Zelda Retrospective: Part VI - Majora's Mask - Day 6

Sorry I'm late, I had a busy weekend. Anyway, on to Zelda!

For this post, I delved deeper into Ikana Canyon. Frankly, I meant to play through the Stone Tower, but I didn't make it that far.
Appalled that I had done the Ocean Spider House on the wrong day and not received the Giant's Wallet, I went to the ocean once again to complete that task. Actually, I began that bit twice because there was a game crashing freeze once again. That's the second time that's happened. I had to restart the system and redo what little I had done on that day cycle. I'm once again wishing that I had downloaded Majora's Mask on Virtual Console rather than play it on the GameCube disc.
So, with thirty Gold Skulltulas dead and the morning of the first day all used up, I obtained my big ass wallet and proceeded to Ikana Valley to tackle the Gibdos' Well. Now this is one of the more annoying sections of the game. For some reason, a bunch of mummies regret that they never got to have some Deku Nuts and bombs, or never got to eat a fish. So they've spent eternity standing guard next to doors in some underground chambers. Its only when you give them what they want that their souls can rest and the doors will open.
Also, the mummies find bugs creepy.

The only tool you need to fool a mummy.

Unfortunately, there are a couple things that you can't get a hold of inside of the Gibdos' Well, like a blue potion, that forced me to go searching around for one. I didn't want to fetch the ingredients for it to take the witches in the Swamp, and I couldn't remember which Business Scrub would sell me a blue potion. I checked in Lulu's room in the Zora Cape before I remembered that he's right there in Ikana Canyon. So I dropped 100 rupees (And thanks to the Giant's Wallet, I made it back and then some) to buy the potion. I did have to break down and look at my old player's guide at the map of the well, if only to remember where I needed to go with the time-sensitive hot spring water. Yes, a mummy's only regret was that it had no scalding water to look at.
Once I wrapped up (Ha!) my business in the well full of mummies, I obtained the incredibly creepy looking Mirror Shield - much creepier than a bug, thank you - and made my way into Ikana Castle.
Since there are only four main dungeons in Majora's Mask, it's kind of nice having the small sub dungeon that is the Ikana Castle. It involves a lot of ReDead, which are pretty easy to kill when wearing the Gibdos Mask, Captain's Hat or Garo's Mask, since they begin to dance and not attack when you wear one of those masks. And because ReDead drop about fifteen to twenty rupees each, that new Giant's Wallet filled up quick. The goal of Ikana Castle is to get to King Igos du Ikana, a skeletal warrior king who looks like the winner at last year's Day of the Dead costume contest.

The runner-up didn't think to carry a sword.

After dispatching his two henchman, a murderous, skeletal version of Laurel and Hardy, you get to take on Igos himself. I always find it's fun to wear the Captain's Hat that is given to you by Captain Keeta, Igos' military commander. This brings about a quick, but rather funny cut scene that shows that Igos might have had a little too much royal blood in his system. Cue "Dueling Banjos." He isn't the sharpest of skeletons. Once you defeat him, he realizes how much he and his kingdom had lost its way, that their failure to trust in each other led them to a long war that destroyed their kingdom and their lives. He then teaches you the Elegy of Emptiness, a song that creates statues of whatever form Link is in, so you can create up to four statues at once as Hylian, Deku, Zora and Goron. Unfortunately, the Hylian Link stature is creepy as hell.

That's going to haunt me.

And so, with the Elegy learned, and midnight passed (my time, not game time), I played the Song of Time, saved the game and called it a quits.
I might double up on the Zelda blogs this week, since there's not much to this one and I've probably got a good three blogs worth of Majora's Mask left at least. I'm eager to finish and move on to Wind Waker and then Twilight Princess.

Zelda Retrospective: Part VI - Majora's Mask - Day 4

Sorry this didn't go up on Friday, I was busy with Halloween plans.
Holy three days of accomplishments, Batman! I got a lot done in this three day cycle.
Before we go into said accomplishments, let me point out once again that if you want to play Majora's Mask, either dust off your N64 or download it on the Virtual Console for your Wii. The emulation on the GameCube collector's disk that I'm playing the game on is terrible. It only seems to be Majora's Mask that has issues. I started playing this cycle earlier this week, but had the game lock up. All I could do was reset and lose all the progress I'd made since the last cycle reset, that included nabbing the hookshot and first egg from the Gerudo Pirates.
Heh, all female pirates. The guys must really enjoy it when the pirates come to rape and pillage.

Had Link been a day earlier, he might have been exposed to the filming of Gerudo Casting Couch 17.

Luckily, on this play through, despite some paranoia that I would suddenly lose hours worth of game time due to another game crash, I got through without losing any progress. Yay!
So once again, I met Mikau, who enthusiastically cried "Baby!" several times in his death throes. Maybe if he hadn't used up so much energy singing to Link, then Link could have gotten him to a Zora doctor? That old dude in the big hook-for-a-hand-shaped building seems like he could have helped. Oh well. Now Link gets to assume the life of another famous guy who no one knows is actually dead. Really, I find that kind of messed up. Link is compressing these people into masks, though it supposedly heals their souls when he turns them into masks, and then stealing their lives. And what happens once Link's quest is over? The moon won't fall and all, but as far as the Gorons and Zoras are concerned, Darunia is dead and Mikau just plain disappeared. Maybe the Zora's will find Mikau's grave... oh, wait, no. Link buried him in sand. All it will take is one good high tide, or maybe a hungry scavenger that's willing to dig to make that body disappear. In ten years, there will be an episode on the Zora version of Unsolved Mysteries, Lulu and the rest of the band will have moved on and Mikau will be utterly forgotten because Link turned the poor guy into a mask.
Oh, here's a scary thought. What if the Mask Salesman lied and the "Song of Healing" doesn't heal at all? Maybe it just turns everybody into masks and steals their soul or something? Link could be stealing people's souls without even knowing it. I wouldn't put it past that Mask Salesman. He's creepy.

And let's not forget that this "innocent" mask salesman happens to carry around a mask that can destroy the whole damn world. That's all kinds of screwed up.

 

Anyway, I got the Zora mask and then went on to the whole pirate fortress thing. I've never once done the fortress without the Stone Mask. So I made it a point to run over to the entrance to Ikana Canyon to find the poor dude who was just so damned boring that you couldn't even see him without the Lens of Truth. I mean, when you have to practice being noticed, then you've got some serious problems. I'm talking intensive therapy, not just a bottle of red potion. Poor schmuck. The main problem is I received a player's guide when I received the game, so I always played the game with a bit of a crutch. I've never made a crack at the fortress without the mask. I told myself I'd try it this time, but truth be told, I was feeling too damn lazy and I wanted to get all the eggs before the dawn of the second day.
After the fortress, I took a picture of one of the pirates to the horny dude who lives alone on the beach. Thanks, Nintendo, for making me provide that guy with something for his wank bank. He gave me a talking seahorse in return, but then I had to take the seahorse out to Pinnacle Rock. There, I had to commit the genocide of what seems to be an endangered species of Giant Sea Snake so that I could rescue some eggs and free the talking sea horse's girlfriend. I was given a piece of heart in return and then left to deliver the last of the eggs. I assume the sea horses started boning after I left.
I delivered the eggs, then learned a song from some tadpoles. Sperm symbolism here? I think whoever designed the whole Great Bay area must have been horny. Then I rode a big ass talking turtle with palm trees growing out its shell - not quite Discworld sized - to the Great Bay Temple.
I found this temple to be relatively easy. It involves a lot of redirection of water flow, but so long as you pay attention to the network of pipes, it's pretty easy to reason out what to do in this temple. You might forget a step or two and have to explore to find the proper room, but it's really not that hard. I also really like the giant waterworks design of the place. The whole temple is essentially a big water-powered machine, which lends itself to the semi-steampunk elements of Majora's Mask, such as motorized boats and such.
After a lot of valve-opening, I made my way into the lair of Gyorg. This is where I think the Great Bay Temple is weak. For one, I couldn't remember what the boss was. I can remember the bosses from the other temples clearly, but when it comes to Gyorg, I didn't remember him until I saw him.

To me, you're just another ugly fish. Sorry, dude.

Because of this, I thought maybe he'd be a fun challenge. But, no, this boss is horrible easy. Hit him with an arrow, turn into a Zora, jump in the water and zap him with my electricity shield. Repeat. Then he changes it up. He swims around spitting out the tiny Gyorgs he keeps in his mouth like an archerfish, while I spam the electricity shield until he's dead. Boringly simple. Oh well.
I actually had more challenge trying to play the horny fisherman's platform jumping game. I just kept falling off the platforms and into the water - at one point with less than two seconds left in the clock. And he just kept laughing that "Heh heh" laugh like some kind of rapist. Weirdo. But I got a piece of heart out of him. Oh god, I hope he didn't rape the seahorse.

Happy Halloween (there's still nine minutes left!)

The Greatest Scary Game You Probably Never Played

In light of Halloween, I've been trying to present some alternatives for your scary celebrations. Tonight, I bring you one of the best, most unplayed horror games ever.
Screw Resident Evil, Silent Hill, Alone in the Dark and all those other old classic horror games, as well as the newer stuff like Dead Space, which I admit has scared me so bad at times that I've yet to finish it - plus I'm horribly stuck in this one spot. Why do I keep admitting the things that scare me on the internet?

File under: Things I know that scare Nate.

I wanted you all to know about a game that I've been playing for about seven years, totally riveted every time I play it. It's a sweeping epic of a story with a great, Lovecraft-inspired mythology and a truly inventive gameplay system that effected the player as much as what would happen in the game.
You might ask, "Where can I play this game?" Well, sir or madame, dust off your GameCube - if you ever owned one - or find a controller and a memory card so you can boot it up on your Wii. That's right, this gem was an M-rated Nintendo exclusive. And people said the GameCube was a kiddie system.
It's name: Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem.

Oh, thank God, finally. Something with good cover art.

Released way back in the summer of 2002, Eternal Darkness was developed by Silicon Knights - then 2nd party developer for Nintendo and now 2nd party developer for Microsoft. It originally began life as a Nintendo 64 game, but Silicon Knights began to rework it once the GameCube's hardware was released to developers. The game came out to stellar reviews from critics and the few consumers who played it. In terms of sales, the game was a total flop, which is probably why many of you have never heard of it.
So let me tell you why you need to play it. In short, the game is about the struggles of twelve different people in different locations over the course of two thousand years. Their fates, both in life and death, are destined to intertwined as they fight against the minions of three different ancient Chuthlu-like creatures that fight against each other to gain dominance in our world.
To go with this epic story is a wonderfully inventive gameplay system: the sanity meter. As your character stares down the shambling zombie that's fully intent on sucking your intestines up like spaghetti, he or she loses a bit of sanity. As your sanity meter drops, crazy ass things start to happen. Yeah, the walls are bleeding. That fly on your TV screen? That's not really there. Oh, I didn't tell you? The sanity effects don't just screw with your character, they screw with you. Try playing this game in the dark with a surround sound stereo on and tell me that the whispering and crying going on around you doesn't get to you. It will.

That's no hug...

Mix with that stellar writing and voice acting, and you've got yourself one hell of a game. Still not convinced? It's been on several top 100/200 games of all time lists from the likes of Game Informer and IGN. It won Outstanding Achievement in Character or Story Development at the 6th Annual Interactive Achievement Awards in 2002, along with being nominated for Console Game of the Year, Innovation in Console Gaming and Outstanding Achievement in Art Direction.
The problem with my recommendation? Well, the game is kind of hard to find these days, considering it's eight years old and that it didn't sell well enough to warrant a lot of copies being manufactured. Sorry about that.

Zelda Retrospective: Part VI - Majora's Mask - Day 3 - But A Year Later...

Okay, so, I fell behind. Way behind. This is like getting those TPS reports in, well, a year late.
Rather than restart my game and begin blogging over things I'd already blogged about, I figured I would continue the file I started a year ago. I found it with Goht and the Snowhead Temple already defeated. Guess I kept playing and didn't blog about that. Oops.

And I thought Gorons were weird in Ocarina of Time.

I do recall, though, that I always found Snowhead Temple particularly infuriating due to the central pillar that you have to raise and lower in order to access different sections of the temple. I'd say it's like the Water Temple of Majora's Mask, but the Great Bay Temple also involves manipulating the water. As I recall, save for the Windfall Temple, the dungeons in Majora's Mask tended to be more difficult than the dungeons of Ocarina of Time.

However, I did end up defeating Goht two more times today for various sidequests. I could have skipped the second defeat of Goht, but I forgot to retrieve my Powder Keg License after blowing up the entrance into the Goron race track. That is one thing where I can say I see why some people didn't like the 3-Day reset cycle in Majora's Mask - if you forgot to do something, you had to to repeat it all in order to finish it.

Goht is one of those bosses that can be either really fun or really frustrating to fight. If you're quick and can avoid the obstacles that pop up while you chase him down as a rolling Goron, it can be a fun and exhilarating fight. But if you're unfortunate to have rocks fall on you or be hit by Goht's beam attacks, it can be a long and aggravating boss battle. I actually had one of each of those instances when fighting Goht today.
Amongst the side quests I performed today were upgrading to the gilded sword, the best version of the sword you can get in the game and one of my favorites, helping out around Romani Ranch.

Did Link ever learn the importance of "Klaatu-Barada-Nikto"?

I love the whole '50's sci-fi approach to the creatures that invade Romani Ranch on the night of the first day. From the design of the aliens, that are beamed down by a giant ball of light, to the thermin-esque music that accompanies the early morning battle with the cow-stealing extra-terrestrials. So instead of Mars Needs Women, it's Mars Needs Bovines? Why would aliens come once a year to steal cows? Do they just make enough jerky to last the year? Regardless of ridiculous plots, it's a fun side quest to play. From there it's on to racing the brothers at Ingo Ranch to grab the Garu Mask, get the Bunny Hood, and safely stave off raiders from grabbing a milk shipment. Along with the Don Gero Mask and Kamaro's Mask, I managed to nab five masks in that three day cycle.
I started a new cycle after that, but only played far enough to get the Zora mask. You know that Zora Mikau was one hell of a rocker if he spent the last of his energy to spend his final moments improvising a song to tell you what happened. That's hardcore.

As a side note, I believe I'm going to make Friday the weekly Zelda day until I finish playing through these games. I figured those of you who read this blog would appreciate more variety in subject matter. I think I'll try to have two other blogs per week besides the Nerdy News on Thursday and Zelda Retrospective on Friday, perhaps with the odd TV, movie, music or game review here and there. I hope you guys enjoy the rejuvenated Smashing the Gnat.