What is interesting about the NES Zelda game is that it only used half the space allotted to it.

I was totally unaware of this and that is really cool to know.

I recall that dungeon that you are talking about that was shaped like a Swastika, people need to remember that this symbol means something very different in Asian countries and that the Nazis actually committed copyright infringement by adopting it :)

It is surprising to hear that you were a bigger fan of Zelda 2 as that one got a lot of flack for not being as good because of the side-scrolling and random encounters in the wild that were pretty repetitive. Who can forget "I am Error" as well. I read that this was a translation issue but it is likely the only bit of dialogue that anyone remembers from that game.

I just kept getting stuck in Zelda 1.

This is part of why gaming was so amazing in the 80's. If you got stuck, you had no choice but to simply figure it out or ask someone on the playground. The concept of an internet wasn't something we could even fathom at the time. I remember facing some sort of spider looking boss that would just wipe the floor with me until one time I simply tried shooting an arrow at him. Turns out that was what they were trying to force you to do but with no indication that this was the case. After that the boss fight was easy.