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(Quick warning! For those who have yet to play this sublime adventure, there are many spoilers ahead. You have been warned!)

A while back, I wrote about The Legend of Zelda series and discussed the games I thought were the most essential.  Objectively, I stuck to the popular view that A Link to the Past and The Ocarina of Time were the best places to start. But on a more subjective level, I think there’s no greater gem than Link’s Awakening, a Game Boy title now over twenty years old.

I recently replayed this classic (the GB Color version, technically) on my 3DS, gaining two powerful insights as a result. First, the game remains as fun and captivating as any modern 2-D Zelda title. And second, its existentialist story still fascinates in a manner unique to the series—despite the flat 1993 localization.

This second point is what got me thinking. Link’s Awakening was conceived during a time when Nintendo of America’s localization department was still maturing, and when most titles were more premise than plot. “Stopping the bad guy” or “saving the girl” were about as deep as games got in those days. In fact, Awakening contains what is possibly the most complex storyline NOA had yet encountered—a plot that explored themes of love and regret, the nature of reality, and even facets of utilitarian philosophy. NOA, of course, had to somehow retain these ideas in its localization while still producing an adventure that was not too heavy-handed. The end result favored the whimsical side of the equation, providing players with a quirky, imaginative tale still framed by an aura of mystery. Ultimately, it was a fine adventure, and yet…it could have been so much more.

For those not familiar with Awakening’s story, here’s a quick recap: Link washes up unconscious on a mysterious island after his ship is destroyed in a terrible storm. He’s rescued by the exquisite Marin, a cheerful, dreamy-eyed girl who bears a striking resemblance to Zelda. After she nurses him back to health, Link sets out to explore his new surroundings. He soon meets a mysterious old owl who tells him about the “Wind Fish,” a mystical creature slumbering inside a giant egg seated high in the mountains. To leave the island, Link learns, he will have to awaken this creature by attaining The Eight Instruments of the Sirens—musical instruments hidden deep within the land’s treacherous dungeons. But completing this task might come at a terrible price; should the Wind Fish awaken, the entire island, including the lovely Marin, could simply cease to be.

Marin and Link's relationship is one of the deepest ever explored in a Zelda game. And yet, it could have been so much more.

Even by modern standards, the plot is fairly complex and raises some difficult questions. What is Link’s true purpose on the island? Should he trust this “owl” and blindly follow what the animal says? Will the island really disappear if the Wind Fish awakens? If so, is that really the outcome Link wants? Does Link have the right to enact such a directive to begin with? Are these islanders mere illusions, or might they actually be alive in some sense? What does that make Marin? Is Link himself real? What would happen if he simply left the Wind Fish to its slumber and remained on the island?

Sadly, these intriguing dilemmas receive little more than a cursory glance throughout the story, relegating much of the soul-searching and moral wrangling to the player’s own imagination. Indeed, even the game’s final scene seems to betray the very pathos it fostered earlier—having just watched the island fade out of existence, Link is shown stranded back at sea, smiling in wonder as the Wind Fish soars away overhead. But would the hero really be so jolly in light of having just snuffed out an entire civilization? Wouldn’t he be mourning the loss of all those colorful individuals he let fade away, especially his sweet Marin? And even if it was all just a dream, wouldn’t Link still feel some sense of sadness or regret? Doubt or conflict? Unfortunately, the ending leaves these stark ramifications unexplored, forcing a happy conclusion over what should be, at least, a bittersweet one.

This finale—expressed solely through the power of imagery and sound—at least suggests NOA isn’t fully to blame for perhaps subduing the game’s more poignant themes via a diluted translation. But it begs the question: Why did Nintendo, on both sides of the Pacific, sidestep the game’s finer ambiguities and meanings? The answer may be as simple as Nintendo deeming “kids” unable to understand or appreciate the more potent qualities of the tale. Nevertheless, this missed opportunity for literary excellence seems downright sinful by today’s standards.

But here’s the fix to set things right—Nintendo, why not take your excellent engine from A Link Between Worlds and remake Link’s Awakening into the modern masterpiece it deserves to be, with a greater emphasis on character development and consequence? Instead of just showing Link and Marin hanging out in a couple of fleeting scenes, make her an indelible, unforgettable part of the story. Make her our girlfriend. Make us squirm and sweat each time we acquire another instrument and thus come closer to perhaps banishing her away forever. Make us second guess ourselves. Tempt us to give up. Convince us to search for another way. To run away. To side with the villain. To curse and distrust that damned owl. And then, as the finale unfolds, show us the consequences of our actions.

Will we smile, relieved we chose right?

Or shudder, realizing we chose wrong?

Or will we simply purse our lips and hope to God (or the Goddesses) we did all that could be expected?

 

Thanks to www.zeldadungeon.net for the image.