I was not interested in the next Zelda.
That, alone, was a shocking thing to feel, but everything I’d seen of the then-upcoming The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker left me cold. It wasn’t sour grapes over not getting the “realistic” Zelda of the SpaceWorld demo so many expected, just a weird feeling that the art style just wasn’t gelling with me.
Mind you, in the primitive media ecosystem of 2001, where I still got most of my game news from magazines due to limited internet access, I had yet to see the game in motion. All I’d seen was just screenshots, printed in less than high definition in small boxes while browsing the magazine rack in a big box store.
It was enough. I’d decided, after years of unbridled love and devotion for the Zelda franchise, I was through. I had no interest in what the doubters had already dubbed “Cel-da.”
It was a weird time for me in general. The Nintendo 64, which I’d loved but admittedly had a small library, was nearly done. I was about to enter college and had this delusion that perhaps it was time to leave video games behind. The unappealing Zelda images only cemented that feeling, even as the shockingly good arrival of “Super Smash Bros. Melee and Metroid Prime seriously tested my resolve.
And then, midway through my freshman year of college, the game was out and people in my dorm began to play it.
Seeing the game in motion was revelatory. All the charm and personality I’d thought absent from the still shots suddenly was leaping from the TV screen right into my eyeballs and begging me to play this game. Yet I resisted.
Then, one day soon after its release, I was sitting with several friends in their dorm room while one of them played The Wind Waker, having just reached the first boss: the Dragon Roost Cavern monster, Gohma. He was struggling a bit, using his newly acquired grappling hook to bludgeon the beast’s eye to minimal effect.
I had an idea, but hesitated to say anything when suddenly, my friend thrust the controller into my hands.
“I got to go to the restroom,” he said. “See what you can do.”
And suddenly I was playing Wind Waker, its gameplay already familiar from long sessions of Ocarina of Time and Majora’s Mask. I dodged a few claws, avoided some lava, and soon had my grappling hook soaring above Gohma’s head to hook onto the dragon tail and push the fight into a new gear.
My friend came back moments later and quickly interrogated me as to what I’d done as he reclaimed the controller.
A day later, I was at the store, college savings at the ready, buying a GameCube, along with a copy each of Metroid Prime and Wind Waker.
A week after that, I had beaten Wind Waker and found it was now my favorite 3D Zelda game. (It still is!)
I learned not to judge a Zelda game on visuals after that. After all, if I could discover love for “Cel-da,” who knew what wonders future games might hold?
