Quest for Coins and Consoles: A Childhood Journey Through the Legend of Zelda: Part 1

I’ve been gaming for over 35 years. If I could boil it down to one game that has aged with me, it would be the Legend of Zelda series. Yes, as a weird anti-socialite in a 90’s household with two older sisters I gravitated to single-player games with adventure and puzzle solving, but who doesn’t like a form of escapism that could best

Some of my earliest memories that stick out the most are game-related. But the one I’ve been thinking about lately is being a toddler begging anyone for coins to play arcades that were everywhere at one time, like vending machines or going with my parents to dinner parties and asking the hosts if they have any video games. One night, I was about three or four, I went to some get-together and all these older kids were upstairs playing The Legend of Zelda (1987). I stalked in the background while these much bigger kids argued about how to play. One kid clutched the controller while open-mouthed gaped up at the TV. The others piled around the manual vigorously flipping pages. I had no clue what was going on, or why books were involved in video games. But this was a level of gaming that I knew was beyond me. Still, the mystery of Zelda, a goofy-looking elf boy with a girl name who shot bullets out of a sword at pig people generated a lot of curiosity.

Shortly after, I got an SNES for my birthday, the greatest present I have ever received, and Legend of Zelda a Link to the Past. I could barely read, but I didn’t let that stop me. I begged siblings to translate (I had uninterested older sisters, so the trade for this precious knowledge was humiliating but worth it) or powered through sounding out the words and learning a life skill. I read that manual cover to cover numerous times. Well, more like stared at each page really hard till it felt read. Regardless, this wasn’t Super Mario, this was Legend of Zelda. A big boy game. You didn’t go in just one direction, you had multiple goals that took you in all directions! (pretty much 4)

I never beat it in my early days, I am sad to confess. The intricate weapon requirements required awareness that only a well-read player could understand the quest chain on how to accomplish. My advanced toddler brain was growing but had a long way to go. Still the advancement from 8-bit to 16-bit. The colors, the animation. SNES was a console I had never dreamed of owning, and I got to suffer defeat over and over again in my living room in a beautiful evolution of the world of Hyrule, unlike anything I could imagine. I also learned early on with A Link to the Past that the hero’s name was Link.

Sometime later, I had finally defeated Ganon. Read the finality of the story of a Link to the Past and put the game in a box, never to be stressed out again. My Zelda days were behind me. Besides, it was a kid game now. Or so I thought.

It’s Christmas 1998. I am 11 years old, walking into Walmart with my mom. I ran off to commit ritual of disappearing to the electronics section to work on straining my neck vertebrae playing the demo consoles. Only this time, I was stopped in my tracks. A huge cardboard cutout of Link greeted me. He stood there with blond locks and piercing eyes. I swear he had epic beard grizzle but that could be how my brain interprets this monumental memory in my life. Below Links giant boots and drawn shimmering sword were the words Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time. I looked past the Standee to see a kid being pried off the demo controller by his mother, dragging him away. I looked up from the bizarre 3-handed grip of an N64 to the screen and saw the world of Hyrule in 3 dimensions. I became closer to God.

The only problem is I didn’t have a N64. And my parents were diagnosed with poor. So, I had to get creative. My dad wasn’t oblivious to my earnest plea. But I wasn’t about to be gifted another console. I was a big kid now. Barely wet the bed. Ocarina of time was scary as shit too. Not for the illiterate toddler of yesteryear. I knew I had a long way to go. What the hell is an Ocarina?