AZ2R - Another Zelda 2 Remake

[Shade Aurion]

Alrighty, I finished segment 1 which is essentially the first 3 map screens of Western Hyrule.
These are the updated maps minus enemy placement and NPCs

Ruto:

Desert Cave:

Parapa Palace:


And this is a comparison from the NES version compared to mine.



There are some slight errors when put together I do plan to iron out later but its going well. This is like a fifth of the continent mapped and the next few maps will be super easy :3
I'll leave the next update til i've completed the next 3 maps as that will essentially mean North Western Hyrule is essentially complete and just needs populating bar minor maps of inside houses, caves, grottos and dungeons (which I have mapped out on paper)

[Shade Aurion]

Aaaand i'm done with the Northern Passage Map South of Ruto)


Next will be Hyrule Castle and Rauru Town. I might make Link have his own house on the outskirts of Rauru and maybe decorate it with old treasures from Zelda 1 (Blue Candle. Magic Wand, Step Ladder) on shelves and such using BS Zelda ripped sprites just to add some personality. I am planning to make Hyrule Castle an actual decent castle with a few screens rather then just 1 with sleeping Zelda. I'll make a dungeon, great hall, empty throne room, empty King and Prince's room, have Zelda sleeping in her room being watched over by Impa. I might have a few hidden secrets you can unlock when you've obtained certain items.

I'm thinking i'll making the towns home to the seven sages. I'll make Rauru the City of Light, Ruto the City of Water (Ironically), Saria the City of the Forest, Nabooru the City of Spirit, Darunia the City of Fire and Kasuto the City of Shadow which will actually be kinda funny as a bit of a Naruto-ish nod with the Hidden Forest of the Shadow. I can make it Impa's hometown and make it a city of ninjas. All of which can be nods towards Ocarina of Time's sages (which took their names from Zelda 2 town names anyways) Hyrule Castle will be the last town of the sages. I might make a descendant of the sages and put them in each town.

Timeline-wise i've got this to word with:
Skyward Sword->Minish Cap->Four Swords->Ocarina of Time->A Link to the Past->Oracle of Ages/Seasons->Link's Awakening->Ancient Stone Tablets->A Link Between Worlds->Triforce Heroes->The Legend of Zelda->Game&Watch->Adventure of Link (This project and the end of the timeline)

Since Skyward Sword and Minish Cap are essentially ancient history, I think i'm only vaguely mention their story. I'll give a proper nod to Link's Awakening, Link Between Worlds, Link to the Past and The Legend of Zelda. I'll have to mention Ocarina of Time as that is when the timeline splits. It does again after Triforce Heroes so I may mention that also but I feel its less important. I want this game to be rich with lore, side-quests, and I really want it to fit into the series with the same sort of polish AM2R brought to Metroid's continuum. Depth, Quality, Polish. These are all important to me. I gotta admit though, there will likely be some minor flaws in the mapping ad not everything fits together perfectly but i'll do as well as I can and hide what I can also

When i'm done with Hyrule Castle and Rauru, that will be North West Hyrule complete. I'll likely work on Parapa palace, house and cave interiors and start adding NPCs and enemies :3

[Diarandor]

This looks great. The only advice I can give you is not to put those rocks in such a homogeneous way (a more irregular distribution would be more natural).
If you understand French, you should read this great mapping tutorial (mainly, the section "Mapping de la nature", where it explains a bit how to avoid the problem that I mentioned above):
http://www.lesforges.org/article/mapping?scroll_to=article

[Shade Aurion]

This looks great. The only advice I can give you is not to put those rocks in such a homogeneous way (a more irregular distribution would be more natural).
If you understand French, you should read this great mapping tutorial (mainly, the section "Mapping de la nature", where it explains a bit how to avoid the problem that I mentioned above):
http://www.lesforges.org/article/mapping?scroll_to=article

Thanks! TBH i'm using them to hide the lack of corner tiles for the edges or mountain tops. A few of them are bugging me too so I might put something different there instead.
Its a no go on the french i'm afraid. I always wanted to learn but never got there. I have been mapping for over a decade though. These layers and tile sets are new to me though and i'm getting better though this last screen was the most difficult as I cannot for the life of me find the appropriate corner tiles so I end up having to wing it as best I can. (Full Hyrule Tileset btw)
I dug into the source code for all projects available on the main site to study the inner workings. I pilfered a few .dat and .lua files too as they save me a huge hassle with items and HUD. Its really tempting to hit up the developers if they mind my using a few sprites also though I have to make a few of my own and i'm nearly read to start doing that. I'll wait til after Hyrule Castle and Rauru though :3

[Shade Aurion]

I am still working on this. I'll update the rocks for the passage map and such after the next 2 maps are completed Diarandor because you're not wrong.
They do look oddly placed. Surely I can find a better way to hid corners. Anyways, here is progress on Hyrule Castle.

Turns out a castle requires many layers to look okay so this is my progress. I wanna do whirlpool portals if I can in key sports around the world you can unlock after entering them once if I can manage that. Might be a better alternative to ocarina warping. I need to clean up the top bit of the moat also as its too straight. Still a lot of work to go into this map, then Rauru Town and that will be North Western Hyrule completed Of course i'll need to set all the transporters and the interior maps but they'll be a snap compared to the world itself. Also I need to learn how to do spriting myself because i'd like to have Minish Cap/Four Swords Adventures style NPCs and enemies just to make things look a little nicer. If I can't figure it out, i'll settle on LTTP lol but i'll stille need to bring the old NES NPCs into that style which shouldn't be too hard. Getting there slowly. I might connect everything up, place all the enemies and NPCs and even though I wasn't gonna make a demo, I might make one for Solarus Staff just for the purposes of critique. I just don't want a public release til the project is done and it'll take me like.. 8 or 9 times as long as this project has been going at least to complete this.

[Max]

Thanks! TBH i'm using them to hide the lack of corner tiles for the edges or mountain tops. A few of them are bugging me too so I might put something different there instead.

Hey, this project is looking really good. I never played Zelda 2 for more than like 20 minutes, I just couldn't get into it. I'd honestly rather play a LTTP style remake, I think, and say that's close enough so this is great, haha.

If you want to send a png of the mountains that are missing tiles and point out what's missing, I could just make some corners for you, I don't think that'd take very long.

[Shade Aurion]

Thanks dude! And yeah a lot of people couldn't get into it sadly. Link to the Past was the sequel people wanted but it doesn't mean 2 couldn't be turned into what people wanted ^_^
As for the tiles, you should be able to see in the corners on the mountains how the corners don't really round off nicely. I'll worry about polishing it up but I am using the Full Hyrule tilesets.

Lastly, this project isn't on hiatus. Life just gets busy sometimes, and I want to make the next update a sizeable one. I'll likely complete the next 5 maps before I release the next update

[Max]

As for the tiles, you should be able to see in the corners on the mountains how the corners don't really round off nicely.

So, to be honest, I can't really tell what doesn't round off nicely and what's the way Link to the Past's cliffs look. They've always confused me- looked great in that game but are really hard to use. So are you taking about the top edges of the cliffs, because it seems like that's where  you've hidden corners with rocks? I tried taking out the rocks and it looked fine to me, there were a couple places that seemed slightly jaggy that I made some edits to fix, but I'm not sure if I can see what's bothering you.

[Bagu]

So, questions. Does anyone know roughly the overworld map size of LTTP if it were in Solarus? I just need a gauge for comparison. I'll be dividing Project Z2R into 4 Maps, 3 Continents and a Mountain Range. Western Hyrule, Death Mountain, Eastern Hyrule and Maze Island.

According to this old reddit thread, the bottom left corner of Zelda 2's overworld map was meant to be a "zoomed out view" of Zelda 1's overworld.



A more direct comparison here.

If this is true, then to recreate Zelda 2's overworld using a "normal" overhead Zelda formula accurately to what Nintendo intended, you would want to built the entirity of Zelda 1's overworld as the bottom-left portion of your map, and then scale the other areas accordingly... padded out with all sorts of newly invented details and smaller zones.

Of course, in the end the results would bear little resemblance to what people remember from Zelda 2 and it would involve a ton of work building out all those new areas. Certainly would be cool, but I'm not sure you'd want to open up that can of worms workload-wise.

Anyway, keep up the good work!

[jojo_f]

I don't want to sound like a wet blanket but I too feel like the scale of the world of Zelda II should be much larger. Honestly it is one of my favorite NES games and has much more character than the first game. The 2d combat is reminiscent of what the combat would eventually be like in 3d (but with ducking ). This epic illustration definitely shows what the calibre of a top-down Zelda II map should be like. Love that Ziggurat in the Zelda 1 portion of the map--the artist has really upped the flavor of Hyrule without really changing a thing. PS: Is that Termina in the bottom-middle?!

[Shade Aurion]

Just here to point out that this project is far from dead. I've just had health issues i'm nearly through, been moving house, etc.

@Max
It's the corners of walls mostly. It messes with my OCD tenancies pretty bad lol Like a puzzle with no corner pieces

@Bagu (best name)
So I doubt I could make a world map to scale using Zelda 1 as a base. I mean technically speaking Zelda 1 was fairly small but a part of that was because screens/maps were a set size. All squares with nothing larger. I mean i'll do my best of course but it'll certainly take some work to pad out the world a bit. There will certainly be many smaller zones and actually many of the dungeons will work well in this format TBH Still, i'll probably make a small portion of the backend of Doom Mountain's map match Zelda 1's or at least the one in BS Zelda Quest 3. Knowing that this game is essentially last in the worst case storyline but before BOTW? Either way i'll do my best to incorporate nods to various games in the series but try and limit them to that specific timeline.

@Jojo_f
Well i'm sure if it were Nintendo remaking it, it would be but basing this off the scale of BS Zelda Quest 3 and A Link to the Past I don't want to push things too far. It might look small in the images but it's vastly zoomed out. I'm basing it off the NES map and it's already 200-300% larger but it will be padded out as I go and there will be plenty of sub-maps to visit whether they're dungeons, caves, trap doors, grottos, or whatever I'm aiming for something that controls similar to Minish Cap that still accurately contains everything from the original overworld and more. I have to take some liberties with dungeons but it's going well. I'm particularly proud of the first dungeon which forms a perfect square of maps with every panel used yet successfully transferred a 2d map to a top down environment effectively.

The bosses will be fun as I kinda know what to do with them with Mezura resembling a Ball and Chain Trooper from ALTTP, Jermafenser's heads flying off but continuing to attack like Blind's heads in ALTTP.. I might recreate something similar to Dark Souls 2's Chariot fight with Rebonak and Carock will be fun, likely with a few Wizrobes as adds. I know exactly what i'll do with Shadow Link and my idea is something even I want to play. I do kinda plan to take liberties with the narrative though. Change the Prince's Wizard friend to a shadow of Agahnim and instead of dying, just the person he was possessing is slain but the spirit flies off to the Great Palace. In the final room where you are to receive the triforce part, I will have a large round room with a large pillar in the center (Like a donut) and up against that pillar will be a large mirror intended to test heroes to look inside themselves. The twist will be that when Link does this, Agahnim will possess his reflection and becoming Shadow Link who will then crash through the mirror and with very aggressive AI begin attacking you and have things like the hookshot, fire rod, boomerang, etc. There will be obstacles and such to use as cover but I don't want it to be a gimmick fight. I want it to just be a straight up hard fought victory. I love the side scrolling game personally but it will certainly be a challenge putting that in a top down action adventure format. Bare with me for now

---

Okay all that said, while I have no developmental update as i'm been in and out of hospital and am currently moving house but the mapping has all been laid out on paper for the whole overworld. Dungeons are half complete, most caves and grottos are done. I'm trying to take my time with towns and want them to just be on the overworld instead of a sub-map. I dunno, getting there. Tossing up whether to have NG+ content and add in a Ganon fight with a prelude to BOTW. What I really need to focus on is the sprite work because i'll absolutely need some custom work done for bosses and such. Either way, this project isn't dead. It was just on semi-hiatus and will be starting up again soon (A week or two)

I'm trying to play through each game again also so I can get a recent sense of the games themselves too:
Zelda 1 (BS Zelda - Quest 3) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FavNpXePO8M&list=PLVFlHPy0Pa9spTT_sfJctz89DcmwOfHjd
Zelda - Adventure of Link (Rev Edition) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9neVJy7ynIk&list=PLVFlHPy0Pa9szee5TqmcrcOs95kjkiFx6
Zelda - A Link To The Past (Redux) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=po45WVrRTO4&list=PLVFlHPy0Pa9tokXrkfRmghByjCmTqLI4U
Zelda - Ocarina of Time HD (Bumped up to nearly 4k) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1RsMz7Aoio&list=PLVFlHPy0Pa9toxW9RvD0hnNhuxApcas6i

Again, if anyone wants to help out with sprite work or coding or get in on this project let me know. If I con't reply in time I can be reached via twitter.
Either way when I get settling into this new house I throw everything up on a github so people can view it and help out if they want to ^_^

[Els87]

Hi Shade Aurion, I've just discovered your project and I really appreciate it, especially your intention of adding to the original plot of Zelda 2 the lore and some references from the rest of the series (in fact, the game's story is a bit strange, mostly for the fact that there are technically two Zeldas at the same time, but it seems to forget the one from the original Legend of Zelda). I have just one thing to say about the story: are you considering the possibility that Yuga (the sorcerer from ALBW) may be fused with Ganon at the time of AOL? In that case, what role would Agahnim's shadow play into the curse of Sleeping Zelda if there already is a sorcerer from Ganon's side and Agahnim himself was revealed to actually be Ganon's alter ego? Besides, is the project going well? What percentage has it reached? I'd also want to know if you're planning to make the game multilanguage, maybe by creating easy-to-use translation tools; I ask this because AM2R and some Solarus games like Mistery of Solarus and Return of the Hylian too got translated in other languages, and I'd like that also AZ2R would.

[Shade Aurion]

Okay. First off, not dead and nor is this project. I just work a lot. I'm not a paid gaming journalist, run TheMetalReview.com, post daily on our DudeGoBack Youtube and am working on 4 game dev projects including this one, that is to say i'll start working on this again.

I'm sorry there has been no updates and while I have worked on a bit more, there isn't enough to warrant showing more right now suffice to say there will be soon. At this moment though I would like to ask if anyone else experienced with Solaris would like to get involved so this project sees completion? I mean it will one way or another but it wouldn't hurt to have people more knowledgable than me working on this to implement features and mechanics i'm having trouble with. I have a pretty decent vision for most of the game though but of course i'm open to creative liberties and suggestions. Some things I really want to do but i'm happy to accept better ideas if they come along.

Til I have a few people helping me I will likely continue mapping. Though i'm experienced in RPGM, some C++ and Java and Ruby3, Solaris is still a learning curve for me and I only have limited time in the day that I can work on this, sometimes limited time in the week. But, i'll keep at it. I still don't want to release a teaser demo or anything like that and keep it on the downlow til its at least at v1.0 so that way it sees a full release in case Nintendo decide to wave that DMCA hammer lol

I'll check back here and there for replies and post a proper update soon. Til then I am contactable via my twitter @shade_aurion

Hi Shade Aurion, I've just discovered your project and I really appreciate it, especially your intention of adding to the original plot of Zelda 2 the lore and some references from the rest of the series (in fact, the game's story is a bit strange, mostly for the fact that there are technically two Zeldas at the same time, but it seems to forget the one from the original Legend of Zelda). I have just one thing to say about the story: are you considering the possibility that Yuga (the sorcerer from ALBW) may be fused with Ganon at the time of AOL? In that case, what role would Agahnim's shadow play into the curse of Sleeping Zelda if there already is a sorcerer from Ganon's side and Agahnim himself was revealed to actually be Ganon's alter ego? Besides, is the project going well? What percentage has it reached? I'd also want to know if you're planning to make the game multilanguage, maybe by creating easy-to-use translation tools; I ask this because AM2R and some Solarus games like Mistery of Solarus and Return of the Hylian too got translated in other languages, and I'd like that also AZ2R would.

Thanks! To answer your question, I would like to keep it as in line with the story as possible so i'd be open to Agahnim being Yuga instead. I was going to have Agahnim be Ganon's shadow and then that shadow pour itself into a sacred mirror in the great palace to form Shadow Link who would then smash through the mirror and very aggressively attack you using all your items against you. I could make Yuga actually be Shadow Ganon though which could explain why Shadow Ganon exists when Ganon is dead but due to the fuse still retains Ganon's form and that of Agahnim. I dunno.. I will cut the two Zeldas part of the story though as thats stupid, but i'll keep the prince and give Impa more of a role. Perhaps similar to how Sahasrala contacts you via stones in ALTTP. I also intend to make some post game content to link AoL with BotW somehow but if I can tie in more games in this paricular timeline I will, though i'd avoid tying in other games from the other split off timelines. Games before the split would be fine though.

Multi-language I would love to implement but I only speak english but am more then happy to work with others to make that a reality if people are able to translate for me

A few friends are nearing their completion of what I consider to be the ultimate hack of the original game over at RomHacking.net and I will draw a lot of inspiration from their project - https://www.romhacking.net/forum/index.php?topic=26001.0

[Els87]

Hi Shade Aurion, it's good to read that the project isn't dead. Speaking about the plot, it makes sense that this "Ganon's Shadow" is actually Yuga who tries to survive the death of his other half (Ganon) but still has his (and Agahnim's) appearance. I also like that Impa takes Sahasrahla's role and that Dark Link is actually Yuga/Ganon who desperately tries to revenge against the Hero (Link). However, I still don't understand what you want to do with Sleeping Zelda, is she actually the Zelda from Zelda 1 or another one like in the NES game? And so, is the prince the brother of what Zelda, the Sleeping one or the original Zelda one? If there is only one Zelda, how do you plan to change that plot? Regardless, the project is very interesting. And yes, this Zelda II Redux hack seems very well done.

[HerooftheFlood]

Hi Shade Aurion, it's good to read that the project isn't dead. Speaking about the plot, it makes sense that this "Ganon's Shadow" is actually Yuga who tries to survive the death of his other half (Ganon) but still has his (and Agahnim's) appearance. I also like that Impa takes Sahasrahla's role and that Dark Link is actually Yuga/Ganon who desperately tries to revenge against the Hero (Link). However, I still don't understand what you want to do with Sleeping Zelda, is she actually the Zelda from Zelda 1 or another one like in the NES game? And so, is the prince the brother of what Zelda, the Sleeping one or the original Zelda one? If there is only one Zelda, how do you plan to change that plot? Regardless, the project is very interesting. And yes, this Zelda II Redux hack seems very well done.

I'm pretty sure it's gonna go by the original story/official timeline. The Sleeping Princess is one of the main reasons why Zelda 1 and Zelda 2 even happen. Making her the same Zelda from Zelda 1 wouldn't make sense at this point in time. Her tragedy before the events of Zelda 1 was one of the main reasons why Hyrule in Zelda 1 is in a post apocalyptic state and in decline. The Tragedy of Princess Zelda I is also important because she's the reason why every Zelda after her tragedy was named Zelda including the one in Zelda 1. Yes technically every Zelda game we've played, the incarnation of Zelda in that game was named Zelda but not every princess in the history of hyrule has been confirmed to be named so. If it were retconned to be the Zelda from Zelda 1 then the tradition the brother had set would have never happened and technically Hyrule shouldn't be in decline. Impa knowing the legend of what the king from several centuries would have never been told to Link since her ancestors would know nothing about it and it would also retcon the idea of her being known as ancient Zelda by the time of the Zelda 1 and Zelda 2. Sure not as ancient as SS Zelda but you get what I mean that her tragedy left a big impact on the land. The brother should still be the brother of Sleeping Zelda since this is his fault. In my opinion Zelda 2's story should stay as is, it's one of the best stories in the series and even considered one of the darkest next to Majoras's Mask and Link's Awakening. Plus if you think about it from a era of decline point of view, Hyrule gaining it's original Zelda from more than a century ago, their current Zelda who was saved six years prior to Zelda 2 and the full triforce once again in their possession, that leaves a Second age of an Era of Prosperity/Golden Era with the first one being before the Tragedy of Princess Zelda I. However I do hope there's a way to implement the Master Sword even though according to Hyrule Historia, it had become lost some time after ALBW and TFH.

Although I am bit surprised that Ancient Stone Tablets and BS Zelda are being added into the history of the timeline for this game since neither were canon and both technically ruin the Spirit of Hero lore from the prequel manga of SS and SS itself.