The Year of Zelda

I got a Wii for Christmas.

Yes, I'm a bit late to this particular party, but then when it comes to Nintendo home consoles I always have been. I'm not much of a Nintendo fan by any stretch of the imagination. Those who know me or have read the blog know of my complete ambivalence to anything with the name of a certain mustachioed plumber attached to it. However, that doesn't stop me enjoying the rest of what their consoles can offer. I have an N64 and a Gamecube, and I've also owned a version of every Nintendo portable since the Game Boy Colour.

My Nintendo consoles add flavour to the more mainstream portions of my gaming diet, like a delicious chocolatey desert compared to the meat and veg of Sony or Microsoft. I may not be bothered by much in the way of Mario, but that still leaves delectable treats like Zelda, Metroid, Smash Bros, F-Zero, Star Fox and Wave Race to dance upon my palette.

I asked for a Wii to replace the Gamecube pinched by my sister and specifically to allow me to play two games. Metroid Prime 3 and Zelda: Skyward Sword. Sure there are other games worth playing on the Wii, and I have a list of titles to find, but it's those two that sold the system to me, and prices have dropped to such a level that I can justify buying a console for two games now. If I'm honest, I wanted the Wii just for Zelda. It's by far the best thing Nintendo have in their arsenal.

I came to Zelda late. Dad bought a Nintendo 64 and Goldeneye for reasons that still aren't quite clear. I liked Goldeneye. It was fun, but it was a loan of Ocarina of Time that really pulled me in. I wound up buying it, and Majora's Mask and I still have them. They started a late blooming gaming love affair that I'm always happy to go back to. I bought my missing GameCube to play Wind Waker and hunted down a proper copy of Twilight Princess as well. None of that waggly right handed Link nonsense for me. Outside of my two big-boy consoles, my portables have provided Link's Awakening, Minish Cap and most recently Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks.

The times I actually play the games are pretty few and far between, and I always get them way after release, but I always enjoy them even if it takes actually playing a Zelda game to remind me of that. The most recent entry to do this has been Phantom Hourglass. Up until last week, I hadn't played a Zelda game since the year Twilight Princess dropped. Hourglass really got its claws into me and reminded me why I love this series so much. It also had me reminiscing, and it dawned on me that although I own a lot of them, I've actually only finished two Zelda games - the GameCube ones.

Clearly this is Sacrilege of the highest order, so I've decided to take inspiration from Nintendo's Year of Luigi to have my own year of Zelda. I'm going to play and complete as many Zelda games I possibly can. And if I can, I'm going to do it on the original hardware. There won't really be any order of play, but as a Gamer, I feel like this is something I owe to myself to do. So, once Phantom Hourglass is done, Skyward Sword will follow and after that, who knows? It's going to be a great opportunity to break out old consoles and right past wrongs.

In the process, I'll have to find another copy of Minish Cap, since mine was 'borrowed' by my sister, and work out how I'm going to play The Legend of Zelda, Adventure of Link and Link to the Past without paying through the nose for them. I've never owned a NES or a SNES so I've never played Link's first three games. In fact, I don't even think I've ever seen those game's carts. I get the feeling that going back to those games might be something akin to digital paleontology. It's going to be very interesting.

This is a proposition of epic proportions, and there's every possibility that I might be doomed to failure. Still those who don't try don't win, do they?

So to quote Celebrity Deathmatch, let's get it on!