Zelda, Metroid, Castlevania ... roguelikes?!
by John Bardinelli 
on Apr 10th 2007 11:04AM
Santiago Zapata has done something horribly, horribly geeky. As if
The Legend of Zelda,
Metroid, and
Castlevania weren't retro enough, Zapata has re-created each game as an
ASCII roguelike. Now, instead of hopping across pools of lava to collect an energy tank, you press "D" to jump, then tap the arrow keys to scoot across slightly darker characters that symbolize higher ground. Despite the obvious limitations the roguelike style presents, Zapata has managed to accurately emulate the feel of each game. You know, even though Link is a purple @ symbol.
All three games include a full arsenal of music and sound effects, and
CastlevaniaRL packs its own graphical tileset. Very little documentation is provided at the moment (the games are still works-in-progress), so start pressing buttons and you'll get the gist of things. Fortunately they aren't nearly as
complex as most roguelikes, so you don't need to remember that "Q" stands for "quaff" which means "drink".
