Video Game / The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past

May the way of the Hero lead to the Triforce.

"The Hero's triumph on Cataclysm's Eve wins three Symbols of Virtue.
The Master Sword he will then retrieve, keeping the knights' line true."

The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past is the third game in the series, released for the SNES in Japan on November 2, 1991, in North America on April 13, 1992, and Europe in September 1992.

A prequel to the NES installments, A Link to the Past (Triforce of the Gods in Japanese) returned to the top-down adventure format of the first game. Unlike the previous games, which were almost purely focused on combat and exploration, A Link to the Past introduces a puzzle-solving element to the series, requiring players to use items in complex ways in order to make progress. The game also contains the first in-depth (yet still simple compared to later games) story in the series, giving the game more than just an Excuse Plot. These puzzle and story elements, along with the established constituents of combat and exploration, eventually became a part of the greater Zelda experience because of A Link to the Past, and this unique combination of elements would be solidified by later games.

The story begins with Link receiving a psychic message from Princess Zelda, telling him to come and save her from her imprisonment in Hyrule Castle. Link's Uncle also receives the call but dies, so Link must take up the call. He discovers that the evil wizard Agahnim is capturing girls from across Hyrule, and learns that the only way to defeat him is to obtain the three Pendants of Virtue from dungeons across Hyrule, and then collect the Master Sword. Of course, saving the world isn't that easy... Link is eventually forced to travel to the Dark World, a parallel version of Hyrule distorted by returning villain Ganon's wishes after he was sealed in the Golden Land (that story would later be told in Ocarina of Time), to save the captured maidens and the Princess, and finally defeat Ganon. The basic plot formula of A Link to the Past (gather three items, get Master Sword, huge plot twist, gather more items, fight the final boss), known to some fans as "The Legend," would be repeated many times throughout the series.

The game would receive a sequel in 1993 in the shape of Link's Awakening for the Game Boy. Link to the Past was re-released on December 2, 2002 for the Game Boy Advance, sharing a cartridge with the multiplayer-only Four Swords. A direct sequel for Nintendo 3DS, A Link Between Worlds, was released in 2013. It has the general look and feel of the original except with 3D graphics (though still top-down) and features the same version of Hyrule with completely new dungeons.

Shotaro Ishinomori created a comic adaptation in 1992. Akira Himekawa created a manga adaptation in 2005.

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A Link to the Past contains examples of:

• Ability Required to Proceed: As a series hallmark, almost every dungeon in the series from this game onward will have puzzles that can't be solved without the item found in their respective dungeon, and bosses will probably need you to use that item to beat them. In addition, one dungeon's item may be required to enter the next dungeon (or even sometimes the section of The Overworld it lies in).
• Absurdly Spacious Sewer: Link and Zelda escape from Hyrule Castle trough the underground sewers. They reach the backside of the Sanctuary, which is located northwest of the castle, and from there Zelda remains safe (for a while) with the loyal sage who resides there.
• Adaptational Hairstyle Change: The fairy's full body artwork shows her with a bobcut. The novelization by Katsuyuki Ozaki shows her with waist-length hair.
• Adaptational Skimpiness: The full body fairy artwork shown her with just her right shoulder and left arm bare. The Katsuyuki Ozaki novelization makes her dress completelely strapless as well as backless.
• After Boss Recovery: Obtaining a Heart Container doesn't heal you. However, rescuing the maiden from each dungeon (which also happens after defeating the boss) will recover your health.
• Alien Geometries: In the lower right corner of Hyrule's Death Mountain is a cave with a non-bottomless pit inside. Falling into it, however, lands you in front of a cave exit even higher up than where you entered. Fans have nicknamed this "Paradox Cave".
• Alien Landmass: The manual for the game includes a picture of the legendary Golden Realm, the resting place of the Triforce. The picture shows a world with a golden sky and endless planks of extremely thin, twisting landmasses balanced precariously on columns. However, the lore itself makes it clear no one actually knows what the Golden World looked like before Ganon corrupted it, and later games show it to be just a beautiful, lush world not much different from Hyrule.
• Alien Sky: The Sacred Realm is said to have a gold-colored sky. It is blood-red by the events of the game.
• All There in the Manual: The manual contains six pages of backstory, and a sealed booklet explaining how to beat some of the tougher puzzles. The translators of the American manual took a few liberties with the text. It created a few inconsistencies with later titles.
• All the Worlds Are a Stage: Ganon's Tower incorporates enemies and puzzles from many previous dungeons, as well as featuring rematches with the bosses of the Light World.
• Alternate Timeline: It's retroactively revealed by Hyrule Historia that this game is the first in the Downfall branch of the series' chronology, following Link's defeat against Ganon at the end of Ocarina of Time (he wins in the other two beanches). Without the Hero of Time around, Ganon was later defeated during the Imprisoning War and eventually sealed, which kickstarted the backstory of this game. All 2D games released on the NES, Game Boy, (original and Color) and 3DS take place after this game, thus being part of this branch of the chronology as well.
• Almost Dead Guy:
  • Link's uncle, who heads off to save Zelda in the beginning of the game and is found beaten in the underground passage. He gives Link his sword and shield and some encouragement before passing away.
  • After Link has recovered the three pendants, the soldiers storm the Sanctuary and take Zelda captive a second time, mortally wounding the Sanctuary Sage in the process. Like Link's uncle, he lives just long enough to direct Link where to go next.
• Amazing Technicolor Population: Agahnim is blue in the official artwork, albeit he has a natural skin tone in-game.
• Amazing Technicolor Wildlife: When Link is transformed into a rabbit, his fur is the same pink as his in-game hair.
• Ambiguous Situation: Due to the timing of when Ganon reveals himself, the nature of his and Agahnim's identity is ambiguous. On one hand, Agahnim is trying to break the seal on Ganon in the Sacred Realm, but as Ganon reveals Agahnim to be his "split soul" in the Japanese script or "alter ego" in the English translation, Ganon is somehow able to send a fragment of himself out of or escape the Sacred Realm. This leads to two possibilities: 1. That Agahnim was possessed by Ganon with some power that could leak out of the Sacred Realm, or 2. That Agahnim is an alternate body created by Ganon that can escape the Sacred Realm but with limited power. Neither explanation is used in-game, but the comics and three mangas depict Agahnim as a servant of Ganon.
• Ambiguous Syntax: This is how you end up Cursed with Awesome by the Mad Batter in the well. For disturbing his rest he curses you so that "your magic power will drop by one-half". Presumably he intended to reduce the capacity of your magic meter by 50%, but instead he causes your magic meter to only "drop by one-half" as much as it normally would when you use magic items, effectively doubling the capacity of your mana meter instead.
• And I Must Scream:
  • Some of the trees in the Dark World are actually people. They’re able to talk and are very unhappy about their condition.
  • The seven maidens, each trapped in a block of crystal after being sent to the Dark World.
• Animal Motifs: People who enter the Dark Realm without the Moon Pearl transform into something reflecting their soul. When first entering, Link is transformed into a pink bunny to reflect his innocence.
• Animorphism: Entering the Dark World without the protection of the Moon Pearl causes Link to transform into an adorable, defenseless, pink bunny-man.
• Anti-Frustration Features:
  • On Death Mountain, around the same place that the falling rocks appear, there's an old hermit that can refill your hearts for free.
  • Trinexx, the boss of Turtle Rock, can initially only be hurt by attacking his fire and ice spewing heads with their opposite elements. If you run out of magic power to use the Fire and Ice Rods, however, his elemental breath attacks will have a chance of leaving a small magic container behind.
  • If you try to upgrade your bomb or arrow capacity while they are fully maxed out, the fairy will return the 100 Rupees you spent.
  • When Link warps between the Light and Dark Worlds, he will have a brief period of invincibility in case he spawns on top of an enemy. The same applies when he flies using the Duck in the Light World.
• Antlion Monster: Antlion like enemies called Devalants in Hyrule's desert area. They bury themselves, then create whirlpools and try to suck you in.
• Arc Words: "May the way of the Hero lead to the Triforce."
• Armor Is Useless: The corrupted guard enemies debuting in this game wear so much plate armor that their face can't even be seen. Yet in all of their appearances, they are among the weakest enemies in the game unlike other armored enemies.
• Artistic Age: Link in this game is obviously in his mid-to-late teens in his official artwork and this applies to him in The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening too. The portraits in the latter game make him closer to "young Link" but it's likely the Super-Deformed style at fault. There is less of an excuse for the The Legend of Zelda: Oracle Games, where he inexplicably looks several years younger than before. Even though according to Hyrule Historia the three Links are one and the same and both Link's Awakening and the two Oracle games take place after A Link To The Past.
• Artwork and Game Graphics Segregation:
  • Famously, the color of Link's hair in this game. He appears dirty blonde in official artwork, but pink in-game. There have been theories for why this is, ranging from graphical limitations to consistency with his pink bunny form later on, but all of this has been disproven.
  • Official artwork depicts Zelda wearing two different outfits: a casual getup consisting of a light blue dress with white sleeves and a royal uniform consisting of a white dress and cape with blue trimming, a pink stole, gold armbands, gold shoulder pads, and a gold headband. Her in-game sprite, meanwhile, opts for a combination of the two, matching her royal uniform but using the color scheme of her casual outfit. Additionally, her headband appears closer to a tiara on her sprite and her hair is hazel instead of blonde.
  • Aghanim's robes are portrayed as green in-game but are depicted as red in all other media.
  • Despite the game's artwork firmly establishing the Master Sword's iconic appearance even today, in-game it appears to have an indistinct brown hilt that becomes white after the sword is tempered later on. This is especially egregious since the sword otherwise appears relatively accurate until Link actually obtains it.
• Attack Its Weak Point:
  • The Moldorm's tail is the only part Link can hit in order to cause it damage. And due to the boss's erratic movement, it's hard to land the sword's slashes properly.
  • Helmasaur King, the Boss of the Dark Palace. Link has to aim for the green crystal on its forehead, which it protects with a mask.
  • Trinexx, the Boss of Turtle Rock. In the second phase of the battle, Link has to attack its glowing midsection.
• Attack Reflector: Link's Spin Attack can redirect the round energy beams shot by Agahnim during his boss battles (the scattering ones must be avoided altogether). This marked a tradition of Tennis Bosses appearing in the series.
• Attack the Tail: Moldorm's weak point. Attacking its flower-like butt is how you defeat it, but it's easier said thatn done. The boss's errating movement pattern makes it difficult for Link to hit it there.
• Audible Sharpness: Charging up for a Whirling Blade Attack gives an audible sound. It's also inverted with the tempered and golden swords, which make "rougher" sounds when swung than the Master Sword's first form.
• Auto-Revive: Starting from this game, catching fairies in bottles has this effect, though you also have the option of releasing them early and using them as a simple healing item.
• Awesome, but Impractical: The good bee in would attack enemies for you and, more importantly, not attack you. Unfortunately, it isn't anywhere near as helpful as fairies or potions, dealing Scratch Damage, easily being lost, and limited by Contractual Boss Immunity. The one boss exempt from that is Mothula, but one bee isn't strong enough on its own and having more than one for that one fight takes up too many valuable bottles.
• Back from the Brink: By the time you reach the first dungeon, the king has been killed, the majority of Hyrule's soldiers have been brainwashed to serve his murderer, and the villain is preparing to sacrifice Zelda as the final maiden to break the seal on the Dark World so its forces can invade Hyrule, your uncle already heavily injured trying to stop them. And then Link gets involved.
• Back from the Dead: All the heroic characters who died over the course of the game (in order, The King of Hyrule, Link's uncle, the priest that sheltered Zelda in his shrine after you rescued her for the first time, the Flute Boy, and possibly all the brainwashed soldiers you were forced to kill) are all wished to life at the end by Link.
• Bad Future:
  • The timeline included in Hyrule Historia says that A Link to the Past^note and by extension, the Oracle games, Link's Awakening, A Link Between Worlds, Tri Force Heroes, the first Legend of Zelda, and The Adventure of Link occurred had Link failed to defeat Ganondorf in the Adult Timeline of Ocarina of Time. While the Sages still manage to seal Ganondorf away, presumably the Imprisoning War cost many more lives than would have been lost if Link had won.
  • In a meta sense, the Dark World. It's referred both in and out of universe as how Hyrule could be should Ganon become its supreme ruler.
• Bad Powers, Bad People: Agahnim is an evil sorcerer with mind-controlling powers. Summed up nicely in the below quote from the Prologue.
  "A mysterious wizard known as Agahnim appeared as from nowhere [...] and with strange magic powers he eliminated the good king of Hyrule."
• Bandit Mook: There's a thief enemy in the game. While he never steals anything of great importance (just bombs, arrows, Rupees etc.), he can't be killed or even stunned. There's also Pikits, who hop around and attempt to snatch Rupees, arrows, bombs, and even your shield from you with their tongue.
• Bat Out of Hell: Ganon transforms into a giant bat after emerging out of Agahnim when Link beats him a second time. He can also create fire bats during his second phase.
• Battle Theme Music: The game plays a fast-paced theme for all regular bosses, while Ganon gets a new, smoother theme for the final battle. A modern remix of the former theme would reappear in The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures and in The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds 9 years later for the Hyrule bosses, while the latter would be remixed for the Phantom Ganon battles in The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker.
• Bee-Bee Gun: You can catch bees and use them to attack enemies.
  • Normal bees will only sting enemies a preset number of times before heading back to you, and will start stinging you unless you catch them again.
  • Special "golden bees" return to you afterwards without attacking, and stick around as long as there are live enemies around. Given enough time they will kill entire screenfuls of enemies. The Golden Bee is also one of the most useful weapons for the boss fight against Mothula.
• Before the Dark Times: We learn via the game's backstory and lore that the Dark World used to be the the Golden Realm; it was a holy, more or less perfect realm where the Triforce resides, before Ganon got imprisoned there and took it over.
• Betting Minigame: There are places where you pay your money and then open one treasure chest, getting a certain amount of Rupees. One of these places holds a Piece of Heart in one of the chests, and in general the odds are much more in your favor. There is also a digging minigame, in which RNG determines what you dig up (including a Piece of Heart), but you have plenty of time, and the RNG is generous.
• Beware My Stinger Tail: The Helmasaur King can attack with a spiked ball at the end of its tail.
• Beware the Skull Base: Beyond the name, the Skull Woods features a large skull shaped entrance to the underground dungeon beneath the forest.
• Big Bad: Agahnim takes over Hyrule by killing the King and brainwashing his soldiers and kidnaps the Seven Maidens to revive Ganon. Except he actually is Ganon, either possessing Agahnim or using Agahnim as an alter ego.
• Big Boo's Haunt: The Dark World has the Skull Woods, which combines this with a forest element. There's a prevalence of skulls, Stalfos, Gibdos and Wallmasters, though it's all even more prominent in A Link Between Worlds.
• Big, Bulky Bomb: The Super Bomb is as big as Link. It doesn't harm anything else except the one specific wall you need to use it on: you can leave it in the middle of a group of enemies and stand next to it, and nobody takes any damage when it blows up.
• Big Creepy-Crawlies: The game introduces Mothula, a very dangerous large moth that serves as the boss of Skull Woods, and has since appeared in later games (including mook versions in The Wind Waker.
• Big Door: Starting with this game, the doors that lead into boss rooms are often big decorative doors that need equally decorative keys to open them.
• Big Storm Episode: During the start of the game, Link is telepathically told by Princess Zelda that she needs his help. Link has to leave his house (against the orders of his uncle) and venture through Hyrule during a stormy, rainy night so he can enter the Castle via a secret passageway. The sun rises and the rain ends by the time Link and Zelda manage to escape Hyrule Castle and reach the Sanctuary, which prompts the proper start of the young hero's adventure.
• Blackout Basement: The somewhat-aptly named Palace of Darkness, the first dungeon in the Dark World. With the exception of a handful of rooms, the basement areas are very dark, making it difficult to see the enemies and doorways. Almost crosses over into Nonindicative Name territory in comparison to the sequel's corresponding dungeon of the same name as only a total of 6 rooms, out of a total of 24, are pitch black.
• "Blind Idiot" Translation: In the original Japanese version, the Flippers were translated in the ending as "Finger Webs." Not surprisingly, this error was fixed in the English translation.
• Bling-Bling-BANG!: Link's strongest sword is made out of (presumably magical) gold.
• Block Puzzle: Block puzzles rarely turn up to block progress in this game, typically being reserved for optional Heart Pieces and rewards, or to screw you out of mid-dungeon refills. There's also the Cane of Somaria in this game and in The Legend of Zelda: Oracle Games, an item whose purpose is to actually create blocks.
• Bombardier Mook: Zirros, enemies found in the Dark World, are flying creatures resembling mushrooms with wings and attack exclusively by spitting bombs at Link. They normally stay well above Link's head, dipping down only to deliver a payload, and will retreat if Link approaches them, making dealing with them tricky.
• Bond Villain Stupidity: Justified. The maidens are a major threat to Agahnim's plans since they are the only ones capable of sealing Ganon or countering his evil magic. This obviously raises the question of why Agahnim only teleports the maidens to the Dark World instead of killing them. The first maiden explains that this is because they are also the only ones who can unseal Ganon, so he has to hijack their powers to free himself from the Dark World. However, one of the maidens implies that Ganon already siphoned all the power he needed from them, which does raise the question of why he's still keeping them around.
• Bonus Dungeon: There's an extra dungeon in the remade GBA version, called Palace of the Four Sword. Players can't access the dungeon until they completed the multiplayer Four Swords game. Inside the dungeon is 4 areas with very tough puzzles and color swaps of some of the bosses Link fought previously, along with new behavior patterns. Beating all 4 bosses opens the way to fighting 4 clones of Link from the Four Sword, each Link bearing a different color and abilities that mirror Link's. Beating these bosses only gets you statistics of your game data, so it's nothing but bragging rights.
• Bookends:
  • The Light World half of the game starts and ends with Link storming Hyrule Castle.
  • The Dark World half begins with Link materializing on the Pyramid of Power and ends with him entering it to face the Final Boss.
• Boom in the Hand: From this game onwards, Link is capable of picking up the bombs he pulls out and throwing them. However, holding onto them for too long will result in them exploding on Link, hurting him.
• Bootstrapped Leitmotif: The song most commonly known as Zelda's Lullaby originated in this game, as the song plays when rescuing one of the Maidens (including Zelda herself, who is one of them).
• Bootstrapped Theme: After its absence in The Adventure of Link, this game recovered the old Title Screen / Overworld theme from the original NES game, where it became the undisputed Main Theme of the whole series. A decade later, The Wind Waker turned it into Link's leitmotif as well; up to this day, the melody still maintains both functions.
• Boring, but Practical: The humble Magic Powder can't defeat most enemies or directly defend against their attacks, and for puzzle-solving purposes it only unlocks one useful but non-essential item. However, it can also convert the common anti-fairy enemy into fairies that can refill Link's health or be captured in a bottle for later use. Once you have a decent working knowledge of where anti-fairies can be found, the Magic Powder becomes one of the most useful safety items in the game.
• Boss-Altering Consequence: The Bug Net can be used to reflect Agahnim's magic bolts back at him. It's only slightly more practical than swinging your sword as it covers more range, but it can only be done during this boss battle.
• Boss-Arena Idiocy: Ganon is virtually invisible and invincible in the dark, but then there are torches in the room that Link can light up and expose Ganon.
• Boss in Mook Clothing: The Ball and Chain Soldiers can be this thanks to their high health and hard-to-dodge weapon. In fact, the first one is treated as a miniboss, as defeating it is necessary to grab the key that opens Zelda's cage.
• Boss-Only Level: The Pyramid of Power, the place in which you face Ganon, is nothing but a boss arena and a short hallway to get back to the boss arena if you fall off.
• Boss Room: While usually played straight with the bosses' whereabouts, there's a unique case with Thieves' Hideout; you open the enormous door with the enormous key, and... wait, you're only just beginning the dungeon, there's even more fighting and puzzle-solving through that door, as the room is initially empty.
• Boss Rush: Ganon's Tower features all four of the Light World bosses with upgrades (icy floor for the Armos Knights, traps in the room for the Lanmolas, a weird floor layout for Moldorm, and two false images for Agahnim). The GBA port features The Palace of the Four Sword, which has more difficult forms of the first four Dark World bosses as sub-bosses.
• Bottomless Pits: The first game of the series to properly introduce them as they are known today. Although some pits drop you to the floor below (usually they are textured), the stark black pits result in Link being sent back to where he fell from and losing half a heart. Of particular mention is a large chasm that surrounds the bottom of Death Mountain and divides it into two parts. It's too dark to see the bottom, but star-like sparkles appear in it. It's unclear if they are meant to be gemstones, or if something else is going on. The Dark World equivalent at least does appear to have a bottom, as veins of lava can be seen running through it. Only the light world counterpart presents an actual fall hazard (it is not possible to jump into the dark world chasm) and it has the same effect as any other bottomless pit.
• Bowdlerise: Since Nintendo of America's Jesus Taboo was still in place when this game first released, a number of religious references (such as Agahnim being called a "priest") in the original Japanese game were removed from the English translation. This extends to the game's title, the Japanese version of which translates to "Triforce of the Gods". The Japanese Super Famicom text also explicitly states that the maidens were being "sacrificed" - both the English SNES translation and all releases of the GBA version, including the Japanese, remove all references to sacrifices. This is averted in the English SNES manual, which uses the word "gods" repeatedly when telling the Hyrule creation myth.
• Brainwashed and Crazy: All of the guards and soldiers in Hyrule are slaves to Agahnim's command. For the most part, though, they still seem to be doing their regular duties, as some of them are very chatty and helpful to Link at the start of the game and the townsfolk will still call them for help if they see Link. Regardless, once they see Link, or are given a direct order by Agahnim, they will carry it out with insane determination.
• Breath Weapon:
  • Blind the Thief and his severed heads can spit fireballs.
  • Trinnex's red and blue side heads can breath fire and ice respectively.
• Bright Is Not Good: Blind the Thief, the Dungeon Boss of Thieves' Town. Besides his vibrant red skin, he has a light orange dress when impersonating the fourth maiden.
• "Bringer of War" Music: The Death Mountain theme opens with militaristic staccato beats, giving it a warlike energy evocative of "Mars".
• Broken Armor Boss Battle: The Helmasaur King's face is covered by a large helmet that protects its only vulnerable spot, and which Link needs to break apart before he can defeat the beast.
• Broken Bridge: In the beginning, guards block all paths that don't lead to the castle until after you've rescued the princess.
• Bubblegloop Swamp: It has several examples: The Great Swamp in the Overworld, which is portrayed in a more positive light but has no lack of critters and monsters like other areas. The Dark World, however, sports two: The Swamp of Evil and the unnamed, Dark World version of the Great Swamp, each with its own dungeon.
• Bug Catching: The Bug Net in this game and its Interquel The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds is used to catch bees and other insects, as well as the fairies that return in later games. Later games even have bug collecting sidequests.
• Build Like an Egyptian: The Pyramid of Power in the Dark World (not inside a desert, but it's not necessary since the Dark World as a whole is mostly a wasteland already). It is located where Hyrule Castle (from Hyrule and the Light World) would be, and it's here where Ganon challenges Link in the Final Boss battle. It's not entirely malicious, however, as it also houses the Great Fairy who can empower Link's arrows and Tempered Sword into the Silver Arrows and Golden Sword respectively.
• But Thou Must!: Many times during the game, you are asked if you understand. Each time you must say Yes to continue. When you are asked if you wish to find the pendants, your choices are "Yes." and "Of course!"
• Call to Adventure: Zelda telepathically contacts Link in the beginning.
• The Cameo: A pair of Chain Chomps appear in Turtle Rock. There’s also a portrait of Mario hanging in a house.
• Can't Refuse the Call Anymore: This comes when he rescues Zelda from Agahnim and becomes a fugitive. Later, it comes again when Agahnim has re-captured Zelda and Link goes to confront him, only to be sent to the Dark World at the end of their encounter.
• Can't You Read the Sign?:
  • The game has a signpost warning people not to throw objects into an obvious circle of stones sitting nearby. Not only is doing so the only way to get an item required to beat the game, but in this game, signposts themselves can be lifted, making it far too tempting to obtain the item by throwing the signpost.
  • There's another sign that warns you to pay no attention to the man standing next to it. If you go up and talk to the man, he's silent. But if you steal his sign, he gets a bit annoyed and starts following you around...
• Carbuncle Creature: The Helmasaur King, a giant reptilian beast whose helmet hides an emerald-like gem embedded in its forehead. This is the creature's only weak spot, and Link must break off the helmet in order to expose it and be able to damage it.
• Cash Gate: There are 3 things in the game that you HAVE to spend money on to proceed:
  • The Zora's Flippers. At 500 Rupees, it's by far the priciest of the required expenses.
  • Kiki the Monkey. You have to pay him 10 Rupees to follow you to the entrance to the first Dark World dungeon, and if you get hit by an enemy along the way, Kiki flees and you have to pay him another 10 Rupees to follow you again. Once you reach the dungeon entrance, you have to him 100 more Rupees to open it.
  • The Super Bomb. After at least the sixth Dark World dungeon, you have to buy one of those for 100 Rupees and drag it to the Pyramid to blast open the cracked wall to reach the Great Fairy that gives you the Silver Arrows necessary to defeat Ganon.
• Cap: Because chests and rewards cannot be saved for later once opened/initiated, the Rupee cap of 999 can be particularly concerning in this game. It's tough to not hit this by the time you've cleared the Swamp Palace, and there are still more secret treasure hoards to acquire afterwards... which you might accidentally waste, by opening or accepting too early.
• Casting a Shadow: In the final phase of the fight against Ganon, he uses a "secret technique of darkness" to make himself invisible and darken the room.
• Catch-22 Dilemma: The game has this in the form of a locked chest with its key locked inside: to open it, you bring it to a former thief who agrees to lockpick it for you in exchange for keeping his whereabouts a secret.
• Cave Behind the Falls: There's one in Zora's Domain, hiding a Great Fairy fountain. And oodles more in the Once Per Game Water level.
• Charge Meter: The game has a spark travel up the length of Link's sword as he charges up for a Spin Attack.
• Chasing Your Tail: Moldorm, a giant worm whose only weak spot is in his tail. You fight it in a tiny little area in the middle of a hole that drops you down a floor if you fall. Getting hit by the boss knocks you back several times farther than normal.
• Chekhov's Gun:
  • Nearly every boss has a piece of equipment that Link can discover to use against it. In fact, The Dragon, Aghanim, can be brought low by the humble Butterfly Net, one of the earliest pieces of equipment found.
  • The lantern. All it's useful for is lighting lamps, which can be helpful but isn't actually necessary for any of the game's puzzles. Guess what you have to do to be able to see the Final Boss in the last phase?
• Chekhov's Gunman: Blind the Thief is first discussed in the beginning of the game when Link talks to a Kakariko villager inside Blind's old hideout. Several plot twists and seven dungeons later, Blind turns out to be the Boss of Dark World Dungeon Thieves' Town.
• Cherry Tapping:
  • Link must battle the otherwise-invulnerable dark wizard Agahnim by reflecting his own magic back at him, using the legendary Master Sword (which you spend the entire game up until that point trying to acquire). Turns out that the Bug-Catching Net that a kid in Kakariko Village lets you play with accomplishes the feat just as well.
  • There are two upgrades to the Master Sword that increase its damage. You can beat the game while avoiding both upgrades, but the un-tempered Master Sword is so weak that it cannot hurt the final boss without charging the sword and using the spin attack.
• Chest Monster: The game does this with skulls (the Dark World's equivalent of rocks) and dungeon tiles coming to life. It also places mines and enemies under some bushes.
• Circling Vultures: In the Desert of Mystery, vultures leave their cactus perch and circle around Link. During the ending credits, vultures in the desert circle around the Master Locksmith, the Average Middle-Aged Man.
• Clear My Name: After Link rescues Zelda from Agahnim the first time, his minions get the word out (with surprising speed) that Link has kidnapped her. Signs are posted in his hometown and if they spot him, his neighbors will yell for the palace guards to come and kill him.
• Climax Boss: The wizard Agahnim is fought after retrieving the three Pendants of Virtue and the Master Sword. Link only thought he was the Big Bad, and after defeating him, is transported to the Dark World to rescue the seven maidens.
• Clipped-Wing Angel: After destroying Trinexx's fire and ice heads in Turtle Rock, it turns into a weaker snake-like form.
• Color-Coded for Your Convenience: The armor of the enemy soldiers as well as that of Link himself is green for the weakest form, blue for the stronger version, and red for the even stronger version.
  • This also corresponds the the ascending order of rupee values. Green is worth 1, blue is worth 5, and red is worth 20.
  • As well as the pendants you collect from the Light World dungeons to get the Master Sword.
  • Healing potions are red, mana potions are green, and blue potions heal both.
• Collision Damage: Obviously, Link will suffer this if he touches a monster. However, the Cane of Byrna allows Link to generate a magic force field that not only allows him to inflict this on the enemies, but also protects him from everything up to falling into pits. You'll still bounce (with no damage) off spikeballs, though.
• Comic-Book Adaptation: Four of them:
  • The western comic adaptation by Shotaro Ishinomori serialized in Nintendo Power and later published in graphic novel form.
  • The first manga adaptation, created by Junko Taguchi in 1993.
  • Another manga adaptation, created by Ataru Cagiva and published in Japan in 1995.
  • Another manga adaptation, created by Akira Himekawa in 2005. It was originally published after the GBA release and was released in North America in 2010.
• Company Cross References: A portrait of Mario can be found inside some houses throughout the game, and the penultimate dungeon, Turtle Rock, has several Mario references:
  • It’s called Turtle Rock, and its boss is a fire-breathing turtle, alluding to Koopas and Bowser.
  • Two Chain Chomps appear.
  • The first Turtle Rock-exclusive gimmick you find are squares with question marks on them. (The fact that they turn into platforms that follow dotted lines could also be a reference to the Rail Lifts from Mario games.)
  • The second such gimmick is tubes that shoot you around like warp pipes. (Most of them have one or more 90° bends, like those in the penultimate world of Super Mario Bros. 3.)
  • The Hokbok enemies exclusive to Turtle Rock are expies of Pokey. Other non-exclusive enemies may allude to Bloopers and Buzzy Beetles.
• Context-Sensitive Button: The A button. With it, Link can talk to other characters, grab movable objects, lift liftable objects, or use the Pegasus Boots.
• Contractual Boss Immunity: All of the game's Dark World bosses are immune to all three Medallions, especially Bombos (even if the Fire Rod affects them).
• Cool Mask: Helmasaur King covers its weak point with a ceratopsian, three-pronged, bony blue mask that must be broken with Bombs or the Magic Hammer.
• Cop Killer: Link has no choice but to kill soldiers who either are brainwashed or do not realize or care that their king has been murdered and that they should be fighting Aghanim's "government".
• Corridor Cubbyhole Run: In the very first proper dungeon, East Palace, you had to navigate a corridor of dark boulders rolling down. Areas like these appeared throughout the series in various forms.
• The Coup: Agahnim seizes power by mind-controlling the castle guards shortly before the game.
• Creepy Centipedes: The Lanmolas return in this game, and are upgraded to a collective Wolfpack Boss guarding the Pendant of Power in Desert Palace.
• Crystal Prison: The first in the series, and perhaps the Trope Codifier. The seven maidens are all put in giant, blue crystals.
• Cumulonemesis: In the second stage of its battle, Kholdstare, the boss of the Ice Palace, splits into three one-eyed, frozen clouds that chase Link across the Frictionless Ice.
• Curse:
  • Anyone who enters the Dark World is transformed into a form reminiscent of what's inside their heart. Which doesn't explain why Link turns into a bunny. The seven maidens sent into the Dark World to break the seal on it are cursed to turn into crystals. Carrying a special pearl allows Link to ward off the curse.
  • A tiny demon curses Link to only use half of his magic power per spell. In other words, the demon's "curse" turns out to be extremely beneficial.
• Cursed with Awesome: You wake a sleeping imp, who curses you for your impudence by halving your magic... although what he actually does is halve your magic cost, effectively doubling your magic. Thanks, buddy!
• Cutscene Power to the Max: When Ganon reveals himself in Ganon's Tower, Link uses the flute to summon the bird to give chase and take him to the Pyramid of Power. Not only can the bird not be summoned indoors, it can't be summoned in the Dark World period, being a denizen of the Light World.
• Cutting the Knot: Getting the Cane of Somaria as soon as possible allows you to bypass a number of tricky block-and-pressure-switch puzzles by just creating a block on top of the switch rather than actually solving said puzzles.
• Cyclops: The game marks the debut of the Hinoxes, one-eyed, bomb-throwing brutes which most closely resemble the classic cyclops of Greek mythology.
• Damage-Sponge Boss: Helmasaur King. As the first boss of the Dark World, its helmet can tank a ridiculous amount of hits from the hammer. Bombs can take it down in fewer hits, but the boss moves around enough that *hitting* the mask with the timed explosives can be a challenge, so either way it can take a bit.
• Damn You, Muscle Memory!: For those coming from later 2D Zelda games, getting used to the starting sword's hitbox can take a while. Unlike later games where the sword hitbox tends to stay mostly consistent throughout with a decent range, the starting sword's hitbox in this game is tiny, often requiring you to get far closer to enemies to hit them than you'd likely be used to in a 2D Zelda game. This often results in swinging the sword, missing the enemy, and, in the process, the enemy hitting you if you don't immediately start spamming the attack button. Thankfully, once you get the Master Sword, the hitbox evens out to what you'd expect from later Zelda games.
• Damsel in Distress: Though Princess Zelda is in a prison cell at the beginning, she is quickly rescued by Link. She only gets kidnapped again about a third of the way into the game; she gets rescued in the second-to-last dungeon, after which she and the other Maidens (themselves Distressed Damsels) use their magic to break the barrier barring entry into Ganon's Tower.
• Dark World: The Dark World is the trope namer. Once it was the Sacred Realm (or Golden Land) and home to the Triforce, but after Ganon was banished there centuries ago, it became corrupted into its current form, a dark mirror of Hyrule. Some landforms are exaggerations of their Light World counterparts, like the ruined Village of Outcasts that stands in place of the settlement of Kakariko; other places are environmental inversions, such as the Swamp of Evil replacing the Light World's desert. Regular people in the Dark World are turned into weird monsters that reflect their hearts, while evil people are turned into demons. Link himself is turned into a pink bunny unless he gathers the correct item. Beyond the Dark World reflecting the Light World, in some cases events on one will affect the other, as seen when Link drains a Light World lake to gain access to a water-themed Dark World dungeon.
• Dash Attack: The Pegasus Boots allow Link to dash forward with his sword out (provided it's equipped), causing large damage and possibly stunning enemies.
• Death by Falling Over: Those rats were just too much for Link's uncle to handle, although the game implies that he was killed in an ambush by Agahnim's forces. The tie-in comics elaborate that, because Link's uncle too was a descendant of the Knights of Hyrule, and thus a potential holder of the Master Sword, that Agahnim killed him personally.
• Death Is a Slap on the Wrist: Falling into deep water without Zora's flippers returns you to shore instantly with no penalty, and on top of that you get temporary invincibility!
• Death Is Cheap: The King of Hyrule and Link's Uncle both die and are returned to life when Link wishes for the Triforce to restore Hyrule. The Flute Boy, who was transformed into a tree, is also returned to normal.
• Death Mountain: The trope namer returns and even has a Dark World counterpart that it shares a name with.^note Well, except in the Japanese version. In it, only one was called Death Mountain, and considering the names of the Dark World's locations, naturally, it was the Dark World version. The Light World mountain was called Mt. Hebra instead, despite being the one of the two that contained the Spectacle Rock feature that was present in the Death Mountain incarnations in the previous two games. (Unlike the Light World counterpart, the Dark World counterpart has more ominous music than the rest of its world's overworld to go with its more twisted nature.)
• Decoy Damsel: Blind. You really ought to know better though; Unlike the other Maidens, 'she' is trapped not in a crystal, but a dingy cage, without even bothering with an explanation as to why she isn't in a crystal to boot.
• Defeat Equals Explosion: After Ganon is slain, his body subsequently explodes like fireworks.
• Degraded Boss: The Light World bosses become minibosses in Ganon's Tower, except Agahnim who retains his role as the dungeon's boss.
• Developer's Foresight:
  • Slightly altered dialogue exists for obtaining the second and third pendants out of order.
  • There is also a slightly altered dialogue for Zelda when you rescue her from Turtle Rock, in the unlikely event that you only half complete another dungeon and don't rescue all six other maidens first.
  • If you defeat Agahnim in his first fight without having the Moon Pearl, you'll be turned into a bunny upon being drawn into the Dark World and Sahasrahla's telepathic message to Link will contain additional dialogue urging him to retrieve it.
• Developer's Room: The Chris Houlihan room, which can only be reached if the game fails to load an area. Chris Houlihan was actually the winner of a Nintendo Power contest which meant his name would appear in a game. Apparently, this was how the developers decided to do it (the room exists in other regional versions of the game, but Chris Houlihan's name is only in the American version). The room was removed in the GBA version, and all subsequent rereleases rename the area "the Top Secret room", due to legal reasons.
• Disc-One Final Boss: Agahnim is the initial antagonist you face, but is dispatched in time for the action to shift to the Dark World and rescuing the seven maidens.
• Disc-One Final Dungeon: Hyrule Castle Tower, full of powerful enemies and where the battle with Agahnim takes place.
• Disc-One Nuke:
  • If you know where to get it, you can go grab the Ice Rod as soon as you rescue Princess Zelda, giving you a weapon as strong as the Tempered Sword.
  • You only need the Titan's Mitts to get the Tempered Sword (and not even them if you abuse a minor glitch with the mirror to warp past the stones blocking the blacksmith), so as soon as you finish the Dark Palace you can go run through Thieves' Town (which is the easiest, shortest dungeon in the Dark World) and then go grab the Tempered Sword which will be very helpful against many enemies to come.
• Disconnected Side Area:
  • The Swamp of Evil in the Dark World, which even has a sign indicating "No Entry, No Escape." You have to reach it via a transporter tile in the Light World, which can only be reached via Flute/bird transport. The Ice Palace requires a similar trick. According to the lore, it's because the swamp was overflowing with rainwater that threatened to flood the rest of the land, so a mountain range was put up to prevent that from happening.
  • Dark Death Mountain, where the Bully and the Ball Boy are running around. The only point of interest is the Spike Cave with the Cane of Byrna in it, with no way to the sections of the mountain with Ganon's Tower, Turtle Rock, or the lower-right cave systems.
• Dishing Out Dirt: Every time a Lanmola emerges from the ground, it sprays rocks that Link has to dodge.
• Disproportionate Retribution: Two brothers south of Kakariko Village got into a spat over an unknown issue. One of the brothers decides to "win" the argument by sealing his brother in his room. Talking to him has him lampshade it saying he knows the whole thing is silly, but he wanted to screw his brother over and not lose to him. After Link blows up the wall, the aggressor decides it's probably time to drop the whole thing and make up.
• Distress Call: Zelda psychically asks Link and his uncle for help escaping her imprisonment by Agahnim to start the game. She also sends him another one later in the game, when she's captured a second time.
• Divine Birds: The bird statue in the town square comes to life and serves as Link's Warp Whistle, ferrying him across Hyrule and even serving as borderline Divine Intervention in the finale by carrying him to Ganon's pyramid.
• Don't Look At Me: There's a very quiet guy just sitting there in the desert. He is a retired thief who wants his old reputation to just go away already. Next to him is a sign:
  I'm just an average guy. Do not try to talk to me. DO NOT remove this sign.
• Doomed Fellow Prisoner: Zelda mentions something happened to the other princesses before Link saves her. It later turns out that they were banished to the Dark World and turned into a crystal in order to break Ganon's seal.
• Doppleganger Attack:
  • In the second fight with Agahnim, he summons two shadowy clones to attack Link.
  • In the GBA version, the rematch against Mothula has the boss unleash a duplicate of itself.
• Door to Before: Beating the boss transports you to the dungeon exit, but returning to the boss' room later can leave you stranded, forcing you to use the "teleport me back" magic item (or save and exit).
• Double-Meaning Title: The title can mean either "link" as in "connection", or "Link" as in The Protagonist.
• Down the Drain: After the first bit of castle and dungeon, Link has to escort Zelda out through the sewers. In the same game, the second dungeon of the Dark World, Swamp Palace, involves manipulating the flow and/or level of water.
• The Dragon: Agahnim, the first time in the series that Ganon has someone doing his dirty work for him. The Japanese original implies that he is some kind of offshoot (the word used is bunshin, "split soul") of Ganon similar to the Phantom Ganons from later games. The English translation suggests that Agahnim is actually Ganon in a form that can travel to the Light World, though only with limited powers. Adaptations in either language tend to make Agahnim a separate entity from Ganon.
• Dual-World Gameplay: The game started this trend in the series. Link stumbles across a portal to the Dark World just before what seems to be the final dungeon. This is one of many portals in Hyrule which trap people in the Dark World and warp their bodies. Luckily, Link gets the Magic Mirror right before he enters, and uses it to return to Hyrule. The mirror is used extensively in the second half of the game as Link finds more portals and collects crystals from the Dark World dungeons.
• Dub-Induced Plot Hole: The English translation of the manual states that the Master Sword was forged specifically to stop Ganon, whereas the original Japanese stated that the people began searching for the Master Sword when Ganon rose. Skyward Sword would later contradict the English version by showing the Master Sword's origins well before Ganon(dorf) even existed.
• Dub Name Change:
  • M.C. Hammer > Magic Hammer
  • Degu Tail (Big Tail) > Moldorm
  • Moldorm > Swamola (note above entry; "Moldorm" refers to a different enemy in English)
  • Tail > Mini-Moldorm (previously localized as simply "Moldorm")
  • Jikkurokku > Helmasaur King
  • Wart > Arrghus
  • Gamoth > Mothula
  • ShuEyes > Kholdstare
  • Geldoga > Vitreous
  • Degu Rokku (Big Rock) > Trinexx
  • Seichi (Sacred Realm) > Golden Land
  • Kyoukai (Church) > Sanctuary
  • Shinpu (Priest) > Loyal Sage
  • Crowly > Crow
  • Gerudoman > Geldman
  • Heiiji > Hoarder
  • Piece > Sand Crab
  • Tendor > Vulture
  • Moriblin > Moblin (previously transliterated as "Molblin")
  • Like Like > Pikit (not differentiated from regular Like Likes in Japanese)
  • Kyuune > Dacto
  • Slurok > Slarok
  • Gapura > Snap Dragon
  • Tainon > Freezor
  • Creepy > Zirro
  • Copy > Goriya (note: "Goriya" refers to a different enemy in the original NES game)
  • Poun > Hardhat Beetle
  • Hiploop > Helmasaur
  • Fanguin > Pengator
  • Guuzu > Rat
  • Nuranuuru > Sluggula
  • Stalfon > Stalfos Knight
  • Pamet > Terrorpin
  • Fallmaster > Wallmaster (note: in Japanese, Wallmasters and Fallmasters are different enemies); in English, they have the same name)
  • Hover > Water Tektite
  • Hebra Mountain > Death Mountain (In Japanese, Death Mountain has a different name in the Light World; in English, it's still Death Mountain)
  • Shinden (Temple) > Palace (applies to every name in which the word appears)
  • Akuma no Numa (Devil's Swamp) > Misery Mire (note: Misery Mire and the Swamp of Evil have the same name in Japanese)
  • Haguremono no Mura (Town of the Astray) > Thieves' Town (note: Thieves' Town and the Village of Outcasts have the same name in Japanese)
  • Pyramid > Pyramid of Power
• Dungeon Town: Thieves' Town. Not only is it located directly inside a traditional town (Village of Outcasts) that also happens to have enemies alongside harmless inhabitants, but inside you also have to interact with a female character and have her accompany you as you venture through the dungeon. More shockingly, the female character is the boss in disguise.
• Early-Bird Boss: A slightly later example than the trope's average: the third boss, Moldorm, takes six hits from the Fighter's Sword regardless of whether you use regular or spin attacks (which deal double damage, equivalent to a regular attack from the Master Sword), and he goes into a rage mode where he moves even faster once he's down to one HP. Given that the major challenge of the battle is avoiding a Ring Out, which resets his HP, it'd be so much easier if you had a stronger attack...like a spin attack from the Master Sword, which you can obtain immediately after defeating him, or the Hammer, located in the first Dark World dungeon. He is refought in the final dungeon and is considerably easier there as a result of your upgraded sword.
• Early Game Hell: You only start with three hearts at the start of the game, and after the easy-by-comparison Hyrule Castle and Eastern Palace, you'll commonly run into enemies that can do at least two hearts of damage. Combined with the prolonged threat of Collision Damage due to the regular sword's short range, the early game can be quite stressful. This doesn't end after you obtain the Master Sword either, as you're thrown into the Dark World not long after, which is where the game really stops pulling punches. You will quickly learn to value every heart you have, and it's up to you to have a Fairy or Red Medicine prepared when the damage adds up.
• Early-Installment Weirdness:
  • This is the only game to refer to the Seven Sages as the "Seven Wise Men"^note Rendered somewhat awkward after Ocarina of Time revealed that most of the sages were in fact women and the Hylians as "the Hylia"^note Rendered awkward after Skyward Sword revealed that Hylia is the name of the Hylians' patron goddess. These terms were updated when the game was re-released for the Game Boy Advance.
  • The official Nintendo Power Strategy Guide makes a distinction between the ancient Hylia people and the modern-day Hyruleans, the Hylia having magical prowess while the Hyruleans are mundane folk. These days both would just be called Hylians. This is borne out over the series, as some games later in the various timelines feature Hylians with little magical power. Occasionally, even the term "Hylian" has been forgotten, with their elf-like ears regarded as a simple phenotypic difference some humans have, like larger noses or fuller lips.
  • Many iconic monsters like Moblins and Hinox are actually Hyruleans under a Dark World curse due to their evil nature rather than being natural pre-existing creatures. Of course, since Hyrule Historia established that Ganon won against Link and got the complete Triforce before Zelda and the Seven Sages sealed him and the Triforce itself away in the Dark World, it's most likely that rumors of the Triforce lured many greedy Hyruleans/Hylians to become minions of Ganon's army like bees to honey.
  • This is the only Zelda game to have each bottle share an inventory spot. Later games in the series tend to have them as separate items (though this is changed in the GBA release, being given an entire row in the inventory with their old slot filled by the shovel.) In addition, they are called "Magic Bottles" in this game (while future games simply called them "bottles").
  • Unlike later games in the series, Link doesn't automatically heal when he takes a full Heart Container after defeating the boss (except for the Heart Container received at the Sanctuary). Instead, he heals after obtaining the relevant Plot Coupon. Also of note, the Plot Coupon won't appear until after collecting the Heart Container, while in games after Link's Awakening, both appear at the same time and the Heart Container can be skipped.
  • This is the first Zelda game to feature the Sacred Realm, but due to Nintendo's censorship policies at the time, the translation refers to it as the "Golden Land", which carries over to the GBA port apart from one early mention of it as "a sacred realm". Later games, including A Link Between Worlds, use the proper translation.
  • Artwork and the logo show the Master Sword with a red grip, a yellow guard, and a different design from the iconic appearance introduced in Ocarina of Time.
  • The three Pendants of Virtue needed to draw the Master Sword were the first of the recurring sets of green, blue, and red Plot Coupons symbolizing courage, wisdom, and power; however, the Pendant of Wisdom was red and the Pendant of Power was blue, whereas nowadays the reverse is standard. Indeed A Link Between Worlds "fixes" the color of those Pendants.
  • The Master Sword itself is treated a bit oddly compared to other games. It is emphasized that the Master Sword cannot actually hurt Agahnim, and if you try it you'll be electrocuted for your trouble. Also, the sword can be tempered twice by the Dwarven Swordsmiths and a Great Fairy to increase its power, unlike later games where powering it up demands divine intervention. Finally, when fighting Ganon at the end of the game, the Master Sword cannot kill him — you have to use the sword to stun him, then shoot him with a Silver Arrow. Later games would reverse this to using a Silver/Light Arrow to stun Ganon and then using the Master Sword to hurt him. All in all, the legendary Blade of Evil's Bane isn't nearly as powerful as it would be in later games.^note At least as far as its in-story capabilities. The actual damage it inflicts against enemies during gameplay made the Golden Sword the most powerful weapon in the entire franchise prior to Breath of the Wild altering the scale.
  • This is the only game where the Big Key is necessary to open the Big Chest containing a dungeon's special item, while some of the boss rooms aren't even locked if the item in the dungeon is crucial to reaching the boss. In later games, Big Keys only open doors leading to the boss' chamber.
  • The "Dwarven Swordsmiths" — the only appearance of classic fantasy dwarves in the entire series. The franchise was still fairly young at the time this game was made, and canon lore was not clearly established — the idea of "dwarves" was dropped from later games and never mentioned again. They were, however, thematically replaced by the Gorons, who share many similarities with the classic dwarf concept. The most popular fan theory clears up this inconsistency by retconning the swordsmiths as simply Hylians who are afflicted with dwarfism.
  • The "Essence of the Triforce" talks to Link at the end. It only happened once again in the series at the beginning of the Oracle games ("Accept our quest, hero!") but, otherwise, the Triforce is silent and seemingly inanimate in all its appearances.
  • The series' Jesus Taboo has not completely taken hold yet. The Japanese guide features an illustration of Link praying in front of a large crucifix.◊ The actual game contains a structure known as the "Sanctuary", called a kyoukai (church) in Japanese.
  • Unlike the first two games, A Link to the Past does not differentiate between the different pieces of the Triforce, and they are treated only as a single combined object. Ocarina of Time onward would fuse The Adventure of Link's lore on the Triforces of Power, Wisdom, and Courage with this game's lore about the (combined) Triforce granting wishes.
  • Unlike for every other entry in the series both before and after, the manual does not use the name "Link" at all, referring to the player character only as "you".
  • As it could not have been foreseen that Nintendo would depict the events of the Imprisoning War at a later date, this game mentions that Agahnim only appeared after the events of that war "were obscured by the mists of time, and [had become] legend" so that the people wouldn't remember what really happened and who was involved.
• Earn Your Happy Ending: Everyone who was killed because of Ganon is brought back to life and every single person you meet in the game goes on to have happy lives, even the random thief that hangs out in the forest! Justified, though, given that at the end the pure-hearted Link reaches the united Triforce and wills everything right.
• Easter Egg: The Chris Houlihan room, an extremely well-concealed ^note The game only sends you there when an error occurs in sending you to wherever you were supposed to go chamber filled with Rupees that was named for the winner of a contest in Nintendo Power.
• Elite Mooks: The Ball-and-Chain Soldier, much more durable than the generic types and his one attack can dish out heavy damage in early game. One of them even serves as a Mini-Boss guarding Princess Zelda herself.
• Empathic Environment:
  • When Link first sets out, It Was a Dark and Stormy Night. After stalling Agahnim by hiding Zelda, the weather becomes much clearer.
  • The Lost Woods is covered in some sort of mysterious fog (a recent phenomenon according to two nearby lumberjacks), but that fog immediately breaks after Link claims the Master Sword.
  • The Swamp of Evil is overcast, stormy and ominous when Link first arrives there. However, after using the Ether Medallion (which calls down lightning from the sky) to open Misery Mire, the weather is much more amicable. This is justified according to a nearby NPC, who states that the endless rain is the result of magic clouds, and only a stronger weather magic (i.e. the Ether Medallion) can blow them away.
• Empty Room Psych: Some dungeons have a few rooms that lock the door behind you, make you fight tough monsters, then don't give you anything. Basically trap rooms.
• Empty Room Until the Trap: A seemingly empty room in the fourth dungeon of the Dark World turns out to be important later. After bombing the cracked floor in the room above it, making light shine down into it, and bringing a girl you rescued into it, and having her stand in the light, she freaks out and reveals herself to be the boss, Blind the Thief.
• "End of the World" Special: Link gets the full Triforce at the end of the game, which he uses to reverse all the evil that Ganon / Agahnim has done throughout Hyrule.
• Epic Flail: The soldier guarding Zelda's cell wields one of these. Link has to defeat a couple more flail-wielders when he invades Hyrule Castle the second time.
• Epunymous Title: For the English version at least. "Link" has a double meaning as both the name of the main character and the fact that the game is describing the "link" between the previous games and this one.
• Escape Rope: Using the Magic Mirror inside a dungeon returns the player to the entrance. Using it outside allows the player to teleport from the Dark to the Light World.
• Escort Mission: A few, most of which are quite brief. Thankfully all of them are very easy because all of the subjects are Invulnerable Civilians.
  • Link must "escort" Zelda out of the castle dungeon at the start of the game.
  • Rather brief compared to most examples of the trope due to how short the walking distance is, but in the Dark World, Link finds the missing swordsmith turned into a frog and trapped behind some heavy rocks (which he can lift with the treasure from the dungeon north of there) and has to take him back to his shop in the Light World. This is of course required to obtain the Infinity -1 Sword from the swordsmiths (which is upgraded to the Infinity +1 Sword later).
  • Another brief one is the old man on Death Mountain whom you lead home after he loses his lantern.
  • The disguised thief Blind has elements of an escort mission. One of the rare examples of the player escorting an enemy boss.
  • Two non-living examples: at one point, Link has the option to "escort" a locked treasure chest to a man who can open it, and later must "escort" a bomb to destroy a certain wall. Both of these are made slightly difficult because pressing "A" (e.g. to run or lift something) or running off a ledge will "disconnect" the item until Link walks back to retrieve it. And if one is not quick enough, the bomb will explode.
  • There is also the monkey that is needed to open the Palace of Darkness. While not a horrible example of an escort, he does require 10 Rupees to just have him follow you and another 100 to open the palace. Compared to the other escorts, getting hurt does cause the monkey to run away. This means having to pay another 10 Rupees just to get him back. Thankfully, there are about three enemies between finding the monkey and getting to the palace entrance, and it is possible to deny the monkey at first, then go ahead and kill the enemies before coming back.
• Evil Chancellor: Agahnim. According to the manual, after he miraculously fixed the numerous ills Hyrule was suffering at the time when he appeared, he more or less became the King's right-hand man. This transitioned to Agahnim being the de facto ruler and finally "eliminating" the King.
• Evil Sorcerer: Agahnim mysteriously puts out a fire to gain the king's trust, before killing him, sacrificing descendents of the Seven Sages, and trying to bring Ganon back. Maybe subverted, depending on whether Agahnim is Ganon, is possessed by him, or is merely being used as a pawn in Ganon's plans.
• Evil Tower of Ominousness: Ganon's Tower. A tall, foreboding building sealed by a powerful barrier that can only be lifted with the Maidens' magic. It is here where Agahnim (who is Ganon in disguise) awaits.
• Excalibur in the Stone: The game marks the debut of the Master Sword, which is planted in a stone pedestal like the fabled sword of Arthurian legend. The game's French localization actually called it "Excalibur".
• Exact Words: The imp "curses" Link so that his "magic will decrease by one half." Which is to say, whenever Link uses magic, the amount by which it decreases is halved.
• Exposition Fairy: Starting with this game, Link is assisted by a character, who mainly serves as this role. Need help? Touch a special tile on the walls of dungeons and Sahasrahla is always there to help. You don't even need to be in the same world as him to do this!
• Equipment Upgrade:
  • The dwarven blacksmiths can temper and sharpen the Master Sword to make it stronger. You can also meet a fairy in the Dark World who can imbue the Master Sword with holy energy to make it reach its full power.
  • The fairy who powers up the Master Sword can also imbue Link's bow and arrows with holy power, turning them into the Silver Arrows you need to destroy Ganon.
  • There is another fairy in the Waterfall of Wishing, near Zora's domain, who can upgrade your shield and boomerang.
• Faceless Eye: Several of the bosses, most notably Kholdstare and Vitreous, who is nothing but a bunch of eyes in a pile of slime.
• Fairy in a Bottle: Ever since this game, this has been a staple of the The Legend of Zelda series, where a captured fairy in a bottle will restore all your Heart Containers or restore you to life if you die, depending on the game. The fandom has a disturbing tendency to show the fairies as entirely unwilling captives.
• Fake King: Agahnim usurped the throne by murdering the King of Hyrule, and then he used this position and his powers to complete his objectives. This did not go entirely unnoticed as one castle guard commented, "After Agahnim took over, everyone began to act strangely."
• Falling Bass:
  • Diatonic: The Fairy Fountain theme (B♭maj7, Fmaj9/A, Gm7, Dm9/F, then B♭maj7, A°9, Gm11, Fmaj7) in this and subsequent games.
  • Chromatic: The game uses a chromatic descending bassline in the main phrase of the Light World dungeon theme and the last part of the Dark World overworld theme.
• False Innocence Trick: This is how you trigger the boss fight with the boss underneath the Town of Outcasts (which is the Dark World equivalent to Kakariko Village). You are told he kidnapped one of the maidens, and in some way you can say he did, but he also disguised himself as her.
• Fanfare: The first game in the series to play the overworld theme as such.
• Fire-Breathing Weapon: The Fire Rod, a recurring item found in several games since this one, sends pillars of flame rolling towards enemies.
• Fire/Ice Duo: Trinexx is a turtle boss with two additional heads — one that's red with fire breath, and one that's blue with ice breath.
• Fisher King: The Dark World, originally known as the Sacred Realm before it fell under Ganon's rule and was warped into a dark and twisted version of Hyrule. The Dark World has the ability to turn anyone who ventures into it without the Moon Pearl into an animal or monster supposedly reflecting their "true nature" - e.g., a bully becomes a fanged and horned demon, and an indecisive kid becomes a bouncy pink immobile ball; hence it is also a Fisher Kingdom. Link becomes a helpless pink bunny, and Ganon, himself, is a massive boar.
• Fisher Kingdom: The Dark World transforms everyone into a form that reflects their heart (except for Link, once he acquires the Moon Pearl).
• Flip-Screen Scrolling: There are map areas about twice as big as the screen, giving it both a smooth scrolling within a map area and a "flip" scrolling from one area to the next.
• Flunky Boss:
  • Arrghus protects itself with small jellyfish called Arrgi.
  • Blind The Thief gets beheaded twice in his boss fight, and his heads continue flying around the room and spitting fireballs as the fight continues.
• Forced to Watch: Agahnim waits until Link has arrived in his attempt to rescue Zelda before he banishes her and does it while Link can only watch helplessly.
• Forced Transformation:
  • Most residents of the Dark World are at least somewhat displeased with having been transformed against their will. Link the pink bunny handles it well, but given his Heroic Mime status, it's hard to know what he really thinks of the situation. He doesn't seem ecstatic with the change, if this piece of artwork is any indication.
  • The missing Dwarven Swordsmith who works near Kakariko ended up in the Dark World trapped as a frog within a wall of heavy stones. Link can escort him back to his partner in the Light World to be rewarded with the Tempered Sword.
  • You can find a Cucco under a pot inside one of Kakariko's houses. Using Magic Powder on it will turn it into a human woman, who instantly regrets the change and longs to be a Cucco again.
• Forging Scene: The dwarven smiths can be asked to improve your Master Sword, turning it into the Tempered Sword.
• Four Is Death: Ganon perishes after Link hits him with four Silver Arrows.
• Franchise Codifier: The game introduced a number of mechanical and setting elements that have remained series mainstays ever since. These include dungeon-specific keys, Pieces of Heart to be tracked down to increase Link's health, Cuccos, an original, polytheistic mythology surrounding the Triforce (instead of a loose pastiche of Christian elements), and the Master Sword. Its gameplay would have a knock-on effect on most later titles, and its general look and style would set the template for the later 2D games that dominate the handheld side of the franchise.
• Free-Sample Plot Coupon: Unlike in the game, the manga adaptation has Link getting the first pendant from Sahasrahla, instead of getting it after some difficult dungeon exploration as in the case of the other two pendants.
• Frictionless Ice: Though the Ice Palace's floor averts the trope (it's slippery, but still has some friction), Trinexx's Ice Head's frost breath can also freeze the floor and make it real slippery.
• Friend to All Living Things: The ghost in the Sacred Grove is seen playing his ocarina for group of forest animals, who disappears if Link goes near him; causing the animals to scatter.
• Full Health Bonus: As in most 2D games, Link's sword can create a Sword Beam when swung, but only if his hearts are full. However, in every game starting with this one, finding a sword upgrade is required before this technique can be used.
• Game Mod: Parallel Worlds^note Which began as the demo "Tower of the Triforce", and has an updated, slightly easier version known as Parallel Remodel and Goddess of Wisdom, among others. This was made possible with Hyrule Magic and Black Magic editing programs.
• Gameplay Ally Immortality: There are a few escort quests, most notably one near the beginning of the game where you must take Princess Zelda through a variety of dangerous environments to the Sanctuary. Fortunately, she's invincible, with monsters passing right through her — her only apparent sign of corporeal existence is her assistance with pushing a bookcase.
• Gameplay and Story Segregation:
  • You can't ordinarily use the Flute in the Dark World, but after the second fight with Agahnim Link uses the Flute in a cutscene and the bird comes flying in to whisk Link away to the Golden Pyramid. Try not to think too hard about the Fridge Logic.
  • Similarly, Link can defeat Ganon without using the Silver Arrows, though this is mainly due to the way the Ganon fight works (there is the tiniest window of opportunity between when Ganon re-colors himself and when he teleports during the fourth phase of his fight), as well as the fact that the arrows carry a damage value with them instead of triggering a cutscene or an event flag.
• Glamour Failure: You find a girl trapped in one of the dungeons who asks you to lead her out, but if you do so she tells you not to go out that way. You have to lead the "girl" into a room with bright sunlight coming in, which reveals her to be the boss Blind. Which makes it very odd that, when you first rescued her from the dungeon, she asked "Please, take me outside."
• Glass Cannon: Sand Crabs go down to a single attack from a sword (or any other weapon capable of damaging them), but they move quickly and erratically and hit for two full hearts of damage, or 2/3 of Link's starting health.
• Glitch Entity: There's a mysterious invisible enemy called the ghost of Misery Mire that used to be an urban legend among fans that turned out to be true. Investigation of the game's code revealed that the ghosts are actually Kus that are glitched due to being placed on the wrong type of ground tile. Kus can only exist on deep water tiles, but a few have been placed on shallow water. They can't attack but can be killed, although doing so may cause other glitches depending on what weapon was used.
• Go for the Eye:
  • This is so common in the series that it was incorporated into puzzles starting in this game, in which a statue of a cyclopean monster acts as a switch when shot in the eye. In the first 3-D games, an ornate eye on the wall would act similarly.
  • Vitreous, the Misery Mire Boss, is nothing but a giant eye, surrounded by innumerable smaller ones. What else are you going to hit?
• Go Wait Outside: The Level 3 Sword. If you leave the building and immediately return, the smiths won't be finished, but all you have to do to trigger the flag is leave the larger map screen where the shop is located. A faster way is to get there in the Dark World, whip out the mirror, go to the Light World, drop the thing off, then step in your mirror portal and immediately warp back. All done!
• Gold-Colored Superiority: The Tempered Sword (an upgrade of the Master Sword) is red, but near the end of the game, even that can be upgraded to the Golden Sword.
• Good Morning, Crono: Link waking up at the beginning of almost each installment has become a tradition in the series ever since this game, as a Stealth Pun on "the hero's awakening" folktale motif. In the case of this game, it's Zelda's voice via telepathy which wakes him up.
• Good Powers, Bad People: Agahnim's powers saved Hyrule from drought and pestilence. Too bad he is an evil sorcerer who murdered the King, brainwashed the soldiers into obedience, and kidnapped Seven Maidens to bring Ganon back to life.
• Good Shapeshifting, Evil Shapeshifting: The villain Ganondorf turned into the demon boar Ganon while sealed in the Dark World. Although the hero Link can use the Moon's Pearl to withstand the magic of the Dark World, getting hit by a Rabbit Beam turns him into a fluffy pink bunny.
• Gotta Catch Them All: Link has to retrieve the three pendants in the Light World, and save the seven maidens in the Dark World. Optionally, he can collect Heart Pieces to extend his life meter, a first for the series (the two NES games only have full Heart Containers).
• Grappling-Hook Pistol: The Hookshot, the first time such an object shows up in a Zelda game. It can pull items toward Link and pull link across gaps with its spring-loaded chain mechanism.
• Gravity Is a Harsh Mistress: Link has a few frames before he falls into a pit (bottomless or not) so a player with extraordinary reflexes can abuse this feature with the Pegasus Boots (whose startup animation gives him temporary "invisibility" to falling) to run on thin air.
• Great Offscreen War: The game talks about a war^note set shortly after Ocarina of Time in a timeline where Link died before beating Ganon, according to the timeline known as the Imprisoning War in which the Knights of Hyrule fought to give the Seven Sages the opportunity to seal Ganon in the Sacred Realm. It also talks about an even earlier war^note sometime after Skyward Sword but before Ocarina of Time which led to the Triforce being sealed in the Sacred Realm in the first place.
• Guerrilla Boulders: While Link is going to the Tower of Hera, boulders will fall down on him when he crosses a certain area on Death Mountain. These boulders fall until Link reaches the summit, which, despite the boulders clearly coming from there, becomes barren of all activity.
• Guest-Star Party Member: The game has Zelda early in the prologue (you have to break Zelda out of prison and escape from Hyrule Castle with her during the opening sequence), a monkey for one of the early dungeons and a maiden in one of the later dungeons (she's a demon and the dungeon boss). Even later, you can find a treasure chest in a house that will inexplicably start following Link around.
• Guide Dang It!:
  • Several puzzles in the Dark World have rather obscure solutions, where without a guide to help you your only recourse is to Try Everything. For example, several rooms in Ice Palace have their doors opened by pulling on the tongues of statues — these statues are unique to this dungeon but otherwise are prolific inside it and only a couple of them can have their tongues pulled. There's also a room in the Palace of Darkness where you progress by shooting a statue with an arrow — the statue is colored differently so it's obvious you're supposed to do something with it, but it isn't immediately clear.
  • There is a puzzle in Misery Mire where you must progress by falling through a black hole in the floor, but typically holes that will transport you to another level have a stone pattern inside of them, whereas black holes typically transport you back to the entrance of the room. There is no reason to know that this hole will drop you down a level, unless you really pay attention to the map layout.
  • Turtle Rock holds rails where, when you use the Cane of Somaria on them, the cane will create a platform you can ride on. This is the only time the cane is used in this manner, and nothing hints to this, not even the cane itself which otherwise has an entirely different usage.
• Gullible Lemmings: A number of villagers believe Link to be a criminal who has kidnapped the Princess due to propaganda disseminated by Agahnim, who has deposed the king (and sent him into the Dark World). Two will even call the guards to attack Link if they see him.
• Hair Color Dissonance: If you look closely, you can see that Link has pink hair (though official artwork shows he's supposed to be a dark blond). No clear explanation for this has ever been forthcoming. Some fans think it was palette limitations, specifically sharing the same palette between regular and Bunny Link (although this is unlikely since the two don't actually share the same palette◊^note The easiest way to see the mismatched palette is for the player to die as a bunny in the Dark World before getting the Moon Pearl.), others say it was to give it better contrast with the rest of his sprite, and the game's backgrounds.
• Hands-Free Handlamp: After Link collects the lantern, he will always have a beam of light in front of him in dark rooms whether it's equipped or not.
• Healing Loop: The boss Moldorm can knock Link out of the raised arena. Link then needs to climb back up from the floor below (or two floors if he kicked Link down the center hole in his platform); but he also regains his full health in the process, effectively resetting the match. There's no strategy to break this cycle, either, other than fighting him over and over until one gets enough reflexes (or enough luck) to dodge him for the whole fight.
• Healing Potion: The game introduces the classic trio of red, green and blue potions, which would reappear in the 3D Zelda games until The Wind Waker (the last game to feature the magic meter). The red one is an updated version of the original game's Life Potion (retaining the role of refilling your hearts), the green one refills your magic meter, and the blue one refills both.
• Heart Container: The game set the tradition in itself and subsequent games in the series to save special cases, only have Heart Containers guarded by dungeon bosses while Heart Pieces are abounded in the overworld. The only full heart container gained in a way other than beating dungeon bosses is given to Link after escaping Hyrule Castle with Princess Zelda in the prologue.
• He Knows About Timed Hits: There are some castle soldiers that talk to Link at the beginning of the game when trying to free Zelda from prison in Tutorial form - "I bet you can't wait until you're old enough to use a sword! (Press B to use your sword once you get it.)" Unfortunately, this is rarely noticed as the player is trying to avoid detection, and the first thing the soldier says is "Hey hey! You're not allowed in the castle, son! Go home and get some sleep!"
• Helpful Mook:
  • The Anti-Fairy is dreaded for being fast-moving, Nigh-Invulnerable, and able to drain your Magic Meter. However, if you sprinkle Magic Powder on them, they'll turn into a normal, helpful fairy. Thus, the neophyte looks upon them with revulsion, and the knowledgeable player with glee.
  • The Mad Batter, a character in a hidden shrine cave who will "curse" you by halving your magic, but which actually reduces your magic costs by half, effectively giving you twice as much magic.
• Herald: The game has the Take Up My Sword variety when Link's uncle, um... passes out really bad or something moments after the story begins.
• Hero Killer: The game takes place in the timeline where Ganondorf managed to kill the Hero of Time, resulting in him and the Sacred Realm being transformed to reflect his dark desires.
• Hero with Bad Publicity: Link is declared a criminal after he rescues Zelda in the introductory dungeon. Some citizens of Kakariko Village will actually call the guards if Link gets too close to them.
• He Was Right There All Along: Blind the Thief, the boss of one of the Dark World's dungeons. While exploring his dungeon, there appears to be a room with absolutely no purpose at all, but upon exploring the dungeon some more (rescuing one of the seven maidens that are sealed in each dungeon and blowing up some floors on the level above in the process), you can return and discover that the "maiden" is actually Blind himself, who is forced to reveal himself by the bright light (which is his weakness) that now shines in the room (thanks to the aforementioned floor bombing). Cue boss fight.
• Hijacked by Ganon: Agahnim is the main baddie through much of the early part of the game, but revelations from rescued maidens reveal that Ganon is behind it all, and it's finally subverted when Ganon himself says Agahnim was his bunshin (Japanese) or alter-ego (English), meaning he was a disguise or Remote Body for Ganon, making Ganon the man behind himself - so there was no new villain, just an old villain in a new hat.
• Hint System: Sahasrahla is good for a clue or two when Link gets stuck. Need help? Touch a special tile on the walls of dungeons and this guy is always there to help. You don't even need to be in the same world as him to do this!
• Hoist by His Own Petard: Aganhim in his second appearance. This time he summons two shadows of himself who can also fire magic at Link. Unfortunately, these can still hurt him - meaning he can easily end up getting hit multiple times.
• Holding Out for a Hero: An aversion shows up in the game's backstory, namely at the start of the branch from ''Ocarina of Time in which Link is killed in the final battle with Ganon. However, the knights of Hyrule and the seven Sages manage to thwart and seal away Ganon in the corrupted Sacred Realm themselves after a great war, forming the backstory of this game.
• Holy Hand Grenade: Like in the original NES Zelda game, the sacred Silver Arrows are the only weapon that can penetrate the defense of the otherwise invincible Ganon.
• Home Sweet Home: The ending of the game provides this for everyone, even characters who have died.
• Honest Axe: Link can upgrade the boomerang and basic shield at the beginning of the game, and obtain the best sword and the silver arrows at the end, by tossing them in a pond. A Great Fairy will appear and ask if they are his: answering honestly will net you the upgraded version. It's also a way to get free magic-refilling potions if you throw in an empty bottle.
• Humanity Ensues: There is a hidden Easter egg. If you go into the northwestmost house in Kakariko village, there's a vase which has a Cucco (basically an in-universe chicken) hiding under it. Part way through the game you get the "Magic powder" item. If you sprinkle it on this Cucco then it turns into a woman and complains about the shift. The effect is reset when you leave the house. The Cucco-turned-woman also gives a hint about the town's statue being not quite what it seems.
• Ice Crystals: A crystal-shaped chunk of ice tops the Ice Staff.
• Ice Palace: The game has the Ice Palace, located in a half-frozen lake in the Dark World and the first ice-themed dungeon in the franchise. The slippery ice floor makes traction more difficult.
• An Ice Person:
  • Kholdstare protects itself with a shield of ice and causes blocks of it to falls from the ceiling.
  • Trinexx's blue head can spit ice, leaving trails on the floor. Link must stun it with the Fire Rod before attacking it.
• Iconic Sequel Character:
  • Hylia has become an important part of Zelda lore and religion, but the name wasn't referenced until this game introduced Lake Hylia. Even then, she only debuted as a character in The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword, twenty years later.
  • Cuccos marked their debut here, becoming a popular species due to their ability to punish Link with surprisingly efficient success for his unjustified violence on them.
• Iconic Sequel Song: "Zelda's Lullaby" has appeared in almost every Zelda title, but it first appeared in this game in particular as a tune associated with rescuing Zelda and the other kidnapped maidens. Also, the leitmotif for Ganon/Ganondorf isn't introduced until this game, and then slightly expanded in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. The Hyrule Castle theme, Kakariko Village theme, and Fairy Fountain theme are also first heard here.
• I Don't Like the Sound of That Place: There's a place in the Dark World known as the "Lake of Ill Omen". A creepy-looking creature lives there and will be upset if you throw a stone onto his lake. But you must do it to receive the Quake Medallion, which is required to progress in the game.
• I Fought the Law and the Law Won: Averted, the guards who are called to arrest Link in Kakariko Village are some of the weakest enemies in the game, although the rarely summoned trident-wielding variety is noticeably stronger than the normal variety with swords.
• Illegal Gambling Den: There are three of these, two in the Light World and one in the Dark World, typically in out-of-the-way locations. Interestingly, the two in the Light World give Link a better return than the house, so it's more like the hosts are gambling on Link losing.
  • One run by civilians has a 20-Rupee entry fee, and returns either 1 Rupee, 20 Rupees, or 50 Rupees.^note The average return on this is 71/3 = 23.67 Rupees — an 18.33% profit.
  • One run by Light World thieves has a 100-Rupee entry fee, and returns either 1 Rupee, 20 Rupees, or 300 Rupees.^note The average return here is 321/3 = 107 Rupees — a 7% profit.
  • One run by Dark World outcasts has a 30-Rupee entry fee, and lets you open up two out of sixteen chests, hunting for either the 100-Rupee chest or the one chest with a Piece of Heart. None of the chest contents are outright worthless, but many contain things other than Rupees.
• I'm Melting!: The game features an enemy made of ice completely resistant to everything but fire magic, which reduces it to a shrinking puddle.
• Improvised Weapon: To defeat Agahnim, you need to use the Master Sword to deflect his magic blasts back at him, but, in a pinch, the bug catcher's net will work just as well. It avoids Sequence Breaking by the fact that you absolutely need the Master Sword to break the seal on his chamber. This concept would become an Ascended Glitch, with Ocarina of Time, Wind Waker, Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword.
• Inconsistent Dub: The Ocarina item is named "Flute" in this game, but it's called an ocarina in other games.
• Inconveniently-Placed Conveyor Belt: There are dungeons with conveyor belts, and an incredibly difficult boss battle occurs on a floor that is fully made of one (and surrounded by spike traps that also move from one side to another).
• Infinity -1 Sword: The Tempered Sword is a result of skilled Dwarven Swordsmiths taking the legendary Master Sword and improving it. It even makes a more forceful-sounding sound effect when slashed. However, it would seem the swordsmiths still didn't unlock the sword's full potential:
• Infinity +1 Sword: In this game, the swords don't get any better than the Golden Sword, which is more than just a prettier version of the Master Sword. One fansite did an analysis of all the swords in the entire series (up to The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword at that time) and found the Golden Sword to be the strongest of them all.
• Insurmountable Waist-Height Fence: Fences that are barely waist-high on Link make for impassable barriers, even when he's carrying a rod that could burn them down.
• Interface Spoiler: By the time you've acquired the Master Sword and head back to Hyrule Castle to save Zelda you've probably explored almost the entire map and saw that there are no other spots of interests left to check, and the game makes a good job making you believe that the final confrontation draws near. However, such a big inventory screen, with such huge spaces for items and equipment, should tell you that even after you get all three Pendants and the Master Sword, there's still a ton of game left. And if that didn't clue you in, if you checked the map during the brief time you had to cross the Dark World in order to reach the Tower of Hera, you'll see that it's completely different from the Light World, with many spots of interest. There's no way all that land is going unused.
• Interspecies Romance: The instruction manual states that the Hylians are an extinct race by this time, replaced with the identical-looking Hyruleans. An excerpt from Hyrule Historia implies that this is the reason why (which also explains why the Sages' descendants all appear to be humanoid).
• Invincibility Power-Up: The game has the Magic Cape and Cane of Byrna, both of which make Link invincible but consume magic at an incredible rate. The Cape also makes Link invisible and capable of moving through certain obstacles, while the Cane gives you the Touch of Death properties, and can be useful in the final dungeon. Incidentally, the former is one of the better options for getting the latter.
• Invincible Minor Minion:
  • The thieves can at best be stunned, but not killed as they try to ram into you to knock away items and Rupees.
  • The Anti-Faeries that circle around blocks or walls in the dungeons though Magic Powder can turn them into normal Faeries... Except the four in a particular room of the Eastern palace, who are immune.
  • The rodent-like Deadrock enemies that roam the Light World's Death Mountain can't be killed normally; they simply turn to stone after being struck. However, sprinkling Magic Powder on them changes them into Slimes, which are not only killable, they're also the least dangerous monsters in the game.
• Invisible Block: There are some late-game dungeons with crystalline blocks that can only be revealed by bright light — either by igniting strategically placed torches, or by using a medallion that summons lightning-like magic. Once the lights goes out, the blocks vanish again.
• Invisibility: The Magic Cape. Comes with invincibility, allowing you to walk on Spikes of Doom undamaged. Also good for hiding from enemies.
• Invisible Monsters: Ganon pulls this off in the final battle. Even worse, he's utterly invincible while doing so. Good thing he doesn't try to destroy the lanterns in the room that can reveal his location when lit.
• Item Get!: When Link gets a new item, he usually holds it above his head while victory music plays. This is even Lampshaded by a merchant. He tells Link to hold the bottle he just bought above his head because it's good for business^note Even though he's selling Link his last bottle.
• It's All Upstairs From Here: Ganon's Tower, as well as the Tower of Hera and Hyrule Castle Tower in the same game. Justified in the former two, not only because both are located in the same place (only in alternate dimensions), but also because their respective highest floors yield critical goals for Link (one of the pendants in Tower of Hera, and Agahnim's whereabouts in Ganon's Tower). In the case of Hyrule Castle Tower, you must reach the top to try to stop Agahnim from kidnapping Zelda, though he ultimately succeeds.
• It Was a Dark and Stormy Night: The game starts off like this. Link awakens in the middle of a dark, stormy night after hearing Zelda's telepathic plea, and goes off after his uncle to investigate his doings and ultimately rescue Zelda from the castle dungeon.
• Jesus Taboo: The Japanese guide for the game features an illustration of Link praying in front of a large crucifix.◊ The actual game contains a church (referred to as "Sanctuary" in the English localization) with stained-glass windows, and to enter the Desert Palace Link prays while drawing a cross on his chest with the Sanctuary theme playing in the background. Lastly, the Palaces were originally called "Temples" in Japanese.
• Just Whistle: Link acquires a whistle that summons a large bird to carry him away on the overworld. Mainly this is useful for quick transportation but is also handy if you're swamped by soldiers or the like.
• Kaizo Trap: The game allows the player to drop themselves into the pit surrounding the Final Boss' arena even after said boss has been defeated. Downplayed, since this doesn't kill the player, and they would have to deliberately throw themselves into the pit in order to activate the "trap"; however, this does force them to replay the final boss battle if they wish to see the ending.
• Karmic Transformation: Most residents of the Dark World take on monstrous forms. Most of them went there to search for the Triforce. In the Dark World, the Triforce's magic changes one's outer appearance to match what is in their hearts. So, their monstrous forms reflect their selfish greed. Link, by contrast, turns into a rabbit, reflecting his fundamental good-naturedness. Played with, in that pure-hearted Link is rendered defenseless in the Dark World while less scrupulous people are given more power.
• The Key Is Behind the Lock: There's one locked treasure chest whose only key, you are told, is inside the chest, and you can never open it. Fortunately, you can drag it with you until you find a master lockpicker.
• Killed Mid-Sentence: Your Uncle survives long enough to give you his sword but dies as he tries to tell you something very important: "Zelda is your..." He gets better along with everyone else killed after you beat the game, presumably because of Link's wish on the Triforce. We never find out what he was going to say, though, until the GBA re-release which alters his "dying" speech and he actually manages to finish what he was saying before dying. In the new version, he basically tells Link that it's his destiny to save Zelda and that he really enjoyed their time together.
• King Mook: The Armos Knights, the Moldorm King, and the Helmasaur King; they are smaller versions of mooks which inhabit their dungeons or the area around them. Additionally, Moblins have been redesigned from their bulldog-like appearance in previous games to resembling pigs, carry mini tridents, and have an implied backstory of being former people. This makes them a mini version of Ganon, a monstrous trident-wielding humanoid boar who started as a person.
• Kishōtenketsu: This is the first game in the series to use this story structure: initial exposition or an easy early victory; a first half of the game full of mounting tension, where something's wrong but you're not entirely sure what; a decisive break where the villain lands a major victory, and we learn what was really going on from the start; and then the rest of the game is a straightforward slog, where it's finally clear what needs to be done but there sure is a lot of it.
• Kryptonite Factor: Only the Silver Arrows and the Master Sword can harm Ganon.
• Last of His Kind: Link is "perhaps" the last one to carry the bloodline of the Knights of Hyrule.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: When you buy a bottle from a merchant in the village, he tells Link to hold it up high above his head because that's good for business. Of course, this is what Link does with every item you find regardless.
• Ledge Bats: Moldorm (the boss of the Tower of Hera) has the additional challenge of knocking you back to a lower floor if it hits you or you hit it in the wrong spot in addition to the damage it would do you normally (you'll have to climb a lot of stairs to get back to the fight, and the boss will of course heal during this).
• Legend Fades to Myth: Retroactively, the game makes the events of Ocarina of Time this since due to Ganon defeating Link, the story of how Ganon found the Triforce in the first place was that he rediscovered the way to enter the Sacred Realm and murdered his followers so only he can obtain it. Justified, since it was years that anyone remembers that Ganon tricked Link into opening the door by obtaining the Master Sword.
  • On the other hand, the in-game text Invokes this as part of its Early-Installment Weirdness. Agahnim appeared in Hyrule after the events of the Imprisoning War "were obscured by the mists of time, and [had become] legend" likely to reduce suspicion of his activities since no-one remembered, at least not with clarity, what really happened back then and who was involved.
• Lethal Joke Item: This game started the trend. In the game, you could deflect the dark wizard Agahnim's projectiles with the Master Sword... or the Butterfly Net, which was normally just used to catch insects and fairies in bottles. Later games had the bottles themselves do the catching and deflecting.
• Let No Crisis Go to Waste: Agahnim's actions before the game started brought him much acclaim. He was famous for stopping a blaze and then he saved Hyrule from a rather mysterious pestilence and drought when no one else in the world could.
• Level of Tedious Enemies: Tower of Hera, full of pits that drop Link to the previous floor, enemies that do little damage and try to knock him into one of these pits, and a boss that resets every time it knocks Link down a floor.
• Light/Darkness Juxtaposition: The game has the Dark World, a darker parallel counterpart to the Light World.
• Light Is Good: Probably most prominently displayed thematically in this game, where Ganondorf's dark power has corrupted the Sacred Realm (a Golden Land where the Triforce once resided) and turned it into the dangerous and evil Dark World.
• Literal Genie: When Ganon obtained the Triforce (which, being an inanimate object, couldn't judge between good and evil), he wished to rule the world. So, the Triforce made him the ruler of the Dark World where he was imprisoned.
• Literally Shattered Lives: Frozen enemies are already dead but shattering them often yields a Mana Potion.
• Live Item: Starting from this game, fairies can be kept in empty bottles; you can either use them directly to recover some energy or wait until your HP is depleted so tbe fairy revives Link automatically. Occasionally, you can find and capture bees too, which are useful to defeat enemies (but unless it's a Golden Bee, it will flee after all enemies are dispatched). Lastly, after you beat Turtle Rock, you can see Zelda in your inventory screen in a crystal.
• Living Gasbag: A Unique Enemy on the east coast of Lake Hylia, called the octoballoon, resembles a bloated octorok floating a short distance above the ground.
• Living MacGuffin: The crystals that imprison the Seven Maidens are the second set of collectibles needed to complete the game. After completing all of the Dark World dungeons, they open the entrance to Ganon's Tower.
• Living Statue: Link obtains a magic flute that awakens a bird stored inside a weathervane. It will then carry him to certain spots on the map.
• Locked in the Dungeon: Zelda is held prisoner in the dungeon of Hyrule Castle at the beginning of the game.
• Long Song, Short Scene:
  • The game has a different overworld theme for the Dark World depending on whether or not you have the Moon Pearl. Given that the first Dark World portal (and only one that is accessible at all before getting the Master Sword) is roughly a 5-second walk from Spectacle Rock, where you must use the mirror to return to the Light World in order to reach the Tower of Hera (which contains the Moon Pearl), the first version of the overworld theme might not be heard in its entirety even if you stop to talk to the NPCs, and certainly not if you don't.
  • The game also features two renditions of the melody that later became known as "Zelda's Lullaby". The one that plays when you rescue a maiden locked in crystal is the shorter version but plays over long expository text seven times over. That's not this trope. What is this trope is the other version, which only plays the first time you meet Zelda at the beginning of the game, and contains a bridge not found in the shorter one. It only lasts for a few text boxes' worth of dialogue, which probably won't take until the bridge to get through. (The same bridge is more prominently featured in later Zelda games, such as Ocarina, where Zelda's Lullaby plays over much longer scenes.)
• Losing Your Head: Blind the Thief has this as a battle tactic, losing and regrowing his head through the fight while the extra heads attack Link.
• The Lost Woods: As with Death Mountain, the trope namer returns. This time, it's significantly creepier in this installment than in their previous appearance in the original. Its Dark World counterpart, Skeleton Forest, is even creepier (and more confusing) and also shares its ominous-yet-catchy music with the Dark World's Death Mountain.
• Luck-Based Mission:
  • There's a buried Heart Piece that costs 80 Rupees for 30 seconds of digging in a vast field. Thankfully there is a good source of income in the Light World version of the nearby village, and it's not uncommon to find more than your 80 Rupees back. And if you're not above glitching, you can speed up the process with your boomerang.
  • There's a Heart Piece in a treasure chest game: open 2 of 16 chests for 30 Rupees a try.
• Made of Iron: The thieves and chickens are the only enemies in the game that you simply CANNOT kill.
• Magical Land: The Sacred Realm a particularly dark flavor of Magical Land in the game, in relation to the more "mundane" Hyrule. This is due to Ganon having corrupted it when he claimed the Triforce.
• Magic Compass: Each dungeon has a Compass that shows the boss's room as well as the main treasure of said dungeon.
• Magic Knight: Link can cast a bunch of spells in this game, probably to emphasize the Hylian blood in his veins. All of them are sourced from items:
  • Link can cast three different fire spells. He can project a small flame from his Lamp, like the Candle from the original but incapable of affecting most enemies, and this is the cheapest spell in the game. In the Dark World, Link can find a Fire Rod that shoots scorching projectiles forward, like the Magic Rod combined with the Magic Book from the original game. Only these two fire spells are necessary to complete the game, but Link can also find the Bombos Medallion to cast Bombos, turning anyone on-screen that can be made a bonfire by the Fire Rod into a bonfire.
  • Link can cast two different "freezing" spells, which damage some enemies normally but turn others into reusable throwables; frozen enemies are also more likely to drop little Magic Jars when smashed with a Magic Hammer, according to a secret hint left by an unidentified helper. The Ice Rod is optional and works against a smaller list of enemies, but Link can get it a lot earlier than the other option. The Ether spell from the Ether Medallion tries to freeze everyone on the screen, freezes more enemies, and straight-up destroys some enemies that aren't affected by the Ice Rod; it also comes with a cool wind and a flash of lightning.
  • Link can cast two different "transformation" spells, which can turn enemies into relatively-harmless forms that are more likely to drop Hearts or sometimes Magic Jars. The Magic Powder is optional, as close-ranged as the Lamp, and only works on a relatively-slim list of enemies; on the other hand, it can be gotten fairly early if you know where to look, it can turn Anti-Fairies and Bunny Beams into Fairies, and it has a couple of other niche uses. Then there's the Quake spell from the Quake Medallion; it doesn't work on flying enemies (due to being earth magic), but it affects everyone on-screen, stuns those that can't transform, and also shakes trees.
  • Link can cast one summoning spell, with the Cane of Somaria. This summon is a magic red block, which he can use as a barrier, a reusable throwing item, and something to hold down weighted switches. While required to complete the game, Link can trivialize more than a few dungeon puzzles if he obtains it too early.
  • Lastly (at least in inventory order), Link can use two defensive magics, both of which are quite intensive on his Magic Power. By throwing on the Magic Cape, Link can make himself intangible; only the things in his hands will interact with the world, and only his shadow will be seen, at least while he's on the ground. By invoking the Cane of Byrna, Link can make himself invulnerable with an invisible bubble shield, signified by a little spark orbiting him; he can still be hit, but it won't hurt him, and the magic will even harm those who touch him. The Cane is 33% less Magic-intensive, lets Link defeat weaker enemies just by bumping into them, and remains "on" even after Link falls into a pit or starts swimming; on the other hand, the Cape is easier to get, allows Link to sneak through enemies, doesn't prevent Link from firing Sword Beams or charging up a Spin Attack, and must be used at least once for maxing out Link's Hearts.
• Magic Mirror: The lost old man on Death Mountain gifts Link an enchanted hand mirror used to create portals between the Light and Dark Worlds. In dungeons, it serves as an Escape Rope so Link can return to their entrance.
• Magic Mushroom: There are mushrooms that can be taken to a witch to make Magic Powder, which can turn chickens into humans and spirits into fairies, awake sleeping demons, light fires and kill certain types of enemies.
• Magic Music: The Flute can magically summon a bird anywhere in the Light World.
• Magic Wand: The Rods of Ice and Fire summon magical blasts of their respective elements. The Staff of Byrna summons an invincibility shield, while the Staff of Somaria conjures blocks useful for puzzle-solving.
• Mana: Called "Magic Power" in-game. This is the first Zelda game to associate action energy with green.
  • From maximum amounts of Magic Power, Link can use the Lamp 32 times, a Rod spell 8 times, or a Medallion spell 4 times; or he can use the Magic Cape for 8 seconds, or the Cane of Byrna for 12 seconds. He can double all of these numbers through obtaining a magical discount, however.
  • Link is also more restricted in Magic recovery than in Heart recovery, since Fairies and Great Fairies won't refill it; to make up for this, some enemies may drop a big Magic Jar when defeated, which is a free 100% refill.
• Mana Burn: Certain baddies in the dungeons drain magic from your meter when they hit you.
• Mana Shield: Link can use the Cane of Byrna or the Magic Cape to become invulnerable to damage, but it will quickly drain his Magic Meter.
• Man-Eating Plant: The game features the Snapdragon, which is something like a daikon radish with legs and a big, toothy maw.
• Marathon Level: Ganon's Tower manages to dwarf every previous dungeon in the game, being filled to the brim with rooms infested with enemies, invisible bridges whose visibility requires obscure methods, rematches against the game's first bosses, Spikes of Doom, conveyor belts, rooms that require clever use of toggleable barriers, and floors with slippery ice.
• Mass Hypnosis: Evil Wizard Agahnim kills The Good King, and brainwashes the soldiers, guards, and Knights of Hyrule into doing his bidding. As such, Hyrule's soldiers are out to get Link in the game. Early in the game, you can talk to one of the guards who mentions all of his fellow guards have gone mad, and now it's starting to happen to him too. The guard is later replaced by an enemy. This seems to have been undone by the World-Healing Wave at the end as regular friendly guards are shown around the revived King of Hyrule.
• Meaningful Name:
  • The wise hermit and hint-giver 'Sahasrara' is named after the crown chakra in tantric yoga, representative of pure consciousness.
  • Arrghus. In English, Italian, Spanish, and German, the name is a reference to the Titan who guarded Io in Classical Mythology. Its French name (Méduso) is in reference to its jellyfish-like appearance (the fourth stage of its lifecycle is called "the medusa"). The Japanese name (Wart) is more of a punny name, since the Arrgi cover it like zits (this name was later used in English when the monster returned in Majora's Mask).
• Medal of Dishonor: A Link to the Past is one of the first games to include a counter for player deaths, "charitably" labelled as your score. The credits will list all of your deaths in each dungeon before displaying your grand total, which will be tacked onto Link's character sprite in the file select screen after resetting. A perfect game should have a score of zero. And no, you can't cheat the counter with a Fairy to resurrect you, the game counts those too. You can, however, reset the game during the death animation to trick the game into not counting it, but that's not very sporting. Also, due to a glitch in the original SNES version, doing a normal Save and Quit without dying first still counts. The only way to get a perfect score in the SNES version is either to complete the game in a single session or pause the game and leave it running if you need to take a break.
• Mentor Occupational Hazard: Link's uncle, parental figure and mentor, and the first on-screen casualty in the game. Fortunately, this is later subverted when Link's wish at the end of the game brings all of Ganon's casualties, including his uncle, back to life.
• Mercy Invincibility: Getting hit causes Link to blink and become invulnerable for a few frames. Useful for saving time and glitching your way past stronger enemies by getting hit by weaker ones. Also invoked when standing on lowered blue/orange blocks if you raise them by hitting a crystal switch... even though this doesn't actually damage you. This was most likely done to prevent the player from being stuck in a solid object. You also get this when you come out of a portal or flute-transport, which is very important since you can easily drop on top of enemies/spikes/whatever.
• Me's a Crowd: In the original Japanese script, Ganon refers to Agahnim as his bunshin, a word used to refer to duplicates of oneself. This implies that Agahnim was a humanoid duplicate of himself (possibly his Ganondorf form) that could escape to the Light World.
• Militaries Are Useless: The army refused to follow Agahnim when he usurped the King, but get brainwashed for their resistance, and kidnap their own princess. The Hylian Soldiers are among the weakest enemies in the entire game, their armor not helping their defense in the slightest, and are easily defeated by Link.
• Minigame Zone: There are several minigame locations, but many of them are found in or near the Village of Outcasts in the Dark World. The most profitable game is in the Light World's Lost Woods, where you bet 100 Rupees for the chance to win 300. You can quickly gain maximum Rupees by locating the chest with 300 Rupees; every time you enter, it will have moved one chest to the right.
• Mirror Match: The Superboss in the GBA port of the game is actually four Links that represent the colored Links you played as in the multiplayer game. Not only do they possess the Golden Sword and the Mirror Shield, along with basic sword slashes, but each color you fight can do everything the last one did and gains a new move. ^note In order: Green can use the Pegasus Boots, Red can use the Hurricane Spin, Blue has the Magic Cape and Roc's Cape, and Purple can shoot fireballs from the tip of his swords (doesn't quite mimic Link's energy attack from his sword when his life meter is at full, but the concept is the same) and takes twice as much damage.
• Missing Secret:
  • A cave in dark Death Mountain has a screen of narrow pathways in a cross pattern, with two clear exits South and West, and two "bombable wall" tiles North and East. The North passage doesn't lead to much, just some fairies in a pond. The East passage, however, cannot be broken down by any means and doesn't lead anywhere. While not the only case of this happening in the game, other instances are more clearly meant for decoration. Here, the narrow hallway and similarity to other paths in the room strongly suggest it is supposed to lead to something.
  • Due to a misprint in the instruction manual, some fans were led to believe that there was an upgrade to the bow called the "silver bow". This wasn't helped by a unique enemy, Octoballoon, being situated over a bow-shaped patch of dirt.
• Mission Control: Sahasrahla telepathically contacts Link through special tiles to give hints or move the plot along.
• Mission-Pack Sequel: The BS Satellaview Japan-only sequel, for the Super Famicom add-on. ALttP's Link is gone, and you are controlling a hero who must complete 8 dungeons to regain tablets needed to reseal Ganon. Also, you'll have to complete the game in under 4 hours. It featured a score counter, full voice acting for Zelda and Sahasrahla^note lost forever in the backup ROMs, guided you throughout the game with gameplay advice, sometimes triggered the medallion spells you couldn't use yourself, and rendered your bomb/arrow/heart count to be infinite for a couple of minutes.
• Mobile Shrubbery: Spiny Beetles hide under bushes, rocks, or skulls and walk towards Link when he gets close. The Power Bracelet is required to remove the rocks and skulls to make the beetles vulnerable, but bushes can be slashed. Several subsequent 2D games in the series bring back these mooks.
• MockGuffin: There are fake Master Swords littered all over The Lost Woods. The game even starts to remark on how amazing it is that you retrieved it for a moment before revealing the fake. You're not likely to be fooled, though, especially after seeing what the real Master Sword looks like.
• Money for Nothing: The game can be finished with a minimum of 710 Rupees,^note 500 for flippers, 110 for the first Dark World dungeon, 100 for the super bomb but the game loves giving out huge sums of money in treasure chests and dungeons throughout the second half. On the other hand, convenient healing in the midst of dungeons can be rather expensive, with a Health Potion costing 150 Rupees in most places.
• Money Sink:
  • The Pond of Happiness, where Link can toss in Rupees in increments varying from 5 to 50 at a time. For every 100 Rupees he throws in, a fairy will increase the maximum amount of bombs or arrows he can carry. Since most of the Cash Gates are cleared within the first half of the game, this gives the player something useful to do with the rest of it. Seven upgrades (six at +5 each and one at +10) can be "bought" for each item, allowing you to spend a maximum of 1600 Rupees to bring your bomb and arrow capacity up from 10 and 30 respectively to 50 and 70.
  • There are mini-games in the Dark World that you can set fire to your Rupees in; a 20-Rupee Bow challenge that's more demanding on one's aim and timing than most of the rest of the game, and an 80-Rupee treasure-hunting game that's essentially a gamble for a Piece of Heart. You can potentially make a profit off of both of these, however.
• Mook Bouncer:
  • The boss of the Tower of Hera, Moldorm, can knock you into a pit, forcing you to walk back up several floors before you reach him again, where he will be fully healed and try to pull the same trick.
  • The Wallmasters drop from the ceiling to grab you and return you to the entrance of the current dungeon.
• Mooks Ate My Equipment: The Pikit. It is a hopping, plantlike creature that can snatch several different items from Link, not just the shield; fortunately, it never eats anything that can't be replaced. You can get back the most recently stolen item by killing it.
• Moon Logic Puzzle: Fighting the boss of the Thieves' Town dungeon. The compass tells you where the boss's room is, but initially nobody is there. There is a telepathic tile where Zelda will warn you not to be deceived by the magic of Blind the Thief (hinting that he is the boss, and that he uses illusion magic), and one of the inhabitants of Kakariko Village will tell you that Blind the Thief hated light, but those are the only hints you get about how to start the boss fight; the game does not specifically say that you have to bomb an unstable section of floor in the room directly above the boss's room so that light shines down into it, then lure the disguised Blind the Thief into the light.
• Moon Rabbit: Referenced with the Moon Pearl, which prevents Link from being turned into a bunny in the Dark World.
• Mordor: The Dark World was once the Sacred Realm of the Gods, before Ganon's influence turned it into a dark, forbidding realm swarming with monsters.
• More Criminals Than Targets: The Dark World counterpart of Kakariko Village – Hyrule's only town – is the Village of Outcasts, which is of course entirely made up of thieves and various assorted criminals. This is justified, as the only people who went over are thieves trying to steal the Golden Power.
• More Predators Than Prey: Every living being in the Dark World is some sort of monster out for blood, making you wonder what the heck they actually feed on.
• Morphic Resonance: Early on, you could encounter a "bully and his friend" within the Dark World. The bully's friend takes on a form of a spherical creature due to him "not being able to make up his mind". By sheer coincidence, his human form face happens to be just as round.
• Moth Menace: Mothula, the boss encountered in Skull Woods, is a gigantic moth that can shoot energy beams at Link.
• Multiple Head Case: The boss Trinexx is a giant tortoise with three heads; a central one, a blue one that breathes ice that leaves frozen trails on the floor, and a red one breathes fire. The two elemental heads get cut off over the course of the battle.
• Muzzle Flashlight: You can use your Ether medallion to temporarily show you where hidden paths are—you're supposed to light torches, but Ether is sometimes easier or more convenient, since you can use it anywhere.
• My Death Is Just the Beginning: Defeating Agahnim in Hyrule causes a portal to draw Link into the Dark World. When you defeat him in Ganon's Tower, he sheds his disguise and exposes himself as Ganon.
• Mythology Gag: In the GBA version, Link's Uncle's dying speech is rewritten to omit the infamous line, "Zelda is your...". But in the Palace of the Four Sword, Link will encounter Blind the Thief impersonating Link's Uncle who says the original dialogue including the infamous original line before apparently dying and transforming into Blind's true form. The reference is somewhat lost in the American localization which translates the original words more accurately, "You must rescue Princess Zelda... You are... the Princess's... ... ... ..."
• Mythopoeia: The series first gained a fictional mythology with this game, which introduced the Three Golden Goddesses as the creator deities, along with the origin of both evil in general (men warring over ownership of the Triforce) and Ganon in particular (a cunning human thief who got the Triforce and was subsequently sealed in the Sacred Realm/Dark World).
• Myth Prologue: The game opens with the myth of how people fought over the Triforce and how Ganon was sealed in the sacred realm after he obtained it.
• Nephewism: Link, in this game, lives with his uncle. As it's eventually explained, they are all that remains of the bloodline of the Hylian Knights. The manga gives a backstory to the absence of Link's parents.
• Nerf: The Tunic, which is a nerf compared to the Rings from The Legend of Zelda. Rings lowered damage from all enemy attacks and traps. Tunics do lower damage; however, some enemies and all traps deal fixed damage, regardless of what tunic Link is wearing.
• Never Accepted in His Hometown: He has to avoid being noticed while traveling through his native village of Kakariko because the townspeople are convinced that he's the villain who has abducted their beloved Princess Zelda. The hero's bad rep stems from some nasty public relations from the Big Bad's minions.
• Never Say "Die":
  • Averted in the Japanese version — in the file select screen of all things! The "delete a file" option is written as "KILL" and is in English lettering to boot.
  • Averted in the English version, too. Death Mountain gets to keep its moniker, even in spite of Nintendo's censorship policies at the time. Oddly enough, the Light World equivalent (named "Mt. Hebra" in Japanese) is also called Death Mountain.
  • Played straight in the opening and ending, however. The king is "eliminated" by Agahnim, and his sprite is sitting on the throne with a skull in place of a head. In addition, Link's Uncle is never explicitly stated to have died, but in the end credits, he "recovers", and the king "returns".
• Never Trust a Title: With the subtitle "A Link to the Past" you would expect time travel to play a major part, but there is nothing like that anywhere in the game. The title refers to the fact that, in its original English release, it was marketed as a prequel to the first two games.
• New World Tease: Your first glimpse of the Dark World is as a bunny on the dark Death Mountain, just before entering the Tower of Hera. Just open the map.
• Night of the Living Mooks: The Poe is a ghost enemy that roams the graveyard, much like the Ghini in the first Zelda game. They're enduring enemies, as Link has to hit them several times with the sword to defeat them. Their Dark World equivalents are the Hyus.
• No Delays for the Wicked: Subverted twice during the game:
  • At the start of the game, Zelda is the last maiden Agahnim needs to banish. When Link rescues her, she hides at the Sanctuary and Agahnim is forced to search for her, giving Link time to find the Master Sword.
  • Even when Agahnim banishes Zelda and breaks the Sages' seal, it takes time for the gateway between the two worlds to open completely. This gives Link time to rescue the maidens and confront Ganon before he can invade the Light World.
• No Entrance: The Swamp of Evil, which houses the Misery Mire dungeon, is completely blocked off from the rest of the Dark World by impassable barriers, with a sign warning Link that there is no way in and no way out. Within the limits of the Dark World, it is indeed completely unreachable. However, Link is able to get in by traveling to the Desert of Mystery -the swamp's Light World counterpart- and finding a portal between the worlds there that crosses into the swamp.
• No Honor Among Thieves: According to the manual backstory, Ganondorf and his band of thieves found the entrance to the Sacred Realm and the Triforce together. Then, instead of sharing the power, the thieves turned against one another in order to claim the Triforce uncontested. Ganondorf emerged victorious and touched the Triforce with the blood of his followers still fresh in his hands.
• No Name Given: Unlike for every other entry in the series both before and after, the manual does not use the name "Link" at all, referring to the player character only as "you".
• Non-Indicative Name: A few, as a result of dubious changes made by the English localization:
  • The "Flute" is actually an Ocarina, as its sprite and Japanese name clearly show.
  • The area called Great Swamp is actually a large grass field with a few ponds of water. In Japanese, it's called a prairie, a much more fitting term.
  • One of the NPCs refers to the breakable jars as bottles in the English localization. It's especially confusing because Bottles are a separate object in the game.
• Non-Lethal Bottomless Pits: A special case. You have an area where there is a nonlethal bottomless pit. By solving the puzzle hinted earlier, however, the platform moves below, and you fall onto solid ground with no damage, and can proceed with the rest of the dungeon.
• Non-Standard Character Design: In the GBA version, the witch's apprentice was replaced with Maple from The Legend of Zelda: Oracle Games... Using her unaltered, three-colors-plus-transparency sprite from the games, which looks out of place among the SNES-grade graphics.
• Noob Cave: Hyrule Castle, crawling with guards, simple puzzles, and a ball-and-chain-wielding mini-boss. You get your sword as soon as you enter, and you can find the boomerang on your way out.
• Not the Intended Use: Using the butterfly net when facing Agahnim is a surprisingly effective way of deflecting his projectiles.
• Now, Where Was I Going Again?: The fortune teller provides hints concerning the main plot, and refills your Life Meter, for a few Rupees. The game provides plenty of easy money anyway, so go right ahead.
• Nuclear Candle: When Link lights up a sconce, the whole room lights up. The only difference between how many sconces are lit is how dim or bright the ambient light is.
• Oculothorax: Chasupas, the Dark World's equivalent to Hyrule's common bats, are giant eyeballs with bat wings.
• An Offer You Can't Refuse: If Link brings the purple chest from the Village of Outcasts to the nameless man in the Desert of Mystery, he will pick the lock in exchange for Link's promise to not tell anyone that he used to be a thief. You get a bottle out of the affair.
• One-Eyed Bats: Whereas bats in the Light World look relatively normal, in the Dark World they're replaced with Faceless Eyes with bat wings.
• One-Time Dungeon: Hyrule Castle and its tower are permanently locked after defeating Agahnim and entering the Dark World for the first time.
• One-Winged Angel: After Agahnim is defeated for the second time, he transforms into his true form: the pig-like Ganon.
• Only the Chosen May Wield: Starting from this game thanks to the debut of the Master Sword, Link has to prove that he is the ancient legends' prophesied Hero before he is able to draw the sacred weapon. Before winning the Pendants of Virtue in the dungeons, Link will not be able to pull the Master Sword.
• Only the Worthy May Pass: Only a descendant of the Hylian Knights can acquire the necessary Plot Coupons to succeed in the game's quest.
• Opening the Sandbox: After you complete the first Dark World dungeon, the game is as linear as the original Zelda. In fact, if you already know where to go, completing the first dungeon isn't even necessary: once you have the Magic Hammer from it, the sandbox is busted wide open. You can even leave King Helmasaur for until you've gotten everything else in the game short of the Red Mail and a single Heart Container.
• Orbiting Particle Shield:
  • The Cane of Byrna uses up magic power pretty quickly, but actually makes the user completely invulnerable.
  • The Swamp Palace boss, Arrghus, is initially protected from attack by smaller orbiting creatures, which must be pulled off with the Hookshot.
• Our Dwarves Are All the Same: The Dwarven Swordsmiths. Short? Check. Beards? Check. Talented smiths? Check. Interestingly, this is the only time "dwarves" have ever appeared in the entire Zelda franchise.
• Outliving One's Offspring: The father of the Flute Boy mentions that his son disappeared a long time ago, and is most likely dead. He's actually trapped in the Dark World, though for all intents and purposes that kind of amounts to the same thing. Fortunately, by winning the game, Link and the player can reunite them.
• The Overworld: Hyrule and the Dark World serve as this collectively.
• "Pachelbel's Canon" Progression: A variation appears in the ending theme of the game.
• Pants-Free: The official artwork for this game makes it pretty clear that Link's not wearing any pants underneath that tunic.
• Parrying Bullets: Link can use his sword to deflect the magic attacks by the wizard Agahnim. Of course, it's a lot easier to do it with the bug-catcher's net.
• Permanently Missable Content: The compass and map found in the dungeons can be passed up rather easily. With all of the main dungeons, a completionist can come back to claim them even after defeating the boss of the dungeon (even though they only have any kind of effect in that dungeon). However, for some reason, the doors to Hyrule Castle will permanently lock themselves up at a certain point, sealing the map^note Hyrule Castle has no compass therein away forever. If you reenter the sewer section using the headstone in the far upper left corner of the graveyard in an attempt to check whether or not you have them it doesn't even show that you have the big key, a required item. So on top of being potentially lost forever, you may never know if you've got it.
• Planet of Copyhats: Ganon was first established as a thief in this game, where the backstory makes out his attainment of the Triforce to be thievery. Come Ocarina of Time, and it turns out the whole Gerudo tribe, which Ganondorf belongs to, wears a Thievery Hat (though it appears they aren't too fond of how far Ganondorf takes such tendencies). This hat is dropped in Breath of the Wild, however, where they aren't portrayed as being radically different from Hylians besides the One-Gender Race rule — a rule Ganon himself notably breaks — and the consistent dark-skinned redhead look.
• Platform-Activated Ability: There are three Medallions that grant powerful abilities to Link, at the cost of magic: Thunder, Quake, and Bombos. While all three of them can be used anytime as long as Link has enough magic, there are also two dungeons whose entrances are sealed off and need Link to use one of these Medallions to open them. The exact spot where Link has to stand on is marked in the ground by engravings that wear the likeness of the specific Medallion that is called for use: Thunder to unearth the entrance to Misery Mire and stop the perpetual rain in the Swamp of Evil, and Quake to make a rock shaped like a turtle's head disappear and unveil the entrance to Turtle Rock.
• Platform Battle: Link has to fight Moldorm on a platform, which the dungeon boss can knock the hero off of.
• Player Death Is Dramatic: The game has a death scene similar to that of the first Zelda game (the entire world turning red as Link dies before fading to black as he finally disappears), but with an Iris Out beforehand.
• Player Nudge: If you fall off the platform when fighting Ganon, you'll see a telepathic tile on the next screen telling you that you need Silver Arrows to defeat him; it's possible to not even have Silver Arrows yet.
• Playing with Fire: Ganon summons large amounts of fire during the final battle.
• Plot Coupon: Three Pendants of Virtue first, then the Seven Maidens. The Pendants allow Link to claim the Master Sword, while the Maidens dispel the force field that protects the entrance of Ganon's Tower. Zelda is actually one of the second set of plot coupons you have to collect and you can see her in your inventory screen in a crystal.
• Plot-Triggering Death: The game starts with the sorcerer Agahnim killing the King of Hyrule. But for Link, the plot really starts when he finds his uncle - his only living relative - on the brink of death, and is urged to Take Up My Sword. Unlike most examples, both of these deaths are undone by the end of the game.
• Poison and Cure Gambit: It's strongly implied that Agahnim did this (releasing a plague into Hyrule, then arriving incognito as a sorcerer able to halt the plague) in the lead-up to the game.
• Post-Defeat Explosion Chain: Enemies and bosses resembling segmented worms, such as Sandworms, Lanmolas and Moldorms, tend to go down in a series of small explosions, each destroying a segment until nothing's left.
• Post-Final Level: The inside of the Pyramid of Power is where Ganon transports Link for their final battle after the latter has already scaled Ganon's tower.
• Pre-Final Boss: The final dungeon concludes with a rematch against Agahnim, who's been antagonizing Link and Zelda for the entire game up to this point. However, defeating him causes him to revert to his true form, Ganon, who Link chases after and fights just moments later.
• Prequel: A Link to the Past is the third game in the series but is set chronologically before The Legend of Zelda and The Adventure of Link
• Prison Episode: Early in the game, you break into prison to save princess Zelda.
• Prison Level: Link infiltrates the dungeon of Hyrule Castle in order to free Zelda from her cell before Agahnim can cast her into the Dark World.
• Prolonged Video Game Sequel: A Link To The Past has a longer main quest than the first two games, which is reflected in the presence of two overworlds, between which Link can explore up to 12 dungeons, tied with The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds for having the highest number of any Zelda game. It also features more sidequests (which, to be fair, were barely present at all in the previous titles), as well as more overworld activity.
• Psychic Link: It is implied that Zelda may have a kind of Psychic Link with Link and his uncle. In this game, Zelda telepathically calls Link and his uncle to help her.
• "Psycho" Strings: The Cave and Dark World Dungeon themes use this to emphasize their thematic danger and (in the latter's associated areas) foreboding atmosphere.
• Pun-Based Creature: One of the enemies in the Dark World's overworld resembles a hopping flower with reptilian jaws and legs. It's called the Snap Dragon.
• Purple Is Powerful: The purple Dark Link of the GBA port is the last "Dark Link" to be fought, is the most resilient, and can copy all of the real Link's sword techniques.
• Puzzle Reset: There's one puzzle (the infamous Ice Palace) that required Puzzle Reset to beat. It is so cryptic and non-obvious that the Updated Re-release replaced it entirely. That said, in the original version you can still skip the puzzle by completing a later dungeon first, giving you access to, essentially, the Cane of Puzzle Skipping.
• Pyramid Power: The appropriately-named Pyramid of Power, which sits at the center of the Dark World, being the site of the game's final boss battle and containing the plot's MacGuffin, the Triforce.
• Quest for a Wish:
  • The game revolves around Link's quest for the wish-granting Triforce; he wants it less to make a wish of his own and more to get it out of the hands of Ganon, who had previously used it to take over the Sacred Realm (in the process turning it into the Dark World) and is currently using it to invade the Light World. Once Link gets it, however, he realizes that he can use it to undo all of Ganon's evil works.
  • Link has to make a wish to unlock the second pendant's dungeon (Desert Palace), though the wish is unstated. Notably, the palace entrance requirement is that he make a wish, not a specific one: it's entirely possible that he just wished to enter the palace.
• Reality Warping Is Not a Toy: The Triforce exists in the Sacred Realm and grants the wish of whomever touches it, altering the Sacred Realm to reflect that person's heart. As revealed in the backstory, because Ganon's wish was evil (to rule everything), the Sacred Realm was altered into the Dark World.
• Rebuff the Amateur: One sword upgrade is obtained by giving it to two smiths who take turns hammering at it. If you try to join in with your own hammer, they tell you amateurs shouldn't interfere.
• Recurring Boss: Agahnim serves as the boss of two dungeons (Tower of Hera in the Light World, and Ganon's Tower in the Dark World). In the rematch, he can summon replicas of himself.
• Red Ones Go Faster: Your Boomerang can be upgraded so that it flies farther and faster. Not only does it turn red, it trails sparkles behind it.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: Ganon was a bloodthirsty king of thieves, while Agahnim gains the trust of the King before killing him and sacrificing the Maidens. It becomes funnier once the player learns that Agahnim is the alter ego of Ganon.
• Reforged Blade: The Master Sword is the Trope Codifier for the way it's used in video games (as a way to avert the Ludonarrative Dissonance of the Sword of Plot Advancement becoming the Penultimate Weapon after being replaced by a better one). It's reforged by a pair of dwarven blacksmiths, and later magically upgraded by a faerie.
• Reviving Enemy: Stalfos (or at least the most powerful types) often need to be finished off by blowing up their bodies with bombs to stop them from reanimating (this is usually only needed to clear rooms that don't open doors or spawn chests until all the enemies within are defeated, since the games make use of Respawning Enemies).
• Rewarding Vandalism: There are thieves who, if you use a bomb to destroy a wall and reveal their hiding place, will give you 500 Rupees and the words "Let's keep this between us, okay?"
• Ribcage Ridge: The Dark World's counterpart to The Lost Woods, Skeleton Forest, is named as such because of the large ribcages that arc over most of its paths. Fortunately, whatever creature they came from is never seen living.
• Righteous Rabbit: Going into the Dark World without the Moon Pearl makes you change your shape based on your personality. Link, being a good guy, is transformed into a rabbit.
• Rocket Jump: The bomb-jumping used in the game (using a bomb to propel you horizontally, ignoring pits and other hazards), while not required, is useful in a couple stages—at the least, Dark World Level 3 to escape from a room, and in Ganon's Tower to access a faerie spring. A lot of romhacks of the game do require it, to the annoyance of No Damage Runners.
• Rope Bridge: There are two rope bridges spanning Death Mountain's halves. The upper bridge is surprisingly sturdy and safe, while the lower one is impassably broken. It is possible to jump off the last plank of the broken bridge, but doing so only sends the player plummeting into a bottomless dark chasm.
• Rule of Seven: The game set the tradition in itself and subsequent games of featuring seven sages who are entrusted the role of protecting Hyrule. In this game in particular, the sages are the Seven Maidens, among which Princess Zelda is included. To rescue them, Link has to venture through the Dark World and conquer seven dangerous dungeons, many of which are coincidentially located in areas equivalent to major locations in Hyrule.^note The Dark Palace and Misery Mire sit where the East and Desert Palaces respectively are in the Light World, the location of Ice Palace matches that of one of the Light World's Great Fairy, the Skull Woods' whereabouts match those of the Master Sword in the Light World, Thieves' Town is located in Kakariko Village's dark counterpart, and Turtle Rock is placed not too far from Ganon's Tower (which in turn stands in for the Light World's Tower of Hera. The only outlier is Swamp Palace, as its Light World version is a regular, unimportant cave.
• Rule of Three: Collecting the three Pendants of Virtue is essential to claim the Master Sword. There are also three Medallions that cast powerful spells.
• Sand Worm: The Lanmolas, which serve as the Wolfpack Boss of Desert Palace. They're green caterpillar-like monsters which frequently dwell within the sandy ground and periodically hop onto the surface, which is when Link can inflict damage to them.
• Save-Game Limits: Compared to its two predecessors on the NES, the game is a little more merciful on the subject of saving and quitting: You have three possible starting points in the Light World and one in the Dark World, though saving and quitting still increases your death count (except on the GBA version). You also resume the game with only three hearts in the SNES version, thus overlapping with Continuing is Painful.
• Save the Princess:
  • Zelda starts out already kidnapped at the beginning of the game and you rescue her during the game's opening sequence. When you get the Master Sword after completing the first set of dungeons, Zelda gets kidnapped a second time and placed in a crystal.
  • Played with in one instance: one of the maidens you need to save turns out to be the leader of a band of brigands, Blind The Thief. Once you defeat him you save the real maiden as usual, though.
• Scary Stinging Swarm: Dashing into trees may knock loose a swarm of bess that will then chase after Link.
• Schmuck Bait: "Curses to anyone who throws something into my circle of stones." You have to do it at least once to beat the game, though doing it again is rather funny.
• Schrödinger's Gun: Three different chests can contain the magic lamp: the one in the house Link wakes up in, another one in a tunnel under the castle, and the last one in Princess Zelda's cell. There's only one lamp; the second and third chests are backups for the first one in case you somehow didn't notice it; so, the lamp will magically appear in whichever chest you open first (if you open the other two, you find only 5 Rupees).
• Sealed Evil in Another World: When Ganon attempted to conquer the Light World, the knights of Hyrule fought to defend the sages while they seal him in the Dark World at the expense of the former losing many men in the process of the seal. However, Ganon through his alter ego Agahnim later had the maidens descended from the sages warped to the Dark World in order to break the seal.
• Sealed Good in a Can: In the Dark World, Link has to rescue the seven maidens, who are descended from the Seven Sages in the game's backstory; Agahnim has imprisoned them in crystals scattered in the dungeons of the Dark World.
• Second Coming: Agahnim sets himself up as this in the back story. In a period where Hyrule is simultaneously ravaged by plagues, famine, drought, and other hardships, he appears out of nowhere and works miracles to set things right. He becomes a hero to the people and the King declares him to be the second coming of the Sages of old and appoints him his priest and second-in-command. Granted, he does herald the return of someone from the past, that being Ganon.
• Second Hour Superpower: Link gets the Pegasus Boots, which greatly speed traversal and are so integral to the play experience that they get their own button, after the first major dungeon.
• Secret Art: Before he dies, Link's uncle teaches the hero his signature Spin Attack which has been passed down their family.
• Secret Underground Passage: Near the begining of the game, you escort Zelda through a secret passage leading from the throne room through the castle sewers, escaping from Hyrule Castle and emerging in the Sanctuary.
• Segmented Serpent: Lanmolas blur the line between this and just a segmented arthropod, and can only be damaged on their heads. Moldorm consists of five progressively smaller segments, and has to be defeated by hitting its tail (ordinary moldorms are mostly head and targeting the tail isn't necessary for them). The second form of Trinexx, the boss of Turtle Rock, resembles a segmented snake whose weak point is unusually in the middle. Swamolas are enemies found in the swamp areas whose bodies are composed of several circulation segments.
• Sentient Sands: Link encounters a literal sand-men called the Geldman, in various desert environments. These became recurring enemies in the series.
• Sequence Breaking:
  • Explotation of glitches opens up worlds of possibilities.
    • It's possible to glitch your way past the guards blocking the rest of the world at the start of the game, letting you go do Eastern Palace without a sword (pots and the Bow can kill all enemies inside), collect the Green Pendant, and give it to Sahasrala for the Pegasus Boots. You can then use another glitch to "reset" the world to its normal state after the start of the game, but still no sword, and then go do the Desert Palace without getting your sword or rescuing Zelda.
    • If you know how to exploit the "Death Mountain Descent" glitch to get into the bulk of the Dark World from Dark Death Mountain, you can progress a fair ways through the Dark World without defeating Moldorm, getting the Master Sword, or fighting Agahnim. You still need to make sure you get the Moon Pearl from the Tower of Hera, though. The Fighter Sword can be reforged into the Tempered Sword, letting you get the Ether Medallion for Misery Mire and thus complete all dungeons and beat Ganon. The only thing that you can't actually get is the Piece of Heart from the Lumberjacks' tree in the Light World, but you're otherwise good to go. ^note  And, even if you do upgrade to the Tempered Sword then to the Golden Sword, but then decide to complete the Master Sword plot hook at some point you can actually return to the swordsmiths and the fairy pond and upgrade your sword again.
  • While the Dark World seems fairly linear, only the Palace of Darkness needs to be beaten in order, and really you just need to get the Hammer from it, you don't need to complete it. The other six dungeons can be completed in any order, though some require the dungeon items from other dungeons. A popular order to beat the Dark World dungeons is 1, 4, 2, 6, 3, 7, 5, 8. This requires no backtracking and gets you the nicest goodies as early as possible without having to half-finish dungeons.
  • If you feel like being brave and doing Ice Palace and Misery Mire early, you can get the Super Bomb that blows a hole into the Pyramid of Power early, giving you access to the Golden Sword and the Silver Arrows, making the rest of the game a breeze.
  • On small scales inside of dungeons, the "bonk" from the Pegasus Boots that send you flying back when you run into an obstacle can be exploited to jump over gaps, some of which would otherwise require the Hookshot, or you can use a trick to "hover" with the Boots and cross large gaps that way. Bomb Jumps (using the knockback from a bomb to push you over a pit) are also a common exploit.
• Shadow Walker: Agahnim can sink into his shadow and move it about the room before resurfacing. In his second fight he splits his shadow into three and has intangible clones of himself pop out of the other two to hurl additional projectiles at you.
• Shall I Repeat That?: The crystals in the Dark World. Obtaining each crystal will reveal part of the story, after which a question is asked: "Do you understand?" with the options being "Yes" and "Not at all." Fortunately, the default option is "Yes."
• Shifting Sand Land: The Desert of Mystery is located in the southwest portion of Hyrule and home of the second dungeon (Desert Palace). In both locations, enemies that hide under the sand (such as Leevers) are frequent, and some vultures which stand on cacti start attacking Link upon his proximity to them.
• Shock and Awe:
  • Agahnim can summon lightning from his hands◊. However, it's easy to dodge, which is good since unlike his other attacks it can't be deflected, because he only fires it when standing in the northern part of the room and he doesn't turn to aim it at Link like he does with his other 2 attacks, so Link can just move to the side of the room when he starts charging an attack on the northern side of the room.
  • Vitreous' most powerful attack in its first phase: Summoning lightning that looks like Agahnim's own.
• Shockwave Stomp: Ganon uses this to shake the room and break the floor in the fight with him.
• Shooting Gallery: A Link to the Past is the first game in the series to feature one. In this case, it's located in the Village of Outcasts; the targets are Octopus-like figures, and Link has to shoot them while dealing with hand-shaped obstructions that move sideways.
• Shout-Out:
  • The boss of the Desert Palace is a trio of worms named Lanmolas. They resemble the Spice Worms who live in the desert planet Arrakis from Dune.
  • Mothula, the third Dark World boss, is based on Mothra
  • In the Japanese version, the Magic Hammer is called the "M.C. Hammer."
  • The Master Sword is lodged in a stone and can only be pulled out by a worthy hero, just like Excalibur in Arthurian Legend.
  • The Flute Boy is the spitting image of Peter Pan.
• Signature Move: Link's Spin Attack, which was introduced in this game and has been a staple of the series ever since. Before that, it was his Sword Beam, although it is often absent in the 3D games.
• Silly Simian: There's a mischievous monkey in the maze preceding the Dark Palace who can guide Link through it for a small price of 10 Rupees. The catch? The palace's entrance can only be opened with a switch that is beyond Link's reach, so he has to pay 100 Rupees to the monkey so it presses the switch for him.
• Silver Bullet: Like in the first game, Ganon can only be properly slain with a silver arrow. They are replaced by the more explicitly magic Light Arrows from the next games on.
• Slippy-Slidey Ice World: The Ice Palace, complete with irritating sliding floors and killer penguins. There are also ice enemies that are impossible to kill without the Fire Rod or the Bombos Medallion, including one in the first room that must be killed to proceed, ensuring that the player has some means of dealing with Kholdstare's first phase.
• Smart Bomb: The three medallions, Ether, Bombos, and Quake, which freeze all enemies on the screen, light them on fire, or affect them the same way as the Magic Powder.
• Socialization Bonus: The Bonus Dungeon in the GBA version can only be unlocked by linking up with someone else with the game and beating Four Swords.
• So Near, Yet So Far:
  • When you first go into the Dark World en route to the Tower of Hera, you can see the base of Ganon's Tower atop the Dark World version of Death Mountain. The only thing separating you from the final dungeon in the game is a single, unclimbable wall.
  • After beating the Disc-One Final Boss, Agahnim, Link is transported to the Dark World atop a large pyramid, with the landscape of the Dark World visible in the horizon. This trope is doubled because not only does the view of the Dark World shows you Ganon's Castle, where the Big Bad resides, but the pyramid Link is standing on actually contains the Triforce, which is the true goal of the entire game!
• Space-Filling Path: Various areas are bordered off by fences, cliffs, and trees, for instance, with only one direct pathway Link must get to in order to reach.
• Spikes of Doom: Spikes usually aren't a problem, being at worst a nuisance during dungeon navigation. However, the boss of the Skull Woods from the Dark World would have been pretty easy to defeat were it not for the caveat that the room not only has spikes everywhere, but the spikes move around a lot, and then the floor moves occasionally as it's a large conveyor belt whose direction varies as well. The boss (a giant moth, Mothula) doesn't even feel the need to really attack Link as a result—it just chills in the air for the most part, watching him get impaled by spikes over and over again.
• Spin Attack: This game introduced the signature Spin Attack, called the "Whirling Blade" in the English manual. By holding down the sword button and moving slowly for a moment, Link charges a circular spin attack with a very forgiving hit box and timing that does twice the damage of a normal sword slash.
• Spotting the Thread: All of the maidens were sealed inside magic crystals. So in the Thieves' Town dungeon, you probably realize immediately that something isn't right when you find the maiden imprisoned in a prison cell. The "maiden" also asks you to take her outside, but if you try to do so, she won't actually let you. Turns out, "she" is actually the dungeon boss in disguise.
• Sprint Shoes: This is the first appearance of the Pegasus Boots, which allow Link to dash quickly in a straight line and vastly increase the pace of the game.
• Sprite/Polygon Mix: The Triforce in the intro is made of polygons, as are the crystals in which the maidens are imprisoned.
• Stationary Boss: Vitreous begins its battle while immobile, and only starts moving once all its mooks are dead.
• A Storm Is Coming: The death of Link's uncle is heralded by a huge thunderstorm.
• Stripped to the Bone: In the game's intro, the King of Hyrule, recently "eliminated" by Agahnim, is shown seated on his throne as a skeleton.
• Superboss: The GBA version has four differently-colored Dark Links as the bosses of the Palace of the Four Sword, plus stronger versions of the first four Dark World bosses.
  • Helmasaur King is more durable and it can regenerate its mask; what's more, it can summon Helmasaurs to impede Link, has to be hit with a Light Arrow before Link can strike it with his sword.
  • Arrghus replaces the Arrgi with regular Bari (that instantly electrify themselves once they get hit with the Hookshot), and summons Kyamerons in its second phase.
  • Mothula is much faster, has a Doppleganger Spin, and can summon bees to attack.
  • Blind the Thief is more of a Puzzle Boss in this rematch: whenever it gets decapitated, Link must swat the head back to its own body to make Blind vulnerable again.
  • Each Four Sword Link has some abilities that Link can use, such as the Hurricane Spin, the Magic Cape, etc. Beating them is purely for bragging rights (though it does lead to a new ending).
• Superior Successor: This game's Link is canonically after Ocarina of Time Link. He's in the Downfall Timeline, created if the Hero of Time were to fail his quest, and fall to Ganondorf's forces. That said, despite facing a Ganon controlling the entire Triforce, and that's after killing one of his predecessors, he roasts Ganon like the pig he is.
• Swamps Are Evil: The Swamp of Evil is where you find the sixth Dark World dungeon, Misery Mire. There is also the Plains of Ruin, which are the Dark World counterpart of the Great Swamp in Hyrule; they contain its second dungeon, the Swamp Palace.
• Sword Beam: The Master Sword and its upgraded forms send forth a spinning energy blast when Link has full hearts.
• Sword of Plot Advancement: The Master Sword — you're finally worthy to wield the legendary weapon, probably a good time to go Save the Princess then, eh? Notable in that this is the first appearance in the series of the Master Sword.
• Sword Plant: The game has Link doing this with the Quake Medallion, allowing him to perform a powerful, yet magic-costly earthquake that defeats enemies on the ground. It is obtained in the Lake of Ill Omen in the Dark World, and is needed to gain access to the penultimate dungeon (Turtle Rock).
• Tactical Suicide Boss: You'd think that after the first time you reflect Agahnim's beam back at him, he'd only use the other two non-reflective attacks. It's even worse when you encounter him again in the Dark World since there are two copies of him and all three versions still use the reflective attack, with both clones using only that, meaning that the fight can actually end up being easier than your first encounter with him.
• Take Over the World: Ganon's wish to the Triforce was to rule the world. The Triforce grants him that wish by transforming the Sacred Realm into the Dark World. Ganon is not satisfied by the results, and seeks to conquer the Light World (Hyrule) as well.
• Take Up My Sword: Link's Uncle, injured and dying, hands Link his sword and shield and charges him with rescuing Princess Zelda as the quest begins.
• Talking Animal: people cursed by the Dark Realm may turn into a talking animal, if they're lucky (compared to some of the freakishly disturbing transformations Link comes across).
• Tele-Frag: Averted; if you teleport via Magic Mirror from the Dark to Light Worlds, you'll be kicked back to the Dark World if you wind up inside a solid object. Can be annoying, since if you first teleport from a spot next to a solid object in the Dark World, and then approach the sparkling gateway from the wrong side, you get forced back to the Light World to try again.
• Teleport Spam:
  • Agahnim teleports after nearly every attack, making teleporting the most common move he uses in battle.
  • Ganon also does this, only with a set pattern. Midway through the fight he'll begin a 'teleporting season' where he doesn't stop, even to attack.
• Tennis Boss: Agahnim can't be attacked directly; he can only be harmed by reflecting his magical attacks back at him.
• Thematic Sequel Logo Change: The logo has the Master Sword, which makes its debut in this game, piercing the "Z", which is in front of a shield.
• Theme-and-Variations Soundtrack: The game does this with Zelda's theme, including the opening and ending themes.
• Theme Music Power-Up: After all the pendant hunting, you reach the forest to pull The Master Sword from its resting place. Cue the powerful "Legend of Zelda" theme music as Link and sword opens up a new dimension of whoopass. Even after 20 years, that's still a great moment to play.
• The Three Trials: The game set the tradition in itself and subsequent games of having Link go to three dungeons to collect three items for initial quest of the adventure, almost always to claim the Master Sword. In this game specifically, the three Pendants of Virtue: Courage, Wisdom and Power. To Link's dismay, by the time he returns to Hyrule Castle and meets Agahnim at the top, Zelda is taken to the Dark World, and after the ensuing boss battle so is Link.
• Throw Down the Bomblet: There are a few soldiers posted on Hyrule Castle's walls, who throw bombs down on Link.
• Throwing Your Sword Always Works: In the first phase of his fight, Ganon throws his spinning Trident at Link. This isn't much of a problem for him since he teleports to catch it.
• Title Confusion: The game features Dual-World Gameplay but does not involve any time travel, as its title suggests. It's called that in English because the main character's name is "Link" and it's a prequel to earlier games in the series.
• Title In: The original version of the game averts the trope, meaning that none of the locations (not even the dungeons) are identified by name in-game when you enter them (the series would have to wait until Link's Awakening for that feature to be implemented in the series). The game's GBA port rectifies this by adding an identifying presentation in the dungeons.
• Toggling Setpiece Puzzle: The third dungeon (Tower of Hera) features color-coded barrier blocks (blue and pink) whose states can be swapped by hitting luminous crystal orbs; by default, the pink ones are lifted while the blue ones are receded. Depending on the case, Link can either hit the orbs with his sword to swap the blocks' states and make his way through the dungeon, or shoot at them from a distance with an arrow in case the active and inactive blocks are placed back-to-back (if he cannot hit them with arrows, he can drop a bomb near one and then run onto the part where he has to go before it explodes). Later dungeons bring back these blocks, and there's a room in Ice Palace that requires a clever use of them to solve a difficult Block Puzzle.
• Tragic Monster:
  • All the generic soldier mooks. They're actually completely innocent people who are being forced to do evil because Agahnim has used magic to make them Brainwashed and Crazy. Yet there's absolutely nothing you can do to help them - you have to kill them or they'll kill you. At the beginning of the game, there are several friendly guards who haven't been affected yet. One of them laments how his fellow men have lost their minds - and the fact that it is going to happen to him, too.
  • Some of the guards in green armor carry very short swords. They will injure Link if they walk into him, but unlike the others who will charge at him when he is noticed, these guards just wander around at random and don't really pose a threat. You can still attack and kill them, however.
• Transformation Conventions: Forceful transformation is one of the consequences of the "magical air" of the Dark World. It is implied that almost all of the monsters in the world, including Big Bad Ganon, are greedy and cruel humans transformed. And Link, of course, becomes a cute fluffy bunny as per his nice nature. Very life-affirming, but totally useless in fighting said monsters.
• Trauma Inn: What the fortune-telling spots in the Light World and the secret-telling spots in the Dark World effectively are, with the added perk of telling you a hint for something you haven't acquired yet (at least with the fortune-tellers). The game also has Healing Springs staffed by Great Fairies scattered across both worlds, but the paid healing is more conveniently-located for certain tasks.
• Treacherous Advisor: For aiding Hyrule and its people, the King appoints Agahnim to be his chief adviser. Then Agahnim gets rid of the king, brainwashes the soldiers, and makes Hyrule Castle his base of operations.
• Treacherous Quest Giver: Blind the Thief. He disguises himself as the maiden for the 4th Dark World dungeon and tries to prevent you from leaving. You have to trick him into a patch of sunlight to begin the battle. By the time you reach the dungeon's only exit and he tells you not to go that way, you've probably figured it out. When you win the boss battle, you rescue the real maiden.
• The Trees Have Faces: The trees in the Dark World all have faces. Most of them are inanimate, but some are aware. The living ones will happily talk to you if you interact with them, but if you dash into them they'll spit bombs at you.
• Tricked-Out Gloves: The game has the Power Glove, enabling you to lift light-colored rocks, and the Titan's Mitt, enabling you to lift dark-colored rocks. Both are required to access certain areas.
• Triumphant Reprise: The Ending Theme is a triumphant reprise of the dark Opening Theme.
• Tube Travel: The Turtle Rock dungeon features pipe-like tubes that must be traversed.
• Turns Red: Most boss fights have multiple stages (the boss might become faster and more aggressive after taking a certain amount of damage, or Link might have to kill a group of smaller enemies before he can attack the main boss), but the one which adheres most closely to this trope is the fight against the six Armos Knights ^note  Fought twice, once in the Eastern Palace and once in Ganon's Tower . At first, they jump around the room in fixed patterns, but when you have killed five of them, the last one turns from blue to red and actively tries to stomp Link.
• Uncommon Time: Ganon's battle theme starts off in 2/4 for two bars, before switching to 14/16.
• Underground Level: Turtle Rock, which notably doesn't have any man-made (or even divine) design like the other dungeons, so it's more like a very extended cave.
• Underground Monkey: Stronger varieties of soldiers simply have differently colored armor. Interestingly enough, the color coincides with the colors of Link's own armor upgrades obtained later in the game (green being the standard version, blue being stronger than green, and red being the strongest). The Dark World's version of soldiers, Tauruses, come in red and blue varieties, though the red ones are rarer, and unlike the soldiers their weapons are different (they wield tridents instead of spears).
• Unending End Card: You defeated Ganon, harmony is restored to the world, the credits roll, and you're stuck looking at The End in the corner. The Game Boy Advance port provides a second example if you play and clear The Palace of The Four Sword.
• Unintentionally Unwinnable:
  • There is a room that crashes the game (it tries to generate a chest it doesn't have) that is inaccessible except through the out of bounds glitch.
  • It's possible to glitch your way into the first battle with Agahnim immediately after you rescue Princess Zelda right at the start of the game. If you beat him, however, then you get transported into the Dark World — which is a very bad thing since you won't have either the Magic Mirror or the Moon Pearl, meaning that you instantly turn into Bunny Link, can't return to the Light World, and can't do a thing in the Dark World beyond wandering around until you eventually get killed. However, once you die or reset the game, you're given the option to restart at Link's house, allowing you to continue the game as normal (albeit with a few anomalies, such as the priest being alive and the Dark World entrance in Hyrule Castle being active at the same time).
  • It is entirely possible to reach Trinexx, the boss of Turtle Rock, without ever obtaining the Ice Rod you need to defeat it^note The Fire Rod is also necessary for the fight, but there's a torch-lighting puzzle in the dungeon that prevents you from reaching Trinexx without it. Thankfully one can use the Magic Mirror to return to the dungeon entrance.
• Unique Enemy:
  • The green soldiers who are summoned if Link talks to the wrong people in Kakariko Village (before retrieving the Master Sword) carry spears and shields, which gives them a little extra reach over the regular green soldiers.
  • The blimp-like Octoballoon that splits into multiple smaller Octos appears near the southeastern shore of Lake Hylia... and nowhere else. In the GBA version, in a blink-and-you'll-miss-it fashion, one appears in a dark room in the Palace of the Four Sword. Its uniqueness combined with its (and its "children"'s) timed self-destruct left many players wondering what its deal was: There's no prize for, say, killing all octos before they die on their own.
  • Turtle Rock has a pair of Chain Chomps in one room. This is their only appearance in the game. The GBA version adds another pair in the entrance of the Palace of the Four Sword.
  • The Lynels only appear as but one group of three at the top of Dark Mountain near Ganon's Tower.
• Unishment: There's an imp who, upon being disturbed, punishes Link by halving his magic's power. Well, he actually halves how much power it takes to use magic, so you can effectively use twice as much.
• Unsafe Haven: We have the aptly-called Sanctuary, where Princess Zelda takes refuge after Link saves her from confinement in Hyrule Castle. It's supposed to be a safe place, even though it's kind of in the open and that enemy knights are kind of on patrol outside. Why Agahnim didn't find it and capture Zelda sooner, like before Link got the Master Sword, is anybody's guess.
• Unseen No More: Ganon isn't even mentioned before you start exploring the Dark World in earnest after defeating Agahnim for the first time. An NPC on the way to the Dark Palace mentions that some guy got the Golden Power first and that's why the Golden Land became the Dark World, and then the first maiden, in the Dark Palace itself, name-drops him, while the one in the Swamp Palace finally expands on the aforemention NPC's words. Ganon himself doesn't appear until you enter his tower and defeat Agahnim again.
• Updated Re-release: The Game Boy Advance version released in 2002 added voice bits for Link (taken from Young Link in Ocarina of Time,) and a Bonus Dungeon unlocked after beating Four Swords. Also a new riddle sidequest for the Hurricane Spin if you collect 10 Medals of Courage by getting the most Rupees in a stage.
• Upgraded Boss: Ganon's Tower features reprises of the four Light World bosses, each with an upgraded arena or moveset to increase the difficulty. However, even with this boost in difficulty, Link's endgame equipment means that these fights still wind up being much easier.
  • The Armos Knights from Eastern Palace return on a slippery ice floor, making it tougher to line up bow shots.
  • The Lanmolas from the Desert Palace are accompanied by a fireball shooter, meaning Link has one more obstacle to keep track of.
  • Moldorm, from the Tower of Hera, appears in a small, narrow arena that makes it even easier for Link to fall down and have to restart the fight.
  • Agahnim, from Hyrule Castle, is the only repeat boss whose moveset changes. Now, he creates two shadowy clones of himself; only the real Agahnim can be harmed, but all three fire magic bolts that can damage Link. However, for a skilled player, that also means three times the opportunity to reflect them and damage Aga.
• Useless Useful Stealth: An aversion; the invisibility from the Magic Cape is quite useful to go through certain boss fights and other situations without taking any damage.
• The Very Definitely Final Dungeon: Ganon's Tower, a compilation of puzzles, enemies, and gimmicks you've seen throughout the rest of the game, and hosts rematches with the four bosses of the Light World.
• Victory Pose: Link does a spin with his sword out and ends by holding his sword up after clearing a dungeon. He skips the spin-around after he defeats Ganon.
• Video Game Caring Potential: After draining the lake in the swamp south of Link's house, you'll see fish flopping around on the land left behind. Pick one up and throw it into another body of water and it will reward you with some Rupees as thanks.
• Video Game Cruelty Punishment: The chickens found in the village are harmless when left alone, and will retreat with an agitated cluck when attacked. Keep attacking them, though, and eventually they will get fed up and summon a swarm of killer chickens to peck Link for a short while.
• Villain-Beating Artifact: The Silver Arrows are specifically stated to be necessary to defeat Ganon by the Pyramid Great Fairy, and deal the highest damage of any weapon in the game (something a player probably wouldn't appreciate unless they play A Link to the Past: Randomizer).
• Villain Forgot to Level Grind: The rematches against the Light World bosses in Ganon's Tower are really easy because by this point you can have the Infinity +1 Sword and the Silver Arrows.
• Violence Really Is the Answer: An attempt to Solid Snake your way through the first castle without hurting the guards by exploiting their line of sight patterns works fine until Link gets to a locked door. To unlock the door, Link must go down to the basement and use his sword to slaughter a guard for the key.
• Visible Invisibility: When Link uses the Magic Cloak to turn invisible, he's completely so, but somehow still has a shadow under him.
• The Wall Around the World: Hyrule is a valley bordered on all sides by impassable mountains and a thick forest on the Northwest. No one knows or even speculates on what's beyond.
• Wake-Up Call Boss:
  • First, there's Agahnim. So the bosses have been fairly easy up to this point. Just a few swipes of the sword and it was over. And now you have a better sword: the Master Sword, the sword of evil's bane. Too bad directly attacking Agahnim with it hurts Link, not Agahnim.
  • The boss of Dark Palace, the Helmasaur King. The bosses of the Light World, Agahnim included, were pretty straightfoward and required only to do one thing. The Helmasaur King, on the other hand, is a bit more complex: you need to break his armor first with either the magic hammer or the bombs, and once its weak point is exposed, hit it with the sword or preferably arrows. All of it, while trying to dodge its brutal attacks. This is to show that bosses from this point onwards can't be just beaten with a single trick, or have more than one phase that requires different tools and/or tactics.
• Warp Whistle: The Flute summons a friendly bird to take you to one of eight fast travel points.
• Was Once a Man: Blind the Thief, the only boss (and the first boss in the series) besides Ganon and Agahnim to actually be given any backstory. He was originally a human man who lived in the Light World, and was the leader of a gang of thieves, earning the nickname "Blind" because he hated sunlight. He was likely brought to the Dark World by a greedy desire for the Triforce, like many others, but the effects of the Triforce turned him into a red-skinned, fire-spitting demon, completely loyal to Ganon.
• Weakened by the Light:
  • Ganon cannot be harmed when he shrouds the boss room in darkness. But if Link lights up the two torches, it temporarily blinds Ganon and leaves him vulnerable to the Master Sword.
  • Blind the Thief might count. You have to expose him to sunlight to reveal his true form, but it happens before the battle starts.
• Weaksauce Weakness: Mothula is the only boss that is vulnerable to a humble-bee sting.
• Weather-Control Machine: The Ether Medallion clears up some rain to open one dungeon.
• Wham Episode: Zelda is kidnapped (after you already saved her once) and transported into the Dark World right before your eyes. Agahnim is actually Ganon, and Link himself is pulled into the Dark World following the confrontation in which this is revealed. For a happy version of the trope, the King of Hyrule and several other dead/lost characters are brought back after Link successfully acquires the Triforce.
• "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue: The first part of the end credits revisits all the characters you've met on your adventure.
• Where It All Began:
  • The game opens with Link infiltrating the sewers and dungeons of Hyrule Castle to rescue Princess Zelda; once you get the Master Sword you return to the Castle to climb its central tower and face Agahnim.
  • When Agahnim is defeated, he warps you to the top of the Dark Pyramid in the Dark World, and the second half of the game begins with the quest to rescue the seven maidens. When you complete Ganon's Tower, Ganon flees the tower to the Dark Pyramid, crashing through the platform at the top leaving a hole you fall down to face the Final Boss.
  • The first time you enter the Dark World will be at the foot of the Tower of Hera, where you can see Ganon's Tower, The Very Definitely Final Dungeon you'll be entering several hours later.
• Wishing Well: There is a fountain at the center of Lake Hylia where Link can throw in Rupees. If he throws in a certain amount, a Great Fairy will appear and grant his wish, which is limited to either the ability to carry more bombs or more arrows.
• Wolfpack Boss:
  • The Armos Knights — where you must kill six identical golems, and the Lanmolas — three identical sandworms; the former group appears in Eastern Palace, while the latter one does in Desert Palace. Both are degraded to mini-bosses in Ganon's Tower.
  • Kholdstare is actually a set of three identical monsters that attack Link all at once when their ice barrier is burnt down.
• World-Healing Wave: At the end, Link makes a wish on the Triforce and undoes all of Ganon's evil actions, including bringing his uncle and the King back to life.
• You Are Too Late: Agahnim decides to wait until Link arrives so that he can send Zelda into the Dark World right in front of him. D'oh.
• You Can't Thwart Stage One: Subverted. While Link isn't able to stop Agahnim from sending Zelda to the Dark World and opening the portal between worlds, he is able to stall him by rescuing Zelda and hiding her at the Sanctuary, forcing Agahnim's soldiers to search for her while Link retrieves the Pendants and the Master Sword. If Zelda had been banished at the start of the game like Agahnim was intending, Link would have had a lot stronger opposition to face in his quest, and Agahnim would have remained alive and made Ganon's foothold in the Light World significantly stronger.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Ganondorf killed his followers after they reached the Triforce.
• Your Princess Is in Another Castle!: A Link to the Past inverts tradition by having Link rescue the princess in the opening act. Later, Agahnim's men storm the Sanctuary and drag her back to Hyrule Castle.
• Zip Mode: The Pegasus Boots. With them, holding a button causes Link to charge forward at considerable speed, pushing aside or destroying enemies and obstacles and continuing until he leaves the screen, hits a wall, or is damaged mid-sprint.

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