Super Smash Bros. Brawl
Just like in Melee, The Legend of Zelda received two new stages in Super Smash Bros. Brawl. Unlike Melee however, it was one of the few series in the game to have that many. This time both stages were based on singular games, so this time two games were fully represented. The addition of the brand new My Music feature also allowed for a lot of previously unacknowledged Zelda games to be acknowledged through songs.
Shouldn’t a bridge have some sort of wall on the edges to stop people from falling off? Who designed this thing?
The first of Brawl‘s two new Zelda stages is the Bridge of Eldin from The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. As with games represented in the previous two Smash titles, Twilight Princess received a new stage due to being the most recent 3D Zelda game at the time. This stage takes place on the eponymous bridge which connects the Eldin and Lanayru Provinces of Hyrule, and played a notable role in the game. A flat stage that extends off both sides of the screen, the bridge is a large open area that only changes with the arrival of King Bulbin. When the sound of a horn is heard, he will ride in on his boar-like mount Lord Bulbo and drop an explosive barrel that blows up after a few seconds and completely destroys the middle part of the bridge, dividing it in two and leaving a large gap. After a while, a Twilight Portal will appear and reconstruct the bridge, returning it to normal. During the events of Twilight Princess, the middle of the bridge is removed, but this was caused by a portal created by Shadow Beasts rather than King Bulbin. Later in the game, Link finds the missing bridge piece and with the help of Midna returns it to its rightful place, just like how the bridge is reconstructed by a portal in this game. While King Bulbin had nothing to do with the bridge’s destruction, he shows up on this stage because this is where Link first fights him in the original game. This battle always takes place at sunset regardless of where the day/night cycle is currently at, and this is why the stage also takes place during the sunset. Hyrule Castle can also be seen in the background.
The Legend of Zelda‘s Overworld Theme appears as a brand new remix yet again, but this time we also received a remix of the game’s Title theme, which also features a segment based on the Dungeon theme from the same game. Naturally, music from Twilight Princess was added, which included the Main Theme (actually a medley consisting of the horseback and on-foot versions of Hyrule Field, and notably being based on the version heard in the E3 2006 trailer) as well as direct ports of The Hidden Village and Midna’s Lament. Ocarina of Time received some new music with the Ocarina of Time Medley, which consists of various songs Link played on the Ocarina, as well as a Hyrule Field remix. The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past also finally received some acknowledgement with remixes of The Dark World and Hidden Mountain & Forest (the theme that played on the Dark World versions of Death Mountain and The Lost Woods).
Tetra’s cruise line venture was unfortunately rather short-lived.
The second stage and the only Zelda stage that has to be unlocked is Pirate Ship, a stage based on The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker. As Toon Link was a newcomer in the game and Wind Waker was one of the significant Zelda releases that came out after Melee, it makes sense for this game to be next in line to receive a stage after Twilight Princess did. This stage takes place aboard a simplified version of Tetra’s ship as it sails across the Great Sea, encountering many dangers like lookout platforms that fire bombs from their cannons, rocky islands that cause the ship to become stranded and pointed upwards at a high angle, and giant cyclones that lift the ship up high into the air before it falls back down to the ocean. These cyclones were encountered in certain locations in the Great Sea in the original game, and were caused by Cyclos, the God of Winds. If bested by Link, he would teach him the Ballad of Gales, which allows Link to warp to different locations by raising his boat in the air with a cyclone, which could be alluded to with the pirate ship being raised into the sky by a cyclone in this stage. The ship’s catapult will occasionally rise from the front of the deck, launching fighters far if they happen to be standing on it when it fires, and the King of Red Lions will sometimes show up behind the ship, providing an extra platform to fight on. In the background, barrels and bottles will occasionally float by, and on the horizon silhouettes of islands can be seen.
Several songs from The Wind Waker are included, which are the themes for The Great Sea, Dragon Roost Island and the Molgera Battle, but unfortunately there are no remixes from the game. Ocarina of Time also received music for this stage, with a remix of the Song of Storms, which is actually a medley consisting of The Windmill Hut theme (which the Song of Storms is based on), Ganondorf’s Theme and the Serenade of Water, in addition to a direct port of Gerudo Valley. Majora’s Mask receives its first song in Super Smash Bros. with a direct port of the Termina Field theme, which itself is a remix of the original Overworld Theme from The Legend of Zelda. The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening unexpectedly received a remix called Tal Tal Heights, which is actually mostly a remix of the Overworld Theme (again, another version of the first game’s), while the actual part of the song that is from Tal Tal Heights is very short. Lastly, a direct port of Village of the Blue Maiden (which is itself a remix of Kakariko Village) from The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures was included.
There was also one returning Legend of Zelda stage from Melee; the famous Temple. What is notable about it unlike any of the other returning stages in Brawl is that this stage received a new song that didn’t appear in Melee; a remix consisting of both the Great Palace and Palace themes from Zelda II. The Palace segment of the track is very similar to the Melee version of the song but with some differences in instrumentation, and only contains the last portion of it.
This time around The Legend of Zelda got a much better coverage of the series. Both new stages were based on specific games this time, representing the two most recent 3D Zelda titles at the time, Wind Waker and Twilight Princess. In addition to this, many other games were acknowledged through music, allowing The Legend of Zelda, Zelda II, A Link to the Past, Link’s Awakening, Ocarina of Time, Majora’s Mask and even Four Swords Adventures to all be referenced. In fact the only Zelda games that weren’t acknowledged at all were the Oracles games, the original Four Swords and Minish Cap. It’s likely none of these games received music was because they were all developed by Capcom, leading to copyright issues. Overall, Brawl offered much more coverage of the Zelda series, and didn’t resort to having any generic stages this time, allowing for two games to be fully represented. At this point in time every 3D Zelda had been represented with stages, while the top-down Zelda titles had none. It was apparent by now that the 3D titles have had priority. The lack of stages for the top-down Zelda games would be acknowledged in the next game of the series.
Games represented:
The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker
The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess
Games referenced:
The Legend of Zelda
Zelda II: The Adventure of Link
The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past
The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask
The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures
This concludes Part 1 of this analysis. Be sure to continue reading with Part 2 for a look at the Zelda stages present in Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS/Wii U and some interesting statistics, trivia and speculation. Be sure to check out MagcargoMan on his Twitter page!
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I don’t know if I’d say Temple squandered its spot. Its certainly better than just retreading old ground like most franchises with stages in 64 did in Melee. I think its good they had a stage to represent dungeons given they’re such a big part of the series, and having a more generic dungeon stage makes more sense than arbitrarily picking a single one to elevate above the rest.
That, and with all the references to Zelda 2 I don’t think it’s outlandish to just consider Temple more or less an Adventure of Link stage. A stage specifically based off any temple from Zelda 2 probably wouldn’t look all that different from Temple’s current appearance beyond being more indoors/subterranean, which can be hard to show in Smash given the need for edges. Granted, Zelda 1 and Link to the Past probably should have been prioritized for stage representation over Adventure of Link.
Perhaps squandered was a bit harsh of a choice of word. Really what I meant was why go with a generic series stage when there’s plenty of games you could give a stage to? I don’t dislike Temple, in fact, I’ve had some pretty fun matches there. I’m glad it exists. It certainly is better than retreading old ground, I just think with several Zelda games unrepresented (which still haven’t had stages) at the time, it would have been better to do something more specific.
Sakurai himself considers it a series-wide stage so that’s what I went with. There’s definitely nods to Zelda II with the music and one part of the stage’s design but if it was a meant to be an Adventure of Link stage I think he would have went more out to convey that. The stage seems to be based of the concept of Temples in general. I don’t think it really represents them well given it’s set outside, but it does have a good aesthetic to it. I don’t think it’d be hard to pull off an indoors Zelda II palace, you’d just to have no roof (pretend the ceiling is off-screen) and maybe make it a walk-off stage with corridors near the blastlines. I think Zelda 1 and ALttP should have been prioritised, but I do think it is cool that a game as neglected as Zelda II got some love in Smash.
I would have loved an A Link to the Past stage. I loved playing that on the GBA. Unfortunately the save feature screwed up and lost all my progress and couldn’t save anymore, although I did get the SNES version on the Wii’s Virtual Console years later and beat it. I think a stage set in Hyrule Castles’s Dungeon would be pretty cool. The opening sequence of A Link to the Past was very memorable for me.