The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword is a game that is going to mean a lot of different things to a lot of different people. For the base which took hold of Nintendo's initial vision for the Wii console, imagining future games where the controller in your hand was -- hey! -- not a controller, but the Master Sword itself; it is that. For those who simply imagined a narrative evolution of the long, long-stagnant Hylian franchise, it is that, too. For Wii owners who just want something to play, it is that as well. It must be that.

As the flagship component of the Zelda franchise's 25th Anniversary, you couldn't ask for a better identikit of the series. As it moves through the all-too-familiar cycle of temples, tools and time-travel, it touches on the franchise's lowest points, adopts its most stellar attributes and, at frequent intervals, taps into a kind of magic that no game ever has before.