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General Zelda What's the Best Way to Play Every Zelda Game. Please Help.

Joined
Jul 2, 2014
Hello there,

I'm hoping to play through every Zelda game in the series over some time. Hopefully before the new one on Wii U is out in 2015.

I'm pretty late to the party though, since I've never owned a Nintendo console before.

I bought a 3DS and played Ocarina of Time and loved it. I've bought all the Zelda games you can for the 3DS, on the eshop. However, this isn't all of them.

So what i'm asking is what's the best way of being able to play every Zelda game, whilst buying the smallest amount of consoles possible. Ive heard you can't use the gamepad on Wii U in Wii mode, so im confused how you would play Zelda games bought from the online store. Or can you buy all the Zelda games in Wii U mode? So would it be better to just buy a Wii cheaply? I don't mind buying a Wii U if the games are playable though.

Anyway, if anyone can help, i'm sure this is a very simple answer for some of you, with a list of what consoles to buy and how to play the games. (including what controllers you would use etc)

Remember i own a 3DS XL, but nothing else, and i would like to play every main Zelda game whilst buying the minimum amount of consoles possible. If something has been re-released, like Wind Waker HD, i would prefer to play the latest version of it, but if there's a much cheaper alternative, i'm open to ideas.

Anyway, thanks for reading, and i look forward to hearing from anyone who replies,

Thanks again,

Sammax
 

Mercedes

つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
Joined
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Location
In bed
Gender
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I suppose the Wii would be a good console to nab for doing this, along with a Gamecube controller. A second-hand Wii is dirt-cheap these days, they're listed on Amazon UK at ~£30 so it's not really a huge wallet hit either.

And for the games you've got Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword for a start, and you can play Gamecube games on it so Wind Waker and also the Zelda Collector's Edition, which has Zelda 1, 2, Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask on it, are good to pick up. I don't think that would cost that much money and it's a decent number of Zelda games.
 
Joined
May 4, 2014
Location
California
You can always download the older games from the e-shop.

Edit-Oh you already have, well a wii or wiiu would be good if you wanted to play TP, SS and WWHD
 

Mr Reaper

Fear The Reaper
Joined
Aug 16, 2012
Location
Myrtle Beach, SC
This way is the cheapest way you will ever possibly do it, you just need to be a little computer savvy:

First off any games or WADS you need can easily be found on Pirate Bay

1. Softmod a Wii (sounds extreme but its actually really easy, just look up plenty of tutorials so you don't brick the damn thing)
2. Install Virtual console WADS (channel files) for Zelda (NES), Adventure of Link, a link to the past, Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask (plenty of tutorials for this)
3. Get a USB flash drive or external hard drive for your wii and put Wind Waker and Twilight Princess (GCN version is better IMO) on it (once again plenty of tutorials for doing this)
4. Install Dios Mios on your wii so you can play GCN games off of the USB(once again plenty of tutorials, but this part is a pain to get working)
5. Put Skyward Sword on the USB device (since this is a Wii game there is a different method of doing it, just look up more tutorials)
6. Install the Visual boy advance emulator on the wii (there is a pc and wii version for this, so don't get these confused, once again, plenty of tutorials, this goes without saying for the rest of this post)
7. Get ROMs for any Gameboy or GBA Zeldas of your choice (coolrom.com is my site of choice for these) and put them on the sd card you used to softmod the wii
8. Enjoy

I know that was a bit rough and convoluted so if you have any questions about this method just respond and I'll help you out step by step.

EDIT: Like the poster above me, I didn't notice what you said about the eShop, but any other titles just follow this process. And DS Zeldas you may have to just buy for yourself.
 
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Heroine of Time

Rest in peace, Paris Caper...
Joined
Aug 6, 2011
Location
Whiterun
Gender
Take a guess.
No matter how I think about it, you'll have to get three systems no matter what, unless you're willing to skip one game.

For the 3DS, you should have Ocarina of Time 3D, A Link Between Worlds, Oracle of Seasons, Oracle of Ages, Link's Awakening DX, The Legend of Zelda, and The Adventure of Link. From there, you can go out and but Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks, the two DS games. They're fairly cheap at this point, especially if you look online.

To get the other games, one option is to get a Wii. As long as you get an older Wii with GameCube compatibility, you can then get The Wind Waker and Four Swords Adventures. You'll have to purchase a GameCube controller and memory card, but they're not expensive. You can also get A Link to the Past and Majora's Mask in the eShop, then purchase Skyward Sword and Twilight Princess for it. (Or you could get the GameCube version of Twilight Princess; whatever you prefer.)

But then, if you really want all the games, you'll have to buy a GameBoy Advanced for The Minish Cap. Again, not that expensive, but it's a pain to buy a console just for one game...

Alternatively, you could get a Wii U. This may actually be more expensive than the method above, but it WOULD let you get Zelda for the Wii U when it comes out. The Wii U eShop offers A Link to the Past, and the Wii eShop offers Majora's Mask. You'd also get Skyward Sword and Twilight Princess with the backwards compatibility. The only game you would be unable to get this way is Four Swords Adventures. I personally love Four Swords Adventures, but it's not really that important of a game if you're not willing to get a GameCube or Wii just for that.

Now there IS Four Swords you'd be missing... with BOTH methods. It's different from Four Swords Adventures. It was originally released for the GameBoy Advanced along with a remake of A Link to the Past, so you could get it with the Wii method, but unfortunately, it's only multiplayer, so you'd need multiple GBAs in order to play it, as well as link cables to link them together. Four Swords Anniversary Edition was available on the eShop for a short time, but it has since been taken down, so you have no other method of getting it. You may want to consider skipping this one. To be fair, some people don't even consider it a full Zelda game, so it's one of the better ones to skip.

To make this easier to decide for yourself, here's a chart of all the consoles you could get the games on, including backwards compatibility:

The Legend of Zelda - NES, GameCube, 3DS, Wii, Wii U
The Adventure of Link - NES, GameCube, 3DS, Wii, Wii U
A Link to the Past - SNES, Wii, Wii U
Link's Awakening - GB, GBC, GBA, 3DS
Ocarina of Time - N64, GameCube, 3DS, Wii, Wii U
Majora's Mask - N64, GameCube, Wii, Wii U
Oracle of Seasons - GBC, GBA, 3DS
Oracle of Ages - GBC, GBA, 3DS
The Wind Waker - GameCube, Wii, Wii U
Four Swords - GBA
Four Swords Adventures - GameCube, Wii
The Minish Cap - GBA, DS technically (but you don't want that for just one GBA game), Wii U
Twilight Princess - GameCube, Wii, Wii U
Phantom Hourglass - DS, 3DS
Spirit Tracks - DS, 3DS
Skyward Sword - Wii, Wii U
A Link Between Worlds - 3DS

I wish you good luck! Your quest to play all the Zelda games is a noble one, I assure you. ;) Hope you figure things out without hurting your wallet too much.

EDIT: By the way, what Mr Reaper is talking about is both against the forum rules and the law, so I wouldn't suggest doing that, but it IS the cheapest if you're desperate...
 
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mαrkαsscoρ

Mr. SidleInYourDMs
Joined
May 5, 2012
Location
American Wasteland
just get a pre-2011 wii model [its backwards compatible w/ gamecube games],so there's twilight princess[gc version rec.],wind waker,skyward sword,four swords adventure,and you can get majoras mask on the wii shop for $10/link to the past for $8

the only thing you'll be missing is minish cap,but there's always THAT particular,free route [alttp is on gba also]

Actually, Four Swords is on the 3DS.

it hasn't been available on there since January of the 25th anniversary and some random week
 
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