Relieving Stress in Twilight Princess

I feel so Hyrule.

High school, for me and for many of us, could be stressful as all hell. I’m not saying it was entirely bad and that those years were completely devoid of meaningful social and educational experiences. Because that wouldn’t be true. What is true is that a lot of my high school memories are clouded in a haze of nerves, anxiety, hormones, and way too much Lynx Africa.

In many ways, stress is a natural part of being a teenager. My world was filling with the responsibilities and demands of an adult existence before I had developed the proper adult reasoning to know how to cope with it all (mind you, this is still a work in progress).

On top of being asked to prioritise my studies and develop a career path that I had no tangible comparison to fall back on, shy, introverted, pubescent teenage me was also trying to navigate:

· connecting with other stressed-out adolescents, and…

· knowing what music I should be listening to, and…

· making sure I didn’t have any dandruff on my school shirt, and…

· talking to girls, and…

· knowing what music I shouldn’t be listening to, and…

· going to a class that didn’t include any of my regular friends and trying to find a seat where I wouldn’t have to talk to other people, but I also wouldn’t come across as a total loser, and…

· trying not to panic if only ten people liked my Facebook post when my last post got fifteen likes, and…

· making sure I didn’t have any toothpaste stains on my school shirt, and…

· not wanting to speak in public in fear of my voice breaking, and…

Yeah. It was a lot.

I was fortunate enough to have a handful of safe places in which I could find peace and stability away from the dizzying g-forces of the high school rollercoaster. One of them was The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess.

My parents bought me the Wii version of the game during my first year in high school. It came at a time when I was right on the precipice of moving on from being someone who enjoyed video games, to someone who was obsessed with them. Twilight Princess pushed me over the edge.

They say you never forget your first Zelda game, and Twilight Princess was a wonderful introduction to this legendary series for me. The game was longer and deeper than anything I had played before. Simultaneously epic and intimate, melancholic and zany. And the way it effortlessly balanced combat, exploration, and puzzle-solving in its gameplay revealed to me the pure magic of Nintendo’s gold-standard game design. A gold-standard that I would come to enjoy in several other games in the years since.

And while I was enraptured by the main quest in Twilight Princess—including its unforgettable cast of characters, quirky items, and the single best set of dungeons in the entire Zelda series—that’s not the part of the game I want to focus on here. Because my relationship with this game continued long after the credits rolled.

During my teenage years, Twilight Princess morphed into this personal stress-relieving tool. A tool that I could reliably use to calm myself down after any day that was a bit too much. I have vivid memories of hopping off the school bus, walking home, grabbing a snack, and booting up the Wii to spend a bit of time in Hyrule. Family dinner and homework and chores would come later in the evening. But in those late-afternoon hours—twilight, if you will—when the pressure of feeling like I was missing some crucial piece of what it meant to be a functioning teenager threatened to take over, I found myself turning to this game.

What would I do during these post-school play sessions? Mostly just chill in the game’s world. The Hyrule in Twilight Princess was so familiar to me, so comforting and filled with memories that were already forming a nostalgic warmth, that simply immersing myself there would be enough to reduce my stress.

I might’ve poked around for missed secrets or partook in the snowboarding minigame for the hundredth time. But mostly, I would just vibe with the game. Riding around on Epona, soaking in the beauty of the stars above Hyrule field at night, the peaceful curiosity of Faron Woods, the silent desolation of the Hidden Village. It was the truest of escapes. A virtual world I had already conquered and which now I could simply wander through and reflect in.

It’s the kind of gaming I can never do as an adult. The stresses and obligations of being a grown-up have rewired my perception of video games as being strictly goal-oriented pieces of entertainment. If I play The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom today, you better believe I’m either working my way towards a destination or actively completing a quest, shrine, or dungeon. Roaming for roaming’s sake is a luxury I don’t have anymore.

But did I really have that luxury in high school either? The stress and pressures may have been different back then, but a mental load is still a mental load no matter how you paint it. So, maybe I need to follow the lead of my teenage self and use my gaming sessions as a way to slow down and take stock, rather than being yet another checklist to fill.

To be fair, I did have a genuine in-game goal that I was working towards during these Twilight Princess relaxation sessions. I was determined to make it the first game in which I crossed the hundred-hour playtime threshold. And I did! Quest complete.

Who knows? The next time I’m feeling overwhelmed by work or my social anxiety or getting toothpaste stains on my shirt (yes, this is still a problem), I may just load up my old Twilight Princess save file and allow myself to be taken away for a little, directionless meander through Hyrule.

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The Video Game Storyteller is a free Substack written and formatted by Harry Fritsch on the lands of the Jagera and Turrbal people, the Traditional Custodians of Meanjin (Brisbane).

All images were either captured directly by the author or sourced from publicly available promotional screenshots.

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