May 23, 2007
Hero of Time
Well, it finally happened. Last night, after nearly 38 hours spread out over two months, I beat The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. And I was sad.
Beating a Zelda game is always a bittersweet experience for me. It’s kind of like finishing a great book. There’s a sense of accomplishment and closure, but at the same time you’re disappointed that what you’ve spent dozens of hours working through is finally done. The journey is through. There’s nothing left.
This is magnified for me in the case of The Legend of Zelda, because playing a Zelda game is quite honestly a nearly-religious experience for me. I anticipate it for months or even years, waiting for it’s release. I study it’s progression through interviews and articles. All the while, I fondly reminisce about the first Zelda games and the impact that they had on my childhood, hoping that the latest entry will somehow recapture some of that magic. Because, frankly, the most rewarding, mysterious, and bilssful childhood escapism of my early years came through the Zelda games, and the world that they exposed me to.
So, playing a Zelda game today is partially an attempt to somehow reconnect with the innocent, imaginative world of my idealized childhood. And though I am always able to do that to a certain degree, it is not nearly to the level that I would have hoped. There are certain themes, characters, locations, or melodies in each chapter of the Legend of Zelda that capture my imagination and reawaken that childhood joy for an instant. However, I always go into a new Zelda game with the foolish hope that it might somehow fully recapture the imagination and joy that I experienced 15 years ago. And it never does. Though the Zelda series has arguably been the most consistently excellent series in the history of video games, each subsequent release since the mid-1990s has left me slightly disappointed. It’s not that the games have lost the magic. I’ve grown up.
So, last night was bittersweet. The final battle was gripping and epic, the ending was emotional and cinematic, but I put the controller down as a 23-year-old man, not as the 10-year-old boy I had hoped to become a little bit reacquainted with.
I’ll try again in 4 years.
Caleb. Dear, sweet Caleb. I’m glad you grew up.
Even I can remember how much you adored Zelda as a child, and I was too young to even PLAY video games in those days lol
Some things, however, do not lose their magic over the years. Three Ninjas, for instance, will always hold a special place in my heart.
I found you via el mol. Can we be blog friends? Disclaimer, mine is pretty weak.
Sorry I don’t share the same enthusiasm for Zelda as you do. I think the only game I ever beat was California Games…wait, can you beat that?
Kerri
I know exactly how you feel. It’s the same bittersweet experience I have when I watch cartoons or try, in vain, to pick up my “paper things” one more time (I do this every six months or so in the hopes that I can relive the wonder and innocent fun from my childhood, but it’s just not the same.)
Maybe this will cheer you up. At Kaitlyn Bugg’s birthday party, David Houck wore a shirt that had a picture of a 90′s pixel sword that said “It’s dangerous out there alone. Take this.” Kyley and I BOTH knew the exact reference. So, maybe you can’t be a child again, but you can rest better knowing that you passed along some of that knowledge to us, the next generation.