Zelda II: The Adventure of Link

Zelda II: The Adventure of Link took the 1987 follow-up in a direction the series never fully repeated — a top-down overworld map for travel, but side-scrolling combat with an actual sword-and-shield stance the moment you enter a town, cave, or palace. It's the most divisive mainline Zelda for exactly that reason: fans of the first game's open exploration met a game that demanded pattern recognition and precise timing instead.

It also introduced experience points to the franchise — Link levels up attack, magic, and life separately by collecting point bags from enemies, and a death sends you all the way back to the start of Hyrule with your levels intact but progress reset. The final stretch, a vertical climb up Death Mountain guarded by Thunderbirds, remains one of the hardest set pieces on the NES.

This page hosts the verified Zelda II ROM, built for Delta Emulator's NES core on iPhone — load it directly with no BIOS file or extra setup required.