Star Trek 64
Image: @SpinaSanctuary

If you like yourself some Star Trek — and what intelligent, attractive person doesn't? — there's certainly plenty of it around at the moment. New series, new films, new games; it's a bountiful time for fans of the final frontier. Star Trek: Picard is currently deep into its second season, with the full main cast of The Next Generation confirmed to be returning in Season 3, and the upcoming Star Trek: Strange New Worlds seems to be offering a return to the episodic planet-of-the-week-style format that fans of 'Legacy' Trek have been jonesing for.

However, we recently stumbled across the beginnings of a fan project that loaded our torpedo bays with more nostalgia than that, even. Behold a bold meeting of two of our very favourite things in the universe: Star Trek: TNG and Zelda: Majora's Mask.

Artist-animator @Amaruuk is the genius responsible, posting on their fan art Twitter account @SpinaSanctuary, and as you can see from the tweets below, the low-poly mixture of MM X TNG looks utterly incredible.

The idea seems to have started recently, when they tweeted the fabled words "What if Star Trek, but Zelda 64????" before posting a 64-bit rendition of Captain Picard's Ressikan flute from 'The Inner Light' soon after:

The artist decided that the episode 'Masks' — a rare late-TNG misfire that falls into the so-bad-it's-fascinating category — was another natural fit for the Majora's Mask mash up. Observe a beautifully blocky Picard having just found the mask of Korgano:

From there the artist made quick progress with low-poly versions of iconic Trek objects, plus Commander Data playing his violin and the redoubtable Commander Riker on the 'bone, both rendered in glorious 64-bit form:

And finally some audio to go with Jean-Luc's Ressikan flute. Pass the tissues, will you? We're getting a bit weepy...

For fans of both franchises, this feels like the most perfect mix imaginable. We've already pondered the whereabouts of the great Star Trek console games — and a Star Trek: Prodigy game was recently announced for Switch — but it's amazing to see that there's hope yet for nostalgic Nintendo fans who like a bit of TNG.

The likelihood of this "ongoing low-poly personal project" ever being something playable is remote, but we'll gladly take a steady flow of gifs like these in our feeds. You can see more of the artist's work on their Artstation page or via Twitter. They're also open for subs on Ko-fi and stream on Twitch, too (where we glimpsed Lt. Worf with his trusty bat'leth). Be sure to express your great joy and gratitude.

Let us know below on a scale of 10-10 just how much you'd love to play Star Trek 64.

Further reading:

[source twitter.com]