I beat Zelda: A Link Between Worlds this weekend on my 3ds¹. While I have played many Zelda games on my many Game Boys, it’s the first Zelda game that I have ever beat that I can remember, and without having to go back to it ages later.

I played for just about 24 hours total. Starting from Christmas, I played it exclusively. I dumped Mario and Luigi: Dream Team² to play it, since I hadn’t beat it yet. My mother-in-law got me Mario Cart 7³ for Christmas, and I played that until I opened Zelda.

Zelda kept me so enthralled that even when I got stuck, I didn’t pop in a different game. I’ve gotten three more games since Christmas, and I didn’t even want to try any of them until I was done with Zelda.

My thoughts on this Zelda game:

1. It was the perfect difficulty for me. I usually didn’t have to fight a boss more than twice, and the puzzles were just enough to keep me entertained but not so hard that I couldn’t figure it out.
2. Ravio is a weird dude, and a weird part of the storyline. You find out who he is at the end of the game but it doesn't even matter, really.
3. It’s interesting how you can essentially get all of the items at once (via renting), but there are items that you pretty much do not need (the boomerang).
4. There are more than 3 bottles. It’s the first time there are more than 3 bottles, and I didn’t realize there were more until I looked something up in a walk-through.
5. I was so close to having all hearts when I defeated the game. The closest I’ve ever been. Less than eight heart pieces to get, and at least 4 of them are from mini games.
6. I still hate mini games.

There was really only two things I needed to look up in a walk-through. One: I did not realize that I could pick up and throw bombs after putting one out. Since in past games, you threw OR set down, and all I could do was set down, I thought that was it. Two: I was at a loss of how to get baby maimais off of the top of things. I literally looked up how to do it moments after I, seemingly unrelated, got the speed boots⁴.

I will probably go back and finish getting my last two hearts, because I like a completely completed game, and I'm looking forward to fighting other people with spotpass.

I’ve heard that I should head to McDonalds more often for lunch as they are “Nintendo Hotspots” and will actually get you the last 6 people who were there, not just who is actively there. Of course, then I have to hope they have Zelda too. But Zelda is so good on the 3ds, why wouldn’t you want to play it?

Also, I am now playing Paper Mario Sticker Star and I’m loving it already.

1. My 4th Game Boy overall: previous versions include Color, Advanced, and a DS. (My sister had the original Game Boy; I was lucky that she shared it with me when she grew bored of it. I’m the only one of my siblings that was/is into handhelds.)  ↩

2. Pretty good, will probably finish it soonish. Lots of collecting. ↩

3. Great for sharing; hoping I can play with some friends, but I actually don’t have friends with 3ds’s, they’re all on previous versions still. ↩

4. Which also took me too long to figure out, since the wall-walking thing didn’t occur to me until way later. ↩