... technically happened November 21st of last year. In Japan. And won't happen in Europe until September 24th. But today, April 13th, in North America, is the celebration day. I mean I celebrated back in November with a casual playthrough and a couple of Randomizers, but I didn't make a topic. Why didn't I? I find myself kicking myself for it because this is a forum full of Zelda enthusiasts, and this is one of the most important games in the series.
A Link to the Past, or "Triforce of the Gods" in Japan, was the first and only canon Zelda title released for the Super Nintendo, and the first to truly solidify the series' identity, taking elements from the prior two Zelda games and forging forward from there. It took the concept of towns and magic items from Zelda 2 and added them to the overhead style of Zelda 1, and then fleshed out the world and lore more. Things had more of a set progression order this time, but the world was for the most part open to you for the majority of the game, and, if you knew what you were doing, you could even do some out of order.
Finally, the Zelda series had found its winning formula, one that it would follow for more than twenty years. Perhaps to a fault, at times... Ironic, then, that the last game to still take pages from the formula would be A Link Between Worlds, the game that follows up on the one to give us the formula in the first place.
But I'm so thankful for this game, because it's a wonderful game and paved the way for the other wonderful games that many of us enjoy. Is it still my favorite Zelda game? It's tough to say, because I'm still basking in the afterglow of Breath of the Wild, but it's at the very least still one of my favorite games.
And it's me, of course I'm gonna gush about this game somewhere.