Open World Zelda & Transformations

New Zelda games usually experiment with new ideas. Whether that's the ability to manipulate objects in both space and time in Tears of the Kingdom, or summoning monsters in Echoes of Wisdom – Nintendo and their partners like to come up with something new for each title (with a few exceptions). And that's both fantastic and admirable. However, there have been Zelda games with ideas so good that it's a shame that they might never come back. One of these games is Majora's Mask, which both had the repeated three-day-cycle and its transformations masks going for it. And it could be very interesting to see the latter return in a modern Zelda game.

The formula is simple enough: take an open wold experience, like in Breath of the Wild, and combine it with the ability to transform into other species from Majora's Mask. It doesn't have to be via masks, where you could have some other artifact that is causing these transformation, but the idea remains the same. This should still include a Goron and a Zora, but swaps the Deku for a Rito, because these have been more prominent lately and they will give you more freedom. And freedom is what's this is all about.

However, it's a freedom that needs to be earned. Unlike in Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom, where you're given all essential abilities right at the beginning of the game, it should be your goal to unlock these transformations one after another. And with each one you will be able to explore parts of world that previously were inaccessible to you.

You can still obtain these transformations in any order, but each one will bring unique advantages that might make your journey easier. For example, the Zora's water powers allows you to cool down lava for easier traversal around a volcano, which then may lead to the finding the Goron transformation. But you can still do it without.

Weapons will also be handled differently. In Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom, Link used weapons from all the different tribes to emulate their combat styles somewhat. In this hypothetical game, however, Link may rely mainly on his Master Sword, which is going to transform alongside him. So, when Link turns into a Goron, it becomes the "Master Hammer", or when Link turns in to a Zora, it becomes the "Master Spear". Maybe the game's story is even about transforming into heroes from other timelines or dimensions, heroes who aren't a Hylian boy for a change.

You can also power up the Master Sword with elemental magic, which by default will be light, but can become fire, water, or wind respectively. And don't worry, the Master Sword won't break in this game. However, secondary items, like bombs and arrows, are still depletable and can be all used as a Hylian. But each of Link's transformation specializes in different types, where they can add more punch to them.

This concept has been on my mind for several years now, where the current "Majora's Mask Month" feels like the right timing to finally discuss it in more detail. Plus, I have recently played through Donkey Kong Bananza, which actually features a part of these ideas, just not in a Zelda game. Now, let's take a look at the individual transformations:

 

Goron Link

As a Goron, Link will be able to roll around the world, but his strength also let's you freely dig through the ground, similar to Donkey Kong in Donkey Kong Bananza. This will make you the "Hero of the Earth", who is able to explore vast cave system that were entirely hidden underground.

Goron Link wields a large hammer as his weapon, but he is also versatile in using all kinds of explosives to maximize his destructive power. In addition, he can withstand high temperatures for a longer period of time and explore areas covered in lava or magma, but he has trouble dealing with water or mud, where he just sinks.

 

Zora Link

As a Zora, Link can swim gracefully at high speeds, but he can also freely explore underwater, making you the "Hero of the Ocean". The game world will have a large marine section, similar to The Wind Waker, Phantom Hourglass, or the Ocean Realm in Spirit Tracks, where at first you will have to travel it by boat or fly across it as a Rito. Once Link has obtained the ability to transform a Zora, he can also now dive into the ocean, where an underwater Zora civilization will await him, as well as sunken ruins.

Zora Links wields a spear, but he can also greatly enhance the effects of Splash Fruits, which allows the creation of larger bodies of water wherever needed. He can easily take out fires, but is weak to electricity and ice.

 

Rito Link

As a Rito, Link can freely fly through the air and effortlessly reach the top of even the highest mountains. The game world will feature a set of sky islands, similar to Tears of the Kingdom, which can only be accessed as the "Hero of the Sky".

Rito Links wields a swift dagger, but he's also an expert archer, who is able to shoot multiple arrows at once and also infuse them with different elements. When he's in the sky, he can freely shoot in all directions around him, as time freezes to assist with aiming. His warm feathers give him a greater resistance to cold, be he is very vulnerable to fire.

The 40th Anniversary & Nintendo Switch Online

Majora's Mask might be the first of various Legend of Zelda titles that are going to be highlighted throughout the 40th Anniversary via Nintendo's different online offerings. This could even be tied directly to those collectible cards in Nintendo Today, where for each new set they might have something else for that game in the various Nintendo Switch Online offerings, like user icons, or soundtracks.

This is supported by the fact that the current Majora's Mask user icons and collectible cards are available for the exact same time frame, until October 23rd. Afterwards they will likely switch to a different Zelda game for both, and this could ultimately fill a number of gaps. And here it's interesting to look at what's still missing.

These titles are still absent from the current NSO game libraries:

• Ocarina of Time - Master Quest (N64)
• Four Swords Adventures (GCN)
• Twilight Princess (GCN) 

These titles are on NSO, but have yet to receive user icons:

• Oracle of Ages & Seasons (GBC)
• A Link to the Past & Four Swords (GBA)
• The Wind Waker (GCN)
• The Minish Cap (GBA) 

These soundtracks are still missing in Nintendo Music:

• Link's Awakening (DX and Remake)
• Majora's Mask 3D
• Oracle of Ages & Seasons*
• A Link to the Past & Four Swords*
• The Wind Waker HD
• Four Swords Adventures 
• The Minish Cap*
• Twilight Princess
• Twilight Princess HD
• Spirit Tracks
• Tri Force Heroes
• Echoes of Wisdom

As for the soundtracks marked with an asterisk: here the situation with the music rights remains unclear. While Nintendo has the scenario rights for all the Capcom Zelda games, which allows them to re-release and potentially even remake these games as they please, the music rights are a different topic, especially in Japan. There has yet to be an instance where they have used the music elsewhere, e.g. in Super Smash Bros. or at the Symphony of the Goddesses. So, keep that in mind.

Not everything here is going to be covered anyway, but there is a good chance that we might see some of it. The collectible card sets vary in size, so there might be some filler here and there. After Majora's Mask they could for one of the NES classics, for example, which already have been thoroughly featured, but they can just bring back the user icons for the time being (and maybe add some more).

Afterwards they will likely feature the Ocarina of Time remake with cards and icons based on that. They may even release its full soundtrack on Nintendo Music, even though they usually wait very long after these "special releases", which feature some selected tracks from a newly released game. We have yet to get the full soundtrack for Metroid Prime 4, for example... But there is already a special release for the Ocarina of Time remake, with only the title theme.

Anyway, what most Zelda fans are waiting for is Twilight Princess. And there is a decent chance that they will add the game to the GameCube library while they are at it, alongside its original soundtrack on Nintendo Music. But I wouldn't hold my breath here... Nintendo knows that the fans are waiting for this, where they don't want it to collide with the Ocarina of Time remake. So, it is more likely something for 2027.

Since they have announced there to be more than 300 collectible cards, this campaign will last long into the 41st anniversary up until July 2027, so we could be getting Twilight Princess in May or so...

Another game that could receive such a full package is Four Swords Adventures, where this would be the first time Nintendo ever re-releases it. But this will require that they can emulate the Game Boy Advance connectivity within the GameCube library, which is not a feature so far. Alternatively, they could be making a special version of Four Swords Adventures for the 40th Anniversary. How about "Forty Swords Adventures", where up to 40 players can go on an adventure together? That would be such a silly Nintendo thing to do.

Some games won't be featured on the Nintendo Switch (2) at all, but still could get at least a soundtrack release, like Spirit Tracks or Tri Force Heroes. And with certain games it might be the other way around, like the aforementioned Capcom titles. In any case, it's going to be interesting to learn how this continues on October 24th.

Nintendo Music: Majora's Mask Added

And here it is. The Majora's Mask streak continues. After the collectible cards for Nintendo Today and the user icons for Nintendo Switch Online, we also got the game's soundtrack on Nintendo Music today. They are truly highlighting the second Nintendo 64 classic, before the launch of the Ocarina of Time remake, which is going to make everyone and their mother ask for a Majora's Mask remake afterwards.

This release is based on the official soundtrack that was released in Japan and North America, but you might notice that it's one track short, 111 in total instead of 112. It's missing one of the two "Event Failed" melodies, which play when you screw up certain mini-games or missions. This may just be an oversight, though not a tragic one.

In any case, they should keep this going with the 40th Anniversary. We still don't even have Link's Awakening on the app yet. And Twilight Princess is now the only 3D Zelda game that's absent both on the Nintendo Switch 2 and in Nintendo Music, but I'm sure that this will change in the next couple of months. You will know it's happening when the Twilight Princess collectible cards are coming.

Nintendo Switch Online: Majora's Mask Icons

It's Majora's Mask Month. Okay, I just made that up, but the collectible cards in Nintendo Today weren't the only news related to the Nintendo 64 classic. The Nintendo Switch Online service is now featuring the game for its rewards and missions, replacing Pilotwings 64 a few days early. You can earn 50 Platinum Points by playing the game once and spend 100 Platinum Points on ten different icons.

Curiously, this was put under the 40th Anniversary banner, which may suggest that they will keep doing this for other Zelda games in the next months. The ones that didn't get any icons yet are Oracle of Ages & Seasons (GBC), A Link to the Past & Four Swords (GBA), The Minish Cap (GBA), and The Wind Waker (GCN), so mainly the Capcom titles. But they could also make more icons for the existing games, especially those that only got five so far.

In any case, Nintendo wants you to play Majora's Mask this month. And it's without a doubt the best Zelda game for the Halloween season, but you might also want to play this one last time before the Ocarina of Time remake gets released next month. Why? Well, the remake could make it very hard to return to these Nintendo 64 classics, once you've experienced its smoothness and modern visuals. Originally, my plan was to replay Majora's Mask afterwards, so I can take notes about what can and should be done with a similar remake by the same team, but I'm afraid that the new Ocarina of Time will spoil me so much that this won't be much fun.

Also, they should add Majora's Mask to Nintendo Music while they are at it... (Update: they actually will! The soundtrack is going to be included on October 9th.)

And I'm really expecting them to close some gaps here during the remainder of the 40th Anniversary, which includes making Four Swords Adventures and Twilight Princess playable at a later date.

Nintendo Today: Majora's Mask Collectible Cards (and more)

The Breath of the Wild set of digital collectible cards in the Nintendo Today app has been completed, and they've started with a second set, this time for Majora's Mask, with a card for Skull Kid to boot. The first set had 25 cards in total, where the new one now has 20, so the third set will start on October 24th.

Anyway, collecting these cards has been going quite well for me so far, despite the technical difficulties from Nintendo's end. It truly became a small ritual to open the Nintendo Today app every single day, where I have yet to miss a single card or medal. The questions are trivial for the most part, though there is the occasional one that is a bit more tricky than the rest. For example, there was a card for the Salmon Meunière, weirdly enough, and it was asking you about the ingredients... Well, you could make an educated guess here, but I double-checked nevertheless.

There also have been some issues... The question for the Bokoblin Mask had two correct answers, technically, but only one of them was counting. So, Nintendo rolled out an apology, promising that the people who have picked the alleged wrong answer will get compensated and have this fixed in the future. Ironically, this had caused even worse troubles afterwards. When you wanted to get the next card, it showed you this apology and you had to confirm this in order to proceed. But depending on your operating system and settings the OK-button was potentially obscured by your navigation bar, so you couldn't hit it.

This also happened to me, where I didn't even see the OK-button at first, thinking that they are simply skipping the card collecting for the day. But then I asked around on some Nintendo fansite and was told that you should be able to dismiss it, reported the problem in the app, and eventually found a solution: turn on gesture navigation on Android, which hides the usual navigation bar at the bottom. Then I was finally able to hit "OK" and move on.

Three days later Nintendo had to apologize again... for their apology. You can't make this up. At least they have learned and made this a separate message in the app. It remains unclear how they will deal with the people who have been blocked by this issue, where there isn't really a simple and fair solution here.

Nevertheless, Nintendo is getting what they wanted out of me: I'm using their Nintendo Today app on a daily basis now. And I'm starting to like it. The animated artworks for Zelda are very beautiful and are actually the true highlight here, not the collectible cards. The cards are just an incentive not to forget to open the thing. I also really enjoy reading or viewing the daily posts.

Like, they have this ongoing series for Echoes of Wisdom, where they let two monsters battle it out and you can place your mental bets beforehand. And even though I have played this game quite a lot, it's never exactly clear who might win, so they've made some good picks. It's fun to watch and some excellent advertisement for what's one of the most underrated Zelda games out there.

Majora's Mask HD and the Oracles?

Last week two curious entries appeared on IMDB, for unannounced Zelda remakes:

• The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask HD
• The Legend of Zelda: Oracles

They are featuring different voice actors for Link: Mitsuki Saiga, who has voiced Link in the more recent top-down Zelda games and Hyrule Warriors, as well as Nobuyuki Hiyama, whose voice was used for adult Link in the Nintendo 64 era. It also lists Hidemaro Fujibayashi (the current director of the Zelda series) as doing mocap for Din, which is hilarious and teaches you all you need to know about the credibility of this information. I can only imagine him performing all those gracious dance moves.

Of course, anyone with the necessary rights can edit IMDB and add whatever they want, so this shouldn't classify as a meaningful leak in any book, unlike a certain Metroid game that has appeared in the news earlier this month... It's still weird how no one has bothered with removing this yet, or with checking any sources. Still, I appreciate the idea of this hoax, because Majora's Mask and the Oracle games are the exact remakes that I would love to see happen next, after Ocarina of Time.

"Majora's Mask HD" is a strange title, however, because the HD suffix implies that this is not a remake like Ocarina of Time, but an HD remaster of either the Nintendo 64 original, Majora's Mask 3D, or a mix of both. Maybe even still coming to the Nintendo Switch, because on the Nintendo Switch 2 this should be called "Majora's Mask 4K".

And that's not what I would want. I would want Nintendo to follow up on the Ocarina of Time remake and take their time with this. The Nintendo 64 Zelda games are siblings and always deserve to receive the same treatment in the same quality. Also, Majora's Mask has re-used a lot of the assets from Ocarina of Time and it makes all the sense in the world for a remake to do the same.

It's the same reason why I still want remakes of Oracle of Ages & Seasons to happen. It simply makes too much sense to recreate them in the same style as Link's Awakening, because they have borrowed so much from the original. Period.

At least, the IMDB entry got the right idea in this case. I like the simplicity of the title "Oracles", where this would be the first time for a Zelda game to receive a one-word subtitle. But it implies that this is going to unite the two Game Boy Color games into one experience, which is how it should be and refreshing to see.

Often you just find pure pessimism or rejection amongst the Nintendo and Zelda community when it comes to this particular remake. Some believe that this will never happen, because they were originally made by Capcom. And if they were to happen still, then Nintendo would never release them as one, because they are too greedy.

But Nintendo owns all the scenario rights for the four Zelda games developed by Flagship. Only the music rights could pose a problem. It's the main reason why you can find Stickers and Spirits based on these games in the Super Smash Bros. series, but no music. However, the music shouldn't be a major hurdle, because they can just compose new tracks...

And splitting Oracle of Seasons and Ages into two games again would defeat the entire purpose of such a remake. Sure, you wouldn't need to use passwords any longer, because they could just read each other's save files, but you would still need to connect these save files manually, making things needlessly complicated, whereas this could and should become a completely seamless experience. (See my Oracle of Worlds article for how this would work in greater detail.)

Plus, when they are effectively offering two Zelda adventures as one, then the full price that Nintendo is definitely going to charge won't feel as unreasonable. At least to some people.

In any case, I personally hope that the "Oracles" is GREZZO's current project, where this might even get released next year. A proper Majora's Mask remake on the other hand may take a couple of years to appear.

Tears of the Kingdom – What Will Return?

In an interview with GameInformer, which took place around the Game Awards last week, producer Eiji Aonuma and director Hidemaro Fujibayashi talked about various aspects of Tears of the Kingdom. One of the key takeaways here was that they consider the Ultrahand ability to be the big gimmick of the game:

Fujibayashi: When we're creating a title, say, Tears of the Kingdom, as you mentioned, the crux of the experience in playing Tears of the Kingdom is Ultrahand and the freedom to create. As you mentioned, that is what Tears of the Kingdom is. So every time we're making a Zelda title, we want to create something new. If, for example, there was any continuation of Tears of the Kingdom and we were to bring in, say, Ultrahand, then I think to us, it would feel like, "Well, we're just bringing in Tears of the Kingdom as is." What we want to do from a game creator's perspective is create something new. From that perspective, I don't think we'll be seeing Ultrahand in every Zelda game or anything in the future.

Aonuma: When you're talking about Ultrahand, that is a really core idea for Tears of the Kingdom and I think it represents our approach of kind of putting everything we could into this game.

This stings a little and actually takes me back to Majora's Mask, which was also a direct sequel and brought something absolutely groundbreaking on the table with the transformation masks. The ability to turn into a Goron or a Zora at will was simply so good that I couldn't imagine Zelda without it, going forward. But it never returned, at least not in the same capacity. We had the wolf transformation in Twilight Princess, which was so bad that the game had to force you into it, and there were the costumes in Tri Force Heroes, but they weren't on the same level. If you want to play as a Goron or a Zora these days, you have to buy Hyrule Warriors.

And when you think about it, then Breath of the Wild doesn't really have a defining gimmick, the one big thing that sets this game apart from the entire rest of the series. The game has completely revolutionized Zelda from top to bottom, but what stood out was really the ability to freely climb everywhere, in combination with the Paraglider. But Tears of the Kingdom has adopted both of this and pretty much everything from its predecessor.

The Ultrahand ability really is just a natural evolution of Magnesis and going forward it's going to be dearly missed. Even if there will be another ability to move around objects, it will automatically feel inferior without the ability to attach them to each other. At the same time it's understandable that Nintendo doesn't want to bring back such a convoluted system, where you even need something like Autobuild on top to make it more convenient. Whatever they will do with the next 3D Zelda game, it has to be something where the players don't feel like they are missing something without the Ultrahand.

And it's probably not desirable to simply fall back into the gimmick pattern. Make Breath of the Wild with the power to build stuff. Make Breath of the Wild with the power to dig into the earth. We already had this after Ocarina of Time and they need to focus more on evolving the franchise, instead of creating ideas for a single game.

But this raises the question, what in Tears of the Kingdom could and should potentially make it into the next game? Is there something in the game as essential as the free climbing in Breath of the Wild? Or is it all just gimmicks that are never meant to return, like the Ultrahand?

The first thing that comes to mind is the sky diving. It's not a new thing, because it first was introduced in Skyward Sword and now has been refined for this game. But this mechanic became so good that its full potential never really gets explored in Tears of the Kingdom for some reason. For example, you can turn around in the air while aiming with your bow, which you may not even know, because at no point in the game this is even necessary. Nintendo has released entire patents for this, but in the game it's really just a thing you can do without any major reason to do it, because the aerial combat is very minimal.

The entire setting of the sky islands is quite frankly underutilized, again, and for the most part just feels like something that was thrown into the game to make you build flying vehicles. Maybe one day we will get a Zelda game that truly focuses on such a setting and brings you aerial mobility to the next level. Third time will be the charm.

Another gameplay mechanic is the summoning, which is a new sort of partner system. This is also nothing that never was done before in Zelda, where for example you had some sages at your side in The Wind Waker as well. The difference is that you can't control them yourself this time, but they will fight autonomously. We also had this with Wolf Link in Breath of the Wild already, but here it lets you summon multiple allies at once. However, it's a bit of a mess, because it gets too crowded very quickly and the sage interactions can get in the way.

They meant well with this idea, but it's probably not something that will return in this form. Instead, this could turn into something that will be explored in other ways, like being able to actually play as other characters, maybe even going back to the transformations from Majora's Mask somehow.

This leaves us with the main items, the Zonai abilities. Well, we've already talked about the Ultrahand, which has the Zonai Devices and the Autobuild as its extensions, where it looks to be a one-time deal and brings a level of complexity with it, which might never be repeated in a Zelda title. At least not for a while.

Fuse is on a similar page, where we most likely won't see the ability in its entirety again, which lets you freely combine all your weaponry with each other and also with objects from the environment. That was just needlessly crazy, but being able to use materials to augment your arrows and/or weapons is really something that needs to stay with the series, in whatever for that may be. In the very least, the ability to craft different types of arrows from your materials should return somehow.

Well, they should limit the total amount of materials for future Zelda games and get rid of all the redundancy, while they should also make them much easier to organize and browse through, but Tears of the Kingdom comes with the best utilization of materials in the series so far. And it would be a shame to lose this, because It makes so much sense on so many levels, where it really feels like a natural evolution for Zelda.

Now, both Ascend an Recall feel a bit underutilized in comparison to what the Ultrahand and Fuse are offering. In case of Ascend this isn't much of a surprise, because it was really just a debug feature that made it into the game (source). The world of Breath of the Wild wasn't created with this ability in mind, where it becomes more useful in that world's extensions, mainly the caves and the sky islands. But it never reaches its full potential, where it would be nice to see this ability return in a future Zelda game that comes with a world more cleverly designed around it. Ascend could become the next Hookshot.

It's quite obvious with the dungeons, which either try to prevent the usage of Ascend entirely or make it pointless in any case, because you're tied to a sage descendant, who can't follow you through ceilings. Imagine dungeons where entire rooms are sealed off from all sides and the only way in is from below...

And Recall is such a smart ability that you could probably create an entire Zelda game with it as the main gimmick. That's not going to happen, now that this item already was a thing, but you never know. After all, the shrinking in The Minish Cap originally came from an item in Four Swords. But it would need to evolve. In Tears of the Kingdom it primarily acts as another great companion for the Ultrahand, where you can move things around and then reverse their movements with Recall. It's also very useful for retrieving things, like gliders that have crash-landed. But otherwise it mainly turns fallen objects into elevators.

Of course this isn't entirely fair towards Recall and there is lots of creative utilization for this ability in the game, but it's clear how Tears of the Kingdom was first and foremost developed around the Ultrahand ability and Recall had to take the backseat here. At the same time it might not be so bad that they didn't turn Recall into a main gimmick, because this could have gotten really tiresome...

Well, the idea of a playable Zelda is something that gets discussed time and time again. If it ever happens, giving her the Recall ability would look like a natural fit, since this was her new power in this game.

Summary

Tears of the Kingdom has experimented a lot with its gameplay mechanics, maybe more than any other Zelda game before it, where it will be painful to lose some of the innovations with the next game. And while the Ultrahand may not return, there is really some good stuff here that definitely should return in future titles of the series, first and foremost the excellent usage of materials and the improved sky diving mechanics. But there is also a lot of potential left with Ascend and Recall, where it would be interesting to see them evolve even further.

Reviving my Nintendo 64

While I have a collection of older Nintendo consoles and games, I'm not much of a retro gamer. I still have my Wii U hooked up to my TV, where this is as "retro" as it gets at the moment and I mostly stick to my Nintendo Switch and the PC for gaming. My older systems rest somewhere in boxes, but from time to time I feel the need to check everything out to see if it still works.

Now, there is the problem that I don't have a tube TV any longer, not even a TV with a SCART input. So, I did get an adapter from Kaico (from my own money, so I'm not sponsored or anything), which gets put into the Nintendo 64 directly, converts the signal to HDMI, and even upscales it to 1080p. I already had the same item for my old Xbox, where I was quite happy with it and now decided to get one for my remaining consoles without HDMI.

There are also a variety of SCART to HDMI adapters available, but such a native adapter felt more natural to me and it also doesn't need an extra power source, you just plug it into your console and then use any HDMI cable. It's very simple. Of course a SCART adapter can be used on pretty much all the old consoles, but this thing also works with your Super Nintendo and GameCube, since they have the same output port. So, this really covers the rest of my old consoles, which were the Nintendo 64 and the GameCube. But I've only tested my Nintendo 64 so far and the result was quite satisfying...

My first test was with Turok: Rage Wars, because that's my only Nintendo 64 game that didn't make make it on PC or a later Nintendo system. This was also my first Arena Shooter and is therefore still quite dear to me, where I was immediately happy to see that the 100% save game on my Controller Pack is still alive. It won't be that way forever, since everything for Nintendo 64 relied on batteries, where I probably should make a back-up soon, as long as it's still possible...

Both my save files for Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask are also still there, which is quite incredible, given how it's been over 20 years. Most of my Game Boy cartridges have dead batteries by now, however, where it's only a matter of time for the Nintendo 64 stuff to meet the same terrible fate. But since I have all of these games on later systems it's not really critical... Only the above save from Turok: Rage Wars would be a bit of a loss.

The two Nintendo 64 Zelda games don't look as good, where the graphics appear a lot more pixelated and the picture is a bit too bright. The Temple of Time now really looks like it was supposed to be the Temple of Light:

Well, it looks much better on the photo, because this is making things darker as well, but in reality I can hardly read the "500" in the bottom left corner, because the backdrop is simply too bright. Of course it stops to be a problem once you leave the Temple of Time...

It probably helps that Turok: Rage Wars was quite dark by default and got also made for split-screen multiplayer, where they kept the graphics clean and simple to keep the performance up. But for whatever reason the image doesn't fill the screen, while it does for the two Zelda games. So, it's not perfect by any means and I can't 100% recommend it, but for my purposes this adapter turned out to be a good and simple choice.

Majora's Mask 3D: Song of Time Screen Icons?

Ikhana Kingdom has faced me with an interesting question, where I had to do some digging to find an answer. When you play the Song of Time in Majora's Mask 3D, it shows you on the touchscreen what you are going to lose, most of it anyway, as a warning. It's essentially a mix of your item selection screen and the right column on the gear screen. When you travel back in time any type of ammo will be set to 0 and you will also lose the content of your bottles, as well as all the trading quest items, like the Moon's Tear or the Room Key, where those go into the right column.

However, there is another row of items at the bottom, showing your Rupees, whether the Pictograph Box has photo or not, and four more slots for... something. And this led to the question: What are these four slots for?

Ikhana already had found out what the third and fourth slots are via a reddit thread, leaving the first two a mystery for the both of us. For me it has been many years since I've played the Nintendo 3DS remake, so I couldn't remember if I ever saw any of these. But I do remember that I was wondering about this myself while playing the game, where it now it was the time to finally satisfy that curiosity... Anyway, I couldn't find anything on the internet, so I had to boot up my good old Majora's Mask themed 3DS and find out myself.

Do you know what goes in there? Do you have any guesses? Well, click to find the answer:

It's Boss Key, Key, Stray Fairy, and Gold Skulltula. It doesn't show you any numbers, where I got multiple Gold Skulltulas from both Spider Houses for example. So, it's just an indicator that you have something left, which you haven't used up yet. The Stray Fairy will change its color, however, if you have collected some from multiple temples.

I don't think I ever saw any of these before, because I usually don't use the Song of Time when I have any of this in place. But it's good to finally know, where this has been a fun little mystery!

Majora's Mask @ Nintendo Switch Online

The Nintendo Switch Online Expansion Pack has been a mixed bag, where the only exclusive thing so far are the Nintendo 64 games, but the emulation efforts were a new low for Nintendo. The input lag is quite high, the games look(ed) weird, there is no button remapping, and it all just doesn't feel like it's worth the extra 20€ per year.

Now, last Friday, on February 25th, Nintendo has added The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask to this list, but also updated the Nintendo 64 application to version 2.0.0. This video by ZFG provides a good overview of what was done, where Ocarina of Time now looks much closer to the original with certain effects, like the fog, restored, while the input lag was also reduced a bit.

This is great, in some aspects the games are now even better than on Wii (U), where certain textures have been improved, like for example the flames. But overall this still seems to be the worst option for replaying the Nintendo 64 classics. As of now, I would only recommend the Expansion Pack to people for whom the Nintendo Switch really is the only way of playing these games.

Still, with the release of Majora's Mask, porting over The Wind Waker HD and Twilight Princess HD feels all the more inviting, because then we would have a collection of all 3D Zelda games on the Nintendo Switch.

Nintendo Switch Online Expansion Pack Announced

If a Nintendo fan hears "Expansion Pack", he/she probably thinks of the Nintendo 64 and its RAM update. And finally the Nintendo Switch Online service really sees an expansion in the form of Nintendo 64 titles, as well as Sega Mega Drive. You will even be able to purchase the respective controllers via the My Nintendo Store, similar to NES and SNES before.

However, it's literally an "Expansion Pack", because you have to upgrade your membership. This is somewhat disappointing, considering that the service simply put a paywall in front of the peer-to-peer online gaming, something that used to be completely free on previous Nintendo systems. That still has a sour taste to it and while the service is quite cheap, it's mainly justified by the extras, like these classic game libraries, where there hasn't been all that much. Some free games, like Tetris 99, and the NES and SNES libraries. That's about it.

So, will we have to get yet another expanded membership, should they decide to add GameBoy titles? Or will any future classic game library be part of the Expansion Pack? Will they still add more to the basic membership from now on? Questions over questions about all of this...

Anyway, Ocarina of Time will be part of the Nintendo 64 launch titles and Majora's Mask will come to the service later on. This brings two more Zelda games to the Nintendo Switch, where now something like a "3D collection" feels much less likely. It would still make sense to put The Wind Waker HD and Twilight Princess HD together on Switch, but it will most likely come without the Nintendo 64 games now, because Nintendo wants you to pay for the Nintendo Switch Online Expansion Pack. At the same time, this also makes a "Nintendo 64 Mini" feel less likely.

Ideally, they will also add Master Quest later on. This never found its way to the Wii and Wii U Virtual Consoles, but Nintendo likes to add some specialties to the Nintendo Switch Online libraries, like Star Fox 2. And we're actually getting Banjo & Kazooie back for the first time, so that's something and should certainly make some fans happy.

Got the F4F Majora's Mask

Got this today as a birthday present! Really nice surprise. It's the First 4 Figures PVC Majora's Mask, which you can also mount on a wall, much like Link did in A Link Between Worlds. This is the simpler version without any LED stuff, which I personally prefer, but the metal stand looks cheap, where it would have been nice, if F4F came up with something better here as well. But the mask itself looks really good and is very detailed, I like it a lot.

Anyway, this is my first First 4 Figures figure... from the Zelda collection at least, since I also own the one of Samus Aran (see here).

Another Game of the Decade

It feels like yesterday that The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask has claimed the title "Game of the Decade" on GameFAQs.com (see here) and now another Zelda game has done it again, beating The Witcher 3 in the finale — The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild.

Of course GameFAQs isn't exactly the most representative site and it's all just in good fun, but it's still nice to see that Breath of the Wild is getting some more praise. I'd even say that it deserves the title "Game of the Decade" more than Majora's Mask did for what it has accomplished. The game truly has been a success to the Zelda franchise and has been the biggest milestone for the series ever since Ocarina of Time, as well as an important milestone for open world games overall.

However, I personally would not say it's the Game of Decade. That title should probably go something that has defined gaming even more in the last ten years...

Minecraft. Rarely ever there has been a game so successful and influential as this one. It sold ten times as much as Breath of the Wild and became the beautiful childhood memories for an entire generation of gamers. Exploration and a great joy of discovery, which have made Breath of the Wild so good, also are a huge part of its experience, on top of the high amount of creativity that this game supports. Minecraft is just pure gaming magic.

Breath of the Wild can keep you playing for hundreds of hours until you've done and explored everything. And it does so really well. Minecraft, however, can be played forever.

Majora's Mask 20th Anniversary

Every Nintendo lover out there seems to make a hot story out of this anniversary, since there doesn't seem to be anything else to talk about right now - other than turnip prices in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, so I might as well as join in on the fun. The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask just turned 20 years today, congratulations!

This actually caught me off guard, because for me the 20th Anniversary of the game would have been in November, which was a much more fitting time for this type of game. But it seems that Japan got it half a year before the rest of the world, which wasn't unusual back then...

Majora's Mask was actually the first Zelda game, where I got the game on launch day (November 17th in Europe) and where I closely followed any news about the game from magazines and TV, because of the lack of internet. This started with articles about "Zelda Gaiden" and later "The Mask of Mujula", depicting how very different the game will be and feel from Ocarina of Time.

Not counting Ancient Stone Tablets, this was actually the first Zelda game that re-used the engine, graphics, sounds, characters, enemies and items from a previous title to save some development time. To me it never felt like this was a bad thing, because Ocarina of Time was absolutely amazing and I was excited to get more like it. To get a game that expands many of the ideas, like the masks, the time system and the different tribes. The idea of transforming into a Deku, Goron or Zora was ingenious and still is.

In many ways both N64 Zelda games also complement each other. Majora's Mask had very different environments to offer and set its focus clearly on side quests and character interactions, while it only offered four main temples. And together both games create one big experience that shouldn't be missed by anyone.

Happy 20th Anniversary, Majora's Mask!

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate: Six Reasons Hinting at Playable Skull Kid

For the last two months I've been quite active on the Smash Ultimate boards of GameFAQs, fighting the same battle over and over again: I'm an advocate of playable Skull Kid, mainly because there have been many signs pointing at his inclusion as a fighter in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate since the Direct in August.

But there have been some fierce detractors, who are very outspoken against Skull Kid. Some of it has to do with the board's obsession of self-proclaimed "leakers", like LeakyPandy, who claims that Skull Kid will only appear as a boss. One other "leaker", who supported Skull Kid after the August Direct, lost all of his credibility later on, which took the wind out of Skull Kid's sails and even worse, gave the Skull Kid detractors the thought-terminating cliché that Skull Kid's support only came from said leaker.

But that's far from the truth, because there have been many reasons, why people might believe that Skull Kid is finally playable this time. I took the time to compile the six most convincing reasons as a reference:

• His Assist Trophy wasn't shown yet, while we got a new Assist Trophy from Majora's Mask, the Moon, completely without him, which is suspicious and puts him into a similar position to Isabelle (or Shadow).
• Young Link is the only Zelda character, where we haven't seen his Final Smash yet. It might be Fierce Deity Link, where they want to save it for Skull Kid's reveal, where his Final Smash might be a form of Majora (e.g. Incarnation or Wrath).
• Majora's Mask was a Mii costume item in Smash 4, much like Chrom, Isabelle or K. Rool, showing its popularity. It was even tagged as "bring Skull Kid into Smash", which shows that this wasn't just about the mask.
• Both Metroid and Donkey Kong got a new rep in form of a villain. Zelda is very popular and also long overdue of a new rep (nothing in Smash 4, only a clone in Brawl), where Skull Kid is arguably the most popular and recognizable choice for a new playable character and a villain. Skull Kid was also a recurring character in the Zelda series, appearing also in Ocarina of Time and Twilight Princess, while Majora's Mask was included in both A Link Between Worlds and Breath of the Wild as an item.
• Majora's Mask 3D was freshly released in 2015, when development of Ultimate began. Fans had been asking for this remake for years in the "Project Moonfall" campaign, showing its popularity to Nintendo.
• During E3 the room decoration with a barrel and a rope ladder eventually hinted at a Donkey Kong newcomer in the colors of King K. Rool (red, yellow and green). During the August Smash Direct, where King K. Rool finally got revealed at the end, we had another suspicious room decoration with a sofa and two chairs in the colors of Skull Kid's rags and his fairies. This is commonly known as "chair theory".

Especially the latter gets a lot of bashing - even the name "chair theory" is just an insult, because the people like to reduce it to the yellow and purple chairs, which could hint at a number of characters, like Waluigi, or at nothing at all... It's often dismissed that there's a suspicious sofa as well and that the same thing apparently happened for King K. Rool during E3. So, this theory gets ridiculed all the time and a lot of laughs.

Of course none of this confirms Skull Kid as a playable character, but all of this is strongly suggesting the possibility. And because of this I've been defending the idea since the last two months. I still might be completely wrong and really end up being disappointed, because Skull Kid was only a boss after all. But I would be disappointed in that case either way, because it would be the same situation as in Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS / Wii U, where the most promising Zelda characters end up as non-playable.

Super Smash Bros. Zelda Stages: Great Bay

Great Bay is finally back. This is the only Zelda stage from the first three Smash Bros. games that didn't reappear in Super Smash Bros. for Wii U. So, it's good to have it back and it's looking better than ever, with some details taken from Majora's Mask 3D. Apparently you can now even spot a Piece of Heart in the background, where you would find it in the original game...

Well, despite the attention to detail the stage isn't entirely faithful to the original location, of course, because some creative liberties had to be taken to turn the Marine Research Laboratory into an actual stage, like turning it by 90° or having the giant turtle appear right next to it. The whole act of the Moon crashing on Termina was also altered and of course fastened.

It will be interesting to see, how the Moon Assist Trophy is affected by this stage. Ideally they would use the Moon from the stage for this, since the Assist Trophy even starts appearing in the same corner:

So, there could be a seamless transition from what's already present. The same could even happen with Tingle, if he happens to return as an Assist Trophy - you could simply have the Tingle on the stage do weird things.

Most of the Zelda stages usually depict an area from the early game, but Great Bay is an exception to this, much like Gerudo Valley (though you can visit the Gerudo Valley first thing as a child after leaving Kokiri Forest, if you wanted to).

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate: Skull Kid?

Today's Direct for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate showed us a new Assist Trophy, which was the Moon from Majora's Mask crashing on the stage. What a spectacle! But it's really noticeable, how Skull Kid was missing in all of this. They could showed his Assist Trophy in addition to the moon or even make the Moon the final phase of his pranks. But he is nowhere to be found...

His chances of becoming playable basically sky-rocketed and he is slowly becoming my new most wanted, next to Princess Hilda and Minecraft. The Zelda series needs at least two newcomers, now that Fire Emblem has surpassed Zelda with its count of playable characters. And there's a good chance that Fire Emblem will have at least one more newcomer as well. So, Zelda needs to step it up!

With Echo Fighters Hilda and Impa seem like the likeliest candidates now. I was previously against adding Impa as an Echo for Sheik, but seeing how Chrom got added as a Roy Echo, the characters don't necessarily have to be counterparts in some form, like Samus and Dark Samus. Speaking of, Dark Link or Shadow Link could have been Echoes as well, but they are seemingly still just alternate costumes.

Anyway, back to Skull Kid... It seems like there is a bigger focus on villains this time with Ridley, Dark Samus and King K. Rool all being added to the roster. And the only villain left in the Zelda series, who is interesting enough, who isn't a one-off character, who isn't potentially stuck in some Capcom rights limbo and who isn't just another henchman of Ganon would be Skull Kid. He appeared in three major 3D Zelda games and was basically the villain of one of them. He's easily the most deserving candidate to finally become a playable unique character from the Zelda series in Smash, who isn't part of the Triforce Trio.

Majora's Mask itself is also an icon of the series. It has been in a lot of games lately, including A Link Between Worlds, as an item in Breath of the Wild and even a Mii costume in Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS / Wii U. Plus, Majora's Mask 3D came out in the same year, where Super Smash Bros. Ultimate started development, so it was certainly in mind at the time.

I can already picture the reveal trailer, where Young Link fights against him and both their Final Smashes clash at the end: Fierce Deity vs. Majora's Wrath. Since the Moon is an Assist Trophy, it makes sense that Skull Kid's Final Smash is some form of Majora. The trailer could start in the Lost Woods with the Earthbound kids getting lost and being tricked.

Skull Kid wouldn't need his own stage, necessarily, but a Clock Tower stage on the Carnival of Time would be amazing to have. It could even transition to the Moon Meadow.

Update:
Apparently, the room deco in the Direct referenced the colors of Skull Kid, mainly the colors of the couch and a yellow and a purple chair for Tatl and Tael. Nintendo seemingly did something similar for K. Rool in the E3 Direct, where you had a barrel and rope ladder in Sakurai's office, hinting at a DK newcomer. The hype is on!

Zelda Encyclopedia: Errors, Oddities and Contradictions

What a book! I've spent the majority of this Saturday's afternoon with sitting on my balcony, skipping through the The Legend of Zelda: Encyclopedia, probably the most extensive work in Dark Horse's Goddess Collection. Much like Arts & Artifacts provided an amazing visual journey through the entire Zelda series prior to Breath of the Wild, it's nice to have this comprehensive collection of information about all the games in the old timelines with Encyclopedia.

I do enjoy having this clean cut created by the 30th Anniversary of Zelda, where everything was coming together once again in these books, before Breath of the Wild created a massive milestone afterwards, essentially starting a new era for Zelda. Well, Breath of the Wild is so expansive, it probably could fill its own book, where there's actually one with Master Works, which will be released in English later this year, also by Dark Horse.

That being said, with a book of this size (328 pages full of information), it is prone to errors. And while it bothers me to have small translation errors here and there, I'm more angered by the fact that the original writers "added their own interpretations and expanded upon the games' stories" seemingly without any supervision. This effectively makes this whole book "non-canon", as thorough as it might have been researched.

Some of these "own interpretations" feel like cheap fan theories, which shouldn't be part of such a book. With Hyrule Historia I was overall fine with what they had established as "facts", but the Encyclopedia went a little bit too far and might even contradict the games at times. I guess, I have to let to sink some of the information in, but here are some larger things of notice:

Oracle of Seasons & Ages in the Timeline

The changed / fixed the timeline placement of Oracles of Seasons & Ages to their own era after Link's Awakening. This is completely fine and it really can go either way. The ending of the Oracle games made it look like they were a prequel to Link's Awakening, where Link sets off in a boat that resembles the one from the intro, where he gets stranded on Koholint. And since Link's Awakening was always said to be a direct sequel to A Link to the Past, Hyrule Historia placed the Oracle games between the two classics.

But, this was always a controversy... Link and Zelda in the Oracle games looks much younger than in A Link to the Past, following the games' main artworks. And when Link and Zelda meet, the dialogues make it sound like they meet for the first time, with Zelda introducing herself. So, this never added up and it's probably a good thing that this was now changed in hindsight.

However, the English version states on page 19 that the hero in the Oracle games is the same one as from A Link to the Past... Which doesn't make any sense at all. Why would they put the games AFTER Link's Awakening, where Link's fate originally always was unknown, if not to make this a story of a new Link? But as far as I know, this is a translation mistake in the English version and the Japanese version states the opposite.

All the timeline diagrams also always put a gap between Link's Awakening and the Oracle games, which symbolizes a jump between different eras, which makes it quite clear that this is supposed to be a new Link and a new Zelda.

Termina Vanished

The Encyclopedia explains that Termina was created by Majora's Mask from the mind of the Skull Kid and that it ceased to exist, after the Hero left... Which doesn't seem to be the case in the game, because we saw the people celebrating, after Link had left. We also saw the Deku Butler mourning for his son in what should have been a part of the Lost Woods... But apparently it was all just another Koholint.

It feels like Nintendo just wanted to shut up the fans asking for another game taking place in Termina, but this kind of kills the mystery surrounding these lands... It does explain, how both Link and the Happy Mask Salesman disappear into thin air at the end of the game. But the thought that you can find your way to Termina through the Lost Woods was always exciting.

Geographical Guesses

Other than the fact that Termina apparently doesn't exist, the book also some controversies about Hyrule and the countries surrounding it.

It treats both Holodrum and Labrynna as some "parallel worlds", while we know that both Zelda and Impa travelled there from Hyrule. Characters from the Oracle games also travel between the two lands, so everything should be connected somehow, but not according to the Encyclopedia...

It doesn't get better with Hytopia, where the book downright states that it lies north of Hyrule, a fact that's coming out of nowhere and has no evidence whatsoever. To make things worse, it formulates the theory that the Northern Hyrule from Zelda II - The Adventure of Link might be, where Hytopia is located, because the people there are so "fashionable". What...?!

At least it acknowledges the fact that the southwest corner of the map from Zelda II is supposed to be the old Hyrule from the first game. But it then tries to make sense out of things by placing the first Hyrule at the foot of Death Mountain from A Link to the Past... I guess, you can see it that way and the Graveyard location does match, but it doesn't explain, how there's suddenly an ocean to the southeast.

So, the book tries to connect similar areas from different eras, where some of these connections are quite questionable. Another example would be Dragon Roost Island, where every fan would have guessed that this is actually Death Mountain from Ocarina of Time. But, no, apparently it's Zora's Fountain, simply because the Zora evolved into the Rito...

If they wanted to theorize about connections like that, they could have used the "Lost Woods" in Oracle of Seasons, where you can find the Master Sword in a Linked Game, as an indication that Holodrum is a neighboring country of Hyrule, instead of deeming it as some parallel world like Lorule.

The Noble Master Four Sword

Apropos Master Sword in the Oracle games... Now, this never made any sense and the Encyclopedia explains it with the Noble Sword receiving the Master Sword's powers. But this doesn't make any sense either, because you never upgrade the Noble Sword, you always get a new sword. And in one case you can even find the Noble or Master Sword on a pedestal in Holodrum's Lost Wood, which is very reminiscent of how you find the Master Sword in A Link to the Past...

At the same time the book states that you can "swap" the Four Sword in Four Swords with the Master Sword by unlocking it in A Link to the Past (page 131)... In reality the Four Sword gains a sword beam akin to the Master Sword, but it doesn't become the Master Sword. The unlockable ability is simply called "Master Sword", but you don't wield the Master Sword in the game. But apparently no one told this the the authors of this book...

Here it would have been correct to say that the Four Sword gained the powers of the Master Sword. The ingame icon for the ability even clearly shows the Four Sword shooting a sword beam, not the Master Sword.

The Dungeon List

The Encyclopedia comes with an extensive "Database" section, where they have a list of "all" the dungeons from all the games. But this one feels rather inconsistent. For starters, they've listed both the Pyramid of Power and the "Mountain Cave" as dungeons in A Link to the Past. Why?

You would think that they are simply being thorough, but it's really an exception. It doesn't list the Maku Path from Oracle of Ages, for example, which at least has a dungeon map screen and is certainly more of a dungeon than some normal caves. How's the "Mountain Cave" any different from other cave complexes in other Zelda games?

In Link's Awakening they list the Southern Face Shrine as a dungeon (that's three rooms), but not the Dream Shrine (that's four rooms). It also doesn't feature the Royal Crypt from The Minish Cap, even though that's an excellent mini-dungeon.

With mini-dungeons it seems to be quite a picky list overall, not featuring the optional ones from the N64 games. It does have the Cave of Ordeals and Cave of Shadows from Twilight Princess, but not the Savage Labyrinth from the Wind Waker, even though those are effectively the same dungeon concepts in the same size.

It lists the "Dark Realm" as a dungeon from Spirit Tracks (it's really not a dungeon, it's just Pac-Man rail tracks), but not the Lost at Sea Station dungeon, which was a huge homage to the Ocean King Temple.

It lists all 32 levels from Tri Force Heroes, plus the Den of Trials, but it doesn't have the Realm of Memories, nor the Hero's Trial from the Four Swords Anniversary Edition. Which leads us to the following point...

Four Swords Anniversary Edition as a Side Note

While the book goes thoroughly through all retail releases of the Zelda series, the enhanced digital-only release of Four Swords for the 25th Anniversary apparently isn't even "canon". It got put on the same page as the BS-X Zelda games, Link's Crossbow Training and the Twilight Princess Picross...

The book is mentioning that this new release has levels based on three past Zelda games, but it doesn't give a name and doesn't mention the Hero's Trial in any form, as if this never existed. It feels like the writers never got to play this version of the game and decided not to bother with it at all. Very disappointing. It would have been nice to read some explanations for both these areas or to at least have their existence acknowledged somehow.

"Minor" Mistakes

While I haven't read everything yet, I've noticed some obvious errors here and there (this list will be updated):

• The timeline page (11) claims that Ganon was part of the story from Four Swords, probably confusing things with Four Swords Adventures. Again, did the authors even play these games? Probably not.
• The Lorule pages (32 and 33) have a caption "Life in Hyrule", despite showing villagers wearing monster masks in Lorule.
• The Item Database lists the "Piece of Power" from Link's Awakening as a "Critical" (= main quest reward) item, while it's just a "Consumable" power-up. Someone probably confused it for the Triforce of Power here.
• ...

Postbox: Early Mountain Village in Majora's Mask 3D

Hey there,

I'm a long time reader of your wonderful blog. Recently I stumbled upon a sequence break that let's your visit the Snowhead area early, before you get the bow, and I was wondering whether you were aware of that, since I haven't read anything about it on your blog.

There's a short video explaining how to do it on Youtube here:

MM3D: Mountain Village Early Tutorial

I think it's arguable whether this constitues as a glitch or not. I'm pretty sure it isn't intentional, but on the other hand it doesn't involve anything like glitching through walls or wrong warping, and it doesn't seem to break the game either.

I'd love to hear your thoughts about this, in case you're interested. :)

I wasn't aware of this and it's certainly interesting. So, thanks for the find!

Usually I'm not one for glitches, which is why you won't find much about it on this blog, but if it's light oversights like this I do like to explore them. I guess, you could compare this to how you could enter Ikana Village with just the Hookshot in the Nintendo 64 version by aiming at the one tree. It probably wasn't intentional and didn't work for me anymore in the Nintendo 3DS version, but it's still fun to use this for some sequence breaking. (Another comparison would be using single wall jumps in Super Metroid to get certain items like the Wave Beam earlier.)

In general I think that Majora's Mask could have been more open and leave the order of the four regions to the player, instead of sticking to a certain sequence. The game can be open at times, but it should allow more.

That being said, with this "glitch" you should be able to get as far as Snowhead Temple, but not any further, because you will need the Bow there in order to finish the dungeon. Apparently you can't even get or use the Fire Arrows, if you go as far. But at least you will be able to use the Goron early in the game, which is neat. I might even try this, when I replay Majora's Mask 3D some time in the future.

More Link amiibo Announced

You may not have noticed, because - like me - you are too busy with playing Breath of the Wild, but there was a Nintendo Direct yesterday. The only real Zelda news were some more amiibo, which seems like a continuation of the 30th Anniversary line and only really adds more Links...

• Link from Majora's Mask
• Link from Twilight Princess
• Link from Skyward Sword

What? No Link from A Link Between Worlds? Well, these amiibo already are supported by Breath of the Wild, where you can get a full Fierce Deity set from the first one, so this wasn't a huge surprise.

Source: Twitter