Dying Gamer's Final Quest: Beating Ocarina of Time on Switch 2

Ever finished a Zelda game? Now imagine saving that very first completion for the last chapter of your life.

That's the reality for a gamer named Blake, who posted on the Nintendo Switch and Switch 2 Reddit communities on September 21. "I'm dying, and I plan to make the new OOT the first game I ever fully complete," he wrote. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time remake hits Nintendo Switch 2 on November 5, 2026 — and for Nintendo it's a heavy-hitting exclusive. For Blake, it's something far more personal.

Blake has ALS, a motor neuron disease that progressively impacts muscle control. The ALS Association notes that people with the condition typically lose the ability to walk, dress, write, speak, swallow, and eventually breathe on their own, with an average survival time of about three years after diagnosis — though many live longer. Blake was diagnosed with a rare form of ALS at 38 and given 12 months to live. Nearly five years later, thanks to medically transformative spinal injections, he can still communicate over email. But in his Reddit post, he admitted, "my time is winding down though now sadly, and I really do only have about a year left." His father also had ALS and passed away six months after his diagnosis.

The response to his posts was overwhelming. Strangers flooded him with good wishes and offers to buy him the game. "All these strangers and people I've obviously never interacted with before sending me all these good wishes and offering to buy me the game, it was crazy," Blake says. "I'm very thankful for all the touching comments from everybody. It's little things like this that put a smile on my face and will be something I remember."

Blake's gaming history makes the Ocarina plan even sweeter. He got into games in the late '80s via Apple computers, starting with Prince of Persia on the Apple II, before moving to consoles with the N64. Back then he leaned toward competitive titles like GoldenEye 007 and NFL Blitz, and only rented Ocarina of Time from Blockbuster because his best friend wouldn't stop raving about it. It just didn't click. Later he sank 11,000 hours into Dark Age of Camelot and 9,000 into Destiny — the live-service grind — but he never actually beat a single game. Not one.

Now a software architect and 3D printing nerd (handy for wheelchair parts), Blake gravitates toward single-player stories as his reflexes weaken. Hades, Celeste, Ori and the Blind Forest, Dredge, and Spiritfarer are among his favorites — the latter, a cozy game about death and the afterlife, "gets me a little emotional with everything going on in life right now." Eventually he'll move to an iPad with an eye-gaze device, gaming with his eyes. For now, he games with his 2.5-year-old daughter, handing her a spare controller so she can "play" alongside him. "Watching her eyes light up, listening to her laugh at the screen... I know my time with her is winding down, and having these special moments to share means the world to me."

So why Ocarina? "That was another item on my bucket list — fully beat a video game," Blake explains. "The timing of the announcement of the remake just fell perfectly for me. I knew I wanted to beat a game, I knew I wanted to give OOT another try, and then the remake was coming out. For me — it just clicked. This will be the first, and likely only, video game I actually beat."

His message to readers is simple: "Life is short, trust me. Try your best to not leave any regrets behind because you never know when the time will come that you won't be able to easily fix those. When I was diagnosed at 38 I could have chosen to hole up in my room and let it consume me — but I have a family that I wanted to make memories with. I chose to fight it."

Will you be picking up the Ocarina of Time remake when it launches? And more importantly — what game would you save for last?