Dividing and conquering

I could tell you that we have decided to split our duties and play different games in order to try to get through the Zelda series more quickly...I could, but that wouldn't be true.  The truth is Zach tried out Zelda II after I beat the first dungeon and decided it was too hard for him.  Zach is moving on to The Adventure of Link, while I'm sticking with Zelda II.  It hopefully will also have the added benefit of allowing us to progress through the series a little more quickly as we won't have to catch up on whatever the other person has done every time we boot up the Nintendo, but we'll see.

On to Zelda II:  The more I play this game the more I appreciate it.  It can be frustrating since the difficulty level is so much higher than the original and A Link to the Past, but the story and play dynamics it adds to the series can not be denied.  Magic, sword techniques, towns (and townfolks) and the third and final piece of triforce were all added to the Zelda series by The Adventure of Link, and have stuck around in future games.  Sure the play control may be different than any other Zelda, ever, but it still is decidedly Zelda.  At this point I have finished the first two dungeons, and collected the candle and glove, two magic containers, one heart container and three spells.  I've also leveled up a number of times and am at least on level 4 of all three skill categories (life, magic and attack).  Yes, this is the first (and to my knowledge only) Zelda to allow users to level up their abilities similar to an RPG.  I'm glad they didn't include that dynamic in future Zelda's, but it makes this game even that much more different than the others, and a nice change of pace from the other games we are working on.