The Legend Zelda: Zero Quest[WIP]

[Neweegee]

Hey! I haven't posted here in a while because I've at hard work on various projects(and trying to figure out what to actually sprite), but this is what I've mainly been working on lately.



It's a fangame, made using Game Maker Studio!
But this one is based on the first Zelda on the NES, and is also a 2D platformer(not like Zelda 2, though).

Besides having most stuff from the NES game, here's a short list of the current features:

- Almost everything changed to work in a platformer.
- New graphics almost all made by me!
- Stuff from newer Zelda games, like the Master Sword(it's not actually a remake of the NES game)
- 2 Player Splitscreen
- 3 Playable characters including an unlockable one
- Music from Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask because I can't find an arranged Zelda 1 soundtrack.
- Some other stuff I can't remember
- No maps whatsoever (sorry)
- Playable Zelda!

The story is almost exactly the same as Zelda 1's, except Zelda is not captured because she's playable this time.

Since I don't have a demo or anything yet(last one I released on a different forum is super outdated), you can check out these screenshots.

Spoiler

These guy are made to show up as standard, 1-hit kill enemies in areas where Octoroks would be too tough.




This new character is Phanpoe. He's based on the Poe enemies.

Also some animations from the game.

Spoiler

Slight Screen glitch I need to fix here

The demo is getting close to complete, but there's still a lot of things that need to be added, mainly the path to the first dungeon and fixing sounds/music. It's progressing really well, though.

[E-Man]

Holy crud! I remember this project! It's awesome that you're back to working on this gem again, buddy!

Anything that you added recently that you're really proud of highlighting?

[Neweegee]

Anything that you added recently that you're really proud of highlighting?

I can't truly say, I'm not really proud of anything I make unless other people enjoyed it.

But here is a more recent feature I added, anyway.

If you press the item button with no item equipped, you can break through pots and push blocks, it doesn't do any damage, though.

[E-Man]

That's really cool, but must you have that many pottery shards fill the screen once you break a pot? Not only would it potentially lag the game, but the effect is a bit too distracting in my opinion.

Also, whatever happened to the old fart man who gives you the sword?

[Neweegee]

I'll tone down the Pot explosion so it won't be too distracting, it didn't seem to lag the game at all, actually.
Also the Old Man is still alive; that was just a test room with the sword item in it.

Now I'm gonna explain how the overworld works:
Pretty much, instead of being like Zelda 2, you explore the whole game without switching to a top down view, so kinda like a Metroidvania.
But unlike (most?) Metroidvanias, you don't really need to use powerups to explore, and it's mostly about the dungeons, just like Zelda 1.


Here is the basic map!

Spoiler

Link is where you start.
White paths are the ones that you'll need an item to go through, which mean half of the world can explored without going into a dungeon.
I separated it like that so people don't get lost in a difficult area at the start of the game.

Also to (hopfully) stop traveling from becoming tedious, you can ride Epona on the overworld!

[recme]

i gotta say, the overworld tileset doesnt really look all that great. it gets repetitive real fast and they are just absolutely boring to just look at. granted, desert (im assuming that whats this is) settings usually look bland and dull. even if thats the case, it still doesnt hurt to add a little of variety to the tiles. heres an example that, albeit a different setting, should help inspire you to see what sort of things you should add to your tiles!




other than that, may i ask what that blue mouse-looking thing is? iirc, you said it was a placeholder enemy, yet, its still ingame...

[LunchPolice]

This game looks fantastic and I love the graphics. Looking forward to more progress reports!

[Neweegee]

i gotta say, the overworld tileset doesnt really look all that great. it gets repetitive real fast and they are just absolutely boring to just look at. granted, desert (im assuming that whats this is) settings usually look bland and dull. even if thats the case, it still doesnt hurt to add a little of variety to the tiles.

OK, gave it a shot and redid it.


I didn't know what the starting area really was in the first Zelda game(which is what this place is based on), since it looked a bit like a desert, but then there was an actual desert in the same game. So now the area is kind of a canyon.

I might remove the green rocks, since they don't seem to fit with the background now.

Also the weird Blue Mouse thing was going to be removed when Octorok was added, but there was no overworld enemies in Zelda 1 that didn't attack, which is kinda needed for a platformer. I plan on changing the way it looks into an actual Zelda enemy, though.


Also here is a screenshot from the multiplayer mode

In this mode, you choose 2 different characters and play the same story mode from the single player. You share the same inventory of items and upgrades, so you don't end up as a weirdly unbalanced team.
It was to up 4 players at one point, but I couldn't add enough characters to choose, so there'll be a bit of empty space on screen, but the game still works perfectly fine.

[recme]

its an improvement, but you're still using the same pattern on almost every empty space. make unique tiles so that nobody can tell that youre using tiles.

also, thats some cool multiplayer! hopefully, dungeons are big enough to accommodate this addition!

[Kelvin]

But this one is based on the first Zelda on the NES, and is also a 2D platformer(not like Zelda 2, though).

Why do people always rag on Zelda 2? I know it doesn't fit the "Zelda formula", but my god, was it really that bad? All the complaints I've heard are that it's a platformer and it's hard. Nothing legitimate.

[E-Man]

The biggest complaint with that game has to do with its unforgiving difficultly. While there are several areas in the game that makes it nearly impossible to not take damage (including the Great Palace), the most absurd difficulty spike has to do with the Death Mountain area. Since there are a lot of extremely powerful enemies in tight quarters, it should have been made a location you need to explore later in the game when you have more health, magic, spells, and attack power.

[SmithyGCN]

i gotta say, the overworld tileset doesnt really look all that great. it gets repetitive real fast and they are just absolutely boring to just look at. granted, desert (im assuming that whats this is) settings usually look bland and dull. even if thats the case, it still doesnt hurt to add a little of variety to the tiles.

OK, gave it a shot and redid it.


I didn't know what the starting area really was in the first Zelda game(which is what this place is based on), since it looked a bit like a desert, but then there was an actual desert in the same game. So now the area is kind of a canyon.

I might remove the green rocks, since they don't seem to fit with the background now.

Also the weird Blue Mouse thing was going to be removed when Octorok was added, but there was no overworld enemies in Zelda 1 that didn't attack, which is kinda needed for a platformer. I plan on changing the way it looks into an actual Zelda enemy, though.


Also here is a screenshot from the multiplayer mode

In this mode, you choose 2 different characters and play the same story mode from the single player. You share the same inventory of items and upgrades, so you don't end up as a weirdly unbalanced team.
It was to up 4 players at one point, but I couldn't add enough characters to choose, so there'll be a bit of empty space on screen, but the game still works perfectly fine.

But I actually like the green rocks. It feels more like an older Zelda game with them. If anything, just vary the tiles a little, but don't remove them completely.

[Neweegee]

But this one is based on the first Zelda on the NES, and is also a 2D platformer(not like Zelda 2, though).

Why do people always rag on Zelda 2? I know it doesn't fit the "Zelda formula", but my god, was it really that bad? All the complaints I've heard are that it's a platformer and it's hard. Nothing legitimate.

That was kind of a joke, but Zelda 2 does have some really bad problems with it being very tedious, not just hard.
It isn't a horrible mess or anything, though.

But what I said also meant that this game is more like the original Zelda in actual gameplay, rather than pulling from Zelda 2 for the platforming.

Now here's the tileset updated again.

I changed the main dirt tile to a solid color, and added some spots and stuff to it in the level, so it should look a lot less tiled now.
(And I kept the green rocks, yay!)


Overall progress on the game has been kinda slow, mostly because of a sudden lack motivation to work on it and then there's spritesheets I need to finish

But it's not being canceled or anything.
I'm working on it whenever I can, so here are some new screenshots from the first dungeon:

pics

Also, I added side-quests. They'll mostly be there to let you get items and stuff that weren't in Zelda 1, like the Mirror Shield! (not pictured)

[Kelvin]

Yeah, I suppose it was a little tedious, what with all the open space you had to traverse.

As for the current progress, oh man, do I wanna play this game! Though some of those vertical passages look hard to reach, unless there's an item that helps with jumping? Seems like it would make backtracking a challenge.

[Neweegee]

Though some of those vertical passages look hard to reach, unless there's an item that helps with jumping? Seems like it would make backtracking a challenge.

Link will jump as high as needed to get through vertical passages, so the dungeon layouts from Zelda 1 can be remade in this game!


Also there has been more progress on the overworld

This is the Underground area. Sometimes you'll end up here if you fall down too far in a few areas, but if you can handle the difficulty, you can use this area as a shortcut to other parts of Hyrule.