 To be honest, it's likely that I will not ever do a Legend of Zelda link to the past video review because most people have already made up their minds about that game, and I don't have much more to say about it. It's great, it's Zelda, blah blah blah. But you know what game I always liked a little bit better? That I hardly hear anyone rave about nearly the same way? It's Link's Awakening for Game Boy. Okay, this isn't a SNES game, but you can play it on the Super Game Boy. So it technically kind of sort of counts. Or not. Whatever. Anyway. There are some differences in the original release of Link's Awakening and the Game Boy Color re-release, which has a lot of bonus content like the stuff with the camera shot, for example. I also have to mention that the Game Boy Color games do not work with the Super Game Boy, only the black and white one does. But you can enter in color codes to snads things up a bit. I'm going to be concentrating on the original black and white version because that's what I've been playing through on the Super Game Boy. Anyway, Link's Awakening is kind of a blend between the original Legend of Zelda, Zelda II, and Link to the Past, although it is more like the latter. They still went out of their way to try and make the game stand out on its own, and they didn't let any Game Boy limitations get in the way. It's pretty impressive. There are a lot of pleasant surprises that are slightly revealed as you keep playing, like getting an item that allows Link to jump from the top-down view, which I like a lot. There's also stuff like the piece of power that sends enemies flying across the screen. You gotta love that. The random Mario references are a nice touch as well, with Yoshi showing up and being able to squash goombas. Bear in mind though, the game kind of de-emphasizes open world exploring. It makes you complete dungeons to obtain items that allow you to unlock more of the map, so to speak. Instead of just letting you wander around 80% of the map from the get-go, like the game's predecessors. Personally, for me, the novelty of open world exploring is kind of worn away, so I don't mind a more linear approach. It works more to the game's strengths here anyway. As for the story, it goes like this. Link is on a boat, returning to Hyrule from training or something, and he gets shipped wrecked during a horrible storm. He's washed up on some island somewhere, and in order to get off, he has to wake up the wind to fish. Right, is that some kind of metaphor or something? So to wake him up, you have to collect a bunch of instruments so you can blast the shit out of a song to wake his ass up apparently. See when it comes to Zelda, I'd much prefer the silly Saturday morning cartoon type story instead of the paint by numbers save the princess stuff that's been done to death. So I appreciate the weird story here, there's a lot of really silly dialogue as well, and I like that. There are some annoyances here and there, like for example, anytime you touch one of those jars, if you don't have the power bracelet, you get this dialogue pop up every single time. Man, that gets old. This is an exceptional Zelda title that I feel like has been overshadowed a bit. Don't get me wrong, Link to the Past is great, but I think I actually like Link's Awakening a bit better. I like the silly story, I like being able to jump, I like the power ups, and I like the simplicity of it all. It's not a hard game by any means, but it's a very satisfying game to play all the way through. So if you miss Link's Awakening the first time around and you dig the Zelda style of gameplay, you're missing out. If you have a Game Boy Color and you want a slightly bigger game, Link's Awakening DX goes for about 18 bucks on eBay right now. Or if you have a Super Game Boy or a Game Boy Advance, the original goes for around $12. However, the best bang for your buck right now is going to be on the 3DS. It's in the eShop right now for 6 bucks, and that's not a bad deal.