I'm 8 years old, sitting on the edge of my bed and leaning into the glow of the TV, avoiding these skeletons that are throwing their own skulls at me until I can line up the boomerang just right.

I'm 29 years old, barely sitting on the edge of my couch, trying to circle around this damn Talus that is throwing its own fists at me so I can shoot it right in the ore.

I'm 10 years old, sitting next to my father in chairs that we pulled right up to the TV, talking out just how far we need to fill the water in this fucking temple so that we can get to the boss key.

I'm 29 years old, sharing a single couch cushion with my wife while she explains how far I have to rotate this fucking lizard to get the next terminal.

Not only is the world of this game breathtaking, the exploration amazing, the characters fun and the puzzles & shrines ingenious, but the way that this game was a time machine and a translator was incredibly powerful for me.

This game was a time machine because it took me away from the troubles of being almost thirty, about to start my final semester of my second attempt at college. When life, finances and my own mental instability all had me teetering on the edge, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild took me back to a time when I could just Z-target my problems or I could solve them if I just took the time to think them through. It took me back to when the world was still fresh, new and exciting and there could be anything around the next corner.

This game was a translator, because I was finally able to convey to my wife the way that two of the most influential games of my childhood cemented relationships and the way they made me feel.

Those two games were Link to the Past and Ocarina of Time by the way, two games that are such a part of me that I barely had to type out the titles as I write this on my phone; my predictive keyboard knew exactly what I was going to say after "Link" and "Ocarina".

Breath of the Wild gave me the closure on the loss of my youth, something I think pretty much everyone seeks, but not everyone finds. When we're children, we can't wait to grow up, have more choices, make money. We don't see the death of our childhood coming, murdered by puberty, bills and sore joints. By the time we realize what's happened, our childhood is six feet under and we didnt even get a good look at the bastard who did it.

I've spent more and more time recently trying to figure out when I went from carefree jokester and clown to the grumpy "old" man I am today. Breath of the Wild took me back to the scene of the crime and let me come to terms with what happened by giving me one last taste of my childhood, and for that, I will be forever grateful.