Nostalgia Hits Fr

Nintendo is remaking one of the greatest games ever made, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. The game first came out in 1998, and now they’ve completely remade the graphics in 2026.

This is the easiest cash grab and biggest ROI since Man City bought Haaland for the price of a house in LA. Everyone who grew up playing video games, especially Zelda games, is going to spend their salary on this instead of putting money into their 401(k). I guess you might have to retire a couple of months later.

But the interesting thing about this game is that most people who played it when it first came out were still kids. Maybe they were in elementary school or middle school, coming home after school and just immersing themselves in a beautiful world.

This is a Nintendo game, so it’s not supposed to be some tryhard ranked game that’s insanely hard to beat. You can play it, collect enough rupees to buy your first shield, beat the bosses, finally beat Ganondorf, and feel satisfied that you spent your valuable time on Earth playing peak instead of touching grass.

But jokes aside, even if what I just said was gibberish, or you’re wondering why a 22-year-old man in a master’s program is talking about a game from 1998, calm down. I’m getting to the point: nostalgia.

The reason I’m using Zelda to talk about nostalgia is that a lot of the people who are going to buy this game aren’t necessarily kids. Younger people will still buy it, but a lot of the audience will be adults.

A lot of them love this game because that specific game reminds them of a specific time in their life. No stress, no worries, no obligations. Just play, relax, and enjoy. They remember that version of themselves that was so innocent and just wanted to do whatever made them happy.

The funny thing is that the 1998 game is still played today because of nostalgia, speedrunners trying to break a game that’s easier to glitch, and random people who never got to play the classic.

Now, before the Nintendo fanboys start getting mad at me, an important question does pop up:

Is the game actually amazing, or does nostalgia blind us?

See, right now there are tons of games that, on paper, are “better” than Zelda. You have story-driven games like Ghost of Tsushima, Spider-Man, The Last of Us, and even newer Zelda games like Tears of the Kingdom and Breath of the Wild. The reason they are “better” is because they have more challenging aspects, better graphics, and more things to do.

Unfortunately, even though I love Ocarina of Time, it is an outdated game. It probably won’t be very hard to complete. While some people don’t play games just for a challenge, gaming is also a form of escapism.

So newer generations might play the remake, love the new art, and enjoy the world, but they still might not fully love the game simply because it doesn’t play like popular modern games such as Valorant or Rocket League.

The point I’m trying to make is that nostalgia is complicated, but it makes us want to reminisce about the past.

Now, pivoting from Zelda to nostalgia in general.

A lot of people tend to dislike their current situation. People get upset about assignments, the social scene, or simply not being satisfied with their life. I think a great example of nostalgia is school in general, whether that’s high school or college. People love reminiscing about the past.

A lot of times, people miss their college days, miss the hangouts after high school, or miss the random soccer matches during lunch break. People love to romanticize the past, while forgetting that, at the time, they didn’t even like the present.

You wanted to be older.

You wanted more freedom.

You wanted to be more confident.

“I wish there was a way to know you’re in the good old days before you’ve actually left them.”

This is a quote from Andy Bernard in The Office, and some people call it one of the best quotes in TV history.

It resonates so much because sometimes you don’t realize that the life you’re living right now might become the good old days. You don’t realize that, even through all the annoying things you have to deal with, this could still be one of the peaks of your life.

It’s weird because nostalgia tends to be associated with positive feelings, not negative ones. Sometimes you also remember the times in Boston when there was nothing to do and the Celtics kept choosing to shoot threes instead of using their size to win games. Sorry, tangent.

But nostalgia is tricky because if this moment right now is eventually going to be considered the “good old days,” how do you stay present in life and just enjoy it, knowing that later on you might not have an opportunity like this again?

I think it’s also important to point out that nostalgia doesn’t mean you want to go back to the past. It can also just mean remembering it. You can be happily married and still remember your college hangouts and what those moments meant to you.

While writing this blog, I don’t really know the direction I’m trying to go with it. In my opinion, nostalgia is kind of inevitable, and there’s nothing you can really do about it. I genuinely think you’ll continue having those moments of reflection, even during times when you’re trying to “level up.”

The Office scene resonates with me simply because it’s about a paper company in Scranton, Pennsylvania. It’s not in New York, not in LA, not in Paris. It’s just a random city in the US.

Someone like Jim in The Office isn’t happy with where he is. I mean, he’s a salesman for a paper company. Kinda boring fr.

But somehow, he marries the love of his life, finds meaning in the boring by pranking people, having fun, and doing weird, crazy things.

A lot of people say where they are is boring, or that they can’t have fun because of where they live. The Office shows that you can make the most of it. People can still be miserable in New York. People can still be bored in Chicago.

With that being said, even some of the roughest parts of your life can eventually become nostalgic. I don’t think you can fully escape that.

So who’s buying me The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time remake?…..