this is the space for spoilers this is the spoiler space this space is here to prevent people who don’t want to see spoilers from seeing em if you don’t want to know information about how ocarina of time ends then don’t read beyond this point the story isn’t really the point of it i think but nintendo put a lot of work and cash money yen into the presentation and voice acting i guess so they obviously care about it and maybe you do to okay enough blather the spoiler space ends in three two one now

First a couple of pre-ending notes. The fountain of the last Great Fairy is behind a Golden Gauntlet block, so you can’t reach her until you’ve done the Shadow Temple path in Ganondorf’s Castle, then you have to backtrack out of it. She charges 500 rupees for her health doubler power, and even says “BOY, you’re rich!” if you pay it.

As with the original, by this time in the game the only thing left to spend money on is potions and consumables, so I think it’s nice that you at last have a use for all those big heavy gemstones in your pocket. While many of the rupee awards for finding secrets have been greatly reduced, there’s still so many of them, and I topped out my 1,000-rupee Giant’s Wallet while finishing off the Spirit Temple. I figure most players will probably be in a similar state by the end of the game, so the 500r cost is almost meaningless other than giving a purpose to all that moolah.

At the end I had 90 Gold Skulltulas, and no idea where to find the last ten. Now there is no real reason to keep finding them after you get 50, and the best reward, the Giant’s Wallet, comes from finding 30, so it’s not a problem, but I would like to find those last ten. The Skullies are there to be that last completionist task, and if the reward for finding them all is the same then it’s just infinite money, as many gold rupees as you want.

I found all of them from the soft soil patches, and also found the sneaky way to the top of the right tower of the Fire Temple. That whole floor is there basically to hide 90 rupees and one Skulltula! I noticed the World Map shows a count of Gold Skulltulas and Heart Pieces for each region, but it isn’t telling you how many there are left to find, but instead how many you’ve found! I guess they’re directing completionists to the Zelda Notes feature in the smartphone app, meaning, players without a phone or can’t run the Nintendo Switch App are at a disadvantage. Not cool Nintendo.

One thing noticed by me, in N64 Ocarina of Time, is that Navi tells Link she can’t get near Ganondorf in the penultimate boss fight, but that doesn’t matter at all in the fight. Despite what she says she is able to target him as she can any other enemy. They rectified that here: if you try to Z-target G-dorf you get a message saying Navi can’t get near him. (Admit it, Ganondorf is kind of a funny name.)

The escape sequence with Zelda has been bulked up to make it more dramatic, but they removed the countdown timer so technically you can’t fail it.

The final boss fight had a minor Breath of the Wild-ism in that Ganon gets a big eye on his forehead for a weak point. Of course they remade the cutscene with Ganon’s reveal, and as with many things with this version, I think it’s slightly worse than the relatively-understated original, but that could just be nostalgia talking. Ganon’s appearance is so great in the N64 version, they really made the most of their limited number of polygons! I will mention that you should really come into this fight with a couple of magic refills, for if you run out of Light Arrow fuel in the last fight, and also run out of item-generating rubble for Ganon to smash, your heroic green ass will probably be stuck.

The credits sequence follows nearly exactly the plan of the N64 version, just with all the upgraded assets and polygons and stuff. It’s the same beat for beat, even with the same music, though with the standard glow-up everything else in this version has gotten. It finishes with Navi wordlessly flying away into the light as she did in N64 Ocarina of Time, which sets up Majora’s Mask if they choose to remake it too. While Ocarina of Time is more iconic, I think Majora’s Mask works a little better as a game game, and its repeated three-day structure gives it an entirely unique feel among Zelda games, so I will look forward to that, in case they decide to make it.

After the ending ends, you get a shot of the “Tapestry of Time” that I think gets slowly filled in through the game, I didn’t notice it during actual gameplay though.

Anyway, so that’s the remake of Ocarina of Time put to bed. When der Ganondorfer is in the white void being sealed, they added magic shackles attached to his limbs. I think they’re trying to set up for Twilight Princess there, but truly the Ganondorf that follows this one is Wind Waker’s more comtemplative, more rueful version, who you’re reminded in that game is not a descendant or reincarnation, but the very same Ganondorf as this one. Wind Waker’s Ganon is the best in the series in nearly every way, so I say it’s good to see that he used his time in the Blank White Void to work on himself.

rodneylives