Majora’s Mask is hard to critique when its flaws are a direct result of how the game was able to be made at all. Ocarina of Time was a smash hit, so taking advantage of the veteran development team and the assets they had to quickly put out another game seemed like a great idea. Even as someone who isn’t a Zelda fan, I have to say that it really, really was. The creative freedom afforded by low development risk lead to what is easily the most artistically ambitious game in the series. Taking a franchise centered on freedom and exploration and putting a timer to it was an incredibly bold move, and the morbid atmosphere it serves to strengthen is even bolder. Sadly, that ambition has a double edge, and the limitations are hard to miss. Watching different characters deal with unavoidable disaster is incredibly interesting, but either through the N64’s limited memory or the low amount of development time, the interaction with them is barebones. Most characters have about three different versions of dialog, and you complete a quest by talking to them at specific times with a certain mask on. The rigidity and lack of depth can make you feel a certain detachment from the narrative, and the immersive quality takes a huge hit. Even so, the experience as a whole is fairly captivating, and I can attest that it holds up enough to win over at least a few Zelda skeptics.