Zelda II: The Adventure of Link (1987)
Zelda II: The Adventure of Link is a 1987 platform video game made by Nintendo R&D4 and Nintendo.
The direct sequel to the original Legend of Zelda trades its top-down overworld for something stranger. Link still crosses a map of towns and palaces, but every fight drops into a side-scrolling arena where sword timing and shield position decide who lives. Experience points, spells learned from villagers, and a magic meter push the series toward role-playing territory. Six palaces guard the crystals that will wake a sleeping princess. Punishing, experimental, and unlike anything else in the run of Zelda games, it remains the black sheep that early fans either revere or resent.
Quick answers
What is Zelda II: The Adventure of Link about?
The direct sequel to the original Legend of Zelda trades its top-down overworld for something stranger. Link still crosses a map of towns and palaces, but every fight drops into a side-scrolling arena where sword timing and shield position decide who lives. Experience points, spells learned from villagers, and a magic meter push the series toward role-playing territory. Six palaces guard the crystals that will wake a sleeping princess. Punishing, experimental, and unlike anything else in the run of Zelda games, it remains the black sheep that early fans either revere or resent.
When was Zelda II: The Adventure of Link released?
Zelda II: The Adventure of Link was released on 14 January 1987.
Who made Zelda II: The Adventure of Link?
Zelda II: The Adventure of Link was made by Nintendo R&D4, Nintendo and Playtronic.
Similar games
Explore Zelda II: The Adventure of Link guides
A few thoughts on Zelda II: The Adventure of Link
Fans chasing the same swing-and-quest fantasy can reach for Brisingr, where a young rider trains toward a reckoning, or Wizard and Glass and its long walk toward a dark tower. For the orchestral weight an NES could only hint at, the The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack score carries the heroic climb.
Sword fights that punish the smallest timing mistake
Zelda II turns every encounter into a side-scrolling duel where sword angle and shield timing decide who walks away. Rurouni Kenshin builds its entire style around that same precision swordsmanship, Attack on Titan makes a single mistimed strike lethal, Mortal Kombat II reduces a whole fight to split-second reads, and Saint Seiya earns every advance in a bout through hard-won technique.
Fantasy quests built around collecting the pieces you need for the final fight
Zelda II sends Link after six palace crystals before he can even attempt to wake the sleeping princess. Brisingr keeps its hero gathering power and allies toward one last confrontation, Oathbringer pushes its cast through escalating trials before everything comes together, Wizard and Glass sends its gunslinger through his own hard trial on the way to the tower, and Sailor Moon collects her crystals across arc after arc.
Music heavy enough for a brutal dungeon crawl
Zelda II gates real progress behind six punishing palaces where one bad fight can send a player back to the start. Painkiller brings that same relentless intensity in pure heavy metal, In the Court of the Crimson King turns dungeon-scale dread into epic prog rock, IX Equilibrium pushes extreme metal into something genuinely mythic, and The Spectre Within carries an early, moody kind of weight built for long, hard journeys.