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"BS-X Zelda"


The Stellaview System, a.k.a. "BS-X"

    You're probably wondering what the heck BS-Zelda is. First of all, "BS" does not stand for what you think it does. I really don't know what it stands for, maybe it doesn't stand for anything. Anyways, I will attempt to explain everything behind this. First of all, you need to know what Super Famicom is. That's simply the Japanese name for the Super Nintendo. In 1995 they released a special accessory for the Super Famicom called Stellaview, or BS-X. It was an add-on that attached to the bottom of the system. This system hooked the Famicom to a special satellite system where you could access games, special information, and gaming news. It was like the Sega Channel. Do you remember that? Well, using the Stellaview, you could download games and play them. Certain games were available only at certain times, for example you could only dowload a particular game between 12:00 and 6:00 on Friday, or something like that. The catch behind the games was that they were realeased in parts. You couldn't download the whole game at once, you had to wait to get a new part each week. This is how BS-Zelda came into being. BS-Zelda was a remake of Zelda I with SNES graphics. It was issued just like the other Stellaview games, i.e. it could only be downloaded at certain times. Unfortunately, the system flopped before Zelda was finished.
    Now, about the game itself. Like I said before, it was a remake of Zelda I. The game is not exactly the same. The overworld is smaller, and the levels are different. However, the game is definitely worth playing. It had a few disadvantages, though. First off, the game had a time limit of about 57 minutes or something like that. And the game was never completed, either. And in the original, Link wasn't the player; it was some mascot for the Stellaview (some little kid with a baseball cap). But don't be sad. There are gracious hackers out there who have hacked the game and made quite a few improvements on it. First of all, you can play as Link or even Zelda. They also eliminated the time limit. And best of all, people wrote the levels that were never finished, so you can beat the game.

Here are pictures of the Stellaview.


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