Welcome to Torrent Peak

I think by now hating water-based dungeons is a forgone conclusion. It's been over a decade since Ocarina of Time's first stalled playthroughs around the globe, after all. The water dungeons in Pandora's Tower are, unfortunately, just as frustrating.

However. In Ocarina of Time, the Water Temple is a pain to work through because of all the keys and locked doors. You need to keep track of where things are, too (much more so than in any other dungeon in that game). In Pandora's Tower keys aren't the problem.

No. In Pandora's Tower the problem is the game's camera system.

Instead of following Aeron in a third person perspective, the game uses a fixed point of view. Sometimes this point of view shifts for different rooms and areas. But, it is always fixed. And there's no way to switch into a first person view to see what's around you.

Combine this restrictive camera scheme with narrow pathways surrounded by water in which you instantly lose a block of health and are sent back to the last doorway you passed through.

Then, for good measure, add in monsters that don't just leap out of the water and onto the walkways before attacking but literally launch themselves at you. Oh, and make sure you're generous with those monsters - let's say toss in two for every stretch of walkway in the main room.

That's Torrent Peak, the next tower, in a nutshell.

Granted, the Lifeforce Band and the Military Scythe do make a deadly combination in this tower. Plus, thanks to the levels gained from all of those fights, I have the room to equip armour along with those two items. So Aeron is a formidable force right now.

Still, falling in the water and re-spawning a the last doorway you passed through is frustrating as all get out. All the more so when you're in the middle of fighting those crowding creatures and have to work your way back to where you were knowing that the beasts are waiting for you.

Wizzrobes must've given Misery Mire its name

I've been dogged by a foe since The Legend of Zelda on the NES. A mysterious, vanishing wizard in form obscuring garb: the wizzrobe. These guys have ended more of my adventures as Link than Ganon could ever hope to.

At the least, Misery Mire lived up to its name.

Within that dungeon's depths are some three Link corpses. One fell at the gaze of the dungeon's boss, the other two at the hands of wizzrobes. Each prone, green-tunicked body was swept aside with a quick reset, though.

I am going to finish this game with zero deaths. Even if it means playing parts of it four times over.

Besides, this ought to be the llast time I get careless and is definitely the last time I'll leave such a gap between saves. Nothing teaches you to save often like having to replay sections of a game over again.

Though this little boondoggle got me thinking. Saving in Zelda games was a roundabout process up  until the franchise went 3D.

In Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask you're asked if you want to save each time you exit your menu. In the HD remake of The Wind Waker, though, the save button is once more tucked aside.

Is this shift a reflection of Nintendo's broadening the Zelda franchise's approachability?

Most people who've picked up The Wind Waker probably have experience with the series if not that entry specifically. So the need to save frequently isn't really present, and putting the save button amidst your menus makes sense.

Whatever the case, my liason with A Link to the Past is just about over. The Ice Palace and Turtle Rock loom before Ganon's Tower, but each is about to take its own quick tumble.

Link eludes capture

One of the reasons why video games entries have been spotty lately is because I was waiting.

Waiting for a good time to test out my video capture set up.

Unfortunately, it looks like there are a few bugs that need working out, particularly my program's telling me that there is no capture device attached in the middle of displaying what's being fed through my capture device. That device by the way is the Diamond VC500. The software I'm running is Ulead VideoStudio 10. And yes, I'm running it all on an old version of Windows (XP).

Another of the reasons for the scarcity of entries about video games is that I was waiting for an opportune time to marathon A Link to the Past, my favourite entry in the Zelda series. Since I don't currently own a 3DS (or a 2DS, for that matter), I can't play A Link Between Worlds just yet and so I figured that its predecessor is the next best thing. That time's not come up, but more important than marathoning it, I want to get through the game without dying a single time.

Unfortunately, all I have with me (aside from an emulated copy, either on the Virtual Console (VC) or through less legitimate means) is the GBA port. Since I've already played through it on the GBA, I figured why not put the old Gamecube Game Boy Player to use and play it on the TV (or computer monitor, as the case may be). The trouble with the game's GBA port, though, is that Nintendo either forgot or neglected to port over Link's grunts from the original game. Instead Link's cries and struggles call up the Nintendo 64 entries in the series thanks to the use of child Link's sound effects.

Not only does this ruin the charm of the original game, but it assumes that this game's Link is the same age as child Link. But what in the game itself even suggests that?

Is it that he's living with his uncle? That he isn't in the middle of military training?

Everyone in Kakariko seems to know Link - unless he's some sort of Dennis the Menace-type character before the game begins, it seems like he'd need to have been active around town before people would be able to know him. To do that, he'd have to be at least a little older than the Link of Ocarina of Time or Majora's Mask. I'd like to peg his age as that of the main character of a fun Zelda-esque Genesis game called Crusader of Centy: 14.

So, why am I playing this version when there's a perfectly good port on the VC? Because controlling it with the Gamecube controller's analog stick almost simulates walking on ice. It's just a little bit too sensitive. Considering I know the game well from playing through it several times, I welcome the extra challenge.

The wet and wild tower

On one hand I'm glad that it's come up so early. On the other, I wish it never had to come up at all.

With Sheerdrop Spire's master defeated, Aeron's next stop is Wellspring Steeple, the water-themed dungeon of Pandora's Tower. So far it's not as puzzling as Ocarina of Time's, but it's still got me stumped. A second look at the water wheel and the mechanism behind it will probably yield the solution. Or I'll find a door that I missed tonight. The new, semi-aquatic servant beasts threw me off my game, after all. They threw me so far off, in fact, that Aeron was battered and bombarded into an early grave.

At the least, my initial encounter with these new beasts revealed that the Elena's homemade cakes give Aeron temporary regenerative powers. Surely that will come in handy down the line. Learning this has also turned me from using the cakes as my primary curative to saving them.

My slow crawl through the game's mechanics aside, I'm convinced that a major variable in the rate at which I'll finish Wellspring Steeple is how much I perceive water-themed dungeons to be difficult. Really, the water temple in Ocarina of Time isn't tough, it's just something that requires attentive playing. I'll definitely be trying the simplest solutions before the most complex ones.

The rise and fall of Zorba Lyrestrummer and the oboes from Athens

According to Marrou, music fell out of favour as a part of the antique curriculum for the same reason athletics did: Music became far too specialized.

The specialization of music is framed as problematic because it limits expertise in it to those who study it from their childhood onwards. However, Marrou does give some credit to the state educated music lover, noting that the true amateur was one who closely listened, while also dabbling on his own (195).

Specialized or not, the ancient method of direct instruction sounds miles better to me than learning to write music before you really play it. Having to copy an instructor as you have to copy the skull kids in that Lost Woods minigame in Ocarina of Time would at leat have let me reforge my somewhat tinny ear.

Twist of twists, though, among the music loving Greeks, musicians were despised. Why? Because they were paid for their work and were therefore tradespeople. Apparently the upper echelon didn't much care for the "working classes."

Somehow successful controlled exploration works

Pandora's Tower is already getting hard to put down. It's definitely a great game so far (though there is that glitch looming all the way down the line at tower 13), but I wonder if its format is as much the reason for my deep investment in it as the gameplay and chain combat are.

Here's what I mean:

In a Zelda game (a good Pandora's Tower analogue) you do the same thing you're doing in Pandora's Tower, and Zelda games are, by and large, great games. But, in a Zelda game, your exploration isn't limited by the need to restore a gauge every now and then (except for Majora's Mask). You can explore any time, anywhere - even in situations like Ocarina of Time's endgame where Zelda has been taken by Ganondorf in a moment of lowered guard. After that point in the game you could spend another in-game month or more wrapping up sidequests (or even just fishing) and Ganondorf and Zelda would still be where you'd find them if you rushed off right away to Ganon's Castle. As a result, the exploration in a Zelda game is (at least by game's end) without restriction.

Pandora's Tower on the other hand forces you to explore the towers in temporal chunks. If you knew where everything was, surely you could get through each tower in the time that each one's master flesh buys you, but otherwise there'd be a lot of trekking back and forth. Because of the game's curse mechanic, every minute in the towers counts.

Now, servant beasts aren't wanting as it is, but even so you couldn't grab some basic flesh, delve into a tower until the curse is just minutes away from coming into full effect and reliably get back in time to force Elena to down some beast brawn. So, at least in my current playthrough, in an average session of 30 minutes, I'm spending about 20 actually in the towers, inching through them on each visit.

Nonetheless, it's the control that the game exercises over your exploration that makes it so compelling to me. Exploration is parcelled out in such small pieces that it becomes a reward for a well managed inventory, a well fed Elena, and a well-outfitted Aeron. The curse mechanic itself presents a puzzle, the solution to which offers the reward of an efficiently running Observatory and a maximization of time to spend in the towers.

"To do" list driven gaming

For a game about a NEET (someone not in employment, education, or training), Rosy Rupeeland is a weirdly "to do" list driven game.

In part the game plays like creating and working through a series of "To do" items because of its "everything-costs-and gives-rupees" mechanic. So to progress through certain events or to activate certain plot points you need to fork over the right amount (or more) to the character (or characters) involved. To have enough to manage this, you, in turn have to actually have those rupees handy, and to earn rupees you'll inevitably turn to one or two tried and tested methods.

What works well about the game's rupee-based everything is that whenever you come into an area for the first time there are a number of things to do to boost your rupee stash substantially. There will usually be a quest or two (or three), new items that let you create pricier soups/juices/medicines/etc, or one-time item drops involving a few precious stones/gems. Plus, if an area has a dungeon, its payout will more than likely equal or just squeak past what you need to open up the next area.

Nonetheless, each time I sit down to play this game I find myself creating a mental to do list. "Explore the new area," "map all the landmarks," "get ingredients needed to finish sidequests," "complete sidequests," "prep for dungeon," "face dungeon," etc. It sounds like the standard, basic outline for playing through most adventure games, but I'm much more aware of myself doing it as I play Rosy Rupeeland than I would be if I was playing through anything else.

The conclusion that I draw from all of this is that in Rosy Rupeeland the steps between plot points are much clearer because their parameters are so well defined.

Instead of simply being (to take an example from the mask trading sidequest in Ocarina of Time) "take the "Keaton Mask" to the soldier at the Death Mountain gate and then return the profit to me," Rosy Rupeeland would have you pay an exact price (or more) for the mask (that you guess at, or use a guide to find out), force you to pay/accept a set amount (or more/less) from the guard upon delivery (guessing or using a guide again), and then require the same upon announcing the completion of the job to the Happy Mask Salesman. Because your objectives are clearly delineated along the lines of rupees, "to do" lists seem naturally to spring up.

A fractured cap for the Triforce quest

If the lack of a sense of accomplishment plagues you at the end of the Triforce quest in The Wind Waker, I think I know why.

The Triforce is an item of such grand legend in the Zelda series that its alleged existence in former games stirred the internet to a fever pitch. Whenever Ocarina of Time's remade, and when the Master Quest was released, there were all sorts of rumours that the Triforce would be obtainable. It's the same thing in Ocarina's Beta Quest, and undeniably one of the coolest things about any Zelda 64 reconstruction project is the possibility that you would be able to get the Triforce.

The one game in which you do get the Triforce, A Link to the Past, has a supremely satisfying ending - and actually getting the Triforce is a major reason for that.

In The Wind Waker, quite obviously, you also get a piece of the Triforce. It's a quest that takes about two to three hours to complete, but the pay-off doesn't match the effort. Yes, you need to get the Triforce of Courage to progress in the game, but the immediate reward is just a cheap little animation. The game jumps to the inventory screen and shows the Triforce of Courage glow while all of its cracks and fissures disappear. This is, plainly and simply, just not enough.

The game's designers went to the trouble to make each piece unique, and yet the joining of them together gets a level of attention dwarfed by even the cinematic of the Triforce of Wisdom reforming:



Suffice to say, a more satisfying joining sequence can be added to the list of improvements I hope to see in The Wind Waker HD.

Dungeon Disappointments and Cinematic Critiques

Though it would risk being hair-tearing infuriating, the co-op sections in The Wind Waker should involve some AI. It's bad enough if you have your companion fall into the hands of monsters, effectively sending them back to the dungeon's entrance, but having to corral them would have been a welcome challenge.

Just dropping Medli at the door, clearing out the baddies and whatever elements of the puzzle Link can handle alone, returning for her, and then solving the room isn't rewarding after a dungeon's worth of tandem trekking.

The dungeon's boss was ultimately disappointing, too. Fun, sure - how could fighting a giant poe you have to stun and then throw into brambles not be fun - but still disappointing. The Hurricane Spin sword technique may have made clearing away the poes that constituted this giga poe named Jalhalla far easier than chasing them down individually, but there should have been a second section.

Don't just give us a cinematic of the haunted mask getting trapped in a shaft of light, let us corral him into a shaft of light. Or, have the player open each eye with a light beam and then fire an arrow into them, thereby keeping with the idea of the dungeon's sun-and-moon light-activated doors.

Having a bit more of Medli in her farewell would also have been better. The long shot that's used for the whole scene is reminiscent of the opening shot during the scene where Link talks with Saria before leaving the Kokiri Forest in Ocarina of Time, but the mood isn't quite the same.

In Ocarina of Time, you get a strong sense that if Link could talk he would say "I'll come back," even if he didn't believe it. In the scene where Medli leaves to continue to pray at the temple there's much more finality and I don't think a long shot does that justice.

In the Earth Temple's Depths

I didn't remember just how co-operative the Earth Temple is. Perhaps it was a matter of running up against the Gamecube's limitations, but the game would be much more interesting if more than the final two dungeons were one-player co-op experiences.

Having two separate inputs in a 3D adventure-type environment can't be easy to keep track of, after all. Plus, some sort of system for door opening would be needed. An alternative could be to make the game split screen and give each dungeon player their own third person view, but stuff could be easily missed then.

Aesthetically, the Earth temple is this game's Shadow Temple. Being an Earth temple, what's safe to assume would have been a place worshipping the fertility of the earth and whatnot, its creepy, old ruin look and atmosphere at first seem out of place. But, kick in the fact that a giant stone head and an impassable magic door were blocking it off for centuries, it's not too surprising to find it populated with floor masters, purple chuchus, and redeads.

Oh boy, this game's redeads. They aren't the lurching creepy polygonal mask-wearing bodies of Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask, but they have a jibblies-inspiring look all their own. And rather than just moaning and latching onto you they screech and their faces become clown-ish before they launch their teal skeletal forms at you. Indeed, their's is a kind of scare that only the Happy Mask Salesman could conjure.

The Zelda Timeline's Consistency

The detailed Zelda timeline isn't terribly interesting. A lot of its written blurbs are full of material that can be gleaned from playing the games, and the whole thing is written from an "in-world" rather than "real-world" perspective.

However, not to sound like a broken record, but the real use of the detailed Zelda timeline is seeing how it all jives together. Like anything that's gone on for 25 years, looking at it as a whole yields much more than just looking at it in pieces. In particular, having just read the section dealing with A Link to the Past, this picture came up:

It's a picture of the Wise Men from the game's introduction. Things get intriguing when you remember that what happens in A Link to the Past's introduction is a sort of retelling of what happens around the time of Ocarina of Time. Why would such an esoteric detail matter? 

Because one of the Wise Men is quite a bit shorter than the others. Also, A Link to the Past was released in Japan in 1991, while Ocarina of Time was released there in 1998.

Now, Zelda games are notorious for their long development cycles. It's also usual for the actual stories of Zelda games to be built after the core mechanics have been set up. But, to have a story detail from A Link to the Past, a game made seven years earlier, match one from Ocarina of Time goes beyond suspicious. It's the sort of thing that could practically convince you that Hyrule Historia's timeline is the real deal.

From Sea to Sky: Zelda Hub Areas

The Wind Waker's sidequests are, mostly kept to Windfall Island. This is much appreciated, since having too many involving sailing (even with the cyclones to warp around in) would just be too much. It's also handy having so many of the island's citizens interested in items that monsters drop.

But this use of a central trading/social/quest center is curious in the wider context of the Zelda games. All of those before Ocarina of Time had no such location. The quests were spread out amidst the various places where you found people, either holed up in caves, or under bridges, or in huts off the beaten path.

Even in Ocarina of Time, there really isn't a central hub. Sure, it has the Castle Town, but there are enough shops in Kakariko Village and Kokiri Forest, and enough things to do in and around the Gerudo Fortress to keep your interests spread out. But in The Wind Waker (and in Majora's Mask) most of the shops and quests can be found in one location. Though these games hold their central places in balance with the rest of the game's map.

Although there are story-related reasons for it, Skyward Sword takes having one central location way too far. Outside of Skyloft there are really no shops, no quests, no mini-games. At least, there aren't nearly as many outside of the game's hub as there are in earlier Zelda titles.

But there are still helpful creatures living on the surface - why don't the Gorons have a shop? Or the Mogma? Why doesn't one of the Kikwi collect Ornamental Skulls as part of her punk rock rebellion? Or why doesn't a Parella want something you need to trade with characters from all over the world to get? How can a game set largely in the sky be so empty when one set in the sea is so lush?

Taking Analog Aim at an Old Dungeon Boss

The Wind Waker's dungeons continue to be great fun. The Tower of the Gods merits some special mention, though. This is a dungeon that's enjoyable to wrok through, but also a bit of a challenge in spots.

This difficulty comes partially from the platforming but also, as someone coming back to a 3-D Zelda game after playing Skyward Sword, from aiming and firing the bow with an analog stick and a button.

It's a lot more difficult to aim accurately with that system after being able to just point and shoot, as you can in Skyward Sword since there's an extra delay between you and your target. Rather than being able to just look and shoot you need to look, move your bow into place and then fire. It might not sound like much, but it can really take some re-adjustment, adding that second step back into the equation.

The Tower's boss  nicely caps off the experience of playing through it, too. Though, having the stone head automatically snort out arrows whenever you run out really takes the pressure off. It makes me wonder why the hands couldn't pound the ground every now and then, shaking debris from the ceiling, debris which periodically had a few arrows in it. Plus, such an attack would really complete the call back to Bongo Bongo from the Shadow Temple in Ocarina of Time.

A Wolf in Knight's Clothing

Twilight Princess can keep its realistic, heavy-armoured, rapier-using ones. Link's Awakening can have its tiny stabbing sprites. Yes, I'm talking about Darknuts, definitely my favourite monster in the Zelda series.

For all intents and purposes, they're just armoured, sword-wielding soldiers, but this is all that's necessary. No other enemy really lives up to the potential for one-on-one combat. No other enemy is so engaging when first encountered, or so difficult to fight off when in numbers. Darknuts really are the greatest of regular opponents whenever they appear in Zelda games. Their variation in The Wind Waker, also adds a curious dimension.

Sure, they're more cartoony, in keeping with the art style. And they're a bit formulaic to fight if you know what you're doing. But, unlike any other Darknut, you're actually shown what's inside all of that armour in The Wind Waker. And what is? A wolf.

This makes great sense, since Moblins, Ganon's classic minions of choice appear in this game. Plus, though it may not be considered canonical by some, there was at least one enemy wolf monster in the CD-i Zelda games (popularly known as the "Dark Triforce," by Zelda fans).

Even if you deny that those strange asides have any bearing on the main series, the Wolfos from Ocarina of Time, thousands of years after appearing in that game, could have grown in Ganon's esteem. Not to mention, they may also have evolved to a point where they became completely bipedal and interested in martial arts. Such an evolutionary step may even have been necessary to adapt to the flooded world in which The Wind Waker takes place.

"The Gods," Spiritual, and Actual Successors

Did I miss something?

Aren't the deities of Hyrule God*esses*?

Then why is everything in The Wind Waker "of the gods"?

Maybe it's just staying true to the original Japanese. I'm not sure when in the life of the Legend of Zelda story and world the goddesses Din, Nayru, and Farore were invented (maybe the Hyrule Historia can tell me), but it must've been after A Link to the Past, since that game's Japanese title literally translates as "The Power of the Gods." Could the use of "gods" in The Wind Waker just be another nod to the SNES classic?

Even when I first played The Wind Waker its structure reminded me greatly of A Link to the Past. You've got a mysterious wizard rounding up young maidens, three things to collect before you make a world changing discovery (and get the Master Sword), then you go through further dungeons, gather a great power, and finally face off against a version of Ganon. Shy of being the sequel to A Link to the Past, The Wind Waker is definitely its spiritual successor.

This fact makes me wonder all the more about how Eiji Aonuma and the Zelda team are going to make a direct successor to A Link to the Past. My suggestion: Bring back the magic bar and all the magic that was taken out of A Link to the Past and Ocarina of Time due to the SNES' and Nintendo 64's limitations. And, to those worried about spells like Ether or Bombos being over powered game-breakers, Link to the Past 2's use of depth could really even things out.

A Picture's Worth a Curious Question

Getting the bombs in The Wind Waker's a bit of a pain, but really not that bad. Plus, it involves some cute cinematics and Tetra being the tough leader that she ought to be even after she's revealed to be Zelda. What's more, getting the bombs allows a rare glimpse into Tetra's cabin.

You find some framed pictures there, each begging the question of why it's there more than the last. That is, so long as you go dead ahead, then look left (or right), look in the remaining direction, and then look left as you leave.

She has a chart of the Triangle Islands that makes an obvious picture of the Triforce, two pages/plates/scenes from the story of the Hero of Time and the flood (of the harmonious world, and of the Hero of Time, respectively), and then a portrait. The chart of the islands makes fine sense, since she's a pirate, and no doubt has trace memories of her true self. The two scenes make sense for a similar reason, perhaps they give comfort because of a strange familiarity. But the portrait is of nothing ever seen before.

As can be seen in the photo (from the Zelda Wiki), it's a portrait of a woman sitting in what looks like a rather important chair. This is thought to be Tetra's mother, the pirates' former captain, and the one who had entrusted the Triforce to Tetra. This sequence of events raises one big question for me: If her mother wasn't Zelda, why is Tetra Zelda? Is there a Zelda born only when there's a Link born?

Since most of the games are at least 100 years (or so) apart, then it's clear that not every ancestor of Link and Zelda becomes the next Link and Zelda, but then what determines those who do? Are Zelda and Link (re)born each time in response to the rise of Ganon? Is it the encroaching darkness that forces the light to shine brighter?

If it is the case that Ganon needs to threaten Hyrule for Link and Zelda to appear, then why hasn't there been a game where we have a pretender Link or a pretender Zelda? What would happen if someone began to spread the rumour that they were the legendary princess or hero during a time of absolute peace? Would that cause Ganon to rise? Or simply an uproar among the populous and a possible civil war of sorts?

The Legend of Zelda games have always been about similar stories but varied mechanics. This is fine (and has resulted in some real gems), but maybe as a break between innovative gameplay or control schemes they could release a Zelda where the story shifted somewhat. It might set a dangerous precedent, but it'd also have the potential to be as, or more, incredible than the much-lauded Ocarina of Time.

Double-Teamed

For some reason having to take on two heavy enemies at the same time is proving difficult. Not impossible, but difficult.

After I grabbed the boss key in the Forbidden Woods two Moblins were dropped on me. Neither of them waited their turn, either, like the considerate Lizalfos in Ocarina of Time; they were both fixing for a fight. And that was unfortunate, since I really wanted to grab one of their pole arms and take a few swings at the other with it.

Actually, that's one thing I hope to see the return of in the next Zelda game - the ability to pick up and use enemy weapons. Though, I hope that they can actually be used more extensively than they were in The Wind Waker. Maybe we could see Link actually taking enemy weapons and keeping them.

Heck, I'm sure it's been done before in a Zelda game (or at least implied), but maybe a dungeon item could be picked from a fallen foe (at least a mini-boss, but maybe a rampaging mini-boss made dungeon boss, because of the item/weapon's power). That would be really cool - and besides, who leaves all this cool stuff in these chests scattered around such dangerous places anyway?

Closer to Rupeeland

With the way unblocked, Steamy Marsh has now opened up to me. It looks like the bees must be braved, though, for there's nothing else to be done other than going inside there.

Reading an interview with two members of Rosy Rupeeland's development team from the game's mini-site has got me thinking. In that interview, the team says that the sounds and place names are all the game really takes from Zelda games.

For the most part, I'm inclined to agree with this statement of difference since the boss innovation in Rosy Rupeeland compared to most Zelda bosses is like comparing A Link to the Past to Ocarina of Time. Not being able to just run up to a boss and whack it with a sword, Tingle's alternative methods have yielded some awesome boss battles so far.

Though the "Triangle Chips" that are apparently littered around the second continent are definitely references to the Triforce. Yellow triangles in a game based around a Zelda universe character could be nothing else.

Gleek-likes, Rupees, and the Dreamt

I fought my way into Turtle Rock, beating the giant turtle head reminiscent of one of Gleek's heads, and all I got for it was one rupee. A piece of heart would be a bit much, but even some arrows or bombs would have been better than a rupee.

Getting yet another rupee is enough to make me think about shoplifting from the village store. I really have no reason to go back there at this point anyway, and so have nothing to fear from powerful shopkeepers.

Before getting into the penultimate dungeon, however, I saw a brief scene between Link and Marin. She's trapped on a platform accessible only by hookshot, Link saves her and she stutters about her feelings for him before being called away by Tarin.

It's a far shorter scene and has less buildup, but it's impact is similar to when Link leaves Kokiri Forest in Ocarina of Time. But if this whole game is a dream, what's it mean for a part of it to have a crush on the dreamer?

Rooted Inside the Deku Tree

It's a bit disappointing inside the Deku Tree. I was hoping that it'd be laid out like the first dungeon of Ocarina of Time. However, the music's a nod to that gem of a game -- it's a slower, slightly ominous remix of Saria's Song. However, the existence of the Deku Tree in the world of Rosy Rupeeland makes me wonder even more how this game fits into the Zelda timeline.

I mean, Link or Zelda haven't shown up (yet), but the Deku Tree and Lon Lon Meadow make appearances. Perhaps the seedling that lives beside the Deku tree is the one that grows into the Deku Tree from Wind Waker, or from Ocarina of Time. Aesthetically, the Deku Tree that Tingle meets is closer to the former, so maybe this game takes place in that part of the "official" timeline.

Speculations aside, this is the first non-linear dungeon. There's a puzzle here much like the one in Lord Jabu Jabu's Belly in Ocarina of Time. After you open up the ladder chutes on the first basement, three plants grow over the main chute. As far as I can figure, you need to find and defeat all three of these plants' roots/hearts to open the way forward.

What's got me stuck, though is that I need "poison to defeat poison" - I must've missed a recipe or an item, because I can't bat back the plants' poison's spit or their mushrooms' spores, and I can't brew up poison. There's the Scrap Broth, but it does nothing.

So, I never thought it would happen, but I'm stuck in Tingle's Rosy Rupeeland. For now.