LogFAQs > #939346764

I've taken to starting every single cycle by going into the Astronomer's tunnel and retrieving the silver rupee behind the bombable wall. This process is sped up a bit by the Bunny Hood, which gives us the power to go fast (valuable in any game, but especially so in one where time is always against you,) and the Blast Mask, which almost feels like an upgrade from The Binding of Isaac - it lets you use the effect of a bomb at the cost of some health. Before I had the Blast Mask, I had to run over to the bank, withdraw enough money to buy 10 bombs, and then use those to retrieve the silver rupee for a profit of 70. With this current setup, and the Song of Inverted Time, it's possible to get the 100 rupees, run over to the store, and buy arrows, a potion, and some bombs all before a single hour has passed, which is useful for a cycle where I'm planning on adventuring.

I find it tempting to spend a lot of time on sidequests in this game. I really shouldn't be pushing for 100% on this or any of the other games in this project, but before I went to Snowhead I got the Heart Pieces for clearing the Deku Scrub minigame and Honey and Darling's challenges three days in a row. The former I struggled a lot with but the latter was not too bad. I also found the Kamaro and Don Gero masks, though I can't get the Heart Piece from the frog chorus just yet.

The context and build up to Snowhead was really well done. One thing I especially liked was the design of the long-lipped Goron Elder, who would visibly sway and shiver as he tried to make his way up the mountain. Link discovers him frozen in a block of ice and has to fetch some hot water to defrost him, and if the player returns after getting what they need (part of a new song) out of him, they will find that he has frozen over again, which is a suitably bleak touch.

As a teenager I definitely didn't understand how much control the game gives you over the in-game time mechanics. This time around, once I had the Goron Lullaby and was ready to start the dungeon proper, I played the song of time so that I could have the full 72 hours to explore it - I remember my run killer last time I played MM was getting most of the way through this dungeon before running out of time.

Progress in Snowhead itself is usually vertical, which means that the player can find himself falling and having to go back over a lot of ground. I admit it happened to me a couple times - I had trouble controlling the Goron roll move well enough to navigate the ramps and jumps successfully every time. I definitely found myself growing frustrated at times, and it led to so much bumbling that I didn't complete the dungeon until just before the dawn of the third day.

The boss was neat. It feels atypical of most video game bosses, because your Goron Roll can brute-force past anything the boss can do, so he has to "outplay" you - normally this situation would be reversed. I like how he starts out trying to ram you only to seemingly realize that this won't work and try a new strategy, now running away and using ranged attacks.

Now that the second dungeon is cleared, spring temporarily returns to the mountain, and we are officially further into Majora's Mask than I have ever been. I know almost nothing about what happens from here on out.

An unfortunate consequence of taking so long to clear the dungeon is that, assuming the reward would be a Piece of Heart, I cleared the Goron Races on the third day, and then found out that the prize was in fact a bottle full of gold dust, which can be used to upgrade your sword - except it takes a full day. I assume (and certainly hope) you can complete the race a second time to get the gold dust again, and that will be my first task when I play the game again.