We don’t always think too deeply about the things characters say in video games, but someone has to. A developer wrote the lines that cheerful or despondent NPC fed your character at the edge of the wasteland, or in a quiet room overlooking a gambling den. And the spectral form who visited your hero in their dreams could have just wailed. Instead, she questioned the nature of humanity, like a proper person.
Some lines stick with us more than others. They linger long after we’ve stopped playing. We use them in conversations with strangers at the supermarket or with coworkers at the office, until they become a part of who we are. That’s why Polygon contributors gathered a list of the 100 greatest video game quotes of all time earlier this year. We considered games from all eras. In the end we came up with one quote that rules them all. And now, after months of debate and 40 years after the game that included the quote launched, I’m here to say not a lot has changed. That top pick is still the greatest video game quote of all time.
Picture, if you will, a dusty wilderness. A young lad, wandering along its margins, encounters an old woman who is battling for her life against monsters that have cornered her. She is weak from hours spent fleeing the slobbering hordes, and not nearly as young as she used to be. When a young man arrives and beats off her pursuers, she is grateful. She’s more grateful still when he agrees to embark on an epic quest to save the kingdom of Hyrule.
The Legend of Zelda, the Famicom Disk System game that remains one of the finest NES games ever released, begins its story just after that fateful encounter between the young man named Link and the old woman, Impa. Without an instruction manual, we would never even know the incident occurred. The game opens as Link stares just ahead of him, at a cave. Then he enters the opening and an old man delivers that immortal line that provides all the backstory some of us will ever need: “It’s dangerous to go alone! Take this.”
In 1986, we couldn’t always appreciate the wonder that awaited us outside the shelter of that cave, but this simple line set the tone. It warned of a harsh wilderness we would soon encounter, before we had seen so much as a single enemy. It offered us the sort of reassurance that only gripping the hilt of a sword can bring. And it served as a reminder that we were mostly on our own… but not quite.
Many of us went on to complete The Legend of Zelda. We braved the second, more difficult quest, which began with another visit to the same cave, to hear the same warning and grab that familiar weapon. On our second visit, the words served not as a warning, but a promise that we could have an adventure once again. Hyrule might still be a dangerous place, but now we knew we could survive it. Now we smiled with anticipation.
It’s no wonder some of us slip the phrasing into mundane conversations, or turn it into memes on social media. Even newer games reference it on occasion. And who among us has not seen our spouse headed out the door and handed them their sack lunch while warning them about the dangers of going alone?
For situations somber and light-hearted alike, offering someone that simple advice evokes memories of other times we’ve ventured into the digital wilds. The cautionary words prompt a smile, a fond remembrance of an experience so many of us have shared. For a pleasant moment, the words prompt us to think back on everything the medium has meant to us, and on how that might change in years to follow. We’ve all been through enough to relish the adventure that awaits. And we reach for that sword one more time.