Action role-playing game
An important influence on the action RPG genre was the 1986 action-adventure, "The Legend of Zelda", which served as the template for many future action RPGs. In contrast to previous action RPGs, such as "Dragon Slayer" and "Hydlide," which required the player to bump into enemies in order to attack them, "The Legend of Zelda" featured an attack button that animates a sword swing or projectile attack on the screen. It was also an early example of open-world, nonlinear gameplay, and introduced new features such as battery backup saving. These elements have been used in many action RPGs since.
The Legend of Zelda (video game)
"GameSpot" featured "The Legend of Zelda" as one of the 15 most influential games of all time, for being an early example of open world, nonlinear gameplay, and for its introduction of battery backup saving, laying the foundations for later action-adventure games like "Metroid" and role-playing video games like "Final Fantasy", while influencing most modern games in general. In 2009, "Game Informer" called "The Legend of Zelda" "no less than the greatest game of all time" on their list of "The Top 200 Games of All Time", saying that it was "ahead of its time by years if not decades".