This is a pretty big classic from back in the day, and one I surprisingly never played until now. Straight away the tileset gives me immense nostalgia of older ZC versions but the quest itself hasn't aged too badly actually. This is definitely a massive quest, way bigger than I expected it to be but I especially do love the mix between Zelda 1 and 2 and how they seamlessly merge together, I think that is the biggest highlight of the overworld to me. I'm also a big fan of the quick travel system, it really makes getting around the world so much easier later on. As cool as the overworld is though, I do feel that this might be a bit too big for its own good. For example, you'll find many places where it's just long screens of practically empty screens, or with the same kind of design repeating for 10 screens+, and this is present all the way through the world. This makes secrets and such extremely sparse, which is great when you do come across them but otherwise it makes the overworld feel kind of boring to explore a lot of the time. I do appreciate that this is a VERY old quest, but this is just something I wasn't a big fan of. The design of the overworld itself is fairly fine though, I can definitely see the graphical improvements the update made compared to the original and it works for what it tries to do (not much you can do with an ancient tileset like this anyway) so that's chill. Some of the screen design does feel a tad "artificial" though, by that I mean you see mountains in perfect straight lines which makes things feel too boxed if that makes sense. I will say however, that the Lost Woods segment of the quest was brilliantly done and I can't say I've seen many quests pull off something like that before. That is an extremely clever way of using Z1 maze paths.
The dungeons are pretty fun to go through and really does the classic style of dungeons well. Big fan of all the mini dungeons scattered around as well. I feel some dungeons suffer from essentially becoming straight lines where you just take one path from beginning to end, but there are also others where they branch out a bit to get different items which is neat. The ending segments are a bit crazy, the fakeout was cool but I felt things started to drag just a little when you realise there's one more dungeon after North Castle, but thankfully I had the Magic Key so I managed to trivialise this a bit lol. The true final boss was pretty neat though, I do have a softspot for 2.10 style bosses and this really took me back.
Overall though this quest was pretty cool and super nostalgic of 2.10 ZC. There are quite a few things I'm not too big on and others where they definitely have not aged very well, but the quest still mostly holds up and it's quite nice to play. I'd give this a 3.5 since 4 feels too high for this quest and 3 feels too low, but since we can only do whole star ratings, I'll take the upper option so it gets a 4 ever so slightly. Gonna tackle the Link's Decision quests next since I recall playing the first one as a kid but never got anywhere.
LoZ: The Nine Villages
Overview
Feature Quest
Creator:
obake-san
Genre: Dungeon Romper
Added: 22 Apr 2008
Updated: 23 Jan 2025
ZC Version: 2.10
Downloads: 1154
Rating[?]:
|
Download Quest (2.08 MB) |
Information
An epic quest spanning across an enormous overworld, 9 full overworld screens in almost 50 named areas.
8 dungeons, 8 minilevels (dungeons or big caves), 7 more optional dungeons, then level 9.
A world map creates a expanding array of shortcuts to quickly get from place to place.
More than 90 songs arranged from a variety of old games. A new one for each area, dungeon, minilevel, more.
Moderate difficulty. Extremely thorough walk through, including maps for every section of the game.
8 dungeons, 8 minilevels (dungeons or big caves), 7 more optional dungeons, then level 9.
A world map creates a expanding array of shortcuts to quickly get from place to place.
More than 90 songs arranged from a variety of old games. A new one for each area, dungeon, minilevel, more.
Moderate difficulty. Extremely thorough walk through, including maps for every section of the game.
About Reviews Comments Forum Topics
Description
An epic quest spanning across an enormous overworld. There are 8 dungeons, and 8 minilevels (dungeons or caves). You can go through 7 more optional dungeons before finally going after Ganon in level 9. A world map creates a expanding array of shortcuts to quickly get from place to place. Tons of songs arranged from a variety of old games.
The overworld should look a little familiar, I got the idea looking through the packaged booklets from my old Zelda cartridges. I made the game moderate difficulty I think. I also made an extremely thorough walkthrough for the quest, where you can choose to see limited information on where to go next, a detailed set of instructions for what to do, an item/HCP checklist with locations, and complete maps for every section of the game. Check the readme.
The overworld should look a little familiar, I got the idea looking through the packaged booklets from my old Zelda cartridges. I made the game moderate difficulty I think. I also made an extremely thorough walkthrough for the quest, where you can choose to see limited information on where to go next, a detailed set of instructions for what to do, an item/HCP checklist with locations, and complete maps for every section of the game. Check the readme.
Story
Story, abridged version....
Eight years after Zelda 2 on the timeline:
Ganon appeared out of nowhere. He attacked North Castle before anybody had any idea what was happening. The king barely escaped before it fell. Ganon captured princess Zelda, and stole the Triforce. But fortunately, the Triforce of Wisdom had been split up across the land to keep him from getting his hands on it.
Ganon's monsters returned, and made all of Hyrule a dangerous place. The remaining nine villages became isolated, and Some of the fields became unable to farm, most of the trade routes were blocked, and some of the villages were running low on supplies. There was nothing the people could do.
Link and Abei were on their way to New Kasuto. The monsters spread from North Castle in a wave, which soon reached them, and monsters appeared all around. Abei fled into a nearby cave, leaving Link alone and surrounded. Worst of all, it was Abei's turn to carry the pack, which meant Link is without his sword.
Eight years after Zelda 2 on the timeline:
Ganon appeared out of nowhere. He attacked North Castle before anybody had any idea what was happening. The king barely escaped before it fell. Ganon captured princess Zelda, and stole the Triforce. But fortunately, the Triforce of Wisdom had been split up across the land to keep him from getting his hands on it.
Ganon's monsters returned, and made all of Hyrule a dangerous place. The remaining nine villages became isolated, and Some of the fields became unable to farm, most of the trade routes were blocked, and some of the villages were running low on supplies. There was nothing the people could do.
Link and Abei were on their way to New Kasuto. The monsters spread from North Castle in a wave, which soon reached them, and monsters appeared all around. Abei fled into a nearby cave, leaving Link alone and surrounded. Worst of all, it was Abei's turn to carry the pack, which meant Link is without his sword.
Tips & Cheats
- Each level has 2 items in it, plus a heart container and triforce piece.
- Each minilevel has 1 item and a HCP (heart container piece) for the boss.
- 4 of the optional dungeons have an item and HCP (the first has 2 of each actually)
- 3 of the optional dungeons have a magic spell and a magic container.
- Each town has a HCP within its boundaries, or in an area next to the town with no enemies at all.
- Bombable rocks are all obvious in the overworld, most burnable bushes are too.
- Your bombs and fire will not hurt you.
- Getting lost in the Lost Woods is easy to do. Use the whistle to open a portal to the beginning.
- When you die or quit, you start out with full health, which is great for dungeons. Do you need to get back to one of the rooms near the entrance, but don't want to go through all those rooms to get back? There's no downside to strategically quitting and continuing (unless you're trying to collect rupees or refill bombs along the way back).
- Walkthrough.... I can't make it any easier than that.
- Each minilevel has 1 item and a HCP (heart container piece) for the boss.
- 4 of the optional dungeons have an item and HCP (the first has 2 of each actually)
- 3 of the optional dungeons have a magic spell and a magic container.
- Each town has a HCP within its boundaries, or in an area next to the town with no enemies at all.
- Bombable rocks are all obvious in the overworld, most burnable bushes are too.
- Your bombs and fire will not hurt you.
- Getting lost in the Lost Woods is easy to do. Use the whistle to open a portal to the beginning.
- When you die or quit, you start out with full health, which is great for dungeons. Do you need to get back to one of the rooms near the entrance, but don't want to go through all those rooms to get back? There's no downside to strategically quitting and continuing (unless you're trying to collect rupees or refill bombs along the way back).
- Walkthrough.... I can't make it any easier than that.
Credits
obake-san and that's it. Is that selfish? Then here's some more people.
Tileset is by Radien, with randomized overworld and cave tiles by obake-san. Additional tiles by PrinceMSC, Ccc, Marcus, Wild Bill, obake-san.
Music direction by obake-san, with some help from knives, maxov, and johna.
Beta testing was pretty much all me, other than reported bugs.
this is version v1.00
Massive graphics update, affecting the entire overworld and caves. Most tiles have four to ten variations, so repeating patterns are not a strain on the eye.
Introduction to the game was added. You can even skip it.
A few other minor bug fixes. There were no changes to gameplay or difficulty, beyond the aesthetics.
Tileset is by Radien, with randomized overworld and cave tiles by obake-san. Additional tiles by PrinceMSC, Ccc, Marcus, Wild Bill, obake-san.
Music direction by obake-san, with some help from knives, maxov, and johna.
Beta testing was pretty much all me, other than reported bugs.
this is version v1.00
Massive graphics update, affecting the entire overworld and caves. Most tiles have four to ten variations, so repeating patterns are not a strain on the eye.
Introduction to the game was added. You can even skip it.
A few other minor bug fixes. There were no changes to gameplay or difficulty, beyond the aesthetics.
