`Majora's Mask' challenge a must-have for Zelda fans
By ADAM TURNER
Scene Video Game Reviewer
As we move through life, a few things are constant. Engineers get no play. The best way to a woman's heart is not through haiku poetry. Fish and peanut butter do not go together.
And if Nintendo produces a game with the title "Zelda" in it, it's going to be a solid, quality addition to your collection (except for that second one, which was like passing a kidney stone).
"The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask" is a crowning achievement for the development staff at Nintendo, recreating a classic in a bastardized gaming world dominated by first person shooters and fighting games.
While some still consider "Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time" to be the greatest game they ever played, "Majora's Mask" is a close runner-up. Once again, you, the player, are bidden to journey together with Link throughout a brand new land known as Termina, after defeating Ganon and leaving the land of Hyrule.
While traveling through the woods of Termina, a fiendish little imp known only as the "Skull Kid" steals your horse, Epona, and the Ocarina of Time. After this you are changed into a plant-like "deku scrub" and told that the moon will crush the land of Termina on the day of the great festival, set to take place in three days.
Next you meet another familiar character, the man from the Happy Mask Shop from Ocarina of Time. He informs you that your quest is to steal back Majora's Mask from the Skull Kid, who is using it for its evil power.
This all sounds well and good, and almost surprisingly simple. Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on how you look at it, this is the most difficult "Zelda" ever, both in terms of environmental changes and puzzle solving.
You have three days to complete the game. Now you may think this means you must beat the game in 72 hours in order to avoid having the moon crush Termina. However, this is not the case.
Each day in the game translates to about 30 minutes in real time. Thus there are about 90 minutes between the start of the game and the moment where the moon crushes the land.
This impossible hurdle is jumped by being able to warp back in time to the dawn of the first day, and continue throughout the game, warping back occasionally when the moon is about to fall again.
As opposed to other "Zelda" games, "Majora's Mask" contains only four temples, each referring to elements: swamp, mountain, ocean and canyon. Each boss holds a mask, which serves as his remains.
This is the same concept as the medallions in "Ocarina of Time" — the masks don't really do anything, but you must have them all to complete the game. To fill in the loss of gameplay, these temples are enormous and tremendously difficult to complete.
In addition to temple difficulty, another added concept in "Majora's Mask" is a notebook, which keeps track of certain people you meet that are in need of assistance at a certain day and time.
As you perform small side quests for these people, they give you various rewards that aid you in your search for the four guardian masks held in the temples.
The most innovative addition in this game is the masks, which played an insignificant role in "Ocarina of Time," but provide most of the amusement for "Majora's Mask."
There are three masks that Link can collect that change his form, in addition to 24 masks that are used for various circumstances throughout the game.
Once collected, putting on a mask can morph Link into either a Deku Scrub, who can burrow into the ground and do other things (this mask stinks), a Goron, whose species is from the mountains and is capable of rolling around, (which is pretty cool, although it sounds like it stinks) and the Zora, whose species is from the Oceans and possesses an electric attack (which is pretty sweet).
Other masks serve as objects of side quests, which are just fun to collect and use if you have a desire to pick the game apart until there isn't anything left to do.
The timeframe in "Majora's Mask" is a giant misconception, especially for the casual player who just wants to pick up the control and casually play for an hour or so in between studying or going to class. Or those die-hard players who will even skip class in favor of playing "Zelda."
If time is running short in the game, you choose to either play the song of time or get crushed by the moon. If you play the song, you warp back to the first day, and you lose your non-permanent items — things like money, arrows, bombs and anything you're carrying in a bottle.
But you don't lose the capacity to carry these things. You also don't lose the guardian masks that you may have collected, but the temples that you've played will revert to the way they were when you first entered them, with no puzzles solved.
This becomes increasingly complex. For example, one of the greatest annoyances of "Majora's Mask" comes from playing a temple. If you have to warp back to the first day when the third night comes, the game effectively erases everything previously accomplished in solving the temple puzzles.
This is the most infuriating concept ever, except for the presence of the physics department at this University.
Overall, "Majora's Mask" is an incredible and highly recommended game. If you like "Zelda," and you don't own this game, you should be pummeled with small animals.
All Scene Stories for Wednesday, February 7, 2001
