Okay look, let’s try and enjoy this before Nintendo’s legal team gets involved because, while it is a categorical breach of copyright, this project is just too wonderful to disregard completely.

A band of industrious (and currently anonymous) modders are trying to build a 2D version of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, reconfigured with a top-down view and a style so lovingly reminiscent of that beautiful SNES game, A Link to the Past.

If the task of rebuilding Shigeru Miyamoto’s defining masterpiece wasn’t daunting enough, the team has pledged to use “no already-existing engine and no utilities such as Game Maker.”

So it is being built from scratch, piece-by-piece, which means it automatically qualifies as a vapourware candidate (sorry for shattering dreams). Equally perilous is the use of existing audio files from the N64 original, which I’m sure swings this into a the realm of plagiarism (again, sorry).

But just in case things soon turn sour, let’s enjoy the fantasy of what this project could deliver: A besprited Ganondorf on Horseback, once feared, now slightly adorable in pixellated form. Quaintly crap lo-fi versions of the Ocarina songs as if they were custom ringtones. The lush forestry of The Lost Woods, pressed into a glorious 2D mush of greens and browns. You know you want it.

Also, the team are promising bonus content, such as unfreezing Zora’s Domain. Take a closer look on the mod’s website, and a view of the game in the videos above and below.

PS: If you fancy a more official (and reliably brilliant) version of Zelda, you could always try the 3DS version of Ocarina of Time.