I, like so many others, grew up with video games as a part of my life. I could wax philosophic for hours about the greatness of video games as a medium, and make it as thought provoking as possible in the grand argument of the benefits or harms of playing nauseatingly long hours of video games. Instead, I’ve decided to talk at you, dear reader, about one of my favorite serieses and which of the games in that series I think are the best based on my personal opinion. So here’s my top five Legend of Zelda games because reasons.

1. Wind Waker

Wind Waker was released in 2002, when I was about 7 years old, for the Nintendo GameCube. It was the first Legend of Zelda game to be cel-shaded, which was a rather hit-or-miss kind of animation at the time and still kinda is today. Not everyone considers it to be a sophisticated animation style, and as such players tend to dismiss games made in this style as immature or somehow lesser. But boy oh boy did Wind Waker have so much to offer to the Legend of Zelda franchise. Yes, it was adorable. It still is. Everything in it is squishy and cute, even the villains. Even Ganondorf. But it was still an emotionally compelling, complex game. And bottom line, it was fun! The sea-based game made the world feel so huge and worth exploring. With tons of interesting little islands and so many side quests as well as the main one. The plot is standard for a Zelda game, but holy heck the possibilities. There is so much to do. You can sail around for hours doing side quests and discovering things and never hit the main questline once. I would know, I’ve done it. Despite this, it was the first video game that I’d ever played all the way through, which gives it an even more special place in my heart.

2. Twilight Princess

This one is a bit more controversial. Despite critical acclaim, not everyone liked this game. This was Nintendo’s attempt to bring the franchise back to the dark tone of some of the older Zelda games, which didn’t quite do it for all players. But I liked it gosh darn it. It was a pretty game, the locations looked beautiful, the dungeons were fun (yeah even the Water Temple). Even the items in the game are gorgeous. When Princess Zelda is taken captive and many major parts of the world are covered in “Twilight”, a magic haze that turns the people of the world into little flame-souls, Link is transformed into a wolf and has to free the world from the evil magic. Along the way he visits numerous locations from the arid desert filled with ruins to the frozen mountain where a rather friendly soup-cooking yeti lives. Maybe the pseudo-villain was a little bit lame and he shouldn’t have squawked so much during his dialogue, but the world created around him for the sake of the game is engaging and intriguing. There’s not necessarily anything innovative or new about it, but innovation isn’t always a good thing (*cough cough* Skyward Sword *cough cough*) and sometimes a fun game is just a fun game.

3. Ocarina of Time

Okay so maybe innovation is a good thing. Ocarina of Time was a huge leap for the Legend of Zelda franchise, incorporating a z-axis and actual three dimensional graphics. It took the open-world feeling of previous games and took it to new heights. Literally. And of course looking back on it, it can be hard to see just how cool this game was at the time, but after the first four 2D games, Ocarina was such a huge leap in style that some gamers didn’t quite know how to respond. But when they finally figured out what to do with it, they went wild. It’s still pretty standard in terms of plot as far as Zelda is concerned, Zelda’s kidnapped, you’re the chosen hero to go mess around in some temples until you get to the last one and save the world. But nobody really cares about that. The game’s reputation has given it incredible staying power and it’s one of the most well-known in the entire series.

4. Majora’s Mask

This one was pretty much Ocarina of Time 2.0, but it wins points for being the first Legend of Zelda game to truly scare the hell out of me. In a world where you have three days to stop the moon from crashing to the ground, tensions run a bit high. The interesting thing this game adds is that you are allowed to reset the three days, with the idea that you will spend each of those sets of three days to complete each dungeon. But of course dungeons are not the only things you can interact with in Zelda games. There are plenty of NPCs whose stories you can play out, but whenever you reset, they forget all about what you did. Sure, overall what you do is for the greater good, but it presents a sort of “needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few” type of situation. Furthermore, this one tops the charts for a) not having Ganondorf as the main villain and b) having hands down one of the most terrifying main villains and accompanying main boss fights ever. Also bonus points for having this pretty face staring down at you the whole game:

And I do mean the whole game.

5. A Link to the Past

This one’s more personal. It’s a great game, don’t get me wrong, but the reason I like this one so much is because it’s one of the games my dad played when I was little. The 2D open world adventure had so many little things to do and so many items to get. And the way the plot is set up, there are two different worlds to explore, Light and Dark. The two worlds, though separate, can interact with each other, adding to the intrigue. Bear in mind, this was prior to the era of online walkthroughs or game guides, so all of these quests required the player to figure out the game’s logic, or at least have a very good friend that had played the game before them.

Almost all of the games in the series have their merits, and almost any one of them could have been on this list (except Skyward Sword because I hate Skyward Sword). These just happened to be the ones I liked the most for my own reasons. Comments, questions, rebuttals? I’d be happy to debate this until judgment day because Zelda is my favorite series of all time.