I’m shocked, shocked I tell you. Well not that shocked.

After dragging my long suffering mum around every shop that might possibly still have a copy of The Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time and finally getting what must have been the last one anywhere.

We then have to go and do a whole load of other things all afternoon while I read the manual from back to front about a dozen times in the back of the car, getting more and more excited.

Then we finally got home but I had to help with dinner first and then eat all the while jabbering incessantly about how amazing it was going to be while I’m sure she just rolled her eyes and said “yes dear” and then I was finally allowed to put the N64 on and I then sat glued to it for hours in a state of wonder and amazement.

Truly the best experience I’ve ever had gaming.

Road Rash also had some bangers:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrjEhJoAY5k

Oh it was one of mine too. But the amount of times you have to slog back and forth across the same 6 or 7 poorly designed maps, fighting the same 4 or 5 enemies and doing the same repetitive tasks gets old very quickly.

It looks fantastic (for the N64) but the sacrifices they made to get the higher fidelity textures and dynamic lighting, including some horrendous object pop-in distract from the visuals.

Also, the inexcusable difficulty spikes make it a very frustrating game (looking at you Beaver Bother and that annoying bug race) and the mini games are an annoying bit of dragging the game out rather than the fun diversion they were meant to be. And who’s decision was it to make you have to get through the whole of the original DK arcade with only one life?

Rare had a genuine hit with Banjo Kazooie and they kept trying to replicate it and just ended up piling more and more stuff onto the formula and made it worse each time. Though if any of their platformers stands up today it’s Conker’s Bad Fur Day.

Tag Anywhere for Donkey Kong 64 makes it at least playable in this day and age (I still don’t think it stands up but it removes the most annoying part of the game).

Master of Time for Ocarina of Time is incredible.

Super Mario Star Road is basically a direct sequel to Mario 64.

Tomorrow Never Dies is a 13 level new Bond game based on Goldeneye 007

I remember the first time I saw the phrase “streaming video” was a website called “teen steam” (which I desperately wanted a credit card to access) in the late 90s / early 2000s.

I’m sure you can guess what the content of that site was and I was sure that “streaming” was some new sex act I had yet to discover and wanted very much to find out. Sadly I was too young, too poor and logged onto the Internet in the school library at lunch time so it was always going to be a long shot.