The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap

As certain men who're confident in their masculinity will admit, size isn't everything. And guess what - they're right. Take the Mona Lisa, for instance; despite its colossal stature within popular culture, it measures a mere 20 x 30 inches.

If you need another example, consider the Minish Cap. It's a huge, top-down 2D adventure, requiring you to roam its vast, open expanses, visit its many villages, solve its dungeons' numerous puzzles and uncover the land's various mysteries in the overall hope of saving a princess. But it can also be a tiny one; living amongst the Minish people to discover their world-within-a-world requires shrinking to their minute size with the aid of an enchanted hat, and one that concerns itself with the barest elements of adventuring convention.

Much of the game is spent passing between these two worlds, learning delightful new skills, gathering new weapons and items, engaging in fun sub-quests, making new friends and vanquishing foes whilst always striving to explore new areas. Central to this voyaging dynamic is the concept of Kinstones. You will find these along your journey and you must subsequently match them to the right villager in order to unlock a new part of the map.

But to focus on this, or any other element, is to miss the exquisiteness of the overall Minish Cap experience. It's a rich and uniquely rewarding game-scape, bathed in fairytale overtones and dressed in a level of such charm that video games very rarely achieve. As possibly the last 2D outing for the Zelda series, the Minish Cap can stand proud, displaying the characteristic "it's-what-you-do-with-it-that-counts" grin of something that clearly knows that it punches above its weight.