Lifted Up and Bogged Down

After wrapping up Majora’s Mask last night, I immediately popped in Twilight Princess. Majora’s Mask was on the top of my Top 5 Zelda games for the whole of a half hour. In Twilight Princess, Nintendo refined the Zelda formula they’ve used since way back on the SNES into a pitch-perfect adventure game. The “get 3 things from dungeons then get 5 more things” method never felt more organic than in Twilight Princess, fluidly evolving from the narrative rather than being an epic fetch quest. The story feels much more rooted because of the rich backstory, not only revealed in the game but also established in previous Zelda titles.

The world of Hyrule has a much bigger scope than in any Zelda game to date and is so much more expansive than ever before. Sure, the capabilities of the system the games are on factors a great deal into this, but it feels really good to ride around a huge Hyrule on Epona with tons of little nooks and crannies to explore. That’s the most impressive thing about the scope: the little side caves and holes and cliffs to find those elusive heart pieces and rupees. Hours upon hours can be spent just looking around this version of Hyrule and discovering everything it has to offer.

I’m not saying that Twilight Princess is more important than Ocarina of time, nor as creative and deep as Majora’s Mask. I’m saying that it knits together all of the best elements of Zelda games seamlessly into an incredibly polished experience. It may sometimes feel like you’ve played it before – because you have. But it feels so good to play.

Trudging along in Pokemon Heart Gold is getting more difficult each run through. Wes and I committed ourselves to using one team every month until we’ve used all 250 of the original Pokemon. After 6 or 7 months in, the game is getting old. It feel more like a chore even with fresh monsters. I’ve probably spent more time in Pokemon between Gold and White versions in the past 6 months than I’ve spent with any Pokemon game in the last six yeas. It wears thin after a while.

There aren’t many games that manage to keep the fun intact after playing for dozens and dozens of hours. I could play a couple of run throughs of Contra 3 every day as well as Super Mario World. Maybe it’s just nostalgia that makes those games fun every time I play them. They’re games that when I pick them up, I feel compelled to play till the end. They’re both especially fun, and probably even better, in co-op mode. Gears of War is another one that I don’t mind restarting and blasting through over and over.

It’s rare that modern games have this sort of longevity of replayability. Leave and comment and let me know what games you could play over and over without it getting old.