It doesn’t take much effort to find horror stories inspired by Majora’s Mask online.  The reason, we might imagine, is obvious:  “Majora’s Mask” is the darkest title in the Zelda canon thus far.  It takes place in an inexplicable parallel world; the apocalypse is constantly occurring; and the moon has an enormous, menacing face.  We can easily write off the disturbing undercurrent of “Majora” as a result of aesthetics such as these, but in this post, I want to offer an argument that the horror which pervades the game is much more subtle and existential than that interpretation.  I submit that the ultimate reason “Majora’s Mask” continues to terrify us is that, as much as we want there to exist an evil for us to conquer, there ultimately exists no evil in the game.

Although I am often tempted to view “Majora” in a vacuum precisely because it is so wildly…

Last Wednesday, Nintendo announced in a Nintendo Direct that, over three years after the release of “Legend of Zelda:  Ocarina of Time 3D,” “Majora’s Mask” is officially slated for a 3D release at some point next spring.  The aim of my project here is to reflect on a game which, far beyond being merely the sequel to “Ocarina of Time,” is, in my view, one of the most significant pieces of art in modern times.  While the release date for “Majora’s Mask 3D” has not been publicized at this point, my goal is to write weekly reflections on different facets of the game, in the hopes that, by the time it is released, I will have articulated just what about this game strikes me at irrevocably moving.

For want of a better place to start, I wish to reflect this week on the aspect of form which simultaneously makes “Majora’s Mask” a…