Introduction

The Legend of Zelda is an action-adventure game from 1986 in which you play Link, a young swordsman, and search a large open kingdom for the eight pieces of the Triforce of Wisdom. You need those pieces to reach Ganon and rescue Princess Zelda. This guide walks through the whole game, from the first sword to the final battle, and also covers every item, upgrade and secret that helps you reach 100 percent.

The game at a glance

The game puts you on a single overworld made of 128 screens, laid out as 16 columns by 8 rows. You can walk almost anywhere from the first minute, so the order you visit places is up to you. Some areas are sealed until you find an item such as the Raft, the Stepladder or the Recorder, and some caves hide the items you need to reach them.

Each of the nine dungeons is a maze of rooms linked by locked doors, bombable walls and secret passages. Dungeons hold a compass, a map, small keys, a few weapons and tools, and a boss. Levels 1 to 8 each also contain one Triforce piece, and defeating the boss of each of those levels leaves a Heart Container behind, which raises your maximum health by one heart.

How you play

Starting out

You begin on the start screen, H8 on the map grid (the bottom row, just right of the middle), with three hearts and no items. The first item is a free Wooden Sword that an old man gives you in the cave on that screen. Use it to clear enemies, then start collecting rupees, the game’s currency, from the monsters you defeat. Bombs are the first tool you will want, because they open cracked walls and many secret caves. For the early steps, follow The Gathering.

Health and hearts

Your health is shown as hearts. Every Heart Container adds a full heart to the total, and the game allows 16 hearts at most. Thirteen containers exist in total: eight come from bosses and five are hidden in caves and behind walls on the overworld. Keep the count in mind, because the White Sword and the Magical Sword both need a minimum number of hearts before you can use them.

Saving your progress

The NES cartridge keeps up to three files in battery-backed memory. When your hearts run out you see three choices. Continue restarts you with three hearts and everything you carry, at the entrance of the dungeon you died in, or on the start screen if you were on the overworld. Save writes your file to the cartridge. Retry throws away everything since your last save and takes you back to the file screen, so avoid it unless you mean it. Nothing is saved automatically, so choose Save at a good stopping point, such as the moment you leave a dungeon with its Triforce piece. The manual says to hold in the reset button while you switch the console off after saving.

The Second Quest

After you defeat Ganon, the game lets you start the Second Quest, a harder version with stronger enemies and different dungeon layouts and item locations. You can also open it at the beginning by entering the name ZELDA on the name screen. The Second Quest is covered on its own in the walkthrough, and the first quest is the one this guide follows in its chapters.

Plain play tips

None of these need a cheat device. When every heart is full, your sword throws a beam, so heal before long-range fights. Open the item screen mid-fight to swap weapons: the Boomerang stuns most enemies and fetches items you cannot reach. Doors that slam shut behind you open again when you clear the room, and in some rooms one enemy is the ringleader, so killing it removes the rest. Fairy ponds restore every heart for free, so use them before you spend rupees on potions. Every Triforce piece you collect refills your hearts and sends you back to the dungeon entrance.

The map and the Compass are worth the detour in every dungeon, because the Compass marks the Triforce room and the Map reveals rooms you have not entered. The Magical Key you find in Level 8 replaces every small key, so you can stop counting them after that. Rupees cap at 255, so spend as you go. If a screen looks empty, burn the trees, push the Armos, bomb the flat wall and play the Recorder before moving on.

Using this guide

The guide is organised in two parts. The walkthrough follows the first quest in order, from the first cave to the ending, with one chapter for each dungeon and the items and secrets around it. The topic pages cover the things you collect across the whole game: heart containers, swords, rings, bomb upgrades, potions, shops, items, enemies and bosses. Use the chapters to play through the game and the topic pages to check a single item or to count what you still need.

The maps page shows the overworld grid and the dungeon entrances, and the story and setting page explains the plot and the places you will visit. Start with the walkthrough if this is your first time through the game.