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The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past

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Title Screen

The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past

Also known as: Zelda no Densetsu: Kamigami no Triforce (JP)
Developer: Nintendo EAD
Publisher: Nintendo
Platforms: SNES, Game Boy Advance
Released in JP: November 21, 1991 (SNES), December 2, 2002 (GBA)
Released in US: April 13, 1992 (SNES), March 14, 2003 (GBA)
Released in EU: September 24, 1992 (SNES), March 28, 2003 (GBA)


AreasIcon.png This game has unused areas.
EnemyIcon.png This game has unused enemies.
GraphicsIcon.png This game has unused graphics.
ItemsIcon.png This game has unused items.
SoundIcon.png This game has unused sounds.
DebugIcon.png This game has debugging material.
RegionIcon.png This game has regional differences.
Carts.png This game has revisional differences.


DevelopmentIcon.png This game has a development article
ProtoIcon.png This game has a prototype article
PrereleaseIcon.png This game has a prerelease article
DCIcon.png This game has a Data Crystal page

The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past is the third game in the long-running Zelda series, and the first (and with the exception of a few Satellaview titles, only) 16-bit entry. Featuring two large worlds to explore, loads of secrets, and a fun assortment of items, this game is a fan-favorite. It introduced many concepts which would later become recurring series elements, including the Master Sword, parallel worlds, elemental-themed dungeons, bottles for varied item storage, and dungeon Big Keys that open special locks that normal keys cannot.

It was later re-released on Game Boy Advance as The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past and Four Swords.

Sub-Pages

Read about development information and materials for this game.
Development Info
Read about prototype versions of this game that have been released or dumped.
Prototype Info
Read about prerelease information and/or media for this game.
Prerelease Info
NotesIcon.png
Game Boy Advance Version
The changes made for the portable port.

Debugging Features

Full Inventory/Walk Through Walls

Use Pro Action Replay (PAR) code 0083F8EA, then create a file with a name beginning with B (JP: ンルルル) in the first save slot to enable the following debugging features:

  • You start with 15 hearts, 255 rupees, 50 bombs, and 50 arrows in the Light World.
  • You have a complete inventory. The Bottles are filled with a Fairy and one each of the Red, Green, and Blue Potions. Additionally, you have the Pegasus Boots, Flippers, Titan's Mitt, Moon Pearl, Fighter's Sword, and Blue Shield.
  • Press B on Controller 2 to enable free-movement mode, which will allow Link to freely pass through obstacles. It will also allow you to use the Magic Mirror anywhere on the overworld, even to warp from the Light World to the Dark World (which is not normally possible).
  • Press R on Controller 2 to remove the selected item or weapon while the status sub-screen is displayed.

Full Restore/Equipment Upgrade

Use Pro Action Replay (PAR) code 0683C1EA, then create a file named BAGE (JP: ンルルル) in the first save slot to enable the following debugging features:

  • Press R on Controller 1 to permanently cut magic consumption in half.
  • Hold R and press B on Controller 1 to enable free-movement mode, which will allow Link to freely pass through obstacles. It will also allow you to use the Magic Mirror anywhere on the overworld, even to warp from the Light World to the Dark World.
  • Hold R and press A on Controller 1 to upgrade your sword, armor, and shield by one step. Once the sword is upgraded to Level 4, pressing A again will reset all three items to Level 1.
  • Hold R and press Y on Controller 1 to max out your life, magic, arrows, bombs, and keys, as well as add 255 Rupees.
  • Hold R and press Select on Controller 1 to warp straight to the Triforce chamber after the fight against Ganon. Works for three save slots and with any name.

Frame Advance

Use Pro Action Replay (PAR) code 00803A00. Press L on Controller 1 to freeze the game; while frozen, press R to advance one frame and press L again to resume normal play.

Unused Graphics

Dungeon Features

Skull Statue

See? See? I do exist!

Boo.

The Skull Woods dungeon tileset contains an unused large skull statue object. This can be seen in a tile viewer, but it's also possible to cause the game to load them into other dungeons via glitching. This tile was eventually used in the GBA port for the Palace of the Four Sword, accessible by beating Four Swords.

The screenshot shows the skull tile loaded into the Dark Palace dungeon, replacing the Rocklops statues in the first room. An explanation of how to perform this glitch can be found here.

(Source: Flying Omelette)

Sanctuary Entrance

ALTTPSanct 2.png

ALTTPSanct 1.png

Every dungeon entrance has a specially-decorated entrance doorway, the only exception being the Sanctuary. There is an entrance doorway for the Sanctuary, but it can only be seen by either moving through certain walls or via Hyrule Magic's map editor.

(Source: Dark Linkaël)

Keyhole

Not opening, sorry

Unused graphics for a keyhole object. Could have been used in any number of places.

Items

Meat

A small hunk of meat. Yummy.

Stored with the graphics for the large and small magic refill decanters are sprites for a large and small piece of meat on a bone, looking extremely similar to the Bait from The Legend of Zelda. Whether it would have worked in the same manner is unclear. It takes up the space that graphics for the fish appear normally, but is loaded in indoor areas, so it may have simply been some kind of object for use in houses.

Magical Clock

Time's up!

An unused stopwatch object! This would presumably work like the Magical Clock in Zelda 1, freezing any on-screen enemies. It appears alongside graphics such as Rupees, so it was probably intended to be dropped by enemies in the same manner as the original game. It may have been removed because the Quake Medallion performs a similar effect.

Sword Text

Ken Tsurugi, expert swordsman.

Japanese text for "ken/tsurugi", which means "sword", fittingly found near the sword graphics in memory.

Letter

Not a map.

The Letter (called てがみ (Tegami) in the Japanese version, but untranslated and blank in the English version) is another item making a return from Zelda 1. As in that game, it uses the same sprite as the Map. It can be added to the inventory in all versions of the game using Pro Action Replay (PAR) code 7EF35301, occupies the spot of the Magic Mirror, and acts like the Mirror when used.

Leaked development material indicates that at one point in development the Letter was used at the start of the game, with Link obtaining it from a character named "Samansapapa" and giving it to the Priest in the Sanctuary in order to get access to Hyrule Castle. An early screenshot from about April 1991 shows Link with the Letter just outside of Sanctuary in a rainstorm.

It's possible that later in development the Letter's purpose was changed to be how the Mirror was acquired, much like how the Shovel is used to acquire the Flute (which then takes the Shovel's spot in the inventory).

1/4 Magic Meter

Normally, the player can only obtain an upgrade that reduces Magic Meter consumption by half (indicated by a 1/2 symbol on the Magic Meter). Doing so causes the VRAM byte located at 7EF37B to change from 00 to 01. However, setting the byte to 02 instead causes the Magic Meter to drain at one-quarter its usual rate instead. There doesn't appear to be a "1/4" graphic for the Magic Meter in any version and the Meter still displays 1/2, but nearly all items (barring the Lamp and Magic Cape, for some reason) benefit from this upgrade. The Lamp can gain the benefit by changing 7B09B from 02 to 01. The Magic Cape can gain the beneift by changing 7ABDE from 08 to 10.

Setting the byte higher than 02 will cause the magic cost to read from the next item(s) in the data chart, or to read from code beyond the data chart, causing unpredictable behavior.

This feature has been implemented in a few different hacks of both A Link to the Past and Inishie no Sekiban.

Graphical Effects

Kholdstare's Shell "Melting"

That's quite an absorbent floor you got there, guys.
Download.png Download Kholdstare Melting Shell Restoration Patch (U)
File: Kholdstare_shell.ips (28 KB) (info)
Current version: 1.0


A close inspection of Kholdstare's logic indicates that its shell was intended to gradually fade out after being defeated with fire-based weapons. Normally, it just abruptly disappears several frames after being destroyed. The sudden disappearance of the shell is not aesthetically pleasing, so it's not surprising that this transitioning effect was implemented. Unfortunately, a coding bug accidentally disabled the effect. A fairly simple patch has been created to restore this effect, a link to which can be found above.

As for an explanation of how it was accidentally disabled, it turns out that the palette that was supposed to be manipulated to achieve the fadeout was not correctly invoked. Instead, a neighboring palette was selected for fading. Regrettably, there were no graphics visible in that scene that also used the palette being faded. Thus, this bug understandably slipped through playtesting due to a lack of obvious side effects, visual or otherwise. This bug is known to be present in all Super Famicom and SNES releases of the game, with the shell's fade effect restored in the GBA port.

(Source: MathOnNapkins)

NPC Sprites

Duck Sprites

Quack.Fly away!

The duck has an additional frame of flying animation that is only used in the GBA version. While the latter sprite is used, it only appears extremely briefly after Link lands from a flight.

Bully's Friend

Wah

While the bully's friend does appear in the game, he never changes from his standard, happy expression. These graphics can only be found in the Japanese version.

Ending Character

Various colors work for this NPC.

This NPC appears alongside the graphics for "The End", which would imply that he was originally meant to appear in the ending sequence somewhere. It's possible he was a Kakariko villager, or potentially a Dark World resident who had returned to normal. He appears to be jumping, which would make sense if he was celebrating in the ending.

Enemy Sprites

Unused Soldier Helmet

Hello. My name is Link. You killed my uncle. Prepare to die.
Alternate palettes.

An alternate helmet for a soldier enemy is present alongside the body graphics for the short blade-wielding regular Soldier, those met early in the game. The other helmets used in-game appear alongside their respective body graphics, so this implies that the weak, less intelligent soldiers originally used this graphic for their helmets.

Why it was removed is unknown, but possibly because it looks more threatening than it should for such weak enemies, or because it's the only helmet that makes it clear there's a human body still within the armor and Nintendo didn't like the idea of Link hurting brainwashed humans. While the game implies that the soldiers were merely brainwashed, other material such as the comic and manga suggest that the enemy soldiers are simply living armor, which might explain why they seem to outnumber the rest of Hyrule's population ten-to-one.

Dark World Bat

Batted awayDriven batty.Uh...Bat Masterson?
An odd, unused Dark World enemy. Some kind of bat or big-armed thing with flapping or throwing frames. Its programming doesn't seem to exist in the game anymore, and its graphics are only present in the Japanese versions of the game.

Up to bat! Wait..
Apparently, it would have shot (thrown?) fireballs at Link.

Unused Spike Trap

Large alternate spike trap.png

Unused alternate graphics for the large spike trap.

(Source: Zarby89)

Misc.

Bomb Shop Sign Women

Link and the sprite with index 0x3D have had a strained relationship over the years. It normally manifests as a lady in a white headscarf pacing back and forth in front of her house in Kakariko Village. If Link gets too close, she'll call out for soldiers to come arrest him and bolt inside her home, locking the door.

If this same sprite is spawned indoors, however, she's a different woman altogether - in fact, she's downright weird. This sprite will turn to face the player like many other NPCs in the game, but the only thing she seems to want to talk about is that the Bomb Shop is somewhere west of Link's current position. It's possible that the message index used for the Bomb Shop sign once held entirely different text.

The red-haired woman (sprite index 0x34) in the village, who also spends her time looking for people to narc on, behaves identically to the scarved woman when placed indoors. As the scarved woman retains her appearance indoors, so too does the red-haired woman. This is due to the fact that that these two sprites share the same logic, except for the subroutines called to render them to the screen.

(Source: MathOnNapkins)

Dialogue Tester Sprite

The sprite entity with index 0xB8 appears to be a leftover debug feature for testing the game's dialogue messages. While it was previously thought that the sprite had some sort of menu for selecting the next message to be displayed, this is a misconception due to the fact that the templates for some of the game menus are found at some of the lowest message indices. Without other logic driving the sequencing of those menu templates, they have no effect.

The sprite initializes its message index to 0x0000 and will increment this index after each message is displayed, which also causes its physical orientation to cycle to another cardinal direction. Each message is triggered automatically when the player gets close enough to the sprite, so the A button is not used to interact in this situation. This effectively prevents the player from passing through the sprite.

There is no bounds checking performed on the message index. Therefore, if the player reads until all of the valid message indices are exhausted, the game will crash, as the next message index will reference data that is not valid for the dialogue system.

When spawned in most indoor rooms, the sprite doesn't look properly constructed. It was later discovered that the Priest (Sage in the US version) sprite and the dialogue tester call the same subroutine to be drawn to the screen. The color of the sprite's garb and skin tone is different from that of the Priest, however.

Unused Enemies

Cannon Trooper

Got his boomstick handy.

A Hyrulean soldier with a portable cannon is fully coded and functional, and would fit quite well in areas like Agahnim's Tower.

Unused Sound Effects

Hmmm...
To do:
Upload these individually.

Here are multiple unused sound effects from the game in sequential order. A word of caution that although they are short, a few of them are a bit jarring or innately loud so do not listen to them with high volume.

These are unique sets of data (except one, which is a sound effect which is used in the final game but with one additional note that goes unused). The other sound effects have nothing pointing to them. Some sound similar to used sound effects from the final game: these include possibly earlier or slightly different, alternative versions of sounds like the cucco cluck and the sound the archery game NPC makes when he uses his drum to signal that the player has hit one of the targets.

(Source: kan)

Unused Text

Japanese Script English Script
あぶない!
深みとゾーラに注意
           DANGER!
Beware of deep water and Zora!

Intended for a sign right before you enter Zora's Domain.

Unused Rooms

There are two unused rooms in the middle of the tiled objects data. In all versions of the game, they can be found at the address 0x0FAD27. The palettes and block set on the screenshot are only there as a preview taken with a room editor, as these rooms do not contain any data regarding that.

Those rooms can't be loaded normally in-game, but you can use the following cheats to start the game in one of them:

  • 1F830C27 1F830DAD 1F830E1F
  • 1F830CF1 1F830DAD 1F830E1F

down down

(Source: Zarby89)

Chris Houlihan Room

YOU ARE ERROR.

Room ID 82 is used as an error handler if you fall into a hole and the game cannot find a proper destination. It is a single cave room and contains a Telepathic Tile as well as 225 Rupees. Exiting the cave takes you to outside Link's House, regardless of which World you were in before entering the room.

There is a bug in the game which can lead you to this room, related to screen transitions using the Pegasus Boots: go to the area to the left of Hyrule Castle and go up. After the transition has ended, drop a Bomb in front of you and wait until it explodes. It will hurt you, and push you against the bottom of the screen. Now, charge up the Pegasus Boots, and turn to the bottom while charging up, so you will immediately move down to the next screen. Now, go to the hole at Hyrule Castle which leads to the secret passage and fall into it, and you will enter this room. Otherwise, go to Hyrule Cemetery, push the tombstone (the one that leads to castle sewer area), place a bomb to the south and stand between the bomb and the hole while facing south, let the bomb explode and push Link into the hole, this will also send Link to said room.

Chris Houlihan is a kid who participated at a Nintendo Power event and received the honor of appearing in a future Zelda game, with the Telepathic Tile being a message from him (the only such Tile that isn't a message from Sahasrahla or Zelda):

Uhh...sure, kid.

Other regions have their own message. While all of them share the trait of not being from Sahasrahla or Zelda, only the English one gives a name to the speaker:

Japanese 「ここは、秘密の部屋だよ~ん。みんなにはないしょだよ~ん。」
(Koko wa, himitsu no heya da yoon. Minna ni wa naisho da yoon. (This is a secret room~ It's a secret to everyone~))
English My name is Chris Houlihan. This is my top secret room. Keep it between us, OK?
French C'est ma pièce la plus secrète. Que cela reste entre nous, ok ? (It's my most secret room. Let's keep that between us, ok?)
German Dies ist mein ganz geheimes Zimmer. Das bleibt aber unter uns, ja? (This is my very secret room. That stays between us though, yeah?)

The source code revealed the name of the room given by the developers : "Anaochi hijyou room", which means "Hole fall emergency room".

(Japanese text translation: GlitterBerri)

Developer Oversights

Push Blocks

Final Super Donkey Prototype
ALTTPFinal BlockPush1.png ALTTPProto BlockPush1.png

A single push block is placed out of bounds in this maze-like room in the Dark Palace. A push block existed in this spot in the Super Donkey overdump, but was seemingly never deleted when the room was redesigned.

Final Super Donkey Prototype
ALTTPFinal BlockPush2.png ALTTPProto BlockPush2.png

A random tile in this Fairy Fountain is flagged as a push block, though since it's not assigned to a solid tile, it doesn't work properly. The Super Donkey prototype also has a (functioning) push block in this spot.


(Source: Dark Linkaël)

Torches

ALTTP Torchs.png

Hidden underneath the ceiling of the secret passage into Hyrule Castle are a few leftovers of an earlier design layout, including a pair of misplaced torches.


(Source: Dark Linkaël)

Stair

ALTTP Stair.png

The upper-right corner of this labyrinthine mountain cave contains an isolated staircase.


(Source: Dark Linkaël)

Regional Differences

Title Screen

The Japanese title screen has neither the sword nor the castle background seen in the English title screens. The European title screen replaced the ® with a ™.

In the Japanese and European versions, you can go straight to the File Select by pressing Start. In the US version, this option is only offered to you after using "Save & Quit" - if you start the game normally, you have to wait until the title screen actually displays the title before you can go to the File Select.

Japan US Europe
Lttp-jpntitle.png Legend of Zelda- A Link to the Past-title.png ALttP title EU.png


File Select / Name Entry

The Japanese File Select has a stark black-and-white contrast not unlike that of the first The Legend of Zelda. The English version uses some nice graphics instead.

Japanese English
I don't know who E - I"- is, so why should he be killed? At least we don't put spaces between each symbol.

File names in the Japanese versions can only be four characters long. The English version ups this limit to six.

Japanese English
Did that bottom row just laugh at me? Why is ours smaller? :(

Introduction

The blue soldiers have spears in the Japanese intro, which were most likely replaced with swords in the English intro because that soldier type isn't actually used during gameplay. That said, the fact they're shown in the intro suggests that type was present during gameplay at one point in development.

Japanese English
ALttP Japanese Blue Soldiers.png ALttP English Blue Soldiers.png
ALttP Japanese Blue Soldiers 2.png ALttP English Blue Soldiers 2.png

Prologue

The ellipsis character was changed into an interpunct character in the European version.

US Europe
ALttP ellipsis US.png ALttP ellipsis EU.png

The French and German localizations, including the limited Canadian French release, use a slightly different dialogue font than the English version; the most notable differences are the serifed "i", the curvier "s", and the more open "a", "c", and "e". Additionally, the French version, but not the German version, uses a non-italic font for the status display, similar to that used in all GBA versions of the game.

English German French
ALttP-dialogue-enUS.png ALttP-dialogue-deDE.png ALttP-dialogue-frCA.png

Unused Text

Although this dialogue for the fortune tellers exists in the text data of both versions, the Japanese equivalent of this text is never shown in-game, rendering this text unused.

Japanese English
ううむ、それはザンネン…。
また、おまちしておりますぞ。
It is indeed a poor man who is
not interested in his future…
I'll be waiting for your return.

This dialogue from the quiet "average middle-aged man" is pretty different between the Japanese and English versions. In the English version, he becomes much more talkative, but in the Japanese version he just gives a terse "why...".

Japanese English
どうして…………… Why did you take my sign? It
says plain as day to just leave
me alone! Sheeesh!

Text Iconography

The arrow marks on the signs were altered between versions. The text boxes were also slightly expanded for the English versions.

Japan US Europe
ALttP arrow marks JPN.png ALttP arrow marks US.png ALttP arrow marks EU.png

The cursor was tweaked between versions as well. The Japanese release was by far the largest, whilst the US version is slightly smaller than the EU release.

Japan US Europe
ALttP cursor JPN.png ALttP cursor US.png ALttP cursor EU.png

In the Japanese version, the Hylian script's hieroglyphic font is much larger and more detailed than in the English version.

Japanese English
ALttPHylianJPN.png ALttPHylianUSA.png
(Source: Killer Bob)

In the Japanese version, the wanted signs of Link in Kakariko Village display your file name next to the portrait.

Japanese English
おたずね者 ALttP-Linkhead.png "File Name"
ゼルダ姫を城よりさらった犯人
みつけたら大声でしらせよ!
ALttP-Linkhead.png WANTED! This is the
criminal who kidnapped Zelda.
Call a soldier if you see him!

Weathercock

In the US version, the Kakariko Village weathercock has a slight difference on its right side.

All versions US
ALTTP Weathercock AllVersions.gif
ALTTP Weathercock US.gif


(Source: Dark Linkaël)

Tiles

This tile in the Eastern Temple (Palace) was changed from a Star of David to a generic symbol due to Nintendo of America's policies on religious imagery.

Japanese English
LTTPMiseryMireTileJ.gif LTTPMiseryMireTileU.gif

Dungeon Map Differences

In the European versions, one of the largest rooms of Misery Mire was modified a little bit. According to the change date in the source code, the change was made on June 2, 1992.

Japanese, US, Canadian UK, German, French
ALTTP Final Room0A2.png ALTTP Final RoomFA2.png
(Source: Dark Linkaël)

Ending

Some lines of the ending sequence were altered between releases:

Japanese English
ALttP Loyal Priest.png ALttP Loyal Sage.png

Another religious reference was removed; Priest was replaced with Sage.

Japanese English
ALttP Finger Webs.png ALttP Flippers.png

The Flippers were originally mistranslated to "finger webs" in the Japanese version despite the Zora Flippers clearly being for feet, likely because the Japanese word for webbed digits or flippers (水かき) doesn't discriminate between human hands or feet. They also forgot to re-center the text when doing so (this can be seen in the other text revisions as well, but not as clearly as in this example).

Japanese English
ALttP Ocarina Boy.png ALttP Flute Boy.png

Changed since the Ocarina is called a Flute in the English version.


Credits

An extra script credit for the localization effort was added to the English version.

ALttP Script Writers.png


The spelling of Ganon's name was changed in the Quest History to be consistent with the rest of the localization.

All text in the game was drawn a few pixels higher in frame in the English version to allow space for the lowercase characters. As a result of this, the Quest History stats came out looking a little bit awkward - the regular text isn't correctly aligned with the smaller secondary text that is otherwise only present in the ending of the game.

Japanese English
ALttP Gannon's Tower.png ALttP Ganon's Tower.png

Miscellaneous

  • In the Japanese version, there is no "howling wind" ambient sound when you're in the Skeleton Forest like there is on Death Mountain. This sound was added in the US version of the game.
  • In the Japanese version, the messages from the maidens you rescue differ from the regular dialogue text in the game: each paragraph gets deleted before the next one appears, rather than scrolling. In the English version, this style is only present in the message the spirit of the Triforce gives you.
  • The text speed is a lot faster in several places in the Japanese version, such as in the prologue.
  • When trying to use Ether against Gibdo (mummies), in the Japanese version they are outright destroyed, while in the US and Europe versions they are only frozen. This behavior would be changed in the Game Boy Advance version later.
  • The areas containing the library, twins' house, maze minigame, and blacksmiths' shop always play the Light Overworld theme in the Japanese version. In the US and European versions, they share their background music with Kakariko Village, and (like the village itself) will only play the Light Overworld theme after defeating Agahnim at Hyrule Castle.

Revisional Differences

Hmmm...
To do:
Several more glitches. See the AGDQ 2016 run of this game for reference.

Glitches in Japanese v1.0

  • After getting the Pegasus Boots, by pressing Y + A at once, you can dash while holding out an item. The item's function can be influenced by this, too: by using the Hammer, for example, you can knock down multiple pegs, which makes the "field of pegs" Heart Piece east of the Village of Outcasts much faster. While using the Shovel in this way will create a trail of holes, it won't actually dig up any items (and as such can't be used to cheese the digging minigame).
  • In the Dark World, there's a ledge on Death Mountain that connects two parts of Turtle Rock. By using the Magic Mirror on the above ledge, you could warp on top of the wall, then jump down to the Turtle Rock ledge and skip a large portion of the dungeon. In later versions, you can still warp on top of the wall, but you won't be able to jump down.
  • In any area with movable blocks where you can't use the Magic Mirror (like the watergate room in the Light World), push the movable block and try to use the Mirror at the same time, and the block will disappear completely.
(Source: darkeye14)
  • By jumping into the water next to a screen boundary, if you fall into the water and trigger the screen transition at the same time Link will start swimming in deep and shallow water even if you don't have the Flippers.
  • Attempting to dash and release a charged up spin attack at the exact same time turns Link into a glitched state. If in this state you step on a ladder/stairway and then step off again, Link will gain ludicrous speed and be able to clip through some ledges and walls. Using the Hookshot while pressing Y + A as described above has the same effect.
  • It's possible to interrupt the animation of Link falling down a hole by getting grabbed by a Wallmaster or having a mortal blow delivered (i.e. bomb explosion). Performing the latter when you have a bottled Fairy puts Link in a glitched state (?).
  • Using a potion and triggering a screen/room transition at the same time causes a race condition where two functions write to the same variable, typically corrupting the game's memory. The effects depend on where you are and what kind of potion you use:
    • Doing this with a Blue Potion causes the game to open the Flute menu, even if you don't have the Flute and even in the Dark World. Doing this from the Dark World will take you to the Light World until you screen transition, upon which time you'll be loaded into the Dark World equivalent of whatever screen you were supposed to transition to. This can also occur in dungeons, which results in you ending up in a massively graphically glitched version of the dungeon room map upon screen transition.
    • Doing this with a Green Potion causes the game to heal all of your health (Green Potions normally only restore magic). It can also cause the camera to become offset, and in dungeons it results in room transitions and the room's data (including items in chests) to be loaded from the next room.
    • Doing this with a Red Potion causes the view to center on Link (similar to "making a wish" in front of Desert Palace). It also has the same secondary effects as the above.

Glitches in Japanese v1.0 and v1.1

  • In the Tower of Hera, there's a hole at the very right side of 3F that's next to the wall. Drop down the right side of it to end up on 2F, inside the wall. Jump off to the right and you're "under the floor", from where you can just run straight to the ending! The hole was moved to the left in later versions, fixing this bug.
  • In the Dark World, killing yourself inside a shop or house will cause Link to reappear on the Pyramid of Power with no music. Switching the screens afterwards causes the Light World music to play, rather than the Dark World music.
(Source: darkeye14)
  • If you make a regular slash with your sword against bombable walls, you'll hear the same sound effect as when you cut bushes. (Not to be confused with the "hollow" sound effect you get when you "thrust" your sword against those same walls, which was already in place.) This of course doesn't make much sense and was corrected in v1.2, though oddly was reinstated in Inishie no Sekiban.
  • It is possible to beat Ganon without the Silver Arrows, simply by slashing him while he's warping away. While this is still possible in later versions, the input window to deal damage to Ganon in this way was reduced to two frames, making this practically impossible outside of tool-assisted speedruns.

Virtual Console

All flashing effects (such as those on the title screen, or caused by Agahnim's lightning attack or the Ether Medallion) were toned down severely as part of Nintendo's newer policies in order to lower the risk of epileptic seizures.

Oddities

LTTP unreachable bats.png

In the cave used to access Death Mountain (where the Old Man is lost), just before the exit there is a formation of six Keese. Due to the way the formation is placed in the narrow passage, the two Keese on the far ends are too far inside the wall to have their movement triggered and cannot be reached by any weapon aside from the Medallions.