What I talk about when I talk about Zelda

In 2021 I decided to play all the games in the Legend of Zelda series, primarily for fun, and secondarily as a reflective exercise. Ever since I played Ocarina of Time in 1999, the series has been beloved to me, occasionally an obsession. I thought playing through the 18-or-so main series games in chronological order (some for the first time) would give me a way of retracing steps through some of the most formative seasons of my life—e.g., discovering Ocarina of Time loosely coincided with my beginning to discover that I was gay—and decided to write an essay for each. (Or maybe I thought all the retracing stuff would justify me playing all 18-or-so games.) Here are those essays:

• “Go to the next room” (The Legend of Zelda)
• “Thanks a million.” (Zelda II: The Adventure of Link)
• “This is all I can give you” (A Link to the Past)
• “…Nostalgia… …unchanged… …boo hoo…” (Link’s Awakening)
• “A person like me” (Ocarina of Time)
• “It may be my undoing” (Majora’s Mask)

UPDATE (5/28/22): Changed “Recently…” to “In 2021…” because this is going to take a while. 🙂