We left off on a part that I really like: The second of two times that rain pours in the game. You need the Flute to get to this cliff in the Light World, and Titan's Mitt to pick up the rocks (which reveals a Dark World portal). This gets you to...
...Misery Mire, which is rainy and AWESOME. I don't know what's miserable about it, it's just the right kind of weather for me. Note: I'm generally regarded as weird.
Portalling back over from the northeast corner of the Mire gets you to...
...another heart piece. That's right, I'm still collecting 'em all. And you get to watch me get ALL OF THEM.
Trudging through this Atmospheric AF mire, there are some creepy dungeon entrances. This one leads to a room with some boxes.
What's in the boxes? WHAT'S IN THE BOOOOXES?
...another one of these, of course. And in the other, Gwyneth Paltrow's head.
Enjoy the atmospheric swamp while you can, because this rain only lasts for one scene.
Use the Ether medallion here and the storm ends, clearing the way to the 6th (for me, 5th) Dark World dungeon. Misery Mire sure requires a lot of items to get to.
With the storm gone, this swamp is now bland and non-atmospheric, and no longer resembles the surface of Titan.
Much like Dungeon 6 of the original Legend of Zelda, this one introduces Wizzrobes. Other than that, it's actually a pretty generic-looking place.
Seriously, looking at screenshots of this dungeon, it'd be hard to tell what dungeon they're from.
It also has 3D bridges. I like when the SNES tries to do 3D on flat planes. Reminds me of wishing Super Mario Kart was fully 3D, which did happen with the N64 version.
The big loot here is the Cane of...Somalia? Is it a mistranslation? If not, where is Somaria in the Zelda world? To be fair, it IS a very Zelda-ish name. For those living under Iraq, this cane lets you create blocks. The player can completely skip most block-puzzles or switch-holding mechanics with this.
The boss here is Vitreous, a pile of eyeballs in goo. He is considered a delicacy in Borneo.
Red sword in action, as he sends the little eyeballs after our hero.
Lightning bolts in action! That's right, they're reusing the lightning attack from the Hyrule Castle fight. It's the main thing to look out for here.
Defeat enough small eyeballs and the big one engages. This type of boss really does seem to be a recurring theme in the game. It isn't even the last eyeball boss in this playthrough, either.
The final phase of the fight has the main eyeball hop around the room chasing our hero, not unlike the Armos Knights and Argus fights. The last four eyes that you can't fight really get at my OCD.
Another crystallized girl is rescued, and this one reveals that Agahnim is a pawn of Ganon (not an alterego)...which goes against what Ganon himself says (that he's an alterego).
Since this is supposed to be Dungeon 6, she refers me right to Dungeon 7 (Turtle Rock) to find Zelda. However, we've got one more stop first: Dungeon 5.
This is reached via a teleport stone in the middle of Lake Hylia in the Light World. It's the most imminently-skippable dungeon in the game because it doesn't have an item that helps you progress per se. The main item of this dungeon is the Blue Mail, which is a simple defense upgrade. Not sure if you can do it after Turtle Rock. As far as I know you only need to do it to unlock the final tower, and it has no effect on any other dungeon before that.
The entrance to the dungeon is one of the more memorable in the game. The Super NES had some great ice dungeons/palaces in its day.
The Ice Palace is full of these creepy goblin-heads. Sometimes you can pull on their tongues to make things happen.
This might as well be called the Block Dungeon because it's full of block puzzles. This is why I grabbed the Cane of Somaria first.
I UNLEASH HELL with the Bombos to take out these roomfuls of enemies. The floor is super-slippery and fighting normally here isn't a good idea.
The puzzles go up a notch in complexity here, like when you have to use a bomb to hit this switch after running around to the north.
Bombs also work really well on Stalfos. These guys were badass in Link's Awakening, but here they're weak (in both appearance and ability).
This room is treacherous, and it's one of the few rooms where you can actually lose a ton of health if you aren't careful. There are similar spike+conveyor rooms in Super Metroid, and they're pretty much the only time I die in that game.
Speaking of things that kill me in other games, the Mario fire-chain is even more of a menace when combined with slippery floors.
The Big Key is found in the broom closet this time around. That or a New York City apartment, hard to tell.
Bombing this innocuous location leads to...
...the Blue Mail, which is, again, not actually needed to progress. Not long after this, you can get Red Mail, which is even stronger defensively. It's surprising that the Blue Mail is acquired so late / close to the Red Mail. Seems like it'd be a good fit earlier in the Dark World.
At the end of the dungeon, we've got this particularly treacherous block puzzle. This is where the Cane of Somaria really shines:
You can just go to the next floor and drop a block on the switch without bothering with the puzzle at all. Things like this make it worth doing Misery Mire first.
There's no boss door this time around. Instead you drop into a pit that puts you right in front of the boss, which is always a cool effect.
Kholdstare is eye boss number...what are we up to now? This is a weird fight because he's stationary for the first phase, dropping ice from above. Winning is a simple matter of wailing on him with the Fire Rod.
Do that enough and it splits into this gang of eyes that chase you around. This is a very Link's Awakening style fight, and easily won with lots of Fire Rod blasts.
This sage-daughter goes on about knights and wisdom and shit and I toke a doobie while she goes on and on.
Something I never really did in past playthroughs is convert rupees into Bomb/Arrow capacity. This time around I'm doing it as much as possible to try and max everything out.
The Dark World version of the Blacksmith's House is now home to this mysterious sealed chest. Since we don't have Schala's Pendant, I lug it all the way south (and across worlds) to...
...desert man of mystery Randy Marsh, who used to be a thief. There are townspeople who actually explain this.
That gets me another all-important bottle. Almost done and the game will be concluded on the next post, which is up next. Not sure why this one took me so long to get back to, but here we go.
The Wizzrobes aren't so bad this time around.
ReplyDeleteMaybe Ganon possessed Agahnim, making him into his alterego.
Whoa, I had completely forgotten about how you get the last bottle.