[Chicken Knife]

No worries, if you still want the game to behave the same way as it did before for the Dolls, all you have to do is reinsert the original bytes to the following two locations:

One of the things I like about this hack is that most changes have been documented throughout the thread, so if there is one particular change one person is not too fond of, one can simply search for it in the thread and undo it.

I appreciate you providing the location I need to switch with the original bytes, but I hope this kind of thing doesn't become the norm for your future projects. I've been a fan of your work over the years and have turned many people on to your patches specifically because you always took a conservative approach and improved classic games without taking these kinds of gameplay liberties.
February 18, 2019, 01:16:44 pm - (Auto Merged - Double Posts are not allowed before 7 days.)

On the convenience part I'd argue against that, but everything else, I feel the same way you do.    I love having challenge in video games, and I think, like you, actively avoiding power-ups to make it harder isn't the best choice for design.  Though some people do enjoy that for challenge runs - like avoiding leveling to do low level runs.  As for Zelda II, it has never been that challenging for me, as well.  That's one of the reasons my Zelda II hacks are so hard, ha ha.

With these statements of agreement, now I'm sitting here incredibly confused over why you are making the game easier

[ShadowOne333]

I appreciate you providing the location I need to switch with the original bytes, but I hope this kind of thing doesn't become the norm for your future projects. I've been a fan of your work over the years and have turned many people on to your patches specifically because you always took a conservative approach and improved classic games without taking these kinds of gameplay liberties.

I do feel your worry over this change.
I also thought that it would perhaps make the game easier, but on closer inspection, it's not that much easier.

First off, you would have to get out of your way to get each one of the Link Dolls, and this would by no means make the beginning portion of the game easier, it would only see a real benefit once you reach the later part of the game, which is where all of the long trips are taken, and where most lives are lost just to get to a certain late-game palace if you start from Zelda's Palace. IIRC, only two dolls are located in Western Hyrule, so that makes you'll get 5 lives tops once you hit Eastern Hyrule, and that's when I believe most lives you get are worth their juice.

Second, and perhaps the most important detail, players doing new runs of Zelda II wouldn't know the Link doll doesn't count towards your total amount of lives. So if they end up getting one Doll during normal play, they will lose it's advantage and the overall meaning of collecting them when they reset or restart the game. This kind of hack makes it so that the Dolls are actually worth getting during your normal play of the game, instead of saving them all for the very end (The very last one is at Great Palace, too).

Taken the whole game into consideration, I think having them be a permanent life addition instead of a temporary one is more of a QoL hack for something that I bet most players will not even know unless they are already experienced Zelda II players.

[Chicken Knife]

I do feel your worry over this change.
I also thought that it would perhaps make the game easier, but on closer inspection, it's not that much easier.

First off, you would have to get out of your way to get each one of the Link Dolls, and this would by no means make the beginning portion of the game easier, it would only see a real benefit once you reach the later part of the game, which is where all of the long trips are taken, and where most lives are lost just to get to a certain late-game palace if you start from Zelda's Palace. IIRC, only two dolls are located in Western Hyrule, so that makes you'll get 5 lives tops once you hit Eastern Hyrule, and that's when I believe most lives you get are worth their juice.

Second, and perhaps the most important detail, players doing new runs of Zelda II wouldn't know the Link doll doesn't count towards your total amount of lives. So if they end up getting one Doll during normal play, they will lose it's advantage and the overall meaning of collecting them when they reset or restart the game. This kind of hack makes it so that the Dolls are actually worth getting during your normal play of the game, instead of saving them all for the very end (The very last one is at Great Palace, too).

Taken the whole game into consideration, I think having them be a permanent life addition instead of a temporary one is more of a QoL hack for something that I bet most players will not even know unless they are already experienced Zelda II players.

I appreciate your very thoughtful response, but I wish I was more convinced by it. I'm curious what the breakdown of new versus existing players is with hacks like this. From my experience chatting about hack projects in facebook gaming groups, it's not typically the young-ins going back to play these thirty year old games or wanting to deal with rom patching in general. Evidence tells me it's primarily those who grew up with them in the first place looking for a reason to revisit. If it would be helpful for you, I have a 30 year old friend who is literally waiting on this being finished to play Zelda 2 for the first time. She is pretty thorough at finding things and I could come back and tell you exactly how many she finds. For me, I know that I'll running on at least 8 lives without looking at any references. With my last playthrough of your patch, I was finding the end section of the game already a lot easier based on the higher XP accumulation rates and the fact I was maxing out all my levels by the 6th palace (I do grind a little admittedly.) I honestly missed the feeling of awe and danger the original game used to give me in the latter stretch. When I think back, you've done a ton of little things to make the game easier. These include lack of XP draining from enemies, higher magic potion and xp bag drop rates, higher xp yield from some enemies, i'm not sure about this one but lower damage in some cases? Also, I'm not certain but lower magic consumption rates? Lower hits required to kill farm-able enemies. Restart in Palace as well. All of those minor changes added up together along with this new change of accumulating a slew of lives makes the game far, far easier.

[IcePenguin]

With these statements of agreement, now I'm sitting here incredibly confused over why you are making the game easier

Fair point, but the Life doll hack does fit within the scope of what ShadowOne is trying to accomplish with Redux.  He mentioned in his original post about improving upon the mechanics of the original (or obnoxious things) to make it an overall more enjoyable experience.  The Link doll thing was mentioned a few times by other users throughout the topic, which frankly, fits along those lines. 

[Chicken Knife]

Fair point, but the Life doll hack does fit within the scope of what ShadowOne is trying to accomplish with Redux.  He mentioned in his original post about improving upon the mechanics of the original (or obnoxious things) to make it an overall more enjoyable experience.  The Link doll thing was mentioned a few times by other users throughout the topic, which frankly, fits along those lines. 

I suppose that means you are thoroughly absolved and Shadowone333 is the individual to be complaining to. 

[ShadowOne333]

I appreciate your very thoughtful response, but I wish I was more convinced by it. I'm curious what the breakdown of new versus existing players is with hacks like this. From my experience chatting about hack projects in facebook gaming groups, it's not typically the young-ins going back to play these thirty year old games or wanting to deal with rom patching in general. Evidence tells me it's primarily those who grew up with them in the first place looking for a reason to revisit. If it would be helpful for you, I have a 30 year old friend who is literally waiting on this being finished to play Zelda 2 for the first time. She is pretty thorough at finding things and I could come back and tell you exactly how many she finds. For me, I know that I'll running on at least 8 lives without looking at any references. With my last playthrough of your patch, I was finding the end section of the game already a lot easier based on the higher XP accumulation rates and the fact I was maxing out all my levels by the 6th palace (I do grind a little admittedly.) I honestly missed the feeling of awe and danger the original game used to give me in the latter stretch.

Oh that's nice, I didn't know you she was waiting on this hack to make her first playthrough of Zelda II.
It would be interesting for sure to know what she thinks of it, and how well or how poorly balanced the game is with these new changes.

The main thing I take into consideration when making a change for this hack is:
How much would this change have made me enjoy Zelda II a lot more if I first played it with it implemented?

That's my basis, and I clearly remember that the Link Doll thing was one of my gripes with the game when I first played it (my first playthrough of it was in the Zelda Collection for GC btw).
I believe the very first problem I had was the saves count as deaths, that gave me cholera, and a close second was the Link Dolls, because at the point I realized I couldn't get them back, I already took like 4 of them, before even getting to the 6th palace.

But I think it's a fair point you make.
Still, if you don't like it, and others also don't feel like this change is worth having, I could make it an optional patch.

[IcePenguin]

I suppose that means you are thoroughly absolved and Shadowone333 is the one to be complaining to. 

Haha, of course not!  It's pretty much my fault since I was the one to make the hack.     Ah, ShadowOne beat me to it, but it would be easy enough to make an optional patch to keep the old functionality, or have the new one.  There are already optional patches for some other things.

[Chicken Knife]

Oh that's nice, I didn't know you she was waiting on this hack to make her first playthrough of Zelda II.
It would be interesting for sure to know what she thinks of it, and how well or how poorly balanced the game is with these new changes.

The main thing I take into consideration when making a change for this hack is:
How much would this change have made me enjoy Zelda II a lot more if I first played it with it implemented?

That's my basis, and I clearly remember that the Link Doll thing was one of my gripes with the game when I first played it (my first playthrough of it was in the Zelda Collection for GC btw).
I believe the very first problem I had was the saves count as deaths, that gave me cholera, and a close second was the Link Dolls, because at the point I realized I couldn't get them back, I already took like 4 of them, before even getting to the 6th palace.

But I think it's a fair point you make.
Still, if you don't like it, and others also don't feel like this change is worth having, I could make it an optional patch.

Zelda 2 was an admittedly divisive game. I suppose you are coming from the perspective of someone who was turned off by it (there are many like you) and I'm coming from the perspective of someone who loved it from the beginning in spite of its at times brutal nature--even more so than Zelda 1 in fact. I'm just a guy who wants a spiffier version with a cleaner UI, touches of graphical polishing, a real pause screen, a way to save without dying, and much needed translation improvements--particularly with things like the "spell" spell. I think the problem with death counters is one of the few things we can totally agree on as it had no other function but to annoy you.

There are more of you than there are of me out there as far as Zelda 2 players so I have to remind myself of this in order to feel better about the situation.  And it is your hack after all. I'm just a backseat driver here.

[ShadowOne333]

Zelda 2 was an admittedly divisive game. I suppose you are coming from the perspective of someone who was turned off by it (there are many like you) and I'm coming from the perspective of someone who loved it from the beginning in spite of its at times brutal nature--even more so than Zelda 1 in fact. I'm just a guy who wants a spiffier version with a cleaner UI, touches of graphical polishing, a real pause screen, a way to save without dying, and much needed translation improvements--particularly with things like the "spell" spell. I think the problem with death counters is one of the few things we can totally agree on as it had no other function but to annoy you.

There are more of you than there are of me out there as far as Zelda 2 players so I have to remind myself of this in order to feel better about the situation.  And it is your hack after all. I'm just a backseat driver here.

It's okay
I will add it as an optional patch for sure, so don't worry about it!

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

EDIT:
Patch added
https://www.dropbox.com/s/iryxgegnyfidey9/OriginalLinkDolls.ips?dl=0
Enjoy!

[IcePenguin]

Amongst the constuctive discussion, I was doing some tests with the life counter.  It didn't occur to me that the tiles for the numbers are located right before the alphabet, so if the player does exceed 9, it'll show A, B, C, etc.  Thinking on it, I actually quite like that, ha ha.  It has a certain... charm to it.  I could still try to implement a visual cap for the counter, but just wanted to express my thoughts on that before going further.  What do you think?  Would you rather it not display above 9?

I'm just a backseat driver here.

Nah, you're just a hardcore Zelda II fan!    Not enough people like that in this world.

[ShadowOne333]

Amongst the constuctive discussion, I was doing some tests with the life counter.  It didn't occur to me that the tiles for the numbers are located right before the alphabet, so if the player does exceed 9, it'll show A, B, C, etc.  Thinking on it, I actually quite like that, ha ha.  It has a certain... charm to it.  I could still try to implement a visual cap for the counter, but just wanted to express my thoughts on that before going further.  What do you think?  Would you rather it not display above 9?

So it does keep counting properly?
That's neat.
However, I do feel that will screw us up with the counter at the Spell menu.
That one's one digit only, it would require a rewrite of the menu to be able to accommodate two digits for lives.
I say let's go for the cap at 9, it's the most proper solution without sacrificing other stuff atm.

[Chicken Knife]

I have a possible compromise to throw into the arena since I am sympathetic to your desire to provide the dolls with lasting value of some kind. Since there are 6 dolls in the game, what if it took 3 dolls acquired to give you one permanent extra life? That would limit your max lives to 5 for completionists and 4 for the average player. 3 is a magical number in Zelda after all. The dolls could also provide a temporary increased life as they did before.

Thank you for the optional patch btw!

[ShadowOne333]

I have a possible compromise to throw into the arena since I am sympathetic to your desire to provide the dolls with lasting value of some kind. Since there are 6 dolls in the game, what if it took 3 dolls acquired to give you one permanent extra life? That would limit your max lives to 5 for completionists and 4 for the average player. 3 is a magical number in Zelda after all. The dolls could also provide a temporary increased life as they did before.

Thank you for the optional patch btw!

If I understand correctly, you mean getting the Dolls as if they were pieces of heart in theory?
Like:
4 Pieces of Heart = 1 Extra Heart
3 Dolls = 1 Extra Life
Like that?

[Chicken Knife]

If I understand correctly, you mean getting the Dolls as if they were pieces of heart in theory?
Like:
4 Pieces of Heart = 1 Extra Heart
3 Dolls = 1 Extra Life
Like that?

Precisely. It would make the dolls a much more important discovery plus it wouldn't imo break the game.

[IcePenguin]

Precisely. It would make the dolls a much more important discovery plus it wouldn't imo break the game.

Interesting idea.  Well, the current Link doll hack is already half-way set up for something like this.  I'd just need to use a second byte in memory that keeps track of Link dolls collected, then adds 1 to the permanent value when you get 3.  So in total, it would use 3 bytes in RAM.  The problem is finding a way to keep track of the link dolls separately from your lives in-game.  It would be a lot of work to make an entirely new number counter, and then to find room for it in the inventory menu...     I could get it working, but might have trouble with creating a whole new counter in the menu.

Trax has done it for his hack, so it is possible.

[mdtauk]

If it is collected like a piece of heart.

And if it acts like a piece of heart.

Replace the sprite with a piece of heart.

[Chicken Knife]

If it is collected like a piece of heart.

And if it acts like a piece of heart.

Replace the sprite with a piece of heart.

Hmm. Heart containers do exist in the game already. Those extend your life bar as opposed to adding a permanent extra life--two different things. I vote to keep them as dolls.

[mdtauk]

Hmm. Heart containers do exist in the game already. Those extend your life bar as opposed to adding a permanent extra life--two different things. I vote to keep them as dolls.

Heart Containers and Pieces of Heart.  But whatever you do, maybe change the sprite to be something less, silly.

Could be something like Crazy Tracey's magic bottle.

[IAmCaptPlanet]

i almost think an alternate reward for the final leveling up that just a 1-up would be cool

i am not sure what that could be at all. but to max every score and have every life, then get a super reward would be cool.

maybe a (just ideas) something like a tunic color change?, or change the color of his sword, or something visual, or change the HUD to not show levels anymore just "MAX POWER", or something?


also, i still feel like that ugly little "M" sitting there is not a good thing. could it be changed to "Magic" written out and also leave the "L" but changed out to "Life"?

i know that everybody knows Hearts are life, but it seems a little weird for one to be labeled and not the other


and lastly, i LOVE LOVE LOVE the thought of having the level up screen not pop up on it's own. that is really really cool, but are you saying, to get to it, you basically hold start longer when you leave the magic menu? that is a true keeper, i love it.

yeah, i think Left and right to switch between them would be a smidge more natural, like "Z" and "R" switches submenus in OoT. but it would still be fine.

most of these single patches make me want to replay Z2:AoL, but to think of them all together is gonna BE LIT!


---edit---
there was a whole other page that i failed to read before this post, lol. sorry

i think most of us are all for the Doll change tbh. it seems like a screw-up from Nintendo. they should clearly be saved over a save/reset cycle. especially if you had to suicide (losing all dolls) to just save the game.

that would be like giving Mario a mushroom, but then not letting him use it until 8-4. lol


also, Crazy Tracy's bottle, or a bottled fairy item could be cool for newbs. you could make it where you have to go collect it every time to use it? blah, that would ramp up the easy though. effectively doubling your life.

also, did i recall correctly? are hearts added in the game? some enemies drop them? becase changing the life bar to hearts would not really be essential unless you could pick up life hearts?

and, just one more last suggestion, i would slightly (slightly!) alter the square where Bagu lives, to be just a tiny bit different than the surrounding tiles, i always had trouble with this one as a kid, i actually thought it was randomized back then. lol

[IcePenguin]

also, i still feel like that ugly little "M" sitting there is not a good thing. could it be changed to "Magic" written out and also leave the "L" but changed out to "Life"?

i know that everybody knows Hearts are life, but it seems a little weird for one to be labeled and not the other

also, did i recall correctly? are hearts added in the game? some enemies drop them? becase changing the life bar to hearts would not really be essential unless you could pick up life hearts?

The "M" tile is a bit tricky.  It could be reworked into something similar to hearts, but it wouldn't be a truly accurate representation for your magic total.  Then on the other hand, if it stays as a meter, there is an issue with the "active" magic tile, which slides down the meter, going outside of the magic display when empty.  The "M" covers this up so you'd never see this in-game.  Honestly, it will probably just stay that way.  It'd be easy to add some text above the heart gauge that says "-Life-" kinda like in ALttP, but only if there is enough free tiles left for gfx - which there probably aren't, ha ha. 

There are no heart pick-ups.  Just a new heart gauge.  This is something that's been desired in Zelda II for a very long time, and although just an aesthetic change, definitely fitting for a Zelda game.  It is quite a change from what were used to in Zelda II, but it works pretty well.

Adding heart drops would be cool.  That's something I can look into.