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This is my personal favorite hack of LTTP and probably the best one out there. As with the original (which I did not get very far in because of all the backtracking, see my review on the page), a lot of work was clearly put into this and I am more than impressed with it.

Unfortunately, this hack has a noticeable amount of glitched graphics, which I did not see much of in the original. I noticed the opening scene is slightly glitched and some of the enemies are as well. There have even been times where I have wondered if the enemies are supposed to be retextured like that or if these are more glitches.

I fully understand how it may be difficult to avoid these glitches. I mean, personally, I have never experimented with any LTTP hacking tool nor even attempted to mod any game at all. I just feel that these glitches should be looked into and have an attempt to be fixed. Despite all this, this is still a beautiful hack and I will likely be finishing this one, unlike the last one where I don't think I bothered to go past the guardhouse. As I mentioned in my review on the original Parallel Worlds hack, I wish you, the developers, the best of luck in your future works!

Great job, very profesional , A job that seems done by Nintendo professionals, those people who do not recommend it is because they do not know about the Zelda saga or have never played it! This is a recommended game for those who start loving Zelda games!

Every time I go into a room, it just puts me into the wall of the entrance with no way forward and no way back. It just softlocks.

As a disclaimer, I haven't played the original Parallel World. The overworld is kind of cluttered with too much stuff making it a bit hard to navigate. The new sprites are alright. I'm not a big fan of the tendency that a lot of hack and fan projects has to fetishize OoT. The Remodel dungeons can be empty or repetitive at time, but there's still some good exploration and puzzle solving. I don't even want to imagine the difficulty of the original. Still with all the criticism, I found myself wanting to go back to this game and see the end of it. The game could lead you through the critical path a bit more, but overall I would say the difficulty is fair and comparable to vanilla ALttP.

I've been playing this hack for a very long time now, and before I begin, I just wanna thank PuzzleDude for making the game more accessible to anyone who may want to play this game without all the extreme difficulty. That being said, let's get to the more controversial topic.

The Remodel Vs. The Original

Let me go on record and say that I've played the original Parallel Worlds all the way up to Impa's Ways (when I first entered the Parallel World) without the use of save states. So yes, I know when a game is too difficult or just right so that it's not pointlessly frustrating. What I'm saying is; The original hack is superior in every way, and I do mean every single way. The hack was clearly structured to accommodate the insane difficulty, much like how the original game, A Link to the Past, was built around it's own difficulty to appeal to both new players and veterans.

The reason why the Remodel and the original Parallel Worlds are so controversial amidst it's fans is because the remodel simply can't recapture the essence of the original hack. The smooth, professional flow of it. Though I adore the Remodel so much that I'm willing to boot it up any time and enjoy it, I can't just ignore that a lot of it feels poorly structured to accommodate it's now lower level of difficulty. Coupled with all the new abilities you have still in-tact from the original Parallel Worlds; the Remodel's even easier than the original game, A Link to the Past!

On the flip side, the original Parallel Worlds is so overly hard that it feels like it was made purely with Save States and Emulator exploits in mind, and even then. It's. Still. Too. Hard. It completely ruined whatever the creators were trying to accomplish, which was clearly something massive and extraordinary. I will always give Euclid and SePH credit where the credit is due, but they messed up hard when it came to this very vital aspect of a video game.

So then what does this all boil down to? The original Parallel Worlds was too hard, but it was designed to accommodate that. The Remodel isn't near as hard, but wasn't designed well enough to accommodate that. A perfect split. I say this because I truly do think this Remodel could use a 1.2 that redesigns it with it's new difficulty in mind so that the difficulty doesn't feel so jumpy and unstable.

Some rooms are completely empty, and just have you walking aimlessly with nothing to do. I realize this is probably a very common complaint that PuzzleDude's fed up of hearing by this point but it's the absolute truth. Some of these rooms could've easily used a few enemies or perhaps a few clever traps here and there to avoid. Heck, just a few enemies to run around at you like morons would be more than enough. Just have "something" in those empty rooms for goodness sake.

The most notable area in which this problem is at it's worst is the infamous Parallel Tower. The Remodel completely killed it's atmosphere of being the final dungeon of the game, and rendered every single maiden's hint useless. In-fact, I'd go so far as to say that their hints should've been replaced with just idle banter. At least then it wouldn't have been as misleading to players who probably never even touched the original Parallel Worlds. It'd be a massive letdown. Heck, it was a letdown for me!

When making a video game (this applies to hacks too) you want to try and make it accessible to as many people as you can. Though no money is involved and there's nothing to be gained from it other than the satisfaction, wouldn't you, as a creator, prefer to create something that more people enjoy than just a select few? I know I would, anyways. Also, the counter argument that hacking games isn't simple to do does make sense to me, since I'm very much aware how hard it actually is, but that doesn't matter. Developers have all kinds of tools to make their games with, but we can still criticize them!

Ultimately, I do feel this hack's fun to play and serves as a good way to, at the least, get to experience all of Euclid and SePH's amazing work without all the pointless hassle. Is it as good and balanced as the original game, A Link to the Past? Not even close. Rather, I like to consider it as a work of art and not like an official game, and with that in mind? Go and download this hack, because trust me, PuzzleDude's managed to make it much more easy to explore all the amazing ASM hacking and designing that Euclid and SePH spent so many years to make.

If you asked my non-professional opinion though, I'd tell you that Parallel Worlds (Remodel) is better than the original game, A Link to the Past, simply because of the art used for the environments. I'm a sucker for snow, and Parallel Worlds managed to make it look absolutely beautiful and even a tad unsettling. I prefer the Icy World over the Dark World, but again, that's my non-professional opinion! Parallel Worlds may never truly be as good as A Link to the Past in terms of quality, but the existence of this Remodel shows that PuzzleDude loved it so much, he was willing to go in and make it so those without godly skills could also enjoy it.

And for that, I am very thankful. I'm a skilled gamer (I like to think so) but I'm not absolutely perfect!

Firstly, the designs of both worlds were amazing. They were beautiful and exploring them was very enjoyable. I was often surprised by the number of secrets I could find even toward the end of the game. The mechanic of being trapped in the desolate Parallel World was unexpected and refreshing. I found myself eager to get the next clue for the Parallel Tower. I only wish they had actually mattered. The ending was a nice touch.

Unfortunately, this hack was tainted by inconsistent difficulty, weird dungeons, and rage-inducing unfairness. An example of the unfairness would be having indestructible enemies attacking you as you try to lift a large rock that's blocking the way forward. You can't stop them from attacking and you also have no way to progress without removing the rock, but their attacks stop the lifting animation from finishing. This is simply not fun and outside of the player's control.

The game was initially tough but acceptable. It quickly became absurd after leaving the Guardhouse. Enemies dealt too much damage. I had to start using savestates in Farore's Isle because a switch blocking the boss room makes it so you essentially have to redo the entire dungeon if you die at any point (including the boss). It really struck me as incredibly tedious. Hyrule Castle was also frustrating. A source of difficulty there and in later dungeons was the sheer number of Medusas - the indestructible turrets that shoot fireballs periodically. The worst was when they were placed by pits, rocks, or in boss battles.

My playthrough almost ended at Nabooru's Hole. This dungeon required taking lots of damage intentionally to reach the end. I could never survive despite having the Blue Mail and 2 Red Potions in reserve. I later discovered that you're expected to have the Cane of Byrna by that point to protect you from some of the damage. The problem is that it's hidden and you can progress through the game without getting it. You can't go back for it once you enter the Parallel World.

I was extremely disappointed by this game breaker. PuzzleDude has acknowledged this problem in some posts but technical limitations prevent him from fixing it. The only reason I don't strongly recommend against playing this hack is because this is avoidable or can be solved by cheating briefly.

The difficulty slowly went down after that. I was able to go without savestates in the later Parallel World dungeons. There were plenty of heart pieces available and the Blue and Red Mails made enemies less threatening. The Parallel Tower was long but sadly anticlimactic for the game's last dungeon.

Contrasting the excellent overworld were most of the dungeons. Strange and pointless rooms were all too common. Several dungeons relied on tedious mazes with few enemies. Except the ridiculously overused Beamos. Others had similar rooms of enemies over and over in long chains. It would be much better if we had access to dungeon maps. It was also annoying that many rooms looked like they had puzzles but were really just a bunch of blocks with no actual purpose. The designs were bad at communicating which rooms mattered and which were just filler. It's not clear whether the rooms were always like that or were mangled while making them easier. They definitely made me better appreciate the dungeons from the original A Link to the Past.

On the other hand, a few dungeons had solid designs. Mainly Rauru's Ruins and Ruto's Fortress (with some nice puzzles).

Lastly, the biggest challenge is knowing where to go next. I loved searching for characters to get hints. The beginning of the game does this well. The trail falls apart at Farore's Isle. Supposedly, the Running Guy at Kakariko Village tells you what to do, but I never got dialogue from him. It's worse in the Parallel World. The map only makes it more confusing by marking the Parallel Tower as the first dungeon. That's actually a known bug.

Overall... This hack is worth playing through if you can put up with the tedium and take the unfairness as a challenge. I feel like it could be so much better if the dungeons were redone and the hints were better. It really feels like some of the dungeons just weren't that good to begin with, then PuzzleDude had to hollow them out or strip out puzzles to make it reasonable. He's done a lot to make this into a playable game.

Truly an amazing game. Everything great about Link to the Past but shines in a new way! I appreciate that the Remodel is a more manageable playable game then the insanely hard regular version. I love the added graphics (sprites), the boat yard, new trees, etc etc, lots of new stuff and it all fits and feels exactly like Zelda. also.. Elsa really did a number on the dark world lol.

As a note: some of the text has been switched around between characters, places it shouldn't be, for example the thief told me "I am the triforce". It's happening more now. A lot of characters told me "Would you like to buy bottles" that were not selling bottles, etc. A boss said "I have been defeated" before we stared fighting. I know the struggle.. when you're making a game, you change some code and it offsets something else, but you don't notice it is offset until like months later.

Also, I don't really like the low heart beeping sound, I know it's that way in all Zelda games, but I wish there was a way to turn it off. It just makes the dying process more annoying, is distracting, hurts the harmony of the game in my opinion. It's sort of an aesthetic thing i wouldn't have noticed in the past, but personally I think talking it out could give a more relaxing breath to the game.

After completing and beating the first Parallel Worlds it was like a trophy to me, so fun, hard, and rewarding and after hearing the game was having a remodel I was looking forward to playing it, but I was wrong...

First off I'd like to say, this game is much more easier than A Link To The Past, very easy to dodge enemies, getting items without any troubles or hard-ship, things like keys and chests are just given to you without a challenge, backtracking was very reduced which is what made the original game great, no keys to find for the Parallel tower, getting the main item (Cane of Bryna) was no challenge at all, I remember I had to bomb jump across ledges to get it, and hear it's just given to you following a path, most of all the dungeons are very bland and just linear paths to the boss, and no extra mini bosses to fight.

And the part I dislike the most was only having to climb the Parallel Tower once, the identity of it is completely gone, the original you had to climb it at least 4x to get all the extra items to 100% it.

I would like to know how much complaining there was to make to this remodel, this game has no challenge in it, if you still think this is to hard than you must have never beaten ALTTP or have no patience at all.

If people wanted to beat Parallel Worlds, this is not even a viable substitute, i'm sorry, but I would not count you beating Parallel Worlds if you beat this remodel

4/10

So I just finished this hack. Overall it was really well done and a lot of fun. Took a bit of courage to go through areas that I've never heard of.

I tried the original parallel world and it was brutal. This was a good balance. However I do think it misses a bit of the Zelda ideal, in that it's a lot more linear now.

I really wish you would be able to go back to the "light" world sooner. But as it stands now, when you can finally come back, you can beat the game.

And unless I missed something, I think a bit of the parallel tower was lost. Apparently in the first hack you needed to go through 3 times, this time I went through once.

But overall I spent many an hour and had lots of fun playing this remodel. I do recommend it.

A complete Zelda - A Link to the Past hack is a tremendous achievement. When Euclid en Seph released Zelda - Parallel Worlds there was so much critical comment about the insane difficulty that I never could find the courage to start playing that hack. A shame, since so much work went into making that hack.

Now Puzzledude comes up with Zelda - Parallel Remodel in which the difficulty of Parallel Worlds is brought back to a normal level and the game is overall less confusing. That leads to a good game that by times feels as a true new 2D Zelda game. Especially the overworld design is beautifully done and you'll spend hours alone discovering every secret of this new world.

Too bad that the dungeon design is very bland and linear. Zelda games tend to stand out with clever dungeon design, this game however can't get near to that high standard. Dungeons are actually pretty boring and the whole design feels often uninspired. If only the amount of detail of the overworld was also found in the dungeon design, this would've been a game up on par with A Link to the Past itself.

Difficulty in this hack is indeed on an acceptable level. It's a bit harder than A Link to Past, but experienced players won't have problems to reach the end without using save states.

Overall this is a good hack to try when your looking for a new 2D Zelda adventure. You will have a good time with it!

This hack (of a hack!) claims to make Parallel Worlds, infamous for its steep difficulty level, less challenging and more entertaining. This is indeed true, as there is less (nearly) blind stumbling around in the dark and most of the puzzles and dungeons are more bearable. Key word: "most".

What this redux unfortunately fails to fix is the original game's difficulty curve, or rather the lack thereof. Dark World enemies that can kill you in one or two hits are still commonplace in the Light World. Mothula is still the first boss. Level 3 is... still Level 3, but brighter. PuzzleDude claims that you will be able to beat the game without using savestates, but unless you have patience that a saint would be jealous of, this is sadly not the truth (even with savestates, Farore's Isle - the aforementioned Level 3 - did everything in its power to turn me into a frothing madman, and it almost succeeded).

If more effort was made to make the game's difficulty curve feel more natural, this would be, more or less, the definitive version of Parallel Worlds. As it is, however, I can't see myself playing much further than the hell that is Farore's Isle.

Most of us that frequent this site have probably checked out the Zelda 3 hack, Parallel Worlds. It's a great hack and one of the better Zelda 3 hacks. The main problem with the hack was its grueling and unforgiving difficulty. Most people, I have heard, would have to use cheat codes to play the game or numerous save states. I still found it highly enjoyable but I can imagine a lot of people probably just got frustrated. Remodel makes the game a much easier experience and, in my opinion, much more in tune with the original game it was hacked from.

Many things have been changed or downright removed. The pacing of the game also moves more fluently so you will never spend more time than needed in a dungeon. As well, bosses are certainly easier than I remember from the original hack. To find out more about what's been changed check out the "readme" file that comes with the .ips.

Both of these hacks are really good but if you want to play something that plays more like Zelda 3 in that the difficulty is tuned back drastically, this is your hack.