Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening Finale - The Shadowtime

This is it, the final episode of Link's Awakening. As Link makes enough of a racket to hatch the giant egg, what awaits inside? No one knows yet, but my money is on Anna Kendrick.

An oft-forgotten aspect of this game is that, if you're quick on your feet, you can actually steal from the item shop. Most players likely do this for the highly-expensive Jeritron 5000 bow and arrows. The only problem is...if you try to go back to the store, the shopkeeper will literally taser you to death. In other news, is it just me, or does this guy look a lot like the City Wok proprietor on South Park?

Mongolians always try to steal his bombs!

One of the stones in the graveyard now moves to reveal a new dungeon entrance. This wasn't in the original version of the game. The graveyard was oddly inconsequential, so it makes sense that they'd use it as the location for the new dungeon in the DX version.

Here's the Color Dungeon, the DX exclusive. It's very colorful (or colourful, to our British and Australian viewers).

The fairy queen? Putting aside the easy Tingle joke, why am I feeling a sense of menace at this news?

This dungeon is some quality bonus content. They could just re-use rooms from the game (like Squaresoft always does in their "new dungeons" during remakes), but they don't. All of the enemies in this dungeon are brand new.

There are also several new bosses, including this boulder-throwing golem. This place is challenging, but nothing particularly above the rest of the game. I was hoping it'd be more of a postgame challenge deal, but it's just a bonus. If you can clear Turtle Rock, you can clear this place easily.

There are some sweet puzzles here that utilize colors. Here's one where you hit switches to change tiles from red to blue, with the goal being to turn them all blue. Of course, hitting a switch causes everything around it to flip.

Here's the dungeon map. Odd shape. I'm also taking a moment to admire my full inventory again. Aw yeahhh.

Here's a gimmicky puzzle that involves throwing color-coded beetles into the proper holes in the ground.

The second boss is one of those electric blobs that plague the overworld...only super-sized. Not as super-sized as the one in Minish Cap, though. Winning is a matter of throwing magic powder at it until it starts tripping balls.

This dungeon is weird...it heavily reminds me of A Link to the Past. Doesn't feel like a typical Link's Awakening dungeon, which is cool. Got some variety.

The big boss of the dungeon is this... thing. I'm not sure what the hell it's supposed to be, but it rants about colors for the whole fight and you need to knock the proper-colored energy blasts back at it to win. With that dungeon out of the way, it's on to...

...the Great Fairy Whore! This must be the queen. She gives you a choice of two new tunics, one blue and one red. The red one doubles your innate attack power (with a sword, not sure about other weapons), while the blue one doubles defense. Of course, since this particular game was bugged, I've had the red tunic since the beginning.

"I CHOOSE THE RED TUNIC! AND THE BLUE TUNIC! AND THE GREEN TUNIC! YEAAAH!"

...er, the blue tunic. Since I didn't have it already and it's a new look, why not?

Thanks in some part to my glitched red tunic, I've got 000 casualties up to this point. If the enemies of Link's Awakening can learn the value of Link's life... maybe we can too.

Link arrives at the mountaintop and commences his one-man orchestra.

This opens a hole in the egg (man, I was expecting it to hatch). Inside is a very small dungeon.

All around Koholint, supporters raucously cheer Dean, not realizing that the apocalypse may be at hand.

The dungeon quickly ends with an ominous pit. Jump down here to face the final boss...

...the Shadow Nightmare(s).

I'm not sure what this thing is, or even if it's singular or plural. What I do know is that it seems to shapeshift. I wonder if it's related to Dark Link from Zelda II.

First form: A shadow blob. A few shots of magic powder takes this form out quickly. What vile god would create these things?

Next up...Agahnim? That's right, it's the sorcerer from LTTP, only in shadow form.

This fight is basically the same, as you bounce his energy attacks back at him. It's a sweet call-back.

Third form/nightmare is a revamped version of Moldorm, the first boss. No pits to worry about, but this form takes more damage to bring down than any other boss in the game.

NO WAY! It's Ganon...but not really. This clone is disappointingly easy to take down.

Next form is...some sort of ball with afterimages. It's very aggressive, but one shot of the Fire Rod defeats it. Yes, this is the easiest singular fight in the game.

The final form is this eye with swinging mace-arms. Forget Dark Link, we're treading in Dark Matter (Kirby series) territory now. The Boomerang one-shots this boss (what's with all the one-shotting?) so I use the Bow instead. At least that makes it a real fight. A bunch of arrows to the eye later, and...

...our hero arrives at some sort of dais in space. The owl makes one final appearance, then summons forth...

...My God! What is it? WHAT HATH THIS WORLD WROUGHT?

It's...a whale filled with helium.

The Wind Fish has been kept sedated by the nightmares. As a result of this, the island of Koholint was created out of the dreams of the fish. Now, waking up the fish means the island will vanish.

...and that's pretty much the story. A bunch of shadow-creatures roofied a giant whale, then it dreamt up an island.

Our hero plays the instruments once more, just making a huge racket.

Marin...is no more.

Tarin...is no more. And it's just as well, because he's way too happy about that shroom he's about to devour.

BTW, hilarious work here, Miyamoto-san.

There's the island. Seems like a great place for Link to spend the rest of his life; way better than Hyrule at least.

And it's gone!

Link wakes up in the ocean, looking at the sky. Great stuff here.

"It...it was all a dream" says Link.

"...OR WAS IT? AHHHHH!"

000 deaths, so I get the secret ending: A picture of Marin. This is a lot better than the 000 death ending of the original game, which had Marin fly by with seagull wings while making bird noises. No, seriously, that's what it was.

So, final thoughts on Link's Awakening?

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