The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds' dungeon design | Boss Keys

Hi. I’m Mark Brown and this is Boss Keys - a series about the dungeons in the Legend of Zelda games. But actually. Pause that for a second. We can’t talk about 2013’s Nintendo 3DS game A Link Between Worlds without first talking about the overworld. Because while we’ve certainly seen the design of Zelda‘s dungeons shift from game to game, the changes above ground have been even more dramatic. And a lot of it comes down to the order in which you can visit the dungeons.

In the very first Zelda game, you were given the freedom to tackle the dungeons in many different orders, with only a few obstacles blocking your path. This meant that you explored Hyrule by following your curiosity instead of a predetermined path. A Link to the Past added a bit more structure to the game. You needed to visit the light world dungeons before the ones in the dark world, and large parts of Hyrule were locked away until you unlocked specific items.

Plus, the dungeons are numbered on your map, which suggests an order. Miyamoto said this shift was because of the story stuff, saying that programming in the logic to have the plot still work when the player is dictating the order of the game, would need more memory than the Super Nintendo could handle. But later games on better hardware just got more and more predefined in their structure. Ocarina of Time offers some choices in the middle of the game, but you’ll have to defiantly ignore Shiek's instructions to take them.

And later games, like Wind Waker, have just one order. Some earlier games could technically be done out of order by leaving the dungeon as soon as you get the key item and then using that to open a new path, but later titles would clamp down on this. Games like Minish Cap and Twilight Princess use special events that only trigger when you finish the dungeon, to lock off future parts of the game. All of this culminating in Skyward Sword.

The video game equivalent of following a GPS on an straight road. But with A Link Between Worlds, things changed dramatically. It’s like a Link to the Past, but even more open. The game’s dungeons can be finished in pretty much any order you like, making it one of the most freeform Zelda games... at this point in time at least. So you need to beat Eastern Palace, which is the tutorial dungeon, first. But then you can tackle either House of Gales or Tower of Hera.

Up to you. Then, once you’re in Lorule, you can do the remaining seven dungeons in pretty much whatever order you please. All of this required some significant changes to the Zelda formula. So Instead of finding items inside the dungeon, you rent the items you need from a cheeky chap called Ravio who will lend out key Zelda gear like the fire wand, hookshot, and boomerang. And you can keep them - until you die. At which point, you’ll need to pony up and rent them again.

And this is pretty smart: it makes death more meaningful and makes you think hard about spending rupees. Unfortunately, the game’s really easy and rupees are absolutely everywhere so you can just rent everything and it’s pretty unlikely that you’ll die much anyway but still... If you’re going to need an item in a dungeon, then you won’t even be able to get through the front door without first renting the appropriate gear - like, with these pegs blocking the Tower of Hera’s door, which forces you to go get the hammer.

That’s better than Zelda 1 where you can hit a brick wall midway through a dungeon because you don’t have the stepladder yet. And I think this is all fantastic. You get to wander off in any direction you please, you very rarely hit brick walls, and if you get stuck in one part of the game you can just try something else. But I would say that while this change to the formula has helped the overworld, it actually harmed the dungeons themselves.

Let’s go back underground. For one, this set-up means that you no longer find items inside the dungeons themselves. As we’ve seen in this series, Zelda dungeons typically have you exploring a space filled with obstacles that are impossible to overcome with your current skill set. You then find a new item, and can return to previous parts of the dungeon to open up new pathways. Only one dungeon does this in A Link Between Worlds.

The Desert Palace gives you titan’s mitts, which let you pick up some heavy rocks you came across earlier. The other dungeons simply don’t have this, which removes a significant bit of puzzle solving. Two, is that the dungeons largely have to assume that this could be the very first dungeon the player has visited, which means the difficulty curve for the second half of the game is pretty flat. Not entirely - some dungeons are more complex than others.

But it’s pretty steady. I mean, technically the game could ramp up the difficulty of the enemies and bosses depending on whether this is your first or your seventh dungeon. I don’t think A Link Between Worlds does this. But in terms of actual puzzles and dungeon structure - that definitely stays the same. That would be a nightmare to make. Three, is that the dungeons must also assume that the only item you’re carrying is the one you needed to get into the dungeon.

So while Swamp Palace can be filled with puzzles and enemies that relate to the hookshot, it can’t have anything related to the boomerang, bow, fire rod, Pegasus boots, hammer, ice rod, sand rod, titan’s mitt, or tornado rod. And if the dungeon needs bombs, it also has to feature these regenerating bomb-like enemies. Which kinda gives the solution away, doesn’t it? Again, the later dungeons in a typical Zelda game can have puzzles based on any and every item you have at that point.

But that’s not possible in A Link Between Worlds. Though one nice thing is that certain enemies and puzzles are easier to deal with if you have rented other items. It’s not quite Breath of the Wild levels of improvising puzzle solutions, but it’s something. You could listen to all of this and say, hey! Listen! No - hey, maybe Zelda games should be linear, because the dungeons have all of these annoying compromises to account for the player taking the dungeons out of order.

And okay. Fair point. But I think this is only because Nintendo has tried to retrofit a linear style of game and dungeon design into something more freeform, with kinda strange bits of design to tape over the cracks. Perhaps what the game needed was an entirely new design philosophy. But I suppose we’ll come back to that down the line. For now, let’s talk about the dungeons themselves. Doing Boss Keys has made me realise that there are basically three types of dungeon in the Zelda series.

The first is all about locks and keys. The dungeon is a maze, where your path to the boss is cut off by padlocked doors, big obstacles, and other hazards. To succeed, you need to slowly untangle the dungeon’s knot by finding and using keys of all varieties. I’ve previously called these find the path dungeons, but let’s just call them lock and key. I’m going to call the second type of dungeon the puzzle box. This is when the dungeon itself is a puzzle, and you must manipulate its very architecture to beat it.

It’s like trying to solve a Rubick’s cube from the inside. This might involve manipulating water, going back and forth in time, chucking the dungeon upside down, and more. Some people consider these the most annoying dungeons in the series, whereas personally I think they can be the absolute best. And then finally there are more simple and linear dungeons. These are less about navigating the space itself and more about solving puzzles and fighting enemies.

They might have some elements from other dungeons, but the layouts are more linear and you don’t have to put in much effort to find your way through. I’ve called these follow-the-path dungeons before, but let’s call them gauntlet. Now, every individual dungeon can be put into one of these three categories, but it’s a bit harder to put an entire game into a single box. In Ocarina of Time, for example, the Forest Temple is lock and key, the Water Temple is the most famous puzzle box dungeon of them all, and the Shadow Temple is pure gauntlet design.

But if we’re generalising, then classic and 2D games generally fall into lock and key, the N64 games and more recently Skyward Sword and Breath of the Wild go into puzzle box. And all the other games go into gauntlet. Which of course begs the question: where does A Link Between Worlds go? And the answer is: for the first time in forever, we’ve got a game filled with lock and key dungeons. And we can use the test I made up earlier in the series to confirm it.

Do the dungeons have branching paths? Yes. You’ll often come across rooms with lots of exits, which means you’ll have to start building a mental map of where you’ve been and where you’ve yet to explore. Does the game offer choices? Sure. For the first time in ages you’ll be carrying around a pocket full of keys and can sometimes pick between multiple locked doors at once. Does the game have backtracking? Yes. You’ll often have to wander back through the dungeon with a key, or because pressing a button in one area did something in another.

And no, the game doesn’t just do the backtracking for you with cheeky shortcuts. Now, A Link Between Worlds is not as complex as the classic lock and key games, like Link’s Awakening or the Oracle games. And that’s down to a number of reasons. One is that the dungeons generally have fewer keys - only about three or four. And, like I said before, only one dungeon has those classic item-and-lock puzzles. Without them, the number of things you must keep track of is greatly reduced.

Also, the map on the 3DS touchscreen is very generous. You get the entire layout from the moment you step into the dungeon, and the compass shows you everything. Plus, the levels are quite cramped and interconnected which makes backtracking easier - but I’d generally call that a plus. As I always say, making the decision to go back is the fun bit, actually schlepping back through the dungeon is often less enjoyable. But still, the dungeons aren’t too shabby and the graphs - I bet you missed ‘em - the graphs look good.

We want wide graphs, because those represent branching paths and choices and backtracking. Not these thin graphs for Skull Woods and Tower of Hera, which are two of the less ambitious dungeons. Though, they're still fun in their own way. Tower of Hera, for example, has lots going for it even if it’s simple to navigate. It’s 12 storeys high, and it looks amazing in stereoscopic 3D when you’re at the top of the tower. These springboard panels are a lot of fun to use.

And oh, man, I still haven’t even mentioned the game’s main gimmick! You can merge with the wall, turning link into a sketchbook drawing so you can cross otherwise impossible pathways. This mechanic leads to a great boss fight, and some fine puzzles. The game’s got a bunch of clever conundrums actually - one of my favourites is in skull woods where you trick a wallmaster into slapping a button for you. All of the elements - the enemy, the button, the way the monster can’t get you if you’re under a walkway - they’re all explained earlier, making for a good puzzle.

There’s also a few puzzles that make use of the fact that these dungeons have multiple floors, which is good. Asking you to consider the dungeon as a real place is always the sign of a good Zelda dungeon. So you’ll drop through holes to get to keys in the room below. And there’s a dungeon where you have to get light to leak down from the top floor to the bottom which is actually really cool but it’s so simple that you don’t have to really think too much about it to make it work.

The same thing happens with Swamp Palace, which is the game’s obligatory water manipulation dungeon. Here, you’re raising and lowering the water level, just like the Water Temple and Jabu Jabu’s Belly. But in most instances, you can only exit the room when the water is at a specific level so you’re not actually making a decision to impact some off-screen room but just solving the current puzzle and then, hey, you also solved the puzzle in the other room too I guess?

Also sometimes the water level simply doesn’t affect other rooms and the whole dungeon is a bit disappointing. It is the first dungeon in a million years to have an entirely optional key, though, so that’s something! Okay, I have a few stray thoughts. So let’s get to them. I think A Link Between Worlds is one of the best feeling Zelda games ever made. Zelda has always been a bit clunky if you ask me - the retro games are kinda stuck in a grid, and in the 3d games, Link has to get locked into a duel with an enemy to actually stand a chance of killing them, giving the games a jerky stop and start rhythm.

In A Link Between Worlds, Link can move around fast and freely, he can absolutely wail on enemies, and it’s also the only 3D Zelda game to play in 60 frames per second and, man, it feels so smooth. The dungeons are filled with optional goodies, which works pretty well. You never know if a puzzle will lead to a key, or just some rupees. But because rupees are so important in the game, it doesn’t feel like a consolation prize or a red herring.

The dungeons also have these super useful hidden items like better tunics, extra magic power for your items, and ore that can be used to improve the master sword. These are really well hidden and they’re a nice bonus for those smart enough to find 'em Oh yeah, I haven’t really mentioned that A Link Between Worlds is like a strange quasi-sequel, quasi-remake of Link to the Past. Like, way more so than Twilight Princess is a strange love letter to Ocarina of Time.

Link Between Worlds has the same general world map, the same light world/dark world concept, and some similar dungeon names and ideas - but all new layouts. I’m not sure what to think about all of this, but I guess it's what Nintendo does now So that’s A Link Between Worlds. The dungeons are generally quite easy, but overall they’re good fun, and it’s nice to go back to a very classical style of dungeon design that we’ve only seen a few times in recent years, in the odd Minish Cap or Twilight Princess dungeon.

I personally think the move to a non-linear structure was a good one. But it definitely wasn’t executed as well as it could have been. We’ll chat more about that soon. But next time on Boss Keys, I’m not going to talk abut Breath of the Wild. That’ll come later. I might wait for the DLC dungeon. Until then... we’ll see. Watch this space. Boss Keys is powered by Patreon, and these are my top tier supporters.