Reviewing Monsters -- Zelda II: The Adventure of Link, Palace Enemies

Part 2 of my review of the monsters of Zelda II: The Adventure of Link. This time, we're covering the 'palace' enemies and the 'bosses' found in the palaces. Again, as mentioned in my previous article for Zelda II, the fan-wikis split the bestiary into 'overworld' and 'palace' enemies, and I've elected to done the same with my reviews of both. The Palace enemies also includes the typical dungeon/palace bosses. 

As mentioned before, Zelda II's combat is all side-scrolling, which is extremely unique even by early Zelda standards. And as what we did before, I'll cover some familiar faces that we have seen in the original Legend of Zelda, as well as enemies that we will see in subsequent entries first, before talking about the more unique one-off enemies that has only ever appeared in this game!

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Iron Knuckle

As with the overworld enemies, we'll go through the ones that show up in other Zelda games... though this is the first appearance of the Iron Knuckle, who'd later go on to become a recurring miniboss in Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask. I don't really have much to say here, though, it sure is a knight with a sword and a shield. Pretty interesting artwork with a straight-up sci-fi looking visor on the helmet, though. 

Bubble

Bubbles! Very much adorable, the Bubbles look basically how they do in subsequent 2D games, being a pixelated skull with an aura of red around it. The artwork offers a fun interpretation of why it's called a bubble. In addition to the protective bubble, the 'skull' is made out of smaller, multi-coloured bubbles in the shape of a skull! That's cool!

Giant Bubble

Okay, the artwork team probably didn't have a single consistent artist like Pokemon's Ken Sugimori, and it really kind of shows here where the 'Giant Bubble' doesn't have the same 'bubble' aesthetic as either the skull portion or the fire-bubble portion of the regular Bubble. The artwork for the Giant Bubble is a demonic Baphomet-esque goat skull on fire! It looks metal as hell, but if you didn't show me the names, I wouldn't have guessed that the two artworks are meant to be variations of the same enemy, when the sprites do have the same aesthetic. 

It's a bubble, but bigger, and shaped like a goat skull. Hitting a Giant Bubble splits it into two regular Bubbles, which, again, would make more sense if the giant goat-skull is also made up of tiny bubbles!

Stalfos

And our final 'returning' enemy is good ol' Stalfos, who's one of the handful of monsters in this game not to have official art. This is old Stalfos, though, a skeleton with a sword and shield. Not much to say here, the interesting Stalfoses are the minibosses from the 3D games, or the jumping ones from some of the 2D games. 

Parutamu

Interestingly, though, we do have a stronger Stalfos variant, who isn't called a Stal-something. Instead it's called the Parutamu, and it's got a helmet! The sprite also seems to imply some kind of upper-body armour. I'm not sure what the name is supposed to mean. Anyway, it sure is a skeleton with a helmet!

Aneru

Huh! The first time I saw the sprites for these enemies, I thought the Aneru were the prototype versions of Deku Babas -- being giant Piranha-Plant-looking monsters. But no, the artwork has the Aneru as these gigantic, eyeless giant snakes with a particularly nasty, monstrous mouth. It's more of a proto-Rope, except it doesn't behave like any snake enemy. No, instead, the Aneru are essentially reskinned (re-sprited?) versions of the Octoroks, shooting rocks or fireballs. In fact, some versions of Zelda II actually swap the locations of Anerus and Octoroks around! 

Wosu

I may or may not be talking out of my ass for this one, since, again, I've only read the story synopsis from the fan-wikis, but considering that all of the enemies here are guarding the 'palaces', then all of them are, in some way, connected to the Kingdom of Hyrule? Whether they're loyal to Zelda's evil-but-nameless brother, or if they're just there as a typical video game dungeon 'we exist to challenge whoever enters our temple' thing, it's interesting that the kingdom of Hyrule, as of this timeline, has finally given some of the beast-folk and monsters some jobs. 

Anyway, this is Wosu. He's a wolf man with a sword. Due to some mis-coding from the Iron Knuckle sprite, there's a pixel left over that makes his sword look like it's constantly dripping blood. I really don't have much to say here!

Fokka

Well, Fokka you, you mother Fokka! Okay. Phew. Got that out of my system. Anyway, other than the hilarious name, the Fokka are just yet another one of the many, many half-animal humanoids in this game. I get that it's a sprite game, but it's kind of a shame that the bird-humanoid doesn't... have wings? They couldn't give the Fokka some Fokking Hawkman-style wings? No, instead he's just a feathery guy with a sword and a shield, and a chicken head. The Fokka at least knows how to cover up with some armour, though, unlike some of the other half-naked beast-men. 

Fokkeru

Some of these enemies do receive brief write-ups in ancillary material, but not the Fokka or the Fokkeru. So we really have no idea if they are connected or not. They should be, right? Why else would they be called that? The Fokkeru is a much more bird-like creature, though, looking more like a bird with an upright humanoid body. It flies around and drops napalm bombs at Link. 

I would've dismissed Fokkeru quickly if not for the connection with the Fokka... and the fact that whoever drew the official artwork saw the very imporant need to slap on a pair of human woman titties on the Fokkeru. What? Why!

Ra

A creature that feels very much like a 'dungeon-only' creature, the Ra resembles the background of certain dungeons, which has a bunch of draconic gargoyle-like heads jutting out of the walls. Except some of them are Ra, and they will fly around and shoot beams at you. Not much to say, it's always interesting to see presumably magically enchanted golems or creatures that are created specifically to give adventurers a bad time. There's a lot of these in the other 2D games that I tend to not cover in these reviews. 

Mau

And the Mau is basically the same thing as the Ra, only it's a wolf head instead of a dragon head. I really don't have much to say here. 

Guma

There's a bit of a confusion because there's a common enemy called 'Guma' here, and a boss called 'Gooma'. I don't think they're meant to be the same thing, though, since they haev different sprites and everything. The Guma here is just a huge red cyclops with minotaur-like horns, and wield ball and chain weapons. Not a whole ton to say here.

Doomknocker

The Doomknocker is another humanoid enemy, another fully-armoured knight that wields a spiky club. The club apparently boomerangs back, for some reason. I mean, I guess this is a setting where scorpions have a giant eyeball for a head and shoot fireballs from their tails, and where stone dragon heads fly around and shoot fire on their own accord, but it's the Doomknocker's boomerang mace that bothers me. 

The Japanese name for the Doomknocker calls it a 'Hell Guma', connecting it to the red ogre-guy above, but I really couldn't find a reliable list of all the Japanese names for this game, unlike most of the other Zelda games I've previously reviewed on this blog. Shame!

Myu

Resembling Terrorpins or Spiky Beetles or something, the Myu are just like spiky domes that move around. Are they like, some kind of mutant snails? Some kind of artificial being like a golem or something? That artwork does kind of imply some kind of gastropod-like 'foot' below the spiky dome. Not much to say here, it sure is a spiky dome that gets the point across on what it is and what its function is in a action game. 

Mago

Taking the place of the Wizzrobes from the first game (and the rest of the franchise) are the Mago, who are hooded hag-like witches that can teleport and shoot flames at Link. Witches as enemies are a neat vriation on the hooded magicians, I guess, but there's a reason they brought the Wizzrobe back for basically the rest of the franchise. Their more inhuman vibe are just way more iconic-looking compared to just some lady in a hood!

Wizard

Oh yeah, a design that definitely would not fly nowadays. Zelda II is the last Zelda game to feature some Christian iconography, and both as an item (a cross to make ghosts materialize) and on the top of these hooded sorcerers. What are they meant to be? Some kind of 'fallen priest' or something? Some tie-in game guides note that the Wizards were Wizzrobes banished by the kingdom of Hyrule for cursing Princess Zelda to sleep, but that doesn't explain why they dress up like Crusade rejects. They are basically the same thing as Magos, but you have to reflect their magic spells back at them. 

Boss Bot

We covered Bits and Bots in the previous review, and Bots do appear in palaces, but there is one that's a boss in one of the dungeons called a Boss Bot. it's got very interesting-looking eyes, which look a fair bit more weirder than the standard 'angry eyes' you'd expect from a boss like this. When you defeat the Boss Bot, it splits into five regular Bots. Not much to say, other than this is a nice way to segue into the actual bosses:  

BOSSES:

Horsehead

Called 'Mazura' in the original Japanese version, all of these bosses guard the 'crystals' needed to be put into the statues at the end of each temple, which would unlock the Great Palace and allow Link to claim the Triforce. Horsehead is... a dude with a horse for a head! Some newer material gives additional backstory to Horsehead. Apparently the King of Hyrule created him from a horse. So the King is also some kind of magician?

Anyway, Horsehead wields a club and you have to hit Horsehead on his horse head to del damage, because the rest of him is armoured.  

Helmethead

I would've dismissed Helmethead (or 'Jermafenser') outright as just a bigger Iron Knuckle, but turns out that his boss fight has a hilarious mechanic -- his helmet head (heh) will detach and fly around, shooting fire. Why? Why does he do this? My guess is that the Helmethead is just an enchanted suit of armour, but then the aforementioned new material released in 2017 identifies the Helmethead as the former Royal Guard captain given new life by the King of Hyrule. Does he... Does he have an enchanted suit of armour that has the feature of remote-controlled fire-breathing helmet drones? Is he a ghost possessing the suit of armour? Why am I questioning the logic of a fantasy game so much?

Rebonack
No, this is the boring 'just a knight' boss. Rebonack looks cool, initially, riding on a floating, legless metal horse and wielding a lance. But destroy his toys, and turns out that Rebonack is a boring ol' Iron Knuckle enemy, which Link hsa to defeat as a 'second phase' of the boss fight. Not much to say, he sure is a knight. 

Carock

A sinister-looking cloaked sorcerer person, Carock is basically a souped-up version of the Wizard enemy, just without the creepier cross motifs and just being a pretty standard sinister hooded enemy. Pretty cool in the context of the game after mostly fighting eyeballs, bugs and beastmen, but otherwise I don't have much to say about him. 

Gooma

Another big ogre guy. The official artwork for this one has him be a giant muscular minotaur with shackles and fangs. He sure is a giant muscle dude with a ball and chain. The most interesting thing about this guy is the confusion with the 'Guma' enemy, and the fact that this guy doesn't even show up in the Japanese version, with Jermafenser/Helmethead showing up in the original Japanese version. Okay.

Barba

Ah, finally. A boss that's somewhat more interesting. So far it's all been kind of boring, yeah? Helmethead and Rebonack are kinda cool but they have such heavy miniboss 'vibes' instead of being bosses, you know what I mean? Barba (called Volvagia in some versions, and is the basis of the more iconic Volvagia from Ocarina of Time) is a giant serpentine Chinese Dragon that coils up from lava pits in his fire-themed dungeon, shooting flames at Link. 

Interestingly, Barba has different sprites, with the original Japanese version (left) and the official art being more explicitly based on an Eastern dragon, but the international English version giving him a different sprite with a more European-looking dragon head. It's interesting, but I do appreciate that by the time Barba/Volvagia makes a reappearance in the franchise, it's with a design that blends both aesthetics and looks unique. 

Thunderbird

Oh! Okay! Unlike what the name implies, the 'Thunderbird' isn't just a boring bird that shoots lightning, but some kind of winged... demon-angel statue god thing! I really wasn't sure what I was looking at with that sprite, but it certainly looks so much more impressive than just a bird (like a Fokkeru above or something) shooting lightning bolts. The Thunderbird looks like some kind of a sacred idol of a forgotten deity, except, of course, it flies around and attacks. That official artwork with an utterly psychotic face on a statue as it jumps down from the dark shadows of his boss chamber to attack Link is also far cooler than any other boss in this game by a far, far margin. Also, Thunderbird makes excellent usage of the sprite to really show off a rather disturbing visage that our head fills in the details on its own. The best thing from this game, by and far. 

Interestingly, despite being a Thunderbird, the Thunderbird is weak to thunder magic, and that's the only way to force it to reveal its face. 

Link's Shadow

And here we end with the final boss of this game, which is not Ganon! No, the guardian of the Triforce of Courage is instead a shadowy manifestation of Link himself, which kind of fits with what little lore we have in this game about the whole thing basically just Link proving himself worthy to gain the Triforce of Courage. It is admittedly a bit more trite looking back at almost 40 years of the game's history that an 'evil Link' exists. Obviously, the iconic 3D boss in Ocarina of Time, and several more other Dark or Shadow Links would show up in various games in the franchise. But this is the first one, so he gets some novelty points for that.