Zelda : The Ocarina Of Time (N64)

So, how did I wind up buying a Nintendo 64? I went to a mate's house for a dinner party. We fired up the N64 and then started playing a game called Zelda, which at the time I thought was a pretty naff name. It took one of us to actually play the game and one of us reading a book on how to work our way through it to really get into the game - but we didn't stop playing until 4 in the morning. A few months later, my wife was giving me a Nintendo and a copy of Zelda for my birthday.

Bonkers? Yes, but that's how deeply this game can affect you. And it's all in a good way. This is a beautiful game, that punches all the right squares, be they visual, emotional or adventurous. This a truly complete game as well in that, as the reviewer points out above, it spans time. Days become nights. Youth grows old and matures. In the end nearly every boy winds up wanting to be Link, the boy who grows up as he winds his way through a magical kingdom to keep the forces of evil from taking over and who gets the girl in the end.

There's never been a game, for a single player, before or since that has come close. Oh yeah, and do do yourself a favour and get that Official Guide mentioned in the above review. Otherwise you may get frustrated, especially if you are a novice player.

First things first: I'm not a Nintendo groupie. I have a GameCube but gave up on Windwaker about two thirds of the way through because I found the sailing grid system tedious and formulaic. I find a lot of Nintendo stuff too cutesie (beautiful game as it is, I gave up on Mario 64 because I can't abide the Mario universe).
Like many people who have been keen gamesplayers for years I have gradually accumulated consoles and so I have an N64, PS1, Dreamcast, GameCube, XBox, PC, GB Advance and a PSP, and solid collections for all of these machines. I'm not biased.
So. In my opinion Ocarina is the best game I've ever played by a massive margin - better than HalfLife 1/2, any of the Dooms, Halo 1/2, Phantasy Star Online or any of the hundreds of other great games that I've had the pleasure of playing.
Ocarina is utterly, absolutely perfect. I played it over the course of a series of weekends where I would continually find myself, come the evening, sitting on the lounge carpet and realising that I'd forgotten to eat anything since breakfast. It became a standing joke.
Others have talked about the graphics, controls and the perfect pitching of the puzzles (although I should mention the constant pleasure of the solid physics engine - so far ahead of its time - that means that in addition to the puzzles that require wonderfully imaginative use of the ocarina in all its time travelling glory, the remaining puzzles are satisfyingly physical and based on skill rather than luck).
What Ocarina did which no other game I've ever played also did (HalfLife came close until it disengaged me with the irritating jumping sections) was captivate me emotionally so that I had a genuine sense of being the fulcrum of an important story.
Ocarina stands as a masterpiece of games design - it's what happens when the person who has the ideas isn't constrained by concerns over programming budgets or rushed deadlines: Have a massive gameworld which plays one way if your character is a child, but totally differently once your character has grown up so that previously ignored "furniture" suddenly opens up totally unexpected sections of the game or becomes critically important. Have a dummy ending about a quarter of the way through before the game reveals its claws properly. Have perfectly-implemented stealth sections long before Sam Fisher. Have satisfying, meaty but elegant combat that would grace any beat-em-up. Throw in mini-games that are practically release-quality by themselves. Have one-off moments that drop the player's jaw but never lose their effect by being repeated (the waterfall parting to reveal the Zora kingdom; the same kingdom frozen solid and ringing with echoes; the rotating picture block puzzle in the Forest Temple; the twisting eye puzzle in the Forest Temple; shooting to the sun over Lake Hylia for the light arrows; the ghost ship in the Shadow Temple; escaping with Epona; each and every one of the astonishingly inventive bosses; the perfect implementation of the reflective shield in the Spirit Temple... the list goes on and on and on). By the time I'd fought my way to the top of Ganondorf's tower, reprising mini versions of each temple as I went, my hands were literally shaking. And there he was, wearing a cape and playing the organ like a proper arch-baddy should!
Shigsy knew exactly what he was doing with this one. Majora's was good, but the three day conceit irritated me as it meant too much repetition. Windwaker just felt... thin. My kid brother claims that Link to the Past is a better game, but he's just being provocative and when he's honest he admits that Ocarina is the one.
Everyone should experience it. You can buy a used N64 with Ocarina for £30; the same cost as, say, this year's FIFA football.
If you're a PS2 groupie and spend your time rubbishing Nintendo, then treat it as a dirty secret - go out and buy a second-hand N64, play Zelda, don't tell anyone, it's okay. You can throw the N64 away at the end. But you'll find that you're less able to crow about Solid Snake or Dante or Kratos or whatever, because deep down you'll know that the coolest hero, from the best game ever, is this skinny kid called Link who dresses like one of Santa's little helpers.
Funny things, computer games.

I brought Ocarina of time when it first came out, and i am still playing it now several years later. This is just one game you don't get tired of, i have completed it about 20 times now, one with absolutley everything possible.

This game, while very chalenging in places (especially the water temple)is just one of the few truley classic games out there. It will keep you busy for months trying to find every heart piece, all 100 skulltullas and completing it's 9 main dungeons.

with an intuitive and simple control system you guide Link through the land of Hyrule killing enemy's in a bid to stop Gannondorf from obtaining the Triforce.

There are just so many memorable moments like when you first see Adult Link, going through Hyrule field on Epona and when you first defeat the final Boss with a huge grin on your face. if you ever brought a game on someone else's review, it should be this one, you won't regret it.