Going down....

There has always been something genuinely unsettling about going downward in video games with me. When I was young, I lived in a house that had a creepy basement, as did we all. I was scared of the dark, the things that went bump in the night, and the creatures of the shadow. That basement embodied every one of those fears. It was dank, dark, desolate, and all kinds of scary. Yet, I still had to brave that basement to get to what I desired: my Nintendo Entertainment System. Eventually, I overcame my fear of that basement, and I realized that there was really nothing to be feared. During the summers I would spend with my dad, I would actually spend time in his equally scary basement. My dad had a Super Nintendo. He also had The Legend of Zelda: A Link to The Past. I would later realize that it's one of the quintessential Zelda games to be played, but back then, it was the thing that would bring back all of those fears of going downstairs into my creepy basement.

Recently I was reading on Kotaku, an interesting article discussing this advertisement. In the article, there is a line discussing the "threshold" that players must gather up the courage and cross in order to save the world, or complete their objective. "Traversing the known to the unknown requires you to cross an important threshold: fear." It is true that we cross into the unknown when we play video games, but often times, we go across that threshold with a casual stride. Perhaps this comes from my old age and experience with video games, but games seem to have lost that appeal. I don't like to get scared, but I like overcoming fears. I love games that give me that sense of overcoming something, and gathering up that courage to achieve my quest. Because the bad guys aren't the only enemy in that game. It's also myself.

The Legend of Zelda: A Link to The Past, and many other Zelda games that I've played, helped me to overcome my fears. They've helped me journey into that unknown without fear. In Zelda games, players take control of Link, just a young and ordinary lad, who also happens to be the holder of the Triforce of Courage. It's really become clear just how much they push the whole courage aspect of Zelda. Every single dungeon in Zelda is a force to be reckoned with. Each one has a momentous sense of being and terror. These are landmarks, filled with mystery, evil, and monsters. The player acts as a light in that darkness. It is dangerous to go alone, and that's what makes Zelda such a brilliant and fearful affair.

Often times in the dungeons, the player must travel downward. Going down a flight of stairs in Link to the past has a sense of foreboding danger. The player couldn't see what was on the other end of that staircase, and Link went off screen. Who knows what could happen? Traveling deeper and deeper into the depths of an ancient and evil temple, further into the dark, that has meaning, and danger. That's something that requires a lot of courage to undertake.

The Legend of Zelda is a great series that is very important to the video game industry on the whole because of subtleties like these. Games just aren't scary anymore. There are the Dead Spaces, and the FEARs, and some kind of gorefest, but they all have the same thing, which is just gore, and jump scares. That's not scary, it's just disgusting. There's no set up, or meaning to it. It's just an insignificant and pointless scare. There's nothing to overcome. In games like those, you just survive, which is exhilarating in its own right, but I feel as though there isn't a take away from those kind of games and experiences. Zelda is a game that instills fear in the player, but in a way that presents a barrier. Players have to knock down this barrier, and when they do, they feel as though they have accomplished something. They've grown, as a person in a small way.

Zelda is an adventure game, and that means that players get to explore, and experiment, and interact, and discover. I feel that most adventuring games these days don't quite capture those elements of discovery and wonder in the way that Zelda does. Skyrim is a fantastic game that captures those elements of discovery quite well. The first time that you come across a Dwarven Ruin, or a Draconic Tomb, and it's a wonderful feeling of adventure and discovery. Yet, because of the modern format of games, discovery is relegated to an aspect of completion. There's no sense of wonder to it, or even wander for that matter. Skyrim is enormous and has lots and lots to offer, but it just doesn't seem to carry as much weight to it as Ocarina of Time. While the overworld of Ocarina of Time seems like a subdivision compared to the entire country of Skyrim, there seems to be a lot more at stake. In the world of Skyrim, folks don't seem to care much if the world is coming to an end. Sure they talk about it, but the game itself doesn't really seem to care whether or not the hero of the story goes off and joins a guild of thieves or revives a terror of a league of assassins. I know that's what the game is for: just doing stuff, but nothing really takes precedence. I'd think that I should take issue with the whole "world ending" matter, but instead I just raise my arms up in excitement and fight them for the fun of it. Killing a random dragon doesn't affect the outcome, or force any progress, it's just another random battle which has been tailor made for me and my character.

While this has been a bit of a rant comparing Zelda games to others, I think that the point still stands that games don't let the player be afraid anymore. They don't build up an illusion of insurmountable odds that the player has to face not only that, but also themselves. Gamers these days rarely have to gather up courage to take on the challenge that lies before them. I haven't felt that threshold for a very long time, and for as much as I dread it's presence, I honestly kind of miss it.