Zelda: Skyward Sword & EDGE Magazine's Review - a perfect 10 in Onanism

(c) Future Publishing

I have been an avid follower of Nintendo’s Zelda series of video games for the last twenty years or so - from the SNES’s A Link to the Past, through the majestical The Ocarina of Time and its multi-layered follow-up Majora’s Mask on the N64, on past the much-maligned Gamecube’s cell-shaded The Wind Waker, to the current Wii generation’s latest reiteration, Twilight Princess - so I felt my heart skip a beat with the release of The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword just last month.

All the gaming magazines’ reviews were unanimous in their adulation for the big N’s newest addition to their action-adventure RPG world, awarding the type of near-perfect scores video games can only dream of in the world of mediocre titles and lacklustre design. So I knew there was just one place to go for final clarification of Skyward Sword’s supposed brilliance and that was Future Publishing’s pre-eminent videogames magazine, EDGE: lo and behold, the latest Zelda title had been awarded the perfect 10-out-of-10 score...

The freezing cold Tea bag tester

Some days are sent to test our resolve, sanity and basic human emotions, of this I have no doubt and I can attest to sampling many of these challenges over my life so far. I usually have a bad March and then a bad October, which being almost equidistant to one another means I can shore up the defences when the individual months mentioned above are approaching: this means cancelling any non-essential trips or appointments, ensuring I have some pittance saved to one side for emergencies that are bound to arise and trying to remain calm and collected in the face of an insurmountable Fate intent on disrupting everything around me.

Gaming the light fandango... pt 1

I am a moron. There, I’ve said it now. In fact I’m going to go a step further and state that I’m not only a moron but an ape, an arse, a clown, a cretin, a tool and ultimately, a twat. Indeed, there are many negative terms I could relate to myself without even becoming abashed at the brevity such monikers instill within our society because I accept that I am nothing more than an absolute pillock. And why, may you ask, am I reducing my very existence to the lowest of common denominators? Well it’s all because a life-long, crippling addiction - controlled for years via private solitude and introverted withdrawal - has suddenly raised its wanton head into my life again and in doing so, now appears to have cost me immeasurably.

GTA V Trailer: Read It and Weep!

The first look at Rockstar Game's newest GTA Sandbox world has finally arrived, so click the link above, jump inside and sample the pixel shaded trailer Elysium that is GTA V (that's 'Grand Theft Auto Five' to all non-gamers out there), which by a stroke of genius is accompanied by the opening instrumental music from the 1968 Small Faces song, Ogden's Nut Gone Flake! Surely 'tis a beast...

A neighbourhood in waiting... pt 2

As the din continued underneath, I stood listening for a few minutes frozen behind my front door, safe in knowledge that my unlit vestibule and the coats draped across its security glass camouflaged me from the noise-inducing cretins below. The same loud thudding that had awoken me seemed a little louder now that it had less brickwork to dampen its echo and through the wired glass I caught a few murky, distorted shapes moving around in the stairwell beyond: actual morons were in my midst.

A neighbourhood in waiting... pt 1

It was a low and dull distant thud that initially brought me out of my early morning slumber, where I was partly protected from the outside world’s intrusion by the yellow foam earplugs snugly fitted into my aural canals. I blinked once and then squinted at a point on my nearest bedroom wall, feeling the relaxation of the last eight hours of sleep rapidly dissipate as I awaited the arrival of another muffled bang.

Tick-Tock Tattoo and a case for wearing glasses

Every two weeks on the Friday, I’ve got the unenviable task of signing-on at my local Job Centre. It’s a place governed by streams of Liberalised red tape and populated with unemployed cretins and employed denizens who have an inability to crack a smile: if you attempt to lighten the mood with a little banter, they’ll glower at you as if you’ve just spat out a hate-filled Bernard Manning joke, regardless of whether you’re just someone trying to earn their next Job Seekers giro or you’re actually an out-of work comedian trying to get a laugh.

Smoking: uttering the dreaded 'S' word!

I used to adore smoking. Not having a joint or anything like that, just smoking normal, tobacco-filled cigarettes. There, I’ve said the ‘S’ word now and I don’t care: if anyone wishes to rain fire and brimstone down upon me because I dare to mention such a social travesty in our health-conscious, non-culture of the 21st century ‘Tweenies’, then feel free to cast your misjudged, self-righteous indignation my way, for I can take it! I’m neither embarrassed about nor regretful for the many years my body suffered at the hands of nicotine, tar and the many assorted chemical ills within each cigarette I interned.

Bad letter day…

My Postman is as blind as a f**king Bat and although his misreading of envelope addresses has never caused me a direct problem in seven years, last week this Elysium all changed and the effect has been affective, to say the least. It all started when I became aware I hadn’t received any mail through my letterbox for nearly a week and yet, I knew my quarterly bills should have arrived and added to my current money woes. Now, whether it’s my latest six-page BT bill full of hidden charges or it happens to be British Gas’ reams of electrical extortion matters not one iota: the simple fact is my personal expenditure is processed and sent out to me on paper, in order for moi to settle the debts as these monopolising conglomerates expect their pound(s) of flesh, regardless of excuses.

Subconsciously counting backwards

It’s a while since I last wrote about one of my dreams - see "Dreams of what lie beneath" for more details - and so by chance, I just happened to have had a very vivid and quite disturbing dream last night. This subconscious rumination’s origin seems to have been a letter I received in the morning post the day before, but which I’d put off reading for 24 hours due to the potential implications laid out within its organised font. I will forsake exploring what was in the letter until after I’ve explained the slumbered intricacies that I can recall for this blog entry, but feel free to guess as you read along from the imagery, metaphors and subtexts used in this story...