Meta Monday: Nintendo Power magazine's 1989 Zelda fanfiction

When I started thinking about putting together these Meta Monday posts, one of the first items I had in mind was today's topic.  I think this is probably a pretty obscure little piece of Legend of Zelda lore, but for some reason, it became planted firmly enough in my 11-year-old brain to get me to seek it out decades later...

In the very early days of Nintendo Power magazine, the publishers held a fiction contest.  I don't remember if I even saw the original announcement (I became a loyal reader but wasn't there from the very beginning), but the winners were announced in the magazine's sixth volume, May/June 1989.  The top entry was printed in that issue...the short story "Friends," by Robbie H. Lawton.

Image from Nintendo Power, and taken from this Tumblr post

For whatever reason, this story was really memorable to me.  Maybe it was the fact that, at the time, I was in the process working myself into an obsessive frenzy over the NES, and The Legend of Zelda was a magical and mysterious entity I had yet to explore.  Maybe it was because it seemed to be written by a kid like me, and I had an idea that I could contribute to the world of Nintendo with a creation like this.  And maybe it was just because it's a delightful little story.

In the tale, we meet young gamer Jason, who is working his way through the The Legend of Zelda like countless other youngsters at the time.  Instead of tapping away on a control pad, however, Jason climbs into his television and adventures around Hyrule as Link's partner.  The story is about searching for the seventh dungeon, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and...given away by the title...friendship.

Another image from the story, also snagged from that Tumblr post

I went to the right place when I decided to try searching up the old story, as a post on Reddit quickly led some kind and helpful Zelda fans to point me toward a thread started by a child of the Jason of the story (who goes by PunishedYoshi on Reddit).  It seems their grandmother actually penned the tale and submitted it to Nintendo Power, and after a long search, they finally located it in a Tumblr post by nteamhero.  If you'd like to read the story in full, just click that Tumblr link...it's a quick read and truly is...well, delightful!  (That's through my thick nostalgia glasses, of course...)  And according to PunishedYoshi, their grandmother also drew at least some of the accompanying pictures, in which case...awesome!

(And for whatever it's worth, it also seems that r/zelda has some genuinely nice folks among its posters...)

Anyway...I really love these little stories of things that happened on the periphery of gaming and pop culture history.  (And, the older I get, the more I think I just like remembering being young...)

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Since I jotted down some details on Toads for 5e and my fantasy heartbreaker the last time I talked NES on here, this seems like a good time to take a look at Link and Zelda's species...!

Hylians

Image from the Zelda Wiki

Hylians are very similar to humans and may indeed be simply a subgroup of humans.  They're pretty diverse themselves, though, as there seem to be various races and ethnicities within Hylians as a group.  It should be noted, however, that they have pointed ears and often a degree of innate magical ability.  So, maybe they're more like elves.  Largely town elves, I guess.  You can find out more about them at the Zelda Wiki's Hylian page.

Ability Score Increase:  Your Wisdom score increases by 2. Choose one additional ability score to increase by 1.

Age/Size:  Hylians seem to age at about the same rate and are around the same size as humans.  They are medium creatures.

Name:  Whatever you like!  Known Hylian names include Akrah, Benny, Garini, Irene, Link, Sonia, and Zelda.

Speed:  Your base walking speed is 30 feet.

Preternatural Hearing:  Hylians have excellent hearing and get advantage on all Perception checks involving listening.  In an ability that is also likely related to their pointed ears, Hylians are able to send and receive messages to and from other Hylians over great distances...and even when in different dimensions of existence.  To telepathically communicate in such a way, both Hylians must succeed on a Wisdom check.  Its base difficulty is 10, with 1 point added for each hundred miles of distance between the two Hylians.  If they are on different planes, the difficulty is simply 10, but both rolls are made with disadvantage.

Magical Nature:  Hylians know one cantrip that can be learned by any type of Mage in your campaign.  Per DM, this can be chosen or determined randomly from the spell list(s).  Hylians use Wisdom as their ability for any spellcasting checks.

Languages:  Hylians can read and speak Hylian and Common.  Other languages may be known according to the guidelines of your campaign.

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8-bit Legend of Zelda battle map

This weekend, I decided to take on another quest to put my university's resources to good use before I no longer have access to them.  I'd been thinking for a while that I should use our poster printer to make some sort of battle map or game board, but I wasn't sure what to print.  Lately, I'd become intrigued by how nicely the layout of the map from the original Legend of Zelda would work as a gridded battlefield, so I decided to give that a try.  Here's the 36" x 48" result:

(Presley's just there for scale.  I guess.  Honestly, getting in the picture was mostly her decision.)

I put a grid of thin white lines over it to divide it into (roughly) 1-inch squares.  (Apologies for all photography from here on out...I need to figure out how to take better closeups of minis...)

It certainly didn't come out perfect, as you can see by the line crossing over the right side of the dark "doorway" pictured below...and the white lines are tough to see on some of the lighter terrain...but overall, I'm pretty darn happy with it!

Now, I just have to figure out what to do with it.  It's actually been a while since I've had much use for a battle map divided into 5-foot squares.  I know I could use it for an RPG or minis game that doesn't need a grid, but now that I've gone to all that effort...maybe I can put the squares to use.

Hmm.  I haven't played HeroClix in a really long time, and while the squares are a bit small compared to Clix maps, it would probably work okay.

I'm thinking it would be a perfect battlefield for the old 3.5-era D&D miniatures game.  (I never actually played that in a head-to-head fashion, but I did use some of the stuff in the Miniatures Handbook in regular D&D.  I liked it quite a bit!)  Maybe I can do some sort of hybrid of D&D Minis with OSR rules...taking some cues from the game I play with Lego...?  There have to be some cool Zelda or not-Zelda miniatures out there.  Heck, some basic Greenskins would probably work as Moblin minis (though they should maybe become Blueskins):

If I had started this months ago, I may have gone to the effort to print up the whole dang map from The Legend of Zelda.  That could be a hell of a campaign!

Now, to see if I have access to a university laminator...