I’ve been playing Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword on the Wii.

Part of the Legend of Zelda franchise, this game is first chronologically in order to explain some of the hard-hitting questions in the series such as: Where did the Master Sword come from? How did Link come in possession of the Triforce? WHY IS EVERY SINGLE ZELDA VILLAIN GANONDORF?!

You meet Link like in every Zelda game; he’s sleeping in instead of preparing for his school’s festival, a very relatable demonstration of slacking. Zelda, not a princess this game, sends a giant purple bird to wake Link up.

From then on, you find out that Link’s being bullied by a fat, narcissistic redhead (with hair even David Bowie would cringe at) who will stop at nothing to win Zelda’s affections, including kidnapping and abusing Link’s pet. (He doesn’t seem to realize that his actions only make Zelda hate him more, not less.) Once the bird is found, you get to fly it. Then, you fly in a tournament.

That’s it; that’s the first level.

It takes about an hour.

Then, when you’re flying alone with Zelda, a giant, black tornado pops up out of nowhere and takes her away.

Kidnapping by weather; that’s a new one.

Link then gets a magical sword and an accompanying sidekick (an amusing yet irritating girl whose sole purpose is to state the obvious), and Zelda’s dad forces Link to go look for her.

It was at this point that whoever was in charge of the game ratings stopped playing.

You’ll see what I mean.

The first dungeon, Skyview Temple, is where you meet the most prominent villain in the game: Ghirahim. He is trying to capture Zelda in order to sacrifice her soul to a huge lizard to revive his master Demise (… who turns out to be Ganondorf, just more powerful and with a cooler name.)

He is the sole reason the game should have been rated T.

First time you meet him, he teleports behind you after promising not to outright murder you (his words not mine) and then molests you with his freakishly long tongue. Next, he’s frustrated that Zelda escaped and wants to hear your agonized screams of pain to make him feel better. Then, you stop him from taking Zelda, and he promises to make your “ears bleed from the sound of your shrill screams.”

This is only the beginning of the flamboyant demon lord’s appearances, and already, I think some young children are scarred for life.

And there’s the side quests. Enjoy running around delivering love letters, cleaning impossibly dirty houses, dealing with the firtatious Item Check Girl, and jumping off a cliff.

The bosses are reasonably hard, too. Ironically enough, it was the first boss who gave me the most trouble while the last boss I beat on my first try. The first boss, Ghirahim, catches your sword, takes it, and uses it against you. It’s frustrating, and the fight takes a really long time.

When you try to use something other than your sword to fight him, (i.e. bug net), he back-hands you across the face. It took a while for me to stop laughing after that.

I kept screaming at him things like: “Stop moving so I can kill you!”, “Die, you no-good jerk!” (my words after they were thoroughly cleaned with censor-soap), and “Let me kill you!!” Then, my mother comes in screeching at me to stop saying the F-word. As she keeps yelling at me, Ghirahim pops up behind me, and now two of my hearts are gone. (Thanks Mom.) And, then I start swearing some more.

My fighting prowess, ladies and gentlemen.

And, if fighting him the first time wasn’t enough, you get to fight him AGAIN.

The fight is opened up with about six minutes of really awkward and easily-misinterpreted dialogue involving corporal punishment, Ghirahim’s “exquisite features,” and the words “my,” “heart,” “filled,” “rainbows,” and “with” were used in a sentence. (In a different order, of course.)

Then you fight him AGAIN.

Then, you fight Demise, which was comparatively easy.

In this game, you swing the Wii remote for the sword, made possible by using something called Wii Motion Plus. You either have to insert it like you would a nunchuk or you can have a remote with it built in; either way, it costs quite a pretty penny. And, it needs to be calibrated like every five seconds.

Another feature the game has is autojump; it’s what it says on the tin, really. It seems convenient, at first. Then autojump makes Link jump into random pools of magma 40-something times, and you’re tempted to throw the Wii remote at the TV.

The game’s a bit on the expensive side, even after all these years ($40-$50), but it’s worth it. You can find it nearly everywhere, though. That, and it comes with a free CD to honor the game franchise’s 25th anniversary.