Link’s Awakening, the first Game Boy entry in The Legend of Zelda fantasy action-RPG series, is being remade for Nintendo Switch and is due out sometime in 2019 (this year!).
Originally an after-hours attempt to simply convert over the Super NES game A Link to the Past for Game Boy, this 1993 game took mechanics from that title and combined them with the original dungeon formula of the NES’ Legend, mixing in some 2-D platforming (and characters) right out of Super Mario Bros., while departing (literally) from the Hyrule story to strand Link on a mysterious island after a shipwreck. No Zelda in sight. But: jumping!
The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening also elevated the role of music in the Zelda series, taking the art out of the background and making it an active part of gameplay — a move that echoed into future Zelda titles on the Game Boy family of portables as well as the N64 and GameCube (and, by extension in 3-D remastered form, on the 3DS and 2DS handhelds).
