The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask Playthrough (Actual N64 Capture) - Part 1

This is part 1 of my capture of me playing through The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask on the Nintendo 64. This is not an emulator and was not played on the Wii Virtual Console. This footage was recorded directly from my Nintendo 64 using an actual Collector's Edition (gold cartridge) copy of Majora's Mask.

As a kid I owned all of the Zelda games that came out before Majora's Mask, but this was the first Zelda game that I bought with my own money - on its release date too. Before that I had only received Zelda games as gifts some time after their initial release. It was extremely exciting coming home from school and being able to play a brand new Zelda game on its release date, especially so soon after Ocarina of Time had been released. I still remember running around Clock Town for the first time and trying to catch the Bomber kids.

However, despite my fond memories, Majora's Mask is nowhere near my favorite Zelda game. It's a strange title and the three-day cycle is repetitive. There aren't many dungeons and most of the game is focused on side quests. Stone Tower Temple is incredibly tedious, and collecting all the stray fairies just plain sucks.

But in general, I enjoy the game's similarities to Ocarina of Time (such as the Gerudo Fortress, which was one of my favorite parts), and I like being able to play as a Goron and Zora. The swamp and snow areas are also cool. I'm not too fond of the Deku Scrub stuff though.

Almost two years after I uploaded my initial playthrough, Nintendo released a remake of this game for the 3DS. Although I haven't played it, I watched some footage of the remake, and I have to say, I don't like the changes (aside from the better graphics). I think Nintendo overcomplicated the boss fights.

One interesting thing to note about the original Nintendo 64 version is that although it uses the Expansion Pak, it doesn't run at a high resolution. It still runs at the same 320x240 resolution as Ocarina of Time but simply uses the Expansion Pak to create better graphics and place more objects on screen, similar to Donkey Kong 64.

In this first part I started a new save file, obtained magic and learned the Bombers' secret code.

Recorded with the Hauppauge HD PVR and the official N64 S-video cable. I used a Toshiba model D-R550 DVD Recorder to upconvert the N64's native 240p signal to 480i so that the Hauppauge could capture the console's audio/video signal.

I'm using a standard N64 controller.