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Our Lord Ditto died for your sins so that His prophet, this regular ordinary human child, could rebuild a society for Our Blessed Trainers to return to.
this post was submitted on 03 May 2026
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I've never actually tested the soft lock. I've just assumed it was there. It would be funny if Link walked outside the temple, took one look around and nope'd back to childhood.
Stone Circles, spoilered but I don't know when or how you would ever know this. It might be some sign or dialog I've skipped over for several playthroughs...
Try the Song of Storms, or the Megaton Hammer (when you get it)If those don't work, I try Zelda's lullaby, Song of Time, or the Scarecrow song, or the eye that can see the truth.
most of the time I just give up lmao
commentary
I would put Zelda's writing in the Young Adult category; enough moral distinction for a proper Hero journey, while still letting some dark to seep in around the edges. In fact one later dungeon kinda depends on a little dark lore. If anything, Sheik loves the poetic so I imagine that Japanese would be hard to translate. I can see playing a second time, lore firmly in hand, would make a Japanese run easier since you would know the gist.
There is a way to fix your sword, but I'll let you find that one out on your own
Hell yeah Epona! Combined with the size of Hyrule Field, riding around with her felt like the world was big in a way previous games couldn't capture. Also Hyrule Field is big and sometimes pretty tedious to cross without her. Win some lose some amirite? Horses are my favorite feature in all the Zelda games.
The Lost Woods is definitely tricky, but it will become second-hand in no time. Also Skull Kids don't like adults, as one Kokiri will tell you. And yes sometimes the beanstalks don't go anywhere special, however try going at night.
The Forest temple is my favorite thematically. The theme and level design mesh well; it feels like a rich chateau that's haunted by centuries of overgrowth. It's also when the 3D puzzles start ramping up, as you noticed. Also yes, Saria, ouch! That hit hard too my first playthrough. A big theme of this game is rescuing everybody you met in childhood one temple at a time, and Kokiri forest leans hard into this in the beginning. I mentioned earlier about the cinematic, and I think of Saria's scene in particular. It elevates Ocarina of Time above it's predecessors and why the game leaves a lasting mark on the series since. You are saving the world, but that doesn't mean everything goes back to the way it was.
I'm on my own slow playthrough myself in the background of other games. I'm finishing up the last temple before Ganon, so only a few temples ahead of you now. At my pace you'll catch up by the time I pick it back up again.
To this day it's the trickiest part of the game for me no matter how many times I replay it. It is a very cool room though.
(this comment covers all the time I've played since the last one—been adding bits and pieces to it as I go, so it's long and a bit jumbled)
I wouldn't blame him! But I guess that's why he's the Hero of Time and I'm not.
Stone Circles
Wow, that seems like a pretty random assortment of things! I've been interrogating every NPC and Sheikah Stone I come across with the Mask of Truth and haven't seen anything about that, but I'll keep my eyes peeled. I'm definitely after the truth thing that's in the Kakariko well (alluded to by one of the old men taking refuge from Hyrule Castle Town), but I haven't managed to get at it just yet. In the small bit that I've played since my last comment, I got the Golden Scale from the fishing hole, but to my surprise, it was still juuuuust short of letting me get to the bottom of the well and enter the opening (although I did get a surprise Piece of Heart from the lab in Lake Hylia as a consolation prize). And as Adult Link, the well is dry but appears sealed off. I haven't tried that hard to get in, though, so for the time being I'm not asking for any hints, especially since it might just be something that changes as I progress through the dungeons....actually, speaking of which: is the Song of Storms something that will just come in due time? Judging by its placement in the pause menu, it does come after the Song of Time chronologically, but I'm a bit mystified at what I need to do to get it. As Young Link, the guy mentions that he's trying to write a song about spinning, but neither my spin attack nor my boomerang seemed to entice him. Full disclosure: I accidentally spoiled myself when looking something else up (which is why I really try to avoid doing web searches for things) which indicated that the Song of Storms may be the key to opening those secret holes, but I guess I'll have to wait and see.
[a few days later] Aha! The solution ended up being pretty simple, but I really enjoy how with this kind of game it's not like, "Get quest, go to marker A, talk to person X, go to marker B, talk to person Y, complete quest." Instead, I remembered that there was a guy in Kakariko who mentioned that the windmill was used to draw water from the well, and then when I talked to the guy in the windmill he talked about how he was annoyed by some kid who played a song. The mental block I had was that I expected to learn the song as a kid, but instead I had to learn it as an adult and go back in time! First puzzle that I had to solve with time travel, but I suspect it won't be the last.
As for the Lens of Truth—I wasn't expecting a whole dungeon! I thoroughly enjoyed being trolled by all the invisible walls and floors. Leans pretty heavily into horror, what with the piles of flesh and the torture implements—definitely seems like the kind of thing that would stick with you if you played it as a kid back when it first came out! It was my first encounter with a Like Like, which I remembered from its Melee trophy eats shields (put together with what at least one person mentioned, specifically Hylian shields), so I kept it stunlocked with my boomerang and escaped unscathed. Also did a cheeky little skip past a pit by jump slashing across the corner, which made me feel smart.
In the end, it is the Song of Storms that opens those secret holes! It worked on every single one of the non-bombable ones that I'd written down. Entirely possible that there's a third type (or even more) in OoT, but that's what I've found so far. Surely must be somewhere in the game that hints at this...I know that NES-era games were more likely to require you to just throw stuff at the wall and see what sticks, but in this game it seems like everything is pretty carefully laid out.
Also, is it just me, or is the timing with the frog minigame ridiculously tight? I consider myself to be pretty good at rhythm games, but it took me about two dozen tries to get the fixed song that they start out with and I found the changing ones after that impossible. Wonder if it's a bug in the original code—I notice that there's a tweak in Ship of Harkinian to give you unlimited time to complete it (because of course there is!).
Oh, and regarding the Lens of Truth: can you give a general idea of how frequently it'll actually come in handy? Knowing me, I'll probably end up scouring every last inch of Hyrule with it regardless, but it'd be nice to know how often I should be hitting paydirt.
commentary
Yeah, I was definitely getting lost with her dialogue as well as the sages, which is kinda problematic when that's where most of the core story is.
200 Rupees?! Well, I act indignant, but I'm basically always maxxed out even with the Giant's Wallet, and if I were ever strapped for cash a single three-bottle run to the Ice Cavern for some Blue Fire to sell to that person who wants to buy stuff in bottles would basically fill it up in one fell swoop. So I'll just take it as Link being a Job Creator™. One thing that I was expecting to need to spend my money on was the tunics, but I got both of them for free, so there are no other big ticket items to spend on (not that I've seen yet, anyway). I even delayed the last part of the mask trading quest because I didn't want to waste the money, but in the end I sold it for 0 rupees
(also, I see that Biggoron has appeared at Death Mountain's summit, but it looks like I need to advance further before he'll forge anything for me. The comment about "Hylian carpenters praise me for my skills" makes me wonder if I need to chat with the carpenter from Kakariko, who I spotted across the broken bridge in Gerudo Valley (another nut which I've yet to crack, but all in due time, I'm sure))
I do really want to go back and play some of the 2D Zeldas. I bounced off of the original game when I tried it a little while back (might have to cave and use a patch to tweak the difficulty or use a guide or something), but A Link to the Past and Link's Awakening (DX) are more modern so maybe I'd have better luck with those (although that'd probably make it even harder to go back and play the original). Super Mario Bros. is still pretty accessible if you're into platformers as long as you know about how to continue from the Start screen, but The Legend of Zelda is pretty brutal when it comes to not holding your hand, so it'll take a mentality shift to fully enjoy it. Might want to go back and read some contemporary coverage of it, since that always gives me perspective.
Ah, I missed this, but when I returned to the Lost Woods as Adult Link I was happy to see that they were there, just hostile, and Navi explained about how they didn't like adults. I don't mind being heckled as long as they're okay!
...of course
Well, I'm still missing some Skulltulas in both the Lost Woods and Kokiri Forest, but I at least managed to rustle up a few more (the one on said elevated part of the room in the Lost Woods as well as one on top of a building in Kokiri Forest), and overall I managed to juuust scrape together 50 Gold Skulltula Tokens. There were two weird ones, though, which I suspect I may have collected in an unintended manner. In Dodongo's Cavern, after running to and fro I finally spotted one in that corridor with the teeny Dodongos (not sure of their actual name). It was up on a ledge that I couldn't climb up to nor reach directly with my hookshot, so I ended up dragging one of the statues used for pressing a button all the way over, backflipping onto it (since you can't climb on them), and then pulling myself onto the ledge. The other one was more straightforward: in Zora's River, there's a Skulltula on the wall a bit before the entrance to Zora's Domain, and while it wasn't there as Young Link and was out of range of the Hookshot as Adult Link when using a normal approach, but by precisely standing on top of the fence I was juuuuust able to reach.
It really does have quite the atmosphere! Amazing what they were able to pull off with the relatively primitive hardware—just goes to show that it's art direction that matters, not polygon counts or texture resolution.
I normally go on a walk first thing in the morning, but when I went on a walk late at night a few days ago, I was thinking about how different the same environment looked and felt and then had the thought, "This is just like the night/day cycle in Ocarina of Time." I voluntarily submit myself to be sent to the gamer gulag
I've been playing very small bits here and there over the past few days (no more than an hour a day), but as soon as I get a big chunk of time to myself (possibly tonight??), I'm gonna finally tackle the Water Temple, which I'm really excited about!
pure commentary
I strongly feel this game gives you enough hints to know what to do. Part of that is the vast majority of NPCs have a purpose, if only to hint at what needs to happen. You don't have to slog through dozens of taken an arrow to the knee generic dialog just to find the nugget you need.
That's why I was a bit cagey about the Permalock, since it could spoil some mechanics like the time travel, but I felt the game would tip its hand soon enough for you that it wouldn't hurt.
SSB has spoiled more of this game than just about anything else, which is why I don't feel too bad revealing some things for a three decade old game. It's also fun intuiting how far and by what path you are taking in the game just by telling me something as innocuous as your first Like Like.
I don't recall there being a trick, but I did only play it on Emulation or original hardware, not the Ship of Harkinian release. It's entirely possible it's a bug.
It's definitely necessary to complete the game as there are several puzzles you cannot complete without it, but it's not a scour-the-map-like-a-metal-detector necessary. On the flip side, it drains mana slowly and I found mana refill bottles drop only slightly less frequently than Rupees. Feel free to just let it run if you feel the slightest bit suspicious. Most of the stuff are small chests with rupee rewards, hidden walls/floors like in the Well, or it can make some minigames significantly easier. One trick I use is to turn it off and on quickly, seeing if anything flickers (chest, wall, etc) when I do it. If you are strapped for mana or want piece of mind, a green potion in a bottle will restore all your mana and it's another money sink.
The whole NES catalog has a well deserved reputation of being brutally hard, so don't feel bad for skipping it. I treat Zelda much like Mario; they are all kinda the same (yeah I said it!) so I (a) don't feel bad about skipping one or two titles, and (b) I approach each entry curious about their unique gameplay mechanics. I never beat the original NES Zelda, it took me over a decade to play Wind Waker, I didn't play Breath of the Wild until a couple of years ago, and I haven't yet played Skyward Sword or Tears of the Kingdom at all! That said I got my Zelda start on Link to the Past and Link's Awakening (OoT was my third), and both come with my strong recommendation.
The dynamic day/night cycle was genuinely a revolutionary feature at the time. Few contemporary game had it, and it would take years for the industry to mainstream it. Riffing on my gameplay curiosity, going back to old games is an interesting lesson in cultural archaeology to see how they adapted and converged on some mechanics and styles, and seeing what experimental ideas were tried that ultimately never made it out of the 90s.
Challenge: IMPOSSIBLE
If anything, I have to waste money or else I will open a chest with a purple rupee and a full wallet. :all-my-apes-gone: but for rupees
Honestly yes. Nice job! It shows that sometimes not knowing the 'official' answer means you don't know it is hard. For the first one, try the Scarecrow song... As for the second, the Water Temple's item makes collecting these a LOT easier. In fact I'll go so far as to say the Water Temple item is the most valuable item in the game as it unlocks quite a bit.
I wrote out a really long response—like, bumping up against the 10K character limit—and then my computer crashed and I lost everything
I'll be writing any future comment in a proper text editor, that's for sure!
I'm sure when I reply to your commentary I'll come up with similar stuff to say, but I'm bummed about the gameplay diary stuff because I wrote it up when it was fresh and I'll definitely have forgotten stuff by the time I rewrite it tomorrow. Ah well, no use crying over spilt milk. Hopefully I'll be able to respond tomorrow!