese you see, even if you don't have to.
Read the instruction manual, even if you don't follow it.
Don't read walkthroughs, they will only make you feel like a cheater.
Get to know your weapons. They're your best answer to puzzles, and the most likely to keep you alive. Be nice to your siblings, even if they do hog the Nintendo. Odds are one day they'll get farther along in the game than you could, and you'll have to ask them how to do it.
Understand that items come and go, but with a precious few you should hold on.
Work hard to find ways around the overworld, because the farther you get, the more you'll need the secret paths you knew when you first started playing.
Own a Playstation once, but sell it before it makes you hard.
Own a Dreamcast once but sell it before it makes you soft.
Accept certain inalienable truths. Bosses will survive, lives will be lost, you, too, will build a fan page. And when you do, you'll fantasize that when you played games, Heroes didn't need continues, Bosses stayed dead, and Nintendo respected their fan pages.
Respect other people's fan pages.
Don't expect anyone else to support you. Maybe you have a pal inside Nintendo, maybe your best friend runs IZC. But odds are both are trying to beat you to the end of the game.
Don't blow in to your carts too much or else by the time you're twenty, they'll work like they're 80.
Be careful whose cheats you buy, but be patient with those who supply them. Cheats are a form of pride. Dispensing them is a way of making you fell like you're helping other gamers, but at the same time it makes you look smart.
And finally, of all things......trust me on playing Zelda.
Staff Comments:
Stalfos333: Sounds like any one of the "Everything I need to know, I learned from..." T-shirts and posters. And everyone knows that the secret of life will be found on a T-shirt.
Zelda is the secret of life. . . sounds good to me.
