My favourite Zelda moments generally don’t have much to do with Zelda. They’re not moments of heroism or even action, to be honest. If anything, they tend towards the opposite: a little change in the world that comes unannounced, an accidental glimpse of something from just the right angle in a quiet moment when I think I’m busy doing something else.
I’m talking about moments like the one in Link to the Past where you climb the mountain and the lovely plump, rounded trees of Hyrule which you’ve spent so much time with up-close are suddenly seen from a distance, far below you. Still plump, still rounded, but coming together to form something larger than their individual selves – a forest!
There’s another moment, from Wind-Waker, that I love just as much. It’s Dragon Roost Island, an early part of the game, and I guess I’m climbing towards a boss. Outside, hopping around on the wind-cleaned rock, I’m messing about with the eyeglass and I see a distant part of the same island, the same cliff, where one of those Kargaroc birds is sat in their straw nest. Simultaneously goofy and rather regal, this is a creature I haven’t seen up close yet, so this is a glorious fortuitous sneak at what’s ahead.
Looking back now, it’s kind of weird that both of these moments – which, truly, are right up there for me, above finding the sword in the quiet glade, above the horseman leaping from oil paintings – both of these moments take place on mountains. Zelda is not a series about mountains, but it’s a series where mountains seem to get the best out of it. Mountains play a funny role here. For me, they’re where the game steps away from its rituals and rhythms and starts to feel real.