More then half the game was ripped from LttP... from the final fight with Ganon to throwing bombs in the mouth of the fire temple boss to collecting the sages medalions, to the layout of the game, really man it was a move of the series into 3D more then reinventing it.  They get the cred for doing it and doing it perfectly I might add where other 2D series died when moving into 3D and making a targeting system that actually worked and has now been copied and/or has been tried to improved upon and most fail, the simple fact is it really didn't reinvent the Zelda wheel just showed how it should be done in 3D.

Maxwell, Claude, did you two even play the original game?

Yes multiple times and have it on my Wii VC at the moment...

The gold cart is sitting right over my NES right now. :)

Then both of you should recognize that what A Link to the Past did was not moving the series in new directions. It might be considered the height of the series in terms of 2-D iterations, but it did not establish new game types, it only established certain tropes (like having to draw the Master Sword).

The original game is what established what the games are all about up to this point, and is still the definitive experience for people looking for where Zelda gameplay came from. Link to the Past was arguably better - one could make a strong argument - but it brought no particular great, sweeping changes to the series.

I could get into a post about how Ocarina of Time actually did change things, and did so importantly, but it would take a long time and I don't want to write that unless you guys want to read it. I can! But only if you'd be all for seeing it.

What LttP did was perfect the 2-d Zelda game, and not revolutionize it.
What OoT did was set the bar for 3-d Zeldas (no other game ,except maybe Mario, made the transition this smoothly)
So when people say only those who started playing on N64 say OoT was the best are kidding themselves. In truth, there is no best out of the two, so the long running argument above seems kinda pointless

No one said LttP moved it in a new direction (though it sort of did). We said it perfected Zelda. It also moved it in the direction of modernization: Link's attacks and movement, the items, weapons and tools, the music, an actual plot and storyline, the representation of recurring Hyrule locations, boss strategies, backstory, etc.

OoT is just LttP in 3D, and not quite as good. What it did was bring the series into 3D and translated the existing formula into 3D, but everything else is pretty much lifted right out of LttP. 

Double post 

Is that a yes then

1. That was only the first part, and in LttP, that was with Aganim, which was really Ganon, but not the final battle.

2. That was the Dodongo Cave, and that was from the first game, so that's a series staple.

3. Wrong. It was collecting three things before the next act of the game. Simply collecting things is aother series staple.

4. Not really. There was no Lon-Lon Ranch. Hyrule Castle was in the center, not the top. The desert was southwest, not west. Lake Hylia was southeast, not south. Kokariko village was west, not northeast. And as for other locations, they were from the first two game.