Jeremy Parish (Radio Edit) @jparish.bsky.social · 1d Even NINTENDO THEMSELVES called it "Zelda III" before launch, right there on the console's box
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I seem to recall Nintendo Power referring to it as Zelda III for a pretty long time as well in their Pak Watch section.
90s mags and the terms 'working title' and 'tentative title' would definitely like a word! (was never super clear on the differences, but those two I saw a fair bit.) so wouldn't be surprised if Nintendo did use 'Zelda 3' at any point.
People actually think people didn't say "Zelda 3?". Heck there was probably a time where I forgot it even had a sub title.
That's neat, but what's much funnier is this copy suggesting that one should buy a Super Nintendo and a copy of Zelda III because Zelda III is going to outsell other games, probably.
Imagine if we kept it up Can't wait for Zelda XXIII!
That Zelda Gaiden tho!
I once had to explain this to a young guy at a store who was extremely scandalized when I called it Zelda III. That’s just normal!
Lots of old Zelda fan sites continued numbering the games even after Nintendo dropped the numbers. Fans didn't stop until Majora's Mask. Zelda 5 (Ocarina of Time) is a thing, but not Zelda 6. 😆
Here's a screenshot from Germany's Nintendo Power equivalent from 1997 (Genuinely have no idea if these are meant to be sales or something else )
I recall many official mentions of "Zelda III"
It should really have been named "Super The Legend of Zelda".
complete with a ™ symbol, so they knew what was up.
We definitely called it Zelda III as kids.
I know people who still call them "Zelda 3" and "Zelda 64" (for Ocarina, yet Majora's Mask is still "Majora's Mask" for some reason.) Hell, Nintendo Power revealed Link's Awakening as "Zelda 4" when it was initially announced.
Trademarked and everything!
i refer to it as Zelda 3 !!!!!!
I remember a site (Siliconera, I believe it was), absolutely insisting repeatedly that Trails of Cold Steel was "Trails in the Flash" before its official localized title was made public.
Prior to release, Nintendo also referred to DK for Gameboy as “Donkey Kong ‘94”
We were denied Super Mario Bros 4 and Zelda III.
See also: Super Mario Bros. IV: Super Mario World
It’s still Super Zelda to me!
This reminds me that when I was growing up everyone called the PlayStation the PSX just because that's what video game magazines called it before it came out. I still do, and I can generally tell how old someone is if they call it the PSOne/PS1 instead.
It's cute how Metroid kept a tradition of having numbered names show up in title screens/promos. Like Super Metroid's intro calls it Metroid 3, Fusion called itself Metroid 4, and even the announcement trailer for Dread used "Metroid 5" as an alternate title.
Reminds me of all the awful forum arguments back in the day when Ocarina of Time revealed that Link was "a child". Both sides were awful but the sheer willfulness of the people insisting "Link was always that young" in the face of every piece of official art, Zelda 2 and Links Awakening was nuts.
I think they were still going with "Zelda V" for Ocarina sometimes too (although less often than Zelda 64)