If they remade Zelda 1 would they take liberties towards making it less cryptic, or would it still require reading the manual and sharing secrets with friends (i.e., guides on the Internet in these days).

I think if they remade Zelda 1 they would probably want to make some changes to give it mainstream appeal in today's times. For example, making the mobs have an AI of their own instead of wandering around aimlessly, making additional tilesets for the dungeons to make them standout from each other, and providing an "easy" mode for people who don't care for a challenge.

Not saying that I personally wouldn't want a true remake of the game, but if Nintendo decided to do this, perhaps they could figure out a way to give players both versions of the game, since it wouldn't be as large of a project by today's standards.

Edit: Sorry for bumping an old thread; guess I didn't realize I was replying to an old message. :P

Didnt take long for a title to beat it!
Luigi's Mansion must be selling extremely well!

I am more or less with what you are saying.

1) Making it less cryptic - My understanding is that the original English translation was poor in a lot of cases.  Making the translation better might fix a lot of the "cryptic" clues.

2) Additional tilesets - Yeah I am hoping part of improving the graphics would be making the rooms more visually pleasing even on a design level.

3) Improved AI - I am actually fine with the AI the way it is, but maybe I would like it better if they improved the AI.  Don't know.

4) easy mode - Why not?  Why not also include a hard mode as well?

5) Speaking of modes - I would actually like them to have some sort of randomization option for both the dungeon layouts and item placement.  That would actually add a ton of replay value, and it wouldn't be too hard to do without breaking the game.  Zelda 1 was mostly designed so that you could go anywhere and finish the dungeons in any order.  That is why a randomizer would a good idea.