I’ve been working through all the games my parents never let me play as a kid using emulators. The idea for this post was inspired by blitz: the league. A dark and gritty American football arcade style game. It features steroids, corruption, and to the modern audience disgusting emphasis on dirty hits and injury. The injuries are emphasized through rewarding the player and mortal kombat style xrays.
It is not without humor (sending sex workers to the away team’s hotel before a game is a feature in the sequel iirc). The gameplay is fun enough and it’s really funny how mad the nfl got because despite the deep flaws it correctly pointed out the corruption.
Final score: “hey dude sniff this milk”/10.
Wind Waker is what I generally recommend to 3D Zelda first-timers. OOT suffers a lot from the weird N64 control inputs not mapping cleanly to modern controllers. And unlike OOT, Wind Waker's art style holds up great 20 years later—doubly so if you emulate the Wii U HD remaster.