Zelda's 25th

Look at that - I'm talking about video games again. Oh well.

I mentioned this in my E3 Coverage post, but this year marks Zelda's 25th Anniversary, 25 years since the first Zelda game was released in Japan by Nintendo. This is pretty exciting for me, as The Legend of Zelda is one of my favorite fiction series of all time.

In about a month (November 20th, to be exact), the newest Zelda title comes out, The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword. This'll be the first Zelda title I buy for myself, and it looks to be one of Nintendo's best, so I'm super excited. Since this year happens to also be Zelda's 25th Anniversary, they're releasing a special bundle of the game which includes a golden, Zelda-themed Wiimote. It costs $20 more to get the game with the wiimote (and $20 is the price of a normal Wiimote), but I totally saved up for it all.

As you can see in the picture, it also comes with an extra CD. The CD will include music played during the special Zelda 25th Anniversary Symphony series. The first actual orchestral performance is going to be next week, at the Pantages in Los Angelos, and if I hadn't been saving up for the actual game, I would have been saving up to go to that (though I doubt I would have had the money in time).

Miyamoto having fun with
the orchestra at E3

The Anniversary Symphony is kind of a big deal, however. Can you imagine a place like the Pantages packed to the brim with geeks and nerds of all ages, from all over the country, dressed in their best to sit and listen to a full two-and-a-half hour symphony? Unless you've played a good number of video games, you may not be aware that the music in video games can be some of the best music around, and something like this is a dream come true to most video game aficionados.

The first concert is next Friday in L.A., and I can't be there. Luckily, however, I'll be pre-ordering the game this week, and picking up the 25th Anniversary Symphony CD which, while not as wonderful as the real thing, will be better than trying to find an illegal, high-quality recording on Youtube. The orchestra is also going to play in London this month, and they'll be doing a world-wide tour through 2012.

To prepare for the new game this November, I've spent the last year or two going through all the old games, familiarizing myself with any that I missed before. I kinda wanted to write a short review of my opinions on each, but I don't think I can keep from making them too long, and I'm not sure anyone would really care. If you've never played a Zelda game before, however, I would highly suggest picking up or downloading The Legend of Zelda: Link to the Past for your Wii Console or DS. After that, Ocarina of Time and Wind Waker both come highly recommended by me, though they'd be more expensive (I also really love Majora's Mask, but you have to be pretty serious to get through it).

Now that Skyward Sword is only a month away, I really can't contain myself. I check for the latest news on the ZeldaDungeon fansite almost every day, and I've been practicing controlling the Wiimote with my left hand ever since it was announced that the game would have a left-handed option (I'm not left-handed, but the game's main character is and has always been. Twilight Princess was the first game in which he was right-handed, so that right-handed Wii users could control him better. If I use my left hand to control the wiimote, he gets to be left handed again!)

November is also NaNoWriMo, so even though I'll be pre-ordering Skyward Sword and picking it up right away, I probably wont have a chance to get into it until December. I don't mind, however, so long as no one posts spoilers on Facebook. I'll also try to keep up with my blog posts, but you've seen how well that's been going lately. If a miss a few days in December, or even a week, you'll know what it means.