"A funner more enchanced version of the original Link's Awakening. . ."

The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening DX was originally released on the Gameboy as The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening in 1994. Finally, in 1998, a remake of the game, called DX, was made. It contained the same story-line, gameplay, and everything the original had, except a few new features. It's now in color, and has a new dungeon, called the Color Dungeon, where you can get a new tunic, that can help you with either offense or defense. You also have a Camera Mouse who takes pictures of you at certain times, and stores them in your Photo Album. Up to 3 files can be saved, and if you list your name as ZELDA, you get a surprise, like in the original Legend of Zelda. The sequel to A Link to the Past, it clearly wasn't as good as it's predecessor, but this game is one of the best Gameboy Color games, and will keep you playing for awhile.

Graphics: 9/10
The graphics are great for a Gameboy Color game. The sprites look very nice. The backgrounds and scenery is great. The grass is a nice shade of green, the sky and ocean blue, the dungeons are all different... Each one has it's own details as how dark it is, the floor patterns... It's all very cool. The bosses look very nice and detailed. The changes from the original game is great. It's all very colorful, cheerful outside, gloomy in dungeons and evil-ish places. The graphics are comparable to great-graph-iced NES games and even some SNES games. Over-all, the game has GREAT graphics giving this column a 10/10.

Sound: 9/10
The sound is fantastic. Almost everything you do has a different sound. Your sword tapping on the wall, against tapping on a cracked wall, producing the tap sounds famous in all Legend of Zelda games.The chickens, dogs, sound of an enemy getting cut all sound the same for each one, but quite cool. The boomerang has that swich-swich sound, and the shield has that clink sound when something hits it. The music is over-all good, but the over-world theme is slightly different... The dungeon themes fit the setting well, as does the cave music fits the caverns. Also each Ocarina song has a short melody. The sound is pretty good, sound effects and music-wise, so it receives a 9/10.

Gameplay: 9/10
Very basic, easy to use, and easy to remember. The D-Pad moves Link around, in 8 directions (North, west, south, east, etc.) The Start button brings up the Inventory Menu, where you can change weapons and look at what Tunic, Shield, and sword you are currently using. You can equip two items and or weapons to the A and B buttons. Among the items you can use are the swords, Shields, Bow, boomerang, Magic Rod, Roc's Feather, and much more. Push A + B + Start + Select simultaneously, to bring up the Save Menu, where you can Save + Quit, or return to the game. To enter each dungeon, you must find the specific key of solve a puzzle. A great way to do this is to talk to the Koholintians. They can be great help sometimes. To access the Special Color, dungeon, placed in a very creative spot, a puzzle in the graveyard must me solved. Inside, puzzles concerning different colors you must complete, winning the Red or Blue Tunic in the end of the dungeon. Red raises offense (attack power) and Blue raises defense. You can go back and change between the two whenever you want to. Sometimes bringing up the Inventory Menu everytime to change weapons, which you have to do alot, can become very irritating. But other than this fact, the game is very fun and easy to use. 10/10 for this.

Story: 9/10
After defeating Ganon in the events of A Link to the Past, the Hero, Link, became head of the Royal Knights of Hyrule. He then set off on a quest to hone his skills and train his body and soul. He sailed to many foreign lands, then was ready to return to Hyrule. On the way back, a powerful, violent storm his his ship, destroying in completely. Link grabbed onto a piece of floating wood, and floated the sea aimlessly, unconscious and barely alive. He woke up on the beach of Koholint Island, and saw a girl named Marin above him. He recovered thanks to Marin's help, and set off on his quest to escape the island of Koholint, and return to Hyrule, his home. It is said Link never made it back to Hyrule, but went to the kingdom's neighbor, Calatia, never returning to Hyrule. The story is quite nice, but doesn't really have anything to do with Hyrule, the Triforce, or anything The Legend of Zelda series sees regularly. Well, it was a nice change to The Legend of Zelda series, earning a 9/10.

Replay Value:
If you have completed the entire game with all the power-ups, weapons, secrets, and anything else, the game has little to no replay value. Like other Legend of Zelda games, the only replay is completing the game with only 3 hearts, not getting hit, not collecting things, unless they must be used in the game, etc. Games like The Legend of Zelda and other similar Action/Adventure/RPG games have low replay value. And this game is one like that.

Hardware:
A Game Pak of The Legend of Zelda DX: Link's Awakening and either a Gameboy Color or a Gameboy Advance is all you need to play.

Buy, or Rent?:
Buy this game. Don't rent it, just buy it. It's a Zelda game, and a very good one at that. It can't be fully completed if you just rent it, unless you play nonstop.

Over-all Grade:
8 : 10 ; A MUST-HAVE
Not the best Legend of Zelda game, but surely one that will keep you playing until the end...

At the end, Link was left floating in the sea, with no sense of what to do. He looks up, and sees something flying across the sky. We then leave Link II there, and he eventually makes it to the land of Calatia, where he stays for the rest of his life, to scared to sail back to Hyrule. It may be him in the Oracle games, but we don't know yet. Link's Awakening DX stayed very popular, and was replayed by many people; ones who have and haven't beaten the original. Link's Awakening is still one of the best Gameboy games, and always will be, even with new great games coming out all the time.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 02/05/02, Updated 02/15/02