Another curiosity about The Minish Cap. This is probably only interesting for people, who live in Europe. I'm recently replaying The Minish Cap, but this time I decided to check out the North American version, which is somehow special. Well, The Minish Cap was the only Zelda game, which was released in Europe, before it came out in the US. "OMG, nooo, say it ain't true, Europe got a Zelda game before the USA?" Of course the biggest insolence in the history of release dates did get a close shave by adding an additional feature to the U.S. version of the game, added by Nintendo of America. They advertised that the U.S. version would have "more", probably to reduce import sales, since the European version came with English screen text. There was speculation for a while, what this feature could be. A lot of people hoped for the missing third Oracle house, but what they did get probably wasn't so satisfying:
A third bomb bag upgrade. Which is availabe at Stockwell's for 600 rupees after you bought the Boomerang. If you collect all three bomb bag upgrades you can carry up to 99 bombs, while Europeans had to get along with only 50 bombs, which isn't much, if you want to blow up all of Hyrule. So, I checked this out by myself, because I couldn't believe this bomb storage miracle until I saw it with my very own eyes.
While this doesn't seem to be much (and we all agree, that American Zelda fans would have deserved at least the third Oracle house and an exclusive bonus dungeon, which holds the Cane of Somaria), if we here in Europe would have gotten an additional bomb bag each time we had to wait longer for a Zelda game than the rest of the world, we would swim in an ocean of bombs right now.
But this "feature" seems to be more or less just a bug fix. I'm not so sure right now, but it seems like the Japanese version did have the third bomb bag upgrade too and that it was just missing in the European version. Could have been easily a bug, that got fixed in the US version. Wouldn't be the only one, for example the nasty bug, where you can screw up the kinstone fusion with the scarecrows, which results in that you can't summon the Gorons and hence can't get one of the empty bottles and the Mirror Shield, got fixed as well.
But the moral of the story is a nice message to Nintendo of Europe. The last version should always be the best. Even if it's just a small gesture like an additional bomb bag, try to add something to the game to make good for the long waiting time. Because every day we have to wait, while the game is already released in other parts of the world, is a potential day, where someone blows an image of the final boss into our faces. The waiting time is always hard for European Zelda fans and it should be rewarded.
A third bomb bag upgrade. Which is availabe at Stockwell's for 600 rupees after you bought the Boomerang. If you collect all three bomb bag upgrades you can carry up to 99 bombs, while Europeans had to get along with only 50 bombs, which isn't much, if you want to blow up all of Hyrule. So, I checked this out by myself, because I couldn't believe this bomb storage miracle until I saw it with my very own eyes.
While this doesn't seem to be much (and we all agree, that American Zelda fans would have deserved at least the third Oracle house and an exclusive bonus dungeon, which holds the Cane of Somaria), if we here in Europe would have gotten an additional bomb bag each time we had to wait longer for a Zelda game than the rest of the world, we would swim in an ocean of bombs right now.
But this "feature" seems to be more or less just a bug fix. I'm not so sure right now, but it seems like the Japanese version did have the third bomb bag upgrade too and that it was just missing in the European version. Could have been easily a bug, that got fixed in the US version. Wouldn't be the only one, for example the nasty bug, where you can screw up the kinstone fusion with the scarecrows, which results in that you can't summon the Gorons and hence can't get one of the empty bottles and the Mirror Shield, got fixed as well.
But the moral of the story is a nice message to Nintendo of Europe. The last version should always be the best. Even if it's just a small gesture like an additional bomb bag, try to add something to the game to make good for the long waiting time. Because every day we have to wait, while the game is already released in other parts of the world, is a potential day, where someone blows an image of the final boss into our faces. The waiting time is always hard for European Zelda fans and it should be rewarded.
This glitch is still presen in the European 3DS re-release. Nintendo, fix that NOW!
ReplyDeleteCouldn't agree more ^ Just playing through the Euoprean 3DS release, first time playing through it. What the hell is this? It's really shitty.
ReplyDelete