My first Zelda game

After School

It was an evening in 2004, the start of the weekend right after school with my best friend. He had invited me over so we could play together. His mom had just bought him a few N64 game cartridges. We figured we'd give them a go. We had no idea what to expect: a gray cartridge, a black background, and written in gold, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. It was a used game, no box, just the cartridge. At that moment, we didn't realize at all what we had in our hands.

We blew into the cartridge like crazy, shoved it into the console, slid the switch to "On," and there it was, it started. The sound of a galloping horse, a super calm music, an environment that looked massive—it smelled like adventure. From the ripe old age of 6 and 7, controllers in hand, we were ready.

We barely knew how to read

We had just barely learned how to read, and here we were facing the save selection menu. We had to pick a name. "Bryan." Of course, it was his game and his console 🤣! Alright, name saved and we start. We watch the cutscene, we understand that things are getting serious, and that's it, we're in: the Kokiri Forest. Saria waves at us and speaks. It takes us ages to read the text bubble, but we manage. We're off, exploring the area. We don't know what to do but we're having a blast just running in circles, talking to all the NPCs, going into the shop...

This guy is weird

When we stumbled upon him, we couldn't help but laugh; he jumps around instead of sitting on a chair. We stopped laughing when we saw the price he was asking for his shield. We head out, looking for rupees everywhere. We find a secret passage. We dodge a rolling boulder and sneak into what looks like a maze, and right there, a chest. We press "A". Da-da-da-daaa! We find the Kokiri Sword, we feel like absolute bosses! We retrace our steps, we have enough rupees, we buy our shield. We wander around a bit more, and we run into some oddball...

And this guy is nuts!

What does this guy want, not letting me pass? Bryan tells me, "If he was in front of me, I would've smacked him" 😂. It cracks us up, we keep moving forward, we face our first enemies. We reach the Deku Tree who tells us his story, and ours too. He opens his mouth, we don't ask any questions, we go inside. On my end, I'm starting to stress out; the vibe is darker, there are enemies everywhere. Up until that point, my only video game reference was Adibou, but Bryan? He's chill, totally unfazed, controller in hand, destroying everything that moves.

We solve our first puzzle, we get the slingshot. We keep moving forward, everything is going well. Then we reach a door. We go through it. Everything is pitch black. We tell ourselves that's weird...

Look up there!

Now I gotta admit, I'm pretending everything is fine, but deep down I'm stressing, I'm super scared! Gohma drops down on us and the fight begins, there's no turning back! Bryan is still unfazed, he lights her up with Deku Seeds and slashes away at her with his sword! After taking out her eggs and slashing her eye 3 times, we take her down, it's over!

But it's also time for us to go to bed, it's getting late. I'm still stressed out, I can't manage to sleep, and when I finally doze off, I have a nightmare about Ganondorf—who actually had the luxury of looking like an uncle of mine. But, the next morning, I only have one desire: to grab the controller in turn and defeat all those monsters myself! That's the exact moment I realized that video games were my passion; it was impossible for me to ever put the controller down!