Blessed are the fan translators. Without them we would never be able to experience the wonder of games like Seiken Densetsu 3, Mother 3 (it's coming!) or Final Fantasy V years before it recieved an awful translation on the Playstation.
Less blessed are the ROM hackers. I know we all went through our childhood tormented by questions like, "What if Mario had a gigantic penis to trip him up while he tried to rescue the Princess?" and, "Gee, Sonic the Hedgehog is great, but it would be really great if someone replaced Mobius' clouds with Swastikas!" but ultimately the answers to these questions turn out to be nothing but messy self-indulgence.
But even my jaded heart can recognise a great piece of fan work when I see it. The Legend of Zelda: Parallel Worlds is a great piece of fanwork. It's also near unplayable for pussies who embody the type of girly gamer who should slink back to her copy of Barbie's Horse Adventures (hint: Me).
The Legend of Zelda: Parallel Worlds is actually a patch that fits snugly over a Legend of Zelda: Link to the Past ROM (Look, ma! I resisted an obvious condom metaphor!). When you think of patches, you think of translations, bug fixes and other "smaller" changes, but Parallel Worlds differs from A Link to the Past in almost every way. There's an entirely new overworld and dungeons, the character sprites have been touched-up, especially Link (who is not Link, shhh) and the whole world you were familiar with has generally been turned on its head.
But the game is also insanely hard, as it's meant to be. You begin the game with your uncle--er, your friend--telling you to meet him at the Guardhouse for some treasure hunting shennanigans. Pretty straightforward fare for any video game, but getting to the "X" marked on the map is not a gentle tutorial about picking up bushes and reading signs. Enemies are out to get you from the start, and you're unarmed; you'd better become good at throwing weeds at guards (weed whacking?). The path isn't straightforward, either. You need a lamp, and let's just say it's not at the foot of your bed this time around.
I'm currently going through the first dungeon, the Guardhouse, and I'm still unarmed. You might be startled to learn that Guardhouses are full of guards. I'll say this much: my first run isn't going to be a perfect affair.
I keep dying...but I keep re-trying. Either I've turned into a masochist or deep down I really like something about Parallel Worlds.
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Faster, Link! Kill! Kill!