The western packaging for the first Zelda game is the stuff of legend today, but we almost got a different version - as discovered by gaming historian (and Time Extension contributor) Martin Lindell.
Lindell has discovered a flyer that was sent to retailers back in the 1980s to showcase upcoming NES games, and while most of the games have the covers they launched with, Zelda and Punch-Out!! both display different variants.
What do you think of this cover? It's certainly in keeping with the theme of those early black-box NES titles, but does it have the same impact as the cover we actually got? Let us know with a comment below.
[source twitter.com]
Comments 4
very interesting. I am glad they went with the gold. Because you knew you must be buying something very special.
Reading the sales pitch is interesting. They must have been able to see into the future, because Nintendo already knew that Zelda was going to be a "series".
Link's smile
Nintendo was going to have Glass Joe as the cover guy? I am glad they ended up getting Mike Tyson.
Forget the box art change. The biggest revelation for me is that there's a slalom game for the NES.
It also proves that Zelda is not an RPG but an adventure game.
@Luigi05 Not only was there Slalom on the NES, it was Rare's first game on the platform!
Prior to that, they had done a few games on the ZX Spectrum under a different company name.
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