The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures

"Another Day; Another Adventure"

With a figurative drought in titles actually utilising the GBA connectivity of the GCN to its greatest extent, it was only a matter of time before Nintendo stepped in to show just what it was capable of. Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures does justice both to the series title of Zelda, and to its innovative style of play. Four Swords Adventures almost blatantly expects that you will be making the most of the game with the maximum of four players. Whilst the game permits up to four people playing simultaneously the catch is that you will need a Gameboy Advance and a GCN-GBA Link Cable for each player when in multiplayer. Ideally by the age you are now, you would have at least made friends with one or two people who actually like Nintendo and have purchased the essential materials so as to play the game to its fullest extent. Those who are yet to make friends with anyone owning a GBA will be sorely disappointed, as it is the multiplayer aspects of which most fun can be derived. The single player mode is fine by itself, but with the prospect of missing out on the most challenging and fun side of the game, you're going to feel a little left out.

The bulk of the game consists of the section known as Hyrulean Adventure. Whether you are playing alone or to the fullest extent with four players, there are always four Links in your party. Roaming around the 8 segments of Hyrule, three stages apiece, it is your job to collect 2000 Force Gems (cheap knock off of the Rupees) necessary to power up your sword so you will be able to destroy the ominous barriers. Puzzles and such are the traditional Zelda style; particularly moreso here than in any previous game. A lot of the puzzles here echo those from games as far back as the first Zelda. There are a collection of various items you will come across in your quest, which can be used for both battle or puzzles depending on the scenario. Most of the items can be upgraded, granting the item in question new abilities. Items and heart containers disappear upon completion of the stage, allowing the game to retain challenge and replayability for when you want to return later to play with friends, or play by yourself. Stages are fairly decently sized with their fair share of puzzles and traps to keep you entertained, but when it comes right down to it, the game itself is short. It'll take you a few days to beat, tops. There are 8 segments of Hyrule, with 3 stages apiece. If you enjoy the competitive aspects though, through multiplayer, you can derive loads more replayability than just the standard "go back here and do this". Certain sections alter depending on how many people are playing, and it just becomes generally more challenging to have to ward off greedy friends from stealing your precious Force Gems, as well as a lot more enjoyable. The phrase "the more, the merrier" has never been so true as it is here.

So, why the GBAs, you might be asking. Well, when you enter a building or cave style environment on the TV screen, your Link is magically whisked onto the GBA screen. This assists in the whole competitive aspect of the game that quite frankly couldn't have been realised any other way. I'm guessing most people griping with the required GBAs are mostly comprised of the population whose friends don't actually own GBAs. Aw mittens. Truth is, the GBAs work wonderfully here and don't fall under the category of some random gimmick. Put simply, it just wouldn't have worked as some split-screen title, whether you want to believe it or not.

Fighting is a large step up from all of the previous Zelda titles. The gut wrenching ease of Wind Waker and the only half-decent simplicity of Link to the Past have both been eradicated in one fell swoop. In the single player mode, you have access to four types of formations to set your team of Links into. These can come in handy in both the puzzles, but also in the battling. There's the standard horizontal and vertical set up, where the Links create a small wall of themselves and patrol in a wide fashion. Handy for dealing with those enemies who evade you with speed, as you can easily swipe them down with one of the end Links. Then there's the Block Formation, which has the Links move into a two by two square. Rather powerful for handling with enemies in tight spaces, as well as some of the larger and stronger enemies. Then, there's the Cross Formation, which is best used when you find yourself mobbed by loads of smaller enemies. Being in Cross Formation also activates a new, larger scale Spin Attack, as well as being rather handy in the "Their hands were everywhere" approach. Beyond that, you can now strafe Link about, as well as performing the jump forward-slash attack. Expanded upon quite a bit since the "stab-stab-stab" approach of Link to the Past. And without the auto-targeting and pathetically simple Parry system in Wind Waker, Four Swords Adventures takes a little more effort to destroy those enemies. Incorporating the various items you will pick up along the way also allows for an expansion upon the battle system.

Shadow Battle on the other hand completely tosses out any regard of team work, plunging you into a battle royal of sorts against your friends. It is a strictly multiplayer affair, but even then, it's only properly playable when you have three to four people playing with you. The bare minimum of two people tends to make pretty strained battles without any of the hectic aspects being properly realised. Unless you or your friend are completely incoherent and unconscious, there is absolutely no way you will "fall for" the change of rotation in the large spinning fire wall, or the collapsing section of grass in the field stage. It is near impossible to do these things, because the other player can clearly only focus on their single opponent, allowing no possibility to sneak off to do your own thing whilst the others battle on unaware of the rampage of Cuccos about to obliterate them.

That being said, Shadow Battle is extremely fun once you manage to muster two to three friends, although only one or two stages appear to have received special attention in the amount of features present. Items and such only add to the frantic battles. The ability to ride around on a horse will ultimately become a mixture of sheer amount of hatred and enjoyment amongst your friends. Enjoyment from the one ploughing through the fray, carelessly tossing the "ground dwelling" Links to an early grave on the back of the speedy stallion; hatred from those left pushing up daisies, cursing their inability to get out of the horse's way in time. Explosions, fireballs, swarms of Cuccos, mobs of enemies make up the recipe for complete chaos.

In addition to Shadow Battle, there are also the Tingle Tower Mini Games, which do offer some pleasurable distraction from the main quest and Shadow Battle side of things. There are eight mini games in all, although a few of them take on the form of smaller stages, as opposed to the more Mario Party type feel others create. You can participate in a Horse Race, a Whack-A-Mole game, a Cucco-round up game and several others. It would have been nice if aspects of these mini games had been randomised, but still, they are mostly quite fun to partake in once in a while.

So, what of the story? Well, admittedly, there's not a whole lot on offer. Possibly Nintendo was just making the assumption that no one would be paying attention to the plot if they were busy with having fun with their friends in multiplayer. Basically, Link and Zelda are off to ensure the Shrine Maidens are keeping their standard Zelda-style protective field up. Without warning, a new character suddenly makes the scene: Shadow Link. Suddenly, each of the Shrine Maidens disappears into the inky darkness, along with Zelda, and Link is forced to dive after the culprit who bears a striking resemblance to him. Unwittingly landing in the Shrine of the Four Sword, Link draws out the closest weapon so as to battle the snickering Shadow Link.

All hell breaks loose as Link learns that the Four Sword was responsible for sealing Vaati, the Wind Sorcerer, and now that the sword is removed from its pedestal, Vaati is free again. Obviously. The whole concept of having Vaati freed is back fired four-fold when the Four Sword magically splits Link into four separate entities. Of course, now Vaati is totally screwed. There's only one twist that a blind man in New Jersey would have seen coming a mile away. The story itself practically replicates the Four Swords title packed with Link to the Past on the GBA, and the bits that are original are given very little depth. The Maidens don't have their own names (although thankfully it's not just a question of a different dress; they have varying hair styles to at least ensure they are not identical) and the plot is largely just a matter of removing the barriers across the land of Hyrule in an attempt to rescue said Maidens and defeat Vaati. Shadow Link crops up from time to time, but literally gets absolutely no build up or plot growth. Every character is rather two dimensional when it comes right down to it.

Graphics are pretty amazing, truth be told. Wind Waker may have had that fluid and well-animated cel shading, but Four Swords Adventures shows that 2D console gaming is still capable of great things. The basic maps are all reminiscent of the third Zelda title on the SNES, Link to the Past, some stages more heavily borrowing from such aspects in a more direct attempt at achieving nostalgia. The game itself moves with little to no slow down, regardless of whether there are 40 odd enemies at screen all attacking you at once. Skeptics, don't kid yourselves; this game would definitely not be possible on the older Nintendo consoles like the SNES and N64.

The effects are just spectacular. Everything from the fire and smoke effects through to the shimmering warp gates leading to the Dark World are performed flawlessly. Everything is shiny, sparkly and magnificent. If you ever doubted that 2D gaming could ever claw its way back up from the old 16-bit era, then Four Swords Adventures will put you to shame. One strange aspect to bring up here though is the zoom function you can sometimes enable. All it really does is completely destroy the smooth appearance by magnifying a poorly pixellated Link. Luckily, most of the time the camera is zoomed out, ensuring a larger degree of smoother action.

The music is top notch throughout the game. Being mostly comprised of older Legend of Zelda pieces, the nostalgia literally engulfs the player, violently cramming memories down your throat until you vomit them back up. Or something. Around every corner lurks another memorable track that will cause even the most stone-hearted Zelda fans to break down into a crying wreck.

The GBA segments of the game are similarly also well worked, with the music in the Dark World being a distorted version of the overworld, or the traditional Zelda-style underground music in others. The music sets the scene well in all regards, although there was one slight, nagging problem. There wasn't any particular stand-out original pieces. All of the best tracks were either remixes or direct transfers from the older titles.

So, as you can probably deduce, one of the best parts of Four Swords Adventures is that it is one of the most heavily nostalgic Zelda games out there. Conversely, this is also its downfall, as it does little to contribute to the series as its own individual title. The very concept and plot of the game is essentially just a build-up of what was already established in Four Swords, the music and puzzles are taken from across the range of Zelda titles and so forth. Nostalgia is good and all, but would an original thought kill them? The other stand-out feature is that this is one of the best multiplayer titles on the GCN. If you enjoy Zelda titles and you and at least one friend of yours owns a GBA, this title is a definite must buy. If you are confident that you won't be missing out on much by not having access to the multiplayer, then I can only encourage you to buy the game. Chances are you will still have a lot of fun, and be able to pick it up and play some time later and still get enjoyment out of it.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 04/25/05