Less than two years after Nintendo's masterpiece "The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time" was released for the Nintendo 64, a direct sequel was released to the same console. Originally planned as a remix to Ocarina of Time that would ramp up the difficulty and modify the dungeons, that game would go on to become The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask. In a game series that was (and still is) notorious for its long development cycles, it's surprising that a proper sequel was created in about a year's time. And yet, it's considerably more surprising that it became one of the most strange, unique, and beloved games in the series' history. Since most of the core mechanics, visual and auditory assets, and base gameplay would be rolled over from Ocarina of Time, it was important that Majora's Mask was given its own tools to distinguish itself from its predecessor. So while the character models, combat, and some of the soundtrack remained the same, the story and overall gameplay mechanic were vastly different. In fact, the limitations in production time gave way to what is undoubtedly the most distinguishable and iconic mechanic of Majora's Mask; the three day cycle.

Since development was rushed, the three day cycle was Nintendo's way of making sure they got the most they could out of the gameplay without it feeling too short or unfulfilling, and it's pulled off masterfully. As soon as you play the Song of Time for the first time, get sent back into the past, and officially start your adventure, you understand that this will be an experience unlike any you've had before. The anxiety of the 3 day mechanic is real, and it serves the game's murky atmosphere perfectly. The moon is the perfect representation of creeping dread. It starts off as a strange looking face in the distance, but as time ticks on it only grows bigger in size, until the third day, when its size eclipses the sky and most of your screen. As Link, the message is clear; time is against you, you can't afford to waste it, and it makes you rethink every action you'll take as you attempt to save the land of Termina from certain doom.

While the three day cycle is the game's most iconic element, it wouldn't be as impactful if it wasn't for the wealth of characters and interactions that exist within this game. When you start playing Majora's Mask for the first time, it's probably because you heard it was a great follow up to Ocarina of Time and you wanted more of that. But defeating Majora is not why you finish Majora's Mask, not really. You finish because you've grown attached to the characters, you're fully engrossed in their worlds, their lives, their jobs, their romances. You want the best for them. Somewhere through the game, you realize that this isn't about defeating Majora anymore; it's about saving the people of Termina.

One of the most immersive aspects of Majora's Mask is the side quests and the character storylines that exist as a parallel to the main story. In a way, it's the aspect that most differentiates the game from its predecessor. In Ocarina of Time, there are side quests, and they mostly exist as a mechanic to distract from the main quest. They are often fun, and slightly add to the worldbuilding aspect of the game, but the game doesn't feel much different whether you do them or not. In Majora's Mask, these side quests are brought to the center stage, and that's what gives you the drive to continue on and defeat Majora. Because in the face of impending doom, it's the kindnesses shown by Link to the characters of Termina that give them comfort in their final moments. You aren't the fabled "Hero of Time" on a quest to save the world and vanquish evil; you're just one person, doing what they can to help those in need. And so the game's message about the importance of kindness and consideration in spite of despair and darkness hits that much closer to home, and ensures that its core philosophy will always be relevant and impactful.

Majora's Mask improves on some key gameplay aspects from Ocarina of Time as well. Although there are only four main dungeons, each one is meticulously and expertly designed, and are more intuitive and less cryptic than their OoT counterparts. However, OoT also boasts a much stronger sense of scale and wonder, and the soundtrack of MM tends to lack its own real identity.

There are drawbacks, however minor, in both the original and remake versions of the game. In the N64 version, aiming and traversing is more challenging and saving is much less forgiving. In the 3DS version, the Zora swimming is more frustrating, the atmosphere is less murky and lacks some personality, and the game is slightly easier. Both versions have rather slow opening sequences, which can make the first three days seem rather uninteresting or tedious. However, no matter which version you choose, if you play long enough to get yourself suitably immersed, you'll experience one of the most unique and creatively rich Zelda games ever made.

This is easily the most effort Gamefreak put in to a Pokémon remake. So much is added without compromising anything from the originals. They even threw in the small Suicune subplot from Crystal. New areas, redesigned gyms, and new features, including everyone's favourite walking Pokémon system that they haven't been able to get right since.

Pokéathalon is still one of the best side activities in the games.

Unlike Fire Red and Leaf Green it also doesn't stop you evolving Pokémon into their new evolutions pre-national dex. Kind of... They do lock a ton of the items required to do so to post-game, but Pokémon that can evolve via knowing specific moves, like Piloswine and Aipom, are free to evolve into their non-Johto native forms.

It unfortunately did NOT fix Johto's horrible level curve. Route trainers just seem to scale completely differently to gym leaders, so you'll still face level 12 teams after fighting a level 19 gym leader. But where it gets at its worst is after the 4th gym where the game let's you go left on the intended path, or right to the "7th" gym. What that means is both routes are essentially balanced around being the 5th gym, so whichever one you don't pick first will be massively underlevelled. And that's sugarcoating it, because even if you go to the Lake of Rage immediately after the 4th gym, this route that is technically around the 7th gym, or optionally the 5th gym, has trainers with Pokémon lower levelled than the 3rd gym leader. The whole balance is such a mess and it needed an update more than anything.

The weirdest part is that while Gamefreak didn't do anything with Johto, Kanto's gym leaders WERE balanced. Before they were pretty much all jokes since most of them were in the lower elite 4 levels (keeping in mind you need to beat the champion just to get access to the Kanto leaders). Now the first gym leader you face in Kanto starts at the same level as the champion.

This is definitely a great remake and has a ton of soul, it's just a shame they didn't fix what was imo the biggest problem with the gen 2 games in the first place.

It's minecraft. My backlog would probably be half as full as it is now if I spent all the time I've put into this game on those games instead. Pretty much a game that you can play forever, especially in multiplayer. I think this game fills in the sandbox-y creative-y community-oriented-y holes for a lot of people that games like littlebigplanet used to fill for me. And unlike that game, this one is absolutely eternal. Sounds weird to call minecraft more than just a game but at this point it's so huge and long-lasting it pretty much is.

Basically smash 4 but they improved upon it in every single way. This game is basically a wonderful tribute to all things gaming, as it has so many characters from so many significant series in it. The spirits certainly weren't as interesting as trophies were but they still do a decent job with archiving game characters throughout history. The game also added a ton of highly-fan-requested characters so it feels like a love letter to the fans as well. My only problem is that smash 4 burnt me out on the series too much for me to really embrace this game as much as I definitely should have. It's still a great time to play with friends though so definitely get this game if you have a switch.

I'll never peak in life as much as the time I beat my whole family at bowling when I was 6 years old.

It's Wii Sports, there's not much to say, really, while since then some technical demos have proven to be more fun and compact (Astro's playroom comes to mind) few have proved to be as replayable , consistent and just plain fun as this one.

It's just a fun collection of sports games with the core idea of them being as simple as possible, and sometimes that kind of dumb fun it's all you need. Bowling is the clear winner of the bunch, with tennis and golf also pretty good inclusions, but baseball was never a home run of a game for me (pun very much intended), and boxing just feels janky, sometimes the fun type of janky, but it can just devolve into shaking the controller like a madman, which none of the other games do.

It's nothing more than a pretty fun little time spender, but the fact it's even something a bit remarkable being a technical demo and a pack in title is really, REALLY shocking when you stop and think about it.

Still, it's not the best technical demo, it's not the best pack in title, it just sits in a very comfortable spot being both things, and it rocks at what it does.